Unemployment Training

“You have been selected to attend this reemployment orientation session because you have been receiving unemployment insurance benefits for at least a month now, which means you are doing something wrong.”

This was the warm welcome I and 39 other unemployed individuals received from our orientation facilitator the morning of Sept. 27, yet his rehearsed delivery made it clear many other unfortunate souls have received the same greeting. You see, I was mandated by the Arizona Department of Economic Security to devote one to three hours of my Monday for a training session “which will provide you with comprehensive information about reemployment services available to you.”

The notion that in this job market and national economy, which has Arizona at an unemployment rate of ten percent, one month of unemployment would certainly be our fault. None the less, I was called to serve and so I did mainly because if I elected not to my unemployment insurance benefits would be discontinued.

Yes, it is very important that I use this time to have a greater understanding of what the State of Arizona offers to assist me in finding work instead of, oh…I don’t know…actually look for work. According to my summons, DES records identified me as being one who could benefit from these services. Services such as Basic Computer Classes, Resume Writing Lab, Networking, and “Boomers & Beyond”.

I was greeted by the lovely gentleman who would turn out to be my session facilitator with a thundering, “May I help you?”

This guy was in his late-20’s/early 30’s, dressed in slacks and a button down straight from Kohls, sleeves rolled up, his belly filling the shirt enough to see he didn’t exercise but wasn’t really fat. And clearly he had all the answers. When he was not welcoming all of his guests/hostages, he was discussing at full volume the experience of consuming raw pumpkin with a fellow front desk receptionist about.

“I have an appointment,” I replied.

“With who?”

Dude had me with that question. I pulled my referral form out to see if there was a name. There wasn’t.

“I have no idea.”

“Fill out these two pages and hand them back.”

Seriously. That was the exchange. This guy knew what the drill was and obviously was anticipating forty-plus people to arrive between 9:30 and 9:45. One would think he could lead with “Are you here for the orientation?”, but no. He had the job and clearly liked being the big man in a room full of people battling confidence issues in some manner.

So, I sat down and quickly completed the “two pages” he handed me, mostly questions I have already answered multiple times in the last six weeks as part of my filing for unemployment. I got up to hand my forms in when a gentleman directly in front of me was shouted down by our host for not filling out the back side of the second form. I wanted to correct the guy by letting him know that there are actually three pages, not two, but I didn’t want Time Out in Unemployment School before it even got started.

The general session ran about 45 minutes and included a 20 minute presentation from a gentleman handling Veterans employment assistance. We had two Vets in our group. Two out of 40. Sure glad we all got to get the rundown of benefits that only 5% of the room could qualify for. We were also told great pearls of wisdom such as “You must have a resume to find a job in today’s job market” and “You have to know how to use a computer and the internet to look for the jobs.” At this point, I was wondering aloud, “What freaking record does the Arizona DES have that would indicate this session would benefit me?!?”

We were then shuffled into a computer lab-type room where would log into our Arizona Workforce Connection profile, update our information and create a virtual resume. My profile was filled with my information from my last period of unemployment – 2001.

This lab room was cold. I mean, the state could easily being going bankrupt simply from refrigerating this space. I swear each computer terminal had its own 15 SEER, 4 ton air conditioning unit (I know these unit specs only because we were the recipients of a new unit for our home this past week). It was cold.

By groups of four or five, people were called to have their one-on-one interviews with their Reemployment Counselors. I was the second to the last called. During this time, I was encouraged to check the super-duper, double-secret, unavailable-anywhere-else job bank that does an exact match of skills to my resume. I got one match: the Director of Sales and Marketing for the Arizona Grand Resort. Keep in mind this is a job for which I have zero experience in either sales or marketing. Good match.

Once called, a kind gentleman took me back to his cubicle where he introduced me to another lady and announced, “We’re training.” I had no idea who was training whom here, but two hours of my morning were now shot, so what the heck. It quickly became apparent that the lady in the chair operating the computer was the trainee and I was picking up the process of virtually establishing my profile at a rate vastly superior to her. Perhaps she could benefit from one of the Basic Computer Classes.

She asked for my resume and the man asked what kind of work I’m looking for.

“I’m looking to continue the community-based project management type of work that I was doing while at ASU,” I said.

The lady looked blankly at her trainer and asked, “How do I enter that?”

Oh boy.

The man then asked me if I had any interest in any of the Employment Center’s classes, juggling some M&Ms as he spoke. I did my best to suppress a response of “Are you kidding???” and just smiled and said “No thanks.”

“So, should I enter ‘Not interested’ here?”

“Ummm…no,” he said to his trainee. He then looked at me and said, “You’ll be quick.”

Thirty minutes later, I was out the door, defrosting and satisfied that my benefits were intact.

And the moral of this story…I directly encountered at least seven people during this experience who all had jobs and over the course of three hours they went from telling me I was handling my unemployment improperly to there was nothing they could do for me. It was a productive morning.

The Training Log

This past week was not the most productive in terms of number of rides, but the quality was tremendous. I did spend the morning of Sept. 25 digging trenches for the kids’ school’s garden, but I have no stats for that.

• Wednesday, Sept. 22 – Hard, long ride from Cactus/92^nd St. to Bartlett Lake and back. This is a training route that Lance Armstrong and the Postal Service Pro Cycling team used to do. Good climbs out from the lake and a stiff headwind on the return trip. 76 miles, 4 hrs 39 mins, 4171 Kcalories, 149 Avg HR, Avg Speed 16.2, Avg Cadence 85.
• Sunday, Sept. 26 – A lovely ride to Le Grande Orange with my wife as Nana had the kids for a sleepover. Very low intensity for me, but hard on Vicki. 30 miles, 2 hrs 27 mins, 775 Kcalories, Avg HR 90, Avg Speed 12.1, Avg Cadence 62.

Anniversary Gift from an Unemployed Husband

I cleaned, too.

Happy anniversary Vicki.

Getting to Know Your Lawn Ornaments and Other Happenings

Do you know anything about the person whose name is on the sign in your yard?

It has now been four months since I last put in an honest day’s work and was compensated with money. While in all real terms that is a very short period, it has at times felt interminable. Quite often I just look out there and wonder what could possibly come along and how long it will be before I apply to man the French fry press at In and Out. Given the rising tension around the old homestead, this may need to happen sooner than later.

There are no two ways about it, being unemployed sucks. But not having to report in to an employer on a daily basis does have a few advantages. For instance, this week my mother treated me to a visit to the Phoenix Art Museum where we took in the Cezanne exhibit and grabbed some lunch. It also allows me some amount of freedom to get out for a ride or run with minimal residential traffic to worry about.

As with the rest of the nation, Arizona is in the throes of mid-term election season. As I ride around town, it’s impossible not to notice the street corners stacked with billboards advertising each of the candidates, getting plastic recyclers giddy for their upcoming bounty of materials to process. I’m always amused by this mountain of red, white and blue (along with the occasional orange or green) signage that I have to believe most people just ignore and pass by, paying more attention to those sign spinners trying to get you to sell your gold.

For some reason though, signs in people’s yards are a little more noticeable simply because that homeowner/renter made a conscious decision to place it there. They have elected to support this candidate so openly that they’ll interrupt their line of lantana to encourage their neighbors to vote for whomever. And I’m one of these people.

Without question, this has been a contentious political season, and anyone who has paid any amount of attention to my Facebook page knows what end of the political spectrum I fall on. But I am still amazed that people are willing to openly support certain candidates with a sign in their yard. I understand that conservatives are angry and “want their nation back,” but there is no way that they can be truly informed about some of these people they are advertising for unless the decide to endorse these candidates purely for the fact that they just aren't a damned liberal. For example:

• Tom Horne, candidate for Arizona Attorney General. A career politician, last holding the job of Superintendent of Public Instruction after his stint on the State Legislature, who proudly “banned bi-lingual education” and oversaw Arizona’s education while its ranking sank to anywhere between 45^th and last in the nation. Now he’s running to be the top lawyer in the state, never mind the fact that he has a lifetime ban from the Securities and Exchange Commission for presiding over an investment firm that went bankrupt in 1970.
• Ben Quayle, candidate for US Congress, Arizona CD 3. The conservative son of former Vice President Dan Quayle, little is known about this guy except: he’s a private practice attorney specializing in commercial litigation, real estate transactions and acquiring small businesses; he posted to a sleazy nightlife website and denied it; he and his wife own a dog they rescued from the Wickenburg Humane Society. Oh, and he hates President Obama so much he’s willing to stand up about it.
• Wendy Rogers, candidate for Arizona State Senate, District 17. Mrs. Rogers is hands down winning the Most Signs contest by a country mile. According to her site’s bio, she and her husband landed in Arizona in 1996 and own a home inspection franchise that employs 10. She is riding her bike around Tempe and Scottsdale meeting people, so I guess she can’t be that bad. But she recently did ditch a District 17 debate, which is too bad as it would have given us a chance to get to know her.
• John Huppenthal, candidate for Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction. Mr. Huppenthal made news in 2008 by getting into a flap for removing opposition signs on Election Day. More remarkably, this past spring he completely disrespected a high school journalist who was interviewing him about his vote of support to cut state funding for vocational education by excusing himself mid-interview and never returning. He also had a fairly weak showing at this week’s debate, constantly wanting to fix the Arizona educational system by “using good science” to evaluate the educational rankings that place Arizona last in the nation.
• David Schweikert, candidate for US Congress, Arizona CD5. Schweikert lost to the sitting incumbent two years ago, so he’s giving it another try. It’s kind of amazing that this Republican-heavy district can’t back a stronger candidate that this guy who was cited in an internal audit of the Maricopa County Treasurer’s Office when he was County Treasurer, that stated his office improperly obtained vendor bids and improperly paid one of his campaign aides with County funds.

 

Spinning up The Program

As I mentioned in a previous post, I am worked on starting up a bike youth-based bike program here in the Valley. This past Wednesday, I coordinated a meeting with the Principal of my kids’ school, their PE teacher, and two representatives from Phoenix Children’s Hospital to launch one of these programs at their school. By all accounts it was a successful meeting and Principal McCoy assured me that she would be contacting the school district’s director of safety to see if my proposal meets all district safety standards and what would be needed to implement the program immediately. This coincides with my submitting for a $1000 grant for the program through the National PTA. Not much money, but it would get things rolling solidly. I’ve simultaneously been talking with the executive director of the Lincoln Family Downtown Phoenix YMCA about starting a similar, if not connected, program.

So now I wait to hear back from Principal McCoy and the good folks at the Downtown Y in hopes that we’ll be able to get these bike programs started up and kids terrorizing neighborhoods by mid-October.

Sowing the seeds...

I am also working on the school’s garden project. This is a really ambitious project with a cool design that will fill a nice open space next to the school library in the east end of the school yard. The project’s leader, artist Rebecca Ross, led the initial charge with the school’s PTA to gather support for the plan and spent a portion of the summer collecting a ton of donated recycled building materials to construct the garden beds. I came in mid-summer and helped bring in another parent with great contacts throughout the landscaping industry who has essentially delivered landscapers and materials to get the irrigation system in place. We’re digging dirt next Saturday, Sept. 25, to lay the PVC and sprinkler heads in place. Another small but important local project underway.

And now for something completely not important…

I know you all have been waiting anxiously for it…here it is…the training log!

• Thursday, Sept. 9 – Hard ride to Camelback Mtn to ride the South Camelback 4, four short but steep climbs on the south side of Camelback Moutnain, with grades in excess of 20%. Weather was hot. 30 miles, 1hr 44 min, 1589 Kcalories, Avg HR 151, Avg Speed 17, Avg Cadence 84.
  
• Saturday, Sept. 11 – Long ride to Riata Pass in North Scottsdale. Steady incline with final altitude gain of 1800 feet. Quick climb on Mummy Mtn on return trip. 80 miles, 4 hrs 26 mins, 4127 Kcalories, Avg HR 152, Avg Speed 17.5, Avg Cadence 89.
  
• Tuesday, Sept. 14 – Ahwatukee foothills ride. 36 miles, 2 hrs, 1878 Kcalories, Avg HR 153, Avg Speed 17.9, Avg Cadence 89.
  
• Thursday, Sept. 16 – 30 minute yoga and light free weights followed by a 2.75 mile run. First run since the spring. Had to walk for a minute after 2 miles. Legs felt tight for four days after.
  
• Friday, Sept. 17 – Slow, hard ride up 2 climbs of S. Camelback 4 + the PV Classics loop, an undulating route through Paradise Valley around the north side of Mummy Mtn. It resembles a European Classics route with the short, sharp hills. 43 miles, 2 hrs 51 mins, 2209 Kcalories, Avg HR 137, Avg Speed 14.8, Avg. Cadence 74.
  
• Sunday, Sept. 19 – Long ride to South Mtn with climb up to TV towers and along San Juan Rd. with Chris Bockey and Wyatt Franz. Rode with Wyatt to his house and then home with headwind. 71 Miles, 4 hrs 15 mins, 3669 Kcalories, Avg HR 146, Avg Speed 16.6, Avg Cadence 84. Time from old gatehouse to TV towers and back was 48 mins 56 secs with avg HR of 162.
  
  

Getting to Know Your Lawn Ornaments and Other Happenings

What Happened to the Melting Pot?

September 11 is a sad date for Americans. Americans don’t like sad dates. This is a country that likes to celebrate greatness, success, achievement – anything that can typically be tied to an excuse to consume alcohol. Look at Memorial Day. This is a national holiday intended to remember our fallen heroes who gave their lives in defense of our country and its ideals. Today, it seems like it’s more of a marker for the beginning of summer and the first wave of big mega blockbuster movies.

My previous bout of unemployment began September 8, 2001. I was working for a dotcom that was well intentioned but spent way too much money on a poorly conceived infrastructure to provide a service that You Tube and Vimeo essentially offer for free. But on the plus side, I was being paid ridiculously because of the monopoly money that all dotcoms were playing with that came from angel investors who thought they were buying in on the next AOL. On the plus-plus side, I had a supervisor who was looking out for me and set me up with a severance package that quite frankly would not have happened had I been let go four days later. One of the home offices was three blocks from the World Trade Center.

I’ll never forget that morning. Lucas was a mere five months old and we were thriving in our new father-son bond thrust upon us by my wife’s need to increase the amount of shifts she worked as an RN to cover my lack of income. We were up around 6:30, I defrosted a bag of frozen breast milk, and we situated ourselves on the couch to scan for something to watch on the old hypnotizer box. I got to the Today Show and caught Matt Lauer saying something about a small plane hitting one of the towers. I watched to get more info and while he was blathering about some incorrect detail, clearly not paying attention to what was on the studio monitors, I saw the second plane come in from the right of the TV screen and plow directly into the second tower. Along with the rest of the nation, I was in shock over what I saw. How could this be happening? There is no way this could possibly be real. Yet it was. The third plane then hit the Pentagon (the fourth plane going down in Pennsylvania hadn’t quite been verified yet), and I called my mom, pronouncing, “We are under attack!”

Here we are, nine years later, and on this day that we should be in solemn remembrance of the events of that day, the lives lost, and the effects it had on our society – that our sense of freedom and security was rocked to its core – headlines and people’s attentions are dedicated to protests and potential acts of intolerance and ignorance. I can say with absolute certainty and conviction: This is completely wrong.

The devastation of September 11, 2001, was caused by a small group of evil, fear-mongering, misguided, desperate fanatics who represented a slightly larger network of like-minded people scattered across the Middle East. We were not attacked by Islam that day. Heck, I don’t even believe that we were attacked by true Muslims that day. That attack falls into the same category as the Nazi’s containment and persecution of Jews, Idi Amin’s execution of his political dissenters, the Janjaweed Militia’s hunt of non-Arab citizens in Darfur, Timothy McVeigh and his militia’s bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City, and the many, many violent acts of the Ku Klux Klan over the past 150 years.

So, while it is important to remember all those who tragically died nine years ago, I think it is more important to remember what it is about America that threatened these people so terribly that they conducted this mass execution: our freedom to express ourselves openly and our diverse citizenry.

The United States of America used to proudly describe itself as a melting pot. The Statue of Liberty and Golden Gate Bridge used to be recognized as shining monuments that welcomed those who were either cast off from their homes or looking for a better life here. You never hear that expression any more, "melting pot." It seems like Americans no longer want to embrace that this is a country built on many cultures and heritages. And a lot of people sure have forgotten the first and fourteenth amendments of the United States Constitution.

So, while I do believe that September 11 should always be a somber (and sober) day of remembrance for Americans, I also feel that the sensibility of the day needs to be altered. First, September 11 needs to become a national holiday. I know it throws all sorts of labor issues out of whack by adding another paid holiday, but this is a national date of significance that should always be properly recognized and honored. Second, I think that September 11 needs to be a day where we re-embrace the melting pot ideal and have it be a true day of multiculturalism. Let’s celebrate who we are and where we come from and recognize our differences while also commemorating our commonality as Americans. It’s the very least we can do to truly honor those who perished nine years ago.

The United States of America is a melting pot. We are different. That’s what we always need to remember.

Rubber Side Down

One of the dangers of being unemployed is that you sometimes get high aspirations that are quickly dashed for any number of reasons – unrealistic expectations, bad timing, unfulfilled effort required to get the desired outcome – and you end up feeling a lot like this guy…

While we can’t all be the great Jens Voigt, we can ask “What would Jens do?” (the true meaning of WWJD)  when we come to our own personal challenges.

For, me, I needed to find some outlet for me to focus my energies toward so I wouldn’t become obsessed with why I wasn’t getting X job or being called for Y interview. That thinking can become a horrific bottomless pit that is sometimes very difficult to climb back out of.

Last summer, my son Lucas began expressing a little more interest in riding his bike. At least I think he was. It’s highly possible I was just projecting this upon him, but he seems to really enjoy riding his bike and rarely fights too hard when I suggest we got for a spin. So I began looking for additional avenues for him to enjoy the beautiful sport of velo.

Well, needless to say I was just a slight bit surprised to find that there is little to no youth cycling organizations across the Valley. Tucson has a really good one. Heck, Colorado has a high school mountain biking league! But here in the Valley, the 15th best bike city in the US, there’s nothing of any real organization or scale.

So I began thinking of how I could create a youth cycling club or program for Lucas and other kids to get exposure to cycling and really enjoy this great activity. This coincided with the incredibly wise passage of Arizona law known worldwide as SB 1070, and I began to take greater notice of the neighborhoods I would pass through on my own rides around town. I regularly pass through heavily Hispanic areas like Guadalupe, South Phoenix, Mesa and Laveen, and I began wondering if the kids in these neighborhoods travel much beyond their own blocks. I also knew that Lucas and most of his friends have little to no experience in these income challenged yet culturally rich communities. Hmmm.

So this is how I decided to put together what I am calling Nuestro Velo Club, an organization devoted to getting kids on bikes and exposing them to the greatness of cycling fitness, safety, and the wonders that our greater Phoenix community has to offer. I have been fortunate to find partners with the Phoenix Children’s Hospital and their fitness and safety programs, and I think I am on the verge of launching pilot programs in a local elementary school as well as a local community organization focused on family and community fitness and welfare.

I hope that the meetings I have scheduled over the next several weeks will allow me to get kids on bikes in structured programs by the end of October. I’m also submitting my first grant for this project this week and hope to have filed the organization as a 501c3 by the end of the month. Ultimately the goal is that these initial pilot programs can successfully develop and expand throughout the Valley and eventually integrate other community-based programs that deal with healthy living and healthy expression such as community gardens, urban mural projects, and cultural story-telling in ways that will help define a community identity that the Metro-Phoenix region has been lacking. Keep your fingers crossed.

There’s a cycling expression for good luck that goes “Keep the rubber side down.” With any venture, there will be some faceplant moments such as the one above. You just hope it’s mostly rubber side down.

I was able to get some personal riding in, and while these numbers may be meaningless to pretty much anyone who reads this, welcome to the training diary portion of the blog:

•    Sunday, Sept. 5 – Medium ride into Ahwatukee with my brother Wyatt over rolling terrain. Weather was nice if not slightly warm. 41 miles, 2hrs 25 mins, 1921 Kcalories, Avg HR 139, Avg Speed 16.9, Avg Cadence 84
•    Monday, Sept. 6 – Hard ride to South Mountain TV Towers with San Juan Rd. Weather was muggy and hot. Legs slightly tired from previous day’s ride. 57 miles, 3hrs 24 mins, Kcalories 3134, Avg HR 151, Avg Speed 16.5, Avg Cadence 77. TV Tower climb (from old ranger station and back) lap time 52:18

Until next time…keep that rubber side down.

There's Always a Beginning

In my latest pursuit of employment, I find myself challenged to remain motivated throughout each day. Therefore, it is in this blog that I will describe the various projects I'm working on, what jobs I'm chasing, and assorted other thoughts and opinions that cross my mind in the hours between dropping off and picking up the kids from school. This is my effort to make sure I don't let a day (well, at least not too many days) go by without some kind of positive productivity.

Good lord, this sounds boring already. Sorry.

I got this idea from a respected cycling coach that I was fortunate enough to work with earlier this year who is operating his own blog as a training tool as he prepares for this super hard, super insane bike race in Costa Rica. It made sense to keep a public account of one's progress because in my experience, as one falls into a sloth-like behavior pattern it becomes increasingly easy to believe that minimal effort/productivity is actually substantial.

Sure, I could surf the job listings on Craigslist all I want, but unless I'm actually submitting several resumes throughout the week, is the act of simply looking for a job productive? I mean, no one's gonna hire me just because I read the job description. Until I learn the Force and become a Jedi. And that would truly be something to blog about.

When I was deemed to no longer be an integral part of my previous employer's staff, I made a few immediate decisions. The first was that I had to maintain my fitness. This is the year I hit 40 and I just happened to have my best physical condition since I was 20 and jumping out of gyms playing for the University of Arizona Men's Volleyball Club. In the two bike races I rode in this spring, I bested previous times by massive margins. I felt good and I didn't want to lose that. Besides, on the days I either rode or did yoga, I noticed my productivity and creative thinking was vastly improved over the days I "rested".

I also decided that I needed to participate on projects or with organizations in ways that help my community. With all of the political shenanigans in the air here in Arizona currently, I have tired of being a spectator. I'm not looking to be the driver of immediate, sweeping change, but I want to get in and do some things that are important to me in small, significant ways.

Lastly, as this idle member of America's labor force looks at forty, I'm fully aware that I only have so many opportunities to restart a career. Sure, this ain't the same America that our parents grew up in, working for a single company until retirement knowing that pension + Social Security = moderate stability. But I need to not take too much of a step backwards in terms of the experience and skills I have developed over the past six years. Having said that...

My problem in terms of my professional career is that I've typically held positions with hard-to-describe, nebulous titles or descriptions like Production Manager, Coordinator, or Special Projects Manager. Why didn't I follow through on my childhood ambitions of archeologist or architect or professional basketball player? People know what those things are. It's pretty bad when your wife has trouble explaining what it is that you do. So, in this fun job market, trying to take my resume and place it in specific holes is...ummm...challenging in an already challenging environment.

Anyways, so today I submitted a resume for a position with PayPal's new customer service center opening in Chandler, something called a User Experience Manager. Sounds like a perfect fit for someone with my background. We shall see. Regardless, I'm not sure how entitled I am to participate in Labor Day celebrations this Monday. Then again, I'm not getting a paid holiday so what the hay!

See, told you this would be boring. Happy Labor Day everybody!!!