Just Checking In

It's been over a week and there's really nothing new to report on the McDoings front. Life goes on: I keep trolling the job sites for positions for which to apply and no interview requests seem to come back. I'm working with an employment agency in Los Angeles and their jobs, many of them temp positions, are the upper crust of the available market right now, but no bites as of yet. I do know that they've been doing a fairly comprehensive background check, talking to previous employers and coworkers, and by now they probably know I'm the genuine article.

One pleasure I have had: no late nights working on awards shows, no early mornings covering award nomination announcements. And while I genuinely appreciate that, nothing has come forward to take the place of the entertainment industry as the professional component of my identity. I think that's what I miss most about not having a job: when people ask, "What do you do?" I can say graphic designer, but I always have to answer the next question (Where do you work?) with, "I'm looking right now." I never imagined I would be unemployed for a year and a half … and counting.

I baked my first carrot cake tonight. I really love carrot cake, but I can't seem to find anywhere in town that has a good one. I caught Paula Deen on the Food Network sharing her grandmother's recipe, so I took it down and tried it. Being a southern recipe, it has pecans instead of walnuts (which are not my favorite, except in honey-walnut shrimp at Panda Inn). The layers are cooling now, and I think I'll have to wait until tomorrow to frost them, since it's already pretty late.

We did our taxes last weekend. It's a rather schizophrenic experience for a married gay couple, since you have to file as single individuals with the federal government and as a married couple with the state. I ended up owing about $2,000, since I didn't have any taxes withheld from my unemployment benefits. Luckily, I held out more than that in the savings account to cover the cost, so I'm cool. Steve got a small refund from the feds and we got a fairly sizable one from the state, so the overall liability is minimal.

I'll try to remember and take a picture of the cake to share in the next blog entry, and I'll let you know how it came out. I'm hoping it's a really tasty recipe (although grating three cups of carrots by hand takes quite a while). That supposedly is the secret of good carrot cake: grate the carrots with a small grater (like for Parmesan cheese) instead of a regular food processor blade.

In any case, our eyesight should definitely improve.