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boomerang job
Wednesday, August 29 2018
Remember that software development shop I interviewed at across the Hudson about two months ago, the one that seemed to like me but then never got back to me? Well, yesterday a guy from there called and asked if I still wanted a job. I did still want a job! I'd been jobless for two and a half months and none of my other job leads had amounted to anything. All the shops not intimidated by my 20 years of experience had been underwhelmed by how much I seemed to know in practice (because, let's face it, I haven't actually been working fulltime as a software developer that whole time). Today the owner of the shop had arranged to meet with me in person there at the office. So late in the afternoon I took a shower, put on clean clothes, popped a ritalin, and drove over. I arrived about eight minutes early, so I sat in the back parking area of an agricultural supply store fucking with my phone to burn five minutes or so. Then I walked to the door and fucked with my phone a little more to burn another minute or so. As I did that, I could hear through the wall a nascent rock band doing their best to rock out despite the absence of, well, chops. There were also a couple random little kids in the hallway trying to interact with me by making what they seemed to think were scary noises. As I stood there, Alex, the keywording guy who had been my foot in the door at this software shop, walked up. He took me upstairs and introduced me to the bossman, and then the bossman pretty much offered me a job. He said we would start out with me working as a contractor for a couple weeks and if that went okay, then I'd be hired fulltime. He offered me a contractor hourly rate of $40, which I talked him up to $45. But by now I was so overwhelmed by something else he'd said that I didn't really much care about the specifics of what I was being paid. He must've heard from Alex that I wanted to work remotely, and he seemed fine with it. Wow, to have the option to work at home or in this beautiful office in a pleasant, easy-to-drive-to village! I'll take it! I can worry about the specifics of my salary in two weeks when I transition to fulltime (after first showing everyone how awesome I am).
On the drive home, I stopped at that Mobil gas station where 9G crosses US 9 (41.957574N, 73.894203W) to buy a celebratory six pack. Two months ago I'd bought a celebratory sixer here after having a great interview, though then I'd been ghosted for two months. I did have presence of mind today to ask about being ghosted and learned it had something to do with cash flow, though some things couldn't be revealed quite yet.
Meanwhile, down in the screened-in porch, I'd used some sort of Liquid-Nails-branded glue (sometimes mixed with sawdust) to make round globs around the roofing screws poking through the ceiling. The glue turned out not to be the rubbery chemical stuff I normally associate with that brand; instead it was a water-soluble white material similar to Elmer's Glue (it even smelled like Elmer's Glue). In any case, it dried into a nice formless shape that, when painted green, looked like just another odd texture in an already-textured ceiling.
Gretchen generally watches teevee at night as the last thing before getting into bed, but in recent days she's been doing something different. She's been going down to her screened-in porch with the dogs and reading until bedtime. She thinks that avoiding glowing screens in the evening might be a way to better transition to sleeping.
Tonight it was so hot and muggy that Gretchen suggested that we and the dogs sleep on the futon in the screened in porch. That sounded like fun, so that's what happened. With the lights off, the porch was illuminated by the rising moon shining through a thin layer of clouds. The crickets and katydids were so loud that it seemed like we were camping out. (Camping out is always associated in my mind with the vague smell of mildew, and we had that too once Gretchen went to fetch a couple extra pillows from the master guestroom.) There wasn't really enough room for two humans and two dogs on that small futon, so Gretchen went and got a dog bed too.
I had trouble falling asleep, and when I eventually woke up at 3:00am, I decided to go upstairs to my actual bed. On the way out of the basement library, Clarence the Cat slipped in, and when Neville saw him, he charged at him, as if to say "No, this is a no-cats zone!" That's kind of Gretchen's thinking too; cats have never mixed well with that space; whenever they've had access, they've quickly turned to urinating into its various carpets and/or area rugs.
Up in the bedroom, I popped an ambien, started watching crap on YouTube, and eventually fell asleep. I awoke a few times and eventually put the laptop away.
For linking purposes this article's URL is:
http://asecular.com/blog.php?180829 feedback
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