The Truth Hurts

The best and worst jobs I've ever had are one and the same. It was the best job for me when I started, but it has become a dead end, allowing me no options other than finding a new job. I am fond of saying "All good things come to an end," and the good times ended for me a long time ago at my job. I am constanly looking forward to the day I can do something else.
When I started my job ten years ago, I was also starting to dig myself out of the hole my life had become. At the time I had been drinking every night for at least five years and I couldn't do anything without getting high. Those were just the drugs I needed to function on a daily basis, but I eagerly ingested anything I could get a hold of. I was living to destroy myself and my new job gave me the chance to do it legally. I could work as many hours as I wanted and I needed that money to pay off a $17,000 debt I had built up with my latest adventures as an outlaw.
Neither my criminal record nor my slum work attire mattered at my job, only my willingness to work as many hours as possible. At my job having a D.U.I. is almost a right of passage. The owner had one dropped to reckless and the vice president has three; both drink a twelve pack a night. Three other people at my job each have a D.U.I. and I have two, all of us used any excuse we could get to drink. As soon as I paid my debt off I went right back to investing in getting the best buzz possible. It didn't matter if the boss showed up on the jobsite and I was drunk from the night before and passed out in a bathtub. The work van was there with the material and I had showed the guys what to do before I went back to sleep, the job was getting done.
I think getting my D.U.I.'s might have been the best thing possible for me. I knew something was wrong with the way I was living, I wasn't happy. I just didn't know how much was wrong or how much I would have to go through to get it right. I'm the only person I know with a D.U.I. who actually went to A.A. and the whole time all I could think was I was never as fucked up as any of these people. I was just as fucked up as they were, just in a different way. I couldn't see the buzz was the only thing important to any of us. I finally figured out that all the things I had been putting off, saying that I was young and had my whole life ahead of me; I was never going to get around to doing. I had been drinking for nearly twenty years and I started to see how much I had given up or pushed aside just so I could get drunk. That was only the begining though, as soon as I stopped catching a buzz constantly, I realized that I was never going to be able to afford to buy a house or retire at my job. I realized that I had gone as far as I could get at my job seven or eight years ago and all I was doing was holding myself back from succeeding in life. My job was perfect for me when catching a buzz was the only thing important to me, but as soon as I wanted to do bigger and better things, I knew that would never happen as long as I was letting myself be held back. My job was constantly changing, I always needed to reevaluate how we were preparing for the job. Another one of my quips I was fond of saying was "Evolve or die," meaning change with the growing expectations of the job or get left behind.
I now know I have out grown my job, it was perfect for me when having a good time was the only thing that mattered, but now I need more in my life. It was the best posssible job for me at the time, because I could never have made it a job where I was expected to be a responsible adult at all times, where there was a possibility of a brighter future. I have now grown to the point where I can work a job that demands I be a normal, functioning and responsible adult. Now for the first time in my life I'm fighting for something other than destruction; I'm fighting for life.

Take Nothing For Granted-Paul's Critique

Paul is a great guy. I've had far worse teachers in my many years of college. He makes the class fun; I didn't fall asleep even once in class. He on the other hand does try to relate EVERYTHING to Bruce Springsteen. I didn't think the class itself was hard, I actually wrote most of the assignments in like ten minutes and only used the Little Brown Book for reference. I never even opened the other book.

There are a few problems I had with the class. The first one is of course simply my own fault. Paul wants everyone to be very comfortable and at ease with technology, so there is a lot of computer use. I am far better acquainted with the computer than I was when I started the class and will not forget what I've learned anytime soon, since I had to do it all on my own. I personally feel that the course was a little too centered on the computer for a writing class but I won't lie, I'm better off than I was before the class.

I personally am a conservationist, so I had a big problem with his methods for homework and studying outside of class. There is a lot of material the student is required to print up off the computer that is never even looked at in class, probably close to half the at home studying. I don't have a problem with the material, but if I'm supplying the paper I only want to print up what I'm actually going to need in class and I'd rather just read the rest of the material. That also in itself is a problem because we have a class outline, we are supposed to be discussing this material and we aren't, so who really has a good idea of what's really important to study. Then my class had two unforseeable missed classes and who knows what is actually viable according to the outline. It doesn't help that the outline changes two or three times throughout the semester. Coming into the last month of the semester I felt like we hadn't even discussed the argument essay, which is the big enchilada for the class. My class only had one fifteen minute piece of class on the presentation part, and it's all on Power Point, which I've never seen before Paul pulls it up on the computer. I talked to a few people from the class towards the end of the semester; they had no idea what was going on with the argument paper. I guess I'm just lucky I feel like I've never had a problem with writing.

Lastly, when the rhetorical essay's come back from being graded all of a sudden Paul's hot and heavy on any mistakes on the papers. I don't know about anyone else but the problems Paul had with my paper, no one said anything about in my peer review. I don't know if anyone else had this problem or not, but if I've been writing a certain way throughout the semster and I'm comfortable with it, when everything changes three quarters of the way through the semester, that just throws me completely off. I understand easing into a certain way of writing, but it was like going from fifty miles an hour to a dead stop. Why not say something about making these mistakes three papers ago?

All in all Paul's a great guy, a great teacher and I would definitely take another course from him. I just hope he's fine tuned his teaching style a little bit more before then. I felt like the guinea pig that A.L.F. couldn't rescue.

Diagnostic Essay: All Good Things Come To An End

The best and worst jobs I've ever had are one and the same. It was the best job for me at the time when I started and now it has become the worst job for me. I constantly look forward to the day when I can do something else.

When I started my job eleven years ago, I had just been arrested for a possession with the intent to distribute and was consuming large amounts of drugs and alcohol on a daily basis. The first year I worked like a dog, as many hours as I could get and managed to repay seventeen thousand dollars of debt. The second year I still worked like a dog, but had no debt so I settled right back into the lifestyle I had lived in years past. I was buying clothes and shoes I had no need for, smoking pot all day, drinking all night and ingesting anything I could get a hold of. I was working solely to get a buzz and look cute.

One of my personal motto's that I've picked up at work is "Evolve or die". I was constantly changing with the demands of my job, trying to ensure my job security. Unfortunately around the same time I figured out I was making about half of what I was making a few years before, I realized other problems with my job. I have medical, IRA and free dental at my job and was overjoyed with this from the begining. The problem is I realized I would never be able to retire with my IRA and I would never be able to afford a house on my salary. There are many other problems I have with my job that have caused me to no longer enjoy it, but those are company problems and things I cannot change. I can change my job if I work hard enough. Another creed I'm fond of is " All good things come to an end".