Diary of an up and coming sociopath

Tomorrow’s apparantly a big day for work, the first of the month involves a lot of stuff happening which means I’ll be working flat out for a few days, which is kind of reassuring, because to be honest if I’ve got any complaint about the last couple of days it’s that occasionally it’s too hard to find work to actually do. It’s far more boring to try and find a product category that I can work on than it is to actually do the work on one.

Today I tuned in a bunch of radio stations and fast deciding that Radio is an inherently shit medium, despite Lauren Laverne’s presence brightening the end of each working week day. I’m constantly swapping channels to try and avoid the crapper artists. I’m not feeling much of a genre mix, either. Radio 2 seems to enjoy playing Elvis Costello and those people, XFM is by far the best, but it has to be in the station’s charter that they play Franz Ferdinand every 3 songs (and the godawful new Razorlight single. Ugh. At least the new Kasabian single (Cutt off) is pretty good,) Virgin seems to be playing the songs that XFM dropped last week, and Radio 1 is laughable. I listened to Eminem once, D12 once, and the rest wasn’t totally indistinct shite, and the DJs are all insufferable. I’d kill to have a decent metal station, if only for the variety. I miss Kerrang. I am going to have to remedy the music situation as quickly as possible.

Speaking of Kasabian, which I did ealier, I think the first lines of the new single are really excellent. They go: “John was a scientist/he was hooked on LSD/Interested in mind control/and how the monkey held the key.” There’s layers in them there lyrics. Even if I do hear a little too much of the Stone Roses in Kasabian for my own comfort. I’m also going to praise David Ford’s new EP, two songs in particular, New York and Finding my Feet; the combined running time is almost 15 minutes, but for acousting songs they’re lyrically and musically strong enough to carry that length of time. Let’s hope there’s a tour of some kind I can attend in the coming months.

Oh yeah, this morning I witnessed my first tube based argument. An old guy wanted someone to move their arm so he could use the armrest, and that guy, for whatever reason, declined. It ended with the old guy’s helper insisting they get off at this stop and wait for the next tube, and the old guy saying “If I was younger, I’d punch your face in!” to the younger guy. Personally, I don’t see what the big deal was about an armrest, but it was apparantly in demand. I’ve also started noticing rats on the tube lines now. I don’t know if I’d just never looked down there before, but almost every time I’m there for a couple of minutes, I can see one run past. They’re pretty small, not like plague rats or anything, but I’m happy enough because wildlife amuses me. It’s like Pokémon, only real. I guess this is the substitute for the squirrels we used to have in Oxford.

This Saturday Nikki and I drove down to Brighton/Eastbourne to see Paul and Relly, and go to David Ford’s Milk & Cookies 4. It’s an annual charity event in Eastbourne, by the frontman of the former Easyworld. Nikki’s been before, but this was my first time in that general vicinity.

We left London around 11:00, and made it to Brighton around 1. That’s a pretty servicable time taking into account the horrendous M25 traffic, and it means I now have a decent bead on what the journey will entail next time we go to see Paul & Relly (£20 of Petrol and 1.5 hours each way, give or take half an hour.) It’s actually almost an identical distance as from Ealing to Warwick, only the other way down the country. We were blessed by whatever deity is in charge of parking spaces, and in the cramped side streets of the Hanover area of Brighton the gift of a parking space, large enough even for me to parallel park in, appeared right in front of their house. It was stark contrast to the last time we were there, when we had to park several streets away and trek about with our stuff. We were about to ring the doorbell, when Nikki realised they’d been changed and wasn’t sure which one would lead to their house. Instead, we phoned Paul, who helpfully informed us: “You need to press the top one.” Helpful advice, except, he was apparantly waiting for us to do that when he already knew we were there, so with gross disrespect for normal house-calling protocol we requested we skip the doorbell step and go straight to being let into the house. Radical, I know, but it worked.

Nikki and Relly went shopping for an hour or two while Paul and I discussed websites, watched Sky, and I read parts of the excellent Simpsons book they had purchased me for my Birthday. It’s a pseudo-intellectual dissection of the show’s 15-year history which even has an introduction by Douglas Coupland, who I remember telling us at the reading I attended that he wished his entire career could be standing around quoting the simpsons. The book is great, and not just because it contains the transcripts of the series’ funniest jokes, and I’ve already got a backlog of people queueing up to borrow it. It’s called “Planet Simpson” and it’s the kind of book I could’ve and should’ve written if I hadn’t been spending the time actually watching the Simpsons. It was a belated birthday gift, I know, but they made up for that by giving me an early Christmas gift - A book of material from popular internet humour site, The Onion. This incredibly windfall of new pop culture to devour relieves me of the longing I get when passing a bookshop in these financially lean months. I just have to remember: I will one day get paid.

In the evening Paul, Nikki and I met with Glenn and some potential web-related clients from East Magazine who want some programming done that I am hoping to furnish them with. It’s looking good on that front. We dropped Glenn back home, collected some promotional stickers for Eastbourne’s newest musical hope (and I feel confident saying that, since they haven’t released anything and therefore all that exists is hope) the Kings of Convenience meets Chas & Dave outfit (again, no material, can’t be contradicted) Perrin. I stuck one sticker in a phone box, which might give people concerns as to the moral cleanliness of Perrin and their website, which the sticker advertises, because advertisments in phoneboxes are normally associated with the slightly seedier side of british life. It can’t have helped that it contained the slogan “Friend or Lover?” either. We went to McDonalds afterwards because I wanted a limited edition mint matchmaker McFlurry, and after I’d choked down the McNuggets and McFries and McIce-Cubes with added coke I was politely informed “We haven’t McGot any.” Just fucking great. It makes me wonder why the advertising for them is plastering every wall. Wankers.

After that there was DMC 4, the gig itself, which involved a lot of great songs being played, a slightly dubious Tom Waits cover, and one slightly better one, and the bizarre appearance of a football team at the end. Mr. Ford’s showmanship is especially evident when he’s playing in a room with less than 300 people in, and even when he was previously playing Brixton Academy supporting Keane, it’s to his credit that he really appears to give it the fullest amount of effort. My favourite part of the evening was probably seeing Nikki’s face when he played an excellent version of “Where is my Mind?” on the piano because she does everything she can to try and convince me the Pixies aren’t the sun that shines upon music, and it doesn’t help her cause when every musician from Placebo to King Adora to David Ford go out of their way to endorse their music. The lowest point of the set was clearly his Keane cover. Lord how I despise Keane.

Beyond the set, we each bought a limited edition DMC4 CD, with 5 new DJ Ford tracks, and caught up with some old friends within the Easyworld set. I gave Eri and Jamie a lift home, and then we headed back to London, got kind of lost trying to find our way back in the dark, but were saved by some sharp navigating. I must buy an A-Z, though. Then we went to bed. Today I took Nikki to Hillingdon to get the oxford tube back home, found a new Sainsbury’s on the way, and for once got to the coach stop at a time when the next coach wasn’t 30 minutes away. I came back and caught up with some TV and Internet use I’ve had neglect over the last few days due to being at work or otherwise not in the house, and now it’s time for bed, because I find myself with a new week of work ahead of me.

Well, that’s 3 days down. So far, it seems to be going well. The hardest part of the entire day is getting up, which probably comes as no surprise to anyone who knows me. The commute could be better, but I at least get some time where I can wake up properly and that doesn’t involve talking to anyone. The only crap part of the entire situation is walking to and from northfields station. I discovered today that if I go in through the back entrance of the building, I can cut some time off my walk from London bridge station, which is nice. Also, I have my security pass now, so no stopping at the desk. Just in the doors, and up the lift.

I discovered while organising data for MP3 players yesterday what the real problem with employment is going to be. Before yesterday, I didn’t want an MP3 player, couldn’t afford one, and had no need for one. After a few 3 hours of dealing with them, I’ve somehow convinced myself it’d be really good for my working day if I owned one of them fancy iRivers with a digital radio in. This morning I did keyboards, and I found myself starting to wonder why I was still using a 101-key keyboard which didn’t have speakers and a media switchboard, and still had wires coming out of it, for god’s sake. On the other hand, I was totally unaffected by the graphics card category, so I might be partially immune.

Still, until I get paid, I can’t afford jack. Then I have some debts to settle, rent to pay, and only then can I start buying stuff. With that in mind, I took in the attachment for the phone Nikki gave me (which I almost threw away the other week, but thought better of it) that allows to phone to be an incredibly convincing FM radio. I get a decent range of frequencies, are there’s XFM, if nothing else. It’s a decent holdover until the cash starts rolling in and I can take my own albums to work. If I can stand listening to greenday, kasabian and muse every 3 songs. It’s like Virgin Radio, but with those bands in place of U2, Queen and RHCP. What I wouldn’t give for some Pixies, or Ben Folds Five, or christ, even the Manics.

My plan is to have half an hour at lunchtime and therefore work 9:30-5:30. People seem to be able to come in whenever they want, more or less. It’s unlikely I’d want to be in before 9, but I think if I want to, I can come in as early as 7, which would at least be useful to know in some situations.

Yesterday lunchtime, three people higher up on the chain than me (Ben, the guy I report to, Vince, the Tech guy for us, and Lyndan, the boss of all the tech team or something, I guess, since he has an office) took me out to a local all bar one for a “welcome to kelkoo” meal, which was pretty cool. I got to kind of mingle socially with the people I’ll be working for, so that was a nice opportunity to stop me feeling like I had no idea what was going on. The Burger I chose wasn’t great, but I enjoyed the chips, drink, fact I didn’t pay for it and the novelty of having hot food at lunch time when it wasn’t Sunday. It’s really been some years since I did that. Like, about 8. That took an hour, which meant I stayed at work until 6, but it really flies by anyway. I’ve done far worse jobs than this. We’ll have to see how I handle a full week of it. I’ll have to set up blogging by e-mail so I can do the odd inconspicuous update on what’s going down up in Kelkoo towers.

Well, anyway, that’s all I’m saying about work now. I’ll consider this the official Q&A post, so if you’ve got any burning questions that you have to ask, do it now, because I’m kind of getting concerned at the amount of times I’m repeating the same details to everyone. At least I only have to tell the internet one time. Which reminds me - I used to claim that in my spare time, I manned the internet. These days, when I’m at work, I write it. So there’s your answer. If anyone asks what I do, then tell them I write the internet.

Today was my first day at work. I went in at half 10, instead of the time I chose as my starting time (9:30) so that they could set up my terminal. When I got there I was shown around and given the basics of what I’ll be doing. It’s all simple enough, and I’d go into detail, but i’ve told quite a few people already and I’m not sure I can be bothered to type it all out again. Suffice to say, I should be capable of it. I mean, I feel capable of it. Tomorrow when I get in I’ll find out if everything I did today was pure gibberish and has wrecked everything, so I’ll find out then if I actually am capable.

The total commute time is around 45 minutes. It’s pretty sedate, though, and involves only 2 significant amounts of walking. Not that I expect I’ll be sitting down much, on the return journey, but it could be worse. I could be standing on a bus.

I do have e-mail at work, and I can get to my usual accounts, so there’s no problem about getting in contact with me if you need to. It seems quite laid back, anyway, as long as I don’t abuse the facilities. I haven’t yet got a contract, but tomorrow I should get the official offer letter. I’ll be writing up some more of the general work experience tomorrow, anyway, since I’m quite tired and bizarrely, I have to get up in the morning. I’ll endeavour not to become a boring prat who talks constantly about work, though. Even if that is mildly better than being a boring prat who talks constantly about being poor and unable to find work.

Finally. My weeks of hard work have paid off. Today I was offered a position at Kelkoo, subject to references, doing SQL-related stuff. The days of spending hours a night searching crappy job sites with bad interfaces, looking for jobs I’m not qualified to do, are over. For now. My financial woes are already feeling like a fading memory. If there aren’t any unexpected hurdles, in 3 months I’ll have earnt around £4000. I used to live on almost that much a year. If nothing else, I can finally stop whining about jobs and money, and start whining about getting up early and using the tube.

This does mean that I’ll never get to go do that Sky interview, which is kind of sad, because I reckon I’d have probably got that job. Luckily, I didn’t really want it much. I may have mentioned once or twice how games testing turns me into a quivering wreck. I’m working in development, and something resembling web development at that. I am frankly overjoyed at the prospect, because it’s a professional job in a huge name of a company. There’s not a person I’ve told who doesn’t go “Ah, yes, Kelkoo. I’ve heard of them.” It’s often succeeded by them saying “I kept ending up at their site when I was trying to buy a digital camera.” My dad recognised their name because of the sponsored links on Google. Who’d have thought those things actually work?

Casual clothing; my own choice (within reason) of starting time; a prestigious location in the centre of London. Truly, they are a modern progressive company. Above all, I never had to get that haircut.

But that’s not all I’ve been doing since my last update. On Saturday Nikki and I helped pack up Nan and Pad’s back room, ready for their moving on Tuesday. Luckily for me, Nikki found a bunch of old photo albums full of pictures of me from when I was young. Really young. And occasionally feasting on a piece of cake the size of my giant 6 year old head. Also, pictures of Mum and Dad from the early 80’s, looking like the fashion victims everyone was, at the time. On Sunday, Dad, Pat, Gordon and I paked up all their kitchen stuff.

It’s strange that they’re moving out. I literally grew up in that house. I spent probably 90% of sundays of my entire life there, no exaggeration. I only stopped going every week, for as long as I could remember, when I moved to Uni. However, while it’s strange, it’s not sad. Before Uni, I was always kind of apalled at the idea of moving out of home. It wasn’t just a room, at the time, it was my entire world. The idea that my parents might one day sell up and drag us elsewhere disturbed me greatly. Before Uni, that was. Moving away from home taught me a whole bunch of trite clichés about home being where the heart is, and whatever. My home isn’t one room in one house, it’s not a building, and it’s not the town. It’s where my computer is. I think my home might actually be somewhere on the internet. Where I’m going with this tangent, is to say that the house, even one I’ve grown up in, is still just a house. The people inside are the essence of home, and if they’re going to be happier in a place with less stairs and a conservatory, then that’s the best place for them. Change is, in this case, positive, so why look back?

Finally, I made a post in my oft-neglected livejournal the other day. It’s just about my livejournal name, usericons and stuff, which is why it’s there rather than here, but I felt like I was mining some rich material when I wrote it. Hence, I mention it here for completeness.

Obivously, because I had an interview the following day, my attempts at an early (well earlier) night werethwarted by insomnia, and my attempts to get a decent amount of sleep were thwarted by the morons in the house next door and their penchant for running powertools at 8am in the morning, half a metre away from my head on the opposite side of my wall. At least that meant I was in no danger of sleeping past 1 (the time I wanted to be getting ready by), which does occasionally happen.

So, fate took me back to London Bridge Tower. I noticed, walking to the tube station, that it’s suddenly gone, more or less overnight, from autumn cool breeze to winter bitter winds, and I was thankful that the smart-casual clothing I had chosen included a thick jumper. The tube ride was punctuated by groanings from my stomach which was trying to say something along the lines of “james, why the hell are you going to an interview when you’ve negleced even to snack since you got up?” That’ll teach me to spend time doing personal grooming whe I should be eating, I guess. I somehow only had time for one of the two.

The doorman asked, when I checked in, “James Hunt?! Is that like the racing driver?”

I can never tell when it’s going to strike. Surely people must know it’s not the first time you’ve heard it. The same way Ian gets repeatedly told he looks like Tim Henman (especially around Wimbledon), I have to suffer this on occasion. My only comfort is that whatever idiocy I suffer can’t be anywhere near as bad as what I expect Relly’s had to live with. I’ve so far avoided using the “Ha Ha! I haven’t heard that one before.” response on people, because I discovered the best way to get them to shu up is to go “Yeah, that’s right!” and leave them grinning to themselves. Another alternative might be “He’s dead, you know,” or perhaps, “Sorry, who?” but let’s just say after 20+ years, I’d rather let people have ther fun, especially if I don’t have to talk to them about it.

Besides that unfortunate reference, though, he was an entertaining guy. He seemed genuinely pleased to meet me, even though I’d never met him. Much better than the rather surly doorman/receptionist I was greeted by last time I went.

The interview went about as well as last time. There were some technical questions which, shock horror, actually required me to recall the university definition of “Object” in order to describe the relationship between it and a class. The interviewers kind of eased me into what the role might require by taking me through example cases, and I got the hang of what they were after soon enough. Looks like an easy enough task, and quite interesting to boot. We’ll have to see how I feel about it after 3 months, but I reckon I’d be happy doing that kind of database and SQL work.

While I was waiting in the reception, a woman ran up to her friend and asked if she knew that Eminem was going to be doing 2 songs for TOTP outside the HMS Belfast, literally just up the road. I had previously read this on NME.com so I would’ve probably hung around for the hour extra I’d have needed, post-interview, to see the recording. However, I had a Girlfriend offering comics and nandos if I went to see her, so it was hardly a difficult decision.

I forewent the chance to get petrol at the Hoover building tescos at a 40-minute journey extension cost, and instead decided to see how far I could make it on what was in the car. I got 25 miles out of Ealing when the light came on, indicating 15-30 miles of petrol left. I’m never certain how much. Instead of running the car dry, I found a Petrol station somewhere just outside Lewknor, where it took me 5 minutes to fill up and be back on the motorway. My gamble paid off, and I made it to Oxford far earlier than if I’d gone to Tescos, though I admit was mostly down to serendipity because I really had no idea where the next petrol station was between High Wycombe and the Oxford services, which was the stretch of road I was likely to run out of petrol on.

I met Nikki in Nandos, where I ate like a king. I’ve been poor for so long I haven’t had the chance to enjoy many Nandoses (plural, anyone?) and I can’t remember the last time just Nikki and I went out and did something like that, so it was an excellent meal in all respects. It could’ve only been improved if Nikki had bought me my week’s comics. Which she had!

We got back home, and I arranged for us to go up to Nan’s tomorrow and assist the moving out procedure, because, you see, they’re moving to a new house, up the road, which doesn’t have stairs. Stairs are a death trap for the elderly, it would seem.

Well, things are looking up somewhat, again. I have an interview next thursday for a gamestesting job up the road, for Sky Interactive, which is shift work between 7:30am and midnight. I wonder how the hell that works, personally, or why they need people testing games at midnight, but for £8-£10 an hour I’m not going to complain. Nikky, assuming you read this, that’s where you work, right? Near the Osterley stop? It’s not the career path I was after, but if it’s all I can get, I’ll probably take it while I try and find some slightly more technical or web-related work.

Of course, that interview isn’t what I’m most pleased about. This morning I was e-mailed by someone from a company I interviewed at the other week, saying that my name had been passed to them, and did I want to come in for an interview tomorrow? Obviously, my answer was a slightly less coarse version of “Fuck yeah.” and so tomorrow, that’s what I’m doing. There may be life left in that opportunity yet. Which would be good, because I really though it’d be an excellent place to work, and to get asked back is really something very encouraging. It was a big enough move in my favour when I got asked for the first interview, to be honest, so I’m hoping my chances of getting this (similar, but different) job are further increased by the fact I didn’t even apply, they asked me if I wanted to do it.

In the intervening time, I watched some Red Dwarf commentaries. The Fan commentary for Back to Reality is pretty funny. In fact, I think all the DVDs should have fan commentaries on. I mean, they probably don’t even need to pay them, and they can give a perspective the actors can’t. It’s especially funny when they all quieten up because they know a good line’s coming. For instance:

“Don’t fish swim south for the winter?”
“That’s birds.”
“Birds swim south for the winter? How do they breathe!?”

Utterly classic. It’s mostly due to Danny John-Jules’ delivery, but the sentiment itself is funny enough that the combination makes it great. Series 5 is probably my favourite series of Red Dwarf. One and Two have their charms, Three and Four have some funny stuff, but I think that by Five we’re seeing the best from the characters, the best Sci-Fi, and some of the funniest writing. Before it degenerates into the re-use of one-liners and ideas that Series 6 is. I’m really appreciating the model work in a new way watching series 5, as well. It looks great considering it’s 12 year old stuff.

There’s an expression which, though inelegant, describes my current approach to jobseeking. I think it goes along the lines of “let’s throw as much shit at the wall as possible, and see what sticks.” I have a big list of jobs that I’m looking to do, from QA, to webdesign, to tech support, to data entry, and beyond. In the past two days I don’t think there’s any kind of job on this list I haven’t applied to. Of course, a crucial part of applying to jobs is actually getting an interview. I have a few days, but I’m hoping something will come out of this. Tomorrow I’m heading back into Ealing Broadway to see if I can’t find some establishments where I can work retail. It’s not ideal, but rather this than nothing. Silverscreen might be the embodiment of all that’s evil, but hey, maybe I can get discount on DVDs at least.

So, soldiering on, I guess. I’ve paid this month’s rent, just about, which has left me all but penniless, so if something doesn’t come along soon I’m going to have to seriously reconsider my options. I mean, if nothing else, I’m incredibly sick of being unable to indulge in any recreational spending. There are films I’d like to see, comics and books I want to buy, and a girlfriend I want to visit, but at this rate I’ll be lucky to still be feeding myself before the next rent payment comes through. Not only that, but over various house movings I have boiled down my posessions to the barest of essentials, meaning that I don’t even seem to have anything I’d be willing to sell. Yet.

In the interest of remaining mentally active while being productive, I’m redoing the mini-portfolio I did a few weeks ago into something larger, which can demonstrate all my skills, and design/development philosophy. I admit the site redesign has stalled somewhat in recent, er, months. I don’t think I’ll get around to finishing it anytime soon. It’s only a little bit of work left, but I realised too late a lot of sections I created don’t actually have enough content to justify existing, so until I’ve got some stuff consolidated to fit in them, i’ll put that idea on hiatus and work on the secret portfolio of mystery, which you will never see because the stuff I’ve written is pretty embarassing out of context, and what’s good for an employer to read certainly isn’t good for my friends to be taking the piss out of. It’s not even uploaded yet, so don’t bother looking for it that way. When it’s done, maybe then I’ll share it, but for now it’s all offline.

Speaking of online projects, Paul Annett’s got an amusing web-design related anecdote concerning Harrods Christmas Hampers over on his blog. It’s far more entertaining (if you’re technically minded and can adequately consider the meta-text of me having linked to it how I did) than these occasionally self-pitying tales of financial woe. Remind me to be more interesting tomorrow.

Dairy Milk with Biscuit: Good.
Dairy Milk Ice Cream with (soggy, chewy) biscuit: Bad.
Time Taken for Danny John-Jules to mention Chris Barrie’s haircut in RDV commentaries: 50 Seconds.
Time Taken to Download Buffy S4 Disc 2, with Wild at Heart Commentary with Seth Green: 49 Hours
Time Taken to Watch Wild at Heart Commentary with Seth Green: 45 Minutes
Amount of Listens before Gwen Stefani’s single sounds infuriating and annoying: One.
Amount of Listens before Gwen Stefani’s single finally gets excised from my head: Still counting.
Eggs Needed to make a passable Yorkshire Pudding: 1.
Eggs Needed to make an excellent Yorkshire Pudding: 2.
Overall Price increase incurred per Yorkshire Pudding by adding an extra egg: 50%
Spam Arriving in my collective inboxes per day (including spam blog comments): Over 200.
Legitimate e-mail arriving per day: Around 1.
Total Spam mails to G-mail account since creation: 1.
Time Spent in bed after alarm went off: 45 minutes.
Time Spent in bed before alarm went off: 6 hours.
Days spent missing Girlfriend: 6.
Days still to go: 6.
Distance to Girlfriend (Physical): 88.4 miles.
Distance to Girlfriend (Metaphysical): Infinite.
Distance to Girlfriend (Practical): 1 phonecall.
Amount of planes crashed in Battlefield 1492 today: 13.
Amount of planes reaching remotely near target: 0.
Episodes of Transformers- Energon endured: 33.
Episodes of Transformers- Energon left: 19.
Amount of times I have wept with laughter at the lameness of Transformers- Energon: Countless.
Amount of times I have been unable to understand the plot mechanics of Transformers- Energon: Countless.
Bad Episodes of Enterprise this season: 3.
Good Episodes of Enterprise this Season: 3.
Days we have put off watching the new Joey episode because we can’t take the shiteness anymore: 2.
Sweet Wrappers on Desk: 5.
Empty Glasses in Room: 2. (I took 3 down to wash earlier)
Best Time on Crimsonland Survivor Mode: 16 Minutes.
Best Time on Crimsonland Rush Mode: 46 seconds.
Average Time Wasted Playing Crimsonland a day: 1 hour.
Time PC has been turned on for: 6 Days, 12 hours.
Record Time PC has been turned on for: 44 Days, 22 hours.

Time Taken to Compose List: 20 minutes
Time Taken to Read List: Not long.

Yesterday I went to an interview with an agency called “The Career Factor” in Richmond, an appropriately named affluent borough south of Ealing. I was due to interview at 10, so I figured I’d be okay to leave at 9 in the morning, given the comparative closeness. It was sheer dumb luck that I noticed about half 8 that trains to richmond were spaced quite far between, and that if I didn’t get on the train before 9:09, I’d be unable to get to Richmond before 10 at all. Some quick calculations and getting speedily dressed and groomed allowed me to reach the platform of Northfields at exactly 9:08, just enough time to get to Hammersmith for the train to Richmond, which arrived practically as I stepped off the other. It was an incredibly tight journey, one of the most efficient I’ve ever made. On the way back, though, I made up for it by getting off at Turnham Green, the Tube Station on the Edge of Forever. Two trains enter. No trains leave. 3 trains back to Richmond arrived in the time it took for one district line train back to Acton town to arrive, and even after that I had to change to a picadilly line to get back home.

Richmond reminds me of Leamington in many ways. The good parts of Leamington, I mean. I found the place I was having an interview with ease, and they gave me a really comfortable sofa to sit on while I waited. The interview all went fine, even if it was in a communal office where I had to talk over other people’s phone conversations to make myself heard. It was for a specific job, but the woman I dealt with seemed keen to have me on the books for other jobs too. I feel slightly better about this agency than the high street ones I’ve been into before, at least.

Something I’ve learnt from going to all these interviews, and that Ian agrees with, is that there needs to be a word in the English language for the overwhelming sense you get upon entering an incredibly expensive building that you are a complete fraud who shouldn’t be there pretending to be good enough to get the job. I’ve ridden in lifts that have a larger salary than I do. I’ve been passed by cleaners who are wearing more expensive clothes than I own. I am just an incredibly poor student who sometimes feels like he can’t afford to work in the buildings he is going to interviews in. I mean, I know I could do the actual job, but there’s something about the imposing corporate identity, something about walking into a glass, chrome and marble lobby of a 15 storey tower that makes me feel like I should probably get a BMW (or at least a haircut) if I want the doorman to take me seriously, let alone the interviewers. I am not a professional. I am a Sci-Fi obsessed geek who likes to piss about with HTML and CSS and do a bit of programming here and there. It takes a lot to make me feel inadequate, but if anything does it… I guess I was picturing small offices above Woolworths rather than the corporate HQ. The idea that they might employ me seems just, insane, and yet I have the skills for the job, just not the experience. I suspect if I ever work in a place like that, it’ll feel a little surreal and unbelievable for the first few months.

So, suggestions for a word to describe that concept would be nice please.

On the way out of Richmond, I was asked by a couple first if I spoke English, and secondly if I knew where a post office was. I was about to say I wasn’t local, but then I realised on the way down I’d noticed a huge post office sign at the end of the road we were on and turned around, where lo and behold, there it was, so I said “Er, yeah. Over there.” and they looked sheepish and thanked me. I wonder if they’d have had more luck if they’d spent more time looking for the post office and less looking for an english-speaking person to ask.

Today I awoke to find Nikki had bought me Red Dwarf series 5, and had it sent straight to me, thereby proving that you all wish you had my girlfriend. Not just the normal version, either, the version which comes in a box with a die-cast Starbug toy. And, if that didn’t please me enough, she later explained how she was concerned the packaging wouldn’t match the other 4 DVDs I already have, but decided to chance it because I could always resell the limited edition version if I cared so much about packaging. Clearly, she knows me well. Luckily, inside the larger box is a regular DVD, so I can now line up the DVDs and have “RE DWA” on my shelf. When I get a shelf. I briefly considered leaving my Starbug toy in the packaging, but the more I thought about it, the more ridiculous it seemed. Reading a lot of comics has taught me that keeping something for the pure collectability of it is an unrewarding and ultimately pointless venture, since there is no enjoyment to be gained from owning something you can’t use. As I say, I’m a comic reader, not a comic collector, and that philosophy sticks for this model. It’s arguable that I’ll regret opening the blister pack when they’re exchanging hands for £100 a throw in 5 years, but then, why would I want to sell this Starbug toy? It currently adorns my monitor, where it will remain until I have a bookcase on which to display it.