I need a job. That's that. My last financial option has been tapped. I just sold all of my books to T.I.S. Bookstore, and when I say selling my books to T.I.S. is my last financial option, I mean it.
I have to thoroughly exhaust every viable source of backup income before I can accumulate the proper amount of debt and self-loathing required to go through the process of reselling used textbooks. Personally, this is the order in which I prioritize items to be sold when it comes to finding sources of income when I'm unemployed: plasma first, pets second, soul third, used textbooks fourth. Unfortunately, I had previously resorted to selling the first three just to make enough money to buy the textbooks in the first place.
Don't get me wrong; I've never actually dropped a bar of soap in a federal prison shower facility, but I can imagine that the ensuing chain of events is merely half as painful and degrading as a T.I.S. employee offering me $6.50 for a stack of books that cost me half the net income of Canada to buy -- while maintaining a straight face.
I'm not suggesting T.I.S. should change its policy, either. There are certain online vendors who will pay much more for the same books to those with the time and the know-how to locate them. All I'm asking of T.I.S. is: With every insignificant stack of ones, a small tube of Vaseline be given to each freshly shattered student on his or her way out. That's all. Why allow chaffing to go on if it can be prevented?
But as I previously mentioned, I did finally sell my books today. And, go figure, I seem to have already spent the money just to buy the gas it took to drive the two and a half miles from my apartment to T.I.S. and back. So, in a few days, when I'm able to walk straight again, it will be time to continue with Summer Job Search 2005.
"Job search." It sounds so easy ... like a dog finding a place to pee. However, there's a lot more to it than just sniffing around for a couple seconds and setting up shop. Finding a job is a lot more like getting a bill passed into law through Congress. There's a lot of pointless paperwork, lying and, of course, the occasional interview when the people in charge aren't preoccupied with hiding their dead mistresses.
Ah, the job interview. That's what's killing Summer Job Search 2005 so far. I've had one interview the whole summer.
I tanked. I tanked with extravagance. After handing my application to The Buckle in Muncie Mall, I was immediately caught off-guard when the manager requested to interview me on the spot.
"Why don't we go to the back and talk about your application?" he said.
Naturally assuming "the back" was a reference to a private office in the back of the store, I was again befuddled to find the interview was actually going to be conducted at a clearance rack in the corner of the shopping area.
Befuddled turned into flustered. Flustered quickly settled into a form of paranoia so intense that I couldn't tell you one detail about the interview itself -- other than that it was short -- because the whole time I was thinking:
"Is my face red? It feels red. Of course it's red, if you're thinking about it. Will he notice? Maybe he'll think it's the lighting.
Oh great. Is that sweat? Am I sweating? Maybe it's more of a glisten than a full-fledged sweat, like Jack Osbourne just walked up a flight of stairs. No, that's a droplet. That makes it full-fledged.
Should I wipe? He wont notice if I don't wipe. Or, he's already noticed and is wondering why I'm not already wiping."
I didn't get the job, of course, but maybe I'll be less intimidated when I apply at T.I.S. tomorrow.
Write to Lance at
lmvaillancou@bsu.edu
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