To the City of My Birth, I Will Go

Comic cons are getting to be nationwide, even the small cities away from the urban centers like Orlando and Tampa are hosting their own.

Bartow, as you know, has one called SyFy (I need to upload photos of the one we just had).

Albany, Georgia has one going now, called Epicon.

I was born there, ages ago, in the forgotten days of yore.

They're hosting their next one in August.

I should go. I haven't been to the hometown since 1974 when my family moved to Virginia Beach. It's right up the road on US 19, there's been several chances I could have gone.

I've got books I can sell, as an author. I have a story in Strangely Funny III, "Minette Dances With the Golem of Albany," that has specific ties to the city.

Now I've got a great reason to do so.

Update 3/14/17: Okay, I am signed up. Now it's a question of finding out which hotels the guest artists are staying at if they've got one lined up.

The Quiet Man: The 2016 Remembrance

Checks calendar

Realizes it's St. Patricks Day

Finds a travelogue of the town of Innisfree.

Also finds a blog reporting how there are difficulties surrounding efforts to rebuild White O'Morn, which had fallen to ruin. The article is a few years old, but anything more recent doesn't seem as reliable. Ach.

One of these days, I gotta go visit. I need to be able to afford the trip, though. :/

Should I Travel Elsewhere to Job Hunt?

My parents keep insisting I need to travel in person to Maryland to do some door-to-door job hunting up there.

See, Florida is still a weak job market.  Even at 8 percent or so that's statewide, but even higher around the Tampa Bay area where I'm at.

Maryland is a better job market - roughly 6 percent, with larger businesses - but there's the costs of going up there in person.  Sure, I have family up there as well, but I can't stay there forever while I hunt for work.

The thing is, in this day and age everything is done via computers and resume submissions.  I've been taught via the local career center, informed by Human Resource personnel giving speeches about how to put in for jobs, and figured through my own experiences job hunting that going in-person and handing over a resume doesn't impress anymore.  Every HR has an application process you HAVE to fill out, and that's mostly done online anymore.

But the other thing is, I'm at that point in the job-hunting process - unemployment benefits long gone, for one - that I'm desperate for a full-time job.  And while I've had more interviews this year than before - for library openings, for a handful of tech jobs - and while I do have a contractual will-call (it's like part-time) work with a desktop support firm, I'm still not getting any full-time job offers around here in Florida.

And the other other thing is, this is December.  Holiday season.  Odds of HR people off on vacations: pretty high.

If there's anything I can go and do would be attending job fairs: places where HR people do sit there and accept resumes by hand.  They may still require an application be filled, but at least you speak to someone and have a means of impressing right away.

So I gotta ask: for anyone in the know in Maryland / DC area, are there any Job Fairs going on this month of December that an experienced librarian / desktop support computer tech can get a decent chance of handing out resumes?  Please let me know in the comments field.  Thanks!