BA has a really f'ed up check-in thing where they close check-in two hours before departure at Newark. That means... well, that means we're out the door by the time I finish the Indiana call tomorrow. Or, er, today.

I'm getting sicker. The dizziness is a pretty good indication of that. Oh, well. In hindsight, maybe I shouldn't have gone to the movies with F, even though I haven't seen him in forever. Er, since the reunion last month, I mean. Anyway...

If I don't have time to come back online before I leave...

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

*squishes everyone and passes on my germs*

Be back on the 1st.

Whee! I have a short, 30ish min. phone interview for a job in Indiana tomorrow!

This is me being excited. INDIANA, people! J's been there before for a business trip and says it's like 2 hours from civilization. But... it is within the network of Companies. Hmm... are there Asian people in Indiana?

Rar. I cannot swallow. I have spent all day looking for ways not to swallow. Hmm... that sounds kind of dirty, and by kind of, I mean totally. Excellent.

Talk about being the luckiest person in the world. I basically slept through the 25th, not quite knowing why except that I was exhausted. Yesterday morning, I felt a slight tickle in my throat and tried to take care of it. Which didn't work because by mid-afternoon, it was getting painful on the left side of my throat. Then I couldn't sleep at night. Then this morning, I woke up with the pain crossing over to the other side of my throat. It hurts like a bitch to swallow, but I know it's not strep because I've been in more pain than this and it still wasn't that. I went all day trying to sleep it off but now the dad's got me self-medicating. Fun. I just sneezed twice and felt like my throat was about to be ripped apart from the inside out. Even more fun. London's gonna be awesome with this to deal with. *sigh*

Ahh... Christmas with the PoohFamily. Thirty-odd adults, three teenage boys, and two toddlers running around. Out of all of them, the toddlers were the best behaved and the most adorable. Unlike Cousin A and her husband T, Cousin Y and husband B don't really go for the themed dinners so, as B informed us, we were going to be treated to a French-Italian-Chinese mish mosh of foods. Oh, and A brought a huge dish of seafood paella, so... yeah, it was basically a pretty international-flavored party. Throw in a couple of Sam Adams (sadly, no hard liquor for me) and we had the American part covered, too.

Because of travel and stuff, we always just start partying around 6PM Christmas Eve all the way to around 4ish AM on Christmas Day. That means we never do the "Christmas Day thing" and just exchange presents around midnight Christmas Day. Except for the kids, we just pass around money. I've passed both the money and presents age, but because of my graduation this year, I still snagged a nice chunk of change. I should graduate more often. Omg, and the uncle who's trying to help me get into the FDA -- the uncle who you can't get to shut up, but because he's such a nice guy who really means well, you can't actually tell to shut up without feeling like the biggest shit in the world -- didn't actually try to sit me down for a long discussion on the merits of working for the FDA or (his newest obsession) trying to talk me into getting my PhD. I guess he covered all that in his 5 page email a few days before when he went into his entire life story and made me think that you couldn't get him to stop in email, either. But everything worked out okay there, too, mostly because he started imbibing soon after he got there and had real adults to talk to. Happiness for everyone!

Most of the adults (about 22) participated in the grab bag this year. The rules were simple. 1 picks a gift; 2 could either pick another gift or take 1's; 3 would then either pick a new gift or take 1's or 2's, and so on and so forth. Apparently, it got pretty heated last year with people taking other people's gifts. This year, the gifts weren't that great (a lot of picture frames, and thank god I resisted the temptation to add to that. phew). But in every family, there's always one person who gets picked on the most. When you come from a big family, that's usually one of the youngest kids. In the case of my mom's side, that poor person is the PoohMom especially since my youngest uncle skipped the party. Cousin J picked up an alarm clock, which the mom is in dire need of, having broken hers last week. So Mom took J's (and it's a tradition now, since last year, J had his gift taken, too). Then other cousin Y took the alarm from Mom. So Mom had to pick another gift, which ended up being this nifty food chopper thing, which she loved much more than the alarm clock. My uncle, her oldest brother, took that away from her just because he could. Aww, you should have seen the Mom's face. She picked up a picture frame, though, and said it was fine. But in the end, Uncle gave it back to her because he felt bad. Poor PoohMommy.

Poor PoohBro, too, cuz that dumbass picked one of our own gifts and snagged a B&N gift card and then bitched at us for not telling him which ones were ours. I say, it's his own damn fault for gluing himself to his Madden game and not helping us. I sucked, too, because I knew exactly what our contributions were, and since the PoohMom reimbursed me for getting all the gifts, I picked up my own Best Buy card. What? I don't need picture frames, and I can buy DVDs and shit with that, yo. But then the Bro bitched and we switched cards. So now I can buy books and stuff, yay!

We also ended up watching Fantastic 4 on the cousins' new 55 inch flat screen TV in their basement. Movie was okay -- a lot better than I expected, but still not the bestest thing ever. Somehow, I then got snagged into babysitting. Sneaky bastards. Little Jared is the cutest thing ever, but he's also the most outgoing, so he was running to everyone. But AJ, the older one at almost 2, kept getting jealous of Jared so everyone tried to pay him special attention. The kid has an unhealthy obsession with trains, too, but damn does he know almost everything there is to know about magnets since all his trains connect with magnets. We ended up on Y's bed where he kept jumping up and down and I had to make sure he wouldn't fall off the bed. Which was really hard to do since he kept trying to roll himself off the side. And then, for some reason, he thought it was hilarious to keep kicking me in the face, especially after I kept feigning pain. Hell, it was the only thing that got him to laugh so much, so I kept it up, even with smelly baby feet in my face and mouth the entire time. *sigh* The things I do.

The highlight of the entire party had to be the new karaoke setup the cousins had hooked up to the big screen TV. Both English and Chinese songs for everyone to play! And, the most fucked up part about the system -- it had some sort of scoring system so everyone tried to out-do each other. We figured out you could cheat it by singing absolute gibberish as long as you sang really really loud and you'd get a kickass score. As we learned, when Cousin T butchered the Bay City Rollers. OMG, PAIN. Bro did Boogie Shoes (of course) and then rocked the hell out of Bon Jovi (duh). Much like the Fangirls in the City trip awhile back, I was more than happy to sing from the sidelines, away from any microphones. Besides, no hard liquor meant I was disgustingly sober -- that one beer did not count because I don't like beer. We left around 2, but the adults were still going strong on the karaoke. Oy.

Overall, an interesting evening. I've been sleeping it off all day at random spurts. For some reason, it's really hard to stay awake for more than a few hours at a time. And surprisingly, I've felt absolutely no inclination to be online for any length of time. This is the first time I've touched the lappy since Christmas Eve and I'm about to get off in a few minutes, having caught up on pretty much everything. I don't know... maybe it's some form of depression? Hope not. London is Wednesday night. Just wish it would stop being gloomy and rainy here, especially since it's supposed to be rainy in London when we get there. Rar.

And um... that's it, I think. I hope everyone else had a great Christmas or December 25th. Heh.

I'm being rushed out the door to celebrate the holidays at the cousin's house.

Oh, joy.

No, really.

Anyway, Merry Christmas to You and You and You, You, You and You.

And a general Happy Holidays to everyone else.

*gropes everyone*

Dear Diary,

Today I decided to be a human and join the rest of society as a semi-productive person by showering and actually getting dressed.

Okay, so I got the shower part down. The getting dressed was a little more complicated and required much more effort. So I passed.

I may be living a sad, pathetic existence right now, but I figure being half-human is better than nothing.

xoxo
Pooh

Alias.

Per instructions, I watched the last five minutes.

(Technically) just prior to the last five minutes according to my clock, I only have one thing to say: WHERE THE FUCK DID SHE COME FROM? *boggles*

The fuck?! Too bad I have no clue what happened before all that because I was too busy making LJ posts about wanting to do reproductive things with the BuxBoy being overcaffeinated.

You post one ass pic and suddenly, fangirls go wild. Poor boyfriend -- being demoted to Man Meat instead of a serious actor.


Job search: SUCK IT!

Hrmph.

THE FUCK!

I just finally checked everything at G's site. The job ID of the application that's all fucked up? Is for a position in Santa Clara, CA and NOT fucking Minnesota. DAMMIT. Not that I care either way, because it's an actual position that I am totally qualified for... the only one so far that hits all of my qualification skills... and will get me into process and QA, which is where I think I'd prefer to be outside of R&D... but I know at least a handful of people who are going to be pissed that it's slipping out of my grasp. Especially the PoohDad, since his great-uncle is in San Jose and he's always wanted more reasons to go visit.

*HEADDESK*

J has spent all morning consoling me and telling me that people start hiring again in January so if I don't hear anything between now and London, it doesn't mean I suck and am not worthy of being a productive, responsible, independent adult or that no one wants me. It still hurts, though; celli's been getting a whole shitload of interviews and second interviews this month! I have to keep reminding myself that engineers and accountants are apples and oranges, but... *sad* Also, there's that whole "limbo experience level" I'm stuck in. RAR.

So instead, I have been watching the entire morning USA line-up. Afternoons are for Trek marathons on Spike. At least I have... uh... a routine? *depressed*

I do plan on calling about the software test analyst position after lunch, even though I have no freaking clue if I have the skills needed for that. I mean... SQLwhat?! Umm... Clear quest the HUH? But it doesn't hurt, right? (Even though someone told me I should only really concentrate on finding one particular type of job since expanding it like that makes me seem fickle and like I don't know what I want to do with my life. I'll tell you what I want to do with my life -- win the fucking lottery and become independently wealthy so I can spend my time doing good deeds instead of working a 9-5 job that'll suck the life out of me, dammit.) You have NO IDEA how much I'm dying for my own cubicle right now. It's scary. J also has some pharm sales rep contacts she says she'll call and ask. I dunno if I can be a sales rep. Isn't that based on commissions and cold calls and stuff like that? When I worked retail, I HATED it. I especially hated it when people would ask if they should buy something/which ones they should buy/which looked better on them. Why the fuck do I care. *hates*

Instead, I'm trying to do holiday cards to take my mind off things. I... lost pretty much everyone's addresses except Meg's and Trix's. So if you want a Pooh card (literally), drop me an email with your address. *pokes people*

Hateful trip. Hateful trip with parents. Hateful trip with the PoohDad, in particular. It is SUCH A PAIN to book a hotel room with him around. Especially since he wants to combine special offers and it involves lots of rearranging and crap on the hotel end. (On the NICE hotel end. Lemme tell you about the REALLY NICE guy I spoke to at the Metropole. The one with the GORGEOUS accent, and if he had just been a tad dirtier instead of flirtier, it would have been like speaking to Jeff from Coupling. Lemme tell you all about... okay, actually, no time; this parenthetical has already gone on for too long.) Nice Guy With Accent booked our two rooms for two nights using special offer and then tried to book our third night with award points, but there were none available. So he offered to find us another hotel. But nooooooooooo. PoohDad wanted to "look at a couple of things himself." Which involved trying to rebook the special offer at other hotels. Crappier hotels. Because he is a CHEAP "Do we really need any of the extra stuff?" BASTARD.

Oh, nevermind. The special offer we booked was nonrefundable. I'd feel bad about that if I didn't like being petty. After all the shit I've had to go through just to help him make this trip happen -- a trip both Thing2 and I were pretty much bored with as soon as the first attempt fell through. But CRAP, now I gotta find another hotel for the third night.

Wait, I forgot. It doesn't matter because he's a freaking Diamond member. Did you know those bastards get guaranteed booking and can kick other people -- people who probably didn't wait until the last minute to book their once in a lifetime vacation using hard-earned money -- out of their rooms? Oy. (Of course, I'm saying this from a non-Diamond POV. Ask me again when I've reached that status.)

Trip is back on. Unless British Airways is as much of a fucktard as Virgin Atlantis. Only I actually called BA after the confirmation went through, and the nice lady even put in our seat requests for the return flight. So... I don't even care that I've heard a buttload of negative reviews for BA and their tendency to lose luggage. PoohDaddy wanted to go to London, and dammit, he's going. Poor man was clicking clicking clicking through as many travel sites as he could remember to find a ticket. Now we're waiting on confirmation about a hotel. And seriously, all of this started because he wanted to stay at a Hilton, specifically. lmfao.

So anyway... December 28 to January 1. I'll be molesting English men.

Trip's a bust. Virgin Atlantic's site is apparently not live so all their info is out of date. Poor PoohDad. He got all worked up and started searching for other trips. Continental had a London only trip, but it was a little too pricey for what he wanted to pay. L.A.'s out, but the PoohBro did snag a ticket using the dad's mileage so at least he'll be going somewhere warm. I've been told not to bother about L.A. anyway since I'm hoping to head out there for a SGA: TLG weekend of squee with phrenitis in February. Hopefully, RL will finally be figured out by then.

Now the Dad's considering Vegas so he can at least hang out at the Paris Hotel and pretend like he's there. There's a couple of packages, but they're all basically as expensive as the one London trip only for a much shorter length of time. He's also been looking at Frisco and San Diego. At this point, I'm pretty much bored of the whole thing and am ready to sleep in for a whole week. Jersey's not so bad when you're spending it under the covers....

*wibble!*

Dad got this great idea to go away for the holidays. He's found a vacation package to London/Paris for the week between Christmas and New Year's. And he wants to take the family, or whoever can go. (omgfrenchpeopleeek!)

The last time he offered to take me on a trip, it was the summer cruise and I backed out thinking I was going to work on my thesis and defend that week. Yeah, we all know how that turned out. This time, I'm all a-wibble because

1. The trip is in TWO WEEKS.
2. I don't have a job, am currently looking for one, and OMG WHAT IF SOMEONE CALLS ME THAT WEEK?

Dad thinks I'm full of crap to worry since according to him, no one works the week between Christmas and New Year's. And "definitely, no one is going to call you in for an interview that week." But really, HOW DOES HE KNOW? I hate that this whole job search is making me paranoid. I also hate that it's still in progress this close to the holidays, which makes me doubly paranoid. And you know what I'm normally like. So yeah, this? Is not good for my ulcer and stress levels. I mean, Thing1 still has to work that week so... you never know! Er... right? Omg, someone say something to me that will make me feel better about being incommunicado for that entire week.

Also, no one but Thing1 knows French, so that'll be interesting. Dad says his experience in Germany has taught him one thing: if you look Chinese, they'll speak English to you; if you look American, they'll speak whatever the native tongue is. Somehow, that doesn't make me feel any better. I'm pretty sure we'll all get lost and die. Plus, last time any one of us were in France (Thing1 in high school), she got mugged. Heh.

Someone from a consulting company emailed me about a Software Testing Analyst position. I can't understand a word of the job description, but she sounded nice over email and I asked if I could contact her on Monday to hear more about it since I don't have the brain capacity to deal with it right now, and she agreed. Now... someone tell me why I'm even looking into it? I don't know software! And definitely not enough to be testing anything!

V... I'm looking up your email addresses that I have on yahoo. It says here you've got a gmail account? I'll forward that stupid email there. S'ok? If it's some stranger's email, maybe they'll help me, too.

Veronica Mars and Alias quickies.

Too lazy to c/p or make a new post. Am still frustrated over job application. RAR!

OMGWTF! The world seriously hates me and doesn't want me to find a job!

Got an email (3 of the same one, actually) from Company G in response to my online application to a couple of their positions. This email states that I need to fill out the ATTACHED Application for Employment (to be used for background checks and stuff, if hired) so they can move to the next step of assessing my qualifications and then determining whether to interview me.

IT'S THE NEXT STEP, PEOPLE!

Okay, except the email doesn't show up with an attachment clippy icon. No problem. There's what looks like a LINK at the bottom of the email. So in Firefox, hovering the cursor over the LINK gives me an asslong addy in the progress bar at the bottom of the browser window. So I click on the LINK and Firefox opens it in a new window. A window with an addy bar that's blank except for a security lock and a main page that says "The system cannot find the file specified." So I right-click the LINK to get the url for a c/p in another window, thinking maybe the link isn't working. Firefox tells me THERE IS NO ADDRESS. WHATTHEFUCKNOOOOOOO!

So thinking Firefox is shit, I open my gmail in IE. The "link" is still underlined and highlighted like a LINK would be. Except the cursor doesn't change the way it's supposed to when it's a real link and no "addy" shows up in the progress bar at the bottom of the browser. SERIOUSLY, WHAT THE FUCK!

Wondering if maybe it's just gmail, I forward the entire thing to my yahoo account. This time? THERE ISN'T EVEN A FAKE LINK LOOKALIKE.

I AM PISSED! This is the next step!!!!!! I don't even care that it's in BumfuckingFreezingMyAssOff, MN!!! THIS IS THE NEXT STEP, DAMMIT! LET ME IN!

The email "name" has an "@companyG.com" but the actual addy beside the email name inside the brackets is from some really weird address that I would normally think is spam if I didn't know better. The email also says they will not respond to individual emails and not to call. Which is fine since there's no phone number anyway.

OMGWHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY?

ETA: Okay, I used the "copy link location" option in Firefox and tried to c/p it into a new window. The url was "invisible." So I c/p'ed it to notepad and HOLY SHIT, the "URL" took up HALF A PAGE! So now I'm even more confused. 'Cuz seriously, WTF!

All questions have been answered and sent. I am done. Rar. Now, I need to go apply to some more jobs. God, does this every end?! That office manager job with the uncle is looking all sorts of nice. I'll get to practice my Chinese while making a buttload of money and letting my brain relax. *sigh*

I need a job soon, too. Gotta start saving money. After the reading the spoilers for SGA "The Long Goodbye," I have a tentative plan to visit JenG in Cali for that weekend so we can squee like pathetic fangirls. Looks like it'll air in... Februaryish, which gives me a little time to play with. But damn, my butt wants to be up and moving right now. Mreh.

OH, POOPY!

The leadership program for the old company that J is part of and tried to get me into, is apparently not for me. I was told that because it's an entry level position, my time spent as an intern (about 1.5 years) disqualifies me as a college hire. WTF. Well, FINE. I didn't want to be move around three times for the next two years and I certainly don't want to be a leader anyway. Hrmph. I LIKE BEING A FOLLOWER, bitches. *sad*

This sucks balls. Not only does my 2 years as an intern make me NOT entry level (according to the director of the program), my 2 years as an intern doesn't give me enough experience for the majority of the experienced-level jobs out there right now. GRRRRR. I'm in a fucking limbo.

HATEFUL!

I should go finish those questions now for the Philly job. I seriously don't know what to write, omg.

Question: What characteristics, traits, and qualities make me stand out from other product development engineers? Because I have no clue what the right answer is.

or

Question: Describe a time you used good judgment in solving a problem. Help!

Maybe I should just go live in a log cabin in the mountains and do something silly like write for my living. *blinks* Or maybe I'll go appraise houses...

Duuuuuuude.

Today ended up being pretty productive -- if you don't count the fact that I still haven't touched those pre-interview questions. I ran for half an hour and my butt thanked me for it. The PoohDad also forwarded me the name of a company that's started hiring in their R&D department. So I applied for a position there, and bonus for those on The Conspiracy List: it's located in Irvine, CA. Probably not going to get it though, because I'm pretty sure I'm ridiculously overqualified for it. Oh, well. And then I sent off my resume to my uncle who does CS work for the FDA. And if you can count my actively procrastinating on the short answer questions as productive because I actually achieved my goal of not working on them, then there's that, too.

I may need a break from all this productive unproductivity, though. I almost sent "Recently, I've been looking for drugs" instead of "Recently, I've been looking for a job" in the uncle's email. All I have to say is THANK GOD I decided to proof it first before hitting send.

D'oh.

Today PoohBro is... holy crap!... um, old... well, one year older than last year, and that was plenty old enough. *hangs head in shame for not knowing siblings' ages anymore* Anyway, happy birthday to him.

I have a 5 question pre-interview thing to fill out, basically of interview-type questions. The recruiter says the company hands these out to all job applicants and I don't need to send them back to him until early next week, but the sooner the better, I'd think. So I have given myself a Monday deadline. Who wants to do them for me? Huh? Huh? HUH? My eternal love and thanks FOREVER! Come on, that's gotta be a good enough incentive, right?

In other news, WHO KNEW livejournal could be a useful networking tool? I always thought it was where silly people did silly fangirl things and posted a lot of silly quizzes. Makes me wonder why I spent so much time HERE instead of at the LJ the past few years. (Except not. Because the boyfriend header is here.) The lovely Jen in L.A. (I really need to start making friends with people not named 'Jen') has informed me that her father, though not in my field, offered to pass around my info to his contacts who are. Of course, she SAYS it's NOT because she's trying to get me to the West coast (and dear god, has she!). *LE SIGH* Add one more name to the 'Pooh to California' fanclub. Seriously, it's like a freaking conspiracy.

MOURNING!

The two jobs I applied for yesterday -- the ones I was totally qualified for, located within 40 minutes from here, and I would have TOTALLY ROCKED -- have JUST BEEN filled. And then one job from a company in Miami -- for a position I was just a tiny bit underqualified for -- has apparently decided I'm no good. There's still a bunch of other positions I applied for with them, but they seem to be taking their sweet time with these. GRR.

I... I wanna cry.

I also need to get some more experience with CAD. Is there a way to do that without spending a whole lot of money? There's a continuing ed online course at school that'll provide me AutoCAD and 100 hours of instruction. For a mere $1500. But um... I'm running out of money here and I'd REALLY LIKE TO BE WORKING RIGHT NOW. Seriously, how many people can say that and have it be TRUE?

Just watch. In a couple of weeks, I'll be on my way to becoming a residential appraiser. Just because.

Ohgod.

Hmm... question on protocol and ethics... if one of my recruiters put my resume online on a company website (umbrella hiring site for all their tiny companies) and I peeked and it's a copy of my resume on their letterhead... If I wanted to apply to another job that's with a different company under the network but sort of in a slightly different field than the one the recruiter has me for... Is it kosher to create my own account with a different email address? Because all those companies say to apply online through that database. Or... should I tell the recruiter?

*SIGH*

Someone who is independently wealthy, will you please sweep me off my feet? I will love you forever and make sure the rest of your days are filled with much laughter and sunshine.

*MOPES*