Woe is Steff is Steff is Steff is Not? Is? Something.

I'm having a tumultuous time of it still, I'm afraid. While my father seems to be rediscovering a desire to be a healthy, alive person and has made health and his recovery his priorities in life -- a great gift to me, and I'm thankful for whoever out there might've pulled the strings -- I'm falling into yet another employment woe scenario. I may be out of work before long.

I'm very formulaic in how I attack my problems. I accept the problem, but I try to find a way out, and if/when that fails, I think "Just how bad can this be?" And then I totally worst-case it and assess all the collateral damage of just how bad things might get. And then I try to figure out how to avoid all that. Knowledge is power, right? Sure. Why not.

Truthfully, I can handle the joblessness if I have the safety net under me, but it's the safety net I worry about. EI now requires 700 hours of work before eligibility -- or that's what I was told three weeks ago. If things work out, at the end of this payperiod, I'll have just achieved 740. If I wind up unemployed with exactly one week past the required amount of labour, why... That ain't gonna look sharp. Shitty way for it to work out. Just luck. (Isn't everything?) In the morning, I'll pop 'round their office on my way to work and see what my odds look like.

Hopefully there'll be work there, but the bosses were decent enough to give me a heads up that 10 days or so from now it looks to come to near a standstill, which would be not to my advantage, to be sure. But knowing has been an advantage, because I'll take care of business while I can.

Whatever. I can't change what is gonna happen, right, but I can try to minimize the blowback. That's the mode I'm in. What if, and ifs being what they are, and probability being what it is, well... I feel like I'm standing by a fencepost, waiting for the quarter to decide onto which side it's going to fall.

There are certainly things I can control. What happens to me? Outta my hands. What I do about it? All me. All the time. So. I'm considering possible courses of action. I'm going to put some immediate job things out there, but I'm not going to overreact. Legally, I qualify for EI. Whether it gets rubber stamped isn't something I can control.

So, I wait. If it gets rubber stamped, I will apply for work, four or five jobs a week, conscientiously. IE: Actual jobs I want, that I'm actually trying to get. I will also look into schooling options. Hey, you never know.

I was in a bad situation when I was looking for work in June. I needed it. More than any thing in my life, I needed a job then and there. It's like they can smell it on ya. Hungry. Needy. If there isn't a saying about "never trust a hungry person with a fork", well, there damned well oughta be. Maybe a hungry unemployed person is something to be feared. Who knows. Never give them a fork! I think my nerves showed a little too much. Plus, I was having trouble with my hearing aids then. Betcha that didn't help matters.

That, or it was your classic over/underqualified conundrum. Heard a lot of those friggin' words.

Whatever. Mentally -- far better place this time.

I'd just rather not have to go there right now. Oh, well.

My house is clean. There's that. I've adopted a simple belief: I cannot control the world around me, but I can control my own little world. I'm creating order, and then with it should come that Zen calm old merchants go hiking mountaintops, seeking gurus for. That, or I want my money back.

I'm about to deliberately go out and fall asleep on my couch. It's blissful out there. I even rearranged my furniture and I swear, snicker, that my chakras tumbled into the right places when I feng-shuied the shit out of that place. Clack-clack. Hear that?

My living room is almost as clean as it's been in years. The only thing out there that still needs cleaning are the cupboards under the kitchen counter, and they scare me 'cos I see silverfish there. I'm gonna try to be big and tough and clean it out this weekend anyhow. Storage: clean. Balcony: clean. Pantry: Clean. Broom closet: clean. Hall closet: clean. Coffee table innards: Clean. (Must tackle a few clutters of paper yet, though. Eeps.)

I'm freaking myself out! This is how clean I wanted to get my house when I *was* unemployed. I'm employed now and this is nearly incredible! If I wind up unemployed, I can focus on things that actually need doing. This kind of order's easy to maintain once it's had. Or so I'm willing myself to believe. My bedroom is next.

But that's why I'm sleeping on the couch. :) Purty and nice out there.