Black Cat Blog

Thoughts, Stories, and Ideas

  • I Did It

    I overcame the anxiety, fear, and inertia! I made the reservation with Avis to begin my ridesharing journey with Uber. I pick up the car on Monday, May 18th at 1 PM. The car is going to be a Chevy Bolt, and while I am looking forward to earning money on my terms, I am still nervous about doing this. To help reduce some of the nervousness, I am going to bust out a spreadsheet to help calculate what I will want to earn per mile or per hour to make the venture satisfying. I am trying to use positive language instead of the needs, shoulds, and woulds. The wrong language can be very destructive mentally.

    So after I get this blog entry written, I am going to bust out LibreOffice Calc and crunch the numbers. I will even crunch the numbers somewhat optimistically so that I feel encouraged. I still plan on working for OPS for 20-24 hours per week. This will allow me to use more optimistic numbers and feel better about doing this. It will be nice to help out Denisse with getting her to and from school whenever possible. I know she will appreciate it very much.

    Today and tomorrow are going to wind down my time at Wilmington Police Department. My services are no longer needed there, and while it has made things financially difficult, I feel mentally relieved because I got a feeling of existential dread by simply walking in the building to head to the CityWatch room. Yes, I hated it that much. But today and tomorrow won’t be so bad because the end is near.

    I am going to get started on crunching those numbers!

  • Feeling a Sense of Defeat

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    Yesterday, my boss sent me a text with some bad news that I think he really did not want to deliver because he is truly a good and decent guy. While I do not like the job and I hate the company, the same cannot be said for Chris. I feel that Chris could be headed for bigger and better things than OPS and I would give him one hell of a recommendation if he ever asked me. Hell, I’d be honored. I digress though because the bad news is that the company lost one of the contracts I was working on.

    I split my time between as a security guard between two sites to get to 40 hours. I work at a police department monitoring city cameras for 16 hours a week and city hall for 24. The police department decided to terminate the contract for under performance effective June 1st. The police department elected to save money by reducing staffing from two evening shift guards to one and three day shift guards to two. So the supervisor was actually fired as he was the one of the guards under performing. I was cut because I was only working 2 days a week anyways.

    OPS does not really have anything else for me at the moment other than where I am presently working. There is one site but it is quite a bit further away and not easily accessible. It’s also more like lite police work, dealing with addicts and transients. This is something I do not want to do. I sought out another company that elected to take a pass on me. There are postings for armed positions but the expense of obtaining that license upgrade is not insignificant.

    So I feel defeated. I feel like my next logical step is to try and get Uber off the ground to fund a business venture. I was watching a YouTube video with Denisse and the person wisely observed that traditionally self-employment was riskier than traditional employment, but in these days and times, it has flipped. It’s getting impossible to find work. It used to be that you could always find work as a security guard. Now that is not even true anymore.

    I am really not enthusiastic about this but I am taking the walk to the local Avis that serves Uber drivers to see what it’s going to take to rent the car and get this venture started. I am anxious and nervous about doing this but I have to get it done. I need a way to earn money. I am getting older and this is increasingly difficult. Corporations don’t like hiring the older worker despite incentives to do so. We are seen as liabilities instead of assets. Is it because of health insurance costs? Is it because we are seen as less capable of learning and adapting? I just don’t know. I love to learn new skills and develop new capabilities.

    Yet again, I find myself having to escape the jaws of defeat. The difference is that I am now older and the perception is that I am somehow no longer capable of working a traditional job, despite having the skills to do so. Who knows? I might find I actually enjoy doing Uber. Maybe it could lead to some opportunities that I am not considering because I am in such a depressed state. I truly do not know what the answer is.

    The only thing I know for certain is that times are crazy and we have even crazier leadership. Trump and his cronies want to build a ballroom that will cost north of a billion dollars and everyday people like myself are hurting. Trump starts a war with Iran and he probably does it to further enrich himself, his family, and the defense industry. I am almost certain that Trump has investments in Big Defense.

  • I Feel Somewhat Better

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    It is amazing what a good night’s rest will do for the body and mind. I honestly feel somewhat better this morning. At the very least, I feel better than I have in several days. I am just waiting for Denisse to wake up and then the two of us can enjoy a nice breakfast and catch up on some more of our favorite shows. At some point today, I want to take a walk to the local Avis rental location that services Uber drivers just to see what monies I need to make this Uber venture happen. I’m over and done with OPS Security Group and security in general.

    It will feel good to reduce security to a weekend gig. I just want to use that to offset a slower week or two. But now that we are getting into the summer season, I expect that things are going to get busier. So, I guess I won’t really be completely rid of OPS but I will be rid of the worst parts of it which are at the Wilmington Police Department and those two 4 hour dock shifts where I don’t really get any personal work accomplished. 16 hours on the weekend is 544 bi-weekly with a rough take home of 408. That could potentially offset a bad week. I could also potentially pick up extra hours one week at OPS if need be.

    All-in-all I think I have a solid plan. It does mean that I will have to work hard. But it will be in spurts versus continuously so I can get rest in between the spurts. This may not be so bad but I will have to wait and see while I get things dialed in. Mostly it will be nice to have access to a car with unlimited personal miles. Even better that is an EV.

    I will have to sit down and churn the numbers to see how feasible this will be. It will do a lot for my mental health to say (mostly) goodbye to what I hate doing and have some more control in my own life.

  • Exhausted

    I kept anticipating my alarm last night so I awoke a couple of times. I did wake up once to legitimately use the bathroom. But the other times I was just waiting to wake up to get ready to go to work. At least I’m only going to work for a short 4 hour shift and then I have 53 hours off. I might even take the armed security class but I just don’t know anymore. I don’t feel like advancing my security career anymore. I want to end it permanently. But how many times have I told myself this!? More than I have fingers and toes.

    I’m on the bus headed to work and I hate this driver because he is some patsy for the transit company. He’s not running the heat in the bus and it is freezing cold. He’s just a jerk of a human being. I’m guessing he doesn’t want to run the heat so he gets better gas mileage and a better bonus for using less fuel. Be damned about the comfort of the passengers.

    My mental health is poor. I’m angry and depressed all rolled up into one ball of human misery. I cannot even see the good I have in my life right now. I cannot even see what potential opportunities exist because I’m in survival mode. Survival mode is very unpleasant and unhealthy. But I don’t know what to do at the moment. I am a loser and I am paying for the poor decisions that I have made in my past.

    The next move for me is probably going to be renting a car from Avis to use on the Uber platform. The cost of the rental is $260 a week for a Chevy Bolt EUV. I don’t quite know what I will be able to make from the whole affair but I sure will try. I think I need to average $24-$26 dollars per hour to make it worthwhile. Of course any more is gravy but any less will hurt because of taxes.

    I miss my mom. She is not doing well due to advanced Alzheimer’s Disease. I miss being able to run ideas by her. I miss her badly. She was my very precious rock, my gemstone and now she only recognizes me. That’s it. She recognizes me for a short while before asking me who I am.

  • Time For a Change

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    I have been miserable now for too long doing work in security and I see that the local Avis that is a few blocks from where I stay has cars again, specifically the Chevy Bolt EVs. I am thinking about renting one for $260.00 a week and using it on the Uber platform. I am going to say a permanent goodbye to OPS Security Group as it seems like it’s just a dead end job and I hate it. It’s making me thoroughly miserable and unhappy. Perhaps I can drive on the platform and still make enough money to make ends meet but there is only one way to find out and that’s to actually do it.

    I am at my wit’s end and I am tired of having doors closed on me. I don’t even have any expectations anymore other than grand failure. I am a failure. I may be smart but I just fail at everything I do. I do not even expect to succeed at Uber. It will just be happy circumstances if I do. At least electricity is cheaper than gas. I am so sad I could just bawl my eyes out. If I could have some success at Uber, I just might feel better.

    I really want some 7-OH to take away the immense physical pain I am in right now. My feet hurt all of the time. I also want some restorative sleep which I will have to wait for, at the minimum, Monday afternoon when I can take a nap.

  • I Don’t Know What to Feel

    This morning I just feel empty and blank. I feel nothing at all and I guess that is okay because it is preferable to feeling depressed. However, it is still somewhat disconcerting. Maybe I will feel better after taking a shower which I kind of have to do before work as my face is a bit stubbly. I have to make it through my 3-11 today and my 7a-11a tomorrow. Then I have a little bit more than 2 days to recuperate before working another marathon 9 days in a row. I think my shifts have been scheduled so that they straddle a pay period so no overtime for me.

    There seems to be no advancement opportunities and no love. Maybe I am just resigned at this point to whatever happens. It could just very well be that I am resigned to my fate. I want to do better but life just keeps knocking me back down hard. I don’t feel much joy anymore. Not even my computer lab gives me much joy. After all, it is plugging away, working, and there’s not much more for me to really do at this point.

    I regret moving from Arizona back to the east coast. Some of the best times of my life were spent in Arizona. I had a 1978 Lincoln Mark V, a 2009 Kawasaki Concours, and nice Jetta daily driver. I had a nice place to live with an absurdly low monthly payment. I enjoyed life. Since moving back east, virtually nothing has gone right. Save for meeting (and getting engaged to) Denisse, I’ve lost years of my life that I will never get back.

    Now I work a menial, dead-end job with no hope of ever rising out of it. I am out of second chances. I have to face this reality. Even my DVR counselor has given up on me. I don’t know what to say or do at this point.

  • Working Second Shift

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    Today I feel pretty darned good because I will be working at my favorite site, the Louis L. Redding City/County Building. This building is both the New Castle County seat and Wilmington City Hall. On weekends the building is locked completely down to the general public and it is collecting a paycheck. I enjoy the work very much because there is plenty of time for me to pursue my own interests and go down rabbit holes and warrens on my laptop. This kind of exploration is tons of fun for me.

    This morning, or should I say afternoon now, has started out positive. I know I should not be doing things like kratom alkaloids but they really help me sleep and relieve pain like nothing else. They are available at the local smoke and vape shop. After a mistake that my manager made, I unknowingly took a fill-in standing shift on Thursday. I am a pretty advanced type 2 diabetic so I was in agony by the end of the day. Since I had expected to have a seated shift, I did not have my cane with me so I limped to the bus stop and limped home from the bus stop closest to home.

    By the time I got home, there were stabbing pains in my feet. My kind, compassionate, and lovely Denisse went to get some 7-OH for me to help relieve the pain and it was instant. The pain was at an 11/10. I have a high threshold for pain and discomfort so if it was that bad, you know I was hurting. Anyhow, I still had some residual pain yesterday but I made the relatively poor choice to do the kratom alkaloid again last night but to dull the emotional pain and sadness I was experiencing.

    Again, my lovely Denisse sat with me through it all. Damn but I love this woman to pieces. At times she may get under my skin a little, but when push comes to shove, she means the world to me and I wouldn’t trade her for anybody else. We are coming up on our 2 year anniversary in August.

    So today the name of the game is to get through the afternoon and evening incident free! The idea is to enjoy the peaceful shift and re-think some book ideas that I have.

  • I Jinxed Myself

    I got all excited for nothing whatsoever. I was excited about the Securitas opportunity and it did not pan out. I got the rejection email about an hour from the time I wrote this, 10:00PM Eastern. I am almost certain I bungled the interview when I think of it. The interviewer asked me why I was seeking out a new position and I said, “I am looking for greener pastures with growth and development opportunity.” When I think of it, my answer implied the deep-seated discontent that I feel with OPS. I guess, in the eyes of Securitas, this makes me more of a liability than an asset. I would take this as a hard and sad lessen learned.

    It was a rough day all around. This morning I got a call from Lodge Lane, the memory care facility where my mom is staying. She hit her head and was brought to the emergency room for evaluation. At least there were no signs of brain injury on the CT scan or MRI so they sent her back to the facility. I am reminded again of just how awful Alzheimer’s Disease is. It’s truly a sad situation. I don’t know how much more bad news I can take. Fortunately, I am not a violent person. The only time I’ve been known to become violent is when my safety has been directly threatened, i.e. it is defensive.

    Sometimes I feel like trudging on is useless but I do not feel suicidal. I just feel like I am bordering on shutting down completely. Almost like going catatonic. Knowing my luck, if I attempted suicide, I would bungle it and end up like a vegetable. So I have no choice but to soldier on. There’s just no other option. I just hope that shitbird RFK Jr. does not take away my access to antidepressants. The antidepressants prevent things from being worse and he’s operating on a dangerously flawed premise. He is the prime example of how important it is to only let someone that is a trained psychiatrist make critical mental health decisions. For that matter, only a trained and board-certified doctor should be making healthcare decisions.

    If we want to vilify anyone, let’s look at how Big Pharma behaves. They charge egregious amounts of money for medicines that have been available in generic for a long time. Medications on the forefront of health are out of reach to everyone but the wealthy. Furthermore, Big Pharma needs to be incentivized to seek out cures for diseases because cures are not long term profit models. It has become ridiculous. We take medications to counter the effects of other medications while Big Pharma reaps in the profits. But nobody will address the white elephant in the room.

    Until such a time as cures can happen, medicines fill a need and they must be affordable. This was a long digression. I’m tired and life feels pretty darned hopeless now. I’m falling further and further behind. I am in a hole I will be unable to extricate myself from soon. I don’t even want to address it. I just want to bury it in substances.

  • Tired and My Feet Hurt

    I’m feeling every bit my age and it is partly my fault for not thinking to bring my afternoon dose of Gabapentin. It was poor planning because I worked a standing shift and I am a Type 2 Diabetic. Well at least I’m on the bus home. Sadly, I have not heard from Securitas yet. I was really hoping to hear from them and pick up a new security job as the company I work for now is dead end. I want to be done with them. The sooner the better.

    In more positive news, my home computer lab is working well now. I have a virtualized OPNsense router that outperforms the piece of rubbish supplied by Verizon. The one thing I have not been able to get going is WireGuard on the router. For now, I spun up a container to power WireGuard. I also spun up another container for Mastodon. I have to see what other services I can host.

    I am currently using the 169.254.0.0/16 but I broke it down into a single 169.254.0.0/29 for my home use but that won’t work. I was planning on using that block as tunnel endpoint addresses for the WAN I’m building. I need to rethink this some. For now, it’s okay but it won’t be for much longer. I’m building this WAN in the name of learning.

  • Reason to Smile

    After a shit day yesterday, I have a reason to smile this morning. After my 4 hour waste of time of a shift, I am headed to the Securitas office for their hiring event to hopefully get a job offer and ditch this miserable excuse for a company called Oracle Protective Services where I work at now. They hit my last straw on Sunday night where I was told I had to use my personal cell phone in performance of my duties and I get no reimbursement for that. Well, things are going to change.

    I know Securitas is what it is but they suck less than OPS. Hopefully they have something that is tolerable where I am not splitting my time between sites and constantly having my hours changed. Once my background check and drug test come back clean, I’m quitting OPS without notice because fuck the 2 week courtesy notice. Companies fire you without notice so turnabout is fair play. I just have to cross my fingers that all will be good.

    If all isn’t good, I have a backup option at VGM and it’s not a bad option either. It will be harder work and longer hours but at least I will be in the driver’s seat. That’s still a reason to smile. Man I hate America. This country is a shit hole country that saw fit to elect one of the worst of human scum and least fit to run a 7-Eleven, let alone a nation. I would leave ‘murica with my fiancee if we could afford to do so. Well, at any rate, I do hope today will be a better day.

    I really want to tell OPS to pound sand and I am hoping today will be the day. Yes, I do like my manager personally but this is business, not personal. I like him but I hate this cheap ass company that basically beats up its employees. Instead of paying us what we are worth, paying us weekly, and giving us reimbursements for using our personal devices to perform the duties of our jobs, they throw us a shiny object called Jolly. Jolly is some points system where we can earn points towards discounts. Problem: you need tens of thousands of points to make it worthwhile and you earn only 10 points at a time. It’s a fucking gimmick.

    But I am smiling because I think today will be the beginning of the end of my year long tenure at one of the worst places I’ve ever worked at – a big fucking joke that’s not even funny. I am done helping out OPS. I won’t even volunteer for extra shifts or anything of that nature. They can go to hell except for my manager. I genuinely wish him well. I’d like to see him look for better employment because he’s capable of so much more.