In this episode we talk about black empowerment! Great show. Take a listen and drop a comment below.
The Couch Sports Podcast EP. 61 – http://wp.me/p7b2aE-4KF
Tag: humor
“Chewing Gum” on Netflix
Omg I can’t stop laughing at this damn show. I just happened to browse this show on Netflix and Thank God. So should you. Its Larry David “Curb your enthusiasm” funny (with a british accent) 😂😂😂😂
Well, guess what?
I finally got an offer accepted and will be moving soon. This whole dilemma will hopefully be behind me. This is the start of the beginning. My wife is excited and I am relieved to know that I will get this process over with.
I told the new agent (that was my former real estate agent’s ‘assistant’) that “You got more done in one day, than some people could do in months. You are a gifted agent.”
Yes, I know I was hella petty, but so what. I hope that he forwarded that text message to him. He is lucky that I won’t write a negative review about his janky ass.
Here’s my celebration song. lol.
Inside Eddie’s Daydream #10
Lately I have been thinking about some incredible ideas. Of course, I make it a habit to write them down, but I really want to start something new.
I don’t wanna quit my job and backpack in Europe. However, there is a part of me that yearns to start something magical. Something that gives me more passion than money. Each book I read, the vague picture becomes clearer in my head.
I got some other decent news besides the MIL situation. My daughter is entering the age of prekindergarten and we are school hunting {really my wife is the one who is school hunting}, and we have decided that private school would work best for now. My daughter went to one of the prospective schools to participate in an aptitude test of some sort. Long story short, she aced it. The teacher who tested her was aghast and said my child is gifted. She continued on saying that my child would need custom made curriculum, because the other kids wouldn’t be at her level.
Teachers get really irritated at parents who say, “My child is REALLLLY smart!”, because it comes off as pretentious and pompous. I researched information for parents who faced similar situations and came across this blog who slammed parents like me and my wife. Here it is:
I loved how the parent ethered the teacher. Lol.
Seriously, I think they both have a point. The only thing I can do is keep taking my daughter to the library, and doing math with her. Emotionally, my daughter isn’t ready for skipping a grade. That is out of question, but she is reading bedtime stories to HER grandmother at night. Lol. She gets mad at me for trying to read to her, she wants to read to me. Everything will be alright.
10 reasons I will never be slim
Technology has made Americans pretty damn lazy. We have become so damn lazy, that we want everything delivered to us. Google and Amazon now have grocery delivery services.
But Seriously
- I eat food for flavor, not for nutrition– When I chew on my food, I want instant gratification. I want to feel the fat, salts, and sugars rushing through my veins like a crack fiend who is chasing his first high. I am not thinking about how many calories, or how much cholesterol is clogging my arteries. I don’t know how many grams of sugar this McCafe syrup drenched coffee has. My boss is an Asshole, and life sucks, but these salty ass french fries is making me feel appreciated. I am on a blissful high that is incomprehensible for a skinny vegan to relate to. I don’t want to blend a kale smoothie. I already know I am gonna die young, I can’t quit this shit. I wanna stop, but I can’t help but go through the drive-thru to buy some palatable junk. I rationalize the bad behavior by deceiving myself. I can’t view food the way you do. I am a psychopath.
how you look at food.. 
How I look at food 2. I don’t drink enough water– Water to me is the most bland, terrible, emptiest fluid one person could drink. In order to lose weight, I would have to eat less food, and drink more water. Not gatorade, not milk, diet soda, or fruit juice, I would be forced to drink actual water. In order to lose weight I would have to ignore my sugar addiction and be old fashioned. Without paying any attention, soft drinks and sugary beverages can add up to 50 percent of your daily calories. The daily coffee I get at 7/11 with the mini shots of creamer adds up. I would have to drink my coffee black with no additives.
The benefits would outweigh the cons. I wouldn’t be constipated, with questionable breath. More water would mean that my piss wouldn’t be dark as my skin color, it would actually be light colored. I would actually eat when I’m hungry. At this moment, I eat first, ask questions last, when it should be the other way around.
3. I mindlessly eat while watching TV, etc – When I am going through my dvr list of shows to watch, I didn’t even recognize that I ate half a bag of pop chips. If I were skinny, I would have to pay close attention to what I eat, by logging every morsel of food and drink inside my fitbit app. I would have to swap all my dinner plates for my daughters baby plates. I would have to swap buttered popcorn for mashed cauliflower with sea salt and carrot sticks.
4. I buy health junk food, and reason that I’m eating healthy -When I go to my local Trader Joe’s or Sprout’s Market in Los Angeles,Ca. I have a tendency to fall for all the fuckery; Gluten-free Chocolate cake, vegan cupcakes, vegan cookies, brownies, potato chips etc.
Despite walking through Trader Joe’s and grabbing some healthy food, I always manage to negate it with garbage: Trader Joe’s Cookie Butter, Maple butter cookies, ice cream bars, cookie n’ creme spread, chocolate salted caramel candies.
I figure if the food is packaged with all the healthy benefits, it must have no consequences. Im eating so healthy with the other food, this “little snack” wouldn’t bother. And that is another reason why I can’t succeed on a diet.
5. I would have to exercise almost everyday – On top of eating like a toddler and being highly irritable from sugar withdrawals, I would have to find time to exercise. I am so out of shape that a simple jog would feel like an eternity.
I work 60 hrs a week, and finding time to exercise would have to be more important than any other task I enjoy. More likely than not, I would have to go straight to the gym after work, and get it in. 30 mins is cute, but to get great results, I would have to do 45 mins to an hour. By time I get finished, I would feel a sense of self-accomplishment and better confidence. I would feel my serotonin levels increase, which would bring down by bouts of depression and anxiety. I would have no time for family and my wife would complain about me not sharing responsibility for our daughter. In other words, “I want to exercise and do what I want to after work too! Why should you get the autonomy to do what you want to do without repercussions? I am handling too much of the load.” and the nagging would be incessant. When I get home from the workout, I would have to prepare my meal and cook my dinner. Anything that could be microwaved, or inside of a package has too much sodium or sugar to consume, so I would have to cook.
6. I would have to prepare and carry my meals – Every night after my work out, I would have to cook my meal and prepare my lunch for the next day. Most of weight loss is about preparation. Cooking and planning my meal would probably take another hour and a half, 3 times a week. I really enjoy convenience, so this would be a pain in the ass. I like to get up and go, stop at the 7/11,get my coffee and hit the road. I like to stop at wherever my hunger leads me to. Every day I have a different place I like to stop and get my lunch, this would eliminate that routine. Broccoli and wild-caught salmon with blueberries and plain greek yogurt every other day would be challenging. Yes, I would be dropping pounds, but the constant hassle of unlearning bad habits would be tough. In the event I forget my meal, what would be my emergency plan? These would be things I would have to figure out.
7. I would have to ignore the midnight cravings – When you exercise and burn calories, you lose fat, but you also become more hungry. Exercise produces a hormone inside of the body called ghrelin. Ghrelin, is simply a hunger hormone. You produce more ghrelin in your body when you are more active. I am already prone to midnight snacking, so I would have to plan a healthy midnight snack that wouldn’t destroy my entire diet. Sugary carbs would destroy my diet and still leave me hungry in the morning. Having limited choices, I would be forced to ignore these cravings and go to sleep.
8. An un-participating spouse that is oblivious – Starting a new diet is always hard. You declare for the millionth time, that you are finished with eating bad. You rid your pantry of as much fat, salt, and sugar as you can find, and explain to your spouse that you would appreciate it if they don’t bring any junk food in the house. Sensing that you are gonna fail for the 512th consecutive time, your spouse dubiously sighs in disbelief. In the spouses mind, you are gonna start this p90x dvd and quit again like you always do. You will blend ninja smoothies for a month, and go right back to chocolate milk and glazed donuts. You are just on another health kick cause you’ve seen the “Food Inc.” and “Fat, sick, and nearly dead” documentaries on Netflix. When you come back home from work, guess what is on the kitchen counter:
“Jesus Christ!!, Sprinkles cupcakes!” you exclaim. “I got these from a friend at work. She was gonna throw them away, but I decided I was gonna take them home, because I knew you would eat em” the spouse says. Next thing you know you are 3 cupcakes in feeling like this.
9. I wouldn’t be able to use Eat24.com or GrubHub – Technology has made Americans pretty damn lazy. We have become so damn lazy, that we want everything delivered to us. Google and Amazon now have grocery delivery services. Driving to pickup some local food at the Thai restaurant is optional. Eat 24 offers a weekly code that takes 2 dollars off whatever you want to order. Between a couple, that is up to 4 bucks off every week to sit on your ass and wait for the delivery to come to your door. These companies are paying you to stay in the house and eat like a slob. Being that I couldn’t eat any thing that I don’t prepare, takeout or delivery would not be a viable option. Even the so-called “healthy” dishes have obscene amounts of sodium and hidden sugars. Every once in a while I could order, but my spouse would have to be in on it as well. It is no way my wife is giving up her favorite Brazilian “Bossa-Nova” restaurant food, once a month. It just ain’t happening.
10. Food is ubiquitous – There is no escaping food. When you pump gas you have to enter the convenience mart to pay the cashier. Frito-Lay and beverage companies know you are stressed out and looking for instant gratification. They purposefully stock Am/Pm with sweets and fatty foods because they know you are in a weak mental state. Food trucks that sell tacos, burritos, burgers and lobster sandwiches are on every corner, trying to lure you in. Food is a form of communication and celebration, it is at your workplace when co-workers offer to go on a group lunch. It is the after work happy-hour that is hosting a Taco Tuesday you feel obliged to attend. You cannot escape food, because it is EVERYWHERE. You probably will eat something immediately after reading this article. Food is in different cultures and flavors. There is an advertisement that will pop up afterwards when reading this page, that will promote a restaurant deal. A holiday or birthday is coming up where food will be presented. For a fat person, he or she cannot escape food, he or she has to learn how to work around the problem. Alcoholics and drug addicts can cut the drug out by re-routing the streets they take. A overweight person cannot avoid food.
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Let’s pretend you are Black: Ty’Qwonne Blacksten (Part one) of short series
What the F**k is this about! Who is Ty’Qwonne Blacksten?
Yes, you are imagining you look like this and your name is Ty’Qwonne Blacksten… Any coincidences are completely incidental, For fictional purposes only.
Let’s pretend you were born Ty’qwonne Blacksten. You just so happened to be black in a middle-to-lower class income household. You are 17 years old, do not commit any crimes. You like playing video games, smoking weed and flirting with girls. You are not in a gang – though your neighborhood is gang-infested – and you attend the local public high school. You have no tattoos, no idea what you wanna be when you grow up, you just are enjoying your youth. You stay with your mom and grandmother. Your father is not home because he isn’t a good father. He is in jail because he was at the wrong place, at the wrong time.
The Backstory of Dad
Your father was charged as an accomplice to a murder that his best friend committed. As your father was driving home from work, he recognized one of his childhood friends in distress. Your father picked his friend (killer) up, because he(killer) claimed that he was evading some enemies that were chasing him. Being the loyal friend your father is, he helps his friend(killer) escape to a safe location. The father doesn’t know that his friend killed someone. He doesn’t know that his friend committed a crime. The cops search and spot your fathers vehicle, and off to prison he went. Your father had a job as a warehouse laborer. He was a blue-collar man that loved his family and helped young kids get off the street on your block. He was not the stereotypical felon. In your neighborhood, there is an implicit oath that forbids “snitching” or being an informant. This violation is punishable up to death. If your father told on his friend and pleaded innocent, he would place his household in danger. The prosecutor tells your father that either he co-operates, plead guilty, or face 25 years to life in prison. Your family has no savings account for cash. Mom is a postal worker with benefits; a great job, but far from rich. She has no money to hire a decent lawyer, so Dad is stuck with a public defender, who currently is handling 183 cases at one time. The public defender tells him to take a deal because the odds of beating the case are dire. Your father accepts a 10 year bid, and has been locked up since you were 13 years old. You still talk to your Dad and visit when you can, but the stress of everything is getting to you. You are now the man of the house. Mom has incrementally placed more responsibility on you. You have a part-time job at the local Subway restaurant, but the money is slow.
School is no better. You stay in a city called Troose. In Troose there are several gangs.
—-The gangs break down as follows—-
45th Ballstone Boyz (Bloods)- Bulls hats, Red and Black
Hyde St Hustla Crips- Houston Astros hats- Blue and Orange
Aspey Street Mafia Brim Gang- (Bloods)- Burgundy and White (Alabama Roll Tide)
Troose XIII (Mexican Gang)- Silver and Black – Raider Hats
Mezza St Murder Mob- (All races- Biggest gang in Troose) Black and Orange
As you can imagine, this is not an easy place to live. Part two coming soon!
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What I learned about Cruise Boat Vacations
Observation #1.) Anything Goes
All the fat-shaming and looks of disgust will be left at departure. On the boat you will see almost everything that you usually wouldn’t see. People will drink, let loose, relax, and romance like you’ve never seen before. There is a night club on the boat where people go after hours to party hard and let it hang out. I happened to go on a boat cruise that was packed with college kids during spring break. I seen a guy who looked like Tom Arnold attempting to do the “Wobble” with his barely 18 year old girlfriend. If you don’t know what the wobble is, here you go. If you don’t dance to this, you just don’t have a pulse.
Pitbull and Flo-Rida was jamming all through the night, with sprinkles of old-school hip-hop to please the crowd. You are liable to see anything, at any moment. I am thankful that I had someone babysitting my toddler daughter back home. Not for the reason of the Nicki Minaj shaped woman with a thong bikini walking around, but for the next observation. I digress, however, this is why I dislike going to Las Vegas, NV during the weekend. The younger and immature crowd are there -walking along the streets with their eyes glazed like a morning donut- looking for some late night nookie. That’s another blog. So lets move on to the next observation.
Observation #2) Sex
I can only speak for myself when I say this, but man, it felt like we just met all over again. We were jackrabbits. I won’t get too “50 shades of grey” on you guys, but I will say it felt good. When you have the constant pressures of a demanding job/career and raising children, sex becomes an accessory. If you can get to the bedroom and get some while you are both are awake and the kids are sleep, congrats. In cases like me and my wife, we have to get it when its apropos. Having the freedom of no responsibility for 3-5 days felt incredible. I missed my child, but I damn sure miss the “first apartment together” sex we used to have. As I alluded to in the previous observation, ANYTHING GOES!!
Observation#3.) Free Room Service
“I’m gettin’ tired of this sorry mutha$#*ka callin’ me, this about the 20th time in one hour!”
You damn rite, I want the grilled cheese sandwich with the tomato soup, and some chocolate chip cookies on the side. Oh, and before you get off the phone, can you grab some fresh cookies, last time they were stale.
Yes, that was me. It was another opportunity in my life where I had that much more reason to be an obese slob, and mail it in. The food was a 6 out of 10. Nothing that would make you stay in the room and order all day, the dinner service is where the cuisine food is at. Most of these observations depend on what boat you choose to cruise on. They have luxury boats that are sumptuous in taste and design. I just happened to take Carnival; the company that is the McDonald’s of boat cruises. There are some fancy luxury cruises out there that are built like The Venetian on water. So experiences may differ.
Observation #4.)Awkward ass dining situations
Carnival, believes in inclusion when guests come on their boat, and it is no escaping it. I am totally into being a hermit, so this was a challenge. First of all, I had no shoes to wear to the formal dinner. So, my wife went to the local souvenir shop where they only had boat shoes. I looked a hot mess, I felt like a Black version of Skipper on Gilligan’s Island. The only piece missing from my costume was his hat. I felt like a complete clown.
So, there my wife is looking fancy, while I walk into the restaurant looking like the guy above this sentence. Secondly, when I arrive there, I am disgruntled and stoic. I want no parts of a friendly conversation, and they put me next to Mr. Loquacious himself. Boasting gleefully to his wife about all of his accomplishments, as if they just met, he would pause the conversation (while staring directly at us) and wait for me or my wife to interject. I just continued eating my frog legs, while acting deaf, dumb, and blind. This actually worked for me, and the couple eventually left, while me and my wife laughed boisterous and wicked. My wife knew I was being an asshole, and played along with me. lol. Lastly, the breakfast was twice as awkward, but I knew how to break the ice. With me being the only token Black, the table was completely awkward. I could read the biases that were on their faces when they arrived at the table. A white couple from a rural town near Buffalo, NY. sat tense from across the table. I introduced myself and chatted about the NFL with the husband, while having laughs about trivial inquiries. Another foreigner couple who barely spoke at all arrived at the table. Then another couple from Florida arrived. They were friendly and nice. I felt like saying, see it wasn’t that bad. Knowing damn well that I was just as nervous as them. We all exited the table being friendly when passing each other later on.
Observation#5.) Short duration of time spent at destination(s)
You buy an excursion package in Ocho Rios, Jamaica for snorkeling and whatever but only have so many hours to enjoy it. By time you get finished with the rock climbing and your “Eat, Pray, Love” antics, you have an hour and a half to get back to the boat. The boat will be jam-packed before departing, and you need to buy some souvenirs and take selfies to make everyone on Facebook know you’ve been there. The scenery is beautiful and the sting ray farm is amazing, but now it is time to go. The ship is taking off as you look at the people who are basking in the elegance of a magical resort at the beach. They get to stay for the whole vacation. You privately begin to stew in envy as the boat takes off. They get the REAL vacation on the beach. The inverse of that argument is that you may not be a Resort kind of person. Resorts are ran differently. Ships are inclusive, resorts are exclusive. The culture of cruise ships are to mix and mingle with everyone:Make new friends. Good times, Celebrations, Salutations!!. While resorts are more suitable for people wanting privacy and savoring the beauty of the culture. They both are awesome, it just depends on your personality.
Observation#6.) Talent Show
If you had a failed attempt at that 90’s rock band as lead singer, or you are a professional shower singer. This is your chance to get your Alanis Morrisette on. It is the most entertaining thing on the boat.
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Two hood books that I automatically assume you haven’t read
Raised in South Central, Los Angeles -now known as South Los Angeles- Ross witnesses a traumatic incident inside of his household. He witnesses his Uncle’s Murder. Moving to the other side of town, he resides on a street called Flower St, a street that runs parallel to the 110 fwy. Therefore, Ross and his friends became known as the “freeway boys”. He attended the local schools during a time when gang wars were at its prime. According to Ross, he never joined any gangs, even though he lived in the territory of the crips. He attended Dorsey High School and became a tennis star. He had played tennis so good that he was offered a scholarship, until they found out he was illiterate. Once scouts found out he was illiterate, he was of no use to the potential colleges. He ended up like just another Black 18 year old kid with no job or school, looking for a way to fill his idle time.
He started off small, then sold the narcotic PCP, then graduated to cocaine. He made a connection with a Colombian and the rest is history. You already know how the story ends. Drug dealer goes to jail and ends up broke. Well, he went to jail and came out blaming the informant who put him in jail, and the secret service that employed the said informant. The Contra Scandal was the real deal, and it had a catastrophic effect on the Black and African-American community. I was born in 1984, the era of “crack-babies”. So, I am not saying that what he claims happened is false; my gripe is that he diminishes his role, when compared to the macro level. The remorse for the actions he took were minimal, making it seem as if he was only a middle man. That is something that I vehemently disagree with him about. Conscientiously selling drugs to your own people, while seeing how the product affected families, was FUCKED UP. As any true drug dealer would privately admit, the bottom line was money. He apologizes, but only before making it seem accidental. That was what irritated me about the book.
THENNNNNN!
When he got out of prison, he saw that someone stole his alias and moniker. Parading around stage, and doing world tours, a rapper was using his name and image to make entertainment money. He got offended by the business move and took the rapper to court. Wow!!! The irony of it all.
Ridiculous. .
This book is based on an inner-city corrections officer who goes rogue. He talks about the ugly realities that exist inside the American prison system. Drugs, sex, murder, and hard liquor all wrapped into one book. He is vulgar and bawdy throughout the whole book. To be honest, you will need urban dictionary more than Webster’s Dictionary. He keeps it hood and gutter. It is very short and easy to read. By time you get to the part where the female officers are being auctioned off as prostitutes to shot-callers, you will become engulfed in the salaciousness of it all.
As I read the book, I could kind of tell he was pulling stories out of his ass to add shock value. I honestly cannot believe everything that was in this book.
Interesting read considering that nowadays, you have 4G cell phones being smuggled in prison for the right price. It is so rampant at this point, that many women on dating sites have to post “NO GUYS IN JAIL” on their profile.
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Life’s too short for boring books
For the past 3 years, reading has become my new hobby. For certain books I read the actual text via e-book. Other times, I use audiobooks. In this quest, I have given many books the time of day. If a book cannot capture my full attention with meaningful substance within a chapter or two, I am out. I have thugged it out with some of the most celebrated books, just to say I have read it. In my mind, I will one day go to some pretentious wine party. At this festivity they will serve wine and cheese, with caviar and crackers as appetizers. We will have a conversation about the greatest books ever, and they will ask me if I have ever read “Ulysses” by James Joyce, or Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. And I will reply with “Why, Yes. Madam, may I suggest The Great Gatsby or Mark Twain?”
Get the hell out of here!
On the other hand, I don’t wanna be that guy who reads the baseless books that are no better than an American infomercial. “Hey, Eddie! have you read the Kim Kardashian Selfie book?”
Im not trying to be a snob, I have no animus towards the Kardashians. I am just saying that we can’t have a civil conversation about books, if you’re coming at me with these kind of book suggestions. Saying you read a selfie book, is like saying you take medical advice from Dr. Oz.
There are way too many books out there that I haven’t read to be reading mundane books. I have read books that were absolute money grabs. I just read a book today that talks about how athletes are performing better. I am reading the book under the impression that he will provide an aspect that will change what I already know. The ultimate point of his book was that they challenge the odds. 7 hrs of book reading, sums up to him writing about different athletes, who said they were gonna challenge the status quo. Another historical book with 4 star reviews, talking about how immigrant meat factory workers were in disease and death plagued workplaces. Sounds interesting, only problem is that it is written in an antiquated style that takes the strength of 2 Adderall pills to understand. I completed another book of a celebrated cocksure guru, who writes in a book to “Give maximum effort, to achieve maximum results!”. Not only does he give common sense advice, he talks to you like a Pop Warner coach while doing so. I can go on and on. Books are anecdotal. Hence, whatever book causes an epiphany for you, may not cause a breakthrough with me. This is why those “20 greatest books” lists always pisses readers off. No more tedious books for me. I hope you gather the courage to discontinue books that don’t inspire reflective thoughts.
The blunt realities of unemployment
Time
This can be either a positive or negative. If you had a part-time business that you never had time for, now you have a full 24 hours with no excuses. When you are at work all you think about is home. Home is the ultimate goal of the day. Escaping the cubicle, Uber-Car, restaurant, or commercial truck is what we strive to do. When you no longer have the excuse of work clogging your schedule, you are challenged to find ways to utilize time. Idle time can have the most negative impact on your mind. Couple that negativity with anxiety and you have doubts hovering over you like wolf clouds. You now have time to exercise, drop off and pick up the kids from daycare or school, and meet with your spouse for lunch. The converse is that time is working against you. Bills need to be paid on TIME, and unemployment is only temporary. It will run out.
Touching up the résumé
This should be the number one thing that you should do. For most people who have recently faced a job loss, this is essential to the whole process. Your resume is easy to make and gives the future boss a glimpse of the potential employee he or she is getting. If you have no clue on how to make a resume and you are confused, you can always get your 20-something old cousin, or spouse to complete the task. Remember to create another email that is appropriate for a resume. For example, Dirtbike_dan666@hellsex.com is not a good look for that administrative assistant job. JohnSmith@applepie.com is more suitable. Use up to date phone numbers that are current, and use job references of people who are LEGIT. No potheads or alcoholics who can’t hold a decent conversation with someone. You need people who can vouch for you, and speak the language a prospective employer wants to hear.
“Wassup Sir!! Oh that boy Kevin is my Dude. When it comes to his gig he is a beast sir!”
Getting a job is a job
You have to spend countless hours of the day in front of a computer, filling out applications for jobs that you feel you have a 2 percent chance of getting. The job post says that you need over 15 years experience with a PhD in Pseudorectomy (lol), and you only have two years experience at Shake Shack with a Master’s Degree in Zoology. The odds are slim, but you never know. You must be on alert for emails that kindly deny your job application by saying “We appreciate your interest in our company”. There will be constant phone interviews and awkward in person interviews that will be the biggest waste of time. Jobs that will hide the hourly pay or salary from you, until the interview, what is usually less than the unemployment that you are already receiving, before tax. There will be days when you will have to take a city job test for an open job vacancy. Lines will be as long as Black Friday before store opening, and the test will be all the questions you studied for. The guy or gal who aced the test to make it on the top of the availability list, just so happened to be a cousin of the city supervisor. Yes, you will have to accept the fact that nepotism may have played a role, but what can you do? Right before you give up the fight and say “To Hell with this, I’m going to the Army!”, another job you were seeking will finally call you and you will move down the yellow brick road.
Harbor no ill will
Yes, Danny, your ex boss, was an asshole. He would never greet you with the proper respect, when in his vicinity. He would berate you in front the cute secretaries, when he could’ve talked to you in private. Unprofessional as he may be, never talk ill of a past boss or superior. Most industries are connected,i.e., medical field, package delivery, restaurant, or transportation. With the economy being in a frugal state, most companies are becoming conglomerates and merging with each other. With that being said, some employees may have siblings that work for opposing companies. Cousins who are both in sales, one works for Verizon, the other for Sprint. Everyone talks, whether they admit it or not. If you slander Danny, it may offend his brother-in-law Eric, the quiet guy who is assistant operations manager at a job you are trying to score. He will smile gracefully in the interview room, and brood in silence as you exit the premises. Be careful, you never know who knows who.
Become financially literate
As you deal with this stint of unemployment, you will go through some financial turmoil. That fly car with the bells and whistles will most likely be repossessed.The credit score will take a hit. Everything that you rationalized spending crazy money on will go out the window. That 40 dollar cricket wireless phone plan will look more appealing than Sofia Vergara in a scantily clad bikini. You will learn that a quarter will get you a gallon of water, and 5 dollars will stretch far in a Spanish Mercado Carniceria. Ralph’s market will become too snooty for your taste. You may have to hop off the hipster-train and eat non-organic fruits until the checks come back. The ridiculous gym club membership that you never used needs to be cut. The 200 dollar spa retreats that you went on must cease. You may have to go a season without the NFL package until things get better. It stinks, but you have to find a way to make the dollar stretch. This is the time to go to the library and soak up as much knowledge as you can about money. I am not telling you to become a cheapskate for life. I am stating that value becomes more important than price. Unemployment will teach you a lot about money. Its not a way you should be forced to learn, but it will make you more aware.
That’s what friends are for. Right?
Insecurity
Going to an in-laws on Thanksgiving is as embarrassing as undressing in front of a crowd. When you are unemployed it feels like the whole world knows. Random people that you never have met before will approach you with the whole “UPS is hiring!” or ” The coffee shop on Winston Ave, and Bloomington Blvd are hiring”. Of course, they mean well, but it doesn’t sit well with you, when you know that you have been busting your ass putting in applications. Some baby boomers are completely dumbfounded when it comes to job searching on the internet. They make getting a job sound like getting a Snicker bar at a candy shop. They’re all like “Hey, When I was your age, I went down to the Post Office and talked with an Irish fella named Jim O’Malley. I didn’t even have to interview, I was driving a big-rig the next day with no license. Back in my day, you learned on the spot! None of this computer crap.” I’m like “Yeah, you also could snort coke and drive drunk in your day too. Where’s the honor in that?!” The insecurity will be constant, but if you let the right person know, you might be able to land the decent job you’ve been searching for.
Eddie Star Blog 