Everyone from all three shifts came. There were drinks, there were laughs, there was a lot of food, and a lot of walking around a completely silent and empty building while trying to process how surreal it all felt.

I saw a lot of friends today, even some co-workers that were fired or quit months or even over a year ago showed up and we traded stories and enjoyed each other's company.

It hit me worse when I got home and wasn't laughing along with my friends anymore. I spent two years giving that place my all and a disagreement between some suits hundreds of miles away made all that effort meaningless. We were literally #1 in the country under that contract for over a year, and it just didn't matter to them.

Yeah, pretty demoralizing. I've already updated my resume and am currently perusing Indeed (where I found this job), ZipRecruiter, and LinkedIn to see what I can find. I DID however also talk to our manager today, who said he's already gotten a job offer at a pre-fab distribution facility not far from where we are now and that he'll be expected to staff his department when he gets there, so I might be able to go back to work for him again under a different company. Just as a bit of context, he'd already arranged that we were all going to be paid for today and tomorrow even though today was just the party and we won't be ready to take the machinery down until Monday. He's always gone the extra mile to take care of us and continued to do so right up until the end.


I've got to sound like a broken record in regards to the Subscribestar I've mentioned over and over again, and I wanted to be more transparent about that:

1. I'm determined not to open it up and fully promote it on each upload until I have a completed set of original stories to prove that I can provide regular content to justify the money.

2. I'm afraid of starting it, not keeping up enough so I don't get a lot of subs, and this dropping me into a funk that leaves me not producing stories for months again.


That and being busy with working overtime, the trip, and then trying to start up job searching again have been factors in why I haven't tried it yet. I do fully intend to do so now, though, as having that as some supplemental income would enable me to try for some jobs that pay less than what I made before, but go up with a year or two of work if I can survive the shortfall.

Like I said in my last journal, I've got several commissions already started, and I should hopefully have a few of those and possibly also some of my own stories coming out in the next few days as I'll obviously have more free time until I have a new job. Hopefully that won't take too long.

In the meantime, trying to stay positive and make y'all some sexy new content!