Cast A Giant Shadow

So last night I slept about 40 minutes by my estimate. The rest of the night I tossed and turned , amazed at how hard my body was fighting sleep. It was strange. I could feel unconsciousness pouring over me like a wave, and just before it could completely wash over me, my body would suddenly snap back, wrenching me out of sweet oblivion.

So many firsts at once. I have to relearn to live on a schedule, relearn not drink until I pass out, and a lack of sleep is the price I pay for all this. Sure there’s less unmentionable bowel related actives, and in theory less sour stomach (though I’ve had plenty of that). In the end I’m not sure whether the money or the freedom seems more attractive. Of course I haven’t gotten the money yet, but I definitely ain’t got the freedom any more.

At the moment things remain as tedious as ever, and never getting any sleep doesn’t help. I’m the only one who stays on the phone cold calling all day while the others switch off from inbound to outbound. Of course this is because I’m the only one among them who is a real sales man. For example today I walk into the bosses office to try and get some feedback. The boss, a condescending little prick who sounds like Paul Lynde (for those of you uneducated types who are too lazy to look it up think of the voice of Templeton the rat from Charlotte‘s Web), tells me he’s not keeping track.

Long story short I ask the right person and it turns out their previous best converter, a mouthy black chick, contacted 42 people and converted 7 yesterday. On the other hand I contacted 32 and converted 23. Big difference. Now they keep hinting that they want me to start selling alarm systems and debt consolidation sooner than later, and before you know it the idea of jerking off polar bears on reality TV doesn’t seem such a bad option.

Oh well I believe that God has a plan, and things will work out in the end. Still with only 4 seasons of Dragnet what’s a boy to do? Sure I can pepper it up with some On The Buses, which is funny, but a man needs Dragnet in order to feel regular. I mean I’m already half way through the fourth. Back to Adam-12 I suppose.

On that note (and by that I mean on an entirely different note) I would like to celebrate the life, and mourn the death of a hero of mine. A great actor, a real and true American icon, and one who managed not to die with a shoe lace tied around his pee pee. I speak of course of John Wayne who as of June 11th has been gone for 30 years. I hate to admit it, but I’m getting misty eyed.

All I can say is that if you don’t like John Wayne it’s because you’re rotten to the core, your parents are rotten to the core, their parents are rotten to the core, and their parent’s parents where probably hobgoblins or poisonous snakes. For any one left who does still have respect and love for the man I recommend going out and immediately renting The Shootist. In it John Wayne plays his final role as an aged gun fighter who settles into old stomping grounds in order to die quietly of cancer. The film is made all that more effective and touching as Wayne himself was loosing his long struggle against cancer. I also recommend popping over to Roger Ebert’s page and reading his blog post about his encounters with Wayne.

Well I’m about as tired as I can get so I’ll saddle up. Like Mose said, “All I want is a rocking chair by the fire”

What A Way To Make A Living

So I perform the single most ridiculous job a person could get paid 15 bucks and hour to do. Basically we've all seem those "win a free ipod" banners on web sites. Well the people who click on those and do the survey's and sign up for the offers, basically I call them back and tell then I'm going to send them another offer via email. I confirm there email address, and send them the email. Bam! That's it. I modified there pitch, and took a more aggressive approach so today (my first full day on the phone) I did double what every one else.

They don't monitor your calls, they don't watch over you, they don't even care when you go for lunch or breaks. You just disappear. The lunch room is the size of a basketball court, it has a Nintendo Wii for the employees to play at lunch, and all the snacks and drinks in the vending machines are under 50 cents.

The place itself is the size of a football stadium, but there is almost no one working there. Every one is spread around this huge office like nomad tribes. Hell I have no idea what the other people who work in the place even do. They say it's temp to hire. I don't know how long it will go on. Could be days, months, or years. This seems like the kind of place where you show up to work one day just 15 minutes before the FBI raids the place.

No one seems to have any idea what they're doing though my manager has that kind of extremely soft spoken passive aggressive exterior, but deep down you know he would stab his own mother in the back. I've spoken less than 3 sentences to him. He once asked me how things were going. I said "good", and he walked off.

It's tedious as shit. Basically today I made 301 phone calls, I got 23 verifications, and had 19 people hang up on me. That's 42 people I spoke to out of 301 in 8 hours. That's about a 13 percent contact rate. So as you can imagine I spend most of my day just dialing and dialing to no avail.

Oh and get this, they don't even want you to rebuttal when a person says no. I still do from time to time, but they basically require I do nothing, but keep dialing. They don't even have a quota.

Still I have not slept in two days. I have been on the verge of puking almost constantly. I cannot drink on week days now. No more than a glass so my body now has to adjust to many new things amongst waking up before noon. Last night I got home and crashed at 9:30, woke up at 1:00 am, and never got back to sleep. Considering I only slept 3 hours the night before, I am the walking dead.

It's all very strange though. I've stumbled into some kind of office version of Xanadu. Only instead of untold earthly pleasures the trees bare fruits of boredom. Without the pressure of quotas, and thick ex-cons breathing down my neck when I don't dial fast enough I find I can sell again. I kind of even like it. I see the people I call as my enemies. I want to destroy them with my emails. Oh such emails I will send! Now suck on this! He says "anti" clockwise instead of "counter" clockwise!!!

Oh Baby Baby I'm That Sexy Lady

So it's 3 in the P.M. I'm standing outside of my grandfather's house in a tank top and swim trunks when I get a message from this other job I applied for not two days ago, and to my joy and excitement I find they want me to come in for an interview. I am excited because this is the job I want. Just as I am about to call them back, I mean the very second I'm about to hit the button, evil current job calls me and tells me that they want me in tomorrow morning at 8:30 in the A.M.

Say what nigga ass niggaz? Not even 24 hours advanced notice! So I call the other place and schedule an interview for 4:30 in the P.M. I then finish washing my dad's car (did you think I was just standing outside of my grandfather's house wearing a tank top and swim trunks for no reason? Still now that I think about it it would have been funnier if I had left out the explanation.) I then change my clothes, and hop on over to the interview just in the nick of time.

Well it's a nice place. Offers incredible benefits, pays two dollars less than my current position, but it's plenty stable. Apparently you set up medical or therapy appointments for worker's comp people. Easy as pie. I go in, apologize for my appearance, and get the 30 minute history of the company speech.

In the course of all this I notice a sticky on my resume stating I have the perfect qualifications, and I also find out that out of the 140 applications they've received for the position I'm one of only a few who have real customer service experience. So naturally I'm perfect for the job.

In a perfect world I would have it at this moment, but this is a world filled with corporate hiring practices. As any one who has ever worked for a major corporation knows nothing that corporations do on a bureaucratic level makes any sense. So I have to wait till the end of the week before all the managers get together and pick a hand full of resumes. Then if I am one of the chosen I will be called back for a second interview with the general manager at which time more deciding and what not will take place.

In the end I could lose my job to some one with a college degree. Experience and success don't mean as much as a piece of paper stating you have been schooled in an unrelated topic in the corporate world. That's right, I could lose my dream job to a liberal arts degree or a business major (I've never in my life met a business major who knew shit about business), or the odd paranormal psychology student. Of course my less than... perfect criminal record could also sink me. Who knows? All I know is poop job begins tomorrow.

Still I know little about poop job so maybe it will kick ass. Still you want to know a real hell? Have this song stuck in your head for two weeks.

The Land Of The Lost

I've yet to get a solid start date on my current "job" so I decided I would apply at a few places just in case. Then I run across a want ad for Bridgestone tires. Get this, they demand a college degree in order for you stand around a small store and sell their tires for a living! A college degree to sell tires? How would a college degree better prepare you for hawking circular hunks of rubber for a living? Or for that matter why would you go to all the trouble of getting a college degree just to end up selling tires?

I think I'll go back to school. I'll go to one of those college's that lets you major in paranormal psychology and then apply for a bunch of jobs like this. Then when I'm a manager at the Dollar Mart I can look down at my employees, many of whom will be twice my age, and proudly say "You don't have my job because you don't have college degree in something that is completely made up. That's right. I proudly make 12 thousand dollars a year riding on the back of my ghost degree". And then I will commit suicide.

Then after I have passed I want those 12 thousand dollars I earned yelling at Little Clee Tron for not putting the month old cookies in the correct isle, and have it used to build a statue. A statue of me looking boldly into the sun, a college degree in one hand, a tire in the other, and one of those ghost things from pac man at my side.

Ladies and Gentlemen the world has lost its mind. On that note here's something hysterical. Godzilla!!!!!

This Shit Is Science

Stood home today in order to sleep in, but now my skin is crawling. I want out of this cage. I still don't know when I'm working, but let's not forget my birthday is just around the corner. I expect e-cards from those of you who cannot attend, but not those cheap easy to find e-cards. I want deeply pornographic e-cards. The kind that could kill small animals if viewed up close. Well not much else is going on. There's a project or two I need to catch up on, but I feel little motivation. It's the damn Game Station that's doing it to me.

I feel how this guy sounds. I know it's long, but stick with it because the pay offs begin around the 5 minute mark. Also if you're interested all his research into R3X can be found here as his website will be going down soon.

I Is Drunk As Usual

And here's something that doesn't suck.... minus the commentary at the end.

The Final Frontier

So I have a job now. I don't know when I start as of this moment, but any amount of precious free time left is appreciated. I will be confirming orders for the video professor series. I don't know what exactly is involved. There will be "cold calling" more or less, but it pays 15 dollars an hour though I have no idea why. I think the staffing agency that got me the job up sold me as some kind of sales man whiz kid. I mean what's more fun than having to live up to total strangers expectations? Ah, sweet pressure!

Other than that I just play my Playstation 2. I'm beginning to understand how distractions can be a poison. Television, video games, and other vices. I had none of these things in the hotel... well I had television, but something will have to be done about all this. The world seems insane to some degree. Especially these days with our "man made disasters" as they now want to call them. I limit myself to watching only King Of The Hill. Except for at night when I watch Adam-12 and Dragnet on Netflix. That I do while I grind.

Soon enough I'll have a little something up from the podcast I am editing. It's strange and Sir John is slow at sending me things. He's a nut. Speaking of nuts how about this girl? Apparently all life existed as 2 dimensional space beings at some point in the past, and that has something to do with the Atlantians, and Lizard People from Mars, and how our physical universe doesn't actually exist, but is instead some kind of trap constructed by space monsters and possibly Jesus.

If you're wondering why she inhales before each video it's because she's channeling space monsters or Hitler or something. I have to admit she is kinda cute.