Grabs the mike.

Sure-fire methods to get me angry: arrive twenty minutes late, repeat the same lines about offered services over and over, speak down to me, avoid asking me what I want, and keep my mother in the room. Call me 'Heather' for good measure, too. Twice.

My parents assigned me to a career counseling service in New Jersey that offers a lot of services for a lot of people, but I can't really see if the woman I met today - the one assigned to me - can do much for someone in my situation. And granted, there was a lot going against her from the beginning, like the weather making everyone in the tri-state area late, but at the same time, when someone presents herself as being able to help me by showing me how to upload a document to a website, I'm not going to be very happy about talking with them.

It took the better part of an hour for me to get to the point where I asked her what she could do, and for her to ask her what I'm doing to find jobs and interviews and follow-ups. She could give me help with tailoring cover letters and resumes, and working with interview questions, and that I'd be fine with. The rest of what she talked about was redundant at best, and came off as patronizing at worst. When I left her office I was fuming, seething, pacing around the waiting room for my mother to get done in there and get me out of that building.

The Clash on the drive back to the city helped. Walking through Central Park for a while helped, and so did topical application of tea, The Good Wife, and spot-editing some cover letters. I'm feeling better about the whole mess, and should be in a position to reply to the preliminary e-mail tomorrow afternoon.

It helps that I've got another job interview tomorrow morning. I'm looking forward to it.