Tag Archives: Talk show host

* Job search status: Pep talk

Career goals, Get on your feet, Job search/Job prospects, Motivations, , , , , , , ,

(Originally posted 12/26/12 at Trojan Horse Productions.  Reblogged 09/06/18.)

A week ago today I had a highly successful interview at a dollar store. There may be one obstacle that, if it’s there, cannot be overcome; but if it’s not there, I’ll have to take a drug test and go for a second interview at which the actual job offer will be made. In the days since, there have been some communications glitches. Meanwhile, time goes on.

This morning in my last five minutes at Lenny’s, I prayed about this, reflecting on (1) my disappointment to have had no word so far and (2) the path by which I got here.

I just completed a two-month “job readiness” program … not as if I needed any program to make me “ready” for a job, but this one is unique in that while one is taking classes, they have scouts hunting down specific job opportunities that well match each candidate. That is the big factor I see missing for most people in the big picture.

Was the class a waste of time? Continue reading * Job search status: Pep talk →

* What the little birds told me

Dependency, Get on your feet, OUR BEST POSTS, The Way of Peace, , , , , , , ,

(Originally published 07/21/12 at Trojan Horse Productions.  Reblogged 08/09/18.)

The pigeons. Years ago, when I had an office job downtown, I’d wait for the bus every afternoon on the south side of Baltimore Street one or two blocks east of Charles. Often, someone tossed down several handfuls of torn-up bread for the birds to eat, and I’d have time to watch them.

For the most part, the pigeons acted just as you’d expect: eating together, share and share alike. But I noticed one individual whose conduct was quite different. This guy never picked up any food from the ground. He never seemed to notice any food on the ground. Instead, he’d notice what someone else was eating, and go over and take it away from that person. Time and time again, he did this.

Put this fellow down on top of a pile of food, and he’d starve to death, because he’d never pick up any for himself. Put another pigeon with him, and he’d be OK — taking away what the other one picks up to eat.

How much closer can you get to the way some people act; who will not do anything for themselves, but only take away what someone else has worked for? Can there be a gene for this?

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When I lived in Barclay, I maintained a bird feeder in the back yard — different locations, but always visible from the kitchen window. Two species used to visit the feeder in flocks: sparrows and starlings. There might be fifty sparrows or fifty starlings there at a time.

Continue reading * What the little birds told me →

* Give from abundance

Career goals, Dependency, Job search/Job prospects, , , , , , , , ,

I normally only publish on Mondays (comments on the news), Wednesdays (recycling old posts) and Saturdays (substantial new pieces).  A couple things happened this morning that seem to me urgent enough to warrant an off-schedule post.

I’d invite e-mail subscribers to hold on to their e-mail copy of this post, and will explain why.

Bookmarks:
Give from abundance  •  Out on a limb

Continue reading * Give from abundance →

* Attitude …

Get on your feet, Homelessness, The Way of Peace, , , , ,

… can make a hard situation easy, or make an easy situation hard.

To enter the shelter, you walk across this parking lot to an iron gate, and then down these steps to the “smoke pit,” an 8 x 20′ area with benches where we sit until they call us in, in groups of six, to register for this night. One does this every day.

Continue reading * Attitude … →

* Are you a good listener?

Get on your feet, The Way of Peace, The William Tell Show, , , ,

(Reblogged from Brain Sweets.)

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Posted by ⋅ February 3, 2014 ⋅ Leave a Comment
Filed Under  , , , ,

Are you listening? Really listening? When you are in a conversation with a friend or anyone, are you hearing what the other says? Or are you thinking about what you will say next? Are you waiting for your opportunity to tell some story? Do you get so excited or impatient that you interrupt? When the other person stops speaking do you begin immediately or do you wait 3 seconds?

Listening is an integral part of communication. Sometimes real listening means you don’t get to tell the story you had in your mind or say the comment you had 3 sentences ago. Real listening means when the other speaker is done and it is your turn that you are continuing the thought, commenting on what they actually said. Waiting 3 seconds after the other person is done speaking is a way to allow your thoughts to form and shows you were listening.

So are you a good listener?

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Another good post from Tracy:

Opportunity or Argument

(Reblogged 2018-02-15.)

* Job search update, 02/03/14; and other news

Clippings, Homelessness, Job search/Job prospects, Local news, , , , , , ,

Bookmarks:
Job search update
Crisis for D.C. homeless families

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Job search update

(Composed 2014-02-01)

Things are moving full steam ahead on my application for a Secretary II position with the City, as I’ve probably described in previous posts. The hours are 8:30-4:30, which under normal circumstances will let me get to the shelter in time to (1) actually get in and (2) take a shower each day. I will need to phone the office Monday morning 02/03/14 to confirm that all’s in line, and possibly find out a start date.
Continue reading * Job search update, 02/03/14; and other news →

* Issues with upcoming posts

Get on your feet, Homelessness, OUR BEST POSTS, Poverty, Squalor, The Way of Peace, The William Tell Show, , , , , ,

In the process of “recycling” old posts on Wednesdays, I am now coming upon a number of posts with which I’m not completely comfortable. I probably would not write them, now or in the future, the way I did at the time; but I’m also still not sure exactly how I’d write them differently.

At the time I wrote those posts, I supposed my homelessness would be brief, and William Tell would soon enough become a public figure able to speak to what he saw as the pressing social issues. My homelessness continues eighteen months later, and my perceptions of those issues have changed.
Continue reading * Issues with upcoming posts →

* The End of Anger, by Ellis Cose (2001) …

Career goals, Media, National media, The William Tell Show, , , , , , , , , , ,

… is a slim volume for $24.99. The description on inside front dust jacket concludes it “may well be the most important book dealing with race to be published in recent decades.” That strikes me as presumptuous. The front matter includes a list of the author’s other titles, from which it appears he seldom writes about anything else.

Yet the portions I browsed remind me of something I want to do on my own show. The preface examines in some detail changes in public opinion polls between 2008 and 2010. I don’t attach the weight to these facts that Cose does. But if, for example, the President’s approval rating rises with one group and falls with another group in the same time frame, I would like to find out from listeners whose opinions changed and why; to examine with listeners how their thinking works, and on what bases their opinions change.

(Originally posted 05/12/12 at Trojan Horse Productions.  Reposted 10/26/17.)