Let me be a wage slave again, please

Are you all getting as tired of me posting about jobs as I am in looking for jobs? If so, cross your fingers for an interview that I have on Monday. Should be an interesting job, with great benefits and hopefully decent pay at one of the colleges.

However, I'm wondering about one little issue. The department posts pictures of all the employees on the website, so I was glancing through to see if I recognized anyone, and saw that one of the employees is one of our near neighbors. She's not someone I've met in person, but there's no doubt that I should recognize the name if we're introduced. And there's a chance that she would recognize me because I always walk Zeppo as far as her mailbox before turning around. I'm wondering if I should practice some complimentary phrases about her lawn in preparation for meeting her. And hope that she doesn't hold the fact that we're a bit messy against me. Maybe I should take a moment today to move the garbage can away from the street and put the hose away just in case.

P.S. I really want to complain about the heat, but I know that Joy has it much, much worse, so I won't. (but seriously, 92 degrees, in Sept, this far north, WTF??)

Que sera sera

Monday morning, I found out that the receptionist/HR coordinator was leaving.
Monday evening, I was offered her full-time job.
Monday night, I crunched the numbers and decided I'd probably lose money if I took it.
Tuesday morning, I declined the job.
Wednesday, they gave the girl leaving the hard sell to get her to stay.
Friday, she accepted, with the caveat that the give her more help.
Monday morning, the woman I replaced was back training with Dawn.
Monday evening, I was fired.

They like me, they really like me

I'm experiencing something completely unprecedented in my 20 years of job-hunting, I'm being sought after. It's very strange.

Way, way back in the fall I took the County Civil Service exam for Senior Accountant. Back in January, they started sending me letters asking if I was interested in part-time work, but I declined. Now they have full-time positions available, and I got a high enough score that I'm being considered for three jobs right now. I've interviewed for two, both in the County administrative office. The third interview is for the school district.

The tricky thing is that of the first two interviews, I think the second job suits me better. Do I dare decline if the first job is offered to me? Also, the first two jobs aren't technically permanent, but the third one would be. And how much should the fact that I love this building and want to work here play into things. You should see the foyer, it was built during the Craftsman period and is floor to ceiling glazed green and yellow tile. Gorgeous. But the third job is closer to the new house and the school the kids will be going to.

Do I need to consult my mortgage broker before accepting a new job? I'd think that a full-time job with 30% more pay would automatically be a plus, but I'd hate to screw up the mortgage if I switched jobs between now and the 24th.

Day two

I wore the butterfly butt jeans today. Yay!

Co-workers are only meh so far. They are accountants after all, and also stressed with year-end paperwork and being understaffed. My boss basically sat me down with a ton of filing and copying my first two days. Not too exciting, but better than having to deal with the old stresses of getting payroll out. My job tasks are still in limbo, but it will probably focus on various expense reports and mileage reports from the field crews.

The best part is that it's 15 minutes from door to door. No more hour long treks turned into three hour long nightmares if there's a bomb threat, car accident, derailment, hazmat spill, power outage, snowstorm, etc. My one complaint so far is my boss's social skills. Shouldn't a boss take at least a minute or two to introduce a new employee to the co-workers and do a quick tour of the bathrooms and break area? I'm not holding my breath for more complicated explanations of where to save things on the network drive. (This may just be a symptom of the above year-end/understaffed problems) If I'd been hired for the job without office experience, I'd be feeling lost and neglected already. Luckily, I'm a "self-starter" and able to "prioritize and multi-task". At least that's what my resume says.

The kids are supposed to be in daycare two days a week and with Dan the third, but they were sick today. We're thrilled that one hour at daycare last Wednesday was enough to give them both nasty, rattling throat colds. Janet watched them for half the day today and last Thursday while we were at work. She's talked about doing it on a more full-time basis, but we want the kids out of the house and socializing more. And I think tying her into even one day of daycare is too hard with George's various health problems. We're just happy to have an option when someone is sick. Our last babysitter was pretty easygoing about things, but Nathan's first daycare would kick him out frequently over diseases that he'd most likely picked up there. It was a ton of fun the morning I brought him into work for a few hours and had to carry him around in the sling while I made copies.

Off to the kid's doctor tomorrow, what a treat for Nathan's birthday! Then to my doctor on Wednesday.

Gainfully employed

I have to go to work tomorrow. Yikes! It's been over 20 months since I worked. Hyatt employed 350 people, with 14 people in my accounting office and another 50 or so that I was on a first name basis with. This company does employ about 150 people, but they're spread over 3 states. I don't think more than a dozen actually work at the headquarters. Quite a change. I'm just going to work 3 days a week, for abysmally low pay. More details when I actually know more.

The big news is that I can wear jeans tomorrow. (I won't, but I can.) This is an astonishing change from my prior dress codes.

Hyatt-Women could only wear pants if they were part of a suit (same fabric and color), no off-beat hair colors, no open-toed shoes

Sea Island - even more conservative, skirts and dresses only, uniformed employees weren't allowed to wear colored nail polish (so guests could see that hands were clean)

Best Western - boring hotel uniform

Trapp Family Lodge - itchy wool skirt and vest. Luckily I wasn't there for the summer, when they wore flowered dresses that were supposed to evoke the feeling that Maria Von Trapp had torn down some curtains and made them herself. Not Kidding.

Old Sturbridge Village - Nothing will ever top this. Cotton Cap, Bonnet, Dress, Petticoat, neckerchief, shawl, apron and handmade leather shoes.


I'll probably still wear skirts to work, because that's what I own. I only have two pairs of jeans, and one has silly butterflys on the butt.

Timber!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Finally got another job interview lined up, the first since mid-october and only the third I've had. I'm trying to do some research on the company, but they don't seem to have a website. Not uncommon around here, Dan's restaurant doesn't have one either. It's a tree service company. My first thought was that it would be pretty small landscaping company, but I've managed to find some references to them having huge utility company contracts. One newspaper article from last year said they got a $27 million dollar contract that would allow them to add 40 new jobs. Hopefully, I'm one of them.

Also got a call from a staffing firm that saw my resume online. They have a postion available too, although I'm thinking it could be the same job. Doesn't hurt to get on their list too. The other staffing firm I'm signed up with certainly hasn't been much help yet.

Must find job

I've gotten sidetracked lately, and need to get back to some real work. I was very gung-ho about looking for work back in September, but after waiting by the phone and only going on two interviews I found the job search to be an irritant instead of interesting. Then I started classes in November, and that got my brain working again, but I've fallen behind now. Partly because of the weirdness of the Nov-March term and partly from my classes each having a different idea of when X-mas break starts and ends. And then getting into the restaurant plan in December sucked up a lot of time that should have been spent on my necessary goals.

So, back to work. I applied for three jobs today. There's a fourth job that seems to be posted in three different places where the candidate "must" have quickbooks. I've been ignoring it for weeks, but maybe I should apply anyway. They seem to be getting desperate, and I have done the quickbooks tutorial on the website. That's good enough, right?

Just so you'll see what I'm up against, these are the jobs in the weekly newspaper, and typing in my zip of 13647 will show you what else is around on this site. Not very encouraging.

My nerd gene has kicked in again

I was stressing out all week over my accounting assignment. It was due at midnight last night, and I still had half the questions unanswered and hadn't taken the quiz as of 6 p.m. A horrible feeling was coming over me, related to the fact that this was only the first chapter in my career defining major, and I was having problems.

Decided to take a slight break from things and read Chapter 2 while waiting for inspiration. What a breeze! It still had lots of new information, but it was practical knowledge that I could relate back to work experience, instead of the theories and grand themes of chapter one.

Not only did it make it easier to get back to first assignment, but I got all of this week's work done by 11:00 pm as well. Plus, I reviewed the syllabus and realized what a small fraction of my grade this work was. Not that I can skip it, but at least it was a reminder that I could fudge one question each week without failing the class. Not worth stressing over.

Add to that the fact that I just selected a research topic for my second class and have no work due for the third and I'm golden.

Class of 2008, or 2009, maybe 2010

Aaak. What have I gotten myself into? Had to read twenty pages from "Financial & Managerial Accounting" today. Now I have to submit some practice questions i.e...

Question #3: A major focus of this course is the process of financial reporting.
a. What is meant by the term financial reporting?
b. What are the principal accounting reports involved in the financial reporting process? In general terms, what is the purpose of these reports?
c. Do all businesses entities engage in financial reporting? Explain.
d. How does society benefit from the financial reporting process?

I also have to make sure I take a quiz by the end of the week. Plus there is a discussion on Ethics that I have to respond to. And that's just Accounting.

My other two courses will be expecting my research topic by next week, and I have to plan all the classes I'm going to take and submit a degree plan.

At first, I didn't even know where to begin. Now I've taped up a reminder schedule of which days I want to do which class. Sunday will always be Accounting, since that is the tougher course, and Dan is home on Sunday so I can take time to myself. Now I wish I'd started work earlier in the day instead of seeing Flushed Away with Nathan. I want to submit the practice questions before I forget everything I read today.

Back to School II

My online classes opened today. It's another week before classes start, but I went in and read the course schedule and updated my profile to share with other students. I'm signed up for

Intro to Accounting - pretty self-explanatory.
Planning and Finalizing the Degree - 2 cr - This is a requirement at Empire. Since all the classes are done online, this is a way to be sure that you have a good relationship with your mentor and are on track to eventually graduate.
Information Literacy - 2 cr - I had a few options for my second Educational planning course. I decided that since I first learned how to research in the 20th century, I needed to re-train myself on education in the internet age.

Since I signed up for the second two classes at the Advanced Level, I'm going to have to write two research papers this term. I think I was smart to pick a term that will be broken up by a long Christmas break, it will give me time to get ahead on the work a little. The idea having to come up with two topics was freaking me out this afternoon, but then I came up with two possibilies while talking to Dan tonight. One paper will be a completely open-ended topic, I'm thinking of exploring the increase of the AMT tax. The other paper is meant to be about my career plans, so I think looking at how the accounting scandals and Sarbannes-Oxley have impacted accounting programs and CPA licenses seems a no-brainer. Alright, do I sound smart just talking about AMT and SOX?

Nothing yet

Well, I called them today. The woman I interviewed with was at their other office, so I left a message. I just don't want this to drag out over the weekend. And I'm getting frustrated because there are no jobs posted right now. I use a good website where stuff gets posted from the local Jobs Office and classifieds, and it's all truck drivers and nurses these days. There's no point in knocking on doors, unless I get desperate and want to do retail for the Holidays. I've got an appnt to take the County Civil Service accounting exam, but that's a looooong process with no guarantee a job will even be available. Grrr arrrgh.

In other news the kids have noses that a running like faucets. I can't wait to get them in daycare so they'll be sick every day. Yay!

And in other, other news, I'm switching drugs again. The miracle drug Enbrel doesn't seem to be working very well for me. And, after this month, my insurance won't be paying for it. So, I'm switching to Rituximab(sp?), which will be injected through a saline I.V. at the hospital. Takes a few hours, but once it's done, it should be good for six months. Cross your fingers, knock on wood.

Luckily, they didn't notice the black eye

The job interview went very well. I think I was more relaxed than the interviewers. Threw in some talk about the AMT tax and the CPA exam, so I think that may have helped show off my intelligence. They were also very impressed with my cover letter, so I think I'm off to a good start.

I had to take an hour long test on spelling, math, etc. I think it was written in the 1920's and has been given to every employee since the firm was founded. Since I always use spellcheck and calculators, I was a little stressed at having to use a pencil and do it all in my head. I'll find out in a few days if I have the job, and make some calls tomorrow to see if the daycares I've talked to have openings. I should also start doing some online shopping to see if I can expand my wardrobe a bit.

School Days, School Days

One of the (many) reasons I have not gone back to work yet is that very few jobs list "BA in History" as a prerequisite. Even with all the accounting experience I have, I'm pretty much back to square one if I go for a job. So, I've submitted all the paperwork to go back to school and get a BS in business from Empire State College.

It's all online. I have no idea how long it will take, a lot depends on how much credit I get for classes taken at Bates. Just for the major, it would be at least 10 classes, and I think I'd only do 2 a term, 3 terms a year. But I probably have to take some Math and Science courses too, Bates curriculum was a little too easygoing and I never took a Math course there.

The plan:
Graduate
Work for bank as Financial Planner
Make tons of Money
Open own Financial Planning business
Make truckloads of Money
Open Restaurant and invest in Commercial Real Estate
Make enough Money to buy a small Island

Sounds good, right?

Working for a living?

I need to write this down to help me think through the problem........

I was just doing the math again trying to decide when I should go back to work. My current fomula of weekly rate-taxes-daycare=$3000 year. Which just about equals what I'd have to spend on health insurance since I'd lose our current coverage if our income rises. That might be a little pessimistic, but even my optimistic calculations only come out to taking home $6000 a year. Yuch!

What to do, what to do.
1. The Lodge is supposed to be on schedule to open next May.
2. Daycare rates will drop as Claire gets older, and when Nathan starts preschool.
3. We really need to guard what is left of our savings so that will have money to move back.
4.It'd be better to add to the savings so we can buy a house asap.
5.Weekly expenses will probably drop if I'm not taking the kids out to lunch and going shopping every other day. Heating bills in the winter will also drop if no one is home.
6.We'll probably lose the current health coverage in Nov. anyway when they realize that Dan gets overtime. I should get a job that provides ins. before then.

A. I'll never see Dan.
B. The kids will be sick more often, and I'll need to take time off work for my Dr.'s appnts.
C. R.A. is still not under control, I shouldn't start work if I may have pain.
D. It'd be nice to be with Claire for first steps, words etc. (She's a slowpoke re:walking)

Hmmmm, I think this means I should go back to work. As long as I find daycare and a payrate that skew toward the optimistic. Then work on our budget some more to make sure that our net worth goes up after I start working, or at least goes down at a slower rate. Nothing would stop me from quitting two months later if it's a disaster.

What color is my parachute?

I'd like a career. I revisit this topic many times, and still haven't made any progress. Over the last few years I've considered Librarian, Financial Consultant, CPA, Restauranter, blah, blah, blah. The one I come back to the most often is Math Teacher. I'd like to take revenge on the Mr. Kowalchyks of the world who scare people, especially girls, away from Math. Years in accounting led to me rediscovering my aptitude for numbers, and any time they sent a trainee my way, I enjoyed teaching.

But how do I do it? I start my research the same way, checking local colleges for courses. Realizing I have to get a double major. Worrying that my Bates GPA will screw me up on transferring the Gen Ed requirements. Deciding that I can afford tuition. Then remembering I've got two kids now, and how can I afford to put them in Daycare or feed them if I'm not working for 3-4 years. And if I do work and go to school part-time, I'll never see them.

Isn't there a looming teacher shortage? Shouldn't people be clamoring to give me $100,000 cash so I can do this?

You know you're an accountant when.....

Is there anyone else in this world who anxiously awaits the arrival of their Tax prep software? I seriously couldn't wait to load Taxcut yesterday, and then stayed up until 11:30 tweaking it and doublechecking the numbers.
But I'm already worried about getting audited. We just barely made the Healthcare cost deduction, which not only saved us money on the taxes, but also saved us from having to pay the 10% penalty for cashing in some 401k money when we were broke last summer. So that's about an $800 refund just there, which we wouldn't get if our healthcare costs were $20 less. Seems like that's the sort of thing that the IRS would red flag.
Geez, I'm really an accountant aren't I? I've been in denial about that for years.