Too Much Time: Too Many Boys
I am spending far too much time with the boys.
How do I know this?
I woke up at 5am this morning and I could hear my liver crying. By 7am I was contemplating removing my own kidneys. Pain. In.The. Back.
Plus I have widened my sexual innuendo, double entendre, pun repertoire.
And my best friend Blondie texted me after she left me in the pub on Tuesday night saying;
"Put down the pint of cider and step away from them."
Upon reviewing my text messages of that evening I had sent her a load of incomprehensible babble. Besides, it was already too late by the time I got that message. I had already started on the whiskey and the conversation had become suitably undone. I am sure hanging around with these manboys prevents me from ever actually meeting anyone.
Further, when Blondie and Dr T and I were out drinking with betterthangoogle and Mr Bee on Tuesday; betterthangoogle and Mr Bee proposed that were not the girliest of girls.
True. Blondie is a black belt ninja and Dr T has spent a great proportion of her time over the past ten years analysing and sequencing the spines of insects, or something like that. And I? Yes, I do my nails, go to the beautician, blah,blah,blah but there is something inherent in my personality that means I act in quite a masculine fashion.
Girlieness
I tried to start to combat this on Wednesday morning by watching "Confessions of a Shopaholic" on iplayer. I did not laugh. Once. I wanted to cry and rip my eyeballs out and smear them across my laptop. I stopped watching it. From this experience I have thus concluded that I must, on a daily basis (even if I don't leave the house) wear my "DareDevil" red lipstick so that when men see me and I am talking as if I am a man that they are so distracted by my big red lips that they ignore my banter and only think about kissing me. I must remember to thank Professor Robert Winston for that insight. After stopping aforementioned chickflick I found a documentary of his about the science of sexual attraction and the behaviours of men and women.
Again, this is probably where I am going wrong - looking at things from a scientific perspective. How very stereotypically male of me.
Which leads me to my next point...
How does this affect me in the job market?
Does my face fit?
I am by no means an unattractive female.I am not exceptional either. People do, other than my nan, tell me I am pretty; often they are men on the street clutching cans of Special Brew.
Yet my face does not seem to fit. Ever. So I guess it is time for me to look beyond the physicality of it all (this thought process surely means I am quite girly?).
It did not fit well in my last job. I did my job. I did it well. I enjoyed it. It did not fit well when I was at university. Or at school. Which leads me to another conclusion - I am an exceptionally difficult person to get on with. Not intentionally. But this just seems to be the status quo.
Now, I don't particularly want to go to job club this week or next week or ever. I fear I may have a physical reaction to it - perhaps anaphylactic shock or I may actually take my eyeballs out. But I have to go as it is one of my action points. So I am going to ask them at job club, what is it I can do, to make myself seem more pleasant and less difficult. A good team player (other than in the realms of pubquizdom). I need to do something about it. And after speaking to my Job Centre Advisor today about my interview this week, she assures me that Job Club will have the answers.
It better, or I am going to go to my GP and demand CBT, a gastric bypass and a face lift.
Here's to hoping my face fits on Friday and that they don't think the lipstick is too much! (And that I can find a way to rap in the interview).
I AM LIKE TOTALLY AWESOME
I can now understand why there is a distinct correlation between the unemployed, mental health issues and addiction. A couple of weeks ago I started to see why when without a job someone could become emotionally unstable, especially when you have been rejected for a job that you were otherwise perfect for (ahem).
Your self-esteem can potentially take a battering during unemployment, thankfully I am arrogant enough to always think of myself as "great" thanks very much. I blame the Persian in me for this. I ride on the waves of glory generated by the civilisation of my forefathers (we will ignore the current state of affairs in Iran because quite frankly that little despot has taken Persian arrogance too far). I accepted from the off that this was going to be an interesting ride into my 30s and that there would be days which were good and days which were bad. Life is like that anyway with or without a job.
A conversation/heated discussion full blown tokenistic quarter annual argument I had with an ex recently consisted of me ending one part of the ten rounded mobile phone exchange with "I am happy actually; please do not patronise me by telling me you wish me to be happy, which means you assume I am unhappy, when being jobless and moving back in with my mother has probably bought me untold joy, I am great, I am a fabulous person so don't try and derail me and make me feel bad, by telling me I should be unhappy because I am unemployed. I AM FUCKING GREAT. I AM AWESOME"
Definitely a monologue of which I am perversely proud of (in no way is it my best work, I am sure he would agree), but retrospectively it was also a clear indication of the beginning of some sort of mental decline and at about the start of the timing of the reignition of some previously questionably addictive behaviours of mine. Which without doubt is more worrisome than awesome...
N.B To clarify the conversation was not a catalyst for my behaviour it is just as I remember at about the same time I started to go and get a little bit wild again.
Misdemeanour's and Mentalunhingement
Since being unemployed I have discovered;
- Mid-week drinking = it has been fun drinking mid-week past 9pm. It is renewed and novel to me. Like a 17 year old with a good fake id;
- Smoking = it has been wonderful chain-smoking again. The lung butter I keep coughing up suggests otherwise;
- All nighters = it is quite simply refreshing staying up all night with friends and drinking until stupidoclock on a Sunday morning knowing I can have a several day recovery period if necessary without having to worry about dealing with work;
- Over the counter = being unemployed involves some degree of unavoidable inactivity, which means it is hard to generate a sense of "tiredness". I am now a regular user of nytol and other stronger sleepy bye bye pills from my local pharmacist;
- An overwhelming desire to be involved in many things = I don't actually overly involve myself in anything I just fantasise about it;
- Gorging = I have put on a fair bit of weight. I eat everything I come into contact with except meat;
- Old friends in new places = one of them has just revealed he is rather bizzarely a Richard O'Brian impersonator.
The Crystal Maze
To me unemployment is like a set of quests or challenges set out for you. The sort of thing you would have seen in The Crystal Maze in the 1990s. The encounter with the Richard O'Brian impersonator (with way too much hair to be completely convincing) made me think of it this way.
I would sit and watch The Crystal Maze religiously as a child, shouting instructions and willing the dumb arse contestant on to complete the activity, quite convinced I had the skill and dexterity to do it blindfolded and bound.
Each zone (Industrial, Aztec, Ocean, Medieval, Futuristic) has particular sorts of tasks dependent on their theme. In parallel unemployment requires you to transcend through different phases and zones in order to be successful or unsuccessful at it. For example the first task I encountered was in the "Dole Zone" filling out forms and jumping through hoops as dictated by the government and dole office (or "Mumsy" in the case of The Crystal Maze). The current zone I am in is probably the "Hunt Zone" where by I am completing forms and updating the C.V.
Worryingly with this analogy it means that Richard O'Brian would be my personal advisor.
I have an actual meeting with my Job Centre Personal Advisor this week. Hopefully I will get some help before I decide that Special Brew is okay at 11am because I don't have a job, and that a 40 a day habit will have to be worked into any new working life I carve out for myself and most importantly before I learn to use the SKY+ recording box to record and store all the reality shows I am now hooked on.
The Phone Call
I have just had "The Phone Call" from what would have been my future-ex-employers in two years telling me "I am afraid you have not been successful".
This is the first time I have ever had such a phone call in my professional career. I should have trawled internet job forums for advice about how to handle such a call. I had an awful sense of foreboding about all of this anyway, I should have taken a pre-emptive strike on-line to better prepare myself. I am trying to remember if, like a wounded teenager I used the phrase "whatever". I am hoping it was just my internal monologue and I did not actually articulate it. Well, whatever. Like I give a fuck now.
Why
Apparently this had nothing to do with my skills or experience. I am comforting myself by telling myself that those skills are pretty much faultless and this job would have involved me taking a £10,000 pay cut thereby DE-SKILLING ME . Of course I am in no way bitter. Allegedly this is to do with the fact that I was not enthusiastic enough. I think her words will cut me forever (more than a manically depressed EMO can cut themselves) " The other candidate was more enthusiastic than you". What I should of asked, but did not was :
DID THEY TURN UP WITH 20 FUCKING BANANAS? DID THEY? How much more enthusiasm do you need?
Along with the rubbish reasoning and rationale of these charlatans what I am also quite peeved about is the whole interview process cost me about £200 which I borrowed (travel expenses, producing materials etc) and because no one at the Dole Office told me I could claim travel expenses or get support I am stuck paying that back.I can not even claim it back retrospectively. I must remember to thank my Capital One card with its' 30% interest rate for its' ongoing support in these times which are starting to turn a little bit bleak. Or rather than thanking my beloved credit card, I could adopt a pseudonym of "Pauline" and go to Argos (JSA pending) and stock up on some lovely jewellery from the Elizabeth Duke range and march down the Dole Office and start a demoniacal unemployed rage aided and abetted with some Special Brew.
Misplaced Anger
It is really quite insulting they bought enthusiasm into this. I am well qualified and have always been very passionate about my work, to the point where some people I know would openly and actively dread me turning up at a social occasion because I would (in their unenthusiastic and dreary opinions) kill it with entertaining love/hate tales of my vocation. If they hated it so much they could have stopped inviting me.Thus I concluded they perversely enjoyed my Catherine Tate style sketches.
My anger is clearly misplaced. I should probably read some shit about CBT on-line - maybe that can help me become a better, more well-balanced, overenthusiastic and employable person?
Or I could just get the hell over myself and apply for other jobs?
I think I will watch some Made In Chelsea later to make me feel better about myself, that will reignite my impetus to succeed. They are my peers after all.
Moving On
In other news the pub quiz team I am a now forced to be a part time member of (due to lack of funds because of a lack of JSA landing in my bank account) has successfully secured 3rd and 2nd place in the last two consecutive weeks. At least when I do get my JSA I can go to the pub quiz and potentially feel like a winner again. This evening I am going to go and hunt down some friends, who will see my teary eyes (NOT ACTUALLY CRYING) and not judge me when I neck £20 worth of shit pikey cider courtesy of Capital One. I am sure they will be happy I will not be talking about work. Instead I will talk about unemployment. In which case I am sure they will wish I was working again.
God Bless Capital One and God Bless Cider.
