Atomictumor

This is another one of GAC’s unpublished (and unfinished) posts.  I’m not sure when it was written, but judging by the first line, and the last line, it would have been 5 or so weeks ago.  I wanted to hear her voice again on a quiet morning.

-AT
The countdown has officially begun. I have almost exactly 2 months left of school. That means I need to find my ass a J-O-B.

Right now, I’m seriously considering Home Depot. It’s still retail, which I’m familiar and comfortable with, but I would be working one-on-one with customers, hopefully designing kitchens and baths. I’ve heard excellent things about Hizzle Dizzle, such as good hourly wages, commission (in certain sales areas), company stock options, etc. After 2 years, Home Depot would pay for me to become a National Kitchen & Bath certified designer, which means I could make decent scratch.

But that’s the soft option. That’s a small return for a small investment. Safe and comfortable, sure, but I’m not going to break any glass ceilings there.

Another option (and one I’m currently persuing) is residential design, working directly with the home owner. I’m still waffling on whether or not this is something I really want to do. It’s extremely scary to go out on one’s own, to trust yourself to make smart and popular decisions. This job can be made even more difficult, or impossible, if you don’t like your client.

School has, unfortunately, only quasi-prepared me to fend for myself in the business world. Sure, I can draft a floor plan, and I can follow codes, and I can tell you about various types of flooring and where they are best used, but I will be coming out of school with no idea of how to use this knowledge.

For instance, the hiring process. It would be wonderful to learn how to write a winning resume, how to knock ‘em dead at interviews, how much money my services are worth in the real world and how to schmooze a client.

Once I secure a client, how do I write up a contract?  What classify as billable hours?  How do I calculate an estimate?

I would also like to know a few go-to guys.  The client I’m working with right now has expressed interest in having her room painted.

GAC started writing this post several months ago, at the end of either last years winter or this years summer semester.  While I liked it, it wasn’t up to her exacting standards.  I’m posting it so we can hear her voice.

I love you, GAC.

        -AT
As I’ve said on previous posts (if you can find them, that is), this past semester of school has been a real bitch-a-roony-doony. I only had three classes, but at 3-hours a pop, that was 18 hours of required classtime a week, not to mention the many extra hours I spent slaving over projects both at school and at home.
Money was also a big factor this semester. Books for three classes were a little over $200, plus two I didn’t even bother buying. Since 2/3 of my classes were art-intensive, I spent a goodly-sized wad on art supplies, mat board, markers, and drafting crap. It was a real boon for me to be able to get between $200-$500 worth of paper from an architecture firm in Knoxville last summer. I suppose I’ve still got around $150-$450 left. So, you know, call me if you need some fancy paper.
I hated my Autocad class. A program that I had previously had a great liking of became a tool of the devil. My chipper-as-fuck-at-8-in-the-morning teacher saw to that. She would talk very fast, going through steps for a project in 2 minutes, and then call us idiots for not getting it the first time and telling us our questions were stupid. She would give out hand-outs that were so littered with typos and grammatical errors, even leaving out critical steps, that they were impossible to follow. Several students cried. It was that bad.
My other two classes were infinitely more tolerable, but way more labor-intensive and with strict deadlines. During the bleak months of February and March, I strongly considered dropping out and taking some time off. But I perservered, and for my efforts received all As. What a relief.
But I’ve been having nightmares. The most vivid involved a final, my much-hated speech teacher, Autocad and drafting a house remodel. With a horrible head cold. In the rain. Other nightmares have involved such thematic elements as being held hostage in a classroom and snakes. I figure I’ve had nightmares half of the nights since finals ended.

While I’m far from seeing Charlie in the trees, I am displaying symptoms that have been tied to post-traumatic stress disorder. Do I have it? Probably not. But my nightmares, coupled with difficulty sleeping at night and the migraines I began developing during autocad class are bothersome.

Pigpen: Quick! There’s a dinsosaur after us!

Me: Oh no! What’ll we do?

Pigpen: We gotta get out of here!

Me: How about we throw it a big cookie?

Pigpen: Flings arm, makes crunching noises The dinosaur ate the cookie!

Me: Whew!

Pigpen: Oh no! There’s a dog after us! What are we going to do?

Me: Throw another cookie!

Pigpen: Flings arm, makes crunching noises Now there’s a talking car chasing us! His name is Lightning McQueen!

Me: Quick, throw a cookie!

Pigpen: Flings arm, makes crunching noises He went away!

Me: We’re safe!

Pigpen: Oh no! There’s a … dancing potato after us!

Me: …

The title says it all, right? I can just stop typing now, hit the “Publish” button and call it a day.

When we test drove our van, the lcd on the cd player didn’t work. We were told that sometimes “they just go out” and sorry Mr. & Mrs. Tumor, there was nothing else we could do. Sometimes it comes back to life for a short period. That’s when I rush to program stations… while I can still see the call numbers.

After we signed the papers and gave them our check, we got in the van to go home. Smoke started issuing from the left headlight. That appeared to be a case of mechanic who’s too stupid to install a lightbulb.

About a year ago a fly got in the van. I rolled down my driver’s window to let it out. I pushed the button to raise the window, but nothing happened. That night, AT took a look at it and managed to get the window up, but smoke started coming out of the door where the motor is.

Sometimes the passenger window works, but we try not to use it since we don’t know if it’ll ever go back up again.

The sunroof, too.

The “door ajar” sensors on the trunk and rear driver’s side door malfunction. Every time I go up a hill or hit a bump, the interior lights come on.

The RPM meter is stuck.

I’m almost out of windshield wiper fluid, so every time I turn a curve, that light comes on. Yeah, that one’s fixable. We’re just lazy.

The other day I woke up to take the kids to school. I hit my head on a lamp, couldn’t find my f-in’ keys, the kids couldn’t find any of their stuff. When I got to the van, everything malfunctioned at the same time. I got huffy and stomped my foot on the brake pedal.

Now the “service brakes” light comes on every time I use them.

Anyone want to buy a van? It has a tv and vcr.

This is kind of a disgusting post, with links to really gross stuff. If you don’t like gross stuff, go here!

I have two classes with a very funny girl named Kathy. Kathy is Polish, but grew up in Germany, so to the untrained ear, she sounds Russian. Exactly like Molotov Cocktease, actually. One day I will get her to say “Brock Sampson”.

But I digress.

Kathy came into class a few weeks ago talking about a nasty-as-fuck problem her husband was having. He woke up one morning with a large bump on his arm. It was bright red, with a good-sized hole in the center. So they did what any of us would do: they squeezed the crap out of it.

Pus seeped out and something could be seen behind the hole. So she broke out the tweezers. After what I can only assume was copius amounts of husbandly cussing, she pulled out a yellow sack-like thing. They threw the sack-like thing away, but took pictures of it for posterity’s sake.

Because it’s always good to know what you pull out of your body, her husband went to see his doc. After looking at the pictures, she admitted she didn’t know what it was. So she took the pictures to a colleague.

The colleague knew. It was a dermatobia hominis, aka human botfly.

Human botflies are typically found in Central & South America. The female botfly catches a mosquito and lays her eggs on it. When the mosquito lands on its victim, the egg(s) fall off onto the host and hatches. The maggot burrows under the skin where it lives and feasts on flesh. After about 8 weeks, it squirms out and goes off in search of a mate.

They grow up so fast!

The doctors said it’s not unheard of for someone to be a botfly host so far north, but it is extremely unusual. I guess he was just one lucky s.o.b.

Kathy got a kick out of telling this story to absolutely everyone at school. Kind of like how I’m enjoying grossing you all out now. :)