All right, this is it. Honest. I’ll finish the story.

I’ve never been unemployed before so I’m a virgin at this unemployment gig. I wait around at home. The Unemployment Clerk said my money will be coming in ten days. I have some savings so I feel I can ride this out. This means ix-nay on the card playing for a while. The boys don’t get it but screw them. This is one of those times when they’re just after my money.

Ten days come and go. No checks. I’ve been filling out the log you get in your little packet of vital and important information. You see, this log is a record of your job search. You mark down the date and place and what you sent them. Easy as can be. So for ten days, I dutifully look for work, fill in the little boxes in my log, and check the mail daily. Nothing. I do some calling to the unemployment office. I’m told it’ll be 21 days before the money comes in. OK, so back home to do my daily little-box-filling-in routine. Wait now, does the 21 days include the previous ten or in addition to the ten? Nuts, I don’t know. I wait some more. Life goes on and I fill in those boxes and before you know it, nearly two months go by. Shit, now I know something’s wrong. I call the Unemployment Office and explain myself. I can hear her nod over the phone. She says there is a problem with my case. I’m to call a Ms Adams. Ms Adams is the trouble-shooter in the agency. The UF gives me the number and I’m off the line. I call the number and get an answering machine. Not unusual. So I call the next day. Same machine. A couple of days later, I call again. It’s the same machine. What’ve they got, a flipping android for an employee? Christ! I call the Unemployment Office folks back. I explain that I’ve called the number I was given several times and was confronted with a machine. Doesn’t this woman ever answer her phone? I plea the fact that the rent is due (which it is) and the UF is nice and gives me Ms Adams’ supervisor’s phone number. OK, now you’re talking. I call this guy and get another guy. I give this guy a message for my guy. This guy clicks off the phone and next thing I’m talking to my guy, Mr. Supervisor. I explain things. How I called Ms Adams several times and an android machine (Is that redundant?) answers. How I’ve been waiting two months for some money. How the rent is due. I give Mr. Supervisor credit. He’s listening. He explains that sometimes school systems use some kind of agency to act as a go-between for the Unemployment Office and the school system. I did some teaching at one point and this past position I had seems to be the hold-up. It seems someone in the school system thinks I’m still working there. Not in your life, pal. So, this was the road block. Some frigging yahoo mistakenly thinks I’m still employed by the school system. Well, now, Mr. Supervisor needs proof. What, my word isn’t good enough? Well, luckily, I have just what Mr. Supervisor needs. Any time you leave a school position, you get a letter of termination from the superintendent. I was smart. When the checks failed to show up earlier in the month, I went down to the administration office and talked to a very nice young woman who gave me all kinds of help and a copy of the above letter. Mr. Supervisor wants me to fax the letter to him. No worries. A local print shop in town still does faxing. Imagine such an old technology such as that still exists. Thank the lord. So, I get my skinny little ass up to the print shop fax machine and send off the letter. This is on a Friday. The following Monday, boom!, three checks.

Who says I don’t work for the money?