I hate the holidays sometimes

Work is cutting hours because we're not selling enough. Except for the part where the other day I personally sold about $1,000 worth of stuff. Thankfully, though, we're not on commission, because days like that are rare. Still, it's a Saturday, which means with all the kids it's going to be hectic. And with hours being cut, it's probably going to mean a small crew to close. Hopefully it's too cold and it starts sleeting. That'll keep the people away, and we'll get out of there at a decent hour tonight.

Monday morning I'm having surgery to have my gallbladder removed. It's outpatient, and not very major, but at the same time I'll be missing a week of work. On the other hand, I do get to enjoy Thanksgiving dinner with my family, and I get to eat whatever I want again. Of course within limits, and I'm going to try to stay on this low fat diet, because I honestly feel, aside from the stress about no money and apprehension about the surgery, better than I have in a while. We'll see how long that lasts.

After that, I'm going to volunteer to be a cashier because working on the floor, I think, won't be the easiest thing. I won't be able to do lifting, work the rock wall (that our department is in charge of), stock, work in the backstock room at all, change signs...really anything but help customers, and on the floor that's only a small part of my job. I'm still putting in all sorts of applications online and trying to find more work for after the holidays, but it's hard. Really really hard. Oh well, I'll just have to tuck in and do my best.

Quick update

So life is kicking my butt. I've got serious health issues that have developed within the past week, and it's going to require surgery. My gallbladder needs to come out being the long and short of it. As soon as I get that done, I have to miss at least a week of work, and I'll be on light duty for a while after that. So coming up into the busiest retail part of the year, I'm dealing with constant hunger, dizziness, nausea, and weakness. I'm going to be missing a week of work when I'm getting almost 40 hours a week. This is BAD news, because I need to get money coming in.

Luckily I've done my Christmas shopping, and also luckily EVERYONE at work is totally behind me on this. I work in a large store, as I've said before, but I've got so many people from different departments making sure I'm taking care of myself and offering anything they can do to help. That's how we do it at work, we all take care of each other because we all get along. We really are a community. My manager and everyone else in my department is willing to work with me and make sure I don't stress myself too much while I'm healing from surgery. The doctor said six weeks before I can lift heavy weights again, but I can definitely work on the floor. There's lots of people to do the heavy work, seriously. And then I'll be able to get more money coming in.

Somehow my sister is working two jobs now, and I know I need to work another job, but the searches are only turning up seasonal work. I really won't be able to start a new job until after the new year, which means it's kind of silly to be looking now because most of the people are still looking for last minute seasonal help. I'm already WORKING seasonal work, I can't start until after the year starts. And everything else requires a degree or manager experience, or I don't have what they want. But I can't give up now, always somewhere that I haven't tried yet.

Car problems solved!

I've managed to fix my car for free! It turns out all I needed to do was stretch a spring. It was really that simple. But there was also a small problem with the radio housing, so I fixed that by putting the radio into the bottom slot so the broken housing wasn't trying to hold the weight of it. Simple and taken care of.

I've also been applying at all sorts of places the past few days. I know that right now a lot of places are hiring for seasonal work, but that's not what I'm looking for. I'm actually looking to start after the first of the year, when I get back from a trip. I'm getting plenty of hours at my current job for the holidays, and the manager is being EXTREMELY fair with what hours she's giving people, and taking into consideration the travel time to and from work during the holidays. Black Friday, for example, I'm not working until late. Which is good, because if I had to get up at 3:30 AM to make it into work on time, I'd have to seriously reconsider my job. If I didn't have to be up until 3:30 PM, however, that would be a different story.

I've also managed to cut drastically back on spending by taking my lunch in to work. I never thought about that, but working three days a week getting a lunch at $6.00 and snacks and drinks from the machines at usually $3.00 a day adds up really fast. That's almost $30 on average for a short work week. Now I buy a drink at $1.00, if anything. And with more hours coming my way and gas being cheaper, that's giving me MUCH more into the bank by the end of the week. And I'm at the point where the first of the large week paychecks are starting to hit my account. Not that it's anywhere near how much I need, but it's getting there. It's a start, and that's how things have to be done. One step at a time.

It's been a while, hasn't it? Well, gas prices have gone down, which is good. I can now afford to go back and forth to work, for the most part. Cell phone bill is still expensive, but I can't go without it, as I don't have a home phone. Living with parents after they've caught the whole cell phone bug is kind of annoying. The house phone is now a cell phone, but since I'm on my own plan, I can't use the home phone because it's on THEIR family plan that THEY'RE paying for. Someone explain parental logic to me again?

In any case, I'm also picking up more hours at my job. I'm still not full time, which is going to be terrible come my birthday when I'm off my dad's insurance. Not that it's terribly good, but it's better than having nothing. I'm still looking all over for jobs, but the only places that I'm seeing that are hiring are for seasonal work, which I don't need. Seasonal hours are actually picking up for me, so I'm doubtful I'll be able to start a new job until...oh, after New Year's?

I'm also taking a trip over New Year's, to Canada. My friend is flying me up there and paying for the hotel, so I don't have to worry about that. All I need is spending money, and hopefully after Christmas and working all sorts of hours, I'll be able to do it.

So at work last week I got more hours than most full time people, simply because I'm willing to volunteer for promotions. I worked with kids all of Halloween, which wasn't bad. The store was pretty dead. The weather was nice, and most kids went Trick-or-Treating in their own neighborhoods. Now, if the weather had been much worse, I would have been MUCH more busy, but I was having a blast with the few kids that did come. There were some ADORABLE children that came through, and they managed to make me smile. And when I'm having a hard time with money and such, I just think of them.

My family has also gone through a giant upheaval, my grandmother on my father's side passed away somewhat suddenly. It was nice to see all the family again, but not good that it takes a death to do it. So I lost some time at work for that, but at the same time, it was worth it. And now another girl at work just had her grandfather pass away, so not only do I know what she's going through, she's going to be away a bit as well, meaning we're either going to be a bit shorthanded, or someone else is getting more hours. The manager can't give them to me because I'll go into overtime on hours. Not that I'd mind, but I don't think the company wants to pay me for it.

Nothing else is really going on right now. The weather's really starting to turn, and I need to get the fan switch fixed in my car (still), but that's a cheap fix. All it takes is a nice day where I won't freeze working on it, the right tools, and time. Hopefully it all works out in the next two days, because it's my 'weekend' from work. And I need it. It's time to sleep in and not do much at all, except for keep looking for jobs.

Can it be New Year's yet? Please?

I had been better. I had money in my bank account. I had a friend come down and was very good with not spending a lot of money. Then the student loan payment hit again, and I'm back to where I was. Except I've got less money in the bank than before. And I've got MUCH more stress from personal issues. That's neither here nor there, but it's making things much more difficult.

The next schedule that's out for work, though, is promising. My department is in charge of the Santa's Workshop, and I'm getting 39 hours one week, somehow. Most of the full time employees aren't even getting that much, but I volunteered early to be put on for as many as they needed working both in my department and in the promotions department. So while at the end of the month I'll be getting more hours, it'll be mid-November before I'm able to see the effects of that in my bank account.

Also, though I have tried calling my credit card company and getting a new card issued (I have the account paid off, no balance, I just need a new card for emergencies), I haven't received it yet. And while I've also called the student loan company I'm with to request a forbearance on my loan, they haven't sent it to me either. It's not because my parents aren't getting it to me, because somehow they've gotten much better at getting me my mail. I'm just wondering if there's a black hole somewhere between the post office and my house. Which isn't that far away at all. Next week on Monday I'm going to the bank and calling the loan company, because I need to get it all taken care of, and fast. If I had an emergency and my debit card declined, I'd like to be able to pay for things that needed to be done.

The past few days have been spent on job listing websites, trying to find something that's going to get me out of this hole. There's not a whole lot going on in my real life at the moment, except for the friend coming in from out of town next week. It's going to be interesting trying to balance less than no money, the need to work as much as I can, and the price of gas with entertaining someone. Luckily for me, however, my friend realizes the situation I'm in and is perfectly capable of entertaining herself if need be. She just needs a break from her family and home, which I perfectly understand.

So far on the job front I've been emailed by several companies trying to get me to be an independent agent. I can't do this, I know this for a fact. I've tried doing it before, but it's never worked out for me. I need more structure than that in my employment. The few places I've actually put in applications have turned me down, but that's not stopping me from going for at least half an hour each day to browse through other jobs and apply, and usually I'm there for much longer than that. Let's just hope that this all works out in the end and I'm able to find a decent job, AND that my current job is willing to cut me down to less hours a week so that I can actually attend my new job. I don't think that will be a big issue. They want to keep me on there, I know this, and I want to stay there, but I'm thinking more and more that it can't be my primary employment.

And hopefully when I get enough money and can make an annealing kiln, I'll be able to start selling some glass beads. Right now I'm still getting all my supplies in, but I learned from a friend, and it's an interesting way to relax and earn some extra cash. Add this to the fact that my sister's mother-in-law, who loves the family and lives blocks away, makes jewelry for a living, and we might just have a joint venture partnership once I can anneal my beads and sell them. Which would be a great deal of fun, trust me. I'd be busy, making beads and dealing with two jobs, but for the money I need to pay down debt and get out of this hole, I'm more than willing to put the time in.

If only I could find another job. This week I'm down to two days of work, and I've got company coming in this Saturday. Fortunately, she knows my current situation and isn't expecting to go out and live extravagantly, but at the same time, it's going to really suck having to entertain on negative money.

I have, however, spoken to my manager and she knows that I need as many hours as possible, whether or not I have company here. And she's more than willing to help me out and get me anything she can. But I work in the camping department of a nationwide retail chain. And camping isn't very much in style during the autumn. The hunting department is getting lots of hours, but I haven't taken the federal tests to sell guns, and they have enough people up there already, so there's really no way I can get on up there with enough time to get me out of the hole. I am looking for other jobs in the area, it's hard. Most people are hiring for seasonal, and as soon as we get our Winter Wonderland set up (within the first week of November), our department is going to be staffing a lot of it, so I know I'll have more hours. And yes, I could cut back to lower hours there if I find a full time job somewhere else, but it's hard to FIND because it's coming up on the holidays and nobody wants to commit to full time employment.

I'm looking on Monster.com and CareerBuilder.com, hopefully I'll find something and cut back to less hours at my current job. It's just hard to find a full-time job listing that doesn't require previous experience and has set hours.

I would have gone to the bank today, but the VP, the only person who can manage the overdraft charges, wasn't there. So I have to go back tomorrow morning. Luckily, the bank is close to where I live, so I'm not using too much gas to get there. If it's a nice enough day I might just ride my bike (assuming I can find a pump for the tires) or walk.

For now, I'll just clean the house so my parents stay happy with me. I said I'd do it Saturday and got busy with other rooms, so it's off to scrub the bathroom.