It's 2:00 A.M. I'm awake. Nervous as hell, and wondering why I can't sleep. 50mg of DiphenHydramine HCl (Tylenol) and I still sit here browsing the web and talking to you. What am I nervous about? I am an extremely marketable person, yet I have been unemployed since the beginning of February? It couldn't be the fact that I am waiting to hear back on whether I got a job or not. You know? I like contracting, I enjoy contracting, but you know what? I want the stability.

I am going to contribute a little to one of our other feature stories, whilst giving a bit of a twist. Days upon days went by when I felt the nothingness of staring a cubicle wall dying for 5:00 to hurry up and arrive. At this point I was employed with a small company. The company, let's call it "Let's Fuck Mike" for shit's and giggles, was a startup. A very marketable startup actually. They had brilliant ideas and were on top of the game. Little did I realize with the stock options and fat pay check, it was a mask. Granted I made my friends there, as well as enemies. Luckily the friends were/are wonderful but the enemy was constantly nagging. I felt as if fighting for the West Bank.

Yack, yack, yack, I know you are saying to yourself. "I have heard it all before..." Alas, maybe you haven't. There is a twist. The enemy seemed to be constantly nagging with lack of communication and false information. It just so happened that the enemy was the only one I should have really trusted, my boss. Let me give you a little background on the situation. It all started in late Oct. of 2000. Me (lead systems admin), development (friends) were chillin on some pizza preparing for a release of our product. I was presented a problem that had already been deemed *untestable*, yet, it wasn't. Though, development and I were positive there was a way to test it. Apparently it had been mentioned to the Director of Development (great friend, great pool player), that this way of testing was forbidden. He proposed the situation to me and I contemplated. I finally decided it was the only possible way to get an accurate benchmark of what we were attemping to release. I proceeded the the test deployment. My boss caught me. Nothing was said.

Eggshells my friends, mother-fucking, rotten eggshells. Imagine, opportunity after opportunity passed me by in the 3 mos. I hung in there waiting for things to get better. Suddenly it's January. The lack of communication with my boss is significantly less, if you can believe that. Yet, finally I had some help in my overloaded work schedule. 65-70 hours a week? That's nothing, until you've done it for the past year without a vacation of any sort. I finally had a prodigy and she was smart. Nothing to worry about (replacement-wise), but smart. Then came satan himself. I don't think he knew he was satan, but, oh yes.. he was. I am soon tasked with training this person in every aspect of my daily chores. One week goes by. Things seem to be getting better. I'm talking to my boss more, I'm working with my co-workers more efficiently (you see I like to get things done fast). And then it hits me. Like a ton of bricks. I'm rewarded with a swift kick in the ass, right out the door. I think the doorknob actually did hit me on the way out it was so unexpected. And to think. I just trained my replacement.

Now, it's time to celebrate. I head to get a six-pack of Shiner and stay with my baby and party! I was soooo happy I was out of that hell-hole. I couldn't wait to take a week or two off. Start a new job. Bust ass and impress everyone at the new place.

One week turned into two. Two into Three. I think you know where I'm going with this. Now it's damn near two months after the fact, and I sit here wishing to be back in that God-forsaken pit of cow dung I lived with for so long. Maybe because it is/was familiar. Maybe because I liked the tension. Hell, I don't know. Yet I sit here typing away at 2:16 A.M. thinking, why the hell can't I sleep?

*Update* - 03/29/2001
Just incase anyone wanted to know. The loss of sleep was not worth a damn thing. Unfortunately I didn't get the job. Oh well, life's a bitch, eh?