Life Update

My life has gotten pretty crazy recently.

Found out about 3 weeks ago that Joey is being transferred to Salzburg, Austria for work for the next 18 months. Luckily for us, they are super awesome and are letting me join the adventure. He is moving over May 31st and I'll be flying over with him to look for apartments then coming home June 11th till the end of the month so I don't have to live in a hotel. It's pretty much an opportunity of a lifetime and we couldn't be more excited to get to live in Europe. His company also will be paying for trips home every 6 months which is awesome because I will probably stay for at least a month on each return trip. I'll be a stay at home girlfriend, weekend trip planner, and german lesson extraordinaire while we are over there. I also plan to take some online classes here so I am at least doing something with my life. If anyone has any ideas of fun hobbies, they would be greatly appreciated. I plan to train for a marathon while I'm there since I won't have to get up extra early to run and I think it would be fun to run through the city. We will see how long this lasts, I might change it to "training for a 5K".


Last Friday was my last day at Sears Pool. The job had gotten pretty stressful and with the big move coming up, it just wasn't fair to Joey or myself to be so stressed at work that I couldn't do anything at home. It was hard to quit, but I am so much happier now that I have time to really relax and enjoy life. I've worked at Sears since I was 15 so it is kind of crazy to be done there. I have picked up some hours at Anthro for the rest of the month so I'll be there quite a bit to try to get some money saved since I wont be working for awhile.
In other exciting news, I'm engaged!! Joey proposed Saturday night after a perfect dinner at the Sundial overlooking the city. He had told me earlier in the week that we were going to dinner Saturday to celebrate our 3 year anniversary but he wouldn't tell me where because he knows just how much I HATE surprises and not knowing things. So we spent the afternoon at the zoo as my part of the anniversary celebration and then headed down to the surprise dinner. We pulled up in front of the Westin and I finally figured out where we were going. The dinner was great and the view was amazing. It was defiantly something really cool to do since we are leaving Atlanta for a bit. We finished dinner and went to the upper area to take pictures of the city. We were looking around and all of a sudden I turn to look at him and he was getting down on one knee! Our favorite views of the city were behind us and it was perfect. No one was around since it was about 10:30 but we found someone walking past to get a quick picture before we left the restaurant to call everyone.

Finishing up dinner

Joey enjoying a beer

engaged!

the ring

Taxes.

So I have learned my new least favorite thing about being an adult. Taxes. More importantly, tax refunds, or in this case the lack of.

I have been putting off doing my taxes because I am lazy and have been hoping my dad would just end up doing them. Finally after Joey hassling me to do something productive I started doing them. I assumed I'd get about $100 back. I knew I wasn't going to be one of the lucky ones who will get a $700 check back to me, but an extra hundred was going to be nice. NOT. I owe $140 back to the State of Georgia. I don't even know how this is possible, but it is terrible. I get a ton taken out every week for taxes, but this is just an extra F-U from the government.

Not cool Georgia.

The 2nd Year

So my Freshman year of life has come and gone...though I think it would only be fair to say my Freshman year of life should go through May since I graduated early.

Regardless, the past year of real life has taught me a lot. I moved out on my own, I got a job and I am starting to learn what I see myself doing as a career. (professional lifeguard? i don't think so.). The past year was nothing liked what I imagined my post-college life would be as a 15 year old, but I am happy with where I am and wouldn't change anything about it (except I would have more money).

I think when we are little we all follow the path we are supposed to--graduate high school, get into college, graduate college, get a job. They focus so much in high school about getting into college they oversee the "figure out what you want to do in college your first 2 years so you don't graduate with no set plan". I wanted to work for the State Department when I went into college which would make sense with my Political Science degree. The thing they don't tell you is that when you decide by junior year that you don't want to work for the State Department, you are left with a Poli Sci degree and no where to go. Everyone always asks me what i want to do with my degree--my answer? I have no idea. I had a set plan but by junior year you can't go and switch the plan. Or you can, but it will cost an addition $40,000 for the extra year you will have to stay in out of state school. So here I am...

The Freshman year of life taught me about as much as the freshman year of college. There I learned to make new friends and do my own laundry while now I learned to pay bills and get up at 8am. 4 years ago I taught myself to like beer, and now I find myself doing the same with wine. I had to make it through the hell week of finals and now I have to make it with no christmas vacation and summer break.

It was my junior year of college where I learned exactly what to study and how many hours before the paper was due that I had to start. It was the last 2 years that I got the highest grades in the class on tests and really started to excell at the whole class part of college. So many it will take 2 years in the real world to figure it all out. Maybe these first two years can be spent how my first two years of college were spent--having fun, messing up, and figuring life out.

Dave Barry's "16 Things That it Took Me 50 Years to Learn"

• You will never find anybody who can give you a clear and compelling reason why we observe day-light-savings time.
• You should never say anything to a women that even remotely suggests you think she's pregnant unless you can see an actual baby emerging from her at that moment.
• The most powerful force in the universe is gossip
• The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of age, gender, religion, economic status or ethnic background, is that, deep down inside we ALL believe that we are above-average drivers.
• There comes a time when you should stop expecting other people to make a big deal about your birthday. That time is age 111.
• There is a very fine line between "hobby" and "mental illness"
• People who want to share their religious views with you almost never want you to share yours with them.
• If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved, and never will achieve, its full potential, that word would be "meetings".
• The main accomplishment of almost all organized protests is to annoy people who are not in them.
• If there really is a God who created the entire universe with all of its glories and He decides to deliver a message to humanity, He will NOT use, as His messenger, a person on cable TV with a bad hairstyle.
• You should not confuse your career with your life.
• A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person.
• No matter what happens, somebody will find a way to take it too seriously.
• When trouble arises and things look bad, there is always one individual who perceives a solution and is willing to take command. Very often, that individual is crazy.
• Your friends love you, anyways.
• Nobody cares if you can't dance well. Just get up and do it.
  

6 Months In

I'm going to try this again--mainly due to the lack of cable in my room.

Life update:
I am working at Sears Pool Management right now full time and at Anthropologie a few nights a week for extra spending money. I moved out of my parents house (YAY!) and live in a townhouse in West Atlanta/Midtown/Howell Mill area-ish. It feels nice to be out of east cobb and having more responsibility in terms of bills and all that. The jobs are going pretty well but 13 hour days get tiring and many days my energy is spent even before making it to Anthro. Its probably a good thing that not many of my friends are home since I have little time to hang out anyways. I try to make time to spend just hanging out around my apartment but even on my days, nights, and someones only hours off I can't get nearly enough done and the next full day seems to come so much quicker than the days off do. I am trying to get a hold of this real life concept though. I feel older now that I have moved out and am paying bills and rent. Some days I question if I made the right decision to leave my parents house which would of been only $200 in rent but I like to think that paying real rent is a better life lesson and practice in adulthood than at my parents. I am lucky to have minimal expenses even with moving out--no car payments, no student loans, no credit cards so that has helped a lot. So this is where I am at now. Some place between living at home and making it on my own.

I am reading a book right now that calls this first year out of college your freshman year of life. And I kept thinking after reading this how true it really is. Freshman year of college, and high school for that matter, were times of change and challenge. They are the time years that really seem to test patience, friendships, and ability to accept change. I'm not sure they have ever been my best years, but they have been great learning years and have set the later years up for great success. So this really is my freshman year of life. The year that I have to figure out what its like to be a grown up and make it on my own. The year I learn what I want to start doing for the rest of my life (or at least the next 5 years). Its the year I test myself to see what I can achieve and what is better left for others to explore. I hope that this year turns out to be as successful as my previous freshman years, but we will just have to wait and see.

Hopefully the rest of the summer give me some time to figure out what I plan to do with the coming years and allow me some time to focus on my future. I hope that I can learn to pay bills and rent while still enjoying life and all that Atlanta has to offer.

Fail

Not only do I fail at keeping up with this blog, I also have been failing at finding a job. I guess I always figured after I graduated college everyone would be running towards me with job opportunities and my life would be so easy. Not the case. At all. Not only is it incredibly annoying filling in applications on a day to day basis, no one ever even calls me back. Talk about fail. What have I learned? Graduating means nothing at this point. These jobs I am applying for are ones that I am over qualified for, both in years of school and past job history, but yet I still don't even get to interview for them. This process is slowly taking my patience. I've been trying to remind myself that everyone is in the same boat and no one is hiring, but its not helping. I really just didn't think it would be this hard. Warning for those of you that are just starting the search: expect it to suck. The okay news is that I do have a job till July as of now. The pool company I worked for last summer (and actually every summer since I was 15) wants me back. Not that this is maybe my ideal choice, but its a job and I love the people there. I just feel like I've failed going back to a job I had pre-diploma. But if they are the company that wants me, then I guess I'll take what I can get!

Today has just been a downer day. I should be happy that I will be getting paid and getting out of my house starting in 2 weeks, but I just thought at this point in my life I would have so much more. I would be living on my own, going to a big-girl job, and wearing suits. But maybe my time will come soon enough, I've got a little bit of maturing to do before heading out to the real world anyways. I still see myself as a 16 year old (even 5 years later) so I guess in some ways I can't imagine myself being completely grown up. Hopefully after this summer I can really nail down what exactly I want to do and then find it. The guy I talked to at a recruiting place told me the best advice he could give me is to stay where I am now (part time at Anthro) and figure out what exactly I am looking for. If you don't know 100% then you won't ever land a job because companies can tell the difference between something you could do and something you want to do. So I guess my next goal is to really start to research jobs and what I am cut out for.

So for now, I am back to working at Sears Pool full time and Anthropologie part time. The good news I guess is that I can wear tshirts to the first job and the 40% discount at the other never gets old. For anyone else in the job market search, good luck. And don't worry, you aren't alone!

Day 2

So I couldn't decide if I should number the days by how many actual days since I started or by the day number by which I have actually done something productive. I am going with days actually doing something job related since it will be easier to keep track.

After my last attempt to look for a job, I took a little break and focused on working at my current part time job. Getting 5 to 8 hours a week at Anthropologie is helping with gas money until a real offer comes along, but this past weekend it was taking up a bit more time than I would of liked. I had planned a weekend trip to St. Simon's with some friends after thinking that my only shift was Saturday. I figured a 4 hour shift wouldn't be too hard to pawn off on someone so I was excited to leave my house for a few days and forget about the looming idea of a job. Of course when Tuesday came around I stopped by to look up my hours for the upcoming week and low and behold I was schedule not just Saturday, but also Sunday and Monday. This put a huge dent in my MLK weekend plans and I ended up having to stay in town and forgo the trip out of Atlanta. I ended up salvaging a little bit of the weekend by making a trip up to Clemson Friday night to visit some of my college friends and tourture myself by reminding myself that I am out of college. It was fun to be back but staying for a night was enough and I don't miss classes or homework at all. I'll just have to keep up the weekend trips up there to help remind myself that I could still be in college.

As far as the actual job hunt is going--ehhh not off to a great start. I'm not even looking for a super great job at this point. I figure I have no idea what I want to do anyways so if I get into something and realize it isn't the job for me I can always change. No need to limit myself since I'm not sure what I'm 100% interested in anyways. All I know after my numerous areas of previous job experience is that I like office work. So I guess I can start at that. I've look at a few administrative jobs but I feel like I could do better than getting someones coffee and making copies after graduating college. I've also looked at the HR route since I had seen how that worked this summer. There are still more options than that in an office and I have come across and sent my resume into some that sound interesting. Hopefully I can get a few more leads tomorrow and submit some more resumes. I'm hoping that I can meet people who know people in a business hiring but so far all my people aren't looking to hire anyone. So it looks like more internet research is to come. If anyone knows of any office positions let me know!