Big Things Are Still Happening

A few weeks back, I wrote about some stormy changes that were really rocking my boat. The storm front passed, but the waters are still choppy. Departing from my normal topics again, allow me to journal the latest.

My Day Job

One month ago, my whole company was furloughed. But at the time of my last post on this topic, I had just been hired by the new company that is buying my former employer. Due to extenuating circumstances, things just weren’t going smoothly. Long story short, when my previous company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, it ended up as Chapter 7 instead. In the past week alone, I brought a couple things back into the office to work but then had to retreat once more. Now we’re told we can’t enter the building for an undetermined time frame. Meanwhile, we can work from home, assuming we don’t lost access to the servers. So, yeah, things are still in flux. The good news is two-fold: at least I’m gainfully employed, and I already received my first paycheck after several weeks of zero income. Hoo-ray!

School

Meanwhile, I continue to press forward with my new Real Estate licensing online courses. This is a substantial task that I committed to the day before I was furloughed. If nothing else, it’s so I have some kind of back-up plan in case my job goes south again. Besides requiring time and self-discipline, these courses drain my mental energies since I must focus diligently to absorb loads of detailed Real Estate information. I actually must comprehend and retain it all, go figure. Here’s the bright side: I’m 94% through the first course. The exam is around the corner. Wish me luck!

My Night Job

Now we come to one of the cool things happening. I previously mentioned that I was hired to write for an online publication. So without further ado, let me announce: I’m an Editorialist for RPGamer.com. So far, I’ve written only two pieces for the site. You can check them out here. In case you don’t know, the site is about role-playing video games (e.g. Final Fantasy). If you follow my blog, then you’ve probably noticed that I like video games, especially JRPGs. Put that together with my fondness for writing and — voila— you’ve magically alchemized my passions. Although I’ve started as an Editorialist, I may branch out to adjacent forms of wordsmithing. My time with RPGamer is not just to write; I also proof edit other writers’ articles. It takes self-motivation and discipline, and I’m still trying to gauge how to balance my time amongst all my tasks. But I think things will settle out soon enough.

Given that I now type words for a large publication, in addition to my other exploits, it’s no wonder that my personal blog time has suffered somewhat. But don’t fear. I plan to keep this thing going on some level. So that’s what has been going on with me lately. It’s been a bumpy roller-coaster of work, stopping and starting; I think I almost vomited once. But at least I can say I survived it. Well, so far.