IN which I go two for two on wardrobe decisions, and other gripping commentary

I had a pre-screening interview this morning for a position that they've been looking for someone to fill for almost two months. I just got the call on it yesterday, so went in knowing nothing about the job, the company, or anything related, really, which is always fun. And they said (like the guy doing the Tuesday interview) "Oh, don't dress up". I don't know what you wear when you go to an interview and don't dress up. So on Tuesday I had on a white button-up top and khaki pants. Which turned out to be a good choice, because the guy I was talking to was dressed much the same (without the French cuffs, which is good, because while French cuffs are profoundly sexy on small-to-medium wrists, they're pretty disturbing on men built like linebackers). Today, khakis with black v-neck, boots, and leather jacket. Walked in feeling like the jacket (chosen because it's the one jacket I own suitable for today's temperature of pretty damned cold but not fucking cold) was probably a mistake. I took it off immediately upon entering the building, but couldn't hide it anywhere, so there I was with the James Dean jacket casually flung over my arm in the midst of Corporate Amerika and the woman doing the interview comes around the corner, sees me, and says "Leathers and boots. I think she'll do." It turns out that the job is support for the president of a young ad and research agency which apparently models its corporate culture on the tech boom of the early 90s. She says later, "We've been looking for someone with a very developed and polished skill set, who can do a range of tasks without blinking, and who is comfortable in an environment where the VPs wear flannel shirts and jeans and everybody keeps beer in the fridge. We haven't found anybody who was a fit with the culture." I say "I'm your girl." She says, "I'm sending your resume and my notes to HR - somebody will call you this afternoon or Monday."

So that's good. I came home and had some celebratory brown sugar and cinnamon toast. It goes well with the Diet Coke. I envisioned a waitress giving me the look of "Oh, a pile of grease and sugar with your Diet Coke? How clever of you." I don't drink Diet Coke out of any misguided weight-loss initiative though - I have no particular inclination to lose weight. I just like the taste better than regular Coke. This apparently makes me a mutant. I don't really care for chocolate either.

In other news, I'm trying to curtail my fiction habit by reading biographies, which are like fiction, except that they're based on a lot of people's imaginings about real people, instead of one person's imaginings about people they made up based on their friends. It's sort of like a gateway drug. I am currently reading biographies of Nikola Tesla and Victor Neuberg. According to their respective biographers, Tesla invented practically everything of note in the modern world, and Aleister Crowley never turned Neuberg into a camel. The author of the Neuberg biography goes on to not-quite-say that Neuberg never buggered a camel either, but the book was written in the late 1950s apparently, when people were too polite to say that sort of thing even to deny it. She makes no guarantees as to Crowley's camel-related behavior.

Finally, this commentary on Crow as totem, from artist Ursula Vernon, recorded here because I swear I have said this before, and I enjoy hearing that other people have independently come to the conclusions I have:

Don't trust the hype. Crow is a thief and a liar and a braggart, and he'd just as soon help himself to your pocket change and your nifty silver pentacle and fuck your girlfriend while you back is turned, as share with you the Deep Spiritual Wisdom of the Cosmos. But he's clever, and he's got an absolutely filthy sense of humor, and when you're wandering around in the spiritual dark, those things count for a helluva lot more than anything you can buy in a New Age bookstore.

Sound like anybody we know?

IN which I go two for two on wardrobe decisions, and other gripping commentary

I had a pre-screening interview this morning for a position that they've been looking for someone to fill for almost two months. I just got the call on it yesterday, so went in knowing nothing about the job, the company, or anything related, really, which is always fun. And they said (like the guy doing the Tuesday interview) "Oh, don't dress up". I don't know what you wear when you go to an interview and don't dress up. So on Tuesday I had on a white button-up top and khaki pants. Which turned out to be a good choice, because the guy I was talking to was dressed much the same (without the French cuffs, which is good, because while French cuffs are profoundly sexy on small-to-medium wrists, they're pretty disturbing on men built like linebackers). Today, khakis with black v-neck, boots, and leather jacket. Walked in feeling like the jacket (chosen because it's the one jacket I own suitable for today's temperature of pretty damned cold but not fucking cold) was probably a mistake. I took it off immediately upon entering the building, but couldn't hide it anywhere, so there I was with the James Dean jacket casually flung over my arm in the midst of Corporate Amerika and the woman doing the interview comes around the corner, sees me, and says "Leathers and boots. I think she'll do." It turns out that the job is support for the president of a young ad and research agency which apparently models its corporate culture on the tech boom of the early 90s. She says later, "We've been looking for someone with a very developed and polished skill set, who can do a range of tasks without blinking, and who is comfortable in an environment where the VPs wear flannel shirts and jeans and everybody keeps beer in the fridge. We haven't found anybody who was a fit with the culture." I say "I'm your girl." She says, "I'm sending your resume and my notes to HR - somebody will call you this afternoon or Monday."

So that's good. I came home and had some celebratory brown sugar and cinnamon toast. It goes well with the Diet Coke. I envisioned a waitress giving me the look of "Oh, a pile of grease and sugar with your Diet Coke? How clever of you." I don't drink Diet Coke out of any misguided weight-loss initiative though - I have no particular inclination to lose weight. I just like the taste better than regular Coke. This apparently makes me a mutant. I don't really care for chocolate either.

In other news, I'm trying to curtail my fiction habit by reading biographies, which are like fiction, except that they're based on a lot of people's imaginings about real people, instead of one person's imaginings about people they made up based on their friends. It's sort of like a gateway drug. I am currently reading biographies of Nikola Tesla and Victor Neuberg. According to their respective biographers, Tesla invented practically everything of note in the modern world, and Aleister Crowley never turned Neuberg into a camel. The author of the Neuberg biography goes on to not-quite-say that Neuberg never buggered a camel either, but the book was written in the late 1950s apparently, when people were too polite to say that sort of thing even to deny it. She makes no guarantees as to Crowley's camel-related behavior.

Finally, this commentary on Crow as totem, from artist Ursula Vernon, recorded here because I swear I have said this before, and I enjoy hearing that other people have independently come to the conclusions I have:

Don't trust the hype. Crow is a thief and a liar and a braggart, and he'd just as soon help himself to your pocket change and your nifty silver pentacle and fuck your girlfriend while you back is turned, as share with you the Deep Spiritual Wisdom of the Cosmos. But he's clever, and he's got an absolutely filthy sense of humor, and when you're wandering around in the spiritual dark, those things count for a helluva lot more than anything you can buy in a New Age bookstore.

Sound like anybody we know?

Another thing about the Job Finding Process

The woman asked me this morning, "So, is accounting your forte?"
I say, "I'm pretty good at it, yeah."
She starts to close the folder and sighs. "There's no accounting in this."
I cock my head to the side a bit. "That's okay. It's a thing I can do, not a thing I have to do."
She looks vaguely startled for a time. She opens the folder back up. The interview continues.

So anyway, here's my question. I can do a hell of a lot of things, many of which are legal to do for pay, and some of which are things that people actually get paid to do on a regular basis. Why would someone assume that since I have been working in a particular field and that I'm good at being in that field, that this would imply that I'm unwilling to/incapable of doing anything else?

If you've got a job, is that kind of job the only thing you feel qualified to do? Is it the only sort of job you would look for, if you were looking for a job?

Maybe it's just me, but that seemed a little bizarre. I've been doing money-related jobs because those were the jobs that I could get, and they pay reasonably well, not because I feel that God called me to be an accountant, or anything.

Another thing about the Job Finding Process

The woman asked me this morning, "So, is accounting your forte?"
I say, "I'm pretty good at it, yeah."
She starts to close the folder and sighs. "There's no accounting in this."
I cock my head to the side a bit. "That's okay. It's a thing I can do, not a thing I have to do."
She looks vaguely startled for a time. She opens the folder back up. The interview continues.

So anyway, here's my question. I can do a hell of a lot of things, many of which are legal to do for pay, and some of which are things that people actually get paid to do on a regular basis. Why would someone assume that since I have been working in a particular field and that I'm good at being in that field, that this would imply that I'm unwilling to/incapable of doing anything else?

If you've got a job, is that kind of job the only thing you feel qualified to do? Is it the only sort of job you would look for, if you were looking for a job?

Maybe it's just me, but that seemed a little bizarre. I've been doing money-related jobs because those were the jobs that I could get, and they pay reasonably well, not because I feel that God called me to be an accountant, or anything.