It ain’t hard to tell I’m on my own clock:  I just lost an hour of my life – and delayed my roadtrip to Indy for an hour – because I had to find out what the Hell the “Zoot Suit” song was being used for the 2010 start of Burn Notice Season 3.

Come to find out they weren’t singing “Get your Zoot Suit on…” but were singing “Get your Silk Suit on.” The Burn Notice 2010 commercial song is “Silk Suit,” by KRAM.

Lyrics are written in a classic blues style. Simple blues riff. Fun to listen to:

Get your Silk Suit on / Get your Silk Suit on
Ain’t nobody else that’s got it goin’ on

The song also insists you get your “black dress” and “sneakers” on as well. Guys, if you must, you must, but I’m gonna support the ladies’ need to do this…

Now, I can drive down to Indy in peace and enjoy my weekend of Colts Football, Indiana ReBar pre and post parties, and learning more insider information about Blog Indiana’s 2010 events.

So long as I have my Silk Suit on, have my Silk Suit on.

Ain’t nobody else that’s got it goin’ on.

Did y’all have as much trouble as I did finding this Burn Notice song?

(photo credit:  ch5224 via flickr)

Popularity: 71% [?]

According to the Indiana State Workforce Development Self Service Claimant Unemployment Website, all you have to do – once you’re approved for unemployment benefits – is the following:

• Register, post your resume and have your resume available on line for employers to view in our job matching service (IC 22-4-14) at https://www.IndianaCareerConnect.com within four (4) weeks of filing your claim.
• To fulfill work search requirements, submit one application per week (first line of on-line weekly voucher) and conduct two additional work searches per week (second and third line of on-line weekly voucher) in order to remain eligible for benefits. You may apply for work in person, by mail, or online, and be able to document your job application information to DWD upon request. Mailing or submitting a resume for an open position qualifies as applying.

Failure to complete these requirements will cause benefits to be denied until these requirements have been met.

(source url: https://solutions.dwd.in.gov/uplink/uplink-information.htm#benefitRequirements)

I have fulfilled the obligation, as noted below:

As you can read, my Resume is online and searchable by employers.

Yet when I go to fill out my voucher, the state unemployment site tells me the following:

Confused? Me too.

Since I figured it was just a disconnect between:

• https://uplink.in.gov/CSS/CSSLogon.htm (Indiana state online employment claimant site)
• https://www.indianacareerconnect.com/ (Indiana state job boar)

I didn’t think too much about it.

But then today I went to go catch up on my claims and I couldn’t go past the week of 12/12 claim because of the “STOP! Provide information on all links below!”

Midnight hit, and I was allowed to reactive my claim. REASON:  I didn’t “provide all information” within 30 days according to the state claim site, even though I had it done within a couple days of filing my claim.

And today is Sunday so I can’t call. So I went to the only place I can ask questions about my claim online:

https://askworkone.in.gov/

I asked the following question:

I have been approved for unemployment. i have uploaded a resume to the indiana career connect site. I have done all that is required yet when i go to my claimant homepage, it still tells me: SMARTLINKS – STOP! You must provide information on all links listed below. Go to Job Match What more do I have to do?

The site told emailed me with an autoreply:

We have received your message and will respond to you within 7 days.

You may review your message below. Thank you for asking WorkOne!

7 DAYS? U’mmm, no.

I bitched on Twitter, got a couple of nice replies from Noah Coffey & Douglas Karr. DK said something that triggered a thought:

Who the Hell did design the sites?

So I did a little poking around to discover that at the bottom of https://www.indianacareerconnect.com/ is a note:

Well, who the Hell is Geographic Solutions, Inc?

Come to find out that Geographic Solutions, Inc. is a employer software solution based in the Indiana town of Palm Harbor, Florida. Here’s the Geographic Solutions Press Release about their development of Indiana Career Connect. Now I know there’s the joke that Florida can also be called “South Indiana,” but I don’t think that counts as My Man Mitch keeping the work in-house.

So, my guess:

Indiana state’s archiac unemployment claim site isn’t syncing with the Florida company’s Indian job board site and people like me who need the site are suffering for it.

PROVISO:

I am still not certain that it’s a sync issue. I could have done something wrong with my claim. If that’s the case, then the state’s sites do not properly tell me what more I need to do to correct the problem. Either way there is a disconnect.

I can’t wait to find out and pass that information along.

Check back tomorrow as I give tips in an open letter to the state on how to make the sites suck less.

Popularity: 100% [?]

(I’m working towards this scene, but forgetting to rest as I go)

I woke up, got prepared for a meeting in New Buffalo, MI, and called to confirm. They answered, said it would be better if I backed it up a day, and I was none more thankful. Now I’m backing up my trip to Indy.

Heaven bless the nature of the business.

See the night before I went out with my old boss and a few co-workers. My old boss claimed it was my birthday and people flocked out. Imagine my surprise. Not only that, it was my third birthday this year. And a, “thank you,” goes out to all who came.

Sometimes you have to blow off steam. I forget that.

I don’t do it enough. I try to pretend I’m a machine. I think about how I’ve got 16 days before I go to Ft. Myers, Margaritaville for three weeks and then think I can work straight on till I board the plane.

I’m not a machine.

So when I went back to bed and didn’t wake up until 3pm, refreshed, invigorated, and mostly free from Gumballhead hangover, my body was trying to remind me to balance myself.

In sports, they would call my last few weeks, “playing to the level of the competition.” Some teams can give the best in their sport a run for their money on any given night and then turn around and falter to the league doormats.

If I can’t perform at my best every day, then I’ll never get to where I want to go. Right now, I have no real pressure or deadlines except ones I imply on myself. The best realize the only real pressure to worry about is the pressure to be the best “you” you can be. Everything is temporal and fades away with time.

I’m getting too old not to remember that.

And someday, I’ll be a craftsman.

Are you doing your best every day?

(Photo Credit: Pat Kono via Flickr)

Popularity: 18% [?]

When developing a social media while working on a writing career, one should be faithfully mindful of a simple concept: opportunity cost.

Case and point: this evening.

After 12 hours of work I warmed up some rigitoni as a part of my dinner. Instead of getting off the bed after inhaling dinner I laid there watching the Dolphins / Jets game while flipping back to see Crank.

And I lost three hours.

In those lost three hours when I could have been blogging a post on my laptop instead of this iPhone or reading Brogan / Smith’s “Trust Agents,” I did the following:

1) I watched my Fantasy League team’s comeback fall short by a half-point because Ricky Williams limped off the field during the Dolphins game-winning drive.

2) I contemplated how Statham’s character survived the 6,000 ft. drop onto a sedan at the end of “Crank” in order to make “Crank 2.” Rumor has it the sequel is nowhere near the quality of the original…

3) I pondered the deep philosophical inspirations that inspired the “Crank” movie franchise.

4) Cleaned up what was left of the moth that I smooshed on ceiling with my copy of “Trust Agents.”

5) Realized the night slipped by, again.

And if I would have accomplished my goals this evening then the cat probably, probably wouldn’t have pissed in my doorway.

It’s not like I rested. I was awake enough not to benefit from laying down.

And now I’m getting inspired by the midnight showing of Remember the Titans.

Oh, if it would have started at 9pm. It’s what people do in those three hours that separates the leaders from the participators.

Can’t wait to read this tomorrow at work. Hope it reminds not to have this evening again.

Popularity: 15% [?]

I’ve still got three things to do before I can actually write a chapter in Book of Blues Prequel. But once those things are done, then its just me and those Book of Blues.

A watching the final season of Royal Pains should do the trick.

For me, writer’s block seems to be a forced condition. My subconscious seems to keep me a safe distance from my fears. Overbearing really.

Luckily there’s only a half-hour of it to go.

Now, will my writer’s block let me get to working out?

Popularity: 13% [?]