Ben

'how is this going to work,' part 500

2230-0930 work (inc travel)
0930-1000 tiresome leaving meeting at jobcentre
1000-1430 free! eat, sleep
1430-2100 college
2100-2230 change, wash, pack bag
2230-0930 work again

In December so far I have:

*Enjoyed a midnight breakdown on the motorway
*Made friends with a cat
*Committed benefit fraud (technically)
*Been interviewed for a job selling double glazing (which I never actually applied for)
*Accidentally caught a lift home with a bunch of strangers

What I need to do is get my homework done and SLEEP.

Enough with the FUCKING builders in the house already.

Oh what a surprise, fucked about by a temp agency for the hundred thousandth time.

I mean, it's lucky I'm an eccentric billionaire and don't actually have to WORK FOR A FRICKIN' LIVING or anything. Otherwise I might be really rather slightly fucking miffed at this point.

Some people dream about action, romance, and adventure.

I have dreams about being fitted for shoes.

Ahhh... maybe it's just coincidence?

Either that, or more people read this than I thought.

Nice to see that the old Adam & Joe Show parody 'The 1980s House' is a real programme now.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/electricdreams/

Oooh, the new Diet Coke ad campaign ('hello you') is shit, isn't it?

I like how they don't even bother to hide their tired contempt for their target audience anymore.

'Kafkaesque' must be one of the most overused literary allusions in the language (second only to 'Orwellian'?) but it's the word that keeps coming to mind in my dealings with my gracious patrons and benefactors at Jobcentre Plus.

My claim is currently under review because I failed to apply for a job back in August. They say they'll keep paying out while they carry out their investigation, and they'll reach a decision in an unspecified amount of time, and if there was any information I wanted to give them to take under consideration under the meantime, I should get it to them within seven days (in a bloody postal strike!) or they would assume I didn't want to defend myself.

Apart from the obvious 'fuck off you target-chasing cunts', I did have a couple of points I wanted to raise, so I wrote a nice polite letter suggesting that, while I didn't recall the exact details of the job in question, I wasn't morally, legally, or religiously compelled to apply for every single vacancy that came up within ten miles, and that I had to be realistic and focus my time on the applications that had some chance of succeeding, so failing to apply for one vacancy six frickin' weeks ago wasn't exactly the same as work-dodging.

Reply sent, I took the time to go through my records and see if I could refresh my memory of this specific job. Yeah. Turned out that;
a) The job was, indeed, pretty much out of my league, and
b) I applied for the same job with the same company in May, and got absolutely nowhere.
So, basically, failing to reapply for the same job three months later wasn't exactly a war crime. I felt pretty vindicated and wrote a follow-up letter with this new information.

I also added a spiteful little PS along the lines of 'I would have happy to tell all of the above to one of your staff at any point over the last six weeks, if only they had raised the issue' - because I think starting off with a heavy-handed threatening letter is pretty shabby behaviour. I almost hope the bastards try something. I am fondly imagining how utterly stupid they would sound making their 'case' in front of the appeals board.

Can't WAIT for more of the same if the Tories get in*.

And the 'bruised shin' I complained about a couple of posts back is obviously something far more serious. When it's bad I can barely walk. I went down the idiot's path of consulting Dr. Internet, and I'm now convinced it's everything from a compartment injury to a stress fracture. Doctor's appointment Tuesday. Hopefully it won't have turned purple and dropped off before then.

*Of course, I'll be a productive tax-paying citizen by then. For def.

Ewwww. Bugs in the cereal.

Nice to know I've probably been chomping on their eggs every morning for the last week.

Already pissed off with the studying.

I have to find big sacks of money for some hitherto unpublicised course expenses including, most notably, a £47 fee per exam (one per module, making £470). So I've been ringing around for help finding various access funds, bursaries and the like. Or I'll have to take out a CDL. All for a crummy part-time college course. If I'd wanted to descend into a whole new level of debt, I would have gone to a proper uni to do my MA!

Obviously these aren't really vast sums and the problem will be solved once I'm working, but now I'm in classes one day a week it's going to be a pain to find a job. Agency work is inflexible with this kind of thing (you either do all the hours they ask or they find someone who will). There is one temp job I could take which would take me all the way up to Christmas, but the only shift I can fit around my classes is the 11pm-7am. Of course I'm going to give them a call but I'm already shudderingly imagining what kind of havoc that's going to work on my sleep pattern.

Also, the tuition isn't exactly top grade. My notes from the last session were a confusing stramash and I couldn't work out what had happened. Our tutor had been telling us about the 'persuasive nature of English law', which confused me a little because she wasn't talking about enforcement or the role of the police or anything; it's only on consulting the course materials online that I realised she meant pervasive. Still, eh, they're only two different words with completely different meanings.

I hope this all works out for the best. Have had to tighten a belt which wasn't exactly voluminously baggy in the first place; not sure when (or whether) youth-based-fun will ever occur again. Was that it, then? All over and now I'm doomed to adulthood? If that's the case, why don't I have money and cool stuff?

Finally, I banged my shin on something yesterday and now it really hurts.

'Anyway, I was thinking - rather than increasing communication and facilitating connection, the internet is a wounding glare, where everyone you ever wanted to meet (who, previously, were hidden from you forever) are proven to exist, and rather than being elsewhere, they're really only INCHES out of reach...placed in your hand then whipped away, like the coin on a string when Top Cat tricks the doorman (oh! that dumb doorman). It makes perfect sense in the context of the age, of course, since it effectively places the Heart's Desire with all the other commodities, behind an alarmed plate-glass window...'

My job feels uncannily like that sometimes.

I'd prefer doing something that lets me be of practical help to people, instead of just being nice to them.

No, I don't want to see who visits my journal.
I know precisely how many people come here.

Last night I went to a recruitment evening with a few hundred other marginally desperate jobhunters. The very first question on the forms we were given was;

Q: How long have you been unemployed, and why?

A fairly brusque question, that, and one that the vast majority of people present could have replied to with a shrug of the shoulders and a mutter of 'Well why the fuck d'you think?'. I, of course, resorted to flippant humour under stress and wrote 'Six months. Gypsy curse.'

I did not get this job!

But to be honest, I'm not even worried about being unemployed anymore. I'm keeping busy and doing my volunteer work and basically making more of a useful contribution to the world than I ever did when I was employed. I have enough put by from my last job to (sort of) get by and (very occasionally) buy things and go places. Today I got to stay in all day and watch the cricket. Tomorrow I'm going to London for weekend funs. You will also come, if you know what's good for you.

'Unfortunately, after careful consideration of all the applications for the post, I am sorry to inform you that you have not been selected to interview. The main reason that you were not selected for interview is that you do not have any practical experience of working in an archive. Although, we are not looking for candidates with fasts amount of experience we do prefer candidates who have little experience of working in an archival environment.

Nevertheless, thank you for your interest in the post.'


Dear Ms Josling,

Thank you for your letter of June 2nd.

Unfortunately I cannot accept your rejection letter at this time. The volume of rejections has exceeded my expectations and, while most have been of a very high calibre, yours showed a certain lack of care and attention to detail.

While I do not demand perfect grammar and spelling from my potential future employers, I do prefer them to at least have the ability to construct an intelligible sentence.

In retrospect, there are some aspects of my application that could have been improved.
Perhaps if I had described my work experience in block capitals and in flourescent-coloured ink, you would not have completely overlooked that section.
Perhaps if I had taken the time to draw a fun join-the-dots puzzle on the envelope, it might have held your attention for longer.
And if I had only spent more time researching your organisation, I might have discovered that the ability to communicate with language was not a prerequisite for entry, and would have been able to change the focus of my application accordingly.

Nevertheless, thank you for considering my application. I am sure that you rather have spent those thirty seconds doing something more productive, like studying the latest module of your English for Beginners course.

All love,

Ben.

Living in a town that seems destined to become a battleground between fundamentalist wackjobs on one hand, and the BNP on the other.

This is the second year in a row that eight Premiership clubs have finished on 42 points or fewer.

If they'd have scraped together just one more point, Newcastle - that's hopeless, national-joke status Newcastle - would have survived.

When people talk about the Premiership being the best league in the world and having this amazing global appeal, they're really just talking about the top half. Or even the top four.

Always with you what cannot be done.

Do not stay up all night doing things you should have taken care of in the daylight hours.

If it isn't done by 8pm, it probably won't get done.