imaweird:

Hate to get all emo, but yah. It almost, I said ALMOST, made me weepy.

I normally get Bambina to bed early, maybe around 8PM, read her a few stories and then pass out with her for the night. And then I wake up around 1AM and wonder why the hell I’m awake. Stay up for a few to read updates, check the feeds, and then lay back down and wonder where the time all went.

Soon enough it’s 7AM, and I’m struggling. I don’t drink coffee so my caffeine if you will is the radio. Yes I said radio. 88.5 is the joint for me. Soon enough Ms. Thang wakes up and I have to get her fed, get me fed, change her diaper and get her dressed for her day and then I go last. I feel bad as hell when I show up for work late. If I didn’t have a little someone to look after I’d be better at getting there. I’m not a morning person. I am not.

The drive to work has me bumpin something loud, usually some profanity laced hip hop tune. This reminds me now to remove some of that smooth stuff that just gets skipped every morning. Ugh, what a buzzkill. Tupac. Snoop. 50. Kanye. My students laugh at me, but that’s how I roll. Loud.

My birthday was yesterday, and there was the usual talking, singing, laughing…how I love these days. I am normally so uncomfortable with the sound of birthdays, particularly mine because I’m a summer baby, and I never had the fetes around birthdays like my classmates. My birthdays were always with family, and they were small and I hate being the center of attention that way, but in my old age, I have learned to appreciate it and just smile.

Now though, my house is filled with the sounds of gentle snoring of Husbandido and Bambina. I just finished putting two pans of banana bread in the oven for my pops. He loves his breakfast/coffee pastries, so I can’t hate on that. I turned off the TV because now, finally, the house is quiet. I love the sound of typing, and the click of my too-long nails on the keyboard makes me feel accomplished. I miss my writing. I miss my daily posts. Blogging now for over 10 years, it’s something I crave, but something that I need to wait until I have moments like this to myself, and those moments are rare.

So I’ve learned to seek out the quiet spaces in between the ones where I have to put on my work/mommy/wife/daughter/friend hat and take time for me. I hate to be selfish but if only for one hour, it’s all good for me.

Damn this house smells good. Now if you don’t mind, I’m going back to me time.

XO,

Char

Some of you may know that I’ve been out for a bit on the job search. Not that I’m unhappy. Not that I’ve found myself out of a job (but one never knows). It is a great opportunity that just came up, and it’s something that I would love to do, so I went for it.

Last week I had my interview, make that interviews. 9 interviews. 1 presentation. 1 campus tour. 1 lunch with faculty. 1 dinner with vice provosts and directors. This was a two-day interviewapalooza that had me running in high heels (more on that later).

Most of the interviews were with panels. From a small group of three to a larger group of six. There were some high powered individuals who were decision makers on the larger campus level, and there were administrative assistants who were, for all intents and purposes, on the lower end of the feeding chain, but still important. I hardly ate at any of the meals I was attending (and that was expected because it’s largely them peppering you with questions), and it was easy to get tired during the hot days in a suit.

There were highs, and there were lows. Some meetings were just fabulous. I left feeling good about my time and energy, and the group gave back a good vibe. Some meetings were rough enough that I felt like just hanging up my heels and saying this was fun, thanks. To be honest, there was only one meeting that was like that, and I was a little rattled by it.

I guess you can say that if you ever felt that a candidate just wasn’t what you expected, you would just ride it out and allow them to move through the interview. I got those quick microexpressions that felt like weights being added to my chest. I panicked at parts and then quickly just had to rise above it and hope that I could move through it. I was that candidate that was a waste of a lunch hour. *sigh*

Thankfully afterwards I had a meeting with another group of folks who left me feeling more buoyed. It helped to negotiate that bad feeling, but that feeling of aww crap just sat with me, and it changed how I felt about the position overall. What was interesting was that I sat down with the hiring manager and told her about my feelings and my experience, and she was kind enough to talk me through it when I didn’t expect her to do so. I really expected her to just take note of me as That Candidate and usher me to my next meeting, so it wasn’t that bad. It said a lot about her as a person and as a manager.

I had meetings with people two above my pay grade and those went really well, I feel. The presentation was easy and truthfully this was to my strength, and I got great feedback afterwards so that was nice.

Interestingly enough, a lot of the meetings had questions like, “What would you do if…” and it felt like they were wondering more about my ideas not because it would provide some insight into my suitablility, but because they needed an idea and I was the key. It was a weird feeling. Again, my idea hamster card got renewed a few times.

The fun part is on Monday I plan on telling my supervisor that I need a reference.

In short, how did it go? It went well, but that one blip doesn’t sit with me well. The whole two-day affair was like buttah, really. Am I going to get it? There are two more candidates to be interviewed (I anticipated that I was going to be one of two, maybe three. FOUR? dang). I should know by the end of July.

That being said, the thing about heels…I went on a campus tour. It was HOT as shit, and wearing heels on hot day is never a good idea, but you know what, I LOOKED CUTE.

How I suffer for my art.

Wish me luck.

Char

I was walking back from a particularly good meeting with a colleague when I was met by two students. They asked, “Are you a student?”

I love this question. I smiled broadly. At almost 40 years old, this is a welcome inquiry and assumption. “No, I’m not. I work here.”

“Did you graduate recently?”

My day just got 1000% better.

-Charlene

The cabs of Times Square

I joke about this all the time, but the thing that I would love the most is lost time. I could lose a necklace, a shirt, whatever, but nothing smites more than lost time. So that time I spent watching crap movies? Gimme that back. Those endless meetings where all I needed to do was update the group with two sentences? I want that time back too. Two times! ;-)