Or, I could be unemployed, broke... and ugly
As Sabrina has indicated here (Link) I had yet another employment interview today. I tried my little 'experiment' (pinning up my sleeve so I looked like an amputee rather than a gimp - I received a couple of curious glances, devoid, this time, of the fascinated horror that usually accompanies them), and after 15 minutes was informed that the software I usually use was, in essence, too sophisticated for the company's needs.
GE SmallWorld 3.0 (the GIS system I first trained on and have used most successfully is one of the most sophisticated, flexible, comprehensive and all around capable GIS suites ever created - capable of multiple layers showing everything from the most intricate internal wiring of an electrical substation, to schematics for subdivisions, to working with and dimensioning tolerances of less than a milimeter, to providing overviews of areas thousands of miles in extent. Bizarrely, its barely used in America. Instead, that wretched and abominable excuse for a GIS suite, ESRI's ArcFM, is most generally used (I know how to work with that too). But this company does not , despite having (according to my interviewer) 'many' clients that do use GIS (almost certainly ArcFM) - preferring instead to use AutoCAD, a suite of tools originally intended for 2D engineering drafting, to which multiple modules have to be added to make it GIS capable.
In other words, my skill set is too developed, too sophisticated, for these retards to make use of.
GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.
How is it possible to be too skilled to be employed? What's up with that?
Enough of that. There was one incident that made me smile this morning. In preparation for my interview I had had my hair and beard barbered the day before. Normally I go to professional barbers/hairdressers. But, being broke, I took a chance and took up the offer of my neighbour (Pinky) of barbering for free (actually, I paid him with a bottle of bud, much cheaper than the usual 30 bucks). To my pleasant surprise he did an amazingly good job, turning me from a woolly-headed Old Testament prophet to something that, according to Sabrina, looks a devil with an evil sense of humor.
I arrived at the office ten minutes earlier and was greeted by the Office Secretary, an attractive older woman with a good figure and striking eyes. As I walked through the door into the office her whole face lit up and she gave me one of those 'if I didn't know better I'd drag you into an empty room and get you to fuck me senseless' looks. She walked in front of me sashaying her hips in such a way that I couldn't avoid looking at her ass even had I wanted to. Which I didn't. That was a well-formed, firm and (for an older woman) still very pert and attractive backside. I thoroughly enjoyed watching her sway it from side to side.
It was the same when she walked me back to the elevator on the way out. And I know had the decision been hers I'd be starting work there on Monday. Of course, it also helps that I still have an identifiably English accent lol - a rather more than usually interesting English accent because I still retain the overtones of my local dialect, Lancastrian English (which, as my mother will tell you, is infinitely to be preferred to the kind of English spoken in Yorkshire).
The English have as many prejudices and bigotries as do Americans - but unlike here, they're not based upon skin color but upon linguistics. Years ago, I visited the port town of Whitby with my first wife. Whitby is high up on the north east coast of England (and a part of Yorkshire). At one time, Yorkshire was divided into four administrative districts, all called 'Ridings', North, South, East, and West. We called into a pub in the town and I fell into conversation with an elderly man who had lived in the town all his life and had never crossed the border of his own particular Riding.
We talked for quite awhile and became quite friendly (as 'friendly' that is as the English ever become towards strangers - which most Americans would describe as little less than outright hostility) and this old gentleman began to complain vociferously about the problems of immigration. In Whitby at that time there was not a single black face, nor a face of any other color than white, so I wondered, aloud, as to where these immigrants were coming from. It transpired, as we talked, that these detestable immigrants were coming from one of the other Ridings of the County - from another part of Yorkshire - and what distinguished these hated newcomers was the way in which they talked. But then, as my mother would tell you, the inhabitants of Yorkshire are not right and nothing more is to be expected of them. They talk funny too.
I confess, the reaction of my secretary with the pert rear end has done much to cheer me today. I like to think of her having a damp spot in her knickers as a consequence of my otherwise utterly useless 'interview'.
C'est la vie, c'est la guerre.
Like the song says - 'I get knocked down but I get up again. You're never going to keep me down.'