The magical world of unemployment

Looking for a job is, in a way, magical. Your future is unknown. You could be on the road to success. You could be on the road to failure. You could be trudging toward total mediocrity. (Come to think of it, I guess that's not all that different from being a full-time employee, really.) To ensure my future employment, I have conferred with my associates living in the Magical World of Disney to determine what is required to convince a future employer of my worth as their loyal subject.

My dear friends Pluto, Mickey and Bambi all agreed that what I need to do right now is to pull a rabbit out of a hat. Literally. So this morning I donned my realistic white beard and my pointed hat, grabbed my custom-made Gandalf staff and began my journey to the Land of the Employed.

And a treacherous journey it was. No sooner had I rounded the corner and left my sheltered home when some bedeviled  creature with a ruddy red face and ruddy red hair screamed at me from his ruddy red BMW. I don't remember being as frightened when facing the Drooling Morlocks of the Midnight Netherworld. (Yes, these were the same Morlocks from The Time Machine. They were drooling in the Midnight Netherworld well before Mr. Wells was playing Martian Invasion in his sandbox.)

As I proceeded on my quest, my road split three ways. I could go left to the prancing liberal land of the Pelosi or I could go right to the dreaded Bogs of Newt. Rejecting both of these options, I decided to go forward and take the Middle Road, even though I knew that led to the seductive but disappointing Audacious Articulations of Barack.

For the nonce, all went well. The trees were singing. The birds were shining. The leaves smiled down from the blue night sky. When of a sudden, I found myself falling. In my reverie, I had failed to watch my step and stumbled head-over-heels into the Endless Pit of Reality. My heart pounded full gallop in my very bosom, just as it did that day when I went over the river and through the woods to Grandmother's house. Despite what you may have heard, the horse did NOT know the way to carry the sleigh.

I waved my staff and screamed these words into the very heart of  the darkened pit, "I SHALL BE EMPLOYED!"

With a flash and a thud I was expelled by the pit into the Downtown of McKinney. I found myself rolling as I did as a child when I attended Gollum's "My Precious!" Gymnastics class for wizards.

As I sat on the sidewalk, a strange gentleman with an aloof demeanor tossed a few coins at me. I heard him mutter to his female companion, "All he needs is a cardboard sign and he'd make a fortune."

The light of enlightenment burst forth and shone through the very substance of my brain, shedding illumination upon the very problem I had set out to resolve. A cardboard sign! That was the very thing.

And so my friends, should you in your own journey find yourself in the Downtown of McKinney, visit me, and toss a few spare coins my way. There is a home in the Shire that I must pay for.

For a taste of my magic, click upon my face if you dare: