If it seems like I’ve been quiet on the net lately, it’s because I’ve been quite busy. After LepreCon last week, I started some classes at the unemployment office.
I went into the week with the pre-conceived idea that the classes were going to be a complete waste of time. I’ve never been big on self-assessment tests, and that’s how the week started. I’ve never been able to make any use of the results of that sort of thing. I’ve known for a long time that I’m either an INTP or an INTJ depending on which time I took the Myers-Briggs you look at. I’m pleased to say we did not take the Myers-Briggs this go around.
Still, I’ve never found those sorts of tests particularly insightful or anything more than a conversation starter in the same way you might talk about the ballgame last night.
Then Monday afternoon we had a change and the instructor started some small group exercises that were actually not too bad. Tuesday and Wednesday we had another class that dealt a lot with communication and workplace behavior. While the material wasn’t particularly enlightening, there were a lot of small group activities and the instructor was an entrepreneur who was quite good at keeping the mundane material interesting. I even got a certificate suitable for framing. It will go into a manila folder.
Today I am scheduled to take some more assessment tests. Apparently the fact I’m teaching math at the community college is not sufficient evidence that I know basic math skills, so I must be tested. Wish me luck.
The interesting thing about these classes has been not only the breadth of skills but also the depth. It really underscores the severity of this recession. Every single person in that room of thirty people had amazing experience and skills ranging from sales to engineering. This is ample evidence that when companies lay off in this recession, it’s not just pruning dead wood. These companies have been cutting off pieces that bleed, sometimes heavily.
In the classes, I discovered a woman with a a desire to write SF/Fantasy. I’m way farther down that road than she is, but I’ve been doing my best to uphold our genre’s tradition of the more established writers helping the less experienced writers. That has been a fun diversion over break and lunch.
Today is the last full day I must spend down there. I have two half-days next week. Then I go full steam trying to get back to work full time, and hopefully finish that novelette that’s been sitting idle since LepreCon started.