What kind of jobs I will not do and a $10 billion guarantee*

It has been 8 weeks since I stopped working full-time. Frankly, I am amazed at how little money I have been able to survive on. And that I am able to end sentences with prepositions. And that I am able to start sentences with the word "and". And that I just started and ended a sentence with a word "and". And I did it twice in a row. Man, communicating is neat.

Of course, I haven't been doing nothing in these past 8 weeks. I have gone back and forth with my former employer about money that's owed to me; a situation that has offered all of the drama of a WWE (formerly WWF) plot line. I have worked some freelance gigs. I have worked part-time hither and yon. I have interviewed with some great companies and some not so great companies. I have explored some new opportunities outside of the world of human resources. Which leads me to the point of my blog today.

What kind of jobs I will not do.

It's easier for me to start with the negative. On Saturday, someone told me that I need to be more optimistic but that can wait a bit. Besides, I'm going to use the proximity effect on this blog. You'll come away feeling all romantic and thinking about how much you love me and would want to hire me. Especially if you're a lady.

Okay... Number one job I would not do:

-- Waiter. Seriously. Can any of you guys see me as a waiter? A surly bartender perhaps but no

t as a waiter. Unless it was at a place like Dick's or Applebee's where the servers are paid to be jackholes to you. I'm not above the food service industry by any stretch of the imagination (I used to work in a pizza joint and at Taco Bell when I was in high school) and I don't think that I was particularly good at either of those jobs.

-- Computer Salesman. I actually interviewed about two and a half years ago for this very position but it turns out that the company wanted me to telemarket ink and toner cartridges. That doesn't sound like fun at all. I know, I know... Work is called "work" and not "super adventure puppy time" for a reason but I don't think I'd be very good at this either. Unless (and this is a BIG unless) Charlton Heston was my boss and I was only pretending to be a computer salesman. Then I'd be willing to listen. If the U.S. government happens to be reading this, give me a call. If Dell happens to be reading this and wants to speak with me about an inside sales role, I must politely decline.

-- Male Escort. Although, I guess I could parlay my experiences into writing a book. What?! You mean it's already been done?! Okay... Definitely throw that out the window. By the way, when googling "male escort service nashville" you don't get many quality results. I can help with that. I understand search engine optimization a bit.

Pretty much everything else is fair game.

I'm finding it hard, though, to fill the days. I spend lots of time networking online, applying for positions, doing phone and in-person interviews but haven't landed just yet. And, let's be honest, there's only so many jobs available and so many jobs posted online. So I've got to fill my days somehow. For instance, I have spent this morning looking for jobs (FIRST THING I DID!!!), blogging, and have progressed regressed to watching Twilight: Vampire Hugs in my underpants:

If that doesn't get your hearts racing, hiring managers of the world, I don't know what will.

So, in closing, if you are looking for someone who understands human resources, recruiting, social media as something that is actually useful and (simultaneously) totally ridiculous, search engine optimization (if you guys link to my blog, I guarantee that you will get $10 billion*), content creation, floral delivery, kicking ass at Jeopardy!, and a whole host of other things, get at me. I'm all about engaging. Especially the engaging that's done at the end of this Twilight: Vampire Hugs movie.

Did I just gave away the ending? Oh, well.

Job leads are appreciated.

*10 billion guarantee not guaranteed.

Working

Holy cow... A whole heap has happened in the past whenever it has been since I updated my blog.

- That Kardashian (What's her name? Kitty?) got divorced.

- Ben Gibbard and Zoey Deschacan'tsing got divorced.

- I got divorced from my job.

What? I know, I know. I think that if it weren't for bad luck, I wouldn't have no luck at all. But at least I'd have burritos.

So, in mid-September, I lost my job. This is due to the fact that I hadn't been paid by said job in several weeks and had begun looking for new opportunities with companies that were going to, what's it called, pay me on time. This got back to the owner of the company and out I was, lickety split. How many times do you think you're going to read "lickety split" on the internet today? Probably not many. And for those of you wondering, I have still not been paid money owed to me. I know that in the midst of a job search, you're not supposed to speak badly about a former employer and I haven't mentioned that company's name once. But you get the point.

So, over the course of the past six weeks, I went on tour with my roommates' band (and their new single called itun.es/iBZ98d">"Better Life" is available on itunes today), I went on some interviews, and I went running most every day. And, frankly, I'm surprised on how

little money I've been able to survive on.

I've also ended a few sentences with prepositions. I live on the edge. But

not like Steven Tyler. That dude lives at the hospital... With all of the falling that he does.

What? He does.

So, after interviewing with a few companies thus far, I am asking you, the internet, to help me find a job. What am I looking for? Well, I'm glad you asked:

- A company that will pay me on time. This means a company that says "We will pay you on the 15th and 30th of every month" and then actually do it. If it's a company that says "I/We promise to pay you just as soon as we can" then they can kiss my Irish backside. I'm 31 years old and I'm, well, too old for that.

- A non-family owned company. I don't want to meet the owner's/owners' kids. I don't care about their soccer practice. I don't care if they got a new bike for their birthday. I'm happy to chat with you about those things for just a second or two but not much more. The company is paying me to do a job, not talk about Umbros. Those are soccer shorts, by the way.

- Growth. I don't want a job that wants to move me just to move me. I worked for a company like that once. It wasn't awesome.

- An open environment. If you want me to just hang out in my office all day, I'm probably going to be bored. If you want me to bounce ideas off of people, we can talk.

- A non-sales position. I don't want to sell life insurance. What man grows up to think, "Man, I'd really like to get my Series Whateverit'scalled License so I can sell insurance"? No one awesome. Except for that Bill Porter guy (portrayed by William H Macy) in that one TNTBS movie. He was pretty awesome.

We can talk about salary later.

So if any of my friends have leads, let me know. I look good in a suit and know how to match my socks. If either of those helps.

The thing about Adele is...

Quick. Stop and think about the most divisive thing that you can think about. There are likely to be several standard answers:

Religion

Money

Whether or not it's okay to drink alcohol (it is)

Politics

Politics 2: Obama Bugaloo

The list could go on and on. And on. And on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on.

There's a movie that came out years ago called What About Bob?. It's sheer piece of genius and

was released before we all realized how awesome of an actor Bill Murray really is. In that movie, Bob Wiley (Bill Murray's character) says a line akin to the following:

"There are two kinds of people in this world: Those who love Neil Diamond and those who don't. My ex-wife loved him."

Okay, so not akin. That's exactly what he says.

But it's true. And the more someone hangs out in Nashville (because all I do is hang out everywhere all the time sit at home in my shorts) the more likely they are to get infuriated with someone else's musical tastes. By the way, my musical tastes pretty much suck so I can make claims like this. I mean, at what point in time does genuinely liking Air Supply no longer not count as a guilty pleasure and just become genuinely liking Air Supply? Whatever that point is... that's where I am.

Bearing all of the above in mind (especially the GIF of the Prez dancing), I submit to the three of you who read this that Bob Wiley was really onto something. But in order to raise my readership from three to perhaps four or even five (*gasp!) people, I'm gonna bring this shit up-to-speed. Ladies and gentlemen (but especially ladies because all of you dames seem to like her), I submit to you the most divisive, polarizing, splitting-uppiest figure in music today:

Adele. If you don't feel like watching the video, turn on your radio and wait about 20 minutes. You'll hear the song.

Now before you ladies guys hang me let me say that this broad can WAIL. Seriously. Pipes for days. A voice we haven't heard since... dare I say it? Aretha Franklin.

But let's dissect this song for a second. Or two. Or however long it takes me to finish writing.

Chick meets boy, boy dumps chick, chick pines for boy for the next four minutes of the song.

That's it. Actually, that was pretty quick.

What pisses me off about this song, and Adele in general, is that every single one of her songs is exactly the same. It's like a remix CD of that "Macaroni" song or whatever it's called... You know... The one with the dancing and shit? But beyond the theme of her latest record I'd like to think that Adele is probably some murderous stalker. I used strikethrough so I can't get in trouble for libel. It's true. Look it up.

Follow me the analysis of the chorus:

"Never mind I'll find someone like you." = "I've done this before."

"I wish nothing but the best for you, too." = "I hate you and I'm gonna kill you while you sleep."

"Don't forget me, I begged, I remember what you said." = "I recall everything you did, every trip we took, every date we went on, every time we talked about soccer football and even have a doll made out of your hair that I keep in a shrine that I made for you in my closet."

"Sometimes it lasts in love but sometimes it hurts instead" = "Remember 6 seconds ago when I sang about killing you? I'm still going to do it and it's not going to feel very good... MUCH LIKE WHAT YOU DID TO MY HEART YOU DUMB STUPID MAN!"

And that's just her current hit single. Can you imagine what the rest of the album including the deep cuts (see what I did there?) sound like? Yes, you can. Because they all sound like that.

I don't know anything about the music industry. I don't know how to make money in/off it but I never really tried to in my defense. I don't know anything about writing a hit song except for that the I-VI-IV-V chord progression still sounds really good. Hell, I don't even know if I have clean socks to wear today.

So, in closing, I hope we have learned that dating Adele would probably be a bad idea because if you break up with her she may shoot you out of a cannon. She's got money. She can probably afford to do that sort of thing. I heard that she is also moving to Nashville. I'm staying away.

Man, I want some pancakes.

I used to play music. I don't play music anymore.

Read this, don't read this. I don't care.

It's shortly after 10:00pm on a Sunday. I'm sitting in my new home (I moved, everybody!). I won't tell you where, exactly, but let's just say that the house is called "Warfield" (crap) and the word "TRON" is spelled out in big block letters on a wall in our hallway. See? I wasn't lying. It's also a holiday weekend which means that I have tomorrow off of work. I've got plans. But, as someone much more quotable than I once put it, the best way to make God laugh is to make a plan. That may have not been their exact words. I'm bastardizing it, I know. I've also had a beer or two this evening and I'm watching the Detroit Tigers in a blowout right now. I really know how to party. I mean, really.

Seriously. Super hard.

In the past four plus years, my musical output has been minimal. I mean, a few guitar parts on friends' recordings here, a few vocal lines there. Nothing, really. I used to play guitar in a band called Death Comesto Matteson. Someone made a video once. This is what the video looks like:

Some people liked the music we made. I did at the time. I haven't listened to it since my rather unceremonious exit some years ago. I'm not pointing fingers or placing blame. I'm too old to care. I am.

A few months ago, my computer crashed and died. I swear this all has a point. Trust me. And when it did, I lost pretty much everything I hadn't backed up to my external hard drive. This was years' worth of music, including the stuff that I had from the aforementioned band. My iPod had crashed several months beforehand and thought that all was lost. How wrong I was. Upon cleaning / unpacking part of my room today, I came across my old iPod and, miracle of miracles, it worked. I spent the better part of the afternoon ripping music off of my iPod and putting back onto my computer.

And with new discoveries of old adventures comes a sense of nostalgia. Do I wish that I was still playing music? Sure, I suppose. Do I wish that I was doing something other than writing in a blog for my creative outlet? Definitely. Do I wish that I was as funny as Animals Being Dicks? Without a doubt. Now, for those few of you who may be holding out for a Death Comesto Matteson show, I wouldn't expect anything anytime soon from a full band. I could be wrong. Peter and I don't hang out very much anymore. I haven't talked to Wayne or Mike since 2006. I see Jozeph about once a year out and about. None of this is really my concern. I was just a guy playing guitar. Mediocre at that. And that's not modesty. Seriously. Did you guys listen to the guitar work on that video? That's me. For better or for worse.

So, in the past few years I guess I have been searching for a creative outlet. And in the past few years, I have made some videos and have posted them on youtube. Some of them are funny. Some of them are serious. Some of them are a mixture of the two. It's not making music. It's not performing. I'm not going to break a string on stage. I'm not going to have my amp burn out on stage (Rocketown, 2006). I'm not going to throw up before I play Wall Street in Murfreesboro (it happened once). But it's what I've got. One's not better than the other but one's what I've got right now.

Well, that and a Flip camera.

My friend Andy and I were hanging out tonight and we were talking about creative outlets. Yes, all of the things mentioned above were covered. And then, as people who are much more creative than I am are seemingly prone to do, he challenged me to come up with a subject for a video. Not to make one just to come up with a subject. No due date. Not for credit. Just whatever I want. Of course, this means that I would have had to find my Flip camera which in my move to Warfield had seemingly disappeared. And given my luck earlier in the day with finding my old iPod, I didn't expect to find my Flip camera this evening. Shows what I know.

I'm dusting off my Flip camera. I'm dusting off my shitty video skills. I'm just going to start filming. We'll see what happens.

Best of Nashville

It's a slow week at work for me. I would be losing my mind due to boredom if itweren't for the fact that I am largely occupied with my move to Warfield (it's in Green Hills where I think I'll really fit in) and watching Six Feet Under (which has made me throw up twice in the past two nights). I also tend to get stoked about the little things. Shiny objects, clean socks, seeing Chewbacca play a harmonica. You know how it is. By the way, I just downloaded that song and will be singing it for the rest of the day. I hope you will, too. Why? Well, because that's what friends are for.

But back to the little things.

The Best of Nashville poll-thing-buyyourvoteswithkissesandhugs is now available. And, like any good, decent, red-blooded, American

male, I went and voted. If you don't vote, you can't complain. That's my theory. And I am one hell of a complainer. Of course, this is also coming from the man who wrote himself in for Sheriff of Wayne County, Michigan, back in 2004. I received exactly one vote. And with me being perpetually 12 years old (I'm the person that couldn't order a Large Banana Shake from Sonic last Monday night without laughing), I decided that in order to cover all of my bases today by blocking out the boredom, voting, and personally amusement, I would make the Nashville Scene my victim. That makes me sound like a serial killer. It shouldn't but it does. English is a tricky language. I know. I've been speaking it for a while now. So, on to my results for this year's Nashville Scene Best of Whatever I felt Like Voting for... In picture form. Because everyone likes pictures. Except for Chewbacca playing the harmonica. Don't be an ass. He's blind.

And those, friends, are the highlights of this year's Best of Nashville Scene poll.

Yes, Best Local Men. I am large. I contain multitudes. That's Hemmingway.

The Jean Situation

I know how pissed you guys get (NICK!) when I don't update my blog on a regular basis. The reason why is that I'm busy. I have things to do. Like update my twitter. And travel across the country.

At any rate, I got a text yesterday evening from my friend JT. JT is tall and can wear dark jeans. I, however, am short and anytime I try to do the dark jeans look, or the white tennis shoes look (I tried it one time, shut up), or the - God

forbid - sports look (this would be all encompassing of things related to sports: basketball shirts, football jerseys, baseball jerseys, and the ever douchey MMA apparel), I fail. Miserably. And I don't mean like the internet tells you how things fail. I mean for real fail. And failing at wearing wearing MMA style apparel in the vein of Ed Hardy is saying something. I mean, just look at the shirts to the right here. It looks like the walls of a tattoo parlor vomited cotton that informs us that "LOVE KILLS SLOWLY". As a marketing idea to myself, maybe I should inform Ed Hardy that while love may indeed kill slowly, bullets do not, which is what I think of when I think of MMA dudes. "Oh, I'm big and strong and can kick your ass with an ancient Brazilian fighting technique." Yeah but can you stop a bullet? Nope. Didn't think so.

What was I talking about here?

Oh, yeah. Jeans and fashion. That's right.

Now those of you who know me in real life know that if I were to make a list of my passions and interests, fashion would not be on there. I'm sorry. I'm just not very good at it. So imagine my reaction when JT said that there was this super secret bar called The Citizen that he was going and that I should join him. Something I want The Citizen to know: I'm sorry in advance if you guys get a bunch of calls saying "Hey... I wanna be in on this super awesome secret bar" because of my blog. I get dozens (literally DOZENS) of blog readers. And anytime I have to go to a restaurant or bar that requires that I wear pants, I immediately become skeptical. No, you dummy, I'm not gonna show up in my underpants (not like that's an option anyway) but if it's ten hundred degrees outside, you can bet your ass I'm going to want to wear shorts.

So as I was getting ready to leave my home yesterday evening and as I was desperately looking for the one pair of blue jeans that I own (I know, Sara, I know...) which I eventually found somewhere near the bottom of a pile of other stuff, I got to thinking, "Man, I really should buy another pair of jeans." But what kind?

There's the kicker.

- As we've discussed, dark jeans are a no go.

- Similarly, I'd say that white jeans are out. Unless, of course, I went back to The Citizen and Lionel Richie were to be there and then I could be like "Lionel! My man! Nice fuckin' pants!" Apparently, he has been known to hang out there. I'm not kidding about any part of this bullet point.

- Tight jeans are out. I don't want to be re-rackin' all night. Guys, you know what I mean.

As you can clearly see, I have but a few options. A fashion challenged individual who doesn't like fashion very much and is a big fan of comfort. What to do, what to do. Do I end that sentence with a question mark? Actually, that's not really a sentence. No subject.

Crap.

As a result of having worked until almost 7 each night so far this week, which I will not be doing this evening, I haven't had the time to remedy this situation. The jeans situation. Actually, I'm gonna call it The Jean Situation. Throw some capital letters into that sucker. Now it sounds like something that would appear on the nightly news. "Tonight... A young man ignited a furious skirmish in the escalating Jean Situation." Either that or it makesme sound like an idiot from the cast of Jersey Shore who, when you look at them, kinda look like they are a combination of orange, the aforementioned Ed Hardy, and regret. The beauty of having unfettered internet access at work and the boss taking a three-and-a-half day weekend allowed me to make a little headway into The Jean Situation.

And guess what I came across. That's right. The single greatest idea in the history of mankind. This is better than scotch, better than the designated hitter in baseball, better than the time Lisa 'Left Eye' Lopez burned down Andre Rison's house.

It's Pajama Jeans. Seriously. Watch this commercial and then after you stop laughing and start thinking objectively you'll realize what a truly brilliant idea this is:

Stylish? Check.

Comfy? Check.

Fits every figure perfectly? Check.

Two easy payments of $19.95? BIG CHECK.

If they make these for dudes, I am set for life. C'mon, internet... Don't let me down!

Teenage Wizard. *BA-BAH! It's only Teenage Wizard. *BA-BAH!

You know what I'm really good at? Staying ahead of the curve. Think about it. Who took 2 years to get an iPhone (and only because his other phone died)? THIS DUDE. Who thinks the iPad is still a piece of shit? THIS DUDE. Who has been driving around for the past three months with his brights on because his regular beam passenger side headlight is burned out? THIS DUDE.

When people think of me, they immediately think "early adopter". See? Despite my best efforts, I did learn something in Marketing 343 in college. Maybe it was a 200 level class. I forget. I wasn't really paying attention.

In keeping with my lifelong ambition to be the coolest, most badass dude on planet earth, I recently made a promise to a dear friend of mine that I would... Crap... That I would finally get around to reading the first Harry Potter book after years and years and years of saying that these "have GOT to be the biggest pieces of shit ever." That's right, I make judgments of books based on their movies. You do it, too. Don't act like you're some book purist. And after seeing the first four HP (that's what kids call 'em, right?) movies, I vowed never to see any more of the movies. I could never quite figure out what Harry was doing with that yarmulke [spelled that right on the first try, by the way] on his head and I was confused from their on out.

Now before you start breathing fire down my neck, I have two arguments for you. First, The Lord of the Rings books and movies are awesome. Secondly, The Chronicles of Narnia books are awesome and the movies look like Jerry Bruckheimer took a magical shit. There. I said it.

So, after 4 years of people telling me how much better the books were in relation to the movies, and after 4 years of seeing the same shitty-magic-broom-field-hockey-dragon-fight-in-the-sky-and-we-can't-talk-about-this-one-dude films on the screen, I vowed never to see another film in the HP universe. And I haven't since. Everyone kept telling me, though, the movies were crap and the books were so much better. I used the "polish a turd" argument and stuck to my guns. The Harry Potter movie I saw? It was called... Uh... Harry Potter 4. I think. It was back in late 2005. It had an obvious and tremendous impact on my life.

I told people that I needed to borrow the first book to and, as usual, the internet exploded with my relenting to the world of Hogwart's. Then... the comments, text messages, and phone calls started rolling in... All about how things really don't get going until the fourth book.

Wait just a damn minute.

Here I am, hanging out in Nashville all by myself, thinking I'm gonna get off easy on this assignment of only having to read the first TeenageWizard [if you're not singing the hook to "Baba O'Riley" you will be soon] book and then I find out that the first half of the series is "kinda boring". You know how to get me hooked on a book series? By telling me that the first 3 of them are "kinda boring". That's the best thing to do.

See? Soon.

Lo and behold, the world premiere of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2 is tomorrow in London. Coupled with the aforementioned promise of reading the first book and how much of an early adopter I am, I decided that now is as good a time as any to read it. So, last night, I sat down. And started reading. And I read the first half of the first TeenageWizard and this is what I've gathered so far:

- Harry's magic parents are dead and he used to live in a closet then went to a lighthouse where a magic giant told him to go magic school and then bought a bunch of magic supplies and then he got on a magic train and ate some magic candy and then wore a magic hat at magic school.

There. I just saved you who haven't read it two long, nudity-free hours.

No dragons, no unicorns, no lightning from fingertips like in Star Wars. This better start getting good soon - I'm gonna try to tough it out for a couple more books. But if it doesn't get better, I'm gonna give you guys a whole heap of "I told you so"s. Is that how you pluralize that? I don't know. And you know what the last thing you guys want from me? Yeah... a whole heap of "I told you so"s. Well, that and you probably don't want nude pictures of me either. But don't worry, 'cause this is Harry Potter and there ain't none of that.

So far...

Also, please don't kill me, Colby Pitts.