Job interview

Yes! I had a job interview! Pretty sure it's the first one I've had in 15 years. And yes, you could kind of tell that I was out of practice.

I've still got the remnants of my cold, so last night I decided to take some Alka-Seltzer nighttime cold medicine, the kind that knocks you out cold (and apparently is abused by teenagers, because the box is covered with warnings about that. Why would teenagers want to knock themselves out cold? I have to admit I enjoy it, but teenagers?). Anyway, I went to bed early (instead of preparing for my interview), had a very long deep good night's sleep and woke up slightly less congested, but still sounding sick. Got the twins off to school, came home and did a nasal cleanse, still sounded sick. Oh well.

By then it was 8:10, time to change for the interview, which was at 10 am in downtown Denver. I had planned to take the bus to Denver, which I had to catch at 8:51 am. I put on the outfit I'd planned to wear and showed Rocket Boy.

"It looks a little dark," he commented.

So then I have a meltdown, tear off my clothes, put on other clothes, cry because they're all wrong, put on still other clothes, cry because I have no money to buy nice clothes... you get the picture. Eventually I ended up back in my original, dark outfit. Then I had to look some things up on the internet, find things I thought I needed to bring to the interview... pretty soon it was 8:45 and I wasn't ready.

"Why don't I drive you?" Rocket Boy said, as he's been saying for days. He strongly disapproved of my bus plan.

So I said OK. That bought us a little time. But first I had to do several more things, such as print out the job description, so we ended up leaving at 9:35, which is LATE. I didn't scream and panic, though. I knew it was entirely my fault, not Rocket Boy's, and yelling at him to drive faster was NOT going to be helpful. So I looked out the window (NOT at the clock on the dashboard and NOT at the speedometer).

We arrived near 1999 Broadway at about 9:58, which would have been fine except that Google Maps had misidentified 1999 Broadway as being an interesting older building, when in fact it was the snazzy new high-rise building across the street. OK, I say Google Maps did this, but later when I checked at home, I saw that Google Maps hadn't done anything of the sort. Mapquest got it slightly wrong, but really, it was fairly easy to see on both mapping programs that 1999 Broadway was the high-rise and not the interesting older building. I must have somehow wanted 1999 Broadway to be the interesting older building. Or I'm losing my mind. Whatever.

Anyway, I kissed Rocket Boy goodbye and ran off to the interesting older building, walked all around it looking for an entrance, wondered why the windows were boarded up, finally realized it wasn't the right building after all, and went tearing across the street to the high-rise and into the lobby to find that my escort was already gone.

"She'll be back in a minute," the nice receptionist told me. "She just took the other people up."

ARRRRRGGGGHHHHH!!!

So that was a very bad start. But it got a little better when the escort returned and took me upstairs. I missed most of the introductory spiel given to the two other candidates, but as I walked in, one of the other candidates, a young man, said he hadn't realized the job wasn't fulltime permanent (it's "seasonal") and got up and left. I figure I went from being at the bottom of a list of three to the bottom of a list of two, and since they're hiring lots of people, I still have a chance.

The other remaining candidate and I were then given a test, which I found fairly baffling, and then we were interviewed (separately), which I also found baffling. I promised not to reveal the substance of the interview and the test, so I won't. But let's say I won't be shocked if I don't get the job. I'm pretty sure this organization will be unforgiving about a late arrival. There are certain basic rules about interviewing, and one of them is Be On Time, or preferably Early. I think it is more important to Be On Time than to have just the right outfit. I will remember that next time.

The job won't start until December 16th (if I'm hired), so I have lots of time to work on my freelance editing job, volunteer at the kids' school, etc. Also lots of time to look for other jobs. Because, I must admit, this job leaves something to be desired. But we need money. We need an income. We found out this afternoon that we were turned down for a Small Business Administration loan to fix our house, because we don't have enough income (in other words, they thought we wouldn't be able to pay a loan back). I need to get a job.

The silly part of it all is that this is of course a federal government job and the federal government just shut down. I won't even find out if I was chosen or not until the government gets going again. Which surely will be before December 16th. Right?

My next interview, I promise, will be better.