I’m a-blinking in the light slightly these last couple of days; not because of the weather (goodness no) but work has taken me by surprise just a little. Whoosh, I would say. Thinking about it, this is the first job I haven’t fallen into, which should make the uptake level I’m expected to be at no surprise. And it’s fine, just a lot of ‘fo. Colleagues are fine, location is great, it’s all gravy. I’m just tired looking at my schedule for the next couple of months though, talk about a baptism of fire…
Archive for June, 2007
“Feel free to text if you want to spew.” Encouraging words for a first day at a new job, although I think my first reaction was not the intended result. Spew forth verbally, I think was the picture. So yes, today’s D-day when the new post begins and although I’m not worried about it as such, nor do I think the work will be a problem, etc., there’s still a slightly sick feeling as with all things new. Stupid guts.
So I’ll top this up later when I have something to report; my guess is that the first day will be like an introduction to the institution, to my new colleagues etc. It should be fine, it should be fine, ad infinitum.
In other news, the new house is already to move into at the weekend: they say that moving, a new job and getting married are the most stressful things you’ll ever do, which means I’m taking on two at once. Good work Simone. But, nae bother, I’m a big boy, I’ll manage. It’s only down the road.
Well the house thing is sorted. We have the chance to stay, but aren’t a-gonna. Ya boo sucks, George. What we are planning to do however, is to move three roads down, to a bigger and better house, with less landlord gibberish, we hope. Potentially, also:
- fewer bratty kids playing football against my car.
- fewer illegal home improvements on surrounding properties.
- a less bonkers Greek to deal with.
- more more more space.
- a dining room?
- patio doors!
- walking distance to Yum Yum.
Holding deposit is down, next step references. On a related note, I’m only sort of employed - I’ve finished at one job and am waiting to start the next. Woohoo! The last day was capped with:
- rounders
- miniature apple crumbles
- Argos vouchers
- no tears (but only just)
- indestructible beercan vs. baseball bat
So, I’m off on my hols to Devonshire to get some much-deserved (I think so, at least) rest, then will be back with reports on new job and new house. Exciting times.
The landlord kindly decided to move back into our house, without really telling us as such. It’s all confusing. But it means my options are many-fold, currently veering down two aisles.
1) Move with everyone then get someone new in soon.
2) Go live on my own.
What? In London? Are you mad? Well, ish, maybe. It’s possibly just a pipedream on my wages, even though they’re soon to go up, but I’m pretty tired of bumming around houseshares. It’s a pretty unfulfilling life that, and going it alone sounds fun, if pricey. And I don’t know, last time I was living without actual friends in the flat, it saw me spend a lot more on entertaining myself. So maybe a three is the way to go…
I was about to type, I hate Greeks. Which is grossly unfair and inaccurate, just one particular Greek.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAArgh!!!! I hate everything to do with landlords, estate agents, renting, everything. Why can’t I just be married and own my own home, it’d be so much better.
I find the various namechecking and diss-trading of hip hop to be a little surreal, if fascinating. Kanye West’s Golddigger was just on the radio, and despite his slightly more cerebral reputation, it’s still knocking back other rappers, and it’s still about hip hop’s current traditions, women and money. It is a bit smarter, but its pinnacle (even above the insanely catchy Jamie Foxx refrain) is the title of this post, a little line that shows that even rappers have feelings.
It reminded me of a post the other regarding Lil Wayne by that lovable Stokie-type Akira The Don. I don’t really know who Lil Wayne is, other than that he has the sort of name you’d normally associate with a buck-toothed youngster round these parts, but touchingly he’s being mocked by the hip hop community for falling in love. Or so I understand, that’s quite possibly totally wrong.
Anyway, I think love is expressed pretty lamely in most pop music these days. It’s either a very lust-based, one-d expression, or overwrought, overly-dramatic heartbreak tales. People are lame. I prefer my declarations short, sweet and simple: one I heard last night, “love never fails.” It’s from the bible innit.
Last night saw a trip up to the delightfully-potholey North Middlesex hospital for my flatmate’s insect bites. These are no ordinary insects, clearly, more likely some sort of prehistoric uber-mozzie given the size of the bites - somewhat like a delicious fried egg, but pink and bubbly on the outside, and browny and fruit pastille looking in the middle. Not a pretty site, really, which is a shame.
That meant a really late dinner (I think a new record). This is not good for my eating early resolution. I am thwarted at every corner, it’s not my fault.
Today I mostly sitting in quiet again and mimbling about on the internet while feeling hungry. I predict my lunch to be a walk down to the Thames and back, then maybe a celebratory curry from the legendary Khushbu on Whitechapel High Street. This is my last stint at this site (before my job ends on Friday: internet woot!), so it’ll be a chance to savour the many and varied delights of Aldgate East one last time.
I’m sitting here on the 3rd floor of work surrounded by students in silence. I am typing quietly. I am invigilating entrance tests, and it is not buckets of fun, surprisingly enough, despite the curious cross-section of life that enters these hallowed (ish) portals. I brought a big heap of work for this week’s impending deadline, and of course ein Database ist kaputt, which leaves me googling my name and visiting property websites for no good reason. On the plus side, the room has windows onto the corridor, and a boy with a full-on pudding-bowl haircut just walked past.
I think I’m the only one of me on the internet. By which I mean, if I google with speech marks I can only find references to me, whereas if I leave them out, I get a whole slew of people with my weird, random surname that I never knew existed. I presumed, clearly naively that I was special. In a way, I am.
I have been to the town with my namesake. It’s a wee suburb of Burnley, and as you’d expect, it’s pretty rank. But I’ve been. I don’t know if the people that I find on google are from there. I guess it’s unlikely. The man in the petrol station almost refused to give us directions, not being able to understand why we’d even want to go there, which is fairly telling.
It makes you wonder, does it not? Obviously, we all have separate fingerprints and DNA and the like, but are we unique? I’m the only me, according to the creeping internet world of Google (heading to take over your entire life one day soon), which is quite nice. If I wasn’t I’d likely get a little confused. As it is I struggle by knowing that I’m a one off and that I matter to ooh, several people at least.
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
No man is an island, it’s true, as per John Donne. Forgive my expanding on a slightly tenuous theme here, I have time to kill. Apparently Donne was a ‘metaphysical poet’, and was interested in neo-Platonic ideals that (as I understand it) temporal beauty is a reflection of eternal beauty, and while the rest of it is kind of bunk, it’s a nice idea. Maybe people reflect God in some ways, though very unlikely many ways. It’d be nice to aim at it, at least. So, I’m no island, I’m not totally separated from any being whether it be physical or metaphysical, natural or supernatural. Weird science.
This pedometer is an accursed thing. Really. Who walks 10,000 steps a day with legs this long? I find solace in Pringles and cooked breakfasts, which only deepens the contradiction further. Tis a curse, a truly Sysepheian task which surely nobody manages.
On the other hand, I’ve been out in the sun weeding the garden; there are many surprises, the biggest being possibly the sheer volume of melted snails that have appeared since the slug pellets went down. In the stretch between the parsnips and the compost bin, the bluebottles are massing, Hitchcok style. There’s a plethora of decaying cephalopods there to stretch your capacity of belief, and they’ve clearly been at my rhubarb, which is pretty much unforgivable.
It’s made up for by the healthy looking ’snips which have surprised me somewhat given the weed situation. I don’t hold so much hope out for the flowers from seed.
Sometimes coincidences happen, if you believe in such things. For example, song of the week features the line “The world is not my home, I’m just a-passin’ through.” Sometimes I feel this more often than others; at times I feel quite distant from those around me, for reasons that can’t really be explained to myself, by myself, or whatever. There are times when only somebody else’s words do, and this week Tom Waits, not known neccessarily for his religious convictions, hits the spot.
“Well you’re high on top of your mountain of woe,
Well you know you should surrender but you can’t let go.”
I can see the logic in this line, as well. It could be (in this very spiritual-type song) speaking to any type of people, but this week I’ve been encountering those who hold a high horse but ain’t so happy. They become, in essence, Mr Gruff. Mmm, coffee. One has to surrender one’s own high horse/goat also at times, so I sympathise. This is all deeply, unhelpfully unspecific. For the record, don’t associate me with either Mr Gruff or his nemesis Lambuel.
On the plus side, I got some bits and bobs for the new job through (see the new map!) and enthusiasm is well and truly kindled. Looks like it might be a little in-at-the-deep-end, but I’m well up for that after a distinctly uninspiring penultimate week here.
