| « I've had my peak piqued | The Bottle » |
"Mechanised petrification, embellished with a sort of convulsive self-importance"
I applied for an admin job with a dance company, partly because I imagine that it's the sort of job in which you'd meet plenty of women, and most of the men are gay, so there'd be little competition for a straight man attracted to arty girls.
"...we regret that on this occassion [sic] we are unable to invite you for interview. We hope you feel inspired to work with [the company] in the future."
Well, not quite unable to interview me; you've chosen not to. And what a ridiculous final sentence, the insidious Weltschauung of work as an expression of the individual spirit. I received that email on the same day as I read Jenny Turner's review in the LRB of Richard Sennett's new book. "It simply doesn't make sense any more, this infusion of working life with near religious emotion, but people still do it".
The vibrant economy of north Lancashire, does however throw up other opportunities.
Does it mean you're working in the refrigerated section or are they looking for a bit of a stoner? More sinisterly, is it a coded warning that the job will require immense reserves of patience and the elimination of self as one is faced with both the stresses of being polite to customers who don't deserve it, and having constantly to defend yourself and your £6.08 an hour against the microsurveillance of a hostile management?
9 comments
“The vibrant economy of north Lancashire, does however throw up-”
Well, that’s one word for what it does. Whatever happened to Eileen Bilton in Warrington-Runcorn?
I have visions of some fazzled woman with a bunch of kids going nuts trying to find the cereal bars she wants because they’ve moved them again and a guy just stood there say “Man… what a bummer for you dude… just such a bummer man… fancy a drag?”
Ah, the pseudo-emotions of employment. When you work in my own profession, you have to always state “It’s all about the kids” in every statement regarding, pay, conditions, hours of work etc.
Is it fuck. It’s mostly about pay and holidays.
Chilled Colleague? Be cautious, it may be one of those really weird jobs, where they expect you to actually stand in the freezer and hand out selected goods to shoppers, or even one of those Arts Council-subsidised things where the “performer” slowly freezes as an expression of the Universal Angst or some other arty-farty claptrap.
I like Furtheron’s idea. *giggle*
It’s probably a really cool job driving an ice cream van…
Sx
“Is it fuck. It’s mostly about pay and holidays.”
Hurrah to hear that. I couldn’t stand the moralistic “it’s a vocation” argument when I was a teacher. It’s a job. A responsible, important one of course, but the idea that it was this noble high vocation was sometimes used as an excuse by management to get you to do endless free overtime (the curse of teaching in the UK).
i’m with the ’stoner’ contingent. ummm… regarding what that job is about, i mean. yeah. dude… you know.
You’d have met plenty of women in really, really, really good shape. Perhaps they sniffed out your true motivations.
Talking of women in good shape, hope things are going well with DF!
Btw M, are you aware of the fact that clicking on your link in comments sends me to this?
Hang on - might be because you’ve mistyped your address, as [your site name].blgospot.com
Form is loading...
