Where Has the Time Gone?

Me and a sea turtle in Kona, Hawaii.

Wow, I can't believe it's been 40 days since my last post! I think this may have been the longest break that I've taken since I started blogging consistently. What can I say? I guess I'm trying to live by one of Einstein's famous quotes - "Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." I guess I needed some time off from stressing out over the whole job search thing...I mean, hey, even a slacker needs a vacation sometime! :)

So, what have I been doing the last month or so? Well, the husband and I went on a week long vacation to Hawaii, I went to Palm Springs for a girl's getaway with some of my best friends and stumbled upon Dinah Shore Weekend, I began an 8-week cake decorating course at Michael's to indulge my creative side and sweet tooth, and I joined Club One - a trendy gym - because I've been eating too much cake...and I can't help it...I'm from L.A.

Oh and a few people have been asking me how my job search has been going recently. To answer that question, in the last 40 days on the job search front, I've had two phone interviews and one in person interview - all of which shockingly did not leave me feeling like an inept imbecile. I haven't heard back from these interviews though, so maybe they didn't share the same the feelings as me...who knows!?

What I do know is that I need to do something a little different. Like Einstein said, it's insanity to continue to do the same thing over and over again, so I'm now open to different career options. Any suggestions?

Bay Area Interview Questions

Today, I had an interview...during the 2 1/2 hours that I was being interviewed, I got the typical questions:

- "Tell me about yourself"
- "Tell me about a time when you failed"
- "What are your strengths?"

etc.

The main question that jumped out at me though was: "What does HTML code look like?" What?! I've never been asked this question before so I did the best I could to warble my way out of the question. If you catch me on a good day, I'm a pretty good bull-shitter, but I'm pretty sure that I bombed this one today...!

When I got home, I told my husband the question and asked what he thought. His answer? Some long winded simile to The Matrix: "Like when Neo gained his powers in The Matrix and saw his world as computer codes." I love Keanu Reeves, but this is one movie of his that I've never seen...too bad because I think that answer was probably a lot more intelligent than mine!

So...Is this a Bay Area thing? I've never been asked this before!

Do You Party?

About 9 years ago, I was interviewing for a position in sales at a television network. One of the questions that the SVP of the group asked me was, "Can you handle your alcohol?" Apparently, there were a lot of client dinners and events and stuff associated with the job and the person in the role would have to be able to socialize with the best of them. At the time I was 22, so of course as soon as I heard this question, I was like, "Fuck yeah! OPEN BAR!"

Fast forward to 2009...I'm way older, I'm married, and I've outgrown drinking like a fish and puking my guts out on Friday nights/Saturday mornings...well, let's just say that I've only done that once in the last year, which is a huge improvement since my 20's...Anyway, last week I was asked at an interview, "Can you handle your alcohol?" What did I say? "Well, let's just say I could handle it a lot better before I was married!" Yikes! If I actually get an offer for this job, are they going to be cool with me drinking Diet Coke at parties? Am I going to have to order tequila shots and pretend to drink them by tossing them over my shoulder!?

Stop Toying With Me!

About a month ago, I came across a job posting online that I was really interested in. The company has a really cool product that I actually buy and can see myself marketing. I foraged my contact list on Linkedin and found a friend of mine who is friends with some higher up in this said company. I emailed this guy and he forwarded my info to the hiring manager, who in turn had her assistant call me right away to set up an interview.

That was exactly a month ago....Since then, I've had about 6 or 7 appointments to talk with the hiring manager over the phone about this position. Each time, she emails me about 10 minutes before our appointment and postpones. Today, I was finally supposed to talk to her at 5pm. At 5:15, I get an email saying that she is stuck in a meeting that she cannot get out of...AGAIN!!

Now if this was a dating situation, I would think that they are "just not that into me" and that I should move on or play hard to get. But really, I have nothing to lose by saying "sure I can do it later, whatever." But really! Is it THAT hard to get 30 minutes of phone time at work? I mean REALLY!

This reminds me of the company that I worked for after bschool....It was a start up that was super crazed and the higher ups could never keep their schedules. Meetings always started late if they happened at all and you just could not plan your day around anything! It was kind of a mess! The worst part of the start up was that you could bring your dog in to work, which made it even messier because on any given day there would be 4-5 dogs in the office and the whole place would smell like dog shit...but I digress...

I just hope that me taking a chance with this new company is worth it. And that if I do get called in for an actual face to face interview, the office isn't covered with dog shit...

Interviews!

Yay! After over a month of being up in the Bay Area, I finally got some interviews lined up!

One is a start up that I don't even know the name of. And they don't offer any salary, just stock options and they expect to go public next year. Yes, it sounds a little sketchy, but hey I'm sitting at home getting no experience and getting older and older and not getting paid anyway, why not go do some contract work for a few months? It may pay out!

The second is for a CPG firm. For products that I actually use! Well, I used to anyway when I had a job and could afford the products...these days I'm on generic brands or whatever is on sale at Target.

Anyway, I guess trolling Linkedin and Craigslist really does work....To be continued...