Another Blog Worth Checking Out

I'd like to share the link to a blog of a woman with Asperger's in recovery:

Autistic Sober Connection

My plan to is have a bunch of links to other people's blogs on mine.

Aftermath of A Highly Physical Fortnight

Well, today I spent three hours helping to rebuild a house in Union Beach severly damaged ny Hurricane Sandy. I, along with about ten other members of a Jewish federation, stripped the aluminum siding and walls so the house can be ready for rebuild with the help a a FEMA grant. That came one day after two friends and I packed up my furniture and donated it to Goodwill. It turned out that one location took half and another took the other half.

Now it's time to straighten out my unemployment benefit delays, send out more cover letters and resumes, and make more connections. I so want to go on an interview and tell people what I've done, what I've been doing, and what my new goals are.

Things I've Learned Over The Past Few Months

Things I've learned the hard way:

1. If you are moving and want to donate your furniture, make the call for scheduling a pickup two months before moving day, so the pickup occurs just as you're ready to move. Places like the Salvation Army are booked a month out with pickups.
2. Locking your bedroom door from the inside may have its advantages, but only if you make a habit of making sure that when you close the door from the outside, the doorknob button isn't pushed in, or you'll be locked out of your own bedroom.

Things I've learned the easy way, mainly by being open-minded:

1. Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, as described by a friend, sounds like a sci-fi retelling of the founding of America, with its controversies between libertarianism and authoritarianism.
2. Both Dominican nuns and former models share my interest in permaculture.

An Open Letter To Chuck Klosterman

Dear Chuck,

I am a big fan of your writings. I've practically memorized the essays in Sex, Drugs, & Cocoa Puffs and Eating the Dinosaur. They contain the kind of insight I sometimes have in conversations, but never have had the discipline to write them down. The way you deconstruct cereal commercials, rock tribute bands and teen sitcoms, I say to myself, Damn, he can put into words what I only vaguely sense.

So I've decided to give myself an exercise. Next month I will purchase a copy of your upcoming collection of essays, I Wear The Black Hat. Each week I will ready one essay and write a response letter to you for that essay. Your theme is villainy in fiction and real life, and how you've become fascinated by it. So I will look at the book from the opposite perspective. As my college technical writing (1) instructor taught us, it's not what's written that makes a point, it's what's not written.

I welcome you to view my blog answering your book. On August 1, get ready for the first entry in "Letters To A Pop Culture Columnist." (2)

http://letterstochuck.blogspot.com/

Sincerely,

Dan Wohl

(1) I majored in industrial engineering at Rutgers. See, I got the footnote thing down, too.

(2) I don't like to use words like "pundit" or "guru" when referring to you, since you provide more interesting answers then questions.

Reaching Out

One of the bad habits I've developed over my life is keeping things bottled up inside of me. Recently, however, I've been making an effort to share more. Here are some examples:

1. When cleaning out my apartment seemed like a grueling, daunting, overwhelming task, I reached out to my fraternity brothers. I posted on our Facebook group pictures of the pieces of furniture up for sale, and said that anyone who helped me move, I'd compensate.
2. When I felt tensions building up between my mother and I, I called a friend, told him how I felt, and told him I did so because I am willing to do whatever it takes to avoid another physical or mental relapse, meltdown, or breakdown.
3. With this interview, I reached out to a Rutgers classmate and current LinkedIn connection about his take on the company. His company is a customer of my interviewers.
4. When a Facebook friend said she was looking for a Napa wine recommendation, I commented that I know someone who runs a Napa vineyard, and I would share his FB page with her.

Not all of my reaching out efforts will produce desired results. But I am slowly moving towards a more open approach to life. For that, I believe that I deserve to be commended.

Interview

I got an interview with a company which, ironically, is in the same town that I just moved out of. I've inerviewed there before, and remain interested in working there. It will simply require me to drive from Central to North Jersey for work, and a thing I haven't done in years.

Another book I've been reading is Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman. Much of it discusses how our amygdalas hijack our frontal lobes, leading us to act in ways which may have been appropriate in dealing with sabre-toothed tigers millenia ago, but not appropriate in dealing with late customer orders or supplier deliveries today.

Class Review

My first day of the course went well. It was six hours, and the course will be sixty-three hours in all. My next session is Wednesday, and it will probably span five or six weeks. I have to read the next few chapters in the book before then.

Part of my search for meaning has to do with this course. If I'm going to work in manufacturing, I want to learn how to do my job better all the time, and be able to add value to the company. Sometime meaning can simply be found in doing a job the best way it can be done.