The Status of My Job Search

I'm currently looking for work, and not getting very many encouraging responses. Things are starting to look up now that everyone's past the Christmas slump, but so far the best response I have gotten is the one reprinted below. I'd be hired immediately, but I'm pretty sure I'd be working for a drug dealer. What do you guys think?

Hello Kimber Starling,

Thank you for your signified interest in the position I advertised. I
will explain the logistics of the job as detailed as possible, I am
sorry if you find it somewhat lengthy but I feel I should let you have
an idea of what you will be doing for me.

I have very tight-fitted schedules, which I must admit I find
difficult to keep up with, and for this reason, I need a personal
assistant who will help me with some of the little details of my
schedules; I used to have someone in this position but she returned to
her home country to assume control over a family business that was
left for her to handle after her father’s demise. As much as I do not
want to use her as a yardstick to measure who fills in her position, I
would reiterate, however, that she was very excellent, prompt, smart,
and courteous in her discharge of duties – I am extremely proud of her
work ethics. All I need is someone who is efficient, timely, and most
importantly, someone who carries out instructions as outlined among
other things.

I am Jerry Jones, 52 years old, originally from United Kingdom, I
moved to the United States about eight years ago, and no doubt, I have
been lovingly enjoying it here all the way. I am an international
businessman who deals in oil and gas ventures, and so far, I have been
involved in a lot of other ventures and businesses which I have been
very well successful at, all over the world from Australia, to Europe,
to The Middle East, and many other continents. As I said earlier, I
have a lot to handle and I need the service of a personal assistant to
handle some of the small tasks that I cannot have time to oversee or
monitor.

As my personal assistant, here are most of the works you will be doing:

•    Running personal errands, like mailing off packages (contents of
which you will be aware of) and making calls from a phone I will
provide for you – you will also receive phone calls on the number.
Mainly business calls that you will be privy to.


•    Handling some of my financial activities – paying some clients,
receiving payments from clients, making donations, depositing cash –
on my behalf.

Nonetheless, I am in Abu Dhabi, UAE, for an oil seminar and will be
heading off to Kuwait for another workshop based on energy and gas;
both these trips will take three weeks altogether, and after then I
will return Stateside. While I am away, I have a number of tasks I
want you to handle for me this week and next, if you will be
available. This will as well serve as a stable foundation to predicate
our working relations and ethics.

Also, I will have you know that this position is not office-based at
the moment because of my incessant trips but as soon as I settle in
the next four weeks or thereabout, I will have an office for you – I
am also working on extending my offices to various parts of the States
soon as I finish perfecting my merge with some other firms from
London. But, for now, the tasks I will have for you should not
normally take you more than one or two hours to completion depending
on your time management skills. You may also have something else doing
on the side as you await my provision for a permanent office for you.

As I was saying earlier, I would want us to start things as soon as
possible so I can test your diligence, efficiency, and promptness
towards all these. I would want to believe that you will be up for the
challenge, eventually, we should have a smooth working relationship
between us.

The first assignment I have for you is to run a donation to a cause:
an orphanage home that I am very familiar with had told me about a
child that needs a brain surgery, and I have pledged to have a
donation sent to them in form of the payment method which they have
informed me about. Therefore, upon your confirmation of acceptance of
this job, I will instruct a client that owes me to write and send you
a check, details of which I will furnish you with if and when you have
agreed to start this job.

If you are willing to take up this position, I will need you to send
me the following information accurately (this must also be the
information where the check will be sent):

Name –
Address –
City –
State –
Zip code –
Cell phone number –
E-mail address –


As soon as I receive these information, I will contact you immediately
with details of the task for the week. You should also know that you
will be paid weekly. Your basic weekly salary is $400.00 and there
will also be bonuses as from the second week, provided you have
handled the first assignment flawlessly. God bless you tremendously

Thanks

Jerry Jones

For Your Happiness

I think we could all use a daily dose of something that makes us smile. Today's dose is of George Clooney. No, I don't blindly chase stars, or keep up on celebrity news, but I stumbled on a Clooney interview (found in the January 2012 issue of Esquire) that made me laugh, and followed a link to a Clooney commercial that made me smile. That smile prompted me to share, because, for me at least, smiles are in short supply right now.

Here is the quote from the interview:

"I keep thinking: Now that every single human being on earth has a camera phone, where are all those UFO pictures? Remember you used to see those pictures. Some guy just happened to have a Polaroid when the UFOs appeared? Either it was all bullshit, or my theory is that the martians have decided, "Don't go down there, man. All those fuckers have cameras now."

And here is a fun little commercial he did. Don't worry about him being a sell-out, he used the money to finance a project to keep war criminals in check.



Also, the commercial has a good point. I'd be a lot less unhappy right now if I had some savings. Or woke up married to George Clooney.

Sorry for my Absence, I've been Depressed and Pining

For those of you who follow me religiously (and there are so many of you), you've likely noticed my long absence from the blogosphere. I wish I could say this due to some awesome occurrence, like being called suddenly to be a secret agent in Russia, jetting off on a whim to the Amazon jungle, or even  just fending off a localized zombie apocalypse; but sadly, it was due to none of these things. I was just depressed.

I hate that I wrote "just depressed", which implies that depression is not a serious mental illness affecting hundreds of thousands of people across the country, and which dramatically impedes productivity, engagement in the world, and overall happiness. If I had my way, everyone would get a yearly physical check-up with their doctor, mental check-up with their shrink, and "good-job-for-making-it-to-work" meeting with their boss. Also, you're apparently supposed to visit the dentist every six months, which I didn't know about until two days ago when fiance informed me of the fact. I thought I was doing good to floss once a week and get my teeth cleaned every two years. But regardless of what tooth-care regimen I'm on, mental illness, even "just depression", is a problem which is not acknowledged, recognized, or dealt with by a lot of people, and I wish that would change. So I revise my statement; I was depressed, and it totally sucked.

Now that I'm feeling better and out and about, I can tell you about one awesome thing I discovered during my days of pitiful interactment with the world: Pinterest. Pinterest is a site where you can visually collect and organize all those inspiring pictures, nifty projects, and funny things you find while browsing the interwebs. You can even upload things from your own computer, which I fully intend to do one day, but haven't yet because I haven't made anything pretty enough to put on display. Sometimes I put on my eyeliner really well, but that's not what I'm aiming for in terms of pin-worthy material.

Anywho, if you'd like to check out Pinterest, I suggest you start here, on my very own board of Heart-Breakingly Adorable Dogs. Then start searching for other things you like (food porn, compost pictures, creepy craft projects), and get ready to waste a whole lot of time. I've found I need to set an alarm when going on Pinterest, otherwise I pass out at the computer after nine hours of pining. If Pinterest isn't your thing, that's okay too, I still can't figure out what the appeal of Twitter is, and it honestly makes me depressed that someone is making millions of dollars off of copying Facebook's status button and making a whole site dedicated to single-sentence posts. Not depressed enough to never leave my bed again. Just depressed enough to eat a few extra cookies tonight.