Fundraisers are a scam

The hardest thing I did yesterday was get this Spring Rolls package open. Seriously. It was ridiculously hard to do. After that, I tried to fry the spring rolls so they would look like the golden brown things on the package. This was a fail. But you know what? I fed it to my family anyway. (Along with all the ice cream they wanted to make up for this offense to my cooking street cred.)




I recently started a job that I am not in love with. It is a parody of "The Office" every day - if "The Office" was filmed at an African American college. Naturally, I stand out a bit there, among other oddities that I have found.
My boss is kind of eccentric. She is a combination of Michael Scott and Stanley from Accounting. Ironically, we are the accounting department and are pretty much hated by the rest of the college, but I have come to conclude that everyone hates the gatekeepers of the money. It just comes with the job. I work on travel expenses and I get to explain why employees can't expense a $70 meal, that we aren't going to pay for your wife and child to travel with you for your business trip, or that the policy says that you have to get a compact rental car for you and your football coaches even if you are all 6' 5" tall and travelling together... Maybe it is a little obvious why we are hated...

Anyway, each day is a new adventure including the fact that: the HVAC is out, there are huge windows with indications that they once held blinds, and the water cooler hasn't been filled since 1996. Don't get me started on the fridge. Anyway, I have toyed with quitting but it really isn't that bad. My biggest complaint is that for the first month no one talked to me. This was the first time that I realized that my chosen profession - accounting - employs a bundle of introverts! I was a wilting flower with each passing day. I would hope to get fired but wasn't willing to just quit. It was a terrible conundrum. I wasn't sure if I was just having a hard time because going back to work at a real job after years of volunteering is just hard. Or maybe it was the people I work with. Or maybe it was because no one has dusted in 20 years. I don't know, but recently things have started changing. I got assigned to a specific type of account. I started having people ask me if I wanted supplies (this is a big deal in an office). I had a brand new comfy chair show up - which caused some hostility with the other employees. Then I got a new computer. Then I was asked if I would like to move into my own private office. This has been awkward because I am the newest employee and no one else is getting these favors. I turned the office down because: it doesn't have a window, I would be isolated, and no one would be forced to talk to me when they walk by. It is a strange problem to have but I can't handle people not talking to me. I eavesdrop on every conversation so that I can feel a part of it. Seriously. I am an extreme extrovert and probably have some disorder but it seems to be working at this place.

So I just keep showing up like it's the most important thing I do each day. "You're going to pay the college back for that nightcap, Professor."

This leads me to the next complaint in my life - I am fundamentally opposed to fundraisers as I feel that they are a scam. They scam you into paying triple the cost of some mediocre cookie dough. They entice children to hassle all their friend's parents, grandparents, and neighbors that they never talk to, and then you run the risk of all those people sending their kids to you when they have a fundraiser. The cost of sending your child out to do a fundraiser could reach bankruptcy levels when the favor is returned in kind. It is a scam.

My child brought home a fundraiser. 

My kids tend to lack ambition, particularly this one, but for some reason one of the prizes has got this child on a mission to sell 20 items. 20 ITEMS! I don't even have 20 friends here who we can ask. We talked long and hard about this because despite all my bells and whistles going off, I have to let this kid explore something that they are finally interested in. However, I told said child that they will have to do the work for it. The prize is that you get to leave school and go to lunch with a group of other kids who scammed 20 people out of their money. I told said child that I will just buy a lunch at that restaurant - to no avail. I had to let this one play out.

The kid wants to sell them at church. Hard no. Then wants me to sell them at work. Um, no. For one thing, I don't want to start that at the office; for another thing, I don't want to be stuck working until the fundraiser items come in, if I should choose that I have had enough with Michael Scott and the crew. So now we are hitting up all the friends. I apologize in advance for those who are stuck in the scam. Said child has tried to be respectful in the way that they have asked, and is learning some good life lessons, but I couldn't have been more surprised that a Ponzi scheme would motivate this kid. Being a parent stinks sometimes. Being an employee also stinks.

So here we are, counting down our last 6 months in Ohio. Our plan is to move to San Antonio at the beginning of April but until then, we will all be struggling to survive, but hopefully not eating failed attempts at cooking spring rolls. Happy Fall!