15 June 2002 ~ A party for the utterly banal...

Oly likes to party. Oly parties all the damned time. Oly parties every chance it gets. I don't mean those loud obnoxious fratboy parties with the kegs and the vomiting; I mean nice, wholesome, bring-the-kids partying. Com e to think of it, maybe it's just a Northwest thing. Portland has a party to celebrate ROSES, f'gahd's sake. They BUNGEE-JUMP and LOOK AT BOATS to celebrate ROSES.

(...Although, admittedly, there is a beer named after Oly. Dustin Hoffman drank one just after screwing the brains out of Mrs Robinson in "The Graduate." Ah, useless knowledge...)

Today, there is a party at the college. I don't know what it's for. They're calling it "Super Saturday." I guess it's a party to celebrate Saturday. Probably has something to do with graduation and all, too, but I like the idea that my town is such a party-fiend that it can celebrate something as utterly banal as SATURDAY without shame. Aw yeah.

["If you're from Olympia, you always want it..."]

Applied for some jobs yesterday. I lowered myself to applying for some REALLY FUCKING CRAPPY jobs. But here's the thing:

First of all, there are a ton of independent shops and such in the area; bookstores, restaurants, and so forth. But EVERYBODY wants to work for them. They're never hiring. They don't even have applications, any of them. They just tell you to drop off a resumé. A RESUMÉ? To essentially flip burgers? What the fuck? But, on the upside of that, I know from personal experience that independent business owners have a fuck of a lot more control over their employees than corporate business. For example: a Starbucks coffeehouse cannot tell you that you're going to be a manager, and then cut your hours and threaten to fire you just because you won't sleep with the boss. Starbucks, being a corporation, has, I'm sure, had such things happen, and has had their asses sued for it, so they make rules about NOT DOING THAT. So, if you're working for Starbucks, and something like that happens, there ARE rules that say you're in the right; you don't have to get yourself a lawyer (and what minimum-wage coffeehouse-kid is going to be able to afford a lawyer? uh...) and go through some traumatic courthouse drama you don't have the money for. If you work for Starbucks and your boss gropes your ass, you tell somebody else, and he gets fired. If you're working for Mama Schmoe's Coffeehouse and somebody gropes your ass, and you tell somebody else, you're likely to get yourself laughed at. Or fired.

So, yeah, while I hate working for the Man (and I REALLY DO hate working for the man...), I'm willing to take what I can get -- and if that's ALL I can get, and I have to take it, then I'll cheer myself up with the above argument.

In cheerier news, I'm going to a party today, and to Seattle for the weekend. My friend Jane is graduating. I'm so proud of her. We met at the College of Santa Fe, like, forever ago; now she's graduating, and I'm... well, I'm going to a party in Olympia. But I don't feel so bad. There are plenty of other people Jane left fumbling at the side of the road by continuing college. Today, those people should go to a party. Tomorrow, they should congratulate Jane.

~Helena*