Mmmmm, books part 2

[teenygozer]

You know what's cool? Having books on Library Thing where you are the only person who has that book.

I seem to have cornered the market in snarky Alice in Wonderland satire of a bygone age:

Comments

[teenygozer]

HAHAHA, no. Most of my flist has posted about LibraryThing at one time or another for the past few years; I only got interested because someone on my flist posted about Amazon throwing their weight around with the site, and the link happened to coincide with A) my being out of work and able to make time to shift through books and B) my desire to catalog, then dispose of, half my library. I have too many books, they're stacked on the floor, and I want to donate a good chunk of the ones that are not valuable, that I will not be reading again or can get an e-copy of if I did happen to want to read it. LibraryThing will be useful for the cataloging part.

But a post touting LibraryThing isn't personal or intimate, whereas my two posts about the necklaces I'd made were, as was a personal essay/short story I wrote about my childhood. It was hurtful to me when people I thought of as friends didn't comment, and then I looked back on the LJ and confirmed my long-held suspicions that they either never comment, or at best almost never comment, while I have often (until recently) posted to their LJs. While it's true that in years past, I used to almost never post to my own LJ, these days I post quite a bit, and I'm posting personal stuff, and yet they still do not comment. It brought home to me the fact that knowing someone for over 20 years can make one an acquaintance but not necessarily a friend.

At any rate, our lives sound somewhat similar: by now, we should have had several stores and a house, instead we have one store that plugs along and everyone loves, but if one of the grotto-style crap comic book stores nearby has a sale, people go there instead. These are the same people who would be shocked if we closed up shop and would bemoan the loss of a fabulous little store, and isn't it sad that it closed! I've been laid off by a company board of directors that didn't just lay me off, it laid off the three people I worked for (and one of them was the goddamn CEO!) and just about everyone I knew as a friend in the company. My skill set is fabulous, I see tv commercials trying to get people to spend lots of money to acquire my computer skills, but there are not only no jobs, there aren't even any interviews. None of my work buddies have been able to get interviews, so it's not just me. Employers are, like the universities, going on the cheap, so when push eventually comes to shove, I will undoubtedly easily get a low-paying temp job without benefits doing what I used to get a very good wage for with benefits. /moaning

[chelseagirl]

I find that LJ responses are fairly random by nature -- some things I've put time into and thought would interest people seemingly go unread until, sometimes, I'm with someone on my f-list and mention something -- nobody commented on it so I figure nobody saw it -- and what they say in reply makes it clear they were paying attention even if they didn't respond.

Similarly, I did read your jewelry posts, but I thought "they're nice" was inadequate, and I didn't have a more appropriate response at the time -- it sounded like you were looking for more thoughtful, detailed responses to the pieces and I didn't think I had anything that would be worthwhile saying -- my inadequacy, not yours. (As I recall you posted shortly after I was at a crafts night gathering with a number of very talented, creative people, so was feeling my own lack of having much to offer in that department very strongly at the time.)

So I'm very sorry if you felt let down by me.

Really sorry things aren't picking up with interviews and etc. -- they keep saying a recovery is on the horizon but it would be nice to see some evidence in the form of jobs. I hope it turns around for you and doesn't come down to temping, at least not for long.