Mmm... Beer...

I think I'm going to like my new job a lot.

• I get to wear jeans to work.
• It's a desk job.
• I actually have to use my brain.
• I deal with beer.
• I get a discount on beer.
• The people I work with are nice, helpful, and are ok with me asking a million questions.
• I'm salaried, so I won't ever get yelled at for going into OT.
• I actually get to use my degree occasionally. 
• The office manager says "fuck" every other sentence, so I don't have to censor my language anymore.
• I end up getting about a month of training in the office and out at corporate, so I may actually have an idea of what I'm doing by the time January rolls around.
• I do something different all the time, so I probably won't be bored ever.
• The hours are perfect. 
• I have weekends off.
• I can actually pay my bills, eat, and have money left over on my current salary, which is a very good number for an entry-level position. Plus, I'm up for a raise after 6 months and 12 months, and then yearly after that.
  

Prepare yourselves. I'll be a beer snob by the end of the year.

The only things I'm not too happy about are the drive and the spiders. OMG THE SPIDERS! There are spiders all over the friggin' office! The drive isn't that bad since I'm going the opposite direction of the heavy traffic, but my car just doesn't get good enough gas mileage to be driving 41 miles round trip every day. Good excuse to get a new car next year!

I GOT THE JOB!

'Nuff said.

INTERVIEW!

I like caps lock this week.

Remember how I said on Wednesday that I would know whether or not I got a second interview by next week? Well, they gave me a second interview Thursday morning. Seriously. Less than 24 hours after the phone interview, I had an email wanting to set up an in-person interview with the owners. They must really like me, which is good because I want this job more than any of the jobs I've applied for. It's perfect. The interview is Monday morning.

I went out and bought new dress pants for the interview since the one pair of good pants that I can actually zip are two sizes too big and have to be safety pinned at the waist. The other dress pants I own are two sizes too small. J is going to kill me, but that's ok.

Speaking of pants, I really appreciate how clothing companies are finally starting to realize that tall women exist and are making more pants in tall sizes. Now they need to figure out that those women who have to buy tall pants also have to buy shirts, skirts, and dresses with longer measurements. I'm sick of only being able to wear t-shirts and men's sweaters because those are the only things long enough. I want to wear cute shirts and blouses. I want to wear the cute sweaters in the women's section. I want to wear dresses again. I've not worn a dress since I was 17 because that's the last time I was short enough to wear a dress off the rack. Yeah, I could buy a new sewing machine and make my own dresses, but I really don't have the time for it.

WOOHOO!

Funny how fast things go sometimes... Right after I posted my last post on Monday night, I applied for a job. Just one. It was the only new posting that I hadn't applied for or at least looked at yet. I heard from HR Tuesday afternoon, and just had a phone interview about an hour ago. Woo! I'll know next week whether or not I get a second interview in person or not. This would be a excellent opportunity for me since they promote from within, have benefits, are actually hiring instead of firing right now, and the company is growing and obviously doing well since they just bought and moved into a larger building two months ago.

Cross your fingers for me! I wouldn't even have to move if I got this job!

It figures.

Still no more interviews, and my store is closing after the first of the year. Great. They're not firing us, but I have to figure out what store I want to go to. I'll probably be back down to 10 hours a week when I transfer. I'm looking at around 40 hours per week until Christmas, but that's still not much when you work for peanuts. Hell, I don't even work for the nuts. I work for the shells. Sheetz and WaWa have a higher starting pay than what I currently make after a promotion and two raises.

CA is looking better and better right now.

Fun!

So not only can I not find full time work ANYWHERE, but now the store I work at part time will probably be closing in 6 months. Great. Right now there is a 98% chance the store will close, but we'll know for sure next week. If I can't find something, and don't end up back in school again, I'm going to be forced to move back to CA and take my old job. It's being held for me until the end of the year. Just what I don't want to do. My hometown is like a black hole. It just sucks you in no matter what you do to try to escape.

I was going to comment on other happenings in my life, but there are no other happenings! I'm doing Christmas knitting, playing video games, and watching too much Doctor Who. I had a dream where I was the Doctor's companion, and we were trying to close a hole in time so Yarnmen wouldn't come through and take over. Yarnmen are like Cybermen only made of yarn instead of metal... I had to darn the hole with the yarny remains of dead Yarnmen. This dream showed up after a night of learning to darn a hole in a sock while watching the same Doctor Who over and over (Rise of the Cybermen).

w00t

I have a job interview in two weeks! Yay! It's just for a bank teller position, but it's full time and pays more than I'm making now. It's a step up! Now I just need to go shopping for an interview outfit. That should be fun... My old nice clothes don't fit anymore (and are probably fairly ratty by now), and my uniform of sorts for the last 13-14 years has been jeans, t-shirt, hoodie, and chucks. I'm 25 and still dress like I did when I was in 6th grade. Fashion fail.

Also, drinking vodka and cranberry juice is like getting drunk on Disneyland. I still need to go to a really seedy dive and ask the bartender, "Can you surprise me with something that tastes like candy and Disneyland?" I'll probably end up with a Midori Sour...

Damn it!

I really need to get used to actually owning a camera again. Every single time I go somewhere with the intention of taking pictures, I forget my damned camera. Since my last camera got stolen, I've gotten so used to not having one that I forget about it until I go to take a picture of something. Then I go "Oh, hey! I have a camera! Pictures! Yay! Oh... I left it at home. *sigh*"

J and I went to the VA State Fair yesterday. It sprinkled the whole time, but we left right before the major rain hit. We happened to be there the same day as the big Alpaca Farm Day thing was going on, so we saw tons of alpacas. I loved it! I kind of wanted to rub my face on one of the alpaca's neck, but I restrained myself. Those things have some major teeth... We also met a super nice alpaca owner who does little workshop type things for the new alpaca owners that he sells animals to. Health, shearing, handling, fencing and barn construction, etc. He's going in my book for future alpaca reference. I will have alpacas some day.

We also saw tons of goats, only two sheep, a funny pig who would oink every time someone touched him, bebbeh piglets, cows (one of which totally wanted to be my friend. She'd lean against the enclosure and let my scratch her side, but as soon as I stopped she'd turn around, glare at me, and moo until I started scratching her again)... Typical fair animals. Oh! We also saw four oxen. I'd never seen one up close. We didn't pet them because there was a gaggle of kids in the area, but it was cool to see them. What else did we see... Typical fair stuff, really. I wasn't impressed with much of the knitting on display, and was supremely annoyed by one person in particular who would shove her way inbetween me and the case I was looking at instead of patiently waiting until I moved (I can only stay in once place for about 5 seconds at a time, so she wouldn't have had to wait for long). J almost flipped out on some idiots who pushed in front of us at the tram stop when we were leaving. His leg was killing him and we had been waiting on a tram for about 20 minutes by then.

Fun times and no pictures, but that's ok. I'm done with the fair for the year. Maybe next year I'll enter some of my knitting just to see what happens.

Soap and Yarn and Soylent Green

This has been such an incredibly long week. Between being sick and some miscellaneous bad news, it's just been awful. Plus, it's always fun to get home from work, blow your nose, and find BLACK boogers from all of the dust and people flakes floating around your work place. Makes you not want to shop at a retail pharmacy, huh? CVS DUST IS PEOPLE!!

But I don't feel like complaining and whining about that. Surprising, huh? No, what I'm really blogging about today is soap. I want to share this hand soap. This is the coolest soap I have ever seen in my life. I want to get it for my mother for Christmas. I would also LOVE to get her a skein of Vitreous Humor yarn, but it is way too expensive for this year. *sigh* Maybe next year...

Answers to Stupid Questions

I answer a lot of really stupid questions every single shift. I've worked retail for many years, and the stupidity still shocks me. It eats my soul and makes me question the intelligence of humans. I have decided to put together a little Q&A so you know which stupid questions you shouldn't your underemployed cashier.

Q: Are you open?
A: No. We enjoy unlocking the doors so the local wildlife can have a chance to roam indoors.

Q: Which register is open?
A #1: The only one in the store that does NOT have a 'closed' sign on it.
A #2: The one I'm standing at.

Q: Do you work here?
A: Fuck no. I get off on wearing a white lab coat and pretending to work here.

Q: How much is this *waves something in the air*?
A: I don't know. What does the tag on the shelf say?

Q: Since the barcode didn't scan, it must be free, huh?
A: No. Can I punch you in the teeth?

Q: Why don't you ever smile?
A #1: They don't pay us enough to smile.
A #2: We are a little known branch of the FBI. The FBI were not issued smiles.

Q: Do you have a store card I can use?
A: Yes, but I'll get fired if I use it. True story. Suck it up and get a damned club card.

Q: Is anyone working here?
A: No. I'm only standing behind the counter at the register because it makes me happy in my pants.

Q: Why don't you carry X product?
A: Because this company hates you and wants to make sure that you are inconvenienced in every way possible.

Q: Why is there a thumb in my pictures?
A: Probably because you're an idiot.

Q: Why are my pictures dark?
A: More than likely because you're not smart enough to turn your camera's flash on.

Q: Why are my pictures so green?
A: Because you took pictures of grass and shrubs. No, I can't make the people you were trying to take a picture of magically appear. We do not live in a Harry Potter book.

Q: Why can't I print my amateur porn pictures here?
A: If they don't pay me enough to smile, do you really think they pay me enough to look at pictures of you bumping uglies with your girl/boy?

Q: I come in here twice a week to buy cigarettes. How come you don't know what kind I always buy?
A: I sell hundreds of packs of cigarettes a week to tens of different people. You are not a speshul snowflayke therefore I cannot remember you.

Q: Can I give you my pictures?
A: No. I will eat your soul if you do.

Q: Do you sell Tylenol here?
A: No. We sell Joker Brand. Smile!

Q: Why don't you sell vodka?
A: Because I drank it all.

Q: *holding up a sign that says "75% off all summer items"* Is the summer stuff 75% off?
A: No. The summer stuff is marked up an additional 75% from the price on the shelf label.

Q: Do you charge for money?
A: Yes. It's a personal rule that I never give money away unless I charge a 500% handling fee.

Q: Are you in school?
A: No.
Q: You seem smart. Why don't you go back to school and get your degree?
A: I have a degree.
Q: I don't mean an associates. Why don't you get a bachelors?
A: I have a bachelors degree. You see how helpful that was.

Q: Do you have change for a $100?
A: Do I look like a bank?

Q: Why are you open on holidays?
A: So assholes like you can buy condoms, duct tape, and baby oil.

Q: I think it's complete crap that you all have to work on a holiday.
A: Yet you are in here buying shit and are therefore the reason we all have to work on holidays. Fuck off.

Q: Oh! You close at 9pm?
A: Yes. GTFO.

Q: Why can't I use your bathroom?
A: We keep the velociraptors chained up in the men's room and the zombies are all in the women's room. The vampires are in the storage closet and the giant man-eating cockroaches live in the breakroom. Are you sure you still want to go back there?

You can't begin to understand how much willpower it takes to not say this stuff on a daily basis.

The Plague!

I really hate getting every stupid sickness that floats around. I have the plague now and had to call out today. Awesome. Working in a pharmacy is really hazardous to my health.

I got my study guide in the mail the other day! It's scary. 500 pages of dense mathematical formulas and few explanations. The review chapter is scary and I already know how to do all of it! I need to go through at least a few pages a day, but I don't know how useful that would be when I'm sick. I can barely pay attention to the movie I'm watching because of the gunk sloshing around in my head. I'm watching Ice Age. Yeah. Not exactly a thought provoking movie... I never realized how often I tilt my head to one side or the other until it started hurting my ears.

I'm about half done with the foot of the first Kai-Mei sock. It's really cool how that one lace panel just floats across the top of the foot. I love it!

Mmm... No.

Today is my only day off this week, and my boss wants me to come in for a few hours. Now, I do not work a nice M-F 9am-5pm job with guaranteed weekends off. I work nights, weekends, weekdays, afternoons, and mornings. If I go in today, it is very probable that I won't have a day off until next Tuesday or so. That's two weeks between off days. Mmm... No. Not happening. I need the money, but I need to keep my sanity. Plus, they only want me to come in for 2-3 hours. Nope. Not gonna.

In other news, I ordered my P/1 exam study guide on Friday! It shipped yesterday. Eek! I'm not even registered for the exam yet, and I'm already getting nervous...

I have not had a day off since last Wednesday, so I've not had much time to knit. I did start a new pair of socks with my Malabrigo sock yarn. I'm doing Kai-Mei from Sock Innovations, so there will be 13" of neverending 3x3 ribbing, but hey! They're gorgeous socks!

Tasty Fly!

Has anyone else ever noticed that towards the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark, Belloq eats a fly? It's during the canyon scene when Indiana Jones is threatening to blow up the Ark with a bazooka. I just noticed it this weekend because I'd never seen the movie on a tv larger than a 19". I laughed even though it should bring back some trauma from finding a fly in my McDonald's french fries when I was about 8 years old (I didn't eat at McDonald's again until I was about 22). NOM NOM NOM! Tasty fly!

Incidentally, the Thai word for 'breast' is actually 'nom'. NOM NOM NOM!

I am having major knitting fail this week. I've frogged more socks that I care to think about, am about to frog another one, and can't settle on one project for more than about 5 minutes at a time. I really hate it when I get like this. I also can't sit still long enough to watch a movie or play a video game. I just end up pacing the apartment, picking things up, putting things down, and trying to figure out what the hell to do with myself.

It called to me.

Not a zombie princess or a sexy pirate. The baking aisle at Kroger. It called to me, and I could not resist. I went to the store for hamburger buns and butter. That's it. I ended up with stuff to bake cinnamon rolls and brownies. Focused grocery shopping fail. I tried to take pictures of the end result, but neither the cinnamon buns nor the brownies lasted long enough. Plus, I didn't want my messy kitchen to end up on the internet (it's clean now though!).

My mother mailed me something like 15 things of flowering tea that she found at a dollar store. Win! Of course, now I have to find a place to store that much tea in my little tiny apartment. I already have an entire shelf devoted to tea. Jason's coffee is slowly, but surely getting voted off the shelf. It's like Survivor: Caffeine Shelf. The tea tribe is going to win.

I'm still stuck on reading trash. I have a feeling it's going to be a while before I can read anything with substance thanks to that sustained torture that is sometimes known as college... Currently, I am reading Club Dead (Charlaine Harris) and Lost in a Good Book (Jasper Fforde), but I am really looking forward to An Echo in the Bone (Diana Gabaldon). It comes out next month. More trash! But this trash has kilts! Everyone loves hot redheaded men in kilts!

Plagiarize! (Only be sure always to call it, please, "research".)

By the way, you can thank Nikolai Lobachevsky for developing a non-Euclidean geometry called hyperbolic geometry. Models of the hyperbolic plane are incredibly fun to knit and crochet. Get enough ripples in there and you end up with something that looks very much like a coral reef.

Sorry for all of the links. I was listening to this song and ended up on a wikipedia odyssey because I wanted to know what else Lobachevsky did.

Can I pay with handknits?

Becoming an actuary is expensive. I need to take at least the first exam in order to get a job, but that first exam is going to cost me nearly $300 for the study guide and the exam itself. Yet another catch-22. I've been finding a lot of those lately.

1. You can't get a job without experience, but you can't get experience without a job.
2. You can't get a job without the required exams and certifications, but you can't afford the required exams and certifications without a job.

Fail. Point 2 could work if you have another job in a different field that actually pays well enough, but I don't. Retail pharmacy is never going to pay enough unless I become a pharmacist. Pardon me while I laugh my ass off for a few moments... At my current job, it will take me 5 years to hit $10 an hour since promotions only give a maximum 5% raise and the yearly merit raise is a maximum of 2%. I was lucky this year and got both a promotion and a merit raise in a week. Fun times.

Enough of that crap. Want to see what I'm working on?

First up is the sock yarn blanket that will never end. The pattern is Barn-Raising Quilt from Knitalong. I have 1.90 squares done and another 40.10 squares to go. US2 needles... Fun. At least the squares go quickly and it's fun to see the colours swirl. Left over sock yarn, so who knows what will end up in here. The first square is Berocco Comfort. The second square is Noro Kureyon Sock.





Second, is an Icarus Shawl. Woo-woo! I have wanted to make this shawl since I started knitting, but could never find just the right colour yarn. This yarn is Alpaca Yarn Co. Suri Elegance in White House on US3 needles. The yarn was originally for a pair of stockings, but I wasn't digging the pattern+yarn combination. This shawl looks like a tangled mess right now, but it will be gorgeous when it's done. I promise.

f(yarn)=knitting+life

It's a new blog! Maybe I'll stick with this one for awhile.

Story time! Do you want to know the meaning of my blog name? No? Tough. It's so nerdy that it will make your head pop. In my head, knitting is all math, but not in the normal sense of counting stitches and whatnot. In math, a function is "an abstract entity that associates an input to a corresponding output according to some rule" (wikipedia.com). When yarn is used in function notation (in my head, of course), an input of yarn gives an output of knitting plus life. But wait! We don't have yarn in the right hand side of the equation! Well, when you remember that knitting=yarn+pointy sticks, then you DO have yarn on the right hand side of the equation and it all works out nicely.

My mom needed a bumper sticker that said "My math nerd's logic beat the shit out of your athlete's brain."

My blog really does't have a point. I like math and I like to knit. Those two things seemed like a good starting point. WIP's to follow later after I get everything set up.