What Have I Been Doing For the Last Five Years?

Right before my birthday in March of 2018, my wife and I decided to divorce. It sucked, but I thought to myself, "At least I still have my career!"

Fast forward eight months to when I was told I was going to be laid off.

Well...sh*t. Now what?

Priority number one, of course, was (and still is) spending as much time with my kiddo as possible. Bills were a lot larger than my unemployment, so after a month on the bench I jumped back into the workforce. My first stop?

The post office!

Not a bad job for a post-radio career. The benefits for career postal workers are fantastic, and there were several career workers who were approaching retirement, so getting my own route was likely only a few years away.

Things went well enough for about a year. I supplemented my part-time postal job with a food delivery job, and made enough money to afford a clean place and food.

Then March 2020 came along and AAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!

That pandemic thing happened, and most people had to stay home. Except, of course, for us essential workers! And bored people burned through their stimulus checks by ordering All Of The Things from Amazon, which turned my part-time postal job into a part-time 60+ hours per week postal job.

I hung on for another 6 months before leaving the post office. I never had time to see my kiddo (or do anything besides sleep and work), and that just wasn't going to work. My next stop was another essential worker job: machining!

I was a press brake operator for about 7 months. It was challenging! There's a ton of math and geometry involved before starting an order. I worked three 12-hour shifts, which gave me enough free time to narrate an audiobook. That was a humbling experience (that I'm saving for a future article). Unfortunately, the shift I was hired for took up my entire weekend. As a working musician (and with pandemic restrictions starting to be lifted), I really wanted my weekends back. So it was on to the next job.

Throwin' kegs!

Everybody loves the beer delivery guy! And while I loved some of the exercise, I didn't love the rest of the exercise. This time I lasted two months before my next next next adventure.

Back to radio!

I stayed put for TWO WHOLE YEARS before leaving that station for The Loon. It wasn't exactly a long trip, but it was a bit of a strange trip. I worked jobs I never thought I'd ever work, and was welcomed back to a place I didn't think I'd ever make it back to. Cheers to not giving up on your dreams!