Making a Comeback: WHAT am I doing?

As mentioned in the last post, at the end of November, I was left without a job. I still wanted to come back to the ranch for Summer 2010 and the chances of getting a job in December, during Christmas? Not looking good.

Have you guys met Craigslist? This has been my life blood! It started in San Francisco and I learned about it when I had an internship out there and needed a place to live. Since then, I have used it to find roommates for my house, getting jobs, selling stuff (anyone need a washer and dryer in Colorado?), etc. It's pretty much amazing. (Ok, so there was the Craigslist killer, but you have to assume most people are good...and then do a background check.)

So, I started scanning Craigslist. And had applied for all these tax jobs (perfect, right? January through April, go back to the ranch in May!), except not one single company responded to me. I guess Actuaries must really fly below the radar! I continued to scour Craigslist, which led to the Gigs/Events section, which led two weeks of hawking Yoplait yogurt, which introduced me to the 'underworld' of promotional marketing, which led me to give away more yogurt, beauty product coupons, and LOTS of Bud Light stuff.

But the problem with this type of work is that it's not consistent (although Bud Light continues to serve me very well). So I had to find other supplemental income.

The big thing about being laid off and not looking for an actuarial job was that I wanted to do stuff I really enjoyed. And that's exactly what I did.

Again using Craigslist, I offered healthy home-cooking, as well as tutoring. I now have one guy I tutor in Macroeconomics and another guy who I cook 5 meals for once a week.

It's pretty crazy because I'll cook for 3 hours then tell Dow that I feel guilty for not working! It's pretty amazing to get paid to do something you love. This is not to say that I'd like to become a chef; I think the fast pace of a restaurant kitchen would take all the fun out of it.

I find that I really enjoy doing promotions and realized my freshman year of college that I was good at selling. I did the Drake Phone-a-thon asking alumni for money and was one of the top 'sellers'. So, I'm trying to think about what I can do in this realm.

As for tutoring, I've always liked to do that and still toy with going back to school to become a teacher or possibly professor.

But what I think I would REALLY like is to work for a start-up company using my financial, sales, and HR-type (I LOVE interviewing people for jobs!) skills. So if you know of any start-up companies....pass my name along! I'll be ready to start in October or November!

Making a Comeback: WHERE am I?

Alright, I've had a few requests to continue blogging. And it really is much easier to talk to people when they have a little more clue about what's going on. Sooooo.....I'm going to try this again.

Coming out of retirement (this may be Garth Brooks style - in retirement, out of retirement, in retirement, out of retirement...), I have quite a lot to catch you up on.

First question I usually get is: Where the HECK are you?

Answer: Colorado

"WHAAAAAAAAAATTTTTT???" you might be exclaiming, "I thought you were moving to south Florida to become a horse trainer!"

Yep, so did I.

Basically, I emailed them right after Thanksgiving asking for an 'official' start date, so I could let Dan & Ellen know what my last day was going to be. Their response?

And I quote:

Hi LeAndra,

Hope you had a great Thanksgiving. We definately ate too much here. The position for training is no longer available.

Have a nice Christmas and New Year!

For those of you who know me, this left me in quite a panic! Less than a month to find a job! What was I going to do? I needed a job! I needed to go back to Florida! Or did I? (Well, I mean, I did need a job!)

This leads us to a little more specific answer of "Where am I?". Waaaaaaaaayyyyy back when, I had made mention of Dow. You remember? I'm not sure I exactly said much about Dow or where he came from, but here's the quick rundown. Amy, ever the matchmaker, brought Dow over to the ranch "to meet the girls," except that he's 32 (in dude ranch speak that's "old"), which means she really brought him to meet Cookie or me. And considering he's totally country and Cookie's totally L.A., I'm guessing Amy had something in mind. Anyhow, we agreed to be friends, which of course, lasted about a week. *sigh* Men.

So by the time that email rolled around, I actually, well, you know, kinda, um, liked him. Which made me decide that maybe I could/should stay here. Except I got "kicked out" out of the ranch. Ok, so maybe it IS really expensive to heat an external building via space heater...details, details. Anyhow, Dow was kind enough to let me live with him.

And there you have it. I am living in Colorado with Dow.

Next edition: WHAT am I doing?

calling it quits

It's been about 2 weeks since my last post, partially because I went to Jacksonville for a week, but also because I'm running out of things to talk about. Summer is bustling and exciting, but winter, well winter is pretty much just maintenance.

So, with that being said, I just want to thank everyone who stopped in to see what I was doing and maybe I'll post randomly if something exciting happens.

Thanks again for sticking with me this summer. I hope you enjoyed the blog!

Sincerely,

The hood wrangler