Working Girl

I've been making a lot of passing remarks about my tiredness of late, but I haven't actually paused to explain the source.

In the beginning there was job 1 and while job 1 was new, challenging, and pleasing to my resume there were always payroll glitches. I knew going in it was a small company and those things happen. However, to me, the trade-off of getting hands-on experience in my field, minus the bureaucracy was enough for me to hang on. Other bonus? I work remotely 90% of the time...score!

To compensate, I picked up job 2. Now, job 2 is truly just a job. The schedule is insanely flexible and all my superiors are concerned about is the completion of tasks, they do not micromanage....ever. Now working 50+ hours a week managing employees at job 1 can get tedious, so it was an interesting dichotomy to be someone else's employee at job 2. Not to mention 2 fabulous fringe benefits of job 2: #1 meeting and working with Sweets and #2 a glorious discount!

Then 2008-2009 happened.....things at job 1 got very rocky. We were embroiled in a lawsuit that threatened to shutter the doors, end my career, and effectively would leave me bankrupt and needing a new moniker. (Pause) I really wish I was being overly dramatic in that statement. There is nothing in this entire blog that I'm more direct or serious about than that 2nd to last sentence---it was truly THAT serious. Not to mention the recession hit something hard and all of a sudden ends started to not be met.

Now....the 2nd quarter of '09 is when I got deadly serious about being ready to relocate. However, 'mama raised no fool' and I knew that realistically I couldn't shoulder that legal burden (of the ongoing job 1 suit) on my own. So I dug in my heels and gave job 1 all of my effort. However, with the quarterly legal fees being more than what the CEO was paying himself annually, you can imagine how tight things got. Sooner than later payroll was about a month behind.

Now through all of the previous payroll hiccups I leaned on my part-time earnings at job 2 to get through. Slowly but surely those checks stopped being shopping money and soon it started being the means for me to pay my health insurance (we don't have benefits @ job 1).

The "oh sh!t" moment happened during the '08 holiday season. Business at job 2 was lousy, at best. Hours started to get cut and tasks got fewer and fewer. By the time we hit the 2nd quarter of '09, I felt like I was playing Russian roulette with my finances (maybe I'll get job 1's check, or maybe job 2's check will be enough to cover the paper it's printed on)...a mess.

Finally, the lawsuit was settled in job 1 and I was no longer in jeopardy of personal liability. However, the monthly payout was/is staggering. Payroll remained/remains at a one month delay. At job 2 the hours aren't diminishing, but they are definitely not increasing.

What's a girl to do???? All the while, I'm on a fervent relocation hunt. I'm intimately aware of what is on the job sites and the sites are familiar with me. However, the more important question is "how am I paying my bills right now?" Well the frustration boiled up in me long enough and I got serious. I started to look for a part-time gig locally....I mean what's the point of job searching if you're cell phone wouldn't be in service to schedule an interview?


Exactly.....

And enter job 3.....yes.....3. I scored a contract for a few weeks (the amount of time it should take job 1 to get payroll caught up) and started this week.

How???

Well I do job 1 in the early morning, job 3 in the morning/afternoon, then go to job 2 in the evening. It helps that jobs 2&3 are across the street from each other. Sounds crazy? I concede it is a little insane, but I'm a bottom line type person and as long as I can juggle it all I will.

Time to hit the ground running......