Being in the realm of the unemployed at Christmas time was something I was originally trying to avoid. I had been lured from a steady full time gig into a one year RTH position at a utility where I did a six month consulting gig a year prior.

Approximately eight months into the new gig reorganization rumblings began and the department I was located in was put on a hiring freeze, according to the manager. Thinking this would be temporary I stayed optimistic.

Optimism took a nose dive at approximately eighteen months in when the manager during a one on one meeting informed me that they were instituting a new policy that required consultants and contractors to be let go after two years or hired. He proclaimed to be between a rock and a hard place since he was still under a hiring freeze, wanted to hire me, yet was going to lose people due to the mismanagement coming from higher up. Interesting circumstances to say the least.

The two year time frame would have put me being out of work right around Christmas time. I suspect this to be true with most parents, however Christmas time is all about children and making it a special time for them and I did not want to have anything less for my nine year old son.

Within a week or so of this meeting I was contacted by a recruiter about a gig that was a six month right to hire managing a database team, so I jumped at it. Thinking it might be worth it from a more long term standpoint to be employed during the holiday season and what was going on at the current job was increasingly odd.

The team I was on ended up losing a few people due directly to the reorganization and consultant changes that put us all in the same position. One must contemplate what the true nature was regarding upper level management putting a manager in a position faced with losing several people due to a time limit for consultants, if they were not hired within two years, but then also putting the manager in a hiring freeze. I have my suspicions as to what was really going on, however that’s not this week’s topic.

At the end of the day, it made no organizational sense, so I opted to give this other position a try, which did not work out. It was not a good fit, red flags started cropping up right away. I gave it time just to make sure it wasn’t related to being “the new guy”. Reading my previous post on the subject, one will also find that it was not related to being “the new guy”.

Having best laid intentions to avoid the position I am now in, here I am. It hasn’t been so bad really, with the side benefit of getting much done around the house that I didn’t have time for otherwise. My home-work!

Home ownership is a chore in and of itself and this time off, in a quantifiably fickle job market, has been beneficial to knocking out many items on my honey-do list.

My days have been filled resolving electrical issues and using the time to do some fixture updates. A big chunk completed on the remodel of one bathroom to date, with an interlude to fix a leaking washing machine, do a plumbing repair, and now a dishwasher that appears to be DOA, my days are busy. I have even completed some work on the Foxbody.

At the end of the day, it will still be a good Christmas for my son, maybe not as great as it should have been, but good. Getting the work done on the house is priceless as it has been very hard to find the time the past few years.

It is hard in this day and age to find someone to work on your home, or car, while putting in the same level of care and craftsmanship as you would. One could say that I am lucky to be skilled to do these tasks, mechanically from an automotive standpoint and remodeling from a renovation standpoint.

If I were lucky, I would find a job to get me out of all this home-work!

Only two more bathrooms and some flooring to go…

My current office situation: