June 3rd, 2001.  Sunday
 
 

     A busy, and generally pleasant weekend.  I should probably mention that when I went to right "busy" just then, I first accidentally typed "busty" twice.  Unfortunately, it was not a very busty weekend.  But still fun.  Feeling pretty good.
    So I started my new job on Friday. I went in for the interview and the boss was like "You sure this is what you want to do with your summer?"  basically saying I was terribly overqualified.  Which i am.  But hey, a job's a job.  It's more data entry, fairly similar to my job last summer at James's company, only even more tedious and I have to wear a tie three days a week.  Not like I haven't had to do that before though. But when I got there on Friday morning, I just wanted to cry. It was just terrible.  Most of the morning was spent displaying my poor listening and poor bullshitting and poor small-talk skills.  The work is tedious to the extreme.  And yes, I am horribly overqualified.  But I need some dough.  I figure I should just bear down and make as much money as I can for now, and start buying things to make me happy.  And of course, get around to paying that ginormous student loan.
    But this tedious job isn't going to be the only money maker.  The substitute teacher thing seems like it'll come through, and hopefull I'll get a job when I finish my Kaplan training.  So that's three jobs.  I don't think I can do the substitute teacher thing and the job I have now at the same time, but at least I have options.  And the Kaplan job has good potential.  I can pretty much make my own schedule, as long as I'm able to commit to a class for its full term.  So I'm thinking I'll do this job for a few months, then in September, start substitute teaching and teaching Kaplan.  I should be able to live off that, and probabl not even work five days a week. Of course, this is all a very big "in the best case" scenario.  I also have a few small writing gigs for webpages, one of which will actually pay me. If they liked my writing samples.  I don't know why my life works in these cycles though. I had absolutely nothing going on for the past three months, and now I have a job, two other prospective jobs, a regular webpage column, and possibly another regular column.  Plus, I start my writing class at the New School tomorrow.  I'm a little nervous about it, but I'm getting better overall about my nerves and confidence.  I was literally shaking today when I had to get up and present a lesson for my Kaplan training class.  But I managed to get through it, and I did a pretty good job, I was told.
    Anyway, back to the weekend, after work, I took a quick nap, had dinner, and went out with Matt.  It was pouring out, but we ventured down to 5th Ave and scouted out the bars.  After walking into what we're fairly certain was a gay bar, we ended up at Great Lakes.  Seating was at a premium, and just as we were ready to swoop down on a table opening up, these two girls beat us to the punch.  The were quite unapologetic about it when Matt confronted them.  But they did invited us to sit down.  So we grabbed another chair and did just that.  I need some work on my casual conversation skills, and it seemed like a good opportunity.  One of the girls is a teacher at a public school in Manhattan called "Talent Unlimited."  Sort of like a "Fame" school I guess.  One of her students was Robert Iler, the kid who plays Anothony Jr. on the Sopranos.  She said he's home schooled now, since he pretty much flunked out.  He never turned in assignments, and was like "I don't need to be in school."  Anyway, I was more interested in the possibility of being a sub there.  The girls seemed nice enough. They left to go talk to the Great Lakes regulars after a while, so matt and I got the table to ourselves.  Matt's trying to turn himself into a whiskey drinker, so I went along for the ride and had a Jamesons with him. I've been trying to drink the stuff for a few months now, and it's not getting any easier. I'm only now starting to not hate the taste of beer.  Anyway, generally a pretty good night at the Lakes,
    So Saturday-  I planned to meet Matt at the New York Sports Club on 14th st.  Something was wrong with our cell phones yesterday, so it took us forever to find meet up. Matt thinks the cell phone problem stemmed from the fact that the Bin Laden terrorists are being sentenced this week, and the FBI said they would be monitoring cell phone calls.  Bin Laden apparently said there will be bloodshed after the sentencing.  Did I mention my new job is in the World Trade Center?  My aunt, who got me the job, was actually in the building back when it was bombed in the early 90s.  Anyway, I'm actually really enjoying going to the gym.  It's nice to feel dead tired for a good reason, instead of just sleeping all day and just being tired because you're sleeping all the time.  Activity is good.  As is a semi-regular sleeping schedule.  A nice natural way to get those serotonin levels up. Of course, though I'm waking up at an earlier hour, I'm still going to sleep on the unemployed schedule.  That's around 3 or 4 am.
    So after the gym, I got a call from Rodzilla as I was getting home.  She and her roommate decided to have a little dinner party.  I thought it sounded like a good way to feel like a grown up for a while, so i showered and headed back into the city.  When I got there, I was expecting three or four other people, so I was quite surprised at the din coming from the kitchen when I got off the elevator.  I don't like walking into a big group of strangers, and told Rodzilla "I should have taken my Paxil before coming over."  You know, that social anxiety disorder drug.  not that I have social anxiety disorder. Or paxil, for that matter. Though I think Jen recommended that at one point.  But that was weeks ago.  Anyway, nobody at the dinner was particularly unpleasant, and I actually really enjoyed talking to the people I met.  It's nice to meet new people.  Mostly, because I get to tell the same old stories and have them be entertaining again.  And i get to impress people with my general movie knowledge.  And there were liberal amounts of beer and wine, which is a good cure for a mild case of social anxiety disorder.
    One of the best things about Rodzilla's apartment is the giant roof she has access to.  it was really foggy last night though, and you could barely see any of new york.  Rodzilla was quite distressed that she couldn't see the Empire State building, and spent a good amount of time saying it'd been abducted by aliens.  Anyway, we all sat up there for a while drinking beer.  One of the guys there used to be a ballet dancer, and another of the guys seemed intrigued by this, so the two of them did some moves on the roof.  Then Rodzilla's roommate Katey, who used to be a competitive ice skater, did a few spins and whatnot.  Everyone was quite impressed. Then I asked if she could do the worm, so she got on the tar of the roof and wormed for a bit, which was funny enough, in part because she's so short, but then she went into a back spin from there.  I was impressed.
    Then we went to a bar, had a drink, and I took a cab over to Smith street, to the Boat bar, where I met up with James, Jed, Matt, Dylan, and James' girfriend Rosario.  So what started as sort of a slow day turned out to be one of the more active and enjoyable saturdays I've had in months.

    Lately I've had this real desire to have a library.  I want to turn the front bedroom of my apartment into a nice big library. I think we have enough books that we could fill a few bookshelves.  I'd just like to move a big table in there, and just sit in there and read.  It's the only room in the apartment that gets any real sunlight, so it's kind of a waste to have it as a bedroom, if you ask me. Of course, the books in the library won't pay $750 a month to be there either.  So practicality wins.  For now.

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