This Whirlwind of a Pandemic.

Hello written blog.
It's been a while.

    To recap what's happened in life, I finished animal technician school in mid-December of 2019. Although it gave me a sense of freedom, I've been feeling defeated as I tried to get a job in animal research straight from the gate. Got some replies, a phone interview, an in-person interview and still nothing. For one thing, I can see why because I'm an absolute mess at replying. I'm also a horrible interrupter and if the nerves really got me working, then I tend to speak way too fast. Every person I speak to probably thinks I'm insane at this point, but whatever. Every chance I get to interview, it just gives me more questions to log down and think of better replies to later on. Let me backtrack a bit...

    I spent my final semester interning at the California Institute of Technology to finish my animal technician program. Aside from the fact that I spent almost two hundred dollars on parking permits over the course of almost three months, I enjoyed that place a lot and was always in awe when I walked through the campus after my "shift". The staff was all super nice and I felt like I fit in really well there. Moreover, I always felt kind of cool when I would collect gifts from spinning PokéStops around campus in Pokémon Go and sent them out. It'd be from really cool places like "The Laboratory of Nuclear Radiation" or some really specific science you wouldn't immediately be able to pull out of your brain. Sadly, there wasn't any open positions by the time I was done with my hours. Part of me regrets not just taking that open animal husbandry position but at the same time, I didn't go to school to get two degrees and a license to work a position that doesn't even need a college education in the first place. I could do so much more than just taking care of a room of a hundred mice cages, you know? At the same time, if I just sucked it up and took a lower position, I could've clocked in enough hours to take a certification exam and I would have two certifications over other people...oh well...

    In late January and into February, my dad was diagnosed with colon cancer and was basically unable to eat and kept vomiting up to the day of his surgery. I mentioned this on my YouTube channel but basically it was supposed to be a laparoscopic removal of the tumor (which is a more sterile procedure) and ended up just being a surgical removal of [hopefully] all the infected cells within his large intestine. 

    Even though COVID19 was starting to appear on the news, we weren't in shut down mode yet because of the idiotic President and his administration. I remember sitting in the ICU section of the hospital beside my dad and hearing the hospital staff talk about how China built a hospital from the ground up within a week or so to handle the excess number of people needing emergency care. During my time sitting beside my dad, I printed out pretty much every chapter of this study book I have for the VTNE and highlighted all the answers because the book was entirely just multiple choice questions. My dad was free to go home after a week in the hospital which I appreciated a lot because my mom literally was shaming me for being against staying with my dad overnight. It's like...the hospital isn't that far from home and there's literally staff there checking on him every couple of hours. Why should I be doing their job and sleeping on a chair, when I could rest up for 8-10 hours and then show up again. It wasn't like my dad was dying either. I'm still mad about that because my brother, even to this day, is still incredibly disrespectful to both my parents and has nothing to show for it. He could very well bring his 3DS and Nintendo Switch (which I didn't have) and tough it out through the night but he chooses to be a royal piece of garbage.

    Well anyway, after I finished animal technician school, I was still waiting for the school to state that I graduated on my transcript before I was able to register for the national exam. I got another interview during the first week of March which was a huge waste of time but it was a learning lesson nonetheless. I got a rejection email during the week of lockdown which was a punch in the stomach. The worst part of it is that the gym is closed and I can't take out my frustrations on heavy weights and being able to physically exhaust myself to get a good night's rest. As late March approached, I got a letter from the college I was attending that stated my transcript was updated and my diploma would be coming soon after. 
    Upon finding out that my transcript was updated, I basically marked the day in April that the next registration window would open and I would sign up to take the VTNE in July as I had planned. For the next two-three'ish months, I basically spent an hour or so a day reading the chapters of the study book I was highlighting at the hospital prior. I also re-registered for VTNEprep and did some practice questions every day until the test day got closer, then I would then do the full practice tests to get a feel of how the duration of the test would go. 

    I literally scheduled my test day during the last week of July because I wasn't sure how the enhanced unemployment would go about. I chose Wednesday because I felt like there'd be less cars around but that's subjective. I drove to the testing center a day earlier just so I wouldn't be frantically looking for the place if I was late the next day. I got there early the next day anyway and with me was the biggest chapter of study questions for some last minute reading. I didn't even read all that much during test day because I had brought my food in the car so that I could use that early time to eat before my test. That way, I wouldn't be "burned out" and thinking of food midway through my exam.   

    The test wasn't easy but it wasn't hard either. I remember my first question wasn't even in any of my study material and I had a flashback to my "applied handling and restraint" class where I my teachers were going over what sheep are vaccinated against. My drug calculation questions were especially hard and the way it was formatted was nothing like what I was taught in school. You don't even get to find out what you got wrong and what the correct answers were in the end, but I passed. Thankfully, it was not like a BARELY passed but over 100 points over the bare minimum. I'm not even sure how the score is calculated though, because it's like a 175 question test with 150 questions actually counting and 25 being experimental questions. My score was like 500 hundred something and the minimum passing was like 420.  

    A week after passing my exam and taking a mental break from all that studying, I felt obligated to let the professor who's most resourceful in the field of laboratory animal know the good news along with my supervisors at Caltech. It was mainly to see if there were any job opportunities I wasn't aware of but I thought they'd genuinely would like to hear from me as well. What I've learned is that it never hurts to ask and the worst someone can say to you is "no", so you might as well try. Even though I've never asked for a letter of recommendation yet, I at least know there are some people who are willing to write one for me. I've also learned that you can be the best out there but landing a job all really depends on timing and luck. Timing in that you aren't bested by someone else more "appealing" than you and luck in that you're the best applicant at that time of need. 

    Following the email, I did get responses. Mostly congratulatory but my professor notified me of a position as a surgical laboratory technician that I could try. One of the vets from Caltech also recommend that I become a member of the local branch of the Association for Laboratory Animal Science which I did so I can just put it on my resume and use it as a resource in the future for continued education credits. Even though I haven't touched a gas anesthesia machine in almost a year, I ended up being one of two candidates for the position as a surgical lab tech. Ultimately, I got rejected which bugged the shit out of me because I know for a fact that there aren't that many veterinary technicians with a bachelor's degree where I'm from. The only reason I could've been rejected was that the other person has a bachelor's in animal science or zoology or something. I don't know. I can only control so much. Even though I wasn't looking forward to the commute had I been hired, it was an opportunity to do really cool things like place implants and stuff to help people with heart disease. 

    Oh well, all I can do now is apply to stuff I believe I can do. Sometimes, I get rejected because I'm overeducated or something, especially the animal husbandry ones. I'm not too focused on getting a new job ASAP being that we're in a pandemic and I'm living in one of the worst countries when it comes to warning the public and contact tracing, so all I can really follow is when I'm looking through the local news and seeing how things like the mayoral debate of a neighboring city is cancelled because one of the staffers tested positive. Things like that keep me grounded knowing the virus is closer than I think.

    At the same time, I really don't want to return to work with my piece of shit, obese brother because it really annoys me seeing him work a job he doesn't deserve. He's been enjoying his enhanced unemployment money so much that he bought a THIRD MONITOR FOR HIS COMPUTER. It's literally one monitor dedicated to a TWITCH stream, one for reddit or video games, and the third for some chat box ticker? He'd also buy a bunch of groceries for himself which consists mostly of packaged sweets and half a year later, my mom noticed one day how swollen his feet are and freaked the fuck out. She was like "that is NOT NORMAL! THIS IS A SIGN OF DISEASE!" and only recently did he decide to start going on an almost daily walk? This is after years of being like "I KNOW I'M FUCKING FAT AND THERE'S NOTHING YOU CAN SAY THAT'LL CHANGE THAT" and now it's like...well, the diabetes and poor circulation is starting to show...heh...because of all the sitting and eating he does in front of his computer...his feet still looks like a dinosaur's. 

    When it comes to me, on the other hand, I've lost almost 20 pounds since I turned 31. I mostly see it in my legs because my stomach isn't as flat as I want it. I'm hoping it will be by my 32nd birthday but it's creeping faster and faster. I haven't been keeping track of my calories since the initial lockdown. I've just been assuming that I'm still eating in a deficit because I haven't been eating as much as I would when I was working. I'm wanting to come out of the pandemic looking fabulous and ready to go back to two hour training sessions in the gym when it opens again.  

    Early voting started in California last week, I already filled out my ballot, signed, addressed, and dated it before putting it in those official 24 hour ballot boxes. I'm hoping young voters will finally understand how important it is to vote and vote regularly, not just at the presidential level. There are evil and corrupt people in your local city council and school board as well. I guess I was lucky enough to be 18 when President Obama was running, so I felt that "excitement" for the first black POTUS. I also majored in Political Science so I know how voting can impact everyone, but now it's very obvious how impacted we are? We probably all know someone who died or had COVID19 and this could've all been prevented if those early cases were traced and isolated and travel was monitored more closely. 

It's so sad what has become of this.

Well, hoping I do get a new job before 2020 ends. 

If there's anything good to come from the pandemic, it's that it gives me better odds at getting hired.

I don't think I'll be posting new pictures to Instagram until things get better.

To end, I just finished rereading this entry and I hope I didn't miss any more of those missing words.

Maybe I'll type another entry around Christmas. Who knows.