Busy Signal

  by Andy - December 3rd, 2008 - 3:34 pm| Uncategorized | 24 comments

It sucks to lose your job.

Everything about it is harsh.

I hate the ink stains left on your fingertips while thumbing through the want ads.

I hate the depression that can envelope you while Christmas commercials of better, happier times air all day long.

Time slows to a crawl while the bills pile up on the coffee table.

Then there’s the phone calls from the creditors who don’t care how down on your luck you are.

It’s a bitter sour taste that is hard to cleanse from your palate.

Add to all of it the thought that nobody out there gives a damn.

That’s the way Michael Sallee feels.

He lost his job right before Thanksgiving.

The Auto Parts salesman says he has spent every moment since then, looking for work, and dialing the Tennessee Department of Labor over and over and over again, trying to file for unemployment insurance.

His tiny Goodlettsville apartment is filled with the drone of a busy signal as he calls the department at my request.

One call. Busy. Hang up. A 2nd call. Busy. Hang up. A 3rd call. Busy. Hang up. And so it goes for 19 straight calls, before he gets through.

Sadly, he only gets a recording that he has heard before. It drones on about this and that and that and this. The 50 year old tells me the call is so long it sucks his cell phone minutes. The husband and father tells me that he leaves a message, but so far nobody on planet earth has called him back.

“Is this the first time you are out of work,” I ask the good natured man.

“Yes,” he laughs. “In 30 years. Yes.”

“What was it like?”

“It was not good, you don’t know where the next check is coming bill coming in. and no income.”

He tells me that his stress is compounded with every busy signal from the department of labor and workforce development hot line.

“You call the number. You get this big long recording and press the numbers and then you get this message, a recording that says because of all these calls they can’t take your call right then, so you have to hang up and try again. it is very frustrating. i just want to know if I can or cannot get unemployment.  That would relieve a lot of stress so I can get out here and find a job, and I am trying to do both.”

Is the state doing enough to get people signed up for unemployment insurance?

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Messed Up Email Of The Day: Electronic signage

  by Andy - December 3rd, 2008 - 2:32 pm| Uncategorized | 2 comments

And this one comes complete with pictures! You know we had to feature it. By request of the author, we’ve removed the sender’s name.

Dear Andy,

I think that it is “messed up” that a neighborhood business is allowed to erect the most disturbing bright red sign in history outside of Vegas.

I have never seen anything like it on this road ever and I have lived in Nashville for 14 years. In fact, I have lived in this home for 5 years and have yet to complain because I bought this home already knowing some of the down falls.

It is bad enough that I have to deal with increased car insurance rates because of the crime here, or the murders (Bellacino’s), or perhaps the abundance of the 21 and up clubs but not this.

My property value for my modest home already suffers because of this truance and now I have to be concerned that a potential buyer will drive by here at night and think they are buying a home in the red light district. It is not just me.

The red light from this sign lights up my home, the neighbor’s homes, and up and down the street capable of being seen in every direction. In fact, the sign is so bright that it reflects off the apartment building windows behind my home and then reflects right into my bedroom.

The sign is the tallest sign on this road by far and the brightest indeed. I welcome you to drive by and tell me you can’t tell what I am talking about here. Please help me make this news worthy.