I have been talking about doing National Novel Writing Month for at least four years now, but never really had the time to do it. It only occurred to me yesterday that I now have all the fucking time in the world. So, provided my underemployment streak holds (and I have no reason to think otherwise since I haven’t been looking for a new full-time job), I intend to actually sit down and bang out the requisite 50,000 words in 30 days. It’s like a marathon, only my training involves drinking a lot of coffee and investigating carpal tunnel prevention techniques.

Five dollar vanilla lattes are a luxury of the employed.

Also, I’m back from slumming it lakeside and looking for someone to pay me to do something.

So that job I interviewed for? Didn’t get it. This, of course, means I now have a serious rejection complex. And no money.

On the plus side, my wife is very happy I’m still employed as the kitchen isn’t going to paint itself. (Note to self: Look into making a fortune by inventing the “Self-Painting Kitchen.”)

Have any of you actually been buying into the “woe is me, I’m unemployed” schtick I’ve been peddling (mainly on Twitter)? I hope not, because unemployment is kind of awesome. Seriously, I recommend it. Here’s a quick list of things you’ll need to succeed once your life career job is over:

• A series of freelance gigs lined up like dominos. It helps if you can smell your layoff coming a good four or five weeks in advance.
• An understanding, supportive and loving spouse. Preferably with a moderate to fantastic income. (I swear, I’m writing the “My Wife Rules” post this weekend.)
• Every season of The Ultimate Fighter. I can’t specifically say why, but this testosterone-fueled bit of reality television that manages to end every single episode with two guys beating the ever-living-shit out of each other has been strangely cathartic.
• A relatively wealthy uncle with a big house on a lake in BC who’s willing to let you go and stay there during your “difficult time.” Bonus points if he has a boat on the dock and Z8 in the garage. By the way, I’ll be out of town next week.
• A sense of humor. Because nobody likes following you on Twitter if you’re all “woe is me, I’m unemployed.”

This might be a short-lived experiment. I have a job interview lined up. I won’t say where — I don’t need any bad juju — but it’s pretty cool. It’s a job I’d love to have and not just something to pay the rent.

Positive thoughts people. Unless you’re a big fan of reading this, in which case you should try and put a hex on me at about noon on Friday then never mention it to me, asshole.

I finally got around to mowing the lawn. You have no idea what a big deal that is. I don’t think I’ve mowed a lawn since high school, choosing instead to live in places without grass and eventually trading chores with my wife to avoid it.

Anyway, I got two blisters. THIS IS WHY I DON’T DO MANUAL LABOR. When I was employed, my biggest concern was carpal tunnel and now I have to put bandaids on my thumbs.

Also, my final check arrived. Once they subtracted the vacation I took but had yet to, you know, “earn,” it was just enough to get a latte with an extra shot of vanilla in it. I suppose this means I’ll have to actually get a little proactive about finding myself some work.

On a totally-unrelated-to-my-current-underemployed-status side note, can you sell either blood or sperm in Canada?

I got drunk while teaching someone how to se up a blog. Surely there’s some career potential here, right?

It could always be worse. At least I’m not this guy.

(From a Craigslist ad, via The Phobia)

What the fuck people! I need a motherfuckin job, and I have a resume that says I am fucking fit to be your goddamn front desk/administrative assistant. I have applied to a ton of jobs on here, and not one of them responded, WHAT THE FUCK?!

Cover Letter? Here’s my fucking cover letter!
Now, I’m really low on money, and I’ll suck a dick if I have to…that’s right!
Got a bear in your backyard that keeps eating your garbage? I’ll fight that motherfucker and I’ll win! Can any other prospective employee say that?! FUCK NO! What’d you say? You lost your keys? FUCK IT! I’ll shoot the goddamn lock off your door with my laser eyes! That’s how bad I need a motherfuckin job! Your brother is gay and you’re not cool with that? I’ll de-gay him with reverse buttsex. Don’t believe me?! Then hire me and I’ll fucking show you!

OBJECTIVE
I need a motherfuckin job.

SHIT I HAVE DONE
-I invented the moon.
-Atlantis was around til 1988, but sunk when I shot out of my mom’s vagina like a silver bullet into a wolverine.
-I am also a wolverine.
-Had sex with the Spice Girls.
-The blowjob machine was originally my idea until that bastard Clint Eastwood stole it.
-I have prophetic visions of the apocolypse.
-Watched the movie “Juwanna Mann” at least 18 times. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0247444/
-Created a new genre of dance in which people get so into it that radiation waves pulsate off of them, I like to call this the microrave.
-I reverse engineered a door, I now know how it works.
-When I was 8, a frisbee flew into my backyard and I blew it up with my mind.
-My brother is the Eiffel Tower
-Direct descendant of Beowulf
-Can make weapons out of anything, very useful in a hostile work environment
-Beat my pornography addiction when I was 19 
-Proficient in Microsoft Office and Photoshop

RELEVANT WORK EXPERIENCE
GlomGlom Corporation of Evil Doing
POSITION: Front Desk/Administrative Assistant
DUTIES: Setting up sex scandals in which to blackmail wealthy politicians, forwarding email, burning down the houses of the poor, loan sharking, answering phones, greeting clients in a manner that would frighten most people

GreenHate Enterprises
POSITION: Once Again, I was a fucking Front Desk/Administrative Assistant
DUTIES: Organizing the dumping of bio-waste into the ocean, peeing in lakes, digging holes to fill with garbage, making garbage out of perfectly good and useful items, filling said wholes with said garbage, creating fake facts about Greenpeace and publishing them on the internet(I am internet savvy), good at filing…documents of hate.

REFERENCES
Glomgor Evil
GlomGlom Corporation of Evil Doings
gorlock@peanutbutternipples.com

Sloblor the Muck Monster
GreenHate Enterprises
sloblor@greenhate.com


So, now that you know the real me, are you gonna hire me or not? I would like to remind you that I can make weapons out of anything.

Sincerely,

Steve Madonna
stevemadonnayeah@gmail.com