I called my best friend today to wish her a happy birthday.  She said that I was the first one to wish her a happy birthday (other than family) and was glad to hear from me.  I asked her how her day had been, and she said that she had to work today.  She said her feelings were hurt because last week one of her co-workers had a birthday and the co-workers threw a party for her, but no one at work acknowledged her birthday today at all.  I felt really badly about that because she is a really good person and does not deserve to have her feelings hurt like that.

Right before I was ready to leave work, my friend Joann called on my cell phone and I decided to answer it even though i was technically still “on the clock.” I had finished up my shift and was heading for the break room to clock out, so I took a chance that my manager wouldn’t have a fit about me using my cell phone. They can be real jerks sometimes, but this time I just decided to take that chance and if they fussed then I would beg forgiveness. If they want to give me a hard time about something this trivial, then I will start looking for another job. I’m sick of all the BS anyway. I work hard for them and sometimes go way above and beyond the “call of duty” so you would think they would appreciate that and cut me a little slack on the minor things.  Geesh!

Up until recently I had a long life of never been fired. Not even once. I was happily retired and then I suddenly found myself needing to get a job to make ends meet. I thought I was doing a great job, but it appears that my co-workers were feeling threatened by my fast progress in learning my job and they lobbied my boss to fire me. So I was fired!

How do you explain that on a job application? When you apply for a job and you have to do that stupid telephone survey where you don’t speak to a live person and it asks you if you’ve ever been fired, and you reply “yes” you are then automatically disqualified from getting the job! How do you deal with that? You never even get to speak to a live person and explain. And even if you DID explain, do you think that the interviewer would believe you?

Would you just act as if you had never worked there, and don’t even include that job in your employment history? What would YOU do?

I am so glad that I stayed home today and cleaned house instead of going out into that insanity that is called “Black Friday.”  I remember last year when I heard on the news that in New York there was a crowd of shoppers so eager to get into their Wal-Mart that they broke down the doors and stampeded over a Wal-Mart employee, who was trampled to death by the crowd!  That is absolutely crazy and stupid, and I think that this is a very good reason to stop holding “Black Friday” sales in the future.  There really is no need of this insanity!  Stores can hold good sales without all of this craziness going on, for crying out loud!  There has got to be a better way!

I’ve been reading a few articles lately about how one of the things that is going to “save” the planet, and the economy, is “green jobs.” “Green jobs” are jobs that are jobs related to work that are going to have a positive impact on our environment. Yet none of the articles are specific as to exactly WHAT those green jobs are going to be – they are very vague.

The last article that I read indicated that they don’t have to be manual labor jobs, but “green collar jobs” are being considered manual labor jobs. And the article indicated that people would be making at least $15 an hour to start. Well, that’s not the BEST money in the world, but it is pretty good starting pay for someone who is just starting out, so I’d like more information on that! It would be really nice if we could start to see more information about these “green jobs” and how people might get “into” a “green job” whether it is manual labor or otherwise.