Disappointment and Desserts

The diet hasn’t been so great lately.

The largest roadblock I face continues to be my twice-a-month weekend road trips to Dallas.  Even though I make plans to cope with food on my return, the plans rarely reach fruition. When I make it back home I’m too tired to shop and too tired to cook, so I start the work week off with breakfast at McDonald’s.  It goes downhill from there.  I’m usually able to put myself back together by Wednesday night, but that’s FOUR DAYS of bad eating behind me.  (Weekend + Monday + Tuesday.)

I thought I had a solution for this — a new job in Dallas — but it’s past time for the committee to make a decision, so it looks like my interview wasn’t successful.  It’s the dream job, the kind of job I left teaching to get, but the committee must have liked another candidate else better.

I did everything I could to prep.  I couldn’t sleep for two nights before the interview due to presentation prepping and nerves, so I went in with three hours sleep (for two nights running) and still performed well, until I started losing steam in the last interview of a day-long interview. Or maybe my perceptions were off due to sleep deprivation. It doesn’t really matter at this stage, does it?  Over is over.

Hm.  I just realized I forgot to send a thank-you note for the interview.  It would probably look desperate at this stage.  I’ll wait a few weeks, until I’m sure I’ve failed, then send one out.

On the positive side, I haven’t gone into a depressing eat-everything tailspin over this failure.  I ate half a chocolate bar today, but I would probably have eaten it anyway.  (Chilis and cherries!!)

This could all be much worse.  I’m not miserable where I am.  I like the town, I like my office-mates.  I’m getting to do a lot of technically challenging things.  I’m just bored, and I feel isolated.  It’s like 50% of my skill sets are going to waste.  And this school is huge, conservative and tradition-laden, with tons of red tape and fiefdoms!  I don’t have the energy to innovate in this climate.

I would have been so good at that job! But I’m not the only one who would be good at it.

I am not going to Dairy Queen.  There are no Blizzards in my future.