America's Most Wanted

Last night I tuned in and saw part of "America's Most Wanted" on TV. I almost immediately recognized the skeletal form hanging behind John Walsh.

Hmmm . . . that sure reminds me of the Crime Museum, I thought. It really did look like the place where my friend Rashmi and I participated in a free CSI laboratory workshop a couple weekends ago.

I watched and waited. A little later in the show, John Walsh was broadcasting from the very room where the workshop took place, and that's when I knew it was the same place. I opened up my laptop and went straight to the AMW web site. Sure enough, the show is being filmed right here in D.C. at the National Museum of Crime & Punishment.

How cool is that!

Job-hunters, Beware

I finally got a job, after exactly five months and one day of unemployment. To all the other job-hunters out there, it ain't easy finding work. In fact, the more senior you are in your skillset, the longer it's going to take. I made 197 job contacts before getting my first real interview (excluding head hunter interviews, of which I was asked to attend only three); and I was 211 contacts into the process before I got an offer. Five months. One interview. One offer.

And that's the good news—it only took me five months to get a job. After that experience, I'm convinced that you're lucky in this market if you can get a job at all.

The bad news is that you can expect a pay cut. To get an idea of what to expect, take a look at your stock portfolio. There seems to be a positive correlation between the percentage drop in value of your overall financial worth and the percentage drop in pay. Don't be surprised if your new job pays 50-60% less than your old one.

Now is a great time to go back to school. If you can afford to go to school full time and live on student loans (maybe combined with a part-time job), do it. I would if I hadn't gotten stuck with a property I couldn't unload when I moved out of state for my last job. That puppy is sucking down more money every month than the cost of a large, luxury studio apartment in Midtown Manhattan. So I'm in school part time. I'll be 47 years old when I finish my Masters degree.

But at least I'll finally be following my dream!

Now to rest up before work starts next week. I've got just three days to relax before life gets crazy busy again. Thank god I can go three days without the headache of filling out job applications several hours a day!

Going Nuts

I can't believe that, as of today, it's been five full months of unemployment. This has never happened to me before. I suspect that there are many others like me, who were sure they'd get a new job pretty quickly after being laid off.

Yup - five months. And 209 resumes sent. That's scary. The good news is, about 12 resumes ago I was finally asked to interview for a position. Usually I get no response at all, so I was ecstatic to get an interview last week. (Heck, I was happy just to go somewhere.) The meeting went amazingly well. I was sure I'd nailed it. I came out feeling convinced that I'd get an offer.

That was a week ago. No offer yet. The waiting kills me. However, I still have all my fingers crossed (which makes it hard to type).

If I don't get a job soon I'm going to go stir-crazy. I've begun volunteering at the local cat orphanage, helping out with adoptions, feedings, cleaning, etc. So at least I have some interaction with other people (and more kitties - yay!). But this job called job-hunting requires too much indoor time and too much sitting. It's incredibly time-consuming. And it can be de-motivating when continued efforts yield zero results.

Being a person of pretty high energy, I am not very good at sitting still for extended periods of time. So this whole being unemployed thing is my own living hell. It's getting so bad that whenever I see New York City scenes on TV I just want to cry. How pathetic is that! There is most likely going to be some kind of therapy on the horizon for me.

On the bright side, I've really bonded with my cat, Baby. She's so cute. When I open a drawer anywhere in the house, she comes running. She could be a mile away and hear the drawer slide open. It's important that she crawl in it (or behind it) in order to see what might be hiding in there. If it's a clothing drawer, it becomes an insta-bed.

With all the time I've spent with her lately, I'm learning her language pretty well. I know when she's hungry, and when she wants to play. I know when she wants to be scratched, and when she wants a brushing. Fortunately, unlike Martin (my previous kitty, may he rest in peace), she doesn't have a need to "go out," so there is no whining by the front door.

But she does love attention. She's very dog-like. She follows me around the house, joining me in whatever room I've parked myself in. Sometimes she does this staring thing when I'm sitting in my favorite chair. (That means, "Get up and play with me!") She loves to play-fight and chase me around the apartment, too. She's a sweet little girl. I'm so glad I found her.

One of my good friends in Seattle, Janet, lost her sweet cat (named "Blue") to diabetes less than two weeks ago. I'm sure that Martin is looking after his soul. Janet had Blue for 18 years, ever since he was just a kitten. I know how she feels. Losing a pet is no different from losing any other member of the family. It's not an easy thing to get over. I don't think my mom ever got over losing our boxer, Ginny, in 1979. Neither did our cat, Kitty, who died not long after Ginny. Probably of a broken heart.

I told Janet that she needs to run out and adopt another one (or two) right away. Honestly, it's the best treatment for pet separation anxiety. Just find another one to rescue and love.

I wish it were as easy to find a new job.

Off to bed, only to wake up tomorrow in my sixth month of unemployment. Yikes!

Arrested in D.C.

I was once detained by a cop in New Orleans in 1996 (for the crime of walking down the street), and I'll never forget how mad (or naiive) I was about it. I had no idea why I was being detained. It was only later, when my fiance got home from work that evening, that I realized that the cop thought I was a prostitute. I wasn't dressed like one, but that didn't matter. I was on a "bad street," therefore I must be a hooker.

That pissed me off, but this is ridiculous! I'm quite sure that my civil rights were violated. Talk about your biased lineup! I don't look anything like those guys. This could ruin my chances of getting a security clearance - geez.

My friend Rashmi and I enjoyed our trip to the Washington D.C. National Museum of Crime & Punishment on Sunday. She, too, was booked. But she managed to escape from her jail cell through the cinderblock wall.

Ok, so it was kind of a large hole.

The one-hour CSI Lab Workshop was fun. The audience was given a homicide to solve and participated in an interactive demonstration given by real CSIs, one of whom graduated from the GWU forensics Masters program.


A shoeprint mold was taken from a footprint left in soil. And we all got to lift latent fingerprints from a framed photo found at the crime scene. Instead of using a fiber fingerprint brush we used a magnetic brush, which was cool.

At the end of the workshop we went upstairs to visit the staged crime scene and examine the evidence. Many of the things we talked about were the same things that I'm currently learning about in my Intro to Criminal Investigations class. It was good to do this workshop on Sunday, as the very next day was "Crime Scene Night" at school—a day that my classmates and I have looked forward to since the semester started.

Rashmi and I toured the museum. We saw John Dillinger's gorgeous car, not to mention a lock of his hair, which was quite the souvenir to obtain after his execution on July 22, 1934 by rogue FBI agents. All John Dillinger ever wanted was to "be a bank robber," a dream that lead to his death at the age of 31.

We also saw the famous Bonnie & Clyde vehicle, riddled with bullet holes.

In the museum section that covers types of goernment executions, there is a glass-enclosed robot measuring about a foot long and maybe 8" high. It is armed with a syringe and is labeled "Prototype: Lethal Injection Attack Droid." I called Rashmi over to check it out.

She took one look and (in her usual quick wit) replied matter-of-factly, "Man, they're cutting back on jobs everywhere."

I couldn't stop laughing for several minutes. :)

Sucker for Cute Kitties

I'm a sucker for cat videos (like this one, sent to me by my old Microsoft boss: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rooyt3ptNco&feature=email). I can't help myself. Even my cat, Baby, is spoiled beyond belief. She basically gets whatever she wants around here.

For example, the longer I stay unemployed, the earlier she gets her dinner. I adopted Baby just three weeks after arriving at my job on Wall Street in late 2007. In those days I got home from work anywhere from 6:00PM to 8:00PM.

So Baby generally got her dinner treat (a heaping spoonful of healthy, natural Innova canned food) between 6 and 7PM. She basically has her dried food available to her on a 24x7 basis. But there's something special about the canned food that she loves. This isn't about hunger.

After I became unemployed in September, I was home job-hunting all day every day (for the most part). So I was able to feed Baby her canned food no later than 6:00 every night. But she took advantage of her new-found fortune of having her caretaker at home all day. If it was getting close to 6PM, she'd let me know. She'd meow then sit and stare at me. Or, she'd follow me every time I got up to go in the kitchen, sitting on the floor looking up at me with those big eyes.

Soon, she was letting me know by 5PM. Her irresistible charms go the best of me, so I fed her at 5:00. That's not unreasonable.

But within a couple months it was 4PM. I told her, "Baby, this is getting ridiculous. I'll feed you now, but don't expect to eat this early again."

It's five months later now; today she ate her dinner at 3:00PM. Sigh.

It Must be February

Of all the months in the year, February is the worst. Grey, lifeless, no-leaf, dismal, cold, dead-of-winter February. Yuk.

Looking back at my last post is something that depresses even me! I blame February. I hate February. Always have. Always will. They should just cancel February and add those days to March. March is a month of renewal and hope. Springtime. Warmer days, the first flower blossoms. A sign of better things to come, like vacations and beaches and suntans.

Well, today I felt better. It was a wonderful, sunny 56-degree day, although it felt warmer than that. After ZipCar-ing up to Maryland to show my rental home to a wonderful woman (I hope she takes it!), I came home and took a long walk. I finally went up to the George Washington Masonic National Monument for the first time. It sits atop a hill overlooking Alexandria, from King Street station to the Potomac, about a mile from home. It's the one tall structure in Alexandria that you can see for miles, and it's lit up at night like the Chrysler building. (If you ever need to find the Amtrak station, just head for this tower.)

Tomorrow my friend Rashmi (from Laurel) and I are meeting downtown to tour the Crime & Punishment Museum. We signed up for a CSI lab workshop afterward, something I've been looking forward to for a couple weeks. We'll be learning about fingerprints, footprints, and imprints. I already got through the chapter about fingerprint ridges in my Criminal Investigations class, but that's not the same as doing it in real life! It should be fun.

Unfortunately, Crime Scene Night for my class was cancelled last week. My teacher broke her leg and ankle on the ice. (That now makes three people in our small class of 10 on crutches.) So Crime Scene Night is slated for this coming Monday, Feb. 9th. I should be well-prepared after my trip to the Crime Museum tomorrow. Let's hope this weather holds up. Everyone needs cheering up these days, myself included!

Although, on a sad note, the famous Peeler Guy (Joe Ades) of Union Square in Manhattan died last week. My brother Dave passed on the news to me. I was saddened by it. But I realize that Joe lived the kind of life we should all celebrate--he's the type of guy who never dies. I used to watch him sitting on a crate on the sidewalk in his suit, hawking his five-dollar vegetable peelers at Union Square, right across the street from the Petco on 16th Street, and sometimes at street fairs. He's a New York icon whose memory will live on in the hearts of millions. See a meaningful tribute written by David Galbraith.

Spam Comeback

I just saw on the NBC Nightly News that Hormel Spam is making a comeback. A few seconds later, I discovered online that Spam was introduced during the Great Depression. With another half a million jobs last in the past four weeks, it's no wonder people are buying Spam again.

A recession is one thing, but now we're hearing talk of a "mini-depression." No doubt, conversations about a "depression" will be right around the corner. Pretty scary stuff.

One of the other things revealed in tonight's news cast is that the two primary sectors that are still hiring are government and health care. These two industries are your best shot at finding a job. It's interesting. If that's truly the case, I should be employed by now. I live in the Metropolitan D.C. area - a hotbed of government agencies. There are probably more government jobs available here than anywhere else in the country. I know because I apply for several every day on the USAJobs.gov web. I literally couldn't have a better chance at getting a job in this sad economy than I do here.

I have a great resume that includes 18 years of IT and technical publications experience. And, I have a degree now. How ironic: this is the first time I've conducted a job hunt having that piece of paper in hand, and yet it's useless (for the purposes of being increasing marketability, that is). Right now it's harder than ever to get a response to a job inquiry.

Let's see . . . looking at my spreadsheet, I see that I've made 188 attempts to get a job interview since September 20th. (That means 188 resumes sent, applications submitted, or contacts made.) Nearly 150 of those submisions are for jobs in the D.C. area. And the responses to those are few and far between. At this point, I'm getting a response for about one in 30 inquiries. And a response can be so much as "do you have a clearance?" "No, I don't." End of thread. They don't even reply to you when you answer their questions. Doesn't matter how many times you beg.

It doesn't get much worse than this. In all my years as a professional, I've never had this much trouble finding a job. I can continue to survive this way for a while yet. That's the good news. It just means I'll be eating up all the money set aside for grad school. I don't mind that. It's if I have to wipe out every penny I've ever saved that will bother me. But I have a long way to go before that happens. That makes me one of the lucky people.

I have it good compared to a lot of people. But, if it's this hard for me to find a job in the one place in the country where there are jobs, what about the rest of the unemployed? What about people who have nothing in savings? People with families and no income? People with massive medical bills? People who lost their homes? These are the folks who need our prayers.

Tough times indeed.

Bad Baby

My dear sweet Baby has a new bad habit. I can't keep her off the kitchen counter. I've tried, but there's just no point in my wasting my breath anymore. She loves to get up on the bar stools parked at the kitchen bar. The counter is just one step up from there, so she really doesn't know the difference. At my old place in Brooklyn she had to jump up onto the counter and would remove herself when I told her to "Get down." Not here in Virginia.

She has the same habit with our new (old) dining room table that my friend Rashmi kept for me while I was living in NY. I certainly can't keep her off the table because it's simply her new path to the window sill.

This is her territory and I can't stop her, so I have given up trying. Not to mention, that adorable face is irresistable. . . .

MagicJack: You Get What You Pay For

Some of us unemployed folks who can't afford a land line (and have bad cell service because all those red-shirted guys in the Verizon network can't seem to find the elevator to my floor), have been forced to try a VOIP system called MagicJack. It's dirt cheap. You pay about $40 for the USB device that plugs into your computer, then about $20/year for unlimited local and long distance calls.

My 30-day trial period is up today, and I've decided to keep the MagicJack, despite its flaws. This is fair warning to anyone out there who wants to try this product. It's a true fact that you will get what you pay for.

The MagicJack works OK for the most part. But there are issues. One issue is that the phone will stop dialing out occasionally. Stopping and restarting the software will generally fix that. Or I just reboot my PC.

Another issue is that you'll hear occasional beeps on the line, as if your cat was walking on the telephone pad, pressing the dial buttons. These can be annoying. Sometimes you hear them on your end, and sometimes your call recipient only hears them on his or her end of the line.

I've seen other complaints about this problem on online complaint boards; therefore, it's what we in the software industry call a "known problem." For every known problem, there should be a fix.

Not with MagicJack. They don't have a clue. Worse, the only way to obtain technical support is via online chat. If you can find the correct link to click on at the MagicJack web site to access the chat support folks, then you're 90% of the way there. After that, it's all downhill.

The support person, who is no doubt sitting in Bangalore (based on the lack of command of the English language) will never offer you a cause for the problem, much less a resolution. The toubleshooting steps consist strictly of trial-and-error, with the tech support person offering such sage advice as, "disable your firewall." Right. "How will that help the occasional audio beeps on my phone?" I asked. "Um, never mind. Don't do that. Let's reboot your router instead."

Unplug your MagicJack. Plug it back in.

Edit the registry. Change permissions on several USB-related folders to Full Control and then delete several registry keys. (My god!!)

If you aren't using the [absolutely unnecessary] USB extension cord, plug it into a USB port and plug your MagicJack to the extension cable. It will magically 'help add power' to your MagicJack. (I beg to differ.) Go to Disk Management and right-click. . .

And that's where I hung up. I know that the phone beeps have got to be a bug in the software. Everything points to that.

Nonetheless, it's a minor inconvenience and I will hang on to my MagicJack for now since it's saving me the 50 bucks a month plus taxes that Verizon wants for a land line, which I think is highway robbery.

To give you an idea of the quality of support you'll get, here is a snippet from my most recent online chat, about 35 minutes into it, which was "escalated" to Rosey. (Note that, at this point in the ridiculous conversation I was just a tad frustrated with the poor quality of support and on the verge of losing my sense of humor. . . . )

Rosey: You are only saying that you are a one
Rosey: If you don't want me to help you fix it, then fine!
susan: I am a "one"?
susan: I want to speak to someone who can help.
susan: Please
Rosey: I am trying to help you, so don't be rude
Rosey: I am trying to be nice.
Rosey: Don't try mew that I will not treat you nice
Rosey: And i am not that..
susan: Oh my god.
susan: Let me speak to your manager please
Rosey: I respect every people and my custoer
Rosey: *customer
susan: Thank you. Please escalate this issue to a manager.
susan: Is Therese available?
Rosey: They are on a meeting right now and I am the one who assigned to assist customers.
Rosey: Therese is not available right now, she is handling other chats.
susan: Well, I still don't have a fix for my ongoing problem. I just made a call and heard the beeping. What next?
susan: Can you just look in your knowledge base and tell me what the known fix is for this, if there is one?
Rosey: Are you using the extension cord now?
susan: yes
Rosey: Okay..
susan: what is the correct fix? if you don't know, then please say so. trial and error is not going to fix a bug in the product. can you please email your developers and ask them what they are doing to fix this?
Rosey: Please go into Task Manager (press alt-ctrl-delete on your keyboard one at a time together to get to it), look for the magicjack.exe process, right click on it, and set the priority to High.
susan: already did that, two days ago.
Rosey: Please do it again
susan: It's still set to high.
Rosey: Okay..
susan: ?
Rosey: Please unplug your magicJack. Now go to "Start" in Windows and click on "run". In there write regedit and press enter.
susan: you want me to edit my registry?????

Studying Computer Forensics

I'm sitting here watching a DVD of Crime 360 episodes. It's prep work for one of my classes in school.

It's been a long time since I actually enjoyed a class I was taking in school. That's because when I chose to go back to school to finally finish my undergraduate degree (in 1988), I basically chose courses that were the fastest route to getting that piece of paper—not classes in a field that I had a passion for.

The minute I found something more interesting to do, (which was work at Microsoft), I quit school again. It's too bad that I spent so many years of my prime confused about what I wanted to be when I grew up.

Grad school is a whole lot different. I'm taking courses that I truly enjoy. And the teachers are people with real day jobs in the field we are studying; they aren't teaching just by a book. I am so glad I finally finished my Bachelor's degree so that I can pursue my dream and get a career that is truly satisfying. (I might be less happy about things if I don't find a day job soon — it'll be hard to study when I'm living on the street.)

Studying computer forensics is a whole new ball game for me. What kind of class lets you watch true crime TV shows for homework? Introduction to Criminal Investigations! That's what kind. What kind of class has you writing a case brief every week? Introduction to Criminal Law —which is more about criminal procedure than law.

I love the stuff I'm learning in both my classes, but Investigations is the more fun of the two courses. For the past few weeks my classmates and I have been looking forward to February 2nd. That's "Crime Scene Night." The stuff we do the rest of the semester will be based on our investigation of a crime scene staged by a veteran DC police criminal investigator.

For example, we have to present our investigative findings (as members of two teams) the week after crime scene night. Then, later in the semester, we each have to write a search warrant. A viable search warrant. It's not as easy as it sounds.

From what I'm learning in my Crim Law class—which is primarily a lot of reading—a search warrant has to meet several criteria if it's going to hold up in court. The most important criteria is probable cause. You can't get a warrant without it. We all know that just from watching TV. Establishing probable cause falls under its own set of rules, however, especially if the information came from an informant.

If a warrant doesn't hold up, any evidence found under that warrant can be thrown out on the Exclusion Rule. In addition, evidence derived from illegally obtained evidence can be thrown out under the Fruit of the Poisonous Tree Doctrine. The key lies in understanding the Fourth Amendment and appropriately interpreting case law that is based on it.

And does an officer always need a search warrant to perform a search? There are exceptions, such as a "Terry stop," otherwise known as a "stop-and-frisk." Determining when you do and don't need a warrant is a decision that frequently has to be made under life-or-death circumstances. Police have to understand individual rights and the laws that protect those rights before they make any move to search or seize a person, place or thing.

It's one thing to know what the Fourth Amendment is, but it's another thing entirely to know how to apply it to real life criminal procedure. Like they say, every rule has an exception. Laws vary by jurisdiction and get modified by the Supreme Court over time. I understand now that police officers have to be really good at thinking on their feet. This stuff is complicated and rarely is as straight forward as they make it look on Law & Order.

If I can recite the Fourth Amendment on the final exam in my Crim Law class, I get extra credit. Woo-hoo! Because my memory is so poor, I've started the memorization process a few months in advance of the exam. It's 54 words, and by now I can remember the first 33 of them. Here it is.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Fascinating stuff!

D.C. on Steroids

Here in northern Virginia, the hype and anticipation leading up to today has been phenomenal. Although I was not one of the hundreds of thousands of people who battled jam-packed subways and freezing cold to join the festivities on the Mall, I did get caught up in the emotion watching the historical event on TV.

I've never seen D.C. so alive. Estimates place the attendance at two million. Wow! Two million happy people in one place at one time. The positive emotion was felt all over the world. One woman interviewed on TV came all the way from Kenya for the event.

A nice family that I spoke to on the subway this afternoon came from Waldorf, MD. The mother and her two daughters were so thrilled, so overjoyed, to have been a part of history. They said they got up at 4:30 in the morning and drove to Virginia, parking across the street from my apartment building to take the Metro into the city. It took them seven hours to get to the Mall. That's dedication. And it is exactly why I didn't go. :)

But it was fun talking to them and seeing their smiling faces. I suddenly felt like I was in New York again!

What an exciting day. It's kinda neat to be in such close proximity to all of the excitement. I wish I could say "I was there," but I'll have to settle for "I was really close by!"

113 Resumes

I am one of 260,000 people laid off from Wall Street in the past several months.

Since September 20 I've submitted my resume/application (or made some sort of job contact) a total of 113 times. The actual responses I get are few and far between. I get a response for about one in every 15 resumes sent. The reasons that the response number is so low vary. Over the past three months I've determined the following:

1. Many jobs listed on the Internet by staffing agencies do not exist. One recruiter actually told me that they post jobs that don't exist just to build their database of resumes. This practice should be illegal. Truly, it is false advertising.

2. No one actually sees resumes that are submitted through online job sites. Whether the job exists or not is irrelevant in this case. Your resume gets dumped into a database without passing the eyes of any live human being. Chances are, you'll never hear back. If I can't email or talk to an individual (a live human being) about a job posting, I know that I'll never hear back, which has proven to be true 99.9% of the time over the past four months.

3. If you do get a hold of a recruiter, they generally say, "that job has already been filled, but we'll add your resume to our database and contact you if there's a match." This is either true or, more likely, the job never existed in the first place. I've seen this where I've applied for a job literally a few hours after it was posted, only to find it's already been filled. Doubtful.

3a. These staffing agency recruiters are highly inexperienced. Most are 20-something and just do the job for a paycheck. I swear, most of the ones I've talked to have zero technical background and don't even understand the technical skill set needed for job that they are recruiting for. It's pathetic and can be frustrating at times.

4. Eighty percent of jobs are gained by knowing the right person, not by applying online. Networking is key. This is why keeping up with your LinkedIn profile and contacts is so important.

5. Competition is steep. On average, right now there are three applicants for every opening.

Applying for government jobs is incredibly time-consuming. For example, I applied for one job this week that cost me hours of my time just learning the application process. The application instruction document was 23 pages long. Then, once I've applied, figuring out which "supplemental documentation" is required for that particular vacancy is a job in and of itself. Circular references are common on these web sites, and figuring out the application process is 90% of the battle.

The good thing is that you know the job actually exists if it's posted on usajobs.gov or fbijobs.gov or a similar agency web site. The drawback is that it frequently takes the agency's HR staff up to 90 days to get back to you. And that's only if you actually submitted all the correct documents, which you'll never know.

Never mind trying to get your account reinstated if you get locked out of one of these gov't agency web sites that you last signed into in 2005. You won't even get a response to repeated requests to have your password reset. There are hundreds of these agencies, and all have different application processes and requirements. It's sad that there cannot be one process for all federal jobs. Think of all the time and money that would save U.S. taxpayers!

With unemployment at 7.2%, these are difficult times. Networking is the key to getting a new job.

I Are a College Graduate

It's official. I graduated from UNC-Charlotte on December 20th, a feat that I embarked upon in September 1981. So, just 27 years and three universities later, I have a bachelors degree in Mathematics with a minor in Psychology. I changed my major so many times over the years that I should have ended up with about five degrees. But I'm not complaining. :) This opens the door to graduate school and a new career for me--something I've desperately needed for several years.

My other good news is that today I found out I've been accepted to the Masters in Forensic Science program at The George Washington University. GWU has one of the best (if not the best) FS programs in the country. It's also one of the most expensive. But it'll be worth it. The top four digital forensics examiners in the nation came out of this program. My concentration is High Technology Crime Investigation. My 18 years of IT work give me a great background for this program, but it's still not going to be easy. There is a lot that I need to learn about criminal law and collecting forensic evidence.

I am so excited to have been accepted. It's a competitive program that accepts 20 new students at a time. I wanted this so badly that I moved to Virginia after Wall Street chewed me up and spit me out. I went so far as enrolling at GWU as a non-degree student, signing up for two undergraduate prerequisites that start next week.

They just had to take me. If not, I would have kept on trying. I'm glad that bridge has now been crossed.

Overall, there are about 80 students in the program at any given time, so it's a nice compact community. Classes start in one week. Today was the first time since I can remember that I stood in line at a university book store. Man, book prices are exorbitant these days. A student can easily expect to spend $100 per class.

Thank god I wasn't the only student in line who is sprouting gray hairs. The rest looked like kids to me!

Driving a Prius

For New Year's I drove down to an old friend's house near Roanoke, Virginia. Tracy and I had worked at the Blacksburg Domino's Pizza in the mid-80's and have been best friends ever since. She is the only person from my Virginia Tech college days that I managed to truly stay in touch with. I visit her family every couple of years. Now that she is only 255 miles away, we can see each other more often.

Because Enterprise failed to honor my reservation the previous weekend for a mini-van (which I needed to pick up my dining room table from my friend Rashmi's house up in Laurel, MD), they owed me a free upgrade for my New Year's trip. I asked for a hybrid and got a red Toyota Prius.
I can't get over the mileage that thing makes. Although the on-dash system reported 47mpg (on average) for the entire trip, in reality it made closer to 43mpg. I'm not complaining, though. I only paid for about 12 gallons of gas for the whole 514-mile trip. Not bad! Especially since gas is about $1.55/gallon now.

The Prius is a great car. I could find only a few minor drawbacks. One was that I had no idea how to work the heating and A/C unit, so I just used the temperature up/down controls on the steering wheel for the first half of the trip. On the way back I discovered that the touch-screen LCD display in the middle of the dash has a page for adjusting the air flow. It's too bad the thing didn't have a navigation system. The monitor was there, after all.

One drawback to this little car is that the standard guages are displayed in green LED lights just beneath the windshield. This didn't bother me until nighttime. The green dash lights are so close to the window that they reflect onto the glass, directly in the driver's line of vision. It's not a show-stopper, but it would probably bother me long-term.

The other thing I didn't like was the center console. It has an 18" oblong lid that flips up from the front, so it's almost impossible to open while you're driving, as you have to twist your right hand under the latch and move to open it. Otherwise your arm is in the way.

And lastly, it has a push-button to start the car. It also has a push-button to put the car in Park. That takes some getting used to. The little tiny gear shift is funny - you slide it over and up for Drive, or over and down for Reverse. The knob goes back to its original position, though, no matter what gear you're in. And every time I turned on the power and tried to put it into gear, it would only go into Neutral. But rebooting fixed that problem. Every time!

So, yes, I recommend the Prius if you are cost- and energy-conscious. The low gas consumption is unbeatable. And it comes with a pretty decent sound system.

My trip was fun. I love Tracy's kids - they are 13 (Elizabeth) and 14 (Matthew) and are two of the best kids I know. Very personable, affectionate, and active in their church. We all went bowling on New Year's Eve, including Tracy's mom and a sister I hadn't seen in about 24 years.

I had warned Matthew that I'm terrible at bowling. I bowled a 69, a 70, and a 67. I hadn't bowled in years and had forgotten how much fun it is. Tracy asked me, "Is this redneck enough for you, Floozie?" (Old nicknames: Susie Floozie and Spacey Tracy.) She does live in a very redneck area - it's a mountainous area of southwestern Virginia called New Castle. Population: 172 people. Percentage of white non-Hispanics: 100%.

You see a lot of confederate flags in that area of the country. Most people own a truck (for deer-hunting) and have a gun case in their homes. Heck, even Tracy has a refrigerator on her back deck. (When her husband put that out there a few years ago for his beer and deer meat, Tracy just rolled her eyes. I told her then that she had officially become a redneck.) She's gotten used to it now.

The stories she tells me are great. We were in the car on the curvy, hilly road when Tracy was telling me about one old local guy who'd had so many DUI's that his license had been permanently revoked. So he rides into town on his riding mower, complete with rebel flag flying. We laughed hard about that one.

Back to the city for me! Happy New Year, all!

It Ain't Rockefeller Plaza

Sunday, December 21, 2008

I was getting a bit stir crazy, so today (when the sun finally came out after several dreary days), I took the Metro into D.C. The Yellow train dropped me off at Chinatown, and I walked south and west toward the National Portrait Museum. Unfortunately, it was closed, so I continued on my path toward the National Christmas Tree.

I came across a street fair, which was neat - reminded me of being in NY. So far, nothing else about this city reminds me of NY. The sidewalks are too clean and uncrowded, the buildings are too short, and the subway too timely.

One good thing about the subways here is there is a sign telling you when the next three trains are coming. I like that. In NYC, you never know. You could wait two minutes for a train, or ten times as long if there's a problem along the tracks somewhere. They don't exactly run on any schedule there. And, here they are much easier to navigate. You can learn the D.C. subway system in one day.

Anyway, being unemployed I was unable to buy anything at the street fair. I enjoyed browsing the arts and crafts, though. And listening to the live band, which actually played on tin cans and washboards and such. Then I watched as a tiny dog on a leash barked at the big live snowman on the sidewalk. That was pretty funny.

I continued on to the White House Visitor's Center, which is nothing but a series of photos and text about the White House. They threw in a few pieces of glass-enclosed furniture for effect, I guess. Not too impressive. When I asked the guard where the National Christmas tree is, he nonchalantly replied, "Across the street." Hmmm, "which street?" I'm thinking.

I'd find it on my own, thank you very little.

So I walked outside and turned left up Pennsylvania Avenue, under the assumption that the tree had to be near the White House. I walked a couple blocks until I saw a crowd of people in a circle around a relatively short, plain, barely decorated and unlit tree. It didn't seem very big.

I asked a couple women coming toward me, "Is that the National Christmas tree?" Affirmative, they told me. "Geez, it ain't no Rockefeller Plaza," I said, and they both laughed.

As I got closer I could see there were some train sets on the ground near the tree, and a large Menora several yards beyond. The grounds were sloppy - like this was a carnival. "Boooooring," was all I could think. I was underwhelmed at the lack of thought and creativity that went into the National Christmas Tree display.

I know I sound like a prude but this was the least attractive Christmas tree I'd ever seen. I took a few shots and turned to head home, missing New York terribly. I kept envisioning myself enjoying the ice-skaters at Wollman rink in Central Park or gazing in the brightly decorated holiday store windows on Fifth Avenue. Then I came home and watched an episode of CSI: NY. Only when I heard the opening lyrics to "Teenage Wasteland" did I feel better.

If I can just find a contract job and get through a couple years of school here, I can survive without slitting my wrists. With my graduate degree, I can get back to my favorite city - or at least go visit it anytime I want.

I can't wait for classes to start January 12. This computer forensics program gives me some purpose - some reason for coming all the way back to an area of the country that I escaped from a little over a year ago.

This weekend made an honest effort to get out and enjoy the city. Yesterday I took a pleasant walk through Old Town (despite it being a cold and gray day). I will keep trying to enjoy life outside of New York City (is there such a thing?). . . . I will certainly feel better when classes start (oh, and when I have some money coming in). A job would certainly help things.

Miss Madison's 15 Minutes of Fame

A few months ago in New York I got a letter of congratulations in the mail from Cat Fancy. In the large envelope were two copies of the Cat Fancy 2009 Desk Calendar.

About a year and a half ago I had submitted a photo of my Maine Coon cat, Little Miss Madison, to the magazine. Sure enough, she was selected for the 2009 calendar!

So if you go out and buy a Cat Fancy calendar for next year, be sure to turn to the page for April 7th (which happens to be my nephew Connor's birthday). There she is! My little clown.

I checked in with her new owner, Shannon, in Annapolis shortly afterward, and she was tickled to death to see our little girl's photo in print.

I Am Green

When I told my older brother Dave that I was planning on living in Virginia without a car he said, "That's very green of you." Come to think of it, he's right!

Today I used a Zip Car for the first time. I went online, made a reservation, walked several blocks over to the King Street Metro station, waved my Zip Car membership card over the windshield, and watched the doors magically unlock themselves. When I got in, the key was hanging from the steering wheel, and the tank was full. All for just $10.50 an hour and a nominal membership fee. Gas is free!

I reserved the car for three hours and drove up to my townhouse in Maryland, which was recently abandoned by the current tenants. Funny, they forgot to tell anyone about that. They moved out in October but, fortunately, have continued to pay rent. It needs cleaning, and my landscaping needs some work (the Butterfly Bush has taken over the back yard!) - but, other than that, it looks ok. I hated going back to the old neighborhood with its creepy residents. Fortunately, I didn't see any of my freaky neighbors.

There was just one thing missing from my Zip Car - a GPS navigation system. I didn't have a map either. (I forgot to print one out before leaving for the walk over to pick up the car.) Needless to say, I was in a panic when I got lost on my way back on I-295 South. There's one spot where the sign says you can stay right to go one way on route 50 or stay left to go the other way. I didn't want to go either way - I just wanted to continue south on 295. But the stupid signs only indicate east and west. Naturally, I was in the wrong lane. Things just got worse from there when I doubled back and missed another hidden sign (until it was too late) to get back onto 295. So I took the long way around D.C. on the beltway. I managed to return the car at 3:29PM. One minute later and I might have been subjected to a $50 late fee! When you're unemployed, you'll do anything to avoid spending money uselessly.

It's not easy going car-less in an area like Alexandria, which is a cross between urban and suburban. Hence I chose a home closest to a Metro station. (You pay a premium for that here.) But I'm learning to get around. The thing is, I don't have a choice but to find alternate means of transportation. I think everyone should try going without a car for a few weeks. Well, not everyone - you certainly have to be near a bus line or subway for it to work. But going car-less does force one to be creative about public transportation. It's a lot cheaper than owning a car, too.

Besides, I hate driving. I can't get over how fast people drive around here. It's bad enough being on the road with these a$&holes, but it's not safe for pedestrians either. At least in New York if you get hit by a car it can't be going more than a few miles per hour because of the constant congestion. But here - man! You'd be dead if one of the frequent speeders ran you over.

I'm all done settling in. It took me less than two weeks. My bruises are starting to fade, my back muscles are less sore, and my fingernails should hopefully start growing back soon. It's the usual collateral damage that is the result of a move. I'm still applying for jobs and can't wait to start classes next month.

Happy Holidays, all! (And drive safely.)

Settling In

Moving into a new home is always a challenge - but in addition there are the changes that you have to get used to. Like not having an icemaker. And all of the electrical outlets being installed upside-down. And the ikky water that tastes like aspirin, dries your skin, and makes you turn all pruney in no time. There's also the screaming kid across the hallway that you can hear all day long because of the 1.25-inch gap under your front door that was hung improperly. The noisy family and I may as well be living in the same apartment.

Oh, and then there's the fun of learning the new cable box and menuing system and what the channels are on TV. You have to reprogram all your A/V equipment. I didn't even live in my last apartment long enough to know which channels go to which networks.

The cool thing is the full-size washer and dryer in the bathroom. The bathroom is huge - mostly just wasted space though. In NY, most bathrooms are only big enough for the sink, toilet, and tub. The one I have here is big enough to put down a 5'x7' rug that I had left over - and it doesn't even touch the walls.

Baby has been enjoying exploring the new apartment. She's taken a liking to the bathtub. In our last apartment we had a glass-enclosed stand-up shower. That was no fun. Now we have the shower curtain and liner. I guess it's fun to hide between them. A veritable kitty playground.

Last night Baby was between the curtains and then jumped into the bathtub while it was still wet from my shower. I grabbed her out, dried her feet (against her protests), set her down, and scooted her out of the bathroom. I told her to stay away while it's wet. She immediately turned around, ran to the tub, and jumped back in as fast as she could - like it was a game. I pulled back the curtain and told her to get out. So she jumps out and goes running out of the room. I gave up on trying to keep her little feet dry. Silly kitty.

I think the biggest challenge is learning the public transportation system around here. It's way too complicated compared to NY's MTA. In New York, you use one card and pay one fare for everything -buses and trains. It's simple: swipe and go. Here, they have these paper cards that you buy from a machine. You don't just swipe it as you get on the train, you have to insert it in a machine, retrieve it, and repeat the process when you get off, too - (it's the only way to exist the turnstiles). That's because the fares vary.

And with the buses, there's the DASH, the REX (Metro express), the Fairfax Connector, and the Metro bus. And the fares are different depending on whether you just got off a train or not, whether you are paying cash or not (cash costs more), and other factors (like age). It's too complex for me. What I need to do is buy one of the "SmartTrip" cards and figure out how to use that for getting around. Who knows which systems it'll work on.

I also joined Zip Car. It's a good deal. For an annual $50 fee (plus another $75 for complete comprehensive/collision coverage with $0 deductible), I can reserve and pick up a car any time and just about any place I want. There are plenty of Zip Cars parked nearby. I use my Zip Car card to gain access to the vehicle that I've reserved. The keys are inside. There is a gas card inside. I pay by the hour (around $10 on weekdays and $5 on weekends) or by the day.

So let's see how well this all works out. Yesterday I walked over 5 miles doing my errands. That was too much. The D.C. Metro doesn't have the coverage that the NY MTA has. I'm used to getting around with ease. This will just take some time to figure out. . . .

Record Breaking Unpacking Job

It's Friday night and I can't believe that in less than 4.5 days I've unpacked every single box - of about 85 boxes total. I had to get through it. The sooner I finish, the sooner the move is over. Seeing as moving takes up such a large chunk of my life, and I'm tired of it, I like to get it over quickly.

Although everything is unpacked, it isn't quite all in place yet. A lot of the remaining items are part of the decor. But the bulk of the organizing is done - which is most of the work. I had to hang a shelf in my closet yesterday (after a trip via bus to Home Depot). Otherwise, the closet design left no place to hang slacks, skirts, and dresses - only shirts.

Baby has adapted rather nicely. She loves the carpeted floors here. She's used to wood floors. Here, she thinks the whole apartment is one big cat bed. She plops down just about anywhere and sprawls out like she's the Queen or something.

This building reminds me of living in the Gershwin on W. 50th St. in midtown Manhattan a few years ago. The water tastes like aspirin, the shower pressure is greatly lacking, and the water leaves your skin all pruny and dried out. It must be something added to the water in high rise apartment buildings. I hope I can get used to it again. Thank god for Brita pitchers.

Hopefully by Monday I'll be done with all the major moving work (which started about six weeks ago). See what I mean about this taking up so much of my life? It's no small job to move - and no small expense. I've spent roughly $8,500 on moves in the past year. In my whole adult life I've probably spent a year's salary on moving!

What I need to do is get outdoors. I've been in this apartment non-stop since Monday morning, with the exception of returning the rental car, going to Home Depot yesterday, and buying a sandwich at a cafe across the street tonight. Maybe tomorrow I'll get out again.

Murphy's Laws of Moving

I won't even go into how the superintendent at my building in Brooklyn tried to tell me on Saturday the 29th that there are "no Sunday moves" in our building and that I'd have to reschedule my move that was planned for the next day - a move that I'd scheduled with him two weeks previously.

What a jerk. I sent him a scathing email response, educating him in the facts of coordinating an inter-state move. I told him that he should have given me the information about the no-Sunday rule two weeks earlier - but because he hadn't bothered to respond to his boss's own request to schedule my move, he'd have to make an exception. Not only that, but I'd sent two follow-up emails confirming my move, neither of which he bothered to respond to.

So it didn't matter what he said. My movers were showing up at 9:00AM the next morning, and he wasn't stopping me.

Although I'll miss New York (terribly), and I'll miss my gorgeous apartment and living in Brooklyn Heights, one thing I will not miss is the lousy maintenance staff at 110 Livingston. The apartment was great, but I averaged 1.5 maintenance issues for every month that I lived there. And getting those guys to respond was like pulling teeth. Ask any resident there - it is frustrating for all. I actually went an entire month without hot water in my kitchen. It took weeks to get my oven working after moving in. My A/C went out on a 98-degree day in July.

You get the picture.

Anyway, I awoke to pouring rain and gale force winds on Sunday. My movers arrived early, which is a rarity in New York City. There were five of them. Good. I'd completed all the packing of 80+ boxes prior to their arrival, so all they had to do was wrap my furniture and load the truck. It took them a little over four hours. Afterward, I had to walk to my storage unit (about 7/10 of a mile away) and meet them there.

But when I stepped outside into the cold, windy rain and off the sidewalk into the first big puddle, I realized that it wasn't going to be a fun walk. As my socks got wetter and my feet colder, I realized that I'd packed all my shoes except this one pair of sneakers I was wearing. Oops. At least I could change socks later.

We unloaded my small storage unit pretty quickly - it was about the size of a large walk-in closet (a suburban walk-in, not a New York walk-in). As soon as they were done, I needed to head to Manhattan to pick up my rental car. I wanted to get the car as fast as possible so that I could do most my driving in daylight hours. My eyes are bad enough (post-LASIK disaster), but driving at night produces horrible glares, and the rain would only compound my vision issues.

I debated hailing a cab, but being unemployed, I chose the subway. I finally made it to Cadman Plaza where I scanned my Metro card and trekked all the way to the 4/5 train. I got to the platform, and the MTA had hung yellow tape up indicating that the 4/5 train wasn't running at this station. Argh. Why they can't post signs before you've swiped your card and paid your fare, I'll never understand.

So I got on the 2/3, thinking I'll just have to hoof it from Times Square to the Budget place near Grand Central Terminal. My subway nightmare began when I tried to transfer to the 4/5 at Fulton Street. Guess what - the train wasn't running from there either. After running around trying to find an alternate route, I approached a surly MTA employee who told me to "get on the downtown J train" then transfer to the 4/5 at Chambers.

If I'd been thinking, I'd have realized there is no 4/5 at Chambers. Nonetheless, I ran around for a good 20 minutes (in circles), trying to find the nonexistent J train. I tried twice to get a woman in an MTA booth to help me, but she was more sullen than the first. Several other people were running around with me trying to get on the right train. It was painful.

I finally said "Screw it," and got back on the 2/3. Thirty minutes wasted. I should have been at the Budget place no later than 2:00, but after all the rotten subway problems, it was 3:00 when I finally showed up.

But despite all of that, and an equally ugly MTA employee on the 2/3 train, I enjoyed the rest of my subway trip after a young fellow carrying a full-sized Christmas tree got on the train with me. He had everyone's attention. He was a cute young guy (early 20's) who not only had this huge, heavy tree, but was also carrying a big plastic garbage bag containing the tree stand and some garland!

I said, "Now that's a first - I've never seen a Christmas tree on a train before," and the rest of the passengers at our end of the car agreed. The subway was crowded, and this guy was somehow holding up this heavy tree horizontally for the entire train ride. A couple of us commented that his girlfriend had better appreciate it! Apparently she didn't think he could do it. He was bound and determined to get that tree home.

Turns out he needed to get to Grand Central, too. He planned to take the shuttle from Times Square. Hmmm. All the time I've lived in NY I never used that shuttle. Good idea! So I told him I'd go with him and help him. I carried the bag while he hauled the tree through the crowded underground passages of the 42nd Street station. Every once in a while he had to stop and rest. I kept offering to help carry the tree, but he was bent set on doing it himself!

Funny, an older couple came by and told me I wasn't holding up my end of the work load! I said, "I tried but he wouldn't listen." They obviously thought we must be a couple - so I explained, "I don't even know this guy - we just met on the train!" It was a hoot. So anyway, I took his picture with my phone and he had me take his picture with his Blackberry.

Anyway, I walked with him all the way to the 6 train at Grand Central and we parted ways there with happy holiday wishes. That was fun! I'm going to miss New York for that very reason - all the wonderful strangers that I get to meet every day there.

From there I walked in the rain and puddles to pick up my rental car, then drove home to Brooklyn in my nice silver Ford Escape to load up the car, pick up Baby, and head south. If I could get out of the city around 4pm, I'd be in Virginia by 9:00 that night.

Ha. Apparently I didn't learn my lesson in July 2006 about traveling on I-95 during a holiday weekend. You just don't do it. Ever. I didn't even realize until well into my trip that it was Thanksgiving weekend, hence the bumper-to-bumper traffic. It took me 2.5 hours to go the first 75 miles. I kept thinking it would clear up, but it was like that all the way to Baltimore, with traffic getting worse at each of many toll booths along the way. It was stop and go for at least 10 miles before each booth, thanks to the thousands of people who think that paying cash at a toll booth is a good idea.

EZ-Pass is the way to go - you just drive through. But 90% of the traffic was going through the cash booths. With today's advances in technology, there's no excuse for lines at toll booths.

I was on I-295 in D.C. with just 16 miles to go when the rain came down so hard that I couldn't even see the road. Just as I'd been given the opportunity to drive the speed limit, I was forced to slow down to a crawl. Finally, the traffic had lightened up. I should have flown the rest of the way to my motel - but no-o-o-o-o-o. It's my usual Murphy's Law luck.

We finally got to Alexandria a full 7.5 hours after leaving New York for the 240-mile drive. It was late, I was exhausted, and my stupid card key wouldn't open up my motel door. Aaagh! I just wanted to get some sleep, and Baby just wanted out of her carrier.

Here I'd said to her, "Now if Martin can go a full nine hours in this bag flying across country, you can do four or five hours." But that was when I'd thought we'd do the trip in normal time. Geez, I lied to my own cat!

She was not happy in that bag. She's no Martin, that's for sure. Moving freaks her out until she sees our familiar furniture again. Martin was so laid back, he didn't care.

Naturally I couldn't sleep in the motel. I can never sleep with so much going on - especially during a move. I had to get up after just a few hours' sleep to meet with my new landlord to do a walk-through of my apartment. After that, I unloaded the car and waited for the movers, who were over an hour late. We had to rush finishing the job. The four of us managed to do the whole unloading in just three hours.

I drove to Reagan airport to return the car. When I was waiting for the Metro train on the platform, I called my dad to let him know I'd completely my move safely. I said, "Hi Daddy, I'm in Alexandria." His response, "What are you doing there?" is just another indicator that I move so often that my own parents can't keep up with me!

Sleep. . . . I need sleep. Bye.