Tough Day at the Office

So after 7 months on the buroo, countless knock-backs from prospective employers, endless hassles with housing benefit, interviews that were nothing but a waste of time and a dwindling back account, that's right, I've finally found a job. It was a shock to me too.

It wasn't easy finding it. A burst of activity on the job market, where I applied for 91 jobs in 12 days did the trick. So aye, right-wing radio phone-in jocks 'there's jobs out there if you look for them'. If you look at every single one of them every single day until someone lets you have one.

Two days in and surprisingly I've not found (much) to complain about. Like everyone else who suffered from the same redundancy axe as myself I've now got a better job, better money, better working conditions, I'm working for a better company and have a more rewarding day than I ever could have dreamed of at my previous employer.

Of course since I started I've done nothing but bat away phone calls and e-mails from other agencies asking me to speak to them about jobs. Yet I could barely get anyone to return my calls from May to November.

Much as I enjoyed having the time off, I'm relieved to have discovered that I'm not unemployable after all. I had months of people saying, 'Something will turn up,' and I would say, 'You know, I'm not so sure.'

So anyway it's back to going to the cinema in the evenings when it's crowded, getting up in the dark, moaning about holidays, moaning about pay, listening to people who get paid more than you moan about pay. Aye, it's good to be back.

Films

Due to having copious amounts of time on my hands I've been to see more films than I care to write about here, but of the last week or so here are the best two I've seen.

In the Shadow of the Moon is the story of the NASA space programme and the men who went to the moon. It's a fascinating documentary featuring archive footage of moon, the space programme and interviews with the surviving men who went to the moon. All except Neil Armstrong.

One of the things that fascinates me about travelling to the moon is that even although (or perhaps because) it was last done 35 years ago it still seems futuristic and difficult to comprehend. There's also the fact that these guys are all in their 70s and 80s now and although travelling to the moon is one of mankind's greatest achievements, in 20 years or so there will be no one left alive to talk about the experience first hand.

The trailer is below.



The Darjeeling Limited is the latest from director Wes Anderson. The film has received mixed reviews, with some people finding it inconsequential. Me, I loved it. Really I think if you're a fan of Anderson's other films such as Rushmore and The Royal Tenenbaums then you should lap this up.

The story of three brothers attempting to reconnect after their father's death by travelling in a train across India provides a lot of funny moments. It's undeniably great to look at and offers a great soundtrack. It probably won't win anyone who wasn't a Wes Anderson fan already over, but if like me you are then it's well worth seeing.

Here's the trailer.

Concerts

Being on the buroo most days it feels like the weekend, but this weekend, the real one I went to a couple of concerts, both at the ABC.First of all on Friday I saw The National. They were fantastic. Right from the opening song they were awesome. A really tight band, nearly every song they played had a big powerful sound.

On Saturday I went to to see The Charlatans. It was the first time I've seen them and they were really good. The singles were the best stuff Just Lookin', Can't Get Out of Bed, How High, but the handful of new songs they played too were quite good.

Below is the video for 'Abel' by The National.

Late Summer Movies

I've been to the cinema a couple of times in the last week. While I'm still an unemployed bum I should spend a bit more time in the cinema than I do.

Anyway first of all I saw Knocked Up (****) it's a really solid comedy. Much as you would expect from Judd Apatow, one of the smartest guys in American comedy. It has plenty of laughs, has characters that you can root for and a strong screenplay that has all the right ups and downs. It's a film that I couldn't stop thinking about even a day or two later. It may well be, as some of the reviews state, the summer's best comedy.

The other film I saw was Breach (****). Chris Cooper plays the real life disgraced FBI man Robert Hanssen. That link tells you all about his crimes, but the film starts off by revealing what happens to him, so therre's no shock ending.

Breach is directed by Billy Ray, who also made Shattered Glass, another story of a man living a lie, who was ultimately brought down. This plays out in a similar fashion. It's a strong, absorbing thriller with excellent performances from Cooper, and Ryan Phillippe as the agent sent to bring him down.

In Demand Fizzy

Its fairly common knowledge that I am to good looks what pro wrestling is to genuine sporting endeavour, and that may well be why despite being married, I’ve never really experienced the heightened attraction that is supposed to come from being hitched and unavailable.

But I’m starting to get the picture from a different perspective.

As you may have read on this very blog, I recently managed to land a job, after about 12 weeks of fairly relentless trying.

During those weeks, I barely got a sniff at a job and managed two interviews in the entire time, and that includes the one for the job I'm about to embark upon.

Weirdly though, since accepting the position I have been phoned up and invited to no less than four interviews in the space of a week and offered one job.

I can’t help but think that if I needed the work, these folk wouldn’t be calling, that there is maybe some pheromone you exude when you’re no longer desperate for cash to pay the bills.

Who knows? All I know is that after weeks of being flung the deafy from what seems like every employer in the Western hemisphere, the chance to stick two fingers up to a few of them is predictably gratifying.

You Wait Eleven Weeks For One Job…

As most of you will know, I’ve been having about as much luck on the jobs front as big T.

Until now that is. Yes, it would appear that I have secured not one but two jobs – sort of.

In a prefect illustration of how life can never just be simple, I agreed to take a part time job on Monday there after a couple of days “work trial”. Work Trial of course means that you turn in and don’t get paid. Magic.

Well, no sooner had I called the Breu to tell them I was coming in to sign off than I got another call telling me I had another, better job pending background checks and references.

Cracking eh?

I have to go in and tell my new boss that he’s in fact my new former boss the morra.

He’ll not be chuffed, as he was training me up to cover a holiday he’d booked for the end of August, so I’m not sure whether he’ll want me to work on ‘til he finds someone else or just punt me on the spot.

Of course, there is also the worst case scenario that I’ll burn my bridges with this guy and end up having some sort of problem with the other job, but I feel I have to give him as much notice that I’m offski as possible.

Then of course I’ll have to sort out the whole mess with the Breu, who seem to be full of earnest enough but not-very-bright people who generally haven’t a clue what they are doing.

Setting up my two-day work trial took about 10 phone calls and a visit for example, a process during which simple things like notes on my file that I was told had been made weren’t.

Of course, they also managed to fuck up my money, leaving me more penniless now I’m back working than I was when living the life of a dole king.

Reading Tom’s posts about looking for work and agencies and the like, I have to concur with most of his experiences.

It would appear that recruitment has become the new marketing in as much as every employer has an unnecessarily complex recruitment system that acts to divest management of the genuine responsibility of hiring and is an extremely wearing and awkward process for people seeking work.

It would also appear that the business is full of people phoning it in who are abysmal at what you’d consider a key component of the job – communication.

Like Tom, I’ve had "interest" from agencies that has dissipated despite numerous attempts to follow up.

The job I’ve landed isn’t exactly a dream, but compared to my last full time job, it’s like winning the lottery.

But by far the most satisfying aspect of landing a half decent job is the thought of not having to deal with scam agencies, an inbox full of "job alert" emails and a Jobcentre Plus advisor huckling me out the door so she doesn’t miss her coffee break.

Plus being able to afford comics, food and clothes will be great.

Phew!

Recruitment Agencies. Why?

Here’s some more frustrations on my current search for employment. I am now applying for roughly 17 to 20 jobs every ten days or so. From this I’m getting an interview round about once a fortnight. So far though I have only had one proper interview for the job I applied for and of course no job offers.

I’m getting close to having sent my CV to every recruitment agency in the West of Scotland. This is because nearly every job on the S1 Jobs site is being handled by a recruitment agency.

Anyway I got a call from an agency the other day. The woman on the other end of the line stated that I had applied for a Customer Service Advisor position. I hadn’t. I had actually applied for a job as a Data Entry Clerk. Immediate start apparently. The woman made no mention of this job, instead asking me if I was interested in working in a ‘contact centre’ in Cambuslang. No I am not. Perhaps that’s one of the reasons I didn’t apply for that job. “I didn’t want you to apply for that job. I’d rather you applied for this one.”

Last week I was left a message from a woman at another agency telling me that she was ‘very keen’ to speak to me about ‘a couple of positions’. I returned her call, only to find that she was with a ‘candidate’. I left my details and awaited a call back. Which never came. A day later I received an e-mail supposedly from her, but actually from a ‘no-reply’ address saying, “we already have your CV on file. Should any suitable vacancies arrive we will contact you.’ So ‘very keen’ tuned into ‘don’t call us we’ll call you’.

So I’m not a fan of recruitment agencies. I fail to see their need, especially when they only seem to be on the lookout for themselves.

A Day In the Life Of A Dolie

One of the few good things about being on the scrap-heap at 38 is that your day can end up quite varied. Take today for example.

I got up about 10am, which is fairly late for me, had my coffee and had my usual half hour of fannying about the net looking for football news etc.

I spend a few minutes looking for jobs on the job websites - nothing doing.

Hung out the washing.

Had a wee half hour on the Playstation.

Made myself braw for signing on. Headed out to the Breu, signed on, came home.

Now here's where it really starts to pick up pace.

After a lunch of microwaved mac and cheese while watching Kids in the Hall, I got cracking with a range of pressing tasks.

First I did the lawn. It was really needing it. Did a wee bit of weeding as well.

Came in, finished off a spooky Western comic I'd been writing. That took a couple of hours.

I then had a wee bit more of a go on the Playstation.

Then I dusted while listening to Frank Zappa, swept the kitchen floor, swept the bathroom floor, hoovered the hall and the spare room, washed the bathroom floor, hoovered the living room before going upstairs to hoover the bedroom and wash the upstairs toilet floor.

Visitors the morra you see.

Then I watched a wee bit of "The Henry Rollins Show" before the missus and the wee one came back in from their lives in the real world.

I, of course, got off my mark and got the tea straight on for them.

I'm no long sat down let me tell you.

I suppose if you'd told me five years ago that I'd one day be dividing my time between sweeping, mowing and writing supernatural cowboy stories I'd have said you were daft, but I've had worse days. Most of them in an office.

Vice Cops

Yesterday afternoon I thought I would indulge in one of my rights as an unemployed person. That is to sit in the park and drink. So I bought myself a few bottles of fancy lager from a shop on Great Western Road and headed for Kelvingrove Park.

I picked a nice spot, sparked my drink and opened up my book. Then I heard the distant sound of piss hitting a tree and noticed that in amongst the seas of trust fund hippies, Emo kids and English students I had managed to sit alongside a team of bare-chested Buckfast drinkers.

So I packed up my book and moved along to a quieter spot, opened beer still in hand. As I walked past some sunbathers I heard a couple of voices shouting out.

“You can’t drink here.”

“No alcohol.”

I looked round to see two guys in their late thirties, with sagging faces that clearly showed drinking in the park was no day off for them. One had a can of Tennent’s in his paw, the other grasped a bottle of Buckie.

“No bother guys,” I replied, showing them I was in on the joke. “Thanks for keeping me right.”

“We’re only joking,” one of them shot back. Obviously in his head his jakey voice sounded like one of reason and authority.

I walked on a good distance away from my fellow bevviers, sat down and got back to reading. Ten minutes or so later I noticed a Police patrol car coming round the park. They parked up and a policeman and WPC got out. Perhaps remembering the sage council from my two new buddies, I drained my drink and stuffed the empty in a plastic bag.

The two police made a beeline straight for my two hard drinking pals. They then proceeded to pat them down, check their ID and quiz them for the following ten minutes. Ah, taste the delicious irony thought I.

Now I don’t know if the police just generally do spot checks on the city’s many parks for people having a drink when the weather’s good, but if they did just decide to pull up two people randomly they’re the two folk I would have chosen. They then went on to quiz the bare-chested Buckie boys.



Remember folks, drinking outdoors can be dangerous.

Films, Films, Films

So enough about the unemployment you’re all saying. Tell us about all the films this free time has enabled you to watch. Okay folks, I will.

In addition to going to the cinema more often I’ve been renting some films on DVD. So here’s a weekly round up.

Shattered Glass. Based on the true story of New Republic journalist Stephen Glass this is quite a compelling watch. A simple story well told. Hayden Christensen plays Glass, a young journalist desperate to impress his peers and his bosses with his fantastic pieces. So desperate that he begins to make things up.

Peter Sarsgaard is excellent as Chuck Lane, his editor, and there’s good support from Chole Sevigny, Melanie Lynskey, Hank Azaria and Steve Zahn.

Conversations With Other Women. Shot in split-screen, this features Aaron Eckhart and Helena Bonham-Carter sharing an evening at a wedding. It feels a lot more like a play than a film.

The split-screen aspect seems to lend weight to the film that it doesn’t really have and it’s only the strong performances of the two leads that carry it through.

The Queen. I never got round to seeing this in the cinema, but seeing as it’s a Stephen Frears film I always knew that it was going to be solid. Helen Mirren is never less than believable as the Monarch, but for me Michael Sheen is the stand-out as Tony Blair. He’s played him before of course in The Deal the drama Frears and The Queen’s scriptwriter Peter Morgan made for TV.

It’s another simple story made compelling in the telling, with The Queen reluctant to make much of a fuss about the death of Princess Diana. While Blair’s popularity among the British public grows in comparison. “You will experience this as well,” she later tells the Prime Minister.

Outfoxed. This is a documentary that looks at Rupert Murdoch and his Fox News company. ‘Fair and Balanced’ goes their slogan, but this documentary shows that they are anything but.

It focuses a lot on Bill O’Reilly, a man so contemptible, the more you look at him, the sicker you physically feel. He’s one of those talk shows hosts who is happy to listen to their guests so long as they agree 100% with him and his politics. Unlike radio talk show hosts who can cut their callers off, O’Reilly frequently resorts to shouting “Shut up!” and asking his technical people to “Cut his mic.”

One notable encounter features Jeremy M. Glick, the son of a man who died at the World Trade Center. O’Reilly had him on his show as he couldn’t believe that he would have the audacity to sign an anti-war petition despite being the son of a man murdered by terrorists.

Glick gives as good as he gets from O’Reilly, who grows increasingly irritated by Glick’s refusal to back down.

Outfoxed had a number of volunteers who watched Fox News round the clock and noted down various anomalies and curiosities about their coverage. Pro-Bush stories masquerading as news items, so called left-wing liberal correspondents backing down in debates with much tougher right wing presenters. However all the volunteers on Outfoxed were already politically aware and all of them had either strong-left wing sensibilities or were already aware of how much Fox skewers the news it presents. I would have found it more interesting had the people taking part been unaware of how Fox spins its news coverage.

Spiderman 3. I really didn’t like this. I was always a big Spiderman fan as a kid and although the films can’t play to all the strengths that made Spiderman popular as a comic book hero it didn’t hit enough of them to make this a success in my eyes.

For instance I don’t remember the comics having lengthy portions where Peter Parker greets over his girlfriend. I think he may have done it once or twice, but usually The Vulture or The Sandman or someone got in the way. In the film his mask routinely keeps coming off. I know you don’t want to keep the star of the film hidden under a mask all the time, but it’s Spiderman for chrissakes. And how come practically everyone knows his identity?

I also had problems with the black suit. Not because it turns Spidey into a darker character, but because it just seems to turn him into an obnoxious dick. The sub-Saturday Night Fever section I found excruciating.

As for the villains. Too many of them and none of them really given enough room to manoeuvre. There were some good bits in the film, mainly with the Sandman, but on the whole this was such a disappointment that it had me looking forward to the new Fantastic Four film.

The Pixies Live at the Paradise in Boston. This is a concert film of The Pixies playing a 200 capacity venue in their hometown last year. The band seems quite relaxed and chatty with the audience as they play through faves like Nimrod’s Son, Monkey Gone to Heaven, Debaser and Gigantic. The DVD also features a 12-song set from a Boston show in October 1986, filmed on a shaky camcorder and transferred from a bad quality video tape.

9/11 Press for Truth. This is a documentary that centres on the Jersey Girls, a group of women who all lost husbands or sons in the World Trade Center. They fight to have established what the Bush administration really knew about terrorists threats before 9/11 and what they did and did not do on the day to prevent them happening.

The film also features Paul Thompson, author of The Complete 9/11 Timeline, who discovered that a lot of articles containing some stunning facts about the terrorist threats to the US were being buried away inside newspapers and online.

It’s an interesting film, that leaves you in no doubt that at the very least those at the top in the US don’t really give a fuck what the general public thinks.

A Scanner Darkly. Another one I missed at the cinema. Phillip K. Dick’s novel, filmed then animated by Richard Linklater. Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder, Woody Harrelson and Robert Downey Jr. all put in first rate performances. Yes, even Keanu, I think the animation format enhances his turn. Although obviously a drug fuelled story it flows very well and the pieces all fit together nicely. And what’s more it made me remember how much I love Winona Ryder.

Mutual Appreciation. I really can’t emphasise enough how much this film is about nothing. I’m a fan of the Brooklyn band Bishop Allen and when I discovered that the two guys in the band are also both actors and read a bit about the films they were in I thought, ‘I’ll look out for them if they’re ever released here.’

Well, Mutual Appreciation was one of those films. On limited release here it features Justin Rice as Alan, a singer who comes to New York, looking to put a band together to play his songs. His band’s songs are actually Bishop Allen’s songs and probably the best bit in the film for me was a nervy live performance of ‘Quarter to Three’.

I really enjoyed this film, but it’s not something I would recommend to people, because very little happens in it. It’s very naturalistic and in one scene where Alan arrives late and drunk at a party that’s wound down I couldn’t help feeling I’d been to exactly the same party.

There’s a little love triangle forming with Alan, his best friend and his best friend’s girl, but it’s so understated it barely gets going, doing to the blushing and fumbling of its participants.

If you imagine Woody Allen as a 25 year old singer/songwriter playing in a band called The Bumblebees you’re not far off Mutual Appreciation.

Special. Michael Rapaport is in pretty much every single scene as a man who discovers that medical tests have given him super-powers and as such he sets out to fight crime. But have they really given him super-powers and is that man really his doctor and are there really ‘suits’ on his trail? To be honest even by the end I’m not quite sure. Was the whole thing a metaphor for something else? Again I’m not really sure.

It’s quite an enjoyable film however. Even if it did seem a little bit baffling and it becomes much darker than it initially appears to be. Rapaport is always good in just the right role and he’s excellent here as a man whose desire to fight crime and have superpowers far outweighs his need to cling on to his sanity.

The Boys From the Blackstuff

What I have to say in not unlike what Fraser has already posted. I went in to sign on this morning in Partick.

I too spent an hour on the phone a few days ago with a lassie in a call-centre, as she asked me a load of questions to inaccurately fill out a form for me. Among the major mistakes that she made was multiplying my final wage by ten, making it appear to the dole that I would shortly be in receipt of several thousand pounds, rather than a few hundred.

There were also a few questions on the form marked as 'UNANSWERED' when more accurately they could have been termed 'UNASKED'.

At the buroo I was met by a lot of Group 4 security guys who radio-controlled my appointment by letting each other know I was coming. "Mr. Brogan coming up to see Mr. Brown..."

"Check."

This was after two of them had a lengthy chat about the army.

My appointment itself went a lot smoother than Fraser's. I was met first of all by a charmless lassie who checked through the form for the obvious errors the call-centre lass made.

One thing I did discover during my interview was that the first 3 days of my claim don't count as they are deemed 'waiting days'. How many millions is that saving them over the course of a year? If I claimed for 3 days I wasn't unemployed for, would that not be termed 'fraud'?

I then spoke with quite an efficient guy who just really wanted all the details on my jobseeker form filled out so he could send me on my way.

And send me on my way he did, armed with a couple of phone numbers to call about jobs I'm not really interested in. Still every job he showed me paid more than the job I've just been kicked out of and a fortnightly trip into Jobcentre Plus offers more prospects than the scumbag company I was with ever did.

The 10 Minute Knock Back

Well, its been just over a week since Tom and I were unceremoniously chucked out on our arses by our former employers.

So far, its been productive time well used. Tom and I are both writing things we'd never have had time to do otherwise, we've done a bit of filming (more on that at a later date) and we have of course been enjoying all the fun of signing on and applying for jobs.

I was in to sign on today and a fucking bizarre experience it was to. These days, what with all the new fangled technology cutting about, it's all change down the dole or Jobcentre Plus as it's now known.

Instead of just tripping into a Jobcentre and having some half interested twat take down your details for about an hour, you have to call up "Jobsomeshitorother Direct", give them all your details, get a big wad of documents sent out to you that you have to fill out and THEN you get to go down the Jobcentre and have your time wasted by some half interested twat for about an hour.

To be fair, I'd have been less time this morning had I not had to help correct the dozens of mistakes the guy I phoned made and fill in the bits he just couldn't be bothered doing with a new start lassie, who had to ask a colleague every time she had to make a decision.

I was then passed off to a Pat Butcher lookalike for my "Jobsearch", which consisted of her complaining to me about her husband (who apparently can't just go and buy a kilt on his own - ah, you know what we're like us men eh?) before she started entering whatever the fuck she felt like on her computer record of me to the point where I wondered if my being there was in any way genuinely necessary.

I could certainly hear myself talking, but lets just say precious little of it made it across the desk.

She then handed me a bundle of paperwork before huckling me out the door because she'd double-booked me with a guy who had learning difficulties and hadn't been able to read the letter he'd received telling him his appointment had been changed.

Fucking rare eh? Canne wait until no-that-bright, overworked employees under this amount of pressure are handling my ID card details.

The place itself is hilarious now, all open-plan, with "jobpoint" terminals which work to the same functionality standards as their laughable website, sofas, "breakout areas" and designer, leather-bound cupboards that hold about two ring binders and a pencil, the kind of office you'd imagine Tony Wilson would have had in about 1986.

Also, for no reason I can put my finger on other than the possibility that they've finally realised they deal almost exclusively with bams all day, the place is crawling with Group 4 security staff.

Maybe they are all looking for work having been sacked after losing dozens of dangerous criminals? Who knows.

But that's not been the best bit of my week so far. That came the other morning when, bright and early, I applied for a job I had received via alert from S1 jobs.

I applied at 8.59am. By 9.09 I had received and email telling me to fuck off.

Despite being qualified for the job and it being a brand new ad placed that very morning I had apparently fallen behind a vast queue of people better suited to the position.

I am fairly accustomed to the feeling of not knowing whether to laugh or cry, but that was a new one even on me.

World Of Employment Get Ready

Looks like today, maybe, just maybe I and Tom's last day...

Thank fuck. Here's Curtis Mayfield.

It’s Official – We’re Binned

As Pish devotees will know, Tom and I work in the same office.

Over the years this has meant that we’ve been able to work closely together on doing stuff like putting together shows and doing stuff for submissions etc. It’s also meant that we’ve quite often got sick of the sight of one another.

Well, a brave new dawn approaches as we’ve just been told officially that we’re finally getting the bin from work.

Rubbish in one way because we all have to eat but probably a good thing, since our work is soul sucking meaningless pish.

We are now of course willing to consider all offers except call centres and gay porn. At least until the reduny run outs.