Medical Drama and Other Drama

Stephen was supposed to get toe surgery done yesterday--just out of his doctor's office, for an ingrown toenail. Unfortunately he worked himself up for weeks about it, and then moreso in the doctor's chair, and he ended up fainting. Poor Stephen.

So the doctor recommended us to a podiatrist to perform the surgery with Stephen under anesthesia. I don't think either of us like that idea much, but we can't, of course, have him fainting off doctor's chairs. Not good.

Stephen twitched while he was out, much like his first fainting incident when we were together. That concerned the doctor some, and he is going to do some research on Stephen's medical history to see if he can pinpoint why this happens to him. He advised Stephen not to drive, although he said he didn't legally need to require him not to drive because of the circumstances surrounding the fainting.

So I will be driving him to and from work and other places this week until the doctor gets back into touch with him with further instruction. I am okay with that. Stephen is not, LOL. He knows I don't particularly like to drive--and him not being able to drive is a big inconvenience, yuck. I told him I'm not worried at all though. I really don't think his twitching is a big deal yet. There have only been two instances of it--both with me, hm. Wonder what that says about my influence on him, LOL. Anyway. I do wish we could get it figured out though. That'd be really nice.

Oh, I should mention that I have to drive Steve's car around, not mine, because my left rear window decided to fall off its track and is now stuck at about halfway. I'm getting it taken care of tomorrow. I hope it doesn't cost much. :P Steve and I are thinking of getting me a new car altogether, because this one seems to be falling apart, even though it's only 3 years old. Grr.

Anyway... Yesterday was quite a rough day for me. Found myself beating myself up a lot for different things throughout the day. I suppose I shouldn't be so hard on myself, like everybody says. I wonder if there's some miracle drug that can keep people from being too hard on themselves? :T

Anyway... So that's my life update for today... Keep us in your prayers.

Job-Seekers, Beware

When people are worried about losing their jobs or not making enough money to support their family, scammers will abound.

Today I had an "interview" with a company. Let me tell you how it went.

First off, they pulled my resume off of Monster.com, called me up and said, "I'm calling about a possible job opportunity with our company. Can you come in for an initial interview this week?" They told me nothing about the job itself. I assumed it was a bank or something, and they were looking for an admin. assistant type position, which is what I've been looking for. I thought I would be interviewed by a couple serious people in business suits about a job at a bank.

But when I arrived at the office today, I found myself plunked down in a conference-like room with four other people and three guys in suits chatting us all up about where we were from and such. First tip-off: it wasn't at all what I expected it was going to be, and they had not told me anything about what it would be like.

We all filled out paper applications, like we were applying at an employment agency. There was a welcome letter in the folders they handed out to us, which I, already suspicious, read thoroughly. It also said nothing about the job, except that it would be as a financial services representative. But it did talk in flying colors about the business. Second and third tip-offs: anything that mentions being a representative, consultant, or distributor means it's a multi-level marketing business, which you must be skeptical of anyway; and if a business you suspect of being multi-level marketing talks about itself in flying colors, you REALLY should be cautious. And still nothing about the job itself.

The "interview" began. A guy talked for an hour and a half. That's all. This is where ALL my scam sensors went off. I nearly walked out after the first 10 minutes, but I knew I couldn't do that without feeling as if I were being a drama queen. So I sat through the entire thing having the worst time keeping a straight face and not outright laughing at the ridiculousness of it all.

Here are the things that were tip-offs to me: 1) you can make 6-figure paychecks in three years off of this job, 2) you earn a 55% bonus on your earnings (but only if you sell $25,000 worth of stuff--in this case, life insurance, stocks, bonds, annuities, etc.), 3) you get promoted really fast, 4) we will pay all your bills in the beginning (for how long? as long as it takes), 5) we are a debt company (how they manage to pay all those bills for upstarters in their company and still remain debt-free is beyond me!), 6) we license our insurance sales people, but it costs $860.

And still nothing about the job itself! But he couldn't stop talking about what a great company it was. We even got three slips of paper in the folders that were apparently "profiles" of "real clients." No last names or locations included.

He had us introduce ourselves after his hour and a half-long spiel was over. He told us to tell him one thing that we would have to have in a job to be happy. And of course, whatever the 5 people said, he spun into "This company is perfect for you!" No matter what they said.

Finally his forever-long talk was over, and we were kind of left wondering what happens next, when I got called out of the conference room. Ironic that I was called first. Do they watch people real close and take them in in order of least to most likely to swallow their bait? LOL. So I went into a room with this assistant manager who was going to question me further to see if I was interested in being part of this "company." He started off asking me if I had any questions for him, which I was grateful for--at least he let me ask questions! I did have plenty, but I could only remember two. I didn't get straight answers for either. The first question I asked was how much the insurances packages sold for, to their customers.

"It depends," he said. "It depends on how much coverage they can get."

"Give me a range."

"It depends," he repeated. "It can go anywhere from $100 a year to thousands a year."

I started to make a further remark but stopped myself. Instead I asked my second question. "How long have you been in this office here?"

"Well, we've been in the area for 30 years," he said.

I couldn't even get a straight answer for how long they've been in the office they were currently at.

I decided to just cut to the chase then. Questioning them further was useless. "I don't think I'm cut out for this job, I really don't," I said. "I'm not a salesperson," was the excuse I gave.

"Well--all right, if that's how you feel," said the man.

LOL.

Ridiculousness.

Job-seekers, beware.