Couch commando

So I've decided, after a few months, that I'm finally going "public" with my blog...  I had started this blog back in February - then tried to delete it - found out that I hadn't deleted it - and then been re-convinced to write a blog by my good friend, a fellow blogger.  I had newfound motivation the week before my husband & I went to Korea, on the same day - actually - that I found out I'd have my first job interview in 6 years the day before leaving for Korea. So, suffice to say, the whole blog thing got sidetracked... until now.

Now I'm back, recovered (more or less) from jet lag, to my daily grind of unemployed nothing-to-do-ness.  For those who don't know, I was laid off back in early March from my job of over 5 years.  It was the classic "blessing in disguise" in that I had been commuting an hour to & from work every day, burning up lots of gas, putting wear & tear on my car, and simply wasting hours of my life away on the road.  I was always tired, sleep-deprived, carb-hungry, and feeling rushed.  The job was good, don't get me wrong! I loved the people I worked for and with.  The work itself was fulfilling, challenging, and dynamic - all the things I want from a job/career.  But it was far away - and getting laid off meant I could now look for work closer to home - maybe for a bigger firm.

I had an inkling of an idea of how lean & mean the job market was from tales my friends who had recently graduated from business schools would tell - of how difficult it was to find a job, just to get an interview even.  And of course every time I turned on the radio or TV, I heard about how high unemployment was, how thousands of more jobs had been cut this week, how unappealing and dim the economic forecast for the rest of the year was... Yet, I'm a hopeful gal by nature.  I've always seen the glass half-full.  So even though I knew I'd probably be in for a long haul, I tried to heed everyone's advice about hitting the ground running.  I updated my resume, sent it to other professionals in my field, got feedback, revised my resume, and then overhauled my portfolio.  I was fortunate enough to get a call from an ex-colleague who was venturing out on his own as an architect.  He generously gave me some work that I could do from home to generate some side income.  Of course, I filed for unemployment the day after I was laid off as well.  Then, as the days after getting laid off became weeks - and the weeks have now become months - I'm still not down in the dumps dejected or depressed.  But I'm definitely a lot more sober, and there's a little less spring in my job-hunting step.

In all other aspects of my life, I feel great!  I get TONS of (if not too much) sleep, the house is a little neater/cleaner than it used to be, my husband and I eat better because I now have time to cook and actually think about what I'm cooking (i.e. try to be more conscious of our waist lines), I can go to the gym whenever I want and however frequently I want (which apparently is still once a week), I read a lot more, I can keep in better touch with friends, I feel more up-to-date on current events... which leads me to my final point, and the reason for the name of my blog & this post - I now watch a disgusting amount of TV.

I say this, with a mixture of awe, shame, and guilt. I feel like I just got up at a 12-step program meeting and said, "Hi, my name is Allison.  And I'm a TV-aholic."

I mean, I always liked TV.  I had a knack for the art of becoming a human vegetable on the sofa, losing track of time & space as you watched program after mindless program of comedy, drama, news, infomercials, and documentary.  I am very good at just turning my brain OFF and getting sucked into the boob tube.

But.

But, before I was unemployed I simply didn't have the TIME to do it endlessly.  Sure, when I lived alone - and even after I was married, I'd come home after work, plop down in front of the TV to eat dinner and watch, watch, watch until it was bedtime.  There was something about working in front of a computer all day, and doing things (no matter how much I loved my job) that you HAD to do and talking to people you didn't really WANT to talk to about things you didn't really CARE about, that just made me want to literally "PLOP" on the couch when I got home and completely not-think.  In a way, it was like I was trying to un-think - to undo all the knotty complicated b.s. that I had had to spew, tolerate, or digest throughout the day - whether at work, at the store, or on the road.

But now I don't even have that problem.  I don't have that daily grind to unwind from - the daily buildup of crud in my ears, brain & psyche that needs to be washed away by mindless game shows and crime dramas. Yet I can still melt away hours on the couch.  Sitting up, laying on my side, laying completely prostrate with just my head turned towards the TV and the rest of my body tightly tucked under a cotton throw like a mummy, sitting cross-legged on the floor, sitting in the armchair with my feet on the ottoman... watching, watching, watching.   I can get up from bed after sleeping 10 hours, walk up the flight of stairs to our Living Room, plant myself on the couch, and not move (except to go to the bathroom) until my husband gets home in the evening.  And even sometimes after he gets home, then we both just sit there for another couple hours until bedtime.  Not that I do this everyday.  I do have enough humanity and my mother's upbringing (i.e. I hear her voice yelling at me inside my head) to not actually WANT to do that every day.  But there are those days... 

Hello, my name is Allison.  And I'm a Couch Commando.