spoiled chinese girl

So yea, in a previous post  I had mentioned that I didn’t know what the outcome of my efforts would be.  Well I had posted the same (not exactly, a similar) story on my IAM page and my adopted jewish mother Rebekah, who runsModified-News.com, e-mailed the American Red Cross to find out what happens when blood donations are incomplete due to situations very similar to my own, or for completely different reasons.

Her reply stated basically this:
Because the donation is not complete, and the Red Cross does not mix blood from one donor to the next, the partial unit of blood is not able to be donated to a person in need, because it wouldn’t be fair for them to receive less then the required amount of blood per unit.  But because such resources are very limited, what they do is they are able to pool these partial donated units together, for research projects or experiments in labritories.  Resources such as these are so limited, that they will try their best to use every drop to it’s fullest.

That sounded fantastic.  Even though my blood wouldn’t help an actual human directly, indirectly I would be helping through being able to provide the system a means of researching and experimenting better ways to store, treat and whatever else they have to do with the blood.

Except….

This is basically the reply I received from Canadian Blood Services:
Because the donation is not complete the unit will not be passed onto a person who is in need of blood.  It would be unfair to the patient to receive a non-complete unit of blood, and it is unwise and not practiced to “pool together” partial units of blood, for obvious reasons.  Therefore, unfortunately the blood donated will likely be discarded.  However, the blood collected for testing will likely still be sent to labritories for scheduled tests.  We hope that in the perscribed waiting time, you will come back and attempt to donate again.

So… not so fantastic.  It feels a bit in vein.  Heh, I just made a funny.   Anyways, that seems to be about that, except…

On the Canadian Blood Services webpage currently, there is a call for people who can’t otherwise be donors in the Vancouver area, to donate anyways.  Mostly people who recently received a tattoo or piercing (who generally must wait 6 months) or had questionable intimate encounters (again, 6 months to a year) or those who would otherwise be banned from donating (People who lived in England, or who have practiced questionable “acts” etc.)  Currently they seem to be doing a research experiment which requires human blood, to test the current methods, and attempt to create better methods of storing, shipping and packaging blood for it’s continued use for living recipients.

So here goes my hope that my blood half-unit of blood is sent to these scientists, where I am indirectly helping the general population, rather than being dumped down the drain, or down some young vampire’s throat.

Alright so Tuesday night/Wednesday morning (at around 1am so take your pick) I applied for a job off craigslist. It’s a job that I’d applied to before, that I remember applying to before, where I though “I’m absoloutly perfect for this job and not a lot of people can say that, why didn’t they call me?” Apparently my application got lost in the shuffle.

Let me explain. I went to school for Graphic Communications Management. I therefore should work in the print industry. Don’t be mislead by the term “Graphic” as I am *NOT* a graphic designer. The program’s favourite tagline is “This is not a graphic design course, if you want to learn graphic design, go elsewhere.” It’s all about the print industry, in it’s many consessions. Basically everything BUT the design itself. From selling, getting jobs to come in, pricing them, how to preflight files, printing them, binding/finishing them, how to run a business.

Anyways, I applied at 1 in the morning, and received a call 9 hours later asking me to come in. The guy said how the last time they advertised, they were absoloutly flooded with graphic designers wanting this position thinking it was a design job, and whoever they hired was sorely mistaken. Their most recent ad stated right at the top “This is not a graphic design job. Please do not apply if you are soley a graphic designer.”

I understood everything he said about the position and the duties, and got-dang I’d probably be totally happy working there as far as I can so far tell. Better yet, the company is pretty close to my house, so I’ll save a ton on gas and mileage on my car (since it’s leased and WAY over right now from my LAST job) and I’d plan on building up a bike over the summer to ride instead. AND It’s spitting distance from the gym I’m at currently, so hopefully that will get me going again. Perhaps in the morning before work.

I’ll update this entry with the results of my interview… once I’ve gone to the interview!

P.S. Last time I bought “Work” like clothes I seem to have been about 20lbs heavier. So nothing particularly fits but I obviously don’t have time to go shopping now, nor the money!

 

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So the interview took about an hour in total.  I arrived 5 minutes early and waited about 15 minutes in total.  Only met with the owner, not the customer service person I was supposed to meet with, she was sick today.  It’s totally a job I could do, but they want experience that I don’t have yet.  Of course, can’t get a job without experience, can’t get experience without a job.  Always the way.  I was offered to go in on a trial week-by-week basis, probably very soon, and I’ll take it, to prove I can do it. 

If not, it was still a very positive interview & all that jazz.

Oh my gawd.  Today I went to Unicycle club.  Correction.  Yesterday I went to Unciycle club.  I didn’t go for the past two weeks for various reasons, and being ontop of the cycle felt very forgein to me.  I did the warmup where I was actually able to spin pretty quickly on the straight-away’s, and even Freestyle-German-Sara commented on my speed.  Apparently this means I will be racing on the 100m straight-away races at the next competition.  I’m… not so good with the turning.  But this was all on the trials unicycle, with a fat 19″ mod low-pressure tyre and 5″ cranks.  So I’ll spin faster on a high pressure slick tyre and 4″ cranks!

Anyways, I didn’t partake in Basketball, still not sure if I’m ready for that.  Also I was helping out my new friend Matt ride, and leant him my freestyle unicycle for the week so he could practice some more before next week.

Next week we discussed a round of flaming puck hockey.  The Detroit guys are coming up for a weekend of fun & unicycling, so they want to play basketball AND flaming puck… and I’ve never played so I totally need the practice!  I hope that’s what we’re doing next week!

And now it’s 3 in the morning, and I should totally go to bed.

I work for several different marketing companies, doing much of the same thing.  When they have a campaign come up, they’ll put the call out for who’s available, and we all march in on our appointed days, and our appointed hours, and stand on our appointed street corners, harassing the patrions of our fair city (Toronto.)  It’s not the *most* fun job I’ve ever had, it’s certainly not the least, and for mindnumbing and soul-crushing, it actually pays quite well on the whole.

But I have to laugh, and I have to laugh anonymously.  There’s a new company in town that apparently landed this massive contract. Problem being, they’re a new company, and they don’t yet quite have the huge stable of willing warm bodies to fulfill this contract.  And I’m not sure what fault in their marketing for people I should attack first.  In no particular order:

• The time. I understand the client’s reason for wanting 6:30am-9:30am, they want to “attack” the commuters.  But if I can get a 4pm-7pm shift, wouldn’t I rather take that, for the same pay?
• The pay.  They offer the same rate for 6am and 4pm.  But one requires much more effort and dilligence, and sacrifice.  Offer a premium!  And don’t hide the pay rate.  $/hr, $x3/shift, $x9 in total all equals to the same thing.  We’re not *THAT* dumb.
• The “training.”  I don’t know about you, but if I have to commute into another city to be “trained” on how to make people hate me, at least confirm that you’ll pay me for my time and effort.  The fact you would even consider having non-paid training would make anyone walk out.
• The current employees.  Why was this campaign not offered first to people who already worked for the company?  I found out I already worked for this company by the reply e-mail address, told the recruiter(?) that someone else already has my details, and he said it was fine.  But why not e-mail me first before posting the job everywhere?
• The potential employees.  You’re looking for a large group of young, energetic people who are strapped for cash.  Why are you not advertising on every lamp post near every university & college?  There’s TONS of them in Toronto!  And they’re close to the target locations ANYWAYS!

I laugh because I at first accepted this job, until I found out the time it would happen. (I’m at least a 30 minute drive in from the city, and then would have to pay premium for parking, or be an hour long commute by transit.)  They’ve since offered to pay for my travel expenses but even that isn’t enough to intice me to get up that early in the morning.  Tack on a 30% increase in the salary, plus my travel/parking expenses, and maybe we’ll talk.

I have a job interview tomorrow, and absolutely NOTHING to wear! And for once this is a job interview I actually care about, for a job/company that I want to work for! GOTD***IT! I need to go shopping.