What the HELL is wrong with me?!?!?!

No …… No …… See?? It's not that hard a word to say. So why didn't I say it??? Agency folk are a pain in the arse. As you know, the last couple of weeks I have been working out in Beverley in a Credit Control job. …… OK, maybe you didn't know the credit control part, but that's what I was doing …… so anyway, the contract came to an end on Friday. A fact, of which, I was so glad because it was the most boring and tedious fucking job you could imagine. I spent 8 hours a day staring at a spreadsheet trying to sort out someone else's mess for a system I didn't understand. Seem to be my remit these days …… I was looking forward to catching up on my sleep, seeing as I had been doing the 5 hours sleep a night thing again, not coming home with sore eyes and a headache, not having to tackle the rush hour traffic for a journey that should have taken 30 minutes and wound up taking an hour each way, and having the opportunity to have yet another PROPER rethink about my direction. I'd made some plans for the interim, such as catching up on AAT reading and tidying, and had prepared myself for another tedious routine of applications, interviews and chat shows.

Come Monday, I decided I should set about looking for another job and contacting the Job Centre to sort out restarting my JSA Claim, and that's what I did today …… I went in, they gave me a form to complete and made me an appointment to go in again tomorrow to see an advisor, and what happens?? I get a phone call from the pushy agency person who arranged the Beverley job the first time round, telling me that they had requested I go back to do some more work on the same project for them. Now, you would have thought that my disdain for the work I had been doing would lead me to say 'No, don't want it, you can stick it!' Right?? Wrong. Me, being me, said, "Yeah. OK."

'Yeah, OK'. YEAH OK!!!! What is wrong with me??? I must be a sadist to do that to myself. Something tells me the whips and chains would be preferable. So why did I say yes?? I think I panicked. I want to work …… I KNOW I want to work …… I just don't want to work THERE doing THAT, but the pressure that you're placed under by agencies and the job centre to find a job, and the preconceived notion that many have of the unemployed (scrounging bastards springs to mind!!) kind of forces your hand a bit. So I start back in Beverley on Thursday …… for a week …… up until Easter. Hardly seems worth the effort. I think part of it is that it's a continuation of what became 'My Baby' while I was there, but that doesn't make it any more appealing. I suppose if I'd known they'd be asking me back this week I wouldn't be so bothered but it's just so 'bitty' and random, no consistency whatsoever. Something tells me they asked someone else to continue the project and they refused saying they were 'too busy' despite the fact they probably spent most of their time gassing about Coronation Street or Lost or Big Brother or whatever the fuck the latest thing is ……

This agency woman is a pain in the arse, she's young and headstrong the way some of the youth of today are wont to be (listen to me sounding like I'm 50, but she's got to be no more than early 20's). She's pushy as hell and makes me feel like I'm doing HER a disservice if I say no to any number of potential jobs she's trying to find for me, in companies where there aren't actually any jobs going so give it a few months and I could wind up redundant again. She's definitely on commission. She put me up for an interview the other week, which I had second thoughts about and wanted to cancel. I can understand her reasoning. Her excuse was "it's all good interview practice", but if you're not sure about a job you don't do your best interview and it therefore isn't that good a practice, it's just going through the motions. Or is that just me. Suffice it to say I never heard back either way for that one but that suits me fine …… so much for practice and feedback ……

And on top of all that …… Avon's discontinuing both the shampoos I like and the bubble bath!!! BooHissBoo!! ;)

A Rock And A Hard Place

It seems you can't win as a job seeker. On the one hand you're told by the Job Centre that you need to apply for X amount of jobs/talk to X amount of employers per week which, if you want to work, you dutifully do, then on the other you get told by agencies that you have to seem enthusiastic about every dead-end boring job you go to interview for. Case in point, I was put up for a job in Immingham, by one of the agencies the other day. I need a job especially as this one was only due to last a fortnight, so I said, go ahead, put me forward. Maybe I didn't read what she'd sent me properly, but it turns out it was for a chiefly payroll position – something which I said I wanted to get away from. But I went anyway, but unfortunately as soon as Payroll was mentioned, my interest in the job waned and it seems I didn't succeed in hiding it very well. Her advice was nervous or not, which I wasn't particularly, I should look interested. The fact that I was stressed because of traffic, tardiness (because of the traffic!!) and a lack of information on the job provided by the agency resulting in my being unable to actually DO any timely research is neither here nor there. If I could have done the research I would, but I'm not going to abuse my current position by surfing the internet while working!!

So what do I do?? I have to apply for a certain amount of jobs whilst not working, but some of those I won't really want, and if I make it to the interview stage, it seems the remark "I need a job" isn't a good enough retort to use in an interview when asked why you applied, even if that is the only reason you have applied. Seems an eagerness just to work isn't enough these days ……

My other related crisis is over-thinking …… AGAIN!!! Maybe it's the number of knock backs again or the uncertainty of temping but it gives me way too much time to think. I commented to Kerry the other day how everything I've done in terms of career I've fallen into. I've never really made a decision for me. It was always convenient or necessary. So here I am wondering if Accounts is my bag of chips …… and wondering how I've got into such a rut. Think it's the time of year again. It's coming up to birthdays and other stuff and I start contemplating my lot again …… promising myself that I'll do something about it and never quite getting round to it ……

I sound like a broken record, I know that. But it just bothers me that everyone else has seemingly found their niche and I'm still looking for it …… Roll on unemployment ……