an unannounced absence.

Hello everyone.

So it's come to my attention that I kind of left everyone out of the loop for the past month or so. I've dropped off the radar because I'm not in school for the summer, so really, there isn't much to tell. I'll be back in the game at the end of sept so, until then, you are just going to have to read a harry potter book, or something, to entertain yourself. For now, I'll wrap up the end of my first quarter in school....

As expected I finished my first quarter with all A's and achieved Portland Community College's highest honor of President's List. My last teacher for the quarter was agonizing and it made me really happy that the classes are only three weeks long. If I had to spend more time with the guy I was going to hurt him. He had never taught before and was in charge of teaching us our second electronics class. Electronics are the building blocks to most of advanced automotives these days (not to mention my favorite subject) and he botched it. It was apparent that he didn't prepare for the class and he spent most of his time referring us to howstuffworks.com. I did not pay $350 for a reference to a website that I can look at for free. There were a few times where we spent more time looking for a car that had working components to test than actually doing the labs. To preface, the cars we work on have been butchered and left to rot in a parking lot for most of year, complete with mice and bums, so they are maybe one step above junkyard cars. I would have appreciated if he had found us cars to do our tests on, like other teachers had in the past. But i guess they were a little more like real life, huh. I shouldn't be complaining.

My hatred for the bad teacher culminated when we got in a conversation about careers. It was the same old bullshit. He asked me why I chose automotives in a demeaning tone that really pisses me off. Like he's just asking because he's curious but because he is judging me. He then told us about how the ability to make money in the field is a lie that they feed students. He tells us his story about working for a place for $12/hr and managing it for $14/hr. He stayed there for TEN YEARS. Like a chump that was willing to put up with such a tiny wage. He had also told us that he never wanted to specialize. Stephanie, extraordinarily perceptive gal, commented on the conversation after we left the room. She said that she didn't want to sound mean, but his real problem is that he was stupid for working for such little money and not moving his way up in the business. Way to be an encouraging mentor for the students dude.

So I looked for a job in the automotive industry, and when it came down to straight-up needing a job, I took what was offered to me since nothing was panning out at any of the auto places I applied. I'm managing a cafe downtown, which gives me the flexibility to make my own schedule when classes start up again in the fall. I'm not enjoying the small shit that goes with being a manager - like phone calls on my day off saying we ran out of quarters in the register (location downtown = banks on every block, figure it out). It's a good experience though, and I'm learning from it.

Also on the horizon, I applied for the electrician's apprenticeship with IBEW (International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers for those who aren't savvy with union acronyms). It's a long process to getting accepted and they online take applications twice a year. I'll keep people posted on how it works out....

So until then, have a great summer. Thank you so much to the people who write me back. I wish I had more time to write each one of you back. It's great to hear from you.