This is it!

After about a year of thinking about it, I'm shutting down FBB. I thought for a long time that I was just taking a break but now it's clear that it's over. I think of entries and write them in my head, like I used to, but now they float right out of my brain after I've "written" them. They don't linger like they used to, pestering me until I put them on the page for you all to read. The reason, I think, is clear.

I started this blog a few years ago as a way to make me write, on a daily basis, and as a way to counter my corporate existence. Now, I write daily on my scripts and I no longer have the corporate life. Weird how that works. Perhaps the blog willed my new life into existence. Now when I have thoughts that I might have explored in the blog, I explore them in my stories or jot them in a journal to be explored another time. The personal exposure got me into a bit of trouble as well and turned me off of the full disclosure feeling of the blog. But again, a script is as personal as writing can be and everything I am not putting down here will end up at some point on the page.

Thank you dear friends and readers! This site will remain archived at: http://fluffybunnybutts.blogspot.com/.

Using my skills to rebuild America

I don't have to tell you that a lot of people are losing their jobs these days. I was laid off last year from a job that I had just relocated for. It seemed like the perfect time to volunteer my services, expand my skills and network with other people in my field. I was excited to find Taproot, an organization that assembles teams of professionals to tackle a specific need for a non-profit. Taproot utilizes the skills that you've spent your career developing and applies them to non-profits who desperately need but cannot afford your expertise. They've developed a system that keeps the project on track so that it doesn't become more hassle than it's worth. You can request to work for organizations that appeal to you and are able expand your skill set by applying for more than one area of experience.

I've worked in marketing for ten years and while I'd been moving in the direction of being a brand strategist, it wasn't something I could call myself yet. After the orientation, I was interviewed by Account Executives and selected to work on a project in that capacity. Through this experience, I learned about a new business sector, had the opportunity to work with talented people that I would be thrilled to work with again and was able to push myself to deliver a brand strategy that everyone was excited about. Never in the corporate world have I encountered such a pure dedication to a project and to a client. Every time we met as a team, we were impassioned and energetic about what we could do for our client. It showed in the results and in the way we won them over, from skepticism to praise.

Around the same time, I met a woman at a dinner party who worked for an education nonprofit. She'd been thinking about applying for a Taproot grant but hadn't yet done it. I've always been very passionate about education so I volunteered to help her out and ended up writing and producing a brochure and then writing and releasing a press release for her company. They were both great experiences that gave me confidence in tackling something totally new and in being able to commit myself and deliver. As it turned out this company was looking for marketing leadership and were very impressed by the work I did for Taproot. I don't know yet if I have the job but I can say for certain that working and developing my skills was infinitely more valuable and rewarding than sending out resumes.

If you've been inspired by our new president this past month, consider donating your skills to a nonprofit – especially if you've been laid off, your hours cut back or your freelance work has dwindled. Taproot operates in seven cities and needs professionals in project management, marketing, creative services, human resources, information technology and strategy management. Or just volunteer the next time you hear someone say they need help. Let's rise to the challenge set forth by Obama of helping each other make America stronger.

An artist in corporate clothing

Last week I interviewed for job I'm still being considered for here in the Bay Area. It's another one of these marketing meets filmmaking type positions, that in reality is all project management with enough marketing for me to convince myself it's a creative job and enough connection to filmmaking to convince myself that it's related to what I'm really interested in. They told me that two people would be selected from this round to meet the SVP of Marketing and then the decision would be made. I got an email right away that I was one of those two.

This is the job that I gave the presentation for and had a sick feeling afterwards. I thought they were they were not enthused with my ideas, I thought they were grilling me because they didn't think I was qualified. Neither was true. I'm realizing now that everything that happens, is happening inside me. What I see on the outside is only a reflection of what's happening in my mind. It may or may not even be happening!

It occurred to me that I still didn't know why I was even continuing to interview for it. I wondered if it was because I don't like to leave things undone and I didn't want to walk away from an opportunity without understanding fully what the opportunity was. Maybe I thought if they made me a good offer, I'd stay for a little while and do my thing later. "Do my thing later?" Then I realized I didn't even know what the salary range was for this position. When the HR assistant emailed me to set up the next interview, I asked. The salary range was far below what I was expecting and what I would have asked for. Interesting.

Now, all of a sudden, it seems easier to walk away from this position. It becomes the final vote to do my own thing. But it wasn't! Somehow this threw me into an even crazier loop because it made me start to understand that it really doesn't matter whether I have a job or how much the job pays. I reviewed the benefits for the company: Three weeks vacation, over a week of holidays and the time between Christmas and New Year off, free gym and classes, free lunch twice a week, flexible work weeks, free counseling, first time home buying assistance, a $5,000 rebate if you buy a hybrid, paid jury duty and volunteer hours, discounts, free tickets, on and on and on. This is why people want to work there. This is why they can hire people who are over qualified and pay them less than they're used to getting. It's not a stepping stone to something else, this is a lifestyle.

After a talk with the HR gal, she said she could add $10k to the top end of the range and with the potential 20% bonus, it was within $8k of the low end of my range. I felt my throat clench and my stomach turn. I felt myself in danger of considering this job (that I haven't been offered yet) even as everything that came out of my mouth was meant to get them to go away. It was like when I was trying to break up with the last guy I dated: he was perfect on paper but he made my stomach turn. I decided to go to the last interview anyway, wait for the offer and then consider it. The SVP asked me very directly why I wanted the job. My answer was weird, weak and unconvincing, even to me. I couldn't think of a reason in the world why anyone would want this job. All of a sudden it made sense why they keep asking me that question.

A friend of mine asked me the same question only an hour earlier and my answer to her was honest. For this and the last three jobs I've considered, I wanted them "because of the potential that it could help my film career." That was my only answer. I couldn't believe it. How absurd! I'm too afraid to pursue what I really want so I look for it in a job. There's a part of me that wishes I could just get a job in a great company like this one, buy a house, meet a guy, get married and make a bunch of babies and friends who like to ski and camp and take trips together. As the years pass, however, more of me begins to accept that I'm just not that person. I'm an artist. I have more ideas than could ever be utilized in a job and at the end of the day, the only thing that matters to me is expressing myself. I can live without the other stuff but living a life without sharing my ideas and creating art with like minded people isn't living; it's dying a slow, comfortable death. I've spent the last three years discovering what came to me yesterday afternoon in an instant. I *don't* want that job, I never did and no one is convinced that I do, even if they see how my ideas and energy could benefit their company.

Starting my own business is also, I realize, not a means to financial independence in the usual sense. I'm not looking for a business idea that will make me rich. Living in this world of tech startups and VC capital has made me think that I probably could. I certainly have the ideas and smarts and enough talented friends to make it happen, but it isn't what I want. What I want is to make movies. That's it. Documentaries, shorts, features, low budget, big budget, webisodes, it doesn't really matter, as long as it's a film. I had a boss once who said my problem was I have "too much potential." He said that it would be hard for me to stay committed to art because I was capable of too many other things. He said that in 2002. It's true that choice can be paralyzing. It is extremely difficult to intentionally give up the earning potential of a steady career to be an artist. There's no clear path, no guarantee of success and no automatic respect in title.

When I get emails from actor friends, desperate for a job because they're flat broke, or when I hear filmmakers talking about spending everything they have on a film that didn't pay out, it scares me. This is a life of poverty and uncertainty, sometimes temporary, sometimes not. All of this time I've been accusing myself of running away from security, responsibility and commitment because I didn't have a solid career, a husband and a house. It turns out, I'm not not running away from anything, I'm just fumbling towards where I belong. The truth is, I do want those things, but not at the cost of giving up who I am.

I have a plan

My friend Natalie called me yesterday, distraught. "You're leaving San Francisco?!" It was only an hour and a half after posting my blog. I had already told most of the people here and many people in Los Angeles that I was thinking about it but not everyone knew.

"Yes," I said, "but I'm moving back to L.A., I thought you'd be happy. Why are you upset?"

"Because San Francisco is just so YOU!" she said.

I laughed. "Well, San Francisco isn't going anywhere, I can come back anytime!" Of course I love it here, of course I'd love to stay but I need to make a transition right now and can't do it while I'm paying $1,885/mo. rent. It's an expensive place to live. I could live more cheaply and have roommates but I don't want to. I was willing to do that when I lived in L.A. because I was pursuing something I was passionate about. That's the problem. In order to stay, I have to get a job that pays enough to afford the lifestyle of a single person in the city and with the money running out, I don't have the luxury of time to find the right opportunity.

Today, while on this call, I realized that none of these jobs will allow me to do what I enjoy. I also understood why I keep being drawn to marketing but find myself constantly disappointed by the jobs I've had. This morning I wrote down all the aspects of marketing that I like. Amazingly, they're all the reasons that I love filmmaking! I like telling a story, creative problem solving, collaboration and tapping into something that is meaningful to people. I love organizing information, research, using logic and intuition to come up with a strategy, testing my theories, seeing them work and making them better. No job is going to let me do all that. Even if companies SAY they want a person to do those things, in reality the job will be waiting for projects to start or be approved, fighting to keep a project from being ruined by the short-sightedness of other people, maintaining the lame status quo, putting together Powerpoint presentations that fabricate the effectiveness of the project or spending money in useless but high-profile ways.

See, I want to make an impact. The reason I like volunteering is because the people I'm working for need me. They WANT strategic marketing and they're willing to let me do what I'm good at. The fact is, I assured Natalie, I have a plan. I'm launching a company that provides a service to small businesses that will make a real and immediate impact for a relatively low cost. This is a simple, down-to-earth idea that provides a necessity. No bullshit, no fluff, no ego, or waste of time and money for something "cool" that means nothing. This is a company that I'm uniquely qualified to run, working for companies that I feel passionate about. I'm so excited about it. It started to come to me over the last few months when I found myself pitching and selling this idea in my interviews, more effectively than I was selling myself! While on the phone with Natalie, it all came pouring out of me, clear as day. Of course! I even thought, maybe I should write a book about it: "My year at mom's."

Fun sucking, time wasting, age discriminating technology

I am seriously about to shoot my computer. Is it just me or is anyone else having trouble with Gmail? I swear I have to quit it constantly, try it in another browser, it just doesn’t load or when I click an email it “refreshes” but nothing happens. My browser gives up. I force quit. After I while I get a message that the program has stopped responding, do I want to force quit? YES! Damn it, I just told it to do that. Grrr. I restart. I try it again, after five minutes of trying, I am finally able to login again. There are seven new emails since I last had access an hour ago.

I’ve been at the computer for three hours already. First I discovered that my move of my iTunes music from my computer to an external hard drive didn’t quite work. It was loading an old library. I replace it with the new library. Now the old songs aren't in it. I recopy the songs, now I have 4,000 duplicates. OMG. It can’t find the original songs now, just the new ones. WTF? I have to delete the duplicates but oops, my favorites are not marked on the new imports. I have to manually mark them first.

I get that done but now I have to rebuild my set lists. That was relatively painless and I finally update the iPod for my impending trip to the UK. I still haven’t figured out how I’m going to recharge the thing after my 11 hour flight…can I plug it into someone else computer and charge? After that, I upload the photos from yesterday’s brunch. I tweak color. I export. I upload to Flickr. I rename, I tag, and I organize. This is about the time my browsers want to poop out. I have about 12 tabs open of links I want to include in blog posts. I copy the links into a Word document. Oh lord, I think Word is about to give up too. I’m just going to restart.

It’s a good thing I’m unemployed. Otherwise, how would I possibly have time for all this technology? Then it occurs to me that half of my workday must have been spent wrangling with technology. Skpying with friends and coworkers, usually about nothing, reading and responding to emails, setting up my Pandora stations, and trouble shooting performance problems. But I was getting paid!

Since Saturday, I’ve written three blog posts in my notebook but they haven’t shown up on my blog yet because of the pain of sitting down and wrangling with technology to get them done. I can’t think with all this wrestling going on. Last week I spent several joyous hours shuffling video files and music from various hard drives to make room for a new video project. Technology has the maddening dual effect of making things much more accessible while also sucking the fun out of them: for me, filmmaking, writing and marketing.

There’s nary a profession these days that isn’t affected by the technology fun sucking phenomenon. My dad became an engineer because he wanted to build things but found himself instead, 20 years later, a programmer who hadn’t built anything. That’s when he quit and starting building houses. He draws the designs on the computer but it’s still a world barely touched by technology. Hairdressers are one of the rare few professions that haven’t changed. People will always have hair and it will always need cut. It’s pretty basic.

But even worse than fun sucking is the experience invalidation. A woman told me in an interview that she’d rather hire a person with two years experience with widgets than a person with ten years marketing experience (me). Seriously? I think it’s probably always been like this but I’ve always been on the receiving end of that short sighted discrimination; the belief that young people are naturally more able to understand what’s going on in the world. I can’t think of anything more preposterous. I suppose the same people who ten years ago thought the person with the most experience was the most knowledgeable are the same ones that think a 24-year old with two years experience is the most hip.

Here's the truth, there are people who are naturally curious, clever and are always changing. It doesn’t matter how old they are or how much experience they have, they are the ones who will do the job well.

Scared stupid

Even though I started working part time a month ago, I have done very little in the way of finding a job. Looking for a job is probably the most depressing thing I ever have to do. I will literally do anything to avoid it. The biggest problem is the jobs themselves, they all sound dreadful and not like something I would ever want to do for any amount of money. Then comes the dreadful realization that I have to do one of these god awful jobs if I expect to continue making delicious vegetables from the Farmer’s Market and sitting on my down-filled couch to watch my Netflix movies, and traveling to see my friends and family and buying new music and sleeping in my comfortable bed. Basically everything hinges on money coming into my bank account, which isn’t happening at the moment.

Working is easy. Getting up, putting on clothes and going to a job is a piece of cake. And honestly, I’ve never had a job that I thought was difficult. Stressful at times, perhaps, because people are involved. Politics, egos and emotions are hard to deal with, not work. But looking for a job is a whole different story. I don’t like talking about myself, I don’t like selling myself, and honestly I think my resume is a sad reduction of my potential as a worker and human being. Certainly I’m capable of much more than that piece of paper can explain. Usually the jobs are so reductive that it isn’t an issue, until now.

Tomorrow I go to interview for a company that, and I’ve never used these words to describe a company before, is unbelievably cool and awesome. They innovate, they solve problems, they come up with ideas and they produce them. They’re interested in what I’m interested in: how to make things better, why people do what they do, what people want, how to fix things that should be easy to fix, making life better. My first interview was over the phone and I all I did to prepare was look at their website. I took it at work on a conference phone and just winged it. I must have done well because they want me in person, but I literally had no idea the company I was interviewing with. I even referenced their fact sheet that I printed from their website, as if I had done my homework!

Now I’m completely freaked out. I feel like I just got lucky on the first interview. Everything I said on the call was in line with their company philosophies because I naturally am aligned with this company. I didn’t have any prepared answers and yet my responses were so right on, it must have seemed like I prepared them. Halfway through the call the ladies started asking what I liked to do for fun. I don’t think I’ve ever been asked that in an interview and I had no idea what to say. I stuttered and muttered and said something about being a geek and going to panels on environmental sustainability. Clearly, that does not accurately describe my fun time. But it made me realize they were looking at me as a person, not just a worker.

I have sat at my computer for the last two days trying to think of a way to put a cool presentation together, something that summarizes my experience or maybe some ideas for their company. Everyone must want to work here, and they must have a dozen or more super qualified and excited candidates. How can I make myself stand out? I’m literally frozen with fear and haven’t done anything. All the work I’ve done at other jobs seems so lame, most of it is lame, so how do I crow about it? After more than ten years in this business, I still feel like I’m waiting for my chance to shine. Self-help books always say if you're afraid, you're probably going in the right direction. Well I'm terrified, so maybe this is it.

Here's an example of what they design:


This company employs experts and thought leaders, TED types. I feel like a wanna be, a groupie in the presence of the greatest band ever. Why aren't I someone? Why aren't I an expert? I've been out of college for over a decade and feel like all I've done is grow my interests and potential. So much potential. So many interests! But where are my accomplishments? Why is it that I feel so unfinished, like I haven't even started taking shape yet?

Landing on my feet

My ex-boss was at my house the other day to tape his segment of the goodbye video I was making. He’s also leaving the company. He watched the video and said that it was bittersweet; clearly everyone believes the best days of that company are behind them. He said that I wouldn’t really understand, as someone who’s never questioned their path. Say what? “Well,” he said, “in my interactions with you, you seem like someone who just goes where the universe takes you.”

I couldn’t believe it. Really? I assumed he meant because I dropped everything and moved to the Bay Area for a job. Then he continued, “I mean, I know you’re disappointed about this job but I really think it brought you to San Francisco for something better.” It remains to be seen but I sure hope he’s right. He asked me how the job hunt was going and I told him about this company I was interviewing with. Oooh, he said, they would look great on my resume. It struck me that maybe he was right. I’ve never taken a job or even considered a job based on how it would look on my resume. I’ve done things that I think would be fun or because it was something I wanted to learn.

Before I left Seattle for LA, I was offered a job as to start up an account department by a friend and ex-coworker. I turned it down, saying that I was going to be an actress and move to LA. My friend said he didn’t care how long he had me but I should come. When I thought about it, he was the best salesperson I knew and I ended up taking the job so I could learn from him. I stayed for two years and then went to LA. Ten years later, I’m still trying to live that experience down, in a way, because people want to keep me in that box. My resume defies definition, which isn’t usually a good thing. One company I interviewed with, the last time I was unemployed, told my recruiter “I didn’t know what I did.” In reality, they didn’t know what they wanted and were hoping my resume would tell them.

I asked my friend and co-worker about my boss’ comment. She concurred that I do seem like someone who goes with the flow and doesn’t get stressed out about things. Isn’t that amazing? I certainly don’t feel like that. She said, “it’s not a bad thing, like you’re just a flake or lazy, you just seem very confident that you’ll land on your feet.” Now that’s a phrase I’ve heard a lot. But what kind of person needs to always be landing? I know many people who never seem to fall but I’m falling all the time so thank god “she lands on her feet,” eh? I guess I have always been terrified of life always being the same, and maybe that stability is something for me to always strive for while keeping things interesting in my own unique way.

Let's start a village

I'm going to do that mashup thing again where I look at a bunch of dots and posit whether they're connected. Here's the first dot. In the 1970's James Lovelock, a chemist and inventor, then working for NASA, published a radical theory: The earth is not a magically self-regulating planet that has always been and will always be, it is a living organism of which we are all a part. It was the first time people were asked to think about our role on this planet as something other than just beneficiaries of all it has to offer. In his latest book, "Revenge of Gaia," Lovelock declares that humans are doomed, global warming is irreversible and by the end of the century, over 6 billion people will die of droughts, floods, disease and hunger.

In an article in Rolling Stone, Lovelock talks about the ones who will survive by recalling a story about a fire on a plane. Everyone stayed in their seats as they were told, frozen, while the few that survived did so by crawling over their fellow passengers and climbing out the windows. The majority of people are going to stay seated during this crisis and die in their seats. It made me think of The Terminator and how Sarah Connor, knowing what was coming, started preparing herself for the fight ahead. According to Lovelock, there are only two ways to survive this - either by going primitive or by going super high-tech. I think it may be a combination of both but the people who can live in a more primitive way, by growing their own food and creating their own energy, will be at a great advantage.

Which brings me to the second dot. An article in National Geographic was talking about the shanty towns near Bombay and then a friend recalled the same story, something he'd witnessed in Mexico City. Enormous populations of people, hundreds of thousands, have built cities from the ground up, by themselves with no developers, no infrastructure, no government support. While poor, these communities are thriving. They have power, they have water, they've built industries and services, their places are clean and nicely kept and they are carbon neutral. These are the greenest cities in the world; everything is recycled or reused and there is no excess. If there is any kind of collapse in our energy supply or our economies, these communities will be impacted the least. Apparently one in six people lives in a squatter town and that number is expected to triple by 2050.

Then I heard one of the most exciting ideas yet in a PopTech lecture by Adrian Bowyer, a challenge to the concept of money. If every home had a small robot that could manufacture any item - a comb, a bowl, a fork - from a resin made of starch grown in the backyard (i.e. corn or potatoes) and those items went right back into the earth when we were done with them, would we have the same need for factories and therefore, money? He quotes science fiction writer Iain Banks who said that "money is a sign of poverty" to illustrate that we would be richer if we didn't need money at all.

Finally, I keep having a certain conversation with my friends about how disillusioned we are with work and its role in our life. These are people scattered all over the country who don’t know each other. They’re all about 30-45, some married, some with children, some homeowners but what we all have in common is that we grew up middle-class, we went to college and we have to work for a living. A rough illustration of who these people are:

- A single guy in D.C. who likes photography, traveling and Jazz. Works in film restoration, which he likes, but there's not much work and it pays very little.
- A recently married woman in North Carolina, about to have a baby, who works as a graphic designer. Loves designing but hates working all the time.
- A new mother and writer in Santa Monica who has to hire two nannies so that she can work when she'd rather spend the time with her baby but can't afford to.
- A single guy in Los Angeles who works a web producer. He loves computers so spends his time in front of one any way but continually has jobs that require 60-hour work weeks.
- A woman in New York working as a teacher whose job is so stressful, she couldn't do it without her live-in boyfriend helping with house work and daily chores.
- A single woman in San Francisco who has spent the last ten years pursuing a career but finds herself unfulfilled by the work.
- A bi-coastal young man, recently out of college, who's already frustrated with the fact that work takes him away from the projects he feels passionate about.
- A woman with a teenage daughter in the Bay Area who finds herself more motivated than everyone she works for and can't figure out how to dumb herself down.
- A single woman in Los Angeles who wants to help people in her native Cambodia but makes ends meet by working at an interactive agency.

We don’t have enough time to do what we enjoy because we spend our lives working and yet don’t make enough money to buy more time. In the jobs, we’re frustrated with others’ lack of commitment or in the company itself and feel that we deserve better. But in the pursuit of a better job in a better company we finally come to realize that work does not fulfill us enough to justify the time spent doing it. Most of us work to create or promote the sale of goods, goods that we use the money we earn to buy. By any measure, it’s not an efficient use of our time.

My friends are ready to quit this rat race of working and buying and are ready to move somewhere quieter, live a simpler life and grow our own food. The problem, I suppose, is that we’re all cultural people who need other people and art to stimulate us and aren’t really the kind of folk you find in rural towns. Back in April of 2007, I wrote that servitude sucks and that we've been duped because more "primitive" societies enjoy abundant free time. Now, it seems, I'm hearing the same thing from everyone: How do we get to a place where LIVING is what we spend most of our time doing instead of WORKING?

And connecting all these dots, I had an idea. A communal village of like-minded people. We want to grow our own food and learn to make our own energy and live without cars. We want to raise each other's children and imagine a society of the future and sometimes watch 30 Rock. Do you think it's possible? It would have to be in Canada, somewhere north that will be less impacted by global warming. I saw a fantastic photo in National Geographic (a similar one I found on the web is here) that shows a village in Israel, built to be egalitarian in that everyone has equal access to school, church, and other community buildings, in the center of town, but everyone also owns a piece of land, on the outside of town. It's limited as to how many people can live there, about 750, and everyone is independent and yet totally connected to each other.


It looks good. It looks real good. What do you think y'all? Ready to buy some property in Alberta?

Feeling a little vulnerable

Last weekend was pretty rough for me. The loss of purpose in San Francisco suddenly hit me. I missed my friends in L.A., I missed my mom, I missed my apartment in Santa Monica, I missed walking on the beach there, my yoga class, and being able to go to a movie, or even make one at the drop of a hat. A beautifully sunny weekend, after weeks of rain and cold, seemed to make me even more homesick.

It’s true that I was ready for a change or I would not have taken the job up here but it did happen very suddenly. Back in August, I literally dropped everything and without saying goodbye, left L.A. and seemingly, filmmaking. This job was an amazing opportunity, something that would have opened a lot of doors for me and without getting to do it, it’s over.

So I find myself adrift in a strange place with only a friend or two and suddenly facing the consequences of moving. We were told today that my boss is leaving, with three days notice, and it’s likely our department head is as well. He told us that this was the most ambiguous time in our department in the six years he’s been here. Then he told us the story of the lobster who, in order to grow, has to shed his shell and make a new one. But while it’s growing, the lobster is very vulnerable and has to find a place to hide so as not to be eaten. He suggested that now was such a time and for us to take care.

It’s possible that the doors that are meant to open for me here have already presented themselves and it took me leaving L.A. to appreciate what I had there to figure out what I want. I’m just feeling a little vulnerable while I’m growing.

A roaring bonfire of possibility

I'm going through a cynical phase; at least I hope it's a phase! I think it started about two years ago: I was in a bad relationship and had fallen out of love with the industry. Even though I had just scored a tiny part on The O.C. and was cooking up some more short film ideas, I just felt like I had tried and I had failed. I never thought I'd feel like that, I never thought I'd feel so drained and spent and unsure if what I was doing was right. So in the absence of all those things, I took a job that would pay me a decent wage, something I'd lived without for five years.

I've changed jobs four times since then and ended the relationship but have been single for over a year, and not feeling particularly hopeful about that part of my life either. And now, five months after taking a job that I moved here for, I'm going to be out of work again. My super cool project got killed when leadership changed and funding got cut. But it has been a bumpy ride and there's a chance, it's all for the best. According to my horoscope, which I don't put much stock in except when it seems to kind of be right, the last two years have been putting me to the test but I'm about to finally break out on my own and reap the rewards that I so richly deserve.

Recently I befriended a young man who was supposed to work on my cool project. He's a very talented filmmaker and is just full of life and enthusiasm. He makes his living doing what he loves, has won awards and spent a year traveling the world but there's not a whiff of pretension about him. He's incredibly sweet and down to earth and curious about everything. I don't register any of the doubt and fear and questioning from him that I suffer from, he seems to just do what he loves without any of that.

We were having a drink the other night and I felt like everything that came out of my mouth was cynical, doom and gloom, been there done that, this is what I've learned in the school of hard knocks bullshit. How is it possible, I wondered, that with only ten years between us I'm such a curmudgeon? Has life really been that hard? I'm still young, I have no debt, I'm capable and passionate and curious and the world should still be my oyster. Have I always been this way? People say I'm an eternal optimist but maybe I'm just stubborn and keep going because I'm a creature in motion, not necessarily because I believe in the future.

It seems so long ago, those ten years, yet I remember feeling so different. I think the challenge is not to revert or try to recapture youth, because that isn't possible. You can't unlearn, undo or take back an experience. Even though we "forget," those experiences alter us forever. We are changed by our years. We can, however, let that wisdom be more of a backseat driver than a front seat driver. Shopping with a girl friend last weekend, I saw a huge photo of a teenage girl short shorts and long slim legs. I said to my friend, "Wow, if I'd known then how fleeting those great legs were, I would have worn more short shorts!"

After a minute, it occurred to me that I wore nothing but short shorts, skirts and dresses through my entire teen years. Only once in recorded history did I cover my legs at school. It must follow, then that there are now fleeting moments that I may not be fully appreciating, or more accurately noticing that I'm appreciating. Much of my malaise, I think, is in looking at what isn't instead of what is. (Ironically my annoying ex-boyfriend, the "bad" relationship mentioned above, told me this about our relationship.) Years from now I'll be saying "When I lived in San Francisco, I should have done more ..." or "If I'd known ... while I was working in Silicon Valley, I would have ..." I am already kicking myself for not making more movies when I was in Los Angeles where I have people and friends who wanted to make movies with me. I made everything so difficult, too important, and I focused on what I didn't have (time, money, energy) instead of what I did have (friends, a camera, a computer, ideas).

I think it's easy to be cynical, especially we get older. All the evidence we've gathered over the years supports the theory that life is hard. Everything in the newspaper supports the theory that people suck and we're all gonna die. (I just started getting The Economist which surely isn't helping my mood). But the fact is that hope begets more hope and gloom begets more gloom. So here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to start looking at what I have and I'm going to capture each spark of hope and fan the flames until I am a roaring bonfire of life and possibility.

Is your job cramping your style?

I feel like a broken record. I'm even tired of hearing myself THINK the same thoughts. I never get enough sleep (about 7 - 7.5 but I really need 8+), I don't get enough exercise (really, appallingly, almost none), my job is stressful and my back and neck always hurt, and I don't have enough time to blog (my notebook continues to fill up with handwritten half-written blogs that never make it to the computer). Some of this is because I don't have the right workstation. I need to buy a desk but it has eluded me despite throwing hours and hours at the task.

Some of it is the job, and now I need to find a new one which I liken to looking for a new husband in the middle of a divorce, absolutely the last thing I want to do! I just want to lick my wounds for a moment and contemplate my next move without the constant threat of eviction and insurmountable debt hanging around like vultures waiting for me to keel over. An acquaintance at work asked me how the job experience has been and to my surprise, my response was not that positive! Not that sweet or politely political. I mean, I've only been there six months, how could it be that bad? I honestly think I'm just not cut out for the corporate world. All the layers and positioning and egos and bullshit, it's a lot to decipher and I feel too vulnerable and too transparent for it.

But I learned something really valuable tonight at a brand lecture I went to that might explain it. This woman speaking said to make sure to carve out an area of incompetence. People who are too good at everything get volunteered for way to much work, and they drown. The key is to make sure everyone knows that you're really bad at a couple of things. That way, you'll only have to do what you're good at, you'll excel and up the ladder you go!

I could also complain that my apartment is too f'ing cold, I hear sirens blast by 3-5 times a night, and I spend way too much money. Every weekend I'm trying to loosen the knots in my back and neck with drinks, dinners, chocolate, shopping. For the most part, I'm spending everything I have with reckless abandon. And I have company. One recent outing for a desk in the $200 range led me to contemplate a desk at $350, then $500, then $900 before I gave up on the whole thing. Modern life isn't easy and jobs seem to take up way too much of our time and energy. I spoke to three good friends and my brother on the phone over the weekend and we spent most of it talking about work. In the private sector and in non-profits, there are the same problems of greed, incompetency, bad management, lack of leadership and vision, nepotism and politics.

I think the moral of the story is that I have to carve out an area for myself. If I dial down my capabilities at work, I won't have too much to do, I won't be as stressed, I'll have more time to exercise, more energy to blog and won't feel the need to shop as much. Now I just have to think of something to be bad at!

Give up the plastic bag!

I've fallen out of writing again (again!) but maybe have another good excuse. The project I was hired to manage, the job I moved for, is “on ice” which basically means it’s been killed. It’s technically on hold but who knows for how long and in January the woman I’m filling in for could come back or the head count could get cut, which means I don’t have a job anyway.

Once again, I find myself reevaluating my self, my work, my life. Life is definitely more difficult when everything goes topsy turvy every few months. Last year I planned to move to Santa Monica to be closer to a boyfriend who I then ended things with because he was breaking my heart. I had already quit acting so I decided to move to Santa Monica anyway to ease my dislike of LA and the questioning began. Then this year, I started another relationship, ended that relationship, quit my job, started a new job, got laid off, was unemployed for three months, got another job, then got hired away by this one, and then moved to San Francisco.

You might think I’m just indecisive but I don’t think that’s it. I think I’m searching for something and I’m just processing my experiences a lot faster than I did when I was younger. Where I would have stayed in a job or relationship for two or three years, I now only need a few months to know if it’s right or wrong. And I value my time so much more. Every weekend I feel like I cram as much fun time as I can into my two days.

This weekend I bought green zebra striped tomatoes, the last of the heirloom crop for the year, at the farmer's market. I went with a friend to Golden Gate Park and climbed to the top of the tower in the de Young art museum for the most amazing views of the park, the city, and the bay. We went to a craft fair and bought a postcard from a woman inside her self-made "postcard machine," and then headed to the Conservatory of Flowers to see lowland and highland tropical plants and orchids. I went to a charming holiday party and socialized with my co-workers. And the next day met another friend downtown to see the latest exhibits at SF MOMA and then to the Ferry Building for a beer and some chowder (I ate animals!).


But tomorrow morning I'll be back on the bus and back in my (for now) routine. I always sit if I can on the side of the bus that faces west. After we leave the city, with the morning sun glinting off the buildings with a honey glow, and past the airport where I once saw a plane fly silently towards me as if in slow motion from a huge cloud so that it looked like a shark swimming out from behind a coral reef, I love to watch the fog fingering its way through the mountain ridges above the reservoir where these little white birds are migrating. It makes me so happy to see animals, like a little deer leaping or a snowy egret landing near the road, a small herd of cows chomping grass or a horse shaking his mane, but what I see way too many of are plastic bags.

Of the debris along the road, almost all of it is those flimsy plastic bags that every store wants to put your items in when you buy something. They're caught in tree branches, wrapped around sign posts, twisted into long grasses, or shredded and flapping in the wind from a fence. There's literally one every 10 feet all the way down the highway. If they're here, it's not difficult to imagine them in the ocean, choking birds and suffocating fish and elsewhere in the wild mucking things up.

I stopped using plastic bags, for the most part, years ago. I take my Trader Joe’s totes to the farmer’s market, a canvas bag to the mail box when I retrieve my mail or will ball up a small plastic bag if I’m going on a walk but stopping by the store somewhere along the way. This was one of the first “reduce, reuse, recycle” actions I took so it seems so basic to me. I still get looks sometimes but what I think is even more ridiculous are the people who will let one tiny item get thrown in to a bag. It doesn’t even occur to them to say, “I don’t need a bag”?

Some cities are banning Styrofoam as a takeout package because of the havoc it wreaks in nature and plastic bags are next. A letter to the editor in Wired from a Dutch guy suggests charging five cents for each bag, but it's hard to imagine that working on Americans. If you need a New Year’s resolution that’s fun and easy, I suggest this one: give up the plastic bag!

Poachers!

I got a call from an executive recruiter today. Last week I got a message from this guy rattling off his name and company with the line "just catching up with you," like I knew him. I looked him up online and found out it was a recruiter. Today I answered the phone by accident and he sounded very surprised to reach me. Immediately he launched into his "catching up" bit and said that I wasn't in the company directory and could I give him my direct line. "Well how did you get to me if I'm not listed?" I asked. He said he'd asked the operator to find me and this time asked me for my email. To which I replied, "I don't know who you are." Does this guy think I'm stupid?

Several times a week I get emails from recruiters but they're never offering me a job, they want me to send them names of people. This guy said he had some jobs available and was wondering if I'd give him some recommendations. "I don't have any," I said. It was kind of fun, I have to admit. He stammered a bit and said maybe he could send me an email and I'd think of some people. No, I said, "I don't feel like doing your job for you." Last time I sent a name over to a company, my friend got the job (but isn't happy there), the recruiter got their fee and what do I get? Nothing. It's not like they're offering me a referral fee, they just want to waste my time and make money off of me.

I continued to tell Mark, the recruiter, that I get emails every week from people wanting me to send them people and frankly, I don't have time. I added that most of the people I know work for themselves and aren't interested in a job, which got a little chuckle out of him. I continued, making a joke about I don't know why people think I've got all the connections. But then this was the weird part, he said "it must be because you're a famous actress." Uck, see, this is why I hate all these online profiles. Now I know that he found me on LinkedIn, probably just by doing a search of the big companies, and because he's read my profile, thinks he knows me. I'm going to put a note on my profile that says "Will make referrals for a $1,000 referral fee" and see how many call me then!

No time in the present

Folks, I'm just not sure how to keep up the blog. I'm depressed about it, in part due to my feeling of responsibility to people who want to read the blog but mostly because I LOVE to blog and I'm really despondent about the fact that I don't have the time to do it. I can't figure exactly why I have no time; I feel like I have no time to exercise, read the newspaper, call friends and a multitude of other things that I used to take for granted. In a corporate environment, we put in10x more effort than what comes out in terms of product (what I can say that I actually did). So there's this feeling of always working hard, being totally consumed by a job, yet never getting my work done and at the end of the day, not having much to show for it.

On the way back from Portland on Monday morning, after spending two days with my nephews whom I love love love, I was on the plane having thoughts of wishing the plane would just crash into the ground. It started with the whole emergency exit thing which I realized is one hundred percent bullshit. Do you realize that the exit is ONLY for a water landing? And do you know the chances, when flying over the continental United States of a water landing? It's pretty much zero my friends. If you're going down, it's into a mountain or into the ground. There's no f'ing water to slide down the wing into. It's a fantasy, a false sense of hope and yet they make you listen to this shit as if it's really going to make a lick of difference.

I don't normally have suicidal thoughts and I'm not even sure that's what was happening. Maybe it's the fact that it's my birthday tomorrow and I often have very "final" thoughts around that time, like what is life all about anyway? Maybe it's because I really don't like transportation and have had to do so much in this job that I feel like I've dramatically increasing my chances of dying. I mean, by percentage flying isn't safer than driving but certainly a person who travels by plane once a week is at more risk than someone who travels once per year? I also, while looking down on the world, had thoughts about how ugly human life is from the air. (And frankly, it's pretty ugly inside the plane as well) The world without us is beautiful and awe-inspiring - mountains, lakes, clouds, the sky and stars, the ocean - but everything human made is pretty much disgustingly ugly from up above. Rooftops, roads, airports, shopping centers. None of this is designed to be looked at from above and it all looks like a blight on beauty and I start to think about what a disaster humans are...and hence start wishing that I weren't one of them, but I am.

So here I am, way past my bedtime (already!) on a Tuesday night with a pile of handwritten blog entries that haven't yet, and may never be posted on the blog because I don't have the time. And I don't know what to do about it. How do I post when I'm on the road when my "spare" time is spent flying? I'm hoping I'll get this whole time management figured out, but it's possible this is just my life for the moment.

Impossible to disengage

If nothing else, I have learned some truly invaluable lessons working in the corporate environment. I hadn’t realized the extent to which the agency environment is utterly free. Even though you work for a client and you could lose the work and lose your job, while you’re working you know it’s a job. You know it’s a job because you’re working for a company that's working for someone at another company. It’s twice removed from you. The people judging you, your bosses, etc, are judging you through the lens of another company. They give you a lot of leeway – the client is a pain in the ass, the schedule sucks, the budget blows, and we can’t do the kind of creative we want so god bless you for sticking around.

In addition, one project really doesn’t affect another that much. Two teams can work on huge projects side by side and don’t have to know what the other is doing. Sure, they have to share resources and sometimes that gets a little annoying but it’s not like a change on my project changes everyone else’s project in the entire company.

But that’s exactly what it’s like working in a corporation. My group launched a microsite. Another group was running print ads to coincide with the launch, another is planning a viral seeding campaign, another a huge buy with You Tube and a partnership with My Space. Then there’s the whole internal team with their own marketing schedule, restrictions and requirements for banner ads, interstitials, emails. One thing changes, like the schedule, the URL, or the creative, and everything has to change. And those things are all connected to other things.

The onsite marketing is scheduled in among a dozen or more groups with their own needs and demands and changing parameters. The media buy is fixed and can’t change. The print ads are already on the press, can’t change them now. And that’s all before I even get to what my boss is telling his boss and so on and so forth. Just hope and pray that by the time the CEO sees it, it’s up, it’s running and it’s exactly what she heard it was going to be. In an organization like this, every little thing affects a dozen groups and potentially thirty or more other people. There are people I don’t even know, haven’t even met, emailing me saying they didn’t know I was doing x, y, and z and can they know more because something in their group depends on this information. How is that possible?

The biggest result of this kind of environment is that it’s impossible to disengage. At the agency level, I’m running the project and the client is somewhere else. In another building, another city, sometimes another state or country! If I feel like taking a 15-20 minute break to write a blog entry, I can. I know I’ve got a few moments, I know exactly what’s going on and I know the client won't barge in on me. Not so in the corporate environment. There’s no hiding from someone who wants or needs something from you, there’s no unplugging for 15-20 minutes and frankly, I don’t completely know what’s going on at any given moment.

I feel sometimes like I’m keeping a power plant from having a meltdown. Keeping small problems from getting bigger, creating solutions to potential problems and all the while trying to keep an eye on the future, well at least tomorrow. One of my friends at an agency we work with put in an interesting way. He said in the agency world, the enemy is the project itself. Getting it done in time, on budget, and with the best creative. Everyone in the company and the client is moving and working towards a common goal. In the corporate world, the enemy is right next to you. Whether you want it or not, you're all working towards the goal of being your boss. So four people are jockeying to fit into one slot - and that's only after the one that's already there has left. It is definitely a much more complicated organism, one that I feel is much more intelligent than I am. I'll keep you posted.

The soccer players and me

Never again will I agree to take a job in a new city without time off. I don't care how urgent the company says it is. When all I had to do was show up, I was on top of the world. I felt smart, I felt needed, I felt like I belonged and I was excited about this job. But as soon as the moving part started, I couldn't focus on anything. It was like the ground and everything else was moving at the same time, in different directions. Then I started feeling lost, stupid, unsure and confused. I'm a creature of habit, I need to have certain things be the same or I lose my bearings. Eventually I got into a little bit of a rhythm, sleeping on a friend's couch and living out of a closet, sure, but getting up at the same time and getting coffee at the same little shop on the way to work made a big difference. I had a few days where I felt like things were clicking, but every week the rhythm was interrupted by a trip to LA (I've been three times in three weeks for work), weekends in the city looking for apartments, and everyone else's vacation schedules. Then I got a really bad cold.

Luckily I'd already found an apartment and got to spend some time just relaxing (I'm still sick but the relaxing was nice). I finished Harry Potter book 5 and was thinking that for all my complaining, I can be grateful I'm not Potter. That kid has problems that just never end, eh? It was funny because the whole book was about his dreams and how he kept dreaming what Voldemort was doing. It make me more conscious about my dreams. Last night I dreamed that a whole team of hot international soccer players were vying for my attention, one had cooked me an authentic Italian meal, another wanted to give me a massage. I cracked myself up at how very female it was - hot guys who cook and give massages (LOL!) - and also how reflective of despite all the chaos, I'm in a pretty good mood. I just hope I'm back on top soon.

Honoring my accomplishments

I’m backdating again. I just wrote and published three entries as if I hadn’t suddenly fallen off the edge of the blogging planet.

I’m starting to wonder if I’ll be able to keep up the blogging now that I have a job that actually requires me to work all day. I started the blog when I had a job without very much work (which naturally led to me being laid off) and then nearly three months of unemployment. There were days when just writing a blog entry was accomplishment I was proud of.

I already miss those days! If I could do whatever I wanted, I’d live in a villa on the Amalfi coast and write. I guess it gives me something to work towards, eh? So, I apologize for getting behind, and I’m going to do whatever it takes to keep blogging. I especially love comments, even the ones that tell me I’m being a judgmental twat.

I started the new job a week ago and it was in chaos the minute I walked in the door. A month behind schedule, and no clear leadership, I was being “trained” by a woman who considered project management to be running reports and setting meetings. She taught me how to upload documents to the extranet and fill out my timesheet like I was starting an after-school job. She’s off to get her MBA at a fancy school and in seven days didn’t think it necessary to explain anything about the actual project.

After a week of inserting myself into meetings and discussions, I took charge. So just as I gained control of this thing, I got my exit schedule negotiated with the two companies (basically I’m working every single day and somehow moving with no time off to accommodate the old and new bosses' vacation schedules). What’s wrong with this picture? I hate that the individual is made to feel so bad for quitting, as if it’s personal, but when we get laid off it’s just business.

Today I had a kick-ass day managing this project myself and people have taken to me being in charge and are reporting to me in a way that I never saw them do with the woman I’m replacing. And I’ve learned quite a bit, like about how data is ingested and what a data model is. My predecessor just wasn’t interested. She’s not a hands-on manager like me. This project will be on a smooth track to production when I leave and I’m pretty proud of that.

One fell swoop

Last week was extremely difficult. It’s hard enough starting a new job, learning a new commute and schedule, but I was also interviewing for another job and feeling like a liar and a traitor. They had a welcome party for me Monday night and the people at this job are so nice. Smart and cool people that I would love to know. And yet, I knew when I took this that it wasn’t going to be something that would make me happy. Did I announce it on the blog? No. That’s pretty telling.

So my interviews were at a building in Century City where I had to valet. I had used my wrecked car as an excuse for my late arrivals at work but in reality, I pushed the car appointment to make the interview. When I pulled up for the valet, he saw the crunched car and I explained that I had to crawl out the passenger side. Okay, he said to which I added, “which means you have to crawl IN that side too.” He got a kick out of that and chose a valet driver to perform the taskIt was even funnier the next day when I showed up for the second interview. The guy saw me coming and just shook his head “no, no, no.”

The new job opportunity came from a recruiter who was referred by my boss at the company that laid me off. Things come full circle, eventually. It was so stressful to invest and being invested in a job without knowing if I was leaving. Although the new company said they would make a decision quickly, it wasn’t as quick as they said. After two in-person interviews, a phone interview on Monday and some questions by email on Tuesday, I finally got the job yesterday! I am so excited.

In one fell swoop I’m getting four things I have been asking the universe for:

1) A reason to move to the Bay Area
2) A senior level position
3) A job that combines my marketing, online and film industry experience and interest
4) Experience with a global company that opens up opportunities worldwide

In less than two weeks, I start working as a Senior Brand Manager for a major internet company in San Jose. That's right, I'm moving to the Bay Area!

Ask and you shall receive (but maybe not when you expect)

I must have been asking the universe for too many different things at the same time because in the last year jobs, opportunities and men have come and gone but none seemed like the perfect fit. They all were close to but not quite what I wanted. And yet now I realize, they all had their purpose.

Last year, I first considered giving up acting for a guy, then for a job and eventually happily quit acting. Then a friend got me another job that would bring my resume up to date, and with a real salary, I was able to pay off all of my debt in three months. In January, things got serious with a guy who lived in San Francisco and he asked if I would consider moving. I started questioning what my purpose was in Los Angeles, now that I wasn't acting, and remembered that I had always loved the Bay Area. Despite having just landed in Santa Monica and having my own apartment for the first time in six years, I was feeling done with Los Angeles. I decided I would take the leap but the relationship ultimately didn’t work out. Two months after taking another job, I was laid off.

That's when the major soul searching began. What kind of job did I want? Where did I want to live? Would I ever have the relationship I wanted in Los Angeles? I committed to a couple of film projects, told a man that I loved him and then, I took a job I didn't really want. Two days later, I got a call for a job that would change my life. A recruiter I had worked with before called to say she had my dream job. It sounded like exactly what I had been looking for, a senior level job that would require my marketing and film experience.

I shuffled time, missed sleep and stretched the truth to find several hours two days in a row to interview. I had to explore this opportunity, but I also wanted to be realistic. I had a job, a good job, and I needed to take ownership of it, despite this dangling carrot.

Another day in the trenches

My basic job hunting/finding problem is that I have done many different jobs and have excelled at all of them. It baffles most minds that a person could literally jump into a job they have never done and do it well, more than a few times. What I didn't realize is that those opportunities, while seemingly common in my world, are not common. What most hiring managers want is someone whose resume looks exactly like their job description. Someone who has done only the job their hiring for and is only interested in that job.

A while back, a recruiter contacted me about an email marketing job. They sent me a list of questions to answer before the interview and I did. To some of them I had to reply "I have no experience with this." I explained to the woman that this job was very technical and not something that i had experience in, or was particularly interested in. I can do it, I said, but I'd much rather be working on a broader marketing level. She wrote back, thank you, she'll keep looking. A couple of days later, she wrote again saying the company wanted to meet me anyway.

In my past interviews I felt like a round peg trying to be stuffed into a square hole of a job, trying to explain why I don't fit, so I decided to take a different tactic this time. Instead of defending my non-linear career path, instead of answering questions about my background and what I did or didn't do where, I would simply just start coming up with ideas and strategies for their company, sharing my marketing philosophy and generating questions for the interviewers. Don't tell them what you can do, show them.

Of course this is easier when interviewing with a company that has a product (rather than an agency in which I'd work for many clients that remain to be disclosed). Such as it was last week when I interviewed for an online photo fulfillment company. I had already interviewed once on the phone and it went well. I met with that same guy and two VPs. They rapid fired questions at me and I came right back with business strategies, product ideas and marketing questions. And, to my surprise, they were very pleased and impressed.

One of the VPs remarked, "You have a GREAT interviewing style, by the way." I thought for a moment that she was making a sarcastic remark to cut me down, but I don't think she was. "Most people," she said, "tell you everything they think you want to hear, but when they leave, you're not sure if it's true. You, on the other hand," she continued, "are totally honest, I feel like I know exactly who you are and what you can do." I've never heard it put that way, but she was right. When that quality is appreciated, it is usually by the owner of the company. That person wants smart, quick, no bullshit people in leadership positions, but when interviewing with upper management, those qualities are usually regarded as anathema.

Hiring managers are thinking one of three things: A) She'll take my job, B) She'll make me look bad or C) She'll make me have to work harder. These people like the status quo because it's easy. Change should come at a slow incremental pace. By comparison, I look like the leader of a revolution. I spent nearly four hours in this interview. They ran marketing problems, product problems, business problems by me. "How would you fix this?" "How would you tackle this?" "What would you do in this situation?" It was fun.

A few days later, the recruiter called me to say that they wanted to hire me as a consultant. I thought it was a dream come true. "They were very impressed with you," the recruiter said, "and think you're a very strong overall marketer." Fantastic! Exactly what I should be doing, crafting marketing strategy and handing over my recommendations for execution by someone else.No political crap, just doing the work. We discussed a rate and he called them to negotiate. Now, here's where the whole thing falls apart.

It's wonderful that I've been recognized for who I am. And I'm so flattered that this company wants to find a way to fit me in, but at the end of the day, all they need filled is a square hole, and I'm still a round peg. See, the recruiters double my rate to get their fee so by the time it's presented to the employer, it sounds outrageous. They needed an email marketer. Now they're thinking about paying a lot more money to hire a person who isn't a permanent employee to do a position that doesn't exist. And the job they're hiring for is still empty. Try justifying that to the boss.

They've now started checking my references so I'm thinking they're going to offer me the original email marketing position. And I'll have to decide if I want an hour commute to take a job that doesn't fit.