the dominos commute

no, i have NOT had to lower myself to working in fast food…

…yet. let’s hope this picture never becomes reality:

DING – fries are done!

*shudders* let’s move on. quickly.

today makes one year i’ve been without gainful, full-time employment. not good. but the other day i had to do some running around in austin and found myself sitting in rush hour traffic on IH-35. i was not alone…but i suppose that, by definition, is “traffic”. as i sat, unmoving, the “SPEED LIMIT: 65 MPH” sign giggling at my sluggishness, i wondered to myself…

…how did i do this every day?

i seriously don’t know how i did for five straight years. traffic in austin (and i assume other places, but austin consistently ranks in the most traffic congested cities in the nation) seems to have such a domino effect – there’s a definite sweet spot that once you pinpoint you feel like a god. it’s not as simple as “if i leave the office (or house) ten minutes later then i get there ten minutes earlier”. life would be sweet if it were THAT fucking easy – but instead it’s some weird trigonometry equation whereby when you leave the office ten minutes later, as it’s closer to “common” quitting time, that many more people leave their office, plus there’s also all the people that left when you NORMALLY do, plus all the people that left all the offices between your office and your home every second you sat your ass at your desk…

…and so forth.

but then (and i was basing the previous rambling statement on the fact i used to leave dell at 4pm, but as i got closer to 5pm it got worse and worse) you get to the OTHER side of the grid, whereby the longer you wait, the less traffic you deal with – which was what inspired after-work workouts for me for quite some time, and later after work happy hours. then came unemployment and all those anxieties melted away.

now, i honestly don’t know if i’m equipped to deal with bullshit traffic. or the domino effect you have to figure out on the fly. maybe i just need a good, “work from home” kinda job?