Rant #2,454: A Brand New Me

Happy Columbus Day!

No, it is not "Happy Indigenous Peoples' Day," it is Happy Columbus Day, and to those who want to change the day's name and focus, I say create another holiday, if you must, but Columbus Day is Columbus Day and that is that.

If you do not celebrate the day for Columbus, himself, then at least honor the day as a day where Italian Americans can rejoice at their heritage.

Don't take that away from them, as many would, are trying to, and have during the past few years.

Columbus supposedly discovered America, discovered the New World, and right now, although not as great historical-wise, I am now discovering my own new world, and it is forcing me to reinvent myself and make "a brand new me."

The last couple of days since the announcement on October 10 that my place of business for the past 23 and a half years is going out of business, and thus, I was losing my job have gone by in sort of a silent whirlwind.

Yes, I don't know what has hit me, and yes, I have had up and down moments to deal with, since this is so new to me.

I have tried to file a claim with unemployment, and have been unsuccessful in doing so. Due to some really idiotic rules in New York State, even though I tried to file the very day I got canned, New York State considered the amount of days I worked last week--four--and the amount of money I made during the week--up to a threshold--as being too much, so I have to file the following week.

Of course, there is no place on the site that actually says this, so I had to go through the process twice, because there is also nowhere on the site that says you can file only between the house of 7:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m.

After I figured out on the site why it was claiming that my email was invalid--it took me a sold half hour before I figured out that the site would only allow my email address in ALL CAPS rather than in lower case, which is in to begin with, and after I filled out the form, I got an error message that I could not file after 7:30 p.m., because it was some time after that time before I supposedly fully filed.

And then when I tried to file the next day on Friday, I found out about the work levels that evidently I went over.

The next problem is that I am going to try to file today, but again, today is a holiday, and will I be able to do so? I will have to wait until 7:30 a.m. to find out.

Since losing my job, I have applied for probably upwards of 20 jobs, both full time and part time. It has kept me active and hopeful, but the reality is that it has also depressed me a bit, because when you read these ads, you wonder about their legitimacy.

Case in point is that I once again used the Indeed job site for my search, and lo and behold, I found that they were still using the bogus advertisement from my old place of work--yes, the place that hasn't hired anyone in at least five or sis or seven years when they were around and the very same site that went out of business last Thursday.

As it has been explained to me, Indeed puts up bogus ads like this to try to get the companies listed in these ads to re0sign with them to place job ads on their site. When the company sees the responses they get, Indeed hopes that they can convince the company to re-up with them to place help wanted ads on their site.

All that this is is false and deceptive advertising, and it leads unwitting job hunters to apply for jobs that do not exist. And as for the company I worked for, they do not exist anymore either, so it is even more deceptive.

I have once again contacted Indeed on this, to take this ad down. The first message was that their site was down, I should try later to send them a message. I then went to their Facebook site, put up a message about this, and also put up a message on Facebook proper.

To this moment, I have not heard a word from them about this, and yes, that ad is still running.

I wish I was a lawyer, I would sue them for false and deceptive advertising. I still might go to my local representative and see what he can do about this.

Whatever the case, it leads me to wonder if the ads I am applying to are real or fake, legitimate or bogus.

Other than that, not having anywhere to go, even with the weekend in between, is a new thing for me, and I am not used to it, and probably won't ever be.

Yes, I am venting here, and again, I promise you that this will not become my job venting blog, but every once in a while, I am going to dedicate some space to my plight, which hopefully will be a short one but in my heart, I know won't be.

So in about 45 minutes, let me try to file for unemployment and get the fall rolling here.

Columbus discovered the New World in 1492. I am discovering my own New World in 2019, and so far, it is off to a rocky start.