Did I get drunk last night? No. Did I have a couple beers? Yes. (I generally limit myself to 2 if I'm going to have to drive anywhere afterwards. Maayyybe 3.)

Having more or less made an art of getting my parents used to the idea that I may be at either or neither place at any given time, I discreetly slipped out to revisit an old haunt. (Again, exactly how old am I now? Sneaking away from the parents to go party.... Shit, unemployment sucks.)

Saw quite a few familiar faces, made a couple of new acquaintance, and said hi to one person I had spoken to on previous jaunts. But mostly, I just soaked it all in. The music. The dancing. The beer. The hot chicks.

Life is good.

I momentarily awakened naturally at the unnaturally absurd hour of 0700 this morning, I went to the grocery store, bought a quart of orange juice, drank most of it, and wandered over to the laser fortress. After loading slashdot a couple of times, I promptly went back to sleep on the couch, until my dad awakened me, asking if I wanted any of this "breakfast" thing he was eating. I ate a little, and then went back to sleep.

I've probably slept a combined total of around 11 blissful hours since going to bed last night. That's the kind of hangover I don't mind having.

It's time to face reality. This "coasting without a job" thing is not going to work on a sustainable basis. Even if it could, I'm not happy in it.

I'm out of money. Well, ok, there's a few bucks in the checking, and I have a little cash left in my wallet, but it's time for the red flags to go up when the balance on the credit card is greater than the checking account. (Technically, I could still say I'm in the positive overall if I add the savings account, but I've vowed not to draw any more from that unless there's a "real emergency".)

Ankle-deep in debt. From here, it either gets better, or it gets worse.

(And yes, I do have some money coming from buildmeasite, but exactly when that will get here is anybody's guess.)

As I see it, in the absence of employment offers overflowing my mailbox, my most viable option for short term cash would be to swallow what little pride I have, go back on my hands and knees to the deli, and see if they have any openings. Based on the manager's appraisal of my performance before I quit, they might even be willing to "make" an opening if one doesn't exist. Therefore, I have a reasonable degree of confidence that if worse comes to worse, there's a job there for me.

Why am I so hesitant to take that option? 1) The work, while menial and boring, also somehow manages to be a stress pit of continual annoyance. It sucks. 2) One of the reasons I jumped ship in the first place was because I felt they weren't paying me anything near what I was worth. That problem doesn't go away if I go back. In fact, I'd be back at starting wages again. 3) The pride thing. By coming back, I'd be implicitly admitting to pretty much everybody that my great opportunity didn't work out so well. Yay for morale on the job market.

Still, when I weigh those against the option of gradually slipping further and further into poverty and debt, it doesn't sound quite so bad.

Maybe if I could actually get myself motivated enough to do some serious resume pimping, phone calling, show some real persistence at this disillusioning and annying task of "job hunting", and seriously open up to the possibility of moving out of state, there might be a little more luck for me.

I just have to get myself going. No better time to start than now.