The Pros and Cons of Unemployment

Wow, just over three months ago, I sung to the rafters my glee to finally be working in the Irish Pub I have loved for three plus years. Yet today, I find myself sacked, canned, and given the boot. The manager whose iconoclasm initially struck me as an asset turned out to be anything but; a liability who repeatedly told employees to "shut up", called customers cocks, bitches, and assholes behind their backs (though has still been overheard more than once), and referred to one attractive hostess as an "amenity' he hired for the male customers. In fact, he was the most unfriendly and ill-mannered in my employment history. And that's saying something. I am old, after all. 


As part of dusting myself off and packing up my troubles in my old kit bag (smiles everyone), I've decided to compose a pro and con list about my new predicament/opportunity.


Pro- I'll have more time for housework.                                
Con- I'll have more time for housework.


Con- My beer budget has severely decreased.
Pro- My weight loss chances have exponentially increased due to lack of beer consumption.

Pro- I'll no longer have to look at stringy, oily hair pulled into a ragged ponytail and meant to cover a bald spot.

Con- My own hair will become stringy and oily as I'll have nowhere I am meant to be other than home.

Pro- I won't have to deal with disgruntled customers (honestly, they were few and far between other than those who complained about the aforementioned manager).

Con- I'll start talking to people in grocery store lines again due to lack of social interaction.

Con II- My teenagers are far more disgruntled than any customer. I'd like someone to gruntle them now.

Con- Paying the mortgage will be challenging if not impossible.

Pro- Appreciating the ability to once again accomplish this feat will be that much sweeter when it reoccurs. And it will reoccur, damn it.

Con- I'll miss my favorite Irish Pub, its atmosphere, and its people, those employed there and those who frequent there.

Pro- I really don't have a pro to this one, which hurts most of all. I still love that place as if it were my own and am saddened that its owners have decided to stay with a manager that drives people away more than he attracts them. Let's see... I'll save gas and vehicle wear and tear by not driving there and back. See? I can be practical when pushed into it!

That last one robbed me of the last of my inner steam so I'll leave it there. 

My hopes? 

That I am wrong, completely wrong, about Unpleasant Manager. That O'Donoghue's thrives like it never has before and becomes a permanent and wanted part of the North Scottsdale social scene. That all the people I have met and grown to love remember me as fondly as I will them.

I'm going back to my art business for now, I already have orders within an hour of announcing its reincarnation via Facebook . Let's make that my final "pro" and end here.

Ádh mór a chara. Beidh tú i gcuimhne i gcónaí. 

Good luck my friend. You will always be remembered.