Cocktails and Records

When I was forced to spend time with the Careers Advisor in high school we were taught about ‘transferable skills’. Mr Shaddock told us that things like ‘report writing’, ‘timekeeping’ and ‘having initiative’ were useful assets to have and that once we had gained experience demonstrating them in one job, we would be able to use this to get another one.

In these celebrity filled days of ours it seems that the best skill to have is ‘being famous’. Once you are famous in one domain, you can apply your fame to any other post requiring that that skill:

• John Sergeant is a news reporter, therefore he is qualified to host comedy panel programmes.
• Ann Widdecombe is an MP, therefore she is perfectly suited to presenting TV documentaries and providing ‘Dear Deirdre’ style problem page advice.
• Vinnie Jones can play football, therefore he can sustain an acting career despite not being able to act.
• Boy George, Paul Weller, Mica Paris etc. can all sing, therefore they have all managed to present rubbish radio shows on Radio 2.
• etc. etc.

I don’t know why, but this really, really annoys me. Probably because I am jealous - I have a number of random skills which I think could easily be applied to other jobs:

• My ability to look contemptuously at people (e.g. who who block entrances and exits on trains) is a fine skill for any job in an independent music shop.
• My general ineptitude at maths combined with my confidence with pointless management jargon should easily snare me a senior role at any top bank.
• And my talent for lying (‘you really look fabulous in that merangue wedding dress’) surely qualifies me for a career in politics.

Can I ask you a personal question? Do you like work? I mean, apart from the practicalities of your pay packet, do you actually need the thought of work to get you out of bed in the morning and through the day?

I don’t. For me, there are a million better things to fill my time with - there are books to read, languages to learn, music to play, gardens to dig, museums to visit, films to watch, meals to cook, walks to enjoy, opinions to blog, short courses to study, daytime Radio 4 to be listened to etc. etc. I don’t hate my job by any means but quite frankly, I find that it gets in the way of life. If I could feasibly quit tomorrow and have nothing to do with the world of work ever again, I would.

I’d always naively assumed that everyone shared this fantasy. But suddenly I keep meeting mothers on maternity leave who can’t keep away, retirees who aren’t coping, people who work on the weekends for fun and others who simply admit that they need its structure to give their life value and meaning. Fair enough, I suppose, but this all still feels completely and utterly foreign to me.

So am I in some kind of weird minority here? What do you think?

Like any good self-obsessed blogger, I find my site statistics fascinating. Apart from telling me useless facts like that the only people who read this blog live in South East England, the West of Scotland and the extreme East and West coasts of the States, I’d like to think that they offer an insight into what’s happening in the zietgeist, man.

And what’s happening in the zeitgeist is Paul Weller’s hair. Since I wrote this post about my unfortunate comments to a female colleague about her Paul Weller-esque hair, I have received at least 3 google search hits a day from people wanting to know more about the great man’s hair.

Search subjects have included:

1. Paul Weller hair
2. How to get a Paul Weller cut
3. Where does Paul Weller get his hair cut?
4. Who cuts Paul Weller’s hair?
5. Does Paul Weller straighten his hair?
6. Does Paul Weller talk about his hair?
7. Paul Weller hairstyles for women (my favourite)

Sadly, this website isn’t going to answer any of those questions but it does suggest that not everyone regards his hair with amusement/disdain/sympathy.

Just thought you’d like to know.

The original plan for working from home today was to fully dedicate myself to finishing writing a strategy that I’m working on - with no distractions, as I enthusiastically told my manager as I left the office last night.

Unfortunately, it’s a glorious day, the strategy’s not due for another few weeks and I’m not good with ‘non-urgent’ items…

So far today I have:

1. cooked myself scrambled eggs on toast for breakfast
2. watched Frasier
3. done a load of washing
4. read various blogs
5. rewritten several pages on our organisations website (completely unrelated to the strategy)
6. hung out the washing
7. listened to albums by The Go-Betweens, Amadou & Mariam and Dennis Wilson
8. gone to our local corner store to buy some milk
9. enjoyed several cups of tea and coffee
10. spent quality time with the neighbours cats in the garden over lunch
11. proofread some work stuff (also completely unrelated to the strategy)
12. danced around the loungeroom to old 7″s by Deacon Blue, Altered Images and The Chills
13. edited and proofread the half of the strategy that I have actually already written
14. written two additional paragraphs and updated a couple of figures
15. made myself a martini
16. posted this*

Result?!

* with thanks to Ill Man’s Life and How Not to Live It post

We have just had anti-discrimination training at work.

As you might expect, the following things are illegal to include in a job ad as they are discriminatory:

‘Applicants must be clean shaven.’
‘Only single people can apply.’
‘Candidates should be young and dynamic.’
‘Applicants must have 5 ‘O’ levels.’

It is, however, perfectly legal to say:

‘Tories need not apply’.

You’ve got to love this stuff.

I managed to completely disgrace myself at work today by innocently complimenting a colleague on their new haircut.

‘That’s a nice haircut.’ I said enthusiastically. ‘It’s great, it looks exactly like Paul Weller’s!’

They looked appalled. So the obvious thing to do was to continue hurling myself down this particular route.

‘Yep, that’s a great mod cut and it looks even better on you than him. I mean, you look much younger than Paul Weller does with that haircut.’

The recipient of my compliments responds frostily with ‘Thanks, you can stop now’. 

Sadly, the whole office has actually stopped by now and are looking at me, some with bemusement, some with pity. 

I guess its not a compliment to compare the hair of a 50 year old female Mariah Carey fan with the modfather.  

The other evening I was in the office (attempting to work, but probably in reality perusing various blogs and wondering whether it is acceptable to use Green Chartreuse in a cocktail) when I heard screaming from down the stairs. Imagining that something absolutely terrible must have happened, I ran out of my office to see what was going on. By the time I got there, somebody else had started screaming as well and both women now cowered in the corridor clutching one another.

It transpired that they had seen a spider.

‘I can’t go back in there’ one of them says pointing into an office.
‘No way. I just cannot believe that I was in the same room as it’ says the other.

I hadn’t seen the evil creature of doom yet, and having been brought up in a country of Red Backs and Huntsman spiders which really can cause damage, I automatically fear the (admittedly highly improbable) worst. And you know what I’m going to say – yes, it was a teeny tiny innocent looking spider that couldn’t hurt a fly. Well, ok, maybe a fly but definitely not a human.

‘I’m going to call security’ one of them says.
‘Don’t you think that’s a bit over-the-top?’ I say cautiously.
‘Well, how else are we going to get rid of it? I am absolutely not going back in that office.’
‘I’ll pick it up and put it out the window’ I suggest.

Bad response. The spider needs to be killed if we are ever to work safely in the office again. I reluctantly agree to do this.

I take a tissue and squash the poor thing, while the others look on admiringly as though I am some kind of spider murdering hero.

I still feel guilty about it.