Tuesday, February 8, 2011

Employed?!?

So the city of Gate (7 miles to the east, pop. 70) has a few businesses. There is a well known cafe that is open from 6 am to 2:30 pm 5 days a week. Good food cooked from scratch. There is an upscale western razzmatazz store (want a $5000 sculpture? find it there!) and if you walk into the back room, waalaa! a tiny grocery store! And there is a museum.

Gateway Museum is partially funded by state and federal groups. It is in the old depot and there is lots of train stuff (you know that makes me happy) and the baggage room is a library of new and OLD books. If there were more windows it would be a wonderful place, but that is just my problem. A back room has items from the farms around the town and is a wonderful collection of turn of the century stuff, plus mastodon bones, Indian arrowheads and meteorites.

Why, you say, am I telling you this? Well, the museum board has decided that they need me to work there. I warned them that I would leave to visit California on occasion, and that I would be leaving for good in July, and they still want me. It is a 20 hour a week job, and unfortunately, as the new kid, I get Monday, Friday and half of Saturday. But the best part (not really, but still nice) is the fact that they had talked about it for a while and no one had the nerve to ask me how old I am because you have to be over 55 and they weren't sure I would qualify. Mwhahahaha!

Anyway, I said yes and now the guy from the fed program has to come out from Enid (150 miles east) to talk to me but he is excited because this is supposed to be a job training job and when I leave to work it will make their stats look better.

I attended the board meeting last night to be inspected, and they were brainstorming ideas to advertise Gate. I had been thinking of a project that involved the museum and I guess I am forming a Stitch n Bitch group in Gate. I had already volunteered to work with a church group to teach knitting and crocheting so they could make prayer shawls, so now I have a classroom. It may just be me that shows up, but if I am going to be sitting there for hours at a time, I may as well be knitting. Of course, I can't call it Stitch n Bitch, because that isn't part of the language here in the church belt. Every time I say those words, people actually physically pull back. Kind of makes me want to call it that.

Anyway, looks like I am going to be making minimum wage for a while, but that is more than I am making now.

3 comments:

  1. What? You've over 55? When did that happen?
    Glad to hear you can help their stats for job training while you get paid to stitch.
    Sounds like you may have to bitch on your own dime. :)

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  2. Trains? Don't tell Zack or Ethan...or Corey for that matter!

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  3. Oh dear, the lady who wants to stop working there is very frustrated.
    The state coordinator guy who has to interview me is dragging his feet. Something to do with funding. I may not be able to help their stats if I don't get started soon. I have to be in Cali in 135 days for yearbook camp!

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