Dear Diary: I Am Still Unemployed

Refusing the urge to call myself “funemployed” took more energy than you might think. Truthfully I’m oscillating between feeling the most fulfilled I’ve ever felt in my life, to lying on the floor with no pants on, desperately wishing to fall asleep so I don’t have to be conscious for my next stress-induced panic attack.

Since being laid off on April 12th, I’ve:

• Developed two board games and two card games, spending roughly 4 hours each day
• Written a Broncos-themed homage to Silent Hill
• Played 300ish hours of video games, including finishing Breath of the Wild: Crying Edition in its first 3 days of release
• Unpacked and organized all of my miniature painting supplies, then stared at them with hollow eyes for several hours without using them
• Reorganized the furniture throughout my house
• Read every single post that has made it to the top 100 of the front page of Reddit
• Applied for 25 jobs
• Attended two interviews
• Gained 30lbs
• Cancelled almost all of my recurring subscriptions. There were a lot!
• Gone outside twice, once to get my wife’s car new tires and once to go to the liquor store
  • technically, I have been in my backyard a couple times to pull my dogs inside and have taken the trash to the curb once a week
• Cooked and eaten over 40 soft tacos
• Excluding one night of heavy drinking, less than 5 drinks total

This is a pitifully short list. I’m the guy that posted a bucket list over 200 items long, most of which consists of completely achievable creative projects, and I’d say that only about 20% of my time has been dedicated to creative pursuits. Thank god I’ve been working on those games or I’d have basically nothing to show for all the free time I’ve had. It’s amazing how little I’ve actually done with this time. I’ve fantasized about having unlimited time to work on my own projects, but the fantasies never include days where I wake up and immediately reject my own consciousness. There really are days when I just don’t want to exist at all. The other days are great, but oscillating randomly between the two states is exhausting.

I also thought I’d spend a lot more effort trying to lose weight. I’m eating decently well (read: not eating fast food or delivery regularly), but the gym is an evil room in my basement where the bad feelings live, so I haven’t been in there more than a couple times. I’m at the point in my life where my body is entering yikes mode so I really need to do something. I promised myself that if I didn’t get down to under 300lbs by my 32nd birthday, I’d start looking into weight loss surgery. I hadn’t considered that I might not have health insurance or a job on that birthday, but it’s looking increasingly more likely to be the case.

If anything, I should be writing more. I’m addicted to the game design process right now so it’s where my mind has gone whenever it feels creative, but I’m going to make an effort to get back to my keyboard some more. That said, my first physical edition of my first board game is out for delivery today, so I see myself spending a big chunk of time staring at it this afternoon and evening.

40 days unemployed. 6/10, will rate again if it lasts to 60.