Define: Moving forward

Well, I didn't get the job at Target. Which, honestly, was a huge blow to my self-esteem. I mean, I like Target, I think it's a fairly nice store, but it's not THAT great. And they didn't want my help during their busiest time of the year? I know that I don't have any retail experience, but how hard would it be to train me? It made me feel pretty bad. I know that the interview wasn't spectacular, but I didn't think it was bad, either.

So I'm still looking for a job. Bath and Body Works is hiring seasonally, so that's my next stop, then Kohl's, then whatever I find next. It's nice to have more than one option. Both of those stores have locations in Jackson and Ann Arbor, so I'll probably apply to both. I am definitely not opposed to having more than one job. But I'm afraid that I'll end up with one in Jackson and one in Ann Arbor, and that's no good. I think I lean a little bit more towards wanting to work in Jackson, since that's closer to Spring Arbor, but I probably have more options in Ann Arbor. I told my dad last night that I could probably get my old job at Aggie's back really easily, but I am not that desperate. I hope I will not be that desperate. Ever.

I finally called to make an appointment to finish up my registration for beauty school. I think I've been putting it off because I know that once I sign up, I won't have the option to work at camp this summer, and I don't want to give that up. I know that I can't work there forever, but part of me still wants to.

No word from Higher One yet. I may ask for an update on how things are going. As soon as this is resolved, I'm closing my account there. This whole thing has been ridiculous.


It's time to fill out more applications.

Animal Scrabble

When I was watching Jack the other day, he said he wanted to play a game. I asked him what game, and he said, "Scrabble."
First I was really confused. "Scrabble?"
"Yeah, animal Scrabble."
I was wondering why he wanted to play Scrabble (and I knew he wouldn't be like, really playing it, but still), and wondering what "animal" Scrabble was. I asked him where it was, he directed me to the closet and pointed to the box.
Animal Scramble. That made much more sense.

I think my favorite part of yesterday was when he asked for a drink after snack. He said he wanted milk or orange juice, which I was pretty sure would be okay, but wasn't positive. I said, "How about water?" And he gave me a funny look and said, "How about not water?"
I love that kid. :)


I'm currently working on my hair school application. I'm supposed to write a letter of intent. I'm not entirely sure what that's supposed to be about. "I intend to go to your school." Then what? I don't know if this is supposed to be like, what I plan to do after, or if I'm supposed to talk myself up in it, or if I'm supposed to suck up in it.
I think it's going to end up being kind of a personal mission statement thing, what I plan to do after. We'll see.


Oh yeah, the Higher One guy hasn't called. He said he would on Monday or Tuesday. :/
I've started knitting this (the one in the bottom right corner, because that's what the pattern is for, although I really like the green one above it). I'm excited to see how it turns out. I guess I'm pretending that when I get to hair school I'll be all stylish. With my hat. It's a dream, don't judge.


I'm also looking at my options for jobs. It would be great to do reception in a salon before I get to hair school, and it might be a job I could keep once I start. But I'm also thinking that once I start, I'm going to be wanting all the breaks I can get. Classes are from 9:00 am - 4:30 pm Tuesday thru Saturday. That's right, Saturday. Sunday and Monday will be my weekend. I'd rather not work on Sundays, which leaves only Monday to work. I don't know if I'll be able to hold a job for one day a week. Unless I work after classes. Which at this point, sounds not fun at all. We'll see how things go, I guess.

Scattered Things

- I'm excited about being so close to the end of school, but sad about leaving.

- Going home is going to be...I don't know yet. I guess I'll start primarily living there again, which is a nice thought, but at the same time, terrifying. I know it's terrible, but I hope Izzy is gone.

- I have no idea what I'm going to do for the next two weeks either. I have a room to paint at my Aunt's, but I'm pretty sure that won't take the whole two weeks. Hopefully.

- I'm hoping to get to go to the zoo before camp starts. Jamin and I have been talking about going for over a year.

- Usually everyone leaves work at 5 except for me. I brought potato chips for just this time, but the new guy has not left yet. And does not seem to be making any preparations to do so. I feel like these are the loudest potato chips I have ever eaten.

- I was also planning to play games after everyone left. But he can see my screen from where he sits, so I feel weird, like I should be doing something productive instead (so I'm blogging, ha. I guess I think that the constant typing will deceive him into thinking it's something important. Probably not working.).

- I didn't call home for Mother's Day. I guess my stepmom was upset, because my dad e-mailed me. He said that he knew it might have been awkward (which it was, and that's why I didn't know what to do, and I haven't done anything before, so...), but the nice thing would have been to call or send a card or something. Which is true, but I honestly hadn't thought about it.

- My stepmom is graduating from WCC on Saturday. My first day of being done. Naturally graduation is at 9 AM. I will so be sleeping in on Monday.

- There are not going to be enough calls to make it worth two of us being here. Really. Go home so I can play my games and crunch my potato chips without feeling judged (I'm sure he's not, I'm just paranoid).

- Becca's family is moving to Ypsi because her dad has a new job (at Jason Verde's church, actually). I am sad for her that she is leaving her house in Kalamazoo, but Ypsi is so much closer to my home. I am secretly (well, when she told me I guess I shrieked very excitedly, so maybe not so secretly) very excited.

- Maybe it's alright that Shawn is still here. Because a phone call just went to him instead of me. Ha. :)

- Stupid crunchy chips.

- I am so excited for camp. I saw Willis Kilbourne today, and he gave me a hug, and I so want to be at camp right now. Only two and a half weeks...I can't wait.

- Jen, we need to start on the purpling dictionary ASAP. We need to have it ready for senior teen camp. No one will know to look out for eggplanting if we don't warn them about it. :)

- Shawn just got up from his desk...but not to leave. Eating potato chips as quickly as possible.

- I had big plans for Plants vs. Zombies tonight. It's cooler than it sounds. And not as yucky as zombies sometimes are.

- It's sad how long I've spent writing this, and Shawn is back, so I think it's time to be done.

- Edit: all of the calls so far have gone to Shawn except one. And when I picked up, they asked to talk to him. Ha. :)

Define: Dread

Dread: when you're finally done helping people actually physically present at the Help Desk, and must now answer the phone that's been ringing for the last 15 minutes.

Define: Light at the end of the tunnel

I met with my new advisor today, and we pretty much planned my next two years of college with a major in drama.

I'm not entirely sure this is something I really want, but it falls under the communications department, which is something that will probably be useful. And at this point, I just want to graduate.

I still need to pick a minor, though. She suggested art, since I seem to like that kind of thing, or maybe writing, but I'm thinking that whatever I already have a lot of credits in is probably what I'm gonna go for. It's a squeeze to get all the requirements for a drama major in in the next two years, so it's not going to be easy to cram a minor in there as well.


But at least I am making progress.



I'm not as caught up on homework as I'd like to be, but I'm not behind yet. I just wish I wasn't so tired! I've been ready to pass out since about 9:30 tonight, and shortly after finishing this post, I think that's what I'll do.

We watched a short video about Dante's Divine Comedy in my world literature class tonight, and they showed a very, very, very, very x 8 unnecessary to show scene. I'm afraid I'm going to have nightmares. Really.

I think that the screening process for new instructors at Spring Arbor University (if there is one) needs some drastic, drastic changes. A woman called the other day, trying to make her course available to her students online. She needed to go to the control panel of the course on the website on Blackboard, and she was telling me she couldn't find settings after opening the control panel. I asked her what she saw when she did open the control panel, and she read me off a HUGE list of things, including, but not limited to: Internet connection, mouse, sound, printer, etc. After she finished reading me the list, I asked her if she could open up Blackboard and click on the link in the browser that said control panel, instead of clicking on Start and going to the control panel listed there.
This woman is supposed to be TEACHING. And she's called back with similar issues, which would take more time than I want to take to explain.

I've got an unopened bag of potato chips, and 11:06 pm is probably not the time to be opening them, but I imagine it's going to happen. Pretty sure I can live with it.

An oldie but a goodie

A professor at the university called the Help Desk and told me that she could not find "the big 'e'" and she could not get on the internet, because "the big 'e'" was gone.


Yikes.

*Insert something witty/creative here*

In my time working at the Help Desk, I've talked to a lot of people that were upset.

Some of these people, outside of the particular situation in which I interacted with them, have loads of people who testify to their cheery, big ball of sunshine attitude. Which makes me wonder, what are they really like?

I know that sometimes people just have off days, or get frustrated, but I also know that when every time someone calls they are rude, it's hard to chalk it up to a bad day.

I'd like to think that when I'm asking someone for their help, I am calm and considerate. I also know that can't possibly be the case, because I am a human being, and I am not perfect.

It's frustrating when the person I'm asking for help doesn't understand my problem right away, but I also know from being on the other side, that it's hard to know what the problem is when I can't see the computer screen, just as the people who help me can't see the whole picture either. All they've got to go on is what I tell them, just as all I know about the problem is what the person on the phone tells me.

I also need to understand, as the person giving help, that the person on the other end of the line may not be computer savvy. Sometimes it's easy for me to get frustrated with problem. I need to remember, from being on the receiving end of help, that all I know is what the person helping me is telling me. The relationship between the person being helped and the person helping is one in which each participant is very dependent on the other.

I need to keep this in mind not just at work or when I'm receiving help, but whenever I interact with someone else. When I ignore someone smiling at me, they don't know it's because I'm grumpy. They might think I don't like them. When someone doesn't wave back at me, I don't know it's because they're focused on something else, I think that they don't feel I matter to them.



I'm going to make an effort to be more conscious of the people around me, and even more conscious of myself.

Define: Cranky-Pants

I got a call today from an older gentleman who was trying to make sure his address was updated on the SAU Portal. He complained that he didn't know how to use the new site, and there used to be a button right there, and he had no idea where it was anymore, and it was probably under these buttons, but he couldn't find it, etc., all with a cranky tone. I directed him to the page where the information was (he told me he'd already clicked that), and I told him what to click to change it.

He didn't even say thank you, he said, "Well, my address isn't updated, by the way," like it was my job to have known that he moved and changed it.

What a cranky-pants!

What a way to start the day...

Someone at work (not someone who called, someone I work with) made me cry today.


Sometimes I really feel like I can't do anything right.


edit:
But you know what? I have lots of soap, and I can wash off the bird poop.
(I just came across the thing I wrote for the camp page, by the way. That wasn't an entirely random tangent.)

Not that my coworker is bird poop.
Heh.
:)

It's Wednesday!

I told Becca if I ever volunteer to work these hours again to slap me.



Excluding Friday.


Two more hours, then I'll only have four things left to do before I am done...


Someone fell asleep on the floor, and when he woke up he had the carpet grains imprinted on his face. It made me feel a little better.

So close...

This is it.

12am-2am Tuesday: Library Helpdesk
7:45am-9am Tuesday: Philosophy of Ministry
10am-12pm Tuesday: Biology lab final
12pm-2pm Tuesday: Greek study session
2am-8am Wednesday: Library Helpdesk
1pm-3pm Wednesday: Greek final
1pm-3pm Thursday: Biology final
3pm-5pm Thursday: Helpdesk
2am-8am Friday: Library Helpdesk

I feel that if I can make it to 3:00 Thursday I will be all set.
Then to my aunt's with Becca Friday evening, and SBC with Nurse Ann on Saturday!

I'm excited.






And procrastinating.
I should go write my paper now.

I have come to find...

...that, surprisingly, the rudest calls I get at the Help Desk are from Spring Arbor staff. I actually had someone hang up on me on Friday. She was angry because she couldn't send e-mails. I told her that one of our servers wasn't working properly, and we were doing emergency repairs at noon (it was probably around 11 when this happened). She was very short with me and told me that she was in contact with such and such and needed to send e-mails. I told her that everyone using a Spring Arbor e-mail was having this problem, and we were going to do repairs at noon. She got ruder, so said, "We're doing repairs at noon, but I will check to see if there is anything else I can do." I put her on hold, and just waited for a few seconds. I had just asked my supervisor about the problem, because the person before her had called with the same thing. He was on a call, and I knew there was nothing he could do, so I got back on the line, and said, "I'm sorry, we're going to be doing repairs at noon, and that will fix the problem." She didn't say anything for about 5 seconds, and then I heard her say, "Yes, can you connect me to *name*?" She was calling someone else while she was on the phone with me! Then she said, "Well I'm getting in contact with our person here because I need my e-mail (she wasn't on the main campus)." I started to say, "I'm sorry I couldn't be more help," but she hung up while I was talking.

I wanted to call her back and tell her that her inside man couldn't do anything, because the server on main campus was down, and she would have to wait, just like the guy before her who called and was nice about it, and that being rude to me didn't get her anywhere with her problem, but that I did include it in the problem ticket.


A close second for rude people is adult students.



I've never had a bad call with a younger student, they're really nice about everything.

Define: Oops...

While I was working at the Helpdesk today, someone called from the Fieldhouse and said, "Can you connect me to the Holton Health Center?!"


I wasn't sure why they called the Helpdesk for that; personally, I probably would have called the switchboard.

In any case, I wasn't about to deny them, so I said, "Yep, let me look up the extension...okay, I'll transfer you."

And I hit the "Transfer" button.


Only to discover .5 seconds later that it was actually the "End Call" button.




Oops.

Oh goodness...

I don't know how I am going to make it through Mondays for the rest of the semester. I'm pretty concerned about making it through the next hour, actually. I try to sleep between my 4-8 shift and this one, but my body just won't have it, so by the time I get out of here I am a zombie. And I have a 7:45 am class.


Ergh.


At least I'm not super behind on homework right now.
And I am knitting a cool hat. Well, it will theoretically be cool. It's a bit trickier than I thought it would be. But I don't think it'll be too bad... I'm gonna wear it either way.

Define: Crap Timing

I am currently working at the Help Desk in the library.  My computer wasn't loading Etsy when I tried to look at it yesterday or the day before, but I wasn't really concerned.  It was sad, but not a huge problem.

This morning, MSN messenger kept telling me my username didn't exist or my password was wrong.  Which made no sense, because I have it set so that it saves my username and password and automatically logs me on.  After I tried it manually a time or three, I gave up, it wasn't that big of a deal.  So I tried to check my hotmail from www.hotmail.com.  That didn't load.  At all.  Which was also really strange.  So I tried it on the computer next to me.  Which also wouldn't load it.  As I was trying to figure it out, someone else in the lab was having the same problem.  I told her I was working on it.

And I did, for a long time, but I can't figure it out.  I called someone off campus, theirs is fine.  I tried msn.com, which also didn't work.  I called my roommate, she couldn't get it to work either.  So MSN/Hotmail/Microsoft things that are online/Etsy are not able to be accessed from campus at this time.

And none of the faculty techs will be back in until Monday morning.

This would happen while I was working.

:/

Define: Booked

I got my work schedule.

On Monday, Biology starts at 9:00 and goes until 10:00.  Right after that is Chapel until a little after 11:00.  At 11:00 I am scheduled to work at the Help Desk in the Library until 1:00, which is when Greek starts.  It ends at 2:30, but I stay there for Introduction to Missions at 2:40 (Did I mention that all of my classes are in the same two rooms except for my Biology Lab?  I think that one is next door.).  That gets over at 3:40, just in time for me to go to the computer lab in the Student Center to work the 4:00-8:00 shift.

My plan is to go back to my room, set the alarm for 11:45 pm, pass out, and then sleep until 11:45 so I can make it to the library to work from midnight to 2 am.

Then I'll go pass out again until about 7:30 am so I can be on time to my 7:45 class Tuesday morning.

Mondays are gonna be extra rough this semester.

Monday Morning Blues...

Do you want to know what happened last Monday morning at camp? Of course you do.



First, my watch died. Which stinks, because I have to be certain places at certain times, and that's harder when you don't know what time it is. Next, I took my cabin down to the Cedar Center for breakfast. When we were done praying, I said, "Amen." Then something hit my nose. I figured it was water from the tree above me. It was still morning, there's dew and all that, right? I wiped it off with my finger, and looked. Brown, with a hint of white. Yes, that's right, bird poop. On my face. On the way back to the cabin after breakfast, I hardcore twisted my ankle. During classes, Becca and I got to drive the golf cart around and take pictures. As we were driving, we noticed this smell. It smelled like something burning, but we figured it was a campfire (which we did think was a little strange, because it was pretty early and we didn't see one). When we got to the paintball class, my boss Kyle said he was going to ride back with us. While we were walking to the golf cart, I was telling Kyle what had happened earlier. A few feet from the golf cart, we realized that it was smoking. Kyle summed it up nicely: "Well, that's not good..." He walked up and picked up my bag. Now, you need to understand, I've had this bag for a year. It's hot pink with black cats all over it, and I love it. It's a cinch top backpack that my friend Leah's mom made for me. When Kyle picked it up, we saw that one of the straps had been singed off. Kyle and Becca looked at me, and I didn't know what to do, so I started laughing, and so did they. What kills me is that Becca and I SMELLED IT BURNING, we just didn't know what it was. No wonder the smell was following us around camp. After stomping out the rest of the embers on the strap, we got back on the golf cart and went down to the main part of camp again. On the way back to the cabins to get ready for lunch, I was telling Jon my day up until that point, and I was showing him where I twisted my ankle, and lo and behold, I twist the other one on the following step.

All this before lunch.

The next day, Tuesday, I was out taking pictures again. I was wearing a bright orange shirt when I went out to the paintball course. I thought it would be cool to get some pictures out in the field, so I informed all the boys that I would be out there, wearing my bright orange shirt and a white towel tied on my arm (theirs were red and blue to mark teams). I told them I wouldn't be hiding, I'd be out in the open, and asked them to please not shoot me because I had the camp's camera (although sometimes I wish we had a different one...). All was well for a while, until I got between the two teams. The blue team waved me past them so that they could shoot at the reds, so I walked right past them. They knew I was there, they'd just waved me past. And it was literally right past them, we were barely ten feet apart. So I got past their line, and then someone from the blue team turned around and shot me. I yelled, and everyone was like, "Who shot the girl?!" The boy said that it was an accident, but I don't know. The thing is, he didn't fire like, four shots and one of them hit me. It was a single shot, square on the shoulder. He totally aimed, and he HAD to see that it was an orange shirt. Plus, I JUST walked past them. It splattered in my hair and all over my neck, and some even made it into my mouth. It was loooooovely.



However, other than that, I had an amazing week. That was my best week counseling out of this year and last, and I wouldn't change a thing.
:)

Crack O' Dawn

I told my boss I was willing to help in the library now that it's supposed to be open 24 hours for exam week.

I was scheduled to work from 6 am to 8 am.

Here I am, outside the library, where the ID swipe won't let me in.  I hope it's just because I accidentally got here early.  Something better change at 6.

I usually work 5 pm - 9 pm on Saturdays, and I said I could cover 9 pm to 2 am as well.

It's gonna be a long day...

Update:

I'm in, no one is here, and I can't find the light switch.  It is really creepy in here...