Eurocircle at Flatwater

So, what is Eurocircle? Eurocircle is a networking group compromised of people of European descent. I'm of European descent, so I belong. I've been to about a half dozen or so of these events and every time I ask myself why I go. These events are poorly planned and executed, and the attendees leave A LOT to be desired! These people are rude and...no, no, rude is not the word, pretentious is the word!! Puh-leez!

Let me get back to the point. Eurocircle...I keep going to these events thinking that I am going to have a good time and every time I go I hate myself for thinking I am going to have a good time at these functions. The place the event was held is a restaurant, not a bar nor a club, a restaurant, plain and simple! There was no place to comfortably stand with your drink, there were tables everywhere but they were all reserved for dinner guests. So, there were all these people there and no place to hang!! The bar staff was slow and about 2 hours into the event the bar ran out of glasses! How can a bar run out of glasses? There were no waitresses and no one to go around and pick up the dirty glasses, so every once in a while one of the bar tenders had to leave the busy bar and find glasses to clean. Grrr...

Anyway, we hung out at this place for a while and then we went to a bar called InnJoy. InnJoy is a bar that holds no pretension. Thanks to InnJoy for making an evening filled with snobs end on high note!!

Coming soon...

I'll be blogging about:

• My Saturday evening out...

• Why I dislike EuroCircle Events...

• Why it's okay to live in Joliet...finally coming to terms with my geographic handicap.

But, first I would like a good nights sleep.

Life's Options...

It has recently come to my attention that I am at a crossroads in my life. Really, this year (meaning the past 5 months and the next 7 months) there are going to be some real opportunities to make some drastic chnages in my life. To be frank, it's a bit scary.

Scenario 1: New job! For the past 2 months I have been interviewing with a company in the suburbs. With this new job comes with a significant pay raise, a pay raise that will change my financial considerations. Drastically! However, there are some glitches with the procurement of this new job. It has now been 1 month since I last interviewed and until last week, I thought I was out of the running until I received a phone call last Friday morning from the recruiter saying that they finally finished interviewing all the candidates and that I'm still their top candidate and that they want to proceed with me and that she will call me Monday or Tuesday to let me know what is going to happen next. Today is Thursday, I have received no phone call. All I need is a little patience, right?

Correction...I just received a phone call and it's worse than I thought! This company is putting the position on hold INDEFINETLY and who knows when it will open up!!!!!!!! Major! Major! Disappointment!!! The recruiter sounded very disappointed as well, she said that she was looking forward to the opportunity to bringing me in for the next round of interviews, and that she thought I was a very strong candidate for the position.

Scenario 2: No job! The other day I was approached by my current supervisor and she asked me if I would like to be surplused. In this world, it means that I would get a letter on May 1 saying that I will lose my job in 60 days. I would get a small severance package and I would be guaranteed unemployment benefits. My plan, would be to take the summer off, fly to Greece for the summer, and then come back in the fall and start school full-time. In the end, I told my boss no, I don't want to be laid off right now.

Scenario 3: Now that I have some answers to my some of my job woes. I have to formulate a new plan. I will probably survive this first round of lay-offs, but I probably won't survive the next round of lay-offs in November. Which means that as of December 31, 2007, I will probably be out of a job. So, I have 7 months to find a job, when I have been looking for a job for the past year.

I need a drink...it's 11:27am and a need to find a bar quick!! Jack Daniels is my best friend!!!

Natural repellants...

As some of you may or may not know, I ride the train to and from work. There are 2 lines the go into Chicago from Joliet, the Rock Island line and the Heritage Corridor line. I take the Rock Island line in the morning to Chicago and the Heritage Corridor home. Anyway, there is a particular passenger that rides the morning train that especially repulses me. I have no idea why this is, and I have never felt this way about a person that I have never met before. I have never spoken to this guy before, I have only ever seen him on the train.

Joliet is the first stop on this line and this guy boards on the second stop. So, every time I see him on the train he seems to sit behind me or in front of me. There is just something about the way this guy looks, smells, moves that repulses me. He wears too much cologne, too much facial hair, something that makes me literally, sick.

This guy has a routine when he boards the train. He picks his seat, usually the seat right behind or right in front of me, removes his jacket, adjusts his pants and then makes his way over to the lavatory. (It's usually at this point where I pick up my stuff and move to another seat in another car!) Then he returns to his seat where he proceeds to breath on the back of my neck for the rest of the trip.

What is about this guy that repulses me so? Yesterday, he sat in the seat right behind me again, and I was almost asleep so I didn't bother to move. He seems clean, like he showers daily, he has a steady job, he's not totally awful looking for an older guy. I even feel nauseous now that I am thinking about him. Has anyone else ever experienced this?

Pulling out all the stops...

On Monday, I interviewed for another job within AT&T. My interview was scheduled for 11:30am, on the 6th floor of my building. I decided that I should arrive for my interview at some point between 11:20am and 11:25am. I knew that the hiring manager had an interview scheduled from 10:30am to 11:00am. When I arrived on the 6th floor I saw that the hiring manager was still interviewing the previous candidate. So, I decided to go for a walk around the floor to kill a few minutes. On my way back, I saw the other candidate leaving and decided to go knock on the HM's office door.

The door was closed and I heard her and another manager talking about the interview. I thought to myself this interview should be good, I have personally worked with this HM before and she knows that I'm a dedicated employee. I knocked on her door to let her know that I was here and she asked me to take a seat in the conference room and that she and another girl would be in there in a few minutes.

I went in the conference room and waited several minutes for my interview to start. They finally came in and the interview started. They asked me a few questions, I asked them a few questions and *POOF* the interview was over in less than 15 minutes.

I was like, what the heck is going on? There are a couple of things that this means. 1. They already have in mind who they want to hire and they are just interviewing me out of courtesy. OR 2. Because the HM and I have worked with each other in the past, she already knows she wants to hire me.

It's a funny game in corporate America. It's not what you know, it's who you know, especially here at AT&T!! So, when I applied for the position, I had the recruiter for this department write the HM a nice recommendation email about me. Then, I asked the department admin to put in a good word. Finally, today, I called a previous boss of mine who knows HM's boss call the HM and tell her that she should hire me. Final decisions are supposed to be made tomorrow and I hope that campaigning for the position had paid off. I'll update my blog tomorrow with the results!

2016: All or Nothing!

It was announced today that Chicago will be the U.S. bid city to host the 2016 Olympic Games. The decision will be made in October, 2009 by the International Olympic Committee. Chicago beat out Los Angeles for the final bid. In a press conference after the announcement, USOC Chairman, Peter Ueberroth, stated that the US Olympic Committee likes the fact that the games could be held on a lake front, something/someplace the games have never been held before.

For some reason, I am very interested in this topic, I guess because I live in Chicago and think it's a great city and I am very excited that there is a possibility that the Olympics could be held here! So, last night, I was at a bar (here in the burbs) where I took a small poll to see if other people think that Chicago could beat out Los Angeles. Of the 2 people I asked (I sad it was a small poll, this isn't science people) Neither of them thought that Chicago could come out of their "Second City" status and play with the big boys. At the time I was too drunk to argue. I knew all along that may be dubbed "The Second City," but it stands second to NO ONE!

Friday the Thirteenth

Ok, today is Friday, April 13th, Twenty O Seven. I had to publish something on Friday the 13th!! So here it is...something good...

These are some of my favorite pics from my trip to Greece in 2005. I was with my parents at a cliff top taverna for afternoon lunch of fresh baby grouper. This was the best fish I ever ate!!

He's is smiling at you!!

Silence of the Easter Lambs

This past Easter many families sat down to a traditional Easter feasts. i.e. Hams and Lambs. Over the holiday my family sat down to a scrumtious lamb dinner. My brother is very interested in the art of grilling, so the deal is that my cousin Tony buys the lamb and my brother Tony cooks the lamb. Kudos to the Chef for a delicious dinner. Here are a few pics for your enjoyment...
Also..here's a link to a great article on Lamb roasting in this past Sunday's Chicago Tribune by John Kass...

Chicago 2016: Speaking the World's Languages

Go Chicago!!