It's not over yet

I started this week. And I am having trepidations.

The 11th hour company is still pursuing. I'm meeting them again on Friday.

And tonight I am calling an old friend, and former career coach - she's a woman with a lot of experience, and incredible amount of poise and honesty, and I need her help!

I may have to pull a really crappy move, but in the long wrong, I gotta take care of me and my family.

I must decide today

It's almost 6 AM. I have until noon today to possibly renege on the offer I accepted at one company. Or not. If I turn them down, my other offer is still contingent on background checks, drug screen, and an ergonomic physical evaluation. Not that I think any of those things would screw me, but it's still a risk. And I put off getting paid another week or 2.

The jobs are different - manufacturing vs. quality. The companies are different -plastic medical devices vs. metal flow measuring equipment. The locations are different - Boulder vs. Fort Collins. The people are different - but almost everyone seemed nice. One company has a small company feel with a larger corporate ownership that seemed to stay out of the way. The other company is a formerly family owned company that is currently owned by a private equity firm and is on the block to be sold.

I like them both. The jobs are very different. The people are different. One of them has a 4.5 day work week, and man, for a chick who lives on a farm, that might just be the coup de grace.

The 11th Hour

I accepted a position. I've already told you that. I start on Monday.

But there is this other company that is playing hardball and they want to hire me. I guess that puts me in the power seat. It also may put me in the asshole seat. If they give me an offer I can't refuse, I have to go back to a company I said yes to, and bail on them. However, no paperwork has been signed. There isn't even an offer letter on the table, just a phone call. Which was weird.

So that is where I am. One more round of negotiations. We'll see where it takes me.

I accepted

I go back to work in 2 weeks. Weird.

That'll put me at about 2 months of being unemployed. I need to buy new pants.

IN 2 months, we have revamped the budget in our house, re-organized our priorities, put a project list together, and learned a lot about what it's like for one person to be home and the other "working".

In 2 months, I've worked my tail off at times, I've gotten some extra sleep at other times, I've gotten some things done, and put off others.

Now I have 2 weeks - I have a website re-do to complete, and some other SWE tasks to finish. Then we get back to life the way it was, but it'll never feel the same to me. I am already looking forward to "retirement" although I have been looking forward to that for a long time!

Offer #2 on the table

Got another offer. A job that is more suited to my skills than the first offer. In an industry associated with energy, so it's more stable than my last job. Equivalent salary to my last job, half days every friday, a volleyball league within the company. Also closer to home than the first offer. The first offer was also contract - which could be good or bad.

Contract would have given me an easy out if AVA Solar ever decides I am worth their while. But instead, I am going to sit down, shut up, and be happy with a job, work my tail off.

And the first order of business - I'm buying a new fridge. And I'm getting a stainless steel one. THEN we start working on running water and electric out to the pasture, and building our greenhouse. Thanks to the lay off, we were finally able to talk about finances, put together a budget and a plan for getting the BIG things we always wanted.