Blown Fuse

Tiffany's Rules of Conduct for Job Interviews

*no specific candidates were harmed in the compilation of this list.

1 - When you show up to interview for a job that involves working in an office setting you MUST wear a jacket and tie if you're a male unless otherwise instructed. [You should not fear that you'll be overdressed. Your job at that point is to impress your interviewers and make it look like you put in effort into your appearance. Don’t go in there wearing a dingy polo shirt and khakis and expect people to be blown away.]

2 - When you walk through the door, treat everyone congenially - do not merely walk in and demand to see whoever it is you're supposed to be seeing without a "Dog, kiss my ass" to everyone else present." [Always assume that everyone you encounter has a say in hiring decisions. For all you know the receptionist could be the sales manager’s niece and if you treat her like shit on your shoe he'll know about it.]

3 - Never interrupt the hiring agent’s pre-rehearsed spiel with utterances of “Mm hmm, yeah, I know,” because contrary to popular belief, you do not.

4 – Ladies must show taste in selecting garments that are interview-appropriate; cleavage is verboten and, I’m sorry naturalists, pantyhose with leg hair poking through it is not acceptable.

5 – Comb your damn hair (both sexes). [While I am personally the Mistress of Frizz, I have that whole “ethnic” thing going for me. If you’re whiter than Casper and show up with wall-to-wall hair you’ll not fare well. Yes, it’s hair discrimination. You’ve been warned.]

6 – If you are lost or otherwise running late you are absolutely required to give a courtesy call. [Sidling up to the front desk fifteen minutes late with no explanation offered will get your résumé put into the “file for one year” box in the storage closet.] Further, if you’re unable to show up altogether, please forego the complex explanations involving broken-down vehicles and baby-momma drama. [We’ve heard it all before too many times. While, true, people are pissed that you flaked on your appointment, it’s better to just say, “I’m very sorry, I need to reschedule” as soon as you know you’ll need to. Too many excuses make people wonder if you’re reliable and if you’ll show up for work on time if you’re hired.]

7 – If you’re only interviewing to test your marketability because you have “Friends that are xyz” and don’t really have a notion of what the job entails you’ll inevitably end up wasting the interviewer’s time, especially if you have a law degree and think that makes you qualified for everything. [If at any point you discover that you definitely don’t want a job, you should wait for the interviewer to pause in the conversation and then state, “You know, INSERT NAME HERE, I’m extremely grateful for your time, however I don’t think I am a suitable match for the position. May I forward your name to others who may be interested?” Don’t sit there going “Mm hmm, mm hmm, yeah, I don’t want this job.” You look like a fucking idiot and the staff will make fun of you when you leave.]

8 – Turn off your fucking cell phone. An emergency will still be an emergency in thirty minutes.

9 – Never lie on your résumé – a good recruiter can sniff out discrepancies and exaggerations and call you on them during your meeting.

10 – If you’re at ALL interested in going further in the interviewing process, send an email “Thank You” immediately to everyone you interviewed with, and follow up with a hand-written note in the mail as soon as possible for instances where the hiring process may be long and drawn out. [By not sending a note you’re basically conveying that you’re not sure if you’re interested and you’ll be passed over for the person equally qualified who acts eager for an offer.]

Family or Not?

Why did I think that Jack White and Meg White were siblings? They just seemed so asexual in regards to either, but I guess "previously married and now divorced" works just fine, too.

I don't know if I could be in a band with someone I'd been [biblical] with in the past. I'd probably oscillate between being pissed at all the groupies crowding my ex and at other times supremely happy because I want someone else to have to be with him just for the sake of verifying that he is, indeed, a fucking psycho.

Updated to add: I just heard in a "Fresh Air" segment that they had in the past told people they were siblings but some reporters had uncovered divorce papers. Jack got married to some model in Brazil recently.

A Study on Bloggers

It was almost painless.

Break it to make it.

Sometimes I add movies to my Netflix queue that have been critically heralded as being so bad that they're not worth the medium they're recorded on, but I can't resist watching them because as you know, any publicity is good publicity.

I added Breakin' to the list because it's one of those titles that just keeps coming up in '80's pop culture commentary.

I added Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo at the same time merely to be able to watch them both at once.

Jeebus. I won't discuss Breakin' as it is what it is, but I'll play a bit of Devil's Advocate for the sequel.

Everything I've seen or read about it touted it as the worst...movie...ever. That's not true - surely 54 is worse. It's like a non-stop music video, the plot is jumpy, the stunts are badly captured and the acting is piss-poor (what do you expect from street dancers, Hamlet?)...but it wasn't the worst movie I've ever seen. It sort of had an 1980s Sister Act appeal to it.

Would I buy it? Hellz no. Would I watch it again if it were on TNT? Um. I wouldn't set my schedule around it. The point is that there's no way it could be as bad as Glitter. It's a nice clean movie that you can use to babysit your kids while you go get your hair done.

Some Aesop-Like Wisdom

I know my credit is in shambles. As a result of some foolish spending habits when I was in college most credit grantors see me as a high credit risk. In reality I pay at least two percentage points over the minimum balance of my cards every month and I pay early (other than a few months with those assholes at Citi who wouldn't move my due date to accomodate my paid-once-per-month self).

I've never made any large purchases in my own name except for my college education (the summer school bits which they don't give aid for) which by the time I get done paying for will have costed the same as an Italian sports car, so I look like I'm not responsible.

I became recently aware that one particular creditor that I no longer dealing with has marked my account as a charge-off to at least two of the major credit reporting agencies. I know that's a gee-dee lie.

A little backstory is in order here. Between the time that I was preparing to graduate from college and finding a job, I may have gotten two months behind on all of my debts. Normal, right? Well, one particular asshole credit card company stopped sending me invoices. When I called to ask why I was told by some rude bitch that the card had been closed as a charge-off and that it was my responsibility to have known that...even though they don't specifically notify you that they're going to do that...and even though I had sent them a payment the previous month.

They never sent me any "Hey, did you forget to pay us?" letters in the mail or any "Bitch, your ass is seriously delinquent" warnings. They just charged it off. It was $137 - the $17 I'd paid a few weeks prior.

I should have taken the advice of every financial guru on the internet and made them REMOVE that status from my reports before I paid them one red cent. Instead I sent them a bank transfer for the full amount on the very next day, which they did not reject, mind you.

Well. Duh, it's still a charge-off. I've been haranguing Equifax for the past two months about this. I'm starting on Experian right now. I have no idea if that card reported to TransUnion, but I think it's in my best interest to pay the few bucks and find out. I also need to send a very sternly worded letter to that credit card company (not that they're going to do shit, but it's nice to have a paper trail).

And the moral of the story is: if you have some shady shit on your credit report, have them remove it before you cut them a fat check, or at least get something in writing saying they will.

Fuckin' 'tards

My CitiBank Visa account has been paid off for months. After the fact they credited to me a $10.00 credit for signing up for paperless billing (like two years ago).

When I requested my $10.00 credit payable to me to close the account off once and for all I recieved a letter from the generic computer customer person thingie "S. Larson" that since my account was closed, blah blah blah. No check for me.

So why three months later do I recieve a $5.00 check in the mail reading "Below is arefund check for the credit balance on your account"?

Um...do the monkey processing the incoming mail scan for keywords and just print out whichever letter matches those? Then when they audit their shit later on they figure out that they owe people money?

Sounds bass-ackwards to me.

Drunk Dialer

To the person in Ohio who called my cell phone at 4:34 this morning and left a message of yourself breathing:

*kicks you in the head because I couldn't get back to sleep.*

Jaws of Life

Is there a certain age that cats are supposed to get to that they stop gnawing on you? I'm just wondering, because Bodie has the tendency to aim for the fleshiest parts of my body (like that web between my thumb and forefinger) and lock her jaws shut onto them.

"This is Not A Bill"

I got one of those "Explanation of Benefts" thingies in the mail today from Blue Cross. Basically, the visit to the eye doctor I had a couple of weeks ago wasn't covered by Blue Cross because it had been less than a year since my last visit to an optometrist [to those of you unfamiliar with the inner workings of the insurance industry, you're allowed one visit to the optometrist per year].

Well. If I could find the entry explaining why my old doctor sucks goats I would refer to it here. To briefly summarize, the quality of care at the franchise place I went to last year was dirt poor. I was put into contact lenses that really didn't fit that were impossible to find anywhere else BUT at the doctor's office. When I tried to go back in a couple of weeks after my fitting to complain about the lenses I was told that I would have to pay for another visit. I said "Screw that" and decided to just deal with them for the year.

Well, I ran out of contact lenses last month and couldn't find them anywhere online. They were backordered for at least three weeks at both reputable places I tried. I didn't want to get them from the Doctor's office because I vowed I'd never step foot into that place again.

I wanted to see a new doctor who actually gave a damn about the plastic gliding around my eyeballs, so I set an earlier than September appointment.

There, now we're caught up.

Is it worth filing a petition for them to cover it given the shitty quality of service I got from their provider a year before?

I'm going to write a letter and try to get this resolved, but I bet I'll just end up eating the $125.00 they say I owe.

*le sigh*

Summer Shopping

This was in the fitting room at Kohl's (they're having a sale).

I'm not really a cullotes sort of girl, but all the other pants I tried on made my thighs look like Christmas hams.

A Frank Discussion of Fathers

While everyone is out today doing whatever it is the do to celebrate their Pops, today for me is another Sunday. You see, my father and I are estranged. I should rewind and say that my father is estranged from at least four of his children (the ones I'm aware of, anyway.

You see, Pops is a Chronic Sperm Disseminator. Although my mother claims that I was "planned" and "wanted," everyone knows that my older sister is a shot-gun wedding baby. It later turned out that Mr. wasn't husband material and so he had to be dropped like a bad habit.

For a long time I really gave a damn that he wasn't active in our (collective "our" meaning me + sister + oldest half-sister) childhoods. He can't make the excuse that he "didn't know where we were." He always knew where I was, even if he couldn't put a finger on the others. I was at my grandmother's and didn't move until I left for college. He never called. He never sent birthday cards.

One year on Father's Day I had a real emotion breakdown because I felt unloved and ignored. I just couldn't wrap my mind around how someone could have all these good-looking, smart, and talented almost-grown kids around and didn't want to at least have a conversation with them. Sure, sending my grandma $20 or $30 a month would have been nice to help out with my lunch money, but you can't have everything, huh?

Over the past few years, I really stopped giving a shit. All of the male influences in my family were by then dead, a.w.o.l., or in a perpetual state of confusion.

I don't want or need shit from him - it's too late for all that now. I'm not even mad at him. I'm basically mellow to the situation and come to terms with the fact that if I ever come face to face with the dude again I'll have to utilize some real strong Jedi Mind Tricks to hold myself back from kicking his short ass.

To all of you dads out there doing what you're supposed to be doing, "Happy Father's Day!"

To the rest who are making excuses as to why they can't call their kid once a year to say "Hi, I think about you" - fuck you take some time to consider how it'll effect your kid.

A Picture Share!

A Picture Share!,
originally uploaded by blownfuse.

Take me out to the ballgame

Scott and I, along with a couple of my coworkers, went to a Durham Bulls game last night. You may have first learned of their impressive physical prowess in the movie Bull Durham starring Kevin Costner.

Scott's company is a season ticket holder so the staff all take turns using the row of seats. We had a good time. We drank cheap beer (and felt it this morning), ate salty foods, and dodged fly balls.

Hell, for $20 you can have yourself a damn good evening and walk out of there drunk and entertained.

I do feel like an asshole for not offering the two spare tickets to someone, though.

You're turning? Well, no shit.

I'm just wondering - what's the point of putting your turn signal on AFTER you've stopped the flow of traffic in your lane? I'm just wondering, because that's dumb.

Gladious.

This is the first one to begin opening this season, and boy I planted a LOT of these. I didn't know which color this bag would be as they were marked as "assorted"...I guess I planted the all-orange ones right next to the house.

A PSA for Southern Chickies

It's hotter than horse shit outside.

This is the time of year that Southern girls start letting it all hang out - halter tops, daisy dukes, mini-skirts - you name it and there are people [who really shouldn't be] wearing it.

While I have no real hateration towards these ladies and the disgusting fleshy rolls amount of meat they choose to allow to hang out of their shorts, I have one request: if you're going to wear coochie-cutters, could you at least not wear them with stilletos? I don't want to feel like I have to wipe your chair down with a Clorox wipe when you leave.

Thank you.

Requisite Occasional Cat Picture

FUCK!

Do you know how difficult it really is to transfer funds between unassociated accounts?

Yesterday's discovery that Sam's Club does not accept credit cards prompted me to write a check. Which prompted a need to transfer funds into my account. Which prompted the realization that the only way this could be accomplished was by getting a cash advance off my credit card and depositing into my checking account. Which prompted the hindsight that I shouldn't have shredded my PIN number.

Which prompted the phone call to credit card company who is unable to change PIN numbers at request and will "send me a new one in 7-10 days."

Which prompted an attempt to Western Union money to myself, which the representative very snottily told me that "That is NOT what Western Union is for" and reminding me that this call is being recorded as if I'm some sort of indentity thief.

Which prompted me to attempt to PayPal money to myself, which ALSO can not be done.

Which prompted me to PayPal money to Scott who in turn PayPal'd it back to me.

Which will arrive in my checking account in 3-5 business days.

That shit's going to bounce.

Stifling the Economy

Did you know that Sam's Club only accepts Discover Card?

I do now.

I forgot I had these.

My mom forwarded these to me last week. I rolled my eyes so hard that my contact lenses almost popped out.

See the rest in the extended entry.

Eh.

Just wondering.

Any of you folks have a wall-mounted flat-screen t.v.?

If so...what do you do with all the cords?

Not even a trickle.

Our water went kaput last night. This is after I'd washed five loads of laundry. When I went to wash the dishes I got the usual pressure flow for about three seconds and then it died.

So, we had no water to shower in this morning.

And so I didn't go to work.

I'm sure I could have gotten up really early and went to work and taken a sink bath in the bathroom but I'm obviously not that gung-ho.

The Roto-Rooter guy came out to fix it this morning and everything's peachy keen.

Looks like it's too late to go to work, heh heh.

Something sharper than my tongue

Yesterday I splurged and went to Williams-Sonoma. I came out with a Wusthof knife and a new Epicurean cutting board to use it on.

I've never owned a good knife so I'm a bit scared of the sharpness of this one. I'm most afraid that I'm accidentally going to drop it point-down and it'll fracture one of my foot bones.

The more you know...

Today I learned that ya can't buy alcohol before noon on Sundays.

I tried flashing them my agnostic i.d. card but it didn't work.

I'm the person you WANT to stand next to in line.

In the coming week, I will squirt out the last of the perfume toilet water I've been hoarding and using sparing for the past six years.

I wear Versace Red Jeans. When I bought that bottle I heard rumors that it was going to be discontinued so I thought, "Hey, I'll save it for a special occasion."

Now I wear it every day and it has become my signature scent. As far as I can tell you can still find it on some places on the internet.

I think I want to try something new and might go looking around this weekend.

What do you ladies wear? Don't you hate it when people sniff you, ask you what you're wearing, and then go out and buy it but don't smell nearly as good as you because their musky-ass body chemistry doesn't meld with the scent?

Crikey!

I just typed in "www.fuckingcat.com" to see if some insane blogger had purchased it to rant about their feline scratches and smelly house. I have myself yelled "FUCKING CAT!" at least twice today.

Well...take my word for it*. It ain't a blog.

(*and I don't mean like a Levar Burton "You don't have to take my word for it." tease, either. We're talking ucky-yay orn-pay.)

Eye choo-choo-choose you.

Just got back from the eye doc.

My eyes are even shittier than they were last year! Celebrate!

I think my left eye is down to a -8.5. As scary as that sounds, a lady that came in after me had a -10. I have a few years yet before I need to panic I guess.

The curvature of my eyes prevents me from choosing from a wide variety of lenses, so I have to take what they give me. At least this time the doc took a hour trying me in different lenses to make sure I didn't have the problems I had with the last asshole who shall remain nameless.

I told him that my lenses had a tendency to fall out of my face and rather than look at me with disbelief he took a look into my eye and saw for myself that my lens will shift all over the place. I was right and the other doctor is an idiot - the moral of that story is to avoid franchises.

Before I go off to finish this beer and contemplate on the abstract beauty of laundry piles I'll say this - the assistant was confused when I asked "What, no 'new patient' fee?"

Apparently not all practices try to gouge you $35 extra bucks to make photocopies when you show up for your first appointment.

First Daylily of the Season

I was beginning to think they were mad at me for splitting them last fall.