Tonight, a little bit of this, and a little bit of that. (I sound like the lyric from that really annoying song they play all the time in the grocery store, but anyway...)

Right now, I'm slightly annoyed because the headphones I've been using for Argo have finally gone bad. The right channel is dead. It's been spotty for a while, but before, I could always coax it into working by futzing with the little volume knob on thex cord. Tonight, no dice.

So I go back and forth between listening with only the left channel, and turning it off because the drastic imbalance is jarring to my senses. Gotta get my Madonna fix, dammit!

Salem Pax (of Iraq blogging fame) has managed to get a bunch of back-postings uploaded! Upon discovering this new mass of content, I spent the last hour or so reading this most interesting account of the war. I grabbed a few quotes along the way.

As the conflict was in the early stages...

I wish the Iraqi and the American governments would stop saying they are doing this for the people. I also want to hold a "not in my name" sign.

On the destruction in Baghdad...

To see your city destroyed before your own eyes is not a pain that can be described and put to words. It turns you sour or was that bitter, it makes something snap in you and you lose whatever hope you had. Undone by your own hands. Close your doors. Shut your eyes. Hope the black clouds of this ugliness do not reach you.

On the Fedayeen...

They want to die in the name of Allah, so what do they do? Do they stand in front of "kafeer infidel aggressor"? No they don't because they are chicken shit. They go hide in civilian districts to shoot a single useless mortar shell or a couple of Kalashnikov shots which bounce without any effect on the armored vehicles.

On looters...

The same crowd who jumped up and down shouting "long live saddam" now shouts in cameras "thank you Mr. Bush" while carrying whatever they could carry.

The aftermath...

The streets markets look like something out of a William Gibson novel. Heaps of cheap RAM (stolen of course) is being sold beside broken monitors beside falafel stands and weapons are all available. Fights break out justlikethat and knives come out from nowhere, knives just bought 5 minutes ago. There are army sighting thingys, Weird looking things with lenses. And people selling you computer cases who tell you these are electric warmers, never having seen a computer case before. Really truly surreal.

Though I like the BBC and some of the other more balanced news sources, I find this sort of account from an ordinary person on the ground invaluable in helping to understand what's really going on over there. Excellent reading.

I will now publicly state, barring some horrible and unforeseen circumstance, that I intend to join the Jaeger contingent in viewing The Matrix Reloaded at Colony Square on Thursday at 1900 MDT. "All who read this webpage and care to see said movie are invited to show up for the event." Ditto here.

I will stop tomorrow on the way to work to procure a ticket. Assuming that goes well, it should be a lock.

Lemme see...

I am not satisfied in my current job. This is no secret to anyone who reads this page. I've been thinking long and hard about how to deal with this situation.

At this stage, I have concluded that it is probably unrealistic to expect to find a regular full time programming job. It doesn't matter how much ability I may or may not have, or what wonders I can make this machine do when I sit at this keyboard. The demand just isn't there. Kiss that dream goodbye.

It sucks to write that.

Anyway, under the idea that some improvement is better than stagnation, and the all-or-nothing approach is a quick road to defeat, I've been thinking that maybe I should just go around town looking for anything that might be an improvement over what I've got, without necessarily being a programming job. Seek to better my lot in life, blah blah blah.

I would have two primary criteria for selection: More enjoyable work, better hours, and better pay. If such a thing could be found, then yay! If not, then it might allow me to better appreciate what I do have, since it sure beats being down and out with utterly no earning ability like I was last October.

So here I was, thinking about getting started tomorrow (nothing fancy, just try fill out an application at some nearby business and see if anything materializes)... And then my dad materializes, and mentions that the newspaper job he's been doing might be looking to hire some new people, in case I'm interested.

Sales. God help me.

I suppose a brief explanation is in order. My dad's newspaper selling job consists of standing in the front of various grocery stores, offering people a free newspaper, and if they accept, he tries to get them to sign up for a subscription. If he's into it, good for him, but me? (FYI, for years, my dad has been into anything and everything that involves selling stuff. It's an obsession I don't quite understand, but it's his thing.)

There's no hourly wage. It's commission-only. He tells me most people who do it (at least the ones who survive it for more than a few weeks) make an average of $20-30/hour, but that varies wildly both up and down depending on how business goes on any given day. That would actually be decent money. If I could stomach the job itself enough to do it with a sufficient degree of competence.

God help me, I actually considered going for it. Still am, actually.

But damn. I am NOT a sales person, nor do I have any desire to be, other than the possible $$ it might mean.

Though I deal constantly with customers in the deli, I would not consider it a sales job by any stretch of the imagination. People walk up to the counter, usually already knowing what they want to order. Occassionally, they may ask for some information about a product, which I endeavor to provide. But never has anything I've done involved trying to convince people to buy this or that. I guess in that regard, I could count my blessings.

Argggg. Could it be that a decent paying job might nearly falling into my lap, but I refuse it because I just can't stand the thought of spending all day jumping in the faces of strangers and trying to push stuff at them in hopes that a small percentage might buy? Ick.

Ick ick ick.

I hate this world. I hate the choices it has left me. I feel almost the same sensation I got while standing in the voting booth, confronted with only two options that had a realistic chance to win. One was labeled "Bush" and the other "Gore". Except this time, it's my freakin life we're talking about!

Oh well. It was nice of my dad to bring that up, whether or not I actually go for it. (How he manages to actually like that sort of stuff is utterly beyond me.)

Anyway, I better get to bed if there's to be any hope of doing anything tomorrow before work. Buy tickets, go to bank, fill out a job application somewhere (chances of that one actually happening tomorrow: 0.1%), laundry, etc etc.

Oh, and I've totally been disregarding the results of that last pole. [snicker] Surprised? I thought not.

I think I'll put up another one tonight though. Peace.