I woke up around 1 a.m. last night to take my first look at election coverage to find that Barack Obama had clinched the win over underdog John McCain. Since the second Bush win in 2004, I have been unable to really follow much of the campaigns because I couldn’t let myself get wrapped up in a candidate and the idea of someone in office until it was certain.

The one thing I am pissed about is Proposition 8 looking like it is going to pass in California? WTF? Sorry, Ellen and Portia and all you other Californians who thought you deserved to be treated the same as everyone else.

One thing that I do LOVE about elections, aside from checking into my own special booth with the always-uncapped black felt tip pen is people outside campaigning near polling stations. I love to beep and wave like a madwoman at people, if they’re waving McCain signs or question one, two or three posters.

The questions went the way I voted, so again, I was happy. Overall, this election has vastly improved the way I look at voting in America… but I’m still confused about California. A state that can go blue but says they want to overturn gay marriage? What about West Hollywood? Come on people….

Now with Obama coming into office, some non-political things we can all look forward to seeing in the news in the future is his basketball court he supposedly will be putting into the White House as reported on Mike&Mike on ESPN radio and also more fashion coverage on the always well-dressed Mrs. President.

She is a vast improvement over Hill and her never ending supply of multi-colored pantsuits. phew

It really is a popular option these days for college kids to actually spend a year or more living at home with mom and pop before scooting out into the real world to their own place and their own utilities/cable/internet bills.

I didn’t feel so bad about coming back home considering that I had spent three months out and was coming home because I wasn’t making the stack that I had been promised. Not to mention I had been living in Nebraska – land of cowboys, Job Chamberlain and the Huskers.

Within my first week back, I had obtained my second part-time employment gig at a gym in the area that I will from this point on out refer to as “Workout Land.” I have been training the last two weeks to be the weekend front desk person and figured it would not only be a good way to make some moolah, but also meet some people my age and hear about what is going on in and around the bubbling metropolis of Worcester.

I have enjoyed myself so far, made some pals and have certainly gotten in some quality people watching. That could be creepy, but trust me, watching members’ weird workout habits like running an elliptical at marathon-qualifying pace while planning your wedding on your cell phone is more hilarious and puzzling to watch than you may think.

Back to my point, it’s just part-time work. I suppose it could be like a career move if I wanted to become the manager of some Workout Land in the future, but that’s not really my thing. And who is gonna complain about making extra money? Not me. That’s for damn sure.

So picture me, bopping around at Workout Land, checking in members, cleaning tanning beds and the such, it’s not as if I really have any other pressing matters I should be taking care of instead. Along comes some person, any random person – they could be an old friend of my parents, or the parent-of-my-little-sister’s-best-friend’s-ex-boyfriend who I have seen at the last like four or five family Christmas parties.

This same person who had never really been able to leave me alone enough to my cans of Bud Light without asking me the same dumb questions about school, so that she could then in-turn brag about her precious boys who were, at that time, enrolled at snotty little private business colleges in the state. If it weren’t bad enough that they were St. John’s alumns, they were also frat daddies. Excellent.

The same woman is a member at Workout Land and I say hello to all members, that is my job. But I see a face that I recognize, an I’m willing to chat.

“Oh, so this is what you’re doing?” she says.
“Yeah, I’m ditching my Bachelors degree to work for just over minimum wage cleaning your sweat off the same treadmill on the reg.” I replied.

Just kidding, I didn’t say that. After briefly explaining my employment history in a three-second spot, she nodded and hit me with “So you’re living at home?”

I have come to referring to my childhood room as “my apartment” basically to humor myself as I rehash the details to every person who I remotely know who asks these same questions of me. Every. Day.

It happens more often than I wish it would, and to be honest, I’m getting tired of it. I’m starting to think I might offer people a few different responses to test them.

Haven’t you heard? I was named the mayor or Worcester?
I joined the Sharks, duh!
I’m pregnant.

OK, so the last option might only be funny to me. Then my parents would get wind, and sickly enough, would become quite infatuated with the idea that they were going to be grandparents and turn my apartment into “the baby’s room.” Ugh.

Moral of the story is, unless you are in your twenties, don’t ask all sorts of question of a recent college grad where answering you truthfully might send them into depression. We all wish we were living in some great studio in Boston or were chilling with Paris Hilton in NYC while working some killer job 9-5 like Lauren Conrad on the Hills where you do nothing.

Don’t make us relive the fact that we’re living at home. Don’t make jokes about how the market sucks. We know all these things, we just graduated and have been scouring job listings for the last nine months and have put in apps at every fast food joint in a 25 mile radius hoping someone calls us back with a full-time spot so we can at least get health insurance.

Instead, you could say everyone’s doing it and you will buy us a beer the next time you see us at the Blue Plate. Alcohol – now that is a reference that any recent college grad can understand and appreciate.

On a positive note, I went to the Patriots game this past Monday. I enjoyed the game until some guy in the row in front of me wouldn’t stop telling me how getting married cost more than having a baby (He knew because his “girl” was preggo). I told him I was there to watch Wes Welker, not host a TLC debate.
I also got my picture with the viking guy who Randy Moss jumped on. These are the highlights that my life consists of right now.

I never thought I would say it felt good to be home, but after spending nearly my entire summer in south-central Nebraska trying my hand at what turned out to be possibly the most hellish job I hope to ever have, I was more than willing to click the heels of my discounted Kenneth Cole heels and make the 26+ hour drive home to Central Mass.

After graduating from the University of Massachusetts Amherst with a degree in journalism and a minor in anthropology, rugby and bar life 101, I was ready to get started on my life post-college, where people go on dates, wear ironed dress pants and have their own health insurance.

You could say I jumped the gun taking a sports writing position at a family of small newspapers in Nebraska. While I loved the job, the hours (70 a week), puny salary ($22,500) and less-than-stellar reimbursement for mileage (25 cents compared to the government-suggested 58 cents) finally wore on me to the point of packing up my two-door civic and coming home.

Returning to my hometown has served as a chance to appreciate things I hadn’t before I left: people in the Northeast look behind them before they back into the road and for the love of fried food, there is only one fast food restaurant in my hometown – in Hastings, NB where I lived, there was every type of fast food place you could think of, including some mid-western specialties that just pleaded for me to put on that extra five pounds I’m now killing myself to run off.

I had been making calls to places I had interned at in the Worcester area, annoyed job posters from Craig’s List for about two weeks before I actually got home, but I was unprepared for the barren desert that is the job market for recent college grads with degrees in journalism with almost a year’s worth of job experience (I freelance for ESPN!) who are hardworking and friendly in the 508.

Alas, the birth of this blog! I am on the quest for a lot of things in my life right now, but isn’t everyone?

First of all, I am looking for a full-time job with benefits so I can start playing rugby again and get ready for the snowboarding season this winter while paying bills and student loans off. I will eventually be looking for an apartment so I can get out of my parents’ house and into my own crib.

Additionally, I will be looking for inexpensive places to eat (that are not fast food), clean and safe places to run outside, dates, a bar (or two) to call home, fun stuff to do and a place that makes a double-shot vanilla soy latte the way I like it among many other things.

Worcester and the surrounding area has a lot to offer, but with the exception of a few winter breaks and weekends here and there during my senior year at the Zoo, I never had the opportunity to experience Worcester as an of-age, single, rugby-playing college graduate.

So here it goes, wish me luck and check back to see how I’m doing and I will give you a heads-up on the goods I find around Wormtown.