New Job, etc

Life has now settled back down to a semi-normal state. At least I am back in the usual routine of getting up and going to work for about eight hours a day. I started at my new job exactly a week ago, and it is going well. It's good to be employed again.

I have also signed a lease on a new apartment. Now rather than commuting about 40 minutes on a congested interstate highway, I will have an easy 15 minute drive to work. And it's closer to a lot of other places I like to go as well. Right now I'm living half-way between two apartments--I'm moving the stuff I can get in my car daily. Downside to this is what when I woke up this morning I realized my toothbrush was at the other apartment. I'll have to coordinate with my stronger and truck-owning friends to get the larger bits of furniture moved over. I've been so eager to start living there that I've spent one night at the new place on mats on the floor. Yes, I'm still young enough to sleep on the floor. :)

I'm still working on the yoga as well. This Monday, I touched the floor without bending my knees for the first time. Small victories :)

crazy job search

This job search has been crazy. I've interviewed with five different companies--mainly contacts I gained though a couple different consulting companies I'm working with. It is the first time I've every interviewed at several places as once, and then had to juggle multiple offers...it has been quite the experience.

I interviewed with one company that I was really excited about since the interview went so well and I enjoyed talking to the people there. But then I accepted the offer from another company to come on as a contractor for six months--with the option of extending the contract beyond that. The only real reason I did it was because the other place were offering about $3,000 a year higher in wages, even though I didn't like their environment nearly as well. It was a bad move. I found out yesterday that they lost their biggest client, and are now not hiring (or taking on contractors, obviously.)

So I tried to go back to the other place--which had been my first choice to start with, and they had already extended an offer to someone else. :(

I do have another offer to fall back on however--such is the advantage of going to several interviews--and lucky for me it is still available. It wasn't quite the perfect situation I was hoping for but it's not bad, and it is definitely a good offer. I'm going to give it a chance.

Moral of this story--if you interview with a place and have a really good feeling about it, don't pass it up for more money! You might just get burned, like I was.

Note, of course, that I'm not mentioning any names, lest the companies or recruiters I've worked with find this blog.

updates and observations

Wow, I've had so much time on my hands and I spent so little on this blog. So, here is an update on what is going on in my life.

Picking up from my last post on September 10th, here is the update on the job search. I am still currently unemployed. However, I have a phone interview and two face-to-face interviews scheduled for the next couple of days regarding positions that look very promising. For both my skill set and career aspirations. Also, I had an interview last Friday that I think went well and I'm waiting to see if I hear back from them with an offer. So, while the job search has not yet borne fruit--the prospects look promising.

I am also using a bit of my free time to study for a certification in my chosen field, so, professionally speaking, this hiatus from work has not been wasted.

Ok, that is enough about work.

I've also rediscovered the importance of sitting meditation during these past few weeks. Pretty much out of necessity. Since I lost my job, for the first couple of weeks I was on on emotional roller-coaster between events such as getting my first interview (elation!) to finding out that that position was not what I'd hoped for (really down in the dumps.) I've taken skill evaluations that I thought I'd done horribly on and this had me so depressed that I felt like a total failure. Then come to find out that I'd actually done alright on the evaluation--actually ahead of the curve of most of the people who'd taken it. So I guess it's all a matter of perception...but anyway I had to get these mood swings under control, and that meditation cushion sitting in the corner of my bedroom was starting to look really inviting.

Pretty much like it's a package deal with the meditation, I decided to pull out some of my books on Buddhism by Thich Nhat Hanh again. Like meeting an old friend again after a couple of years of absence. And that led to me deciding to visit my sangha again on Sunday. This time it was literally meeting old friends after a couple years of absence. Along with some new ones (the group has grown!) Maybe I'll stick around a bit longer this time.

And I've started taking yoga classes too. They are wonderful--I'll add more on that topic later.

Cosmic Connection | The Eloquent Atheist

This site is not the Eloquent Atheist for no reason. This poem is just wonderful and I couldn't help but spread it around.

Cosmic Connection The Eloquent Atheist

Far out on a country hill I place my blanket on the grass and lie flat.
Above my head to the north is steady Polaris.
Off my left arm the gas giant Jupiter rises silently. Off my right, Mercury Is settling into the deep blue twilight.
As velvet black of true darkness comes, the majestic backbone of night appears – the Milky Way.
Its angle from my right foot across to my left shoulder orients me, and I tilt my head to the right to become upright in my home galaxy.
Peering into the dense star cloud of Sagittarius, where the galactic center hides, I begin to feel my citizenship in the Universe.
Reaching out, I run fingertips along the edges of the billion-star band of light.
The Carbon, Nitrogen and Oxygen atoms that are me resonate with their birthplaces, in the cores of those stellar furnaces.
And the connection is made, transcendence complete.