After All This Time

LADIES AND GENTS, saints and sinners, freemen and yeomen, Hold on to your respective armrests, because I'm here to report that I have what's known in the employment sector as a real live interview taking place tomorrow. Places and Names shall be withheld for now, of course -- I'm not superstitious, just a little stitious -- but rest assured I do have documentation to back this up and I'm not afraid to use it if I have to.

It is my first such scheduled encounter with a prospective employer in quite some time, and like fellow frustrated out-of-work blogger Nazz Nomad, it hasn't been from lack of applying over lo these many weeks, or months in my case; just a reflection of a very heated competition for what few opportunities present themselves every day. Meaning any relevant job posting on, say, craigslist or mediabistro is immediately inundated with a flood of qualified candidates within literally minutes.

In this instance, a publishing agency I'm registered with emailed it to me. I jumped on it forthwith and followed up with a phone call and another email. It sorta has my name on it, and I'm not quite sure whether this agency or another is sending other proofreaders out to be interviewed for the same job or if it's my chance alone. It does me no good to know either way, does it... I don't really tend to overthink things like that anyway; I save obsessively dwelling for your big metaphysical questions like, If the Shroud of Turin is a genuine 1st century artifact, as I'm beginning to think it is, and not as some nonbelievers among you would have it a Medieval forgery, then do I have to put my shekels where my mouth is and admit I'm starting to feel something stirring the more I read about the early Christians. Ah, you didn't see that one coming, did you. Neither did I, until I found myself literally in tears the other day when reading the stirring conclusion of Thomas Cahill's magnificent Desire of the Everlasting Hills. I won't spoil it for you, except to say it just might be one of the top 2, 3 books of history I've ever read.

Now I'm already well into James Tabor's extremely speculative and conjectural but nevertheless spellbinding The Jesus Dynasty, a work which doggedly depicts the historical Jeez (as his buddies called him), partly by stripping the gospels bare of their theological motivations and partly via recent archaeology, as well as elevates the role of his cuz John D. Baptizer to fellow messiah-ship, among other startling claims, postulations and possibilities. This book literally -- a word I don't take lightly -- couldn't be more fascinating, to me at least, and at the moment that's who we're dealing with here if you hadn't noticed.

Moving off religious history till further notice (and what other kind of notice is there?), I will relate that I'm also scheduled to take the census test Thursday at something called the New York Irish Center located at 10-40 Jackson Avenue, wherever that is. I mean, I know where it is, but to us proud Astorians that's out in the boonies pun intended.

Ironically, or perhaps characteristically, I was at the library printing out my resume and attending to other vital matters Monday when I found out that they were giving the census test upstairs that morning in that very building. But when I asked the census guy today about taking it there, he said tests given at the library fill up fast. So now I have to take a bus ride to Long Island City instead of walking 5 blocks to Ditmars Blvd. That's what I get for procrastinating.

"After all this time
To believe in Jesus
After all those drugs
I thought I was Him
After all my lying
And a-crying
And my suffering
I ain't good enough
I ain't clean enough
To be Him"

The Clash - Sound Of The Sinners

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