The carrot and the stick. It’s a metaphor about how to handle someone. The stick is discipline and force. The carrot is rewards and persuasion. The universe or God or whatever threw me a couple of carrots.
After I stopped talking to those two girls on hinge in February and that disastrous mixer and board game group, I actually got a match. A pretty good match. She’s kinda cute. Likes the same things I like. I got her to match with my by asking her about which format of MtG she plays. She only has above the shoulders selfies, but she seems to be on the chubbier side, which I’m absolutely cool with (bigger girls are the best). As if that sort of thing matters. We only matched yesterday before I went to bed and the excitement from finally getting someone to care about me kept me up a couple hours.
This carrot is rotten, but it’s still a carrot. My temp period has been extended by a month. So now instead of 8 weeks after this one it goes back to 12. Now normally that would want to make me put a bullet in my brain. But I’m seeing this in another angle. It gives me time. Time before I have to commit to working as a full employee over at that fucking hell hole. Time to potentially get hired by an actual engineering company. It makes no real difference whether I’m a temp or a full time employee. Nothing changes. Except I get an insignificant pay boost ($3 more dollars an hour whoopee) and actual health insurance I hope. Knowing how much we’re worth, it’s probably not great health insurance. Ironically now that I think about it, it probably only got extended so those cheap ass cocksuckers don’t have to give me these benefits and keep me as their ***** for longer. But in my mind, the minute I sign on as a full time employee, that’s it. I’ve lost. I’ll be stuck there for years and years and years. Shackled down even tighter than I am now. No hope of escape. Even though there’s barely any I have now.
Now these carrots are just false hope. It probably won’t end well with the girl. Eventually she’ll get bored of me or find someone more interesting. Something banal. No big grand romance that goes sour. Just simple disinterest. One month time extension for my temp period is nothing. If I haven’t managed to secure an engineering job in the 6+ months I’ve been trying, what chance do I have with an extra month? The carrots are to keep me going. The universe doesn’t want to miss playing with its ragdoll. If I quit and finally manage to blow my brains out, how will God torture me then? No. It’s meant to keep me going. Just a little more. You can do it. Keep trying. You’re almost there. And then they kick you in the teeth. Since all my analogies come from pop culture, it’s kinda like that one moment in the Conquest fight from invincible. While Conquest has mark broken and battered in his hand, he says “Hey. Hey. Don’t give up. You can do this. You still got a chance. You just need the right motivation.” And then continues to beat him to death. He didn’t want the suffering to end. It was fun to him. These are what the carrots are. And it’s sad that I can’t even find joy in good things anymore.