It’s officially been more than a calendar month since this “Safer At Home” mandate has kept me quarantined at home. And, on day 31, I was officially laid off from my job. This was not entirely unexpected, but it still sucks. My boss applied for Paycheck Protection Program money to keep us paid at least through the next couple of months, but that money was apparently better suited for fucking SHAKE SHACK than an actual small business. Suffice to say I won’t be eating there ever again. Enjoy your ten million dollars, you chain restaurant dicks.
Yes, I know as of my writing this Shake Shack is “paying back” its ten million dollar loan, but it doesn’t mean much in hindsight. The funds can’t even be reappropriated until Congress passes the next stimulus plan. And how many other Shake Shacks are there out there, with more than enough money in their coffers to stay afloat while true small businesses shutter? How many more publicly-traded companies got loans when they could have just relied on equity offerings for quick cash injections? Shake Shack is now the face of this disaster of a “recovery plan,” so they still own this — at least in a karmic sense.
So…yeah. My last paycheck will arrive in my bank account on Thursday but as of now, I have no job. I filed for unemployment this morning. Supposedly they waived the waiting period, but I still have to wait for a letter in the mail confirming my claim. I’m kind of amazed there is no email confirmation program where you can at least see that your claim was filed properly. You just get a claim number upon clicking “submit” and…that’s it. If you try to log into your account and make any changes to your claim, the process of filing starts all over again. I don’t even know if doing that undoes what you previously submitted. What a brilliantly programmed system.
So…what am I going to do until I’m — hopefully — rehired? I don’t really know. I’m looking into some online courses. I can try to re-open my online “shops” to sell CDs and vinyl from my collection, but is anyone out there even spending any money right now? Isn’t everyone else tightening their purse strings? I haven’t had a credit card balance pretty much since this pandemic started. One of my cards even has a negative balance from all the refunds I’ve received for canceled events and travel plans. Who even has the excess cash to spend on CDs and vinyl right now? I bought one record within the past month and it sat in the doorway for two days because I was afraid to handle the package. It sounded nice when I eventually listened to it, but I’m in no rush to buy more vinyl now.
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Unrelated, but this weekend was pretty boring even by quarantine standards. We had no big Zoom gatherings or game nights. Actually, that’s kind of a lie. On Friday we made dinner (nothing special) and settled in to watch a movie. Then I started getting bombarded with texts to join a Zoom-in-progress with my old Echo Park roommates. I sat in for maybe 30-45 minutes and then Irish goodbye-d in order to finish watching the movie. On Saturday I was granted a reprieve from cooking, and instead of socializing, we watched the first half of that Waco miniseries on Netflix. We finished the miniseries last night while chowing down on some local pizza. Tonight I think I’m going back to cooking dinner, although I’m not sure what is on the menu at the moment. I’m certain to receive my marching orders momentarily, as it’s getting close to the end of the work-day for those of us in this house who are still employed COUGH COUGH.
Sorry, that was rude.
Anyway, I’m going to go relax and play some video games. It’s the only thing I have left to calm my nerves.
I can’t believe my birthday is in five days.
We were born at the wrong time.
Stay healthy, and stay safe.
Bal Pare – Herz Aus Stein [MP3]
