Have a coke and a smile.

Being unemployed again, is not without it's moments. A little deja vu for me as I write this, (wasn't I just here like yesterday?) but with something old, there is always something new. Last time around, I sat at a tiny little desk with an IDES worker (Illinois Decides Everyone's Stupid Illinois Department of Employment Security) and tried to explain how I got fired from my last job. You see, I wasn't very good at the whole money making thing in the frenetic world of futures trading, and when I rashly pissed away the chunk of money my new employers had bestowed upon me, they decided what I already knew: that I sucked as a trader. But this time around is a whole new ball of wax: how to convince them that I deserve money after I quit.

Well I am not going to re-bore you with all of that. It is winding its way through the process, but I wanted to point out a more serious observation I noticed yesterday while in the land of the unemployed. Apparently, "unemployment office" and "smiling" are not in the same sentence. Not in the same dictionary. Hell, not even in the same galaxy. I was there for little over an hour, (yes Fridays are the best days to go, if there is a best day to actually be unemployed) and the entire time I was looking at everyones faces. From the downtrodden citizens in line with me, to the frenetic security guard that jetted around the place like his pants were on fire, to the robotic man behind the counter sending us all in this direction or that to wait out our fate, nobody ever so much as cracked a hint of a smile.

Now this phenomenon is what I like to call Flatlining Corner of the Mouth Syndrome, or FCMS for short. One would expect that standing in line to prove you aren't working, so you can have the privilege of taking home less than 1/3 of what you used to make isn't on the top ten list of things that make you smile, and I wholly anticipated that my fellow disenfranchised would not be in the smiling mood. But the workers there were like monotonal robots, unable or unwilling to make the slightest of gestures to lighten the surely despondant mood of those throwing their humility to the wind and waiting for a handout from the state. I mean, they have a job. And we don't. You would thing that fact alone might entice them do voluntarily ditch FCMS, but maybe the unrelenting stream of the same thing day in and day out has sucked the joy out of their faces.

Or maybe working for a government agency just does that to a person. Ever see anyone at the DMV smiling? Or any other government agency for that matter? I mean, aren't government jobs supposed to be coveted? And if they are so coveted, why does everyone walk around with a surly expression on their face that says, "I hate my job, I hate my life, and most of all I ain't smiling for you!" Maybe when one goes to work for the government, they catch FCMS like a cold that never goes away. Maybe it's a pre-requisite for being a government employee. Check this box if you don't smile. EVER.

Well, it's apparently working. Despite my attempts to seem not entirely unhappy but actaully pleasant by smiling at whoever came my way, no one smiled back. I can just hear Dean Wormer screaming at the top of his lungs, "No more fun of any kind!" But would it kill someone looking into the eyes of a despondant unemployed citizen and offering up the slimmest of hope by cracking a little smile? Apparently so. I know now there are three undeniable truths in this world: there is no crying in baseball, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, and there is no smiling at the IDES. Maybe they just need a coke.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CD6j_7bgrtA

(DISCLAIMER: Bandzoogle in it's infinite wisdom has stripped me of the spell check, and I had to do it the old fashioned way, by re-reading this 7 times. Let's hope it didn't need an 8th.)

Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.

At last post, dear faithful readers, I had walked on my job. If any of you still have any memory comprehension, and can pull out some fleeting flash from over 2 years ago, you might recall that I once stated that I loved my job. And I did. I once stated that I respected my boss as well, and you see how well that went. So with no job, and no prospects, why aren't you posting every day you might ask? Surely there must be endless amounts of unfiltered boredom around my house, no doubt filled with tales of crossword puzzles, job search engines, pastry recipes, rabid squirrels, and cans of paint. Yea I did paint brooding young teen #2's bedroom, but that's it so far. But the only excuse I can come up with is ennui. Lack of ambition. And the move.

Yes the move. It seems brooding young teen #1, soon to become adventurous and wise twenty-something #1, has had enough of life in his 12 x 14 cell that we called his bedroom. He wanted to move out. So we obliged. The young fledgling was ready to spread his wings, and take that first deep plunge out of the nest. Er, sort of. Yes he moved out as I have stated. Of his bedroom. And into the basement. Our all in one workout room, computer room, spare TV room, band room, and whatever else we can cram down there room is gone. I type this vast expose from my new perch on the second floor, next to the wife's spin bike and yoga mat, TV balanced next to my head. It is a little cramped, but we will make it work.

But the move? It all started with the bed. If that went, then all would be right in the world. The mattress made it down the 2 flights of stairs easy enough. And when we got to "the bend" at the bottom of the basement staircase, we were able to cajole it into it's new resting place. But an eerie uneasiness was start to creep into my brain, one that went something like, "but what about the box spring dumb-ass?" Yes the comfy, bendy part of the bed was one thing, but if I know any thing about box springs, I know the "box" part is made of wood, and if I know anything about wood, I know it does not willingly bend.

So there we were, on our holy grail of a Friday night, sitting in frustration at "the bend", me on one side, the wife on the other, and a very unrelenting box spring effectively wedged in the middle apparently for all eternity. It would not make it 'round "the bend". And worse yet, it did not want to go back upstairs. We sweated. We cursed. We laughed and we cried. But the damn thing wasn't going anywhere. So just as frustration was setting in at the possibility of this box spring becoming a permanent part of the staircase, the handy man in me took over. If the bed wouldn't go around the wall, then there was only one logical choice: the wall had to go.

And go it did. Thanks to a bit of chicanery and a little help from the Rockmaster borrowed from my neighbor, the wall came down. Not the whole thing, but just enough to squeeze the bed around it. Only it wasn't enough. So more wall came down. We tried again. It appeared for a millenia minute that removing the wall was a monumental waste of time, and the thing wouldn't go. Once again we sweated and we cursed. We laughed and we cried. We pushed and we twisted. And we almost gave up. But then I took a step back, looked at the impending Jenga puzzle in my basement staircase, and had a moment of inspired vision. It was like suddenly finding the solution to one of those metal bar puzzle thingy's. One little shift to the left and it was down. The wife and I high fived each other and laughed. And breathed a heavy sigh of relief. We may have even chest bumped.

So now the young lad has his crib, sort of. He has a couch and a TV, his bed, a little nook in the corner to set up the drum kit. But more importantly, a little space to call his own. Until that fateful day when he actually does move out of the house. And we do it all over again with the other young-un. I just know I am going to have to buy a sawzall one of these days.