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INTERVIEW ADVENTURES

3/29/2015

My beloved boss gave his notice this week at my Corporate World job, taking my job search to a new level of priority. After doing an in person and a phone interview this week, I started thinking about the whole interview process. I know many people find it nerve racking and the rejection of not getting the job a little disheartening, but I have a totally different perspective. Here are the top three reasons I love interviewing and why, even if you are not looking to leave you job tomorrow, you might want to give it a try every now and then!

IT BUILDS CONFIDENCE

Spend thirty minutes talking about everything you have done in your career and you walk away from the interview feeling like you are one Bad Mama Jama! We all forget how much we have accomplished until we actually sit down and talk about it! Be prepared to go back to your current job and feel like they are so lucky to still have you!

IT IS GREAT PRACTICE

If I get called for an interview, even if it is for a job I probably would never consider taking, I go. Why? PRACTICE. I rarely get nervous before a L.A. Lyon show. Why? Because I have been doing it for years. Interviews are the same way. When the one job you really want comes up and they call you for the interview, do you really want to go in not having interviewed with ANYONE in five years?

IT SHOWS YOU THE POSSIBITIES

You go to work every day and you think, “This is all there is. It will never be any better.” WRONG! There are dozens of jobs out there that you don’t even know exist! A life you could be living that is greater than anything you could ever imagine! Even if it is something you don’t get, you have been let in on a secret your current job doesn’t want you to know. They are NOT the only game in town! And you don’t have to settle!

So what is an interview? Stressful. Nerve racking. But also the door to a whole new life! Open it. You never know what you may find.

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We Are Women Hear Us Roar!

3/22/2015

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A flipper purchased the home right next door to mine. They did a beautiful job of fixing up a house that had not been remodeled in over 30 years. Of course, once they held an open house, I went next door to look around. What I was most impressed with was the view out of the newly opened up kitchen. It took me a minute to realize that the view that was making me drool, was the same view I had from my own backyard. Hello, the house is next door! The reason I hadn’t seen it was the overgrown trees in the back.

I mentioned it to one of my most un-girly girlfriends and she said, “I have tools. Don’t pay anyone, we can do it ourselves.”

So this morning, bright and early after a really fun and really late night at Tumbleweed’s with L.A. Lyon, armed with a chain saw, a hand saw and a ladder, we set up getting my neighbor’s view of the mountains.

I was unsure we could handle it. I had visions of a possible missing limb or You Tube videos of two crazy women falling out of tree. But we are both still alive with all our fingers and toes intact. There were a couple of mishaps. A pretty good sized branch fell on my arm and I am sure there will be a mark. My friend hit herself in the jaw with the hand saw. But all in all, it was more “Property Brothers” than “I Love Lucy.”

Despite some stiff muscles and bruises, it was actually a lot of fun! We laughed a lot and I think provided a bit of entertainment for the older gentlemen who live behind my house. We also commented on how instead of spending an afternoon spending money on overpriced shoes and purses, we not only saved money, but accomplished something.

Tonight I will take some of the fire wood we created, start a fire in my fire pit, pour myself a glass of wine and enjoy that view. Yes, we are women. Hear us roar!

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HOME IMPROVEMENT: THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE UGLY

3/15/2015

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The two bright colored buckets and the bright pink doormat I picked up this weekend at IKEA (total cost $24.00) is the start of my home projects in 2015. I have a list that makes an episode of “The Property Brothers” look like a merry-go-round ride, but one thing at a time! As the D-Man always says, “It is not like the house is going to get sick of you, take Sami and move to San Diego!”

Next weekend a girlfriend and I are trying our hand at tree trimming. Hopefully, we won’t end up on You Tube, missing limbs. This whole home project thing got me thinking of the good, the bad and the ugly of some of my home improvement projects.

THE GOOD

Putting in a toilet. Yes, a two person job, but the only home project the D-Man and I have done together that came in UNDER the allotted time. New toilets come already put together and aside from the heavy lifting part, it is easier than figuring out why the DVR is recording every show that has the word “football” in the title. Watch one of the aforementioned You Tube videos and you will be on your way.

THE BAD

It is amazing I ever continued with home improvement and decorating since my first project didn’t quite work out as planned. I bought a book when I was in my pre-teens on decorating your room and one of the suggestions, was taking one wall and putting up silver reflective wallpaper. Since we were renting at the time, my mother put the kibosh on that idea. Not to be deterred, I bought some rolls of Reynolds wrap aluminum foil and proceeded to try to tape in to the wall. Unfortunately, I hit an electrical socket and the current hit the aluminum foil, sparked and set a portion of the foil on fire. I bet you never saw that one on HGTV!

THE UGLY

I have often been asked what is the worst project I ever took on been. I don’t even have to think about it. It was putting a new epoxy floor in my garage. After my fire (check out some of the archived posts if you are new to the blog!), I decided my newly constructed garage needed a snazzy grey speckled epoxy floor. The materials were not cheap, but the D-Man gave the kit to me as a Valentine’s Day gift, so one morning when I wasn’t working, I went out to put down the sexiest garage floor ever.

It also came with a special rolling tool and a video and in the video, they stressed the epoxy dried fast so you only had a few minutes to get it rolled out.

They weren’t kidding. Luckily, they advised only mixing a portion at a time. Unfortunately, halfway, through, the hand dandy rolling tool broke. I desperately tried to fix it, as the stuff became as stiff as, well, you get picture. I ended up rolling on my hands and knees, but still had half the garage to finish and no tool.

I drove to the nearest hardware store, the tool in the back of the truck, covered in epoxy, my hair matted to my head, in torn shorts and a t-shirt, walked in the store and basically screamed, “Can someone help me?”

Several clerks came running over to see who this psycho babe was, and one of the first questions one of them asked was, “Did you buy the roller here?”

Remember Linda Blair in “The Exorcist”? Think of that person, only with a Venti Starbucks in her and you will get the idea of my reaction. I barely remember leaving the store, but I believe they gave me a new handy dandy paint rolling tool at no charge. The only good thing was the next time I went in there, with makeup and hair in place, no one recognized me. Or maybe most of them had quit, traumatized by EPOXY DEVIL WOMAN!

Had your own good, bad and ugly? Post some comments and here is hoping that 2015 is not just the Year of The Goat, but all good home projects!

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A Taxi Story

3/8/2015

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I was coming back from an out of state business trip this week and my boss and were discussing how I would get to the airport. He suggested Uber and I said, that at this point in its existence, I wasn’t 100% comfortable with getting in a car with a stranger driving.

He rolled his eyes and said, “What, your BFF is a cab driver?”

Point taken, but I still feel more comfortable riding in a taxi. Riding to the airport, I started thinking about my first trip to Las Vegas.

It was the mid-eighties and my mother and I decided to take a “Girls Only” trip to Las Vegas. I had never been and it had been over 20 years since she had been. We lived in Wisconsin, so it was not a weekend jaunt, as it is in So Cal. It took a couple of months of planning and saving, but there were, staying in the Stardust hotel, getting ready for our first night exploring the strip.

We went to several different casinos, finishing up our evening at Caesar’s Palace. On the cab ride back to our hotel around midnight, my mother pulled some cash out of her wallet, showing me what she planned to tip the guy to get my approval. Unbeknown to either one of us, the wallet slip off her lap and ended up under the seat of the cab.

Once inside, we decided to do a little more gambling and split up to find our favorite slot machines.

She found me about five minutes later, totally horrified.

“My wallet is gone!” Of course, so were all her credit cards and her id, along with $400.00 in cash she had saved up for the trip.

The hotel staff were very helpful, even figuring out which cab company had dropped us off, but we had no idea who the driver had been. We called the cab company and they told us that most of their drivers got off their shifts around 200am. If the wallet was still in the cab, the driver would probably find it when he cleaned out his car.

We were both pretty doubtful it would be found intake. This was, after all, Vegas. Another customer could easily get in, clean it out, and perhaps leave the wallet. Or the cab driver could easily take the cash and say he found it that way and return the id and credit cards. We were pretty sure, best case, if we got the wallet back, it would be minus the cash.

I went to bed, but my mother couldn’t sleep. This was pre September 11th, so she could have flown home with no id. Credit cards could be cancelled. Just call Dad in the morning and have him send out some more cash.

“You don’t understand,” she said. “That was MY money. I saved it so we could go gambling and have some nice dinners.”

Her money, Dad’s money. What the hell difference did it make?

But it mattered to her. Years later I would have a conversation with my aunt, shortly after I bought my first house solo and she said, “You know it wasn’t that long ago, that women couldn’t buy houses on their own.”

It is easy when you grow up having options, as a woman, as a minority, to forget. Is it a perfect world when it comes to sexism and racism? Of course not. Just the United States has a long way to go to say neither exists anymore, but we also need to stop sometimes and be thankful for how far things have come.

My mother grew up in a time when women couldn’t buy their own houses, were expected not to work once they got pregnant and basically relied on their husbands for everything. Saving up $400.00 of her own money, for a vacation with her daughter was a big deal. A trip that 30 years before, would have never happened. Now the money was gone and she was going to have to ask her husband to bail her out.

At 300am that night, the phone rang in our hotel room. It was the front desk of the hotel. The cab driver we had earlier had found the wallet when he finished his shift. He looked at the picture on my mother’s license and remembered he had dropped us off at the Stardust. He was down in the lobby with the wallet. Did we want to come down and pick it up?

I got out of bed, threw on some clothes and we both went down. When the cab driver handed her the wallet back, he was beaming that he had found the owner.

She looked inside. $400.00 in cash and all the credit cards. She started crying and tipped him a $50.00, which at first he didn’t want to take.

“We want people to feel safe in Las Vegas. I was just doing my job,” he told her.

I thought of that story as I was being driven to the airport. A woman, owner of not one, but three houses, traveling on business, going back to a band she runs herself.

Someday maybe I will try Uber. But for now, I think I will stick with the cabs.

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INTERVIEW ADVENTURES

We Are Women Hear Us Roar!

HOME IMPROVEMENT: THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE UGLY

A Taxi Story

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