Well, shit

So longstrider didn't get the Kalamazoo job.

And now I need to come clean about something I haven't been talking about for the past year: although we didn't know it when he started his job search, it took on a much more urgent cast when we were informed that longstrider didn't get tenure. So at the end of the month, he will no longer have a job, and while there are other opportunities on the horizon, it seems very likely that there will be at least some period of unemployment. This, obviously, is very bad.

Me being me, I've been planning for this for a while. I'm going to stop waiting for the right job and go sign up with as many employment agencies as it takes to find a job. longstrider will be doing the same, while still sending his resume out for good jobs. The austerity budget will be instituted. If neither of us can find a job that offers health insurance, we'll borrow money from my mother for COBRA (do I even have to rant about how much it sucks sometimes to live in a country that doesn't consider health care a basic human right, particularly when you actually need it? I absolutely cannot let my health insurance coverage lapse, because if I do, I won't be able to get coverage for pre-existing conditions when we get it again. And I think health insurance that doesn't cover my heart would be a bit of a bad thing...). And I realized recently that the thing that's been keeping me from applying for more library jobs is that 1) I'm rusty in certain aspects of cataloging, and 2), I've never used OCLC, the basic cataloging software that's a prerequisite for just about any cataloging job out there. So I'll be taking a cataloging class at the IU library school this fall, which will whip my cataloging chops back into shape, and more importantly, teach me how to use OCLC. So then I can start sending my resume out as well.

So there's a plan. And me being me, I can rest much more easily when I know what to do. But I'd be lying if I said I wasn't still a bit scared.