Friday, July 9, 2010

The Great Obama Depression

Recession is when it happens to everyone else
Depression is when it happens to you.


I can't recall the soothsayer who originally coined this phrase, and frankly am not interested in initiating the exhaustive 2 minute google search to find out. I'm just not that curious. I can, however, attest to the wisdom of the statement, having entered into the Great Obama Depression with my layoff back in February. Fact is, this is a Depression for millions of Americans living in the expanding shadow of the Obama regime.

Since last we spoke, my wife also lost her administrative job due to declining enrollment at the school. Neither of us were interested in donning brown shirts and scouring the neighborhood as census workers for the socialist-in-chief, so that greatly lessened the pool of potential future employers.

Needless to say, we have been economically devasted by these events. You could also say we were highly leveraged, what with tuition payments for one son attending Notre Dame and the other two in Parochial schools (not to mention hockey bills and other necessary sundries). Frank and Dodd's democrat housing scam caused us to be approximately $90k upside down in our house. Did I mention we lost our income? The perfect sh*# storm.

On the positive side, I just dropped off some suit pants to get altered, having lost 25 pounds in the last 5 months. Some loss was due to stress, but mostly I did this on purpose by taking better care of myself and watching what I eat. Besides, government cheese can make one lose their appetite.

The good news is that after months of fruitless attempts at finding work in Flint, Michigan, I expanded my search and was successful in landing a position in Wisconsin. They're lucky to get me, and I feel just as blessed to be going there. Many of my friends were shocked to learn I was sticking with the newspaper industry, but like I've told them, my experiences here have left my sphinxter perpetually puckered. That said, I'm going to a market that is relatively stable by comparison, and to a company that is as strong as it gets in this business. I will be earning about half as much as I was a little over a year ago, but Hillary thankfully sent me a slightly used red reset button, so it's all good.

Also on the positive side is that my middle son will be just down the road in Milwaukee attending Marquette. He is excited about school again now that he will be joing the Navy ROTC program offered there.

So what does the future hold? How should I know, but my plan is to start consuming cheese in vast quantities, washing it down in responsible amounts of Spotted Cow, and kicking butt for my new employer.

Hmmm. Maybe I should have waited on getting those waist lines taken in.

The next few weeks and my upcoming move should prove to be busy, so I probably won't be hanging around this spacious Chattering Teeth office on a regular basis during this period. Once I'm settled in though, I hope to run a vacuum and dust off this blog's counter tops again.

4 comments:

  1. Your keeping your head on straight for having had such a crappy time.

    Hope things start getting better.

    Take care.

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  2. Good for you DaBlade & best wishes in your new job. I'm sure the golfers will miss you.

    Obamaconomy just sucks. I have my own business. It hit the fan during late '08 and has gotten worse since the immaculation. If I was able to lay myself off, the unemployment would be about 3 times what I have paid myself this year..but while CT taxes self-employed for unemployment, we cannot collect.

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  3. Thanks Chuck. It hasn't been any fun for us but it has made us stronger in a lot of ways.

    Bill, I told brother Snap that I'd still help with his stats and the Snappers website, but I might not be able to sub the 1 or 2 times per season as has been typical the last few years. Maybe I'll get on a league that plays at Whistling Straits! Hang in there. Chinese takeouts are bound to pick up :)

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  4. Good luck, and come back to the blogging world soon.

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