19th October 2010

Well here we go, I started this new work yesterday. I'm not entirely sure what to tell you about it, because it's work and it's all a bit the same. I'm never wildly impressed when people spend 10 - 15 minutes telling you how different they are rather than demonstrating it, you know?
At any rate, I was there on time, and had been terribly well organised all morning - how sad that it all falls apart this morning!! Still never mind, there was a group of about 12 of us I suppose, and I think myself and one other lady are clearly the eldest by some way I'd say. I think that by and large, the group is clearly made up of students. It is a nice building, modern and somewhat confusing in lay out - I got lost at least once, but I think I'll manage to find my way around it by the end of the week. We got to do training, and yep, at last I have a contract in my hand - which reminds me I really must call the benefits people etc and then I'll have to ferry this thing around from organisation to organisation so they can all photocopy it etc. But I really must get that done.
Anyhow the training by and large was taken up with all the things you expect - filling out forms, listening to health and safety drills, and a lot of chat about security etc - you're expected to have your phone off, which must be quite distressing for the younger ones who expect to be in communication with the world at a moments notice any time of the day or night. But you can, and are expected to be able to demonstrate that it's off when asked at any time by a manager - to me, this is strange, but of course I suppose people wouldn't turn them off unless they were liable to be checked.
So today of course, the actual training starts - I'm doing my best to be enthusiastic about this, but of course age and experience will have it's evil way with one, and enthusiasm, for me, is something that grows depending on the environment I find myself in. Too many super-grinning individuals around me and I'm apt to switch right off, almost as if I have to be different! But we'll see. At any rate they took the Jury Service thing well, which is good, and the full on 2 - 10 training is only going to be 3 days instead of 5, which is also good, as with any luck come Thursday I'll be able to crack on with real, uni-type work. As it is, I'm not doing wildly well with the get up early and crack on with it, before dashing off to go to work, if you see what I mean. I managed it yesterday, and even read a chapter of a - well ok, half a chapter of a book before I went to sleep last night, but so far I have not got very far with the stuff I'm supposed to have read for the seminar tomorrow. However, I shall take it to work with me, isolate myself in the 30 minute lunch break and crack on with it. And it's only ten thirty, so I can get a bit more done this morning, and hopefully a bit more tonight. Hopefully it will all shakedown in a week or two and I'll have developed a routine - jury service permitting - and all will be well.

Sunday 10th October

Grr I'm surrounded by more books on the Normans than I know what to do with, but have at least managed to get them into ordered piles. So I know what book is for what task - ie, the presentation, the essay.. next week's reading. And, needless to say I seem to have lost one booklist, blast it.
Frankly the last week has been something approaching chaos. Why I hear you asking, and to be honest I don't have an answer. Don't you ever get weeks like that, when it's not that you have to do something, or prepare to do something, but it's like you have nothing to do, so everything descends into an unexpected mess?! I can only hope this stops at some point, like hopefully in the next hour or so.
Still at least the booklist that's disappeared is not the one for next week, so I have made a start on this weeks reading, and I seem to have a tutor who, for some extraordinary reason, is tolerating my apalling chaos. He must be gritting his teeth very tightly, and saying to himself it will improve...

On another tack entirely, I had Lesley up to visit last week - very nice to see her, and it seems like we did nothing but chat. Loved it, it was excellent to see her. We went to see the Matthew Bourne Swan Lake, which was gorgeous, and where else did we go - it seems like not a great deal although we had a nice walk in the Necropolis - I may get the photo's off my phone at some point! The weather wasn't bad - until it came time for her to fly back to Bristol, which of course delayed the plane - when don't people get stuck at airports is what I want to know, if it's not the weather, it's a strike, or volcano's and stuff.

So this is what's been happening. Awful isn't it?!

Sunday 19th September

This last week has felt like I've been running from one end of Glasgow to the other! And being hauled from up in the air to the pit of despair - alright perhaps not quite the bottom of the pit, but well pretty near to it at some points.
Firstly I got the job - yep this one I've been moaning on about every now and again for months it seems like. You would think this would have me leaping up and down in delight, and I'm certainly not complaining about it, but I do rather feel that I've been in the process of applying for it for so long now I'm exhausted with the whole thing. Then there's the fact it doesn't start until the second week in October, and I need to be working (and earning!) now!!! But still, one doesn't look a gift horse in the mouth, and you just damn well get on with it, and sort out the financial stuff, and you never know, something else might just come along to pad out that bit. At least that's what I'm sternly telling myself in the dead of night when thoughts of gas bills etc etc come creeping along.

On a way more positive note, uni has gone and got itself all organised. I shot off to my meeting with Alex, and I'm signed up to do courses on the Normans, and Renaissance-Anti-Renaissance next term. I don't know very much about the Normans - ha, what else is new, it's like everything I've done on this entire course has been about something I don't know very much about, but perhaps a smidge more than total ignorance. I did do courses on them in the way distant past, when I was doing Med History 1, etc, ie, in the first year of being an undergraduate. So as I say, a smidge more than total ignorance. This course looks interesting too, it's not about the Normans per se, but the Normans as invaders, colonisers etc, so as outsiders. That is always interesting no matter who's doing the invading or colonising, and a lot of this is looking at the other parts of their invading and colonising, in Italy, Scicily, etc. There was a fair bit of contact between them and the Byzantine Empire for example, and their relationship with the Papacy - well, let's just say it varied between non-existent and touchy.
As for Renaissance and Anti-Renaissance, I'll get to this later in the year.
So that was that sorted out, but back to the old financial doldrums, I decided to try and put in a claim for council tax benefit, and housing benefit, which is why I've been racing around from one end of the city to the other. Get the registry to stamp one form, then head back over to Parkhead Council Office with the form, they give me more forms so I have to get those filled in and go get the supporting evidence - I never seem to be terribly lucky with benefit claims, so we can only keep our fingers crossed. A bit the same as Jo, who as a good number of you know is not at all well at the moment, and is trying to claim a bit of disability allowance. First time in her life she's ever needed to claim a benefit, and she falls foul of this government and it's cuts. Her timing couldn't be worse eh? And if she's finding it difficult, imagine what it must be like for someone who's less able to stand her ground and fight her corner. It doesn't bear thinking about, particularly as people claiming disability allowance aren't in any position to be having to fight for things.
As for me, well I don't know. I can try to claim, and just see what happens - it's a bit of a pain to have to produce all this paperwork, but then again, fair that everything is properly checked and stuff. And I must say that they've been sending me letters and stuff awfully quickly, which I felt was very on the ball of them. I hadn't expected to be hearing from them for at least what, another week? But then I tried to claim benefits earlier in the year, and got absolutely nowhere. On the other hand, I feel quite strongly that as someone with no income at the moment, that I should at the very least get something off my council tax.

And I dare say some of you are wondering what the Pope's visit was like. Alas, I can't really tell you, except that on the day it happened, the buses took about twice as long to turn up as clearly half of them had been sent off to ferry people to Bellahouston Park. There'd been a lot of expecting the centre of Glasgow to be gridlocked with traffic, and the motorways to have seized up, but I have to say I saw no sign of it. So really in a way, no news was good news, and a bus did turn up eventually that did get me to where I was going, so... not a lot more I can tell you about that really. At one point, I had to go to my rental agency to collect some paperwork, (yes, more paperwork!) and my walk to this took me past a Church, with a large banner outside it announcing Pope Benedict's visit, and presumably this was where people had gathered to catch a bus to the event, but this was some hours after they must have done so, so I saw nothing of it. Nice looking little church though. (Says her father's daughter. Ah yes, the years of being dragged around churches rub off on one..) And they did have very good weather for it. Its been a bit breezy, but otherwise this week has been fairly dry - Monday and Tuesday felt a bit like everytime I set foot outside the heavens opened, but otherwise it's not been bad weatherwise.
So that's been the week that was, and the week that will is ahead of us, with first point of call being the Benefit Office, with the batch of requested papers. Then I shall be off to the library to pick up a few books on the Normans!

Sunday 12th September

Ok here we go, this week uni starts, and I've got to go to a few meetings - teaching doesn't start just yet so it's like go see Alex Shepard and get my courses sorted out. I have a startling lack of enthusiasm for this, I freely admit. I'm still worried sick about this job, for which I have heard nothing further beyond that I passed the interview and they are waiting for the references to kick in. I keep telling myself that this could well be down to the fact they have to get a new disclosure certificate for me, which takes forever. But it's very depressing, there's no doubting that.
So what have I been doing to fill my time? Trying not to pay too much attention to those who've handed their dissertations in and are now fancy free, etc! Even in one case, off on holiday! This seems like rubbing salt in the wound. But not to worry, ok, yes I'm worrying, but I'm trying to keep a grip on it.
It was Martin's birthday yesterday - his birthday is now indelibly marked by the events of 9/11, which frankly always seems to me to be wierd, because it should be 11/9. Every time this comes around, I remember talking with him on the phone when I was coming home, on the day itself and saying we could be at war by the time I get there. War with who, one of us said, and I'm not sure we're any the wiser now. At any rate I feel I should pay tribute to the post office who did a really sterling job this year of getting his package to him in less than 24 hours - I posted it around 3.30 to 4 o'clock on the Friday, and was stunned to hear it had actually arrived. The reason for the delay was in the late arrival of one component, an Aston Villa Miscellany from the club shop. He tells me it's full of interesting stuff, including about Pongo Waring, who he remembers Dad going on about quite a bit. Pongo apparently got his nickname from setting off for a trip (presumably a game) with only a toothbrush as luggage, not even a change of clothes. Either it's that or smelly feet allegedly. Personally I cite the influence of PG Wodehouse, who wrote memorably of Pongo Twistleton, a member of the Drones Club and pal of Bertie Wooster. Think of the derogation this poor man's memory may be undergoing if the nickname merely originates from Pongo being his favourite character or something.
And how come no one gets fancy nicknames like Pongo these days? It must have been a 20s/30s thing, and perhaps - well I know I wouldn't want such a nickname! At any rate he must have been a very good player, to still be being talked about all these years later.
Ah, Wikipeadia to the rescue.
Thomas (Tom) "Pongo" Waring (12 October 1906 – 20 December 1980) was an English professional association football player. Nicknamed "Pongo" after a famous cartoon of the time, Waring is one of Aston Villa's all-time great centre forwards. In his career, he scored 243 league goals in 363 matches over 12 seasons for 5 different clubs.
1928 to 35, apparently, died in 1980 and had his ashes scattered at the Holte End prior to a match with Stoke. Seems appropriate somehow. Couldn't find a photograph of the man, which is a shame. At any rate, Martin seems to like the book, which I have to say ranks as a triumph, present wise. What is it about men and presents? You just can't find anything they a) like, or b) really want!

Sunday 5th September

God but this possible may, or may not have a job is giving me kittens. For all those of you who've been reading my FB updates, maybe I'm being too optimistic here, and I'll try to explain why I feel this way.
Firstly, this is a very good job - for a student at any rate. The other thing is it's only a temp job until Christmas, which is actually not too bad, because they employ lots of people and there's always a good chance that something a bit more permanent might turn up. Which is sort of why I'm quite keen on getting it. But...
Ok, so Friday I had to go to this assessment day thing - turned out it was only a morning, we had to take a mountain of paperwork with me, so much ID stuff that I was almost crazed before I set off. Birth certificate, passport (I only have an old out of date one) photo id, utility bill, so much stuff I had to pack it into a folder to make sure none of it got lost. Then, before I went, I had to try and figure out where the place was, which wasn't as simple as you'd think it was.
Yep, went on to google, and used the street view bit, but it was the address that was screwy, they reckoned they were at an "X square" rather than "X street". The street was on the map alright, but not a sign of the square anywhere to be seen, and I was virtually marching up and down there for hours. Turns out the square is the address of a multi storey car park behind the building that they're actually in. I had to even ring them up for instructions it was so peculiar. And given this, I decided I'd set off in plenty of time to ensure I arrived in good time (they said in their email turn up at least 15 minutes early to fill out the forms...!) Happily there was a coffee bar sort of over the road, but my God I won't be going there again in a hurry, it was the worst decaff Americano I've ever had.
Anyhow I get there, with my forms, paperwork - I forgot to tell you, I was supposed to fill out an application form before I got there, and I'd done this, took me two hours but I'd got a really nicely word processed variety. Only when I arrived, and opened my folder of paperwork, thinking I was going to be able to blind them with my efficiency, it turned out I'd picked up the blank copy that I'd printed off and not filled in!!! Talk about - well, showing yourself up to the worst possible advantage. And they were so insistent about it! I had to sit there and try and fill it in from memory, which frankly is not my strong suite - but I eventually persuaded them I'd email the finished copy as soon as I got home, which I did and called them to ensure they had received it. Anyhow, having done that I then had to fill out the form for the disclosure stuff - this is where you get your (lack of) police record checked. This I have no problem with, beyond that I put my old address down on it first, and my current address underneath that, which I didn't think would matter, but they insisted that I re-do it, the right way around.
By this time, I was getting a touch flumoxed I'll admit. In fact, I think I was slightly past caring, thinking I've made such a stuff up of this, it doesn't really matter what I do at the assessment itself. At any rate, it wasn't too bad at all, no interview as such, no the only time their people talked to me it was about bloody paperwork - it was sit in a group with all the other people applying, and chat about pre-recorded calls from this helpline, and say what we thought was good about them, and what was bad. Oddly enough, one thing I found really quite useful for this was the various times when post graduate teaching has cropped up on the agenda, and we've been roundly told that post grads are the worlds worst markers, because they're so harsh. So I was actually specifically looking for the hidden good stuff, and I think that came across a bit. Besides, I have to admit, I hate being negative about everything, you've got to find a positive to end with.
So we did this, and I feel I did quite well. They were really tight about keeping us to deadlines, and there were three calls, one we had to crit on forms, one we had to discuss between ourselves (being listened to) and one we had to 'present', or rather one poor girl had to present, which I felt was a bit, well, odd. There was no time to discuss who was going to do this, the girl who was sitting nearest to the board had to do it, and we had no time to write down headings or anything like that, it was just simply there you are get on with it. I can distinctly recall making a pest of myself by telling them we didn't have enough time for the finicky bits, we have to move on to the next, so I guess I was sort of timekeeper woman. Again, all the presentation stuff in RRSH came in useful here, and I must remember to tell Mark! Given the mess I made of my dissertation presentation, I think he'll be pleased to know I did at least take in the salient points.
So having done all this, we had an English test - I'm sorry to say I found this a bit of a doddle, I must've finished it 5 minutes before everyone else, and I have to say that I think that's an age thing. You just know stuff as you get older, and you don't have to faff around thinking a, b or c. You just know it's c, and there's no need to worry about whether it could conceivably be a, because a is plain wrong.
At any rate, then it was off to have your paperwork interrogated, or in my case, my lack of paperwork, and then off home. The funny thing was when I left, I started to feel so sick - really quite physically sick, as if I'd been bottling up all of the stress and tension etc - this really isn't like me at all. I had to go and have a sit down and another cup of coffee, and I was thinking about it, and it's my belief that it's taking me so long to find a job that no matter what people say to me, I'm totally stressed out about it. I'm financially strung out, and all the psychological terror that accompanies that is getting a bit too much for me. So - I shall be inordinately pleased if I do get this job, but it's down to references and the disclosure check. I'm not worried about that at all, happily I know I have no criminal records etc, but references? Ee-yuck is all I can say, I'm not at all sure about them. We all know how bad the 'reference' was I got from a certain someone, who when I asked for one I could show to people, constructed one that was extraordinarily peculiar and left me feeling I should slash my throat now, because for sure I was never going to work again. So I'm kind of feeling very ambiguous about this. Which is why I'm not to sure that I will actually get this job, and that I may well end up back at square one, and in real trouble because then I'll know I've got a problem with that specific reference, and what the hell will I be able to do about it? It's hard, particularly when you know that you've given time, and trouble and sheer effort in the job, and gone to a lot of trouble to be helpful and offer cover for when people are off, and stuff like that. And it's even harder when you know that you could have done so much more, if you'd been ever asked to have undertaken some kind of task or what have you. At least that's how I feel about it. My guess is that I make some people very nervous, and I've got my own views as to why that is. But what the hell, I'm not at 'back to square one' yet, fingers crossed eh?

Friday 27th August

Funny old week it's been, that's for sure. Firstly I managed to pick up a heavy cold from somewhere, which hasn't helped, and secondly, it's become clear that some of the potential employers in Glasgow just like messing people around. It makes you so damn angry that they do this! And there's nothing you can do about it, you can't even complain because if you did you could kiss goodbye to any future chance of employment.
Basically as you may or may not know, I went to the hairdressers on Monday, and whilst I'm sitting there getting my hair cut - dripping, the mobile goes off, so I answered it. There's this bloke on the phone, saying he's from this call centre that I'd sent a cv to recently, and he asks if I can talk, he wants to do an on-the-phone assessment to see if I'd qualify for an interview. I say it'd be a bit difficult (this is supposed to take 15 minutes) as I'm in the hairdressers, and he says ok, no problem, if you call us back, I'll send you an email with a reference number that you just quote when you call. Fine, I say I'll call you this afternoon.
And I did. First I called when I was back home, about say what, an hour later? Answerphone. Oh he'll be at lunch I thought, and went off to an appointment I had and rushed home and called him again. XX is unavailable. Ok, I thought, maybe a meeting. (I should add that I'd left messages each time, to say that I'd called, with the reference number which he had indeed sent.)
I called perhaps another four or five times on Monday. No problem I thought, I'll be bound to catch him on Tuesday. I started at nine o'clock, and I was a tad surprised to find that he was already engaged. No problem I thought, leaving a message, again, I'll keep calling, and I've left a message, he might call me back.
I called three times an hour for the entire morning. Frankly I'm not sure what else I could have done. I'd found the only other number available for the place, and rang that, only to get another answering machine, on which I left another message. Not one of these multiple messages got any sort of response out of these people, and at no point did I get a ringing phone that didn't get answered by an answerphone. I must have called them fifty times. My guess - now - is that they have a number of vacancies, and they go through the applications on a call them once basis, and if they don't answer, or can't talk, move on to the next, but to cover ourselves, we'll send them a reference number so if there's any comeback, we can prove that we've tried to contact them.
What they don't bargain on is fools like me who keep on ringing, still thinking that they might have a chance of some sort of work. What they don't take in to account is the amount of money we spend on our phone bills to do this. God only knows what this has cost me, because it's not simply a ring, no answer, hang up. There's that answerphone which when it answers starts my bill ticking. All those bloody messages.
No wonder when the cold kicked in I was feeling really quite down.
Then yesterday, I got a call from someone else I'd sent an email to. Could I come to an interview? Of course I could. I'd've needed to have been on my deathbed not to have gone to an interview. Chit chat about the position. Then comes the fatal news, no it's not a part time position, it's a full time one - so there's no point in going to an interview, I'm not about to junk my uni course. So that was that.
I keep cruising the job sites, and I keep on sending my cv off, and yep, things must be picking up a bit, because I'm getting more responses to the cv than at anytime for the last 18 months. But it's soul destroying to have potential work dangled in front of you, and then snatched away, either because they've made a mistake in their advert, or they won't call you back. But then why should they? There are thousands of people out there looking for work, and to judge by the news last night, a few more hundred as of this morning. Oh well, onwards and upwards.

Monday 16th August

Well I did it. It was pretty touch and go there, especially on Sunday - I have blisters on top of blisters, owing to the incredible amount of walking, and I have to say that whilst the idea of following people was pretty interesting to start out with, it got pretty boring in the execution!
Firstly, people have absolutely no idea that they're being followed. You ought to try it, simply to give you an insight into how oblivious you become when you're shopping. Next time you're in M&S, or wherever, just for five minutes, pick the third person to come in through the door, and follow them. The trick to it is that as you're doing it, you stay a bit back from them, but keep them in your eye line. As you go along, touch, and lift up whatever items are on the rails in front of you, or reach to fiddle with the price ticket. That way you make yourself into an ordinary shopper. The person you're following will simply accept that that's what you are, and you become a part of their wallpaper. When people are shopping, they are looking at whatever's on sale. Other people only impinge on their radar if they become an obstacle to be got around, or if you are suddenly focused on the same thing. Then it's that curious dance of "Oh I'm sorry!" when you brush into each other, that kind of thing. You only come back to the reality of your surroundings when you need to find a sales assistant, or the changing rooms, or go to the checkout. Then you start to take in the whole of the room again. Focus is a weird part of being human, the way we blot out the totality to seek out whatever we want, and must have been a key part of survival back in the dawn of prehistory. How else would we have been able to see a ripe berry or the tiny flower of a particular herb amidst a mass of greenery? Now, we turn focus onto whatever we look for amidst a mass of clothing, or whatever.
I've seen some mighty strange things over the past few days. I've seen two teenage girls hunt out the corner that was out of range of the cctv, bury one jacket deep in the bottom of a bag whilst the other tried the identical jacket on and made a big fuss about whether it suited her or not - talk about displacement activity. I wasn't at all sure what to do about this, but we'd been given strict instructions that we were only there to watch, and shouldn't intervene if we saw something like this. So I didn't and yep, still go a few guilt pangs about it. The only thing I can say is that I have absolutely no idea what either of these girls looked like, I can't remember a single distinguishing characteristic of any of these people, because when I picked them to follow I focused on a characteristic that allowed me to pick them out at a reasonable distance - one woman was tall, another had a very odd hair thing involving a ponytail - someone else had the world's worst jacket (I'd swear it was yellow leather), that kind of thing. And I was so transfixed by what they were doing that I didn't seen them at all. Another day I followed a middle aged man and his wife around a men's clothing department, and I'd swear they examined every single shirt in the place. They took what felt like hours doing this, and my guess is that she wanted him to branch out a bit into something a bit different from what he would normally wear - but what did they end up with? A blue short sleeved shirt. Hours it felt like. I would swear that if she hadn't been with him, he'd have been in and out of there in 15 minutes.

But my overwhelming memory that I'm going to take away from this is going to be my feet. The first day we were at this from twenty to ten in the morning until 8 o'clock at night, and the other days were twenty to ten until 6, and I think it's a miracle that I've managed to get through it - confession here, I didn't manage it at all on Saturday, I could barely walk. Come Sunday, I was back at it, and I'm extremely thankful that its over and done with. I wouldn't be able to do this, I don't think anyone would be able to do it on a long term basis. It's not just the trekking up and down between Buchanan Galleries and St Enochs, it's the miles you walk inside of these shops, and I mean miles. A shop like John Lewis, not only is it what, three floors, but those floors have one heck of a lot of ground space. You follow someone in through the doors say at the back opposite the bus station, then they go up an escalator, spend forty minutes or so trekking around the women's clothing department, then they go on a short trip to the loo, perhaps pick up a pair of shoes before heading back to the clothing department to select a few of the garments they've looked at and have twenty five minutes in the changing rooms. They are perfectly capable of coming out of there and going to fetch another four or five dresses. Then maybe it's back to the shoe department to change their original choice for a version in blue, then they'll go off to the cafe - not me, worst luck, I'm stuck in the area around the cafe entrance waiting for them to come out, then maybe they'll be off to look at the lighting, or the hats... it's interminable, and after say what the third time this happens, stultifyingly boring. The only really interesting thing I've found over the past four days is that there are some rather nice scarves around which I may at some point pop back to pick up. I'm getting fed up of hair in my eyes, and it's either that or a haircut.. no not the haircut!!!

The other big downside of this job was that there was nowhere to go to put your feet up, or eat a sandwich. I had to go to cafes and stuff for lunch, and there aren't that many around in the shopping centre that serve a)decent food or b) cheap food! In fact I have to say M&S's cafe - particularly on Sunday when it's unaccountably quiet - was remarkably good value for money. As for that hellhole in the Buchanan Gallery which goes by some variety of the name "Streat", they are charging the most outrageous prices for the biggest plateful of cr@p I've ever had the misfortune to pay for. I had the allday breakfast at about 3 pm on Thursday. What you get is a huge plate, a simply vast bowl style in which are 'decoratively' arranged two extremely cheap sausages - more filler than meat, a small dessert spoonful of scrambled egg that at my guess where scrambled say at about 8 am, enough time for them to have become set scrambled egg at any rate, and I'd swear they must have started out as powdered, a piece of carbonised bacon - so carbonised, or more probably microwaved, that teeth could not penetrate it, and a large piece of some sort of bread. This was extremely mysterious because I suspect it was possibly some sort of pitta, or flat bread, with those odd green/grey marks on the bottom that are meant to indicate it's been baked on stone. This thing had never seen a stone in the totality of it's existence. How they get those marks there I have no idea, but I suspect that a machine stamps them on. It had then been toasted at some point, because it had the toasting lines on the top of it, but despite this, I'm convinced it was a solid lump of dough in the middle. Vile. I didn't touch it. Anyhow for this ghastly concoction they have the cheek to charge you £3.95, which frankly should be reported to the trades description people, but who's going to go to that much trouble? The staff are nice though, and you feel embarrassed on their behalf. In M&S I got a nice salmon and cucumber sandwich and pot of earl grey tea for about the same amount of money, and it was fresh, and tasty. I don't normally go in for food reviews, but maybe amid the sea of woe that were my feet, the most important thing was I got to sit down for 20 minutes!!!

Weds 11th August

Ok so I got the date wrong on the two posts below. Sorry about that, date blindness has been haunting me since I stopped working - but, this post is going to be all about... yay, WORK!
For those of you who don't know, last week I actually got a call from one of these applications I've been making for jobs you see on these websites - I have been seriously suspicious of this, since I keep applying for them and getting no response. But, yay, last week someone called, and off I trotted on my birthday, and even more yay, I got a job. It's only for four days, so it's not leap screaming into the air, but it's a start, and better still, the agency tell me that they always look for their previous employees to fill a vacancy before advertising it, so (should this be the case, rather than simply something I'm being told) I may get even more out of it than simply 4 days work.
But, today I went off to the training. The job is a market researcher, for a company in London who do this sort of thing for various chains, and shopping centres, and frankly it sounded like fun when I heard about it, and now it's turning out to be serious fun having done the training. What I'm going to be doing is following people around in various different shops, with this little handheld computer thingy, tapping 'labels' - ie, lone woman, lone man, looking at item, touching item, measuring item, (it's clothing people, relax!) looking at the price, all that kind of thing. But all of this is done surreptitiously!!!! Yes, I'm going to be a spy!!!!! Oh I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't get excited, but I have seriously always wanted to do something like this! And it's not really spying per se - well it is, but not spy type spying, but it's sort of spy-craft. I had a go this afternoon, in the menswear department of a local department store, and for the first time in my life, my shortness has been a plus - I can lurk behind racks of clothes, and my eye line is just perfect for the gap between the shelf on the top, and the rail that has the hangers on! Everything I've read in all those Le Carre books is just perfect for this. I keep them in my eyeline, and 'follow' them by veering off the 'path' through the department, carelessly handling piles of t-shirts as I go along. God I am loving this job! I dare say I'll be fed up to the back teeth with it by the time Sunday comes, but in the meantime, I am having such fun!


It's not all following people. We also have to count footfall, which means going to the requisite shop, finding a place to casually lean, or sit or whatever, and draw an imaginary box around the door we are watching, then count the people going through the box, those that go in, those that leave, and if they're leaving do they have bags with them? This is not quite as much fun, but I imagine - provided I can find a little seat to do this from, a bit of a rest which will be very welcome. And yes, we will have to do a bit of asking people to answer a short survey. But the big news on this is we have another interactive gadget, so they will be able to do it for themselves whilst I hold the thing. Way better than asking people if they want to contribute to a charity via direct debt for a living. (Mind you not to say that this isn't also a perfectly valid means of earning a crust!) If there was anyway I could do this for my weekends for the rest of my uni career I'd be in seventh heaven, but alas, four days and that's it. Still, in the meantime I shall enjoy it!!

Monday 8th August

Oh dear, Villa are in trouble. Alas Martin O'Neill has left - actually resigned, which is a thing Premiership managers virtually never do. There are clearly deep and dark reasons behind it, which we don't know, and it's very frustrating. Clear contenders are the fact no money has been released to buy in any big players, which leaves us understrength and now he's gone, you've got to put money on no one arriving until the January transfer window. There's no immediate appointment, so this has clearly come out of the blue. Oh God, here we go again. That's all I keep thinking, is this the 70s come all over again?
And that raises more interesting thoughts. Exactly how much of the 70s are we seeing re-played here? We've got a depression. People are being thrown out of work, and we have a caring sharing Conservative government to ease us through these troubling times - personally I'm begining to see a lot in the concept of revolution. There was a very interesting article in the Grauniad yesterday about the North South divide, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/08/north-south-divide-soon-become-chasm which really says it all. Anyday now I expect brown and grey to become the most popular colours, Cameron will start clutching a handbag (frankly I'm surprised he doesn't already carry one, not to mention how fetching he would look in a two peice navy blue skirt suit), and well.. not much more you can say about this really, except how bloody depressing it all is.

Saturday 7th August

Busy week this, what with re-opening the Ebay shop, birthday and all that. What is it about birthdays that makes me feel ambivalent about them? This year's was really great, so many people ringing, texting, leaving messages on FB and all, it was a really great day and yet at the same time I feel like to mention it is somehow to be shouting about what a great time I had in the face of someone who's accidentally wandered onto this blog and may be in the pit of despair - why? Because they've had a lousy birthday that's what!
At any rate I had a very good day. Particularly so because first thing in the morning I went off to East Kilbride and saw an employment agency that not only had a bit of work, but some that they needed to get other people to do - ie, I have a weekend's worth of work next week. This is major to me, and of course they were saying how good they were about finding work for people once they're registered etc - which does rather leave me wondering about whether this alleged opportunity will ever materialise. You know? Everywhere you go and talk to about work, they'll always tell you oh yes, send us a cv, we have various permanent contracts, we'll be in touch. Or some sort of variation on the theme, and you never hear from them again. So I'm not holding my breath, but in the meantime I have as I say a weekends work, and let's not look this gift horse in the mouth. Market research, in other words I shall be one of those women standing outside of a shopping centre begging people to spare me a moment of their time.. like I say let's not look a gift horse and all that. There is genuinely no selling involved in this, it's really interviewing, so it might be more fun than anticipated.
What else did I do? Well we went to Tibo's for a meal on the day itself - very nice. I had beefburger. I was hoping for a nice fishy specials board but there was none, and apparently hasn't been for a while now. I found that a touch alarming, I wouldn't like to see it go downhill. But a good time was had by one and all, and it all led to a slight hangover the next day and it's been a while since I had one of those!
I got some wonderful earrings off a mate, really gorgeous, and a few other bits and pieces (thanks to Ness, Abbs, Aimee!) and even the family remembered - something of a minor triumph there I think! I even had a call off Nick, a day late (what else is new, I'm lucky he remembered it was this century!)

So.. post birthday letdown now....!

Late Sunday night... not the greatest time in the world to be feeling down. Got some bad news this morning about a job that I'd applied for, and for no reason had felt would just be right for me - and although I've no reason to be feeling like this, it feels like it's been snatched away from me like that plum cherry you've just been fancying and reaching out for, and suddenly it's just not there anymore. Yet I've got no more reason to feel like this about this particular job than any other of the multitude I've applied for and haven't got.
Thing is, I suppose, the longer this goes on for, the more unemployable I feel I'm becoming, which is not a good thing. I've organised myself to go to the job agencies tomorrow, see if I can pick up something temporary, but I'm not particularly hopeful. I tell myself sternly that this is simply how I feel, I don't actually have a sign around my neck saying 'unemployable', but when you get into a cycle like this, it's hard not to feel it's there, and dragging you down. And I know myself too, it's at times like this that I get to feel so desperate that I'll take anything, something that I really can't do, and it all goes pear shaped, I'll end up exhausted, earning a pittance, and in some crappy place where I don't want to be.

And then when you add all this to the trail of unpleasant events that have been happening recently, well it's just one long tale of disaster! In fact, it's almost funny what's been going on for the past few weeks - and I suppose that's my saving grace, that at the moment, I can still laugh about all this. Ah well, enough moaning and groaning. Life goes on eh?

Ah, the end of the World Cup. I shall miss it - until the premiership starts at any rate. Personally I'm going for Holland, much as I like Spain, I just think Holland's time has come. It's supposed to be summer here, but frankly over the past few days you'd have been hard put to tell it from mid-October - wind, rain.. not quite cold enough to demand heating, but you know that's merely weeks away.
I'm trying to think of something interesting to write about. I've been making up new bookmarks - the shop has been shut for quite a while now, but I was thinking I would open in up in later August, and do a sort of Autumn - Christmas stretch, and then see how it goes. Times have not been so good for your average on-line seller, and I'm hoping for a better Xmas than last year. Anyhow, I have had enough time recently to put a good few stints in with the pliers and cutters, so I shall have some new stock.
Went out to meet up with friends for coffee on Thursday afternoon - I've been to the library a few times over the past few days and I should drag myself over there again soon - plugging away at the old dissertation research.
All told, life plods on. I still have high hopes of a job that I applied for recently, although the waiting is interminable. Isn't that always the worst part of job apps?

Monday 28th June

Well I guess we all have to come down from this football style hangover that we seem to have been collectively indulging in. I think I'm so past it that I won't even go on about it - just roll on August and the start of the new season. Yay.. (whispers) Go Villa!!

This isn't going to be a long post because as this evening has been going by I've been feeling just that little tingle at the top of the head that whispers sweetly, migraine.. migraine.. take pills now.. and I haven't, and really must go and do so. With my last cup of tea (ginger) of the evening.
Anyhow tomorrow is library day, I'm hauling my sorry self up to the tenth floor - yes, the delights of the theology department, where I can drag out the actual physical copies of Acta Sanctorum - no I still can't download the damn thing - so looks like I'm in for the hard copy version. I shall copy and take it home to work on it with dictionaries and grammar books to hand (it's in Latin..) I can also start mining the no doubt inexhaustible depths of Analecta Bollandiana. We're also having a sort of meet up of History pgs, in the pub natch.
Went to the fliks last night with Aimee, we ended up seeing this Wild Targets thing. It wasn't bad... but mm.. I don't think I'd describe it as being good either. You know the sort of thing I mean, in my opinion it needed a lot more work on the script, the plot.. the cast was good though. Anything that has Rupert Everett & Bill Nighy in it can't be all bad - that was my operating theory going in to it. However Nighy is a bit too creepy in it, & Rupert Everett just isn't in it enough. And the girl -- the one everyone's running around after - is frankly just too whiny and self satisfied, irritating to hell.
Ah well, yes, I must go get my migraine pills.

17th June 2004

It's gone midnight, and I've been veging out for a couple of hours, but I'm.. hungry. I have never managed to get a lock on whatever it is in my brain that correlates diet with hunger. I'm not actually hungry, I tell myself, I just want to eat something. I find myself fantasising about things like jam sandwiches, which I wouldn't touch in a month of Sundays, and this afternoon I almost binged out on rice cakes - if one hadn't been revoltingly overly-salty, I would have ended up eating half the packet. Perhaps the over- salted one was added by the manufacturer in the knowledge they were saving someone from a binge.
Actually I have to admit I really like rice cakes. There's something about the texture of them that seems, well, ok, sponge like, and I'm not talking about the variety that comes with buttercream and sugar. Did you not suck the water out of sponges when you were very small? I'm afraid to say that I did, and what's more I quite liked it!

Back to the diet. I have actually lost some weight, just not this week. However, last week I lost 5 lbs, which I think is probably enough to be satisfied with in a fortnight. I would like to loose this weight both hopefully for some time to come (let's not be over-optimistic here! No stupid promises like forever!) and well, loose it too fast and its a sure thing that I'm trying to do this too fast, and eating too little and will end up going off the deep end in a fast food joint or something. So 5lb over a fortnight is ok, it's a substantial loss. Thing is, well, I'm not too sure that I'm actually sticking to this that well. Take today for example. I had the smoothie for breakfast, still love those things, then tuna salad (with no dressing!) for lunch, and tonights dinner was chicken breast - all 4 oz of it, roasted - ha! roasted. Wrapped in foil and baked in the oven - I had to tart it up with something, so I rubbed lemon zest and black pepper all over it, so yes it did have a bit of flavour. I steamed the veg - carrots, potato and green cabbage, and I finished off with a cherry low fat yoghurt. I had an apple a bit later - it's the snacks that get me, because as I think I mentioned last time, come four, five o'clock I want tea and something. Something today was supposed to be two rice cakes and a teaspoonful of peanut butter. I ended up having four slices of wholemeal toast. Am I freaking out where there's no need to freak at all? God only knows. We'll see if I loose anything this week, and if not, well I shall need to do something. It's not like I'm stuffing myself full of chocolate or stuff like that. And that has to be an improvement.

Apart from this life this week has consisted of football and miracles. I take down my miracle records - for the database that my dissertation will be based on, and I listen half heartedly to the football. I have to admit, I did actually stop with the miracles to actually sit and watch Spain get decimated this afternoon - firstly because frankly it was so unusual, and secondly because Fernando Torres has a new hairdo that makes him look pale and interesting. I couldn't quite make out if this was actually his real hair colour, or he's a strange natural mouse blonde. Whatever, he's got a very good hairdresser. I hear the voices of my brothers rumbling in the background, enough with the fashion critique, what about the football? Yes.. mm. I think a lot of people are saying that at the moment. I have yet to see a match that has really caught fire. I did see the North Korean man weep, allegedly with pride at representing his country, but couldn't help wonder if partly it was down to fear at what would happen to them if they lost. I thought Gerrard was just brilliant. I don't care what Franz however you spell it thinks about it, but I did think they weren't anywhere near as bad as the media are currently making them out to be. I'm afraid I was a big Gerrard supporter when the whole captainship thing was an issue in the first place, and I hope he goes on to show why he should have been appointed in the first place. Ok, the whole court thing was a bit dodgy, but hell, over and done with now. I like to see Liverpool men do well. Nothing to do with the fact that I'd take MU over Chelsea anyday, but well, family and all that. We have connections to Liverpool and I always like to see them do well. Well shod of Raffa too I think.
Ok, now to steer myself away from the controversial opinionated bit.. miracles. I've got a whole pile waiting to be input into the database, but it's come time to do the test querying bit. In fact I really should be taking the instruction manual to bed with me to try and figure out how I do it, but I think that's pushing it a bit and I'll leave it till tomorrow morning. It's going to take me forever anyway. And if that wasn't enough, the blasted vpn client went corrupt on me again last night, what is it that makes a perfectly straightforward program that worked last week suddenly stop working when you've done nothing to it? God only knows.

What else? I have the date for my jury service come through. July - so at least it will all be over and done with before next term starts. Alas, the law will prevent me from including any juicy details, so you can expect to hear a lot about sitting around and waiting for things to happen I expect. I've applied for a couple of new jobs, but heard nothing as yet - one I definitely don't expect to hear anything from as it's with the Scottish Ballet, and I expect they will be flooded out with hot young marketing grads. Still as I keep telling myself, experience might just count for something. Its Friends marketing, that sort of thing, and it's been a long time since I last passed through a stage door. Still we can cross our fingers and hope.

Ah well, the witching hour has come and gone and at least I no longer feel hungry. I'm off to bed!

Friday 7th June

Ok, time to come clean... I've been dieting. I'm not going to go into any sordid details of exactly how much weight I'm trying to loose, or have lost. Some things shall remain forever secret twixt me and the scales. But none the less, I've been at this about a, well I was going to say a week, but I think it's more like two now.
It was the knee that was the final straw. I've been having problems with my knee for a while now, ever since I had a bad fall a couple of years back, and I'd been limping around over the past few weeks - I felt like it wasn't healing, then it was, and anyhow I was thinking about it and eventually decided that really you couldn't expect a relatively small joint like a knee to take the constant pounding mine must get. Loose some weight I thought, it'll do them both good. Hence..
So then I have the big decision of ok, what sort of diet am I going to follow? I can't tell you how much I hate the whole Weightwatchers thing. I've done the whole turn up at the church hall thing to death - the last time, Jo and I decided to do this together, and both of us went (on a single occasion) to join the group in Bradford on Avon. It was held in the simply stunning thirteenth century hall - I couldn't tell at the time whether it was a church hall or a village hall, or what sort of hall it was, but the half-timbering and plaster work was stunning, and worth the visit - sort of. Now this has to be a good, four, perhaps even six years ago. We felt nervous to start with because there didn't seem to be many people around, and frankly none of them that we could see appeared to be in the slightest bit FAT. One or two of them could have stood to loose a couple of pounds, but - jesus, Jo and I could have outweighed two of them singly by ourselves. Add to this that most of them were wearing designer gear, and that they all of them didn't appear to be inclined to talk to us - well you'd think that on it's own would be enough to finish us off. However, there was a further horror in store. As the class started, it became apparent that one woman was attending accompanied by her daughter, who couldn't have been more than about 12. She was a lovely little girl, bright and friendly - if I remember rightly, she was the only one to have looked in our direction even if she didn't speak. She was plump. She was plump in the way that my mother would have described as puppy fat. That I would describe as puppy fat. The sort of fat that in a couple more years, even in possibly twelve months, would completely have disappeared, yet this poor child was being dragged into a 'class' of adults, presumably comprising of most of her mother's friends, and was completely targeted by the class leader. Both Jo & I were totally horrified. We couldn't understand why the mother was behaving so inappropriately as to not seek out a more suitable group, if she felt her child needed to be subjected to the rigours of a diet class in the first place. Personally, I would have had her down to the swimming pool or some sort of high level physical activity before I'd subjected any child of mine to that. As it was, the next week we found a far more suitable group for ourselves - we did loose a few pounds, but like most of certainly my dieting experiences, it went back on within a few months of stopping the class.
So. No class for me. But as a (relatively) experienced dieter, I know that these things work, the whole weigh me in front of others somehow produces it's insidious effects - you do loose weight. But I'm not into this sort of thing on my own at the moment, I just really don't fancy it. I'm online now, and there's loads of online dieting services, I thought I would give them a go and check them out. So in short, I've signed up for the Grauniad's diet club, Eatright it's called.
It's a strange sort of experience. You go through all the joining process, pay up (and none of these things are cheap - but I'll get on to the real devil in the piece later) and put your details into the system. I.E. - how much you weigh. At the time - no scales. No I don't keep a set of scales about the place capable of weighing me, only the average kitchen variety. So that involved more expense, go buy a set of scales. I used the weight I'd been given at the doctors when I joined the new surgery, which had to be over a year ago, and frankly I think I'd done my best to forget that as soon as she'd weighed me! As it turned out, it wasn't that far out, although I'd overdone it by a stone. So I can't tell you how much weight I've actually lost yet, come next week, yep, then I shall be able to say yes, I've lost X pounds.

Anyhow when you've done all this, you then choose your meal plan, and get down to selecting your meals. This comes in a 7 day format, which would have been convenient had I decided to start this diet on say a Monday, but no I had to get the big commitment bit on a Thursday, which now comprises my day 1. I'm going to fiddle around with it a bit, and try and get it to run properly, I'll do myself a new week plan from Monday if I can and perhaps that'll make it run properly. Anyway, my meals seem to be nice enough, I've even had a few that I really like - Red lentil and Walnut salad for example, and an Apple and Walnut Salad - ok, maybe too heavy an emphasis on the walnut motif here, but hell, I like nuts! I had an extraordinary experience the other day when I opted for the Chicken Fried Rice meal one evening. Have you ever measured two ounces of dry rice out for yourself, and then cooked it? I was looking forward to this, rice - again like nuts, a favourite food. What I ended up with was a bare desertspoon full of cooked rice, that got me scraping those odd grains that always stick to the pan out! Horrified does not describe how I felt in relation to this!
The other thing that I have to say has really got to me over these past couple of weeks is the extent to which food immediately takes over the brain the moment that the concept of 'diet' is decided upon. My day's are becoming dominated by, ok, wake up, where's breakfast? It's not a meal I normally eat, and I've been able to have a smoothie for this, which I'd recommend to anyone who's normally a non-breakfaster being forced to contemplate food at whatever hour of the day you normally rise at. My smoothie comprises of a glass of fruit juice (I've been going for cranberry, it's a good mixer), in the blender, with a banana, and an ounce or so of berries. I've been on the strawberries for the past week, tomorrow I branch out to blueberries. Fancy having to measure an ounce of blueberries. Six or so I should think. The punnet will last for a month at that rate. So anyhow blend and drink. The resulting substance will see you through to eleven at least, and is actually drinkable, and enjoyable. I now find that I can tolerate the slice of wholemeal toast and teaspoonful of peanut butter about then. Yep, literally, a teaspoonful of peanut butter. So depressing..!
Then it's lunch. Lunch is normally a good meal for me, I'm not used to eating vast quantities, usually it's a sandwich and cup of coffee, so the red lentil salad, or a tuna salad - these are good substantial meals to me. But then we get to my downfall.

Tea, I love my tea and slice of cake - I like to come home and have tea, and then I'll eat a dinner, and yes, I feel it is dinner that has done the damage over the years. Particularly combined with the tea say an hour and a half beforehand. No cake now for Tess.. sniff. Now I have my snack, which is normally some form of cracker, with teaspoonful of peanut butter, or a spoonful of hummous, something wholefoodie. I'm getting used to this. I've even had fruit on a couple of occasions. Dinner - well dinner's a whole different story. I've taken to racking up the vegetable content so that I don't go mad about nine thirty and find myself devouring half a loaf or something. And that's where the demon money comes into all this. I went to Asda on Monday, and I'm telling you I spent £80. Horrifying. And what was this on? Vegetables that's what. Extraordinary quantities of vegetables, and it's the middle of summer and this stuff is supposed to be cheap now!!! No chance. God knows if I can actually afford to loose weight, that's what I say. Good quality, varied types of vegetables are expensive. It's awful. And it just goes to show you why so many people are overweight right now, they can't afford to be thin!

I shall stop here now. I need to go and find something wholefoodie to eat.

Thursday 27th May

Well folks, I reckon that was summer! I don't know how it is with you, but right now we're back to cold, well chilly at least in comparison, and this afternoon we had a hail storm. Only lasted what, 5 minutes, but it was bouncing off every surface it could possibly hit. Unbelievable.
Still, I'm more and more convinced that this is all down to that damn volcano - I know it's died down, but we've been having some really very attractive sunsets (I'm not around to see the sunrise!) very pink and streaky, which has inspired me to start up a little project. Life can't be all Latin and miracles, trust me. Anyhow, I'm making a mixed media picture, I've been wanting to do something truly mixed media for a while, and this seems an ideal opportunity. When I've finished it, and if I think it's actually worth putting on general view, I'll put a picture up, and maybe even a whole how I did this blog, since its been a while since I did this. I've bought a little fabric, renewed some of my paint tubes - it's been so long since I painted anything that many of them have dried up, yikes! I need to do things like this, I'm one of those people who needs to express the creative urge regardless of whether that urge produces anything wholly decent as such. I suppose I should be busy turning out bookmarks, but frankly the shops' been shut since my last huge essay deadline date, and over the past few months I'd say that it's not exactly been selling stuff like hot cakes. Since it's expensive to run - the Ebay fees are just horrendous, I thought I'll leave it until later in the year, when sales usually pick up.
What else have I been up to? Suffering in the knees is what. I'm grasping this bull by the horns by trying to loose a bit of weight, exercising, and no it's not going wonderfully well. I've been doing the exercises that the physio gave me for about two and a half weeks, and not one jot of benefit have I yet to see, which is a touch worrying. Normally these work like hotcakes, with things picking up within a matter of days, but not this time. We must just keep our fingers crossed that a) it doesn't get worse and b) it's not something other than muscular or ligament damage. I have a nasty sneeking suspicion that it's going to prove that way, and technically yes, I should go to the doctor, but I don't like doctors, never will, and I'd rather suffer for a while longer until I really can't put it off anymore. At least until I can prove by some weight loss that I am trying to do something about it myself.

As for the weight, well, as I said I've commenced dieting. I don't know what it is about diets, but the moment you start one, you get instant wild hunger pangs. I had a fabulous lunch, measured out on the scales, two ounces of red lentils, 1 oz of walnuts, handful of rocket, tomato, all done according to the recipe, and it was delicious. I can't tell you often enough that it really was tasty, and will be a pleasure to eat again, even if I wasn't dieting. It was filling. I mean, lentils for the lords sake, take a wee bit of eating. Walnuts need to be masticated. I thought well this will keep me going until supper. But come tea time, what did I want?? Food. I was hungry. I did stick to the diet, which provides snacks, I had plain wholewheat toast, with a teaspoon of peanut butter. As laid out in the plan. However, whilst they say one slice of toast with peanut butter, I had four. Yep. Disgraceful isn't it? I'm not too freaked by this, if I'd have raided the deep freeze for the icecream I know is there, then I would have been cross with myself, but no butter was consumed, and I did stick to the teaspoon full of peanut butter on each slice. Small falls like this are only to be expected, and you can but struggle on, safe in the knowledge that if you stick to whats on the diet sheet, the odds are you are still probably eating less than what you were eating prior to commencing.
The dinner was pasta with bacon and spinach, and I'm sorry to say whilst I like bacon, and I love spinach, I didn't take to this as well as I did the lentil recipe. Tomorrow is Spaghetti Primavera, that should be good. Lunch is a baked potato with beans. Got the beans, not sure I've got any baking potato's - that's another diet based issue, the cost of the bloody thing. You are constantly food shopping too. You have to have so much food to produce meals that are high fibre, low fat types, because you have to have the variety so you don't get bored and devour whatever fatty food is to hand or run screaming to the shop for half a dozen packets of cheesy whatnots. Gross isn't it?

Weds 19th, sort of, because it's after 12 so really its thurs 20th!

Yep, and again here I am late at night, blogging. Well it seems to be a habit of mine. Anyhow weirdness of weirdness, today I got a notice that I've been selected for potential jury service. For the next two years, I can be summoned at three weeks notice, I have to let them know when I'm planning on being away, and serve on a jury. I've actually done this before, and frankly I have to say that I feel it's somewhat unfair that I can have my life thrown into this degree of uncertainty - they didn't hold me in abeyance for two years the last time! I just got a letter, went and served - none of this you will tell us where you are if you're planning on going away from home, in advance - not that I've got anything against jury service, but I think it would be a bit better if they shared it out a bit more fairly. What's wrong with the idea that if you've done it once, that's it, you've done your bit and thanks for that. Let's share out the duty and those people who, when I say I've done this, go Oh God, I've not, I'd love to - well why not let them? When I did it last time a woman told me once you're summoned, you get summoned again and again. What a pain. Why couldn't it have been your premium bond's come up?!
It is like winning the lottery, only not, if you see what I mean. If my number has to come up, on this not exactly common lottery-type event, why couldn't it have been the actual lottery? What's to bet I get summoned say in the first week of next term, or three weeks before an essay is due or something. Yep, that'll be it. My number will well and truly come up three weeks before I'm due to hand my dissertation in. Still mind you I can at least ensure that that isn't in a state of disarray three weeks before the hand in date!
So what else has been happening - Abby came to visit this weekend, and along with the trips around museums, I seem to have destroyed my knees. Every day they started getting a bit weird, but ever since she's gone home & I've been left to get on with normal life, it's like they've crumbled to some strange powdery state. I feel like a little old woman staggering around with my stick and on full dose painkillers. I shall have to take them to the doctor for physio I think. Mind you, having said that, I've been doing the exercises I got when I fell a couple of years back regularly for about the last three weeks, I've even constructed a support pillow for the back of the knee out of popping plastic and packaging tape. It doesn't seem to be doing a bit of good. However it was great to see Abby, and I don't think we stopped talking the whole weekend. We went to see some great places as well, the Tennement House, the Burrel Collection, and St Mungo's. St Mungo's is the Catholic Cathedral of Glasgow, and we saw a rather fascinating end of a service given for some sort of priory organisation that reminded me somewhat of the unsavory groups out of Dan Brown's little fantasies - a number of older men in smart suits wearing tunics over the top of these apparently constructed from white sheets. And a number of them could have done with the larger version too, they pulled across the jackets and seats of their suits in a most unfortunate fashion! I suppose I should add that I have no idea who these people were, but they were accompanied by six masons of what was clearly a very high degree to judge by the badges, iconography and medals they were wearing, not to mention the fact that these guys were in tail suits. Full morning dress, bar the top hats. Extraordinary. The cathedral itself was rather interesting, with a number of wall placques that are well worth a look. And the necropolis is fascinating, and at some point I'll get the photo's off my phone and put them on Facebook.

I'm off to a mapping workshop soon. They organise this sort of thing for post grads at the university, and this is in pursuit of my quest to be able to put spots on a map of antique Europe, where the miracles actually take place. I'd like a nice colour coded set of spots saying here were ten, here were twenty - here was a single miracle in say 595. You know the sort of thing. I think it will look very fancy in my dissertation, but it's not as simple as saying you get a map and put spots on it. This is going to be a seriously intensive course, I've had to download stuff, log on to digimap, which appears to be a system whereby you can access lots of ordinance survey maps - it's all very interesting. I like maps, there's something about them that whenever I see a map I end up gazing at it as if it was vibrating and turning purple. I particularly enjoy maps of old places that I used to live, it sort of takes me back I guess. But any old map will do, if I can't find one of where I used to live I'll settle for mysterious places. I have a road atlas of America, which I find absolutely - well, rivetting. I look at all those place names and marvel. It's not as if I particularly want to go there and actually see these places for myself - although I wouldn't turn it down, but I like actually looking at the map itself. What I'd really like to get hold of is a sort of A6 sized map of the UK, a hardbacked book type version, of the type of map that you used to have to have when you, ahem, ok, I was at school. I'd like to be able to get on a train or a coach and follow it, so I could see what that mysterious building twenty miles in the distance is, or what those hills are called. I think the only solution to this is to get one of these new Iphones, with a satnav on it. However, I'm keeping a very firm hold on this idea, no way am I doing this until I have work.
Which brings me to the fact that I still don't have any work. Pain in the neck or what? Oh well, I keep on trying.

Friday 7th May

Yet again I'm going to start this by saying that I'm tired, but this time it's entirely my own fault, as I stayed up most of the night listening to the election. I'd love to be able to tell you what I finally fell asleep listening to, but alas, I don't remember. By the time I nodded off it had all become one great blur... my neighbours must be about ready to slaughter me, but I turned the radio down to a tiny little noise, so hopefully it didn't disturb them too much.
Well, when I woke up of course, I was feeling this is another fine mess we've gotten ourselves into, but to be honest, I don't actually feel like that. I'm sort of hoping that the party bosses are actually out there taking notice of all of this, because it was sort of the result we wanted I think - except for what the hell happened to the Lib Dem vote?? Poof and it's all gone! Extraordinary. And it can't all be explained by tactical voting either, or I guess we'd have Gordo back in number 10 and ordering up a new range of cabinet ministers, rather than no doubt hovering by the phone and wondering if anyone's going to call.
Mind you one thing has occurred to me and that is a short spell in a coalition would serve to give the LibDems the necessary experience to be able to be a realistic proposal as a government - way back when, I remember lots of people saying oh you can't vote for them, they've got no experience. It's rubbish of course, it can't take much more experience to run a government, and I don't recall anyone hurling that one at the Hiss-Spits, when the only experienced members of government they have are the one's who got all that experience under Thatcher. It's also quite extraordinary how many people are just riveted by the whole business, everyone I've met today is wanting to chat about what's been happening.
On a personal level, I would definitely go for a total revamp of the electoral system, which would result in no single party being able to dominate politics again in the way that the hiss-spits and Labour have for the past what, thirty years? I have grave doubts that the hiss-spits will ever agree to this, but I also have extreme reservations about Gordo's offer this afternoon of 'emergency legislation.' I don't want emergency legislation, I want something that's been carefully thought out, and well planned thanks! Not something rammed into place within a couple of weeks, so that when a minority hiss-spit govt collapses, there's a new system in place that will guarantee that they never ever obtain power, or a sniff of power ever again. I want them to work together, properly, treating each other with respect. I don't want Ken Clark in front of his rhododendrons telling me that the financial chaos is Labours' fault when it patently was not. He may think that if he says this often enough, that I'm going to start believing him, but I can tell him that I'm not, and I'm getting mighty fed up with this endless repetition that's been going on. If there's a natural political home for Bankers, it's there behind the rhododendrons with good old Ken. What is it about that man that makes him look self-satisfied and pompous before he's opened his mouth and said a word?
And what on earth are they going to do about whatsisname? I can't remember his name but he has one of the most unpleasant natural faces I've ever seen, and they apparently are going to make him Chancellor of the Exchequer. If they've got an inch of sense they'll ditch him and make the offer of the Chancellorship to Vince Cable, who if ever there was a case of the right man for the job emerging, then surely it's this. If Gordo gets a crack at this, which I very much doubt, then that's what he should do. Darling hasn't exactly been a raving success has he?

But lord, I didn't mean to go on. I'm sure you've all got your own ideas of who should be where, and doing what. One thing they have to do and very very fast is sort out what happened at the polling stations, asap. We can't have that happening again, my God it was better organised in Afghanistan by all accounts. It makes you ashamed to be British to see that going on. And how fantastic to have a Green! I thought that was brilliant. Maybe we'll get a few more of them with a PR system. That would be worth having a blasted BNP, we can get Ken Clark to sit on them, in combo say with Prescott who'll be looking for something to occupy him in his retirement.
You see? Doolally with exhaustion. I'm off to bed!

Sunday 2nd May

I'm off to bed in a minute, as soon as I've done this, I've had a long and somewhat exhausting day. Why? AskSam is why - its a new database system I've downloaded, and getting to grips with it is - well I'm sure you know. Any type of programming, they tell you oh it's so easy, oh it works so well, oh it's supermarvellous.. and I've no doubt that it will be, once I've learnt how to use it.
The basic idea is that I have to have a database in which to store records of miracles, the records of which I can then do marvellous things with that will be the making of my dissertation. After consultation with the tutor of RRSH - who's particularly good at this kind of thing, I'm constructing a trial database, to make sure the bloody thing works properly before I start stacking records into it. Hence the flapping about with AskSam, which I think is actually askSam.com, but never mind that - the thing is askSam is a database system designed to work with text. You can store masses of words in it, and it counts them, it can use boolean operators etc, and I'm sort of hoping that by using this, I can avoid the whole coding issue. Coding is a particular hate of mine, ok, you can turn yes, no and not stated into code relatively easily - either that or have 3 columns, but you try devising a code for stuff like the use of oil in miracles. Death, prior, during or after the miracles has occurred - you'd be amazed how many apparently successful recipients of miracles drop dead six months later. For the earlier database I used Excel, which works, provided you code appropriately or use hundreds of columns, but I'm thinking - no coding, no headache! Still I'm not sure. I know no one else who's used this, and the bloody thing has crashed on me twice in the last 8 hours. It can crash as much as it likes right now, it has one record in it, but if it crashed when I've got it stacked with records - ha. No way. I should point out here that I'm using the trial version, and probably not terribly well at the moment, let's not cast aspersions on what's probably a perfectly good product. Still come on here Tess, I've had it for 24 hours so far, and I've got the database, and an entry form to put the data on to - it's looks a bit tatty at the moment, but I can tidy that up should I decide to go with it. And the other thing about this is that I can also use it to construct a searchable database of quotes, a particularly attractive thing to have when it comes to writing up.

So what else have I been doing this week? Well I can now tell the full and unexpurgated story of the interview for a 'job' I had this week. I found this 'job' on the jobshop website, so phoned them up - it's a simple little sales job for a jewellery shop in fairly central Glasgow. I phoned them up and that seemed to go ok, and had to go along to see them on - lord I've forgotten what day of the week it was now, my heads so full of askSam! Thursday I think. Anyhow this shop wasn't where I thought it was, but in a far more dubious part of town. And can I tell you when I saw it, my first instinct was to turn tail and run, the fascia was all rundown, the window was only what half stocked - and when I got inside! This is not a shop that sells new stock, it sells old stock, it's not a pawnshop, I don't think there's any returning of stuff, but the other rather peculiar thing was there didn't seem to be much to sell. Let's just say my spidey senses were tingling. The place was no bigger than one of the cupboards in my flat ( bar work, waiting, that kind of thing. When I conceived of this whole thing in the first place, back in the dim and distant, securely employed past, I did my usual thing of telling myself that its a big city and tenement flats have very large 'cupboards' that are made out of what were the old Victorian bedspaces - check out the Tenement Flat museum site, they're bound to have pictures!) I mean literally this place could have been installed in my clothes cupboard. Anyhow having gone in here, and met the people who were running it, who I should say seemed perfectly legit as far as I could tell - had an 'interview' of all of about 7 minutes. He then says oh I'll either phone you on Sunday or not bother to phone if you've not got the job. Frankly that was ok by me, because I thought he's not going to offer me any part of this job, so what the hell. And of course he didn't, and I'm extremely relieved. After all, what the - well I was going to say what the hell would I do then, but there's no what the hell about it, I would have politely declined. And I'm sure that he must have known that, because he didn't offer me anything. I'm not in the least upset about it, beyond that I was foolish enough to actually go for this in the first place, but then it's what I'm looking for. A few days or so regular, non-demanding work that'll bring me in a bit of income. One that's not going to distract me too far from my miracle collecting. In fact I'd more than happily sit on a till in a supermarket for 8 hours of the day, if there were any supermarkets looking for staff - alas, Glasgow is deeply entrenched in recession, Scotland itself has only just emerged in this current sector about 3 months behind the rest of the UK. So there are just not that many jobs around, and the one's that are, are more suited to the young, thin and glamorous - ie there'd be plenty of work. Well it's a big city alright, only not so much work. Still, this past week has got me a bit more in the swing of it, and even this little interview has to a certain extent demonstrated that I need to brush up a bit on my interview techniques. Can't say I did that good a job of selling myself as the ideal assistant, but that's probably more down to be somewhat gobsmacked at what I'd walked into! Something will turn up. It always does, and in the meantime, yes... askSam!

Sunday 25th April

I say the 25th, but in reality it's Monday, and I should be saying 26th - but I'm off to bed in a minute, so ya boo sucks to that. I've spent most of today scrabbling around on Youtube, digging out just so many old video tracks - my arm hurts with clicking the mouse!!!

And have I done anything else? I took the rubbish out, I've done a bit of light cleaning and washing, the usual weekend stuff. Last week, I took the bull by the horns and went to the jobcentre to look for work - basically that's a great big HA! in the face. No work to be had, as far as I could see. I've been doing some reading, thinking about starting off my new Miricle database - yes, really must get that moving, so yep, Monday I shall start that off.

And that's been this week, not much to say really.. maybe next week will be more exciting.
And oh yes, I had my hair cut. But I feel like I've said enough about that already on FB, thanks for all the nice comments guys!

Saturday 17th April

Well, this time last week I'd rather thought that I was going to be hosting Abby's visit, but the volcano cloud has put paid to that. Nevertheless, the fact that this has had to be delayed - we've rearranged another date, but some of the things you hear about this cloud make you wonder if we're not in for some kind of wierd dark age with no air travel for months - has got me off my backside, and I've now got a benefits appointment for next week. It would have been a hair appointment as well, but the salon I've chosen isn't open until midweek so, well, maybe this is telling me something and I should choose another salon. I'm not a good getting a haircut person, I really dislike it, principally because I have to take my glasses off which means I'm sat there squinting at the mirror where I can see a blob moving around my head but not a single smidge of what the blob is actually doing. I know that I really really upset my last hairdresser, who gave me a brilliant cut, but couldn't figure out why I was sitting apparently stony faced throughout the whole thing, and I'm not sure he believed me when I told him that I couldn't see a thing he was doing. This time I'll make sure that I tell them before they start. Maybe they'll give me a chance to pop the glasses back on, so I can actually see what they're up to. Some chance of that, in my experience. Anyway it's got to be cut, it's never been this long and it does nothing, absolutely nothing for me. I want something short and spikey, and with the summer coming up, that can be washed daily.

So back to the benefits experience. It's got to be what, ten years since I last claimed benefits? Interesting this, I decided since I didn't know where the job centre was I'd google it, and ended up on Ugov, or whatever they call it, and phoned the hotline - really interestingly, this meant that I got a sort of mini-interview on the phone, where they took my basic details and fixed me up an appointment - the girl I spoke to was very nice, none of your usual flapping about with 'how do you spell that?' or 'You live where?' with a totally blank response to Glasgow!!! And to judge by the sound Newcastle accent, clearly they are based in this country and haven't been exported to India. Not that I've got anything against India, don't get me wrong, I just - like most of us I expect - think that no matter how much educating those places do, someone who lives in England tends to know the cities and towns far better, and you get a clearer phone line. You're never going to be able to speak to someone thousands of miles away as clearly as you can speak to someone about a hundred miles away - is that anti-phone line-ist? I don't care. One of the worst in my experience was Virgin, who actually provide phone lines, and you couldn't hear or be heard clearly ever. Mind you working in a call centre is ghastly, I'm pretty sure I read an interview with a union guy earlier this week, election thing, but he called call centres the modern equivalent of the dark satanic mills, and by god he's right. I've never worked in places like them, and I've no doubt that I shall probably end up in one again, but dear god they are awful places to work. Mind you I'd settle for work right now, any kind of work, but what can I do? Short of moving to India that is.

Anyway, so I spoke to the woman on the phone, and I'm off to Parkhead Job Centre next week. It'll be a novel experience, but I'm hoping that it'll bring me in a few extra pounds a week, either that, or of course, find me a job. Now there's a novelty. I know the sort of thing I'd do, I know the sorts of things that I'm good at, and no one's going to force me into bar work or any kind of manual labour. Bar work would have me - well, lets face it, I don't think anyone's going to employ me on bar work anyway, I'm no fresh faced eighteen year old, which is what most bars in Glasgow are looking for. A pub would be a different thing, a nice quiet pub, now that I'd willingly do, but I'm not going to be selling myself into fifteen hour shifts that finish at three in the morning. I have to say as well, I'm not fond of what alcohol does to people. So what does that leave me, well I really wouldn't mind a bit of shop work. I know it's tough on the feet, but I think I could hack that, and although manual labour isn't exactly my thing, I can manage a bit of shelf filling. It's not exactly the sort of thing that screams out as a good job, but for a student a few hours a week sitting on a till wouldn't be far short of a good job, especially if it was for one of the big supermarkets where there might be a chance of a bit of overtime when I needed it, and it offered me a regular wage packet. No I wouldn't mind that at all. I think the chances of something like housing work or whatever for the council is a non-runner, they're pretty much on the brink of having to make tons of people redundant. I don't think that they're hiring at all. I've been applying for stuff that pops up on these internet search sites, but I don't know. Nothing much seems to come from that. Signs of the times, eh? I always thought that living in a big city like Glasgow would give you a good chance of being able to find work, but times have changed, and there's not been much about really ever since I got here. But summer's coming, and it's not just the money angle of all this, I need something that's going to get me out of the house every now and again, make a few friends who aren't going to be off home and that sort of thing. So I'll tell you how it goes when I've been there.. what's that old Chinese proverb.. oh yes, interesting times. Yep, we're living in interesting times. Changeable at any rate.

Saturday 10th April

I'm sitting here thinking what do I have to blog about... and I can't say that anything springs to mind with that instant let's do this, or do that... Villa lost to Chelsea in the FA cup - no Match of the Day on Scottish tv.. bored now.

Boredom. How does one deal with boredom? I could get out my beads and put together a few bookmarks, which I haven't done for a while. When my essay deadlines got to 'breathing on the back of my neck' I closed the shop and haven't re-opened it yet. I should do that but perhaps not until the week after next. I could get a book and read - which I probably will do when I've finished this, but to be honest I'm a tad read out at the mo, I'm currently making my way through.. let me see, Saints and their Miracles in Late Antique Gaul. I feel the urge for something a little bit more fiction-y.
I watched Harry Potter and the whatever it was on the box tonight. Now this was moderately interesting as I hadn't seen it before, and it did strike me that Daniel Radcliff - Harry - hasn't exactly sprung up inch-wise has he. Probably just a slow developer, either that or Ron is now six feet five inches. Perhaps that's a bit more likely! Anyhow it was the usual thing, you know I was going to say Harry gets into trouble, Harry gets rescued, Harry goes home from school. But it wasn't really, I suppose because they're getting towards the end and Harry must at some point kill off Voldermort? Does Harry kill Voldermort? I'm fairly sure I must have read the last book, but it hasn't stuck that well in my memory. Actually I'm presently re-reading Ursula Le Guin's Left Hand of Darkness, which is very good indeed. Genly Ai is in Mishnory, and he and the ex-Prime Minister are about to have to make a run for the ice. Anyone who's read this will know what I'm talking about, and those of you who haven't - who knows, you might be sufficiently mystified to find out! Ok, not, but you know what I mean.

But of course the very mention of the words Prime Minister - whether ex or not, brings me to the election. Yes. Very yes indeed. Picture me frowning here, drawing in the metaphorical breath, and letting it out with great slowness. I have to physically restrain myself, because they make me so Goddam Angry!!!!! No I can't this is the third time I've deleted what comes below because I don't want to make personal remarks that might offend - you see that's the sort of person that I am. In part it's why I hate this campaign, the offensiveness of it all. The fact that these people - from all sides, I'm not being favouritist about this, a good lot of them from pretty much all sides, seem to think it's acceptable behaviour to insult each other, and each other's opinions in loud voices. I wouldn't find that acceptable behaviour in a person that I knew, and if someone persisted in doing it in front of me, I would likely as not, eventually tell them so. If I was forced to continue associating with them, that is, the most likely result first and foremost is that I wouldn't continue to associate with them. Every one has a right to say what they think, but they should do so calmly, and without insulting the person whose opinions they are criticising. Critique is a valuable skill that can take a bit of learning, in an academic setting, and all of these people have some degree of education, why can't they practise what they've been taught? And can someone tell me why, or even when, it became acceptable to fight a general election campaign whilst avoiding telling the truth about what you intend to do should you be elected? God knows, every time Brown starts suggesting that Labour intend to reform the House of Lords, I find myself asking well didn't you say you were going to do that back in 1997, and wasn't that one of the reasons, if not the chief reason that I personally became very un-fond of Blair, and very hopeful that Brown would carry out the mandate that I was under the impression that he had been given? I fully expected Labour to go a good way towards dissolving the Lords entirely, and turn it into a fully elected house but no, apparently not. So I don't get best pleased when they bring it up because I'm reasonably sure that they've got no intentions of actually doing this should they be elected, and it's a ploy to the Lib Dems should they find themselves in a hung parliament. As for the idea that Brown might bring in proportional representation, well I'm reasonably sure that I've heard him dismiss the idea in the past. I could be wrong, he might have had an epiphany, but I doubt it.

As for the Tories.. don't get me started. The amount of what might be described as tactical untruths that they are coming out with at the moment is beyond belief. Why exactly should I, a single woman, who has been single all of her life, spend my tax pounds on supporting married couples? I'm almost tempted to say that should such a thing happen, I shall try to refuse, or reclaim it. I think it's an appalling, disgusting, divisive idea. I think it shows exactly what sort of people you're dealing with here, people who like the idea that some sort of ceremony makes a difference. It's so 1950s. Worse, it's 1940s. Incidentally if you're out there spluttering that they say they're going to pay for it with a banking surcharge, let me remind you that that's going to happen what, once? If they had any intention of continuing a surcharge on over a long term period, they'd go for the Robin Hood tax, which would at least do some good.
And the Lib Dems. I'm not entirely sure why they didn't elect Vince Cable as leader, but I feel it's another example of them shooting themselves in the foot, probably - must have been a result of the Ming debacle. Mind you, had they done so - elected Vince Cable that is, then he wouldn't have been able to be a potential chancellor in a hung parliament, which is what I for one, am devoutly hoping for. We're up the river, and the paddle's floating out of view, with rapids to the left of us, brambles to the right, and sharks snapping at the sinking canoe. We all know this people. We know that there will have to be massive cuts to public services, but I'll be damned if I don't point out that the Conservatives are the natural representatives of the very people who got us into this mess in the first place, not the Labour Party, but the bloody bankers. They keep droning on about their list of business leaders who support them, and the Labour Party left it to the LibDems to remind people that these are people who earn millions of pounds, and are now telling you loudly that £15 a month is too much for them to pay to keep you in work. Thats the reality behind all this. It makes me sick, it really does, the longer this goes on the less I feel like actually voting at all, but that won't stop me. And to be really honest, although I'd like to say you should go vote Labour, I'd rather that you actually go and vote for the Tories rather than not vote at all. Do that and we could end up with the BNP, and that frankly will give me apoplexy. I shall stop now...

Wednesday 8th April

Had a nice chat with my sister this evening - sadly one of her little dogs has passed away. She's very upset. The vet had told her that the dog had a terminal condition, and given her pills for the dog which were supposed to maybe give little dog another six months or so, two weeks later, little dog has died. This in and of itself is sad, but unremarkable, except for the fact that this is an almost identical repeat of what happened to my friend Abby's last dog - again, terminal condition, vet gives pills and say may give another six months, two weeks later, the dog has passed. Like I said to Jo, clearly this is a way that vets give people time to adjust to the shock and trauma of loosing a much loved pet. Still, I have to say, Doris was a very sweet little dog, never gave anyone a moments trouble, or anything but unconditional love. She'll be much missed, not least by her sister, Tilly, who also lives with my sister. Poor old Tilly is very confused and upset right now, because her sister has suddenly disappeared. It's such a shame that you can't explain to an animal, that they don't understand the implications of future events. Poor old girl. I remember when Jo first got them, two tiny, tiny puppies, far too small to have been taken from their mother but they got them from the RSPCA I think, so perhaps something had happened to their mother. They both made it through, Doris, frankly in somewhat better condition than Tilly, who seems to have a canine version of ocd. She now even recognises the spelt out version of B.A.L.L. If you stood and threw the ball for her to chase and bring back, you would be the first to drop, before Tilly lost interest.

Tomorrow I think I'm off to the library, check back in with a few books, and I dare say take a few more out. I must make a start on my reading, and devise a means to store possible quotes for the dissertation. I need some more of those big hard back notebooks, and some highlighters too I think. And yes, another wretched ream of printer paper. Stationery is becoming the bane of my existence, no sooner have I bought the stuff than I've run out of something and need to replace it. Oh well. Nose to the grindstone and all that.