The notion of a forward moving career trajectory right now feels as pointless and non-existent as a vigorously sandpapered unicorn horn. I only bring this up again because of recent events relating to the actions of others in the world of Facebook and because working in retail over the Christmas period is enough to send even the most optimistic person on a ride in a one-horse open sleigh off a cliff made of discounted spirits, pigs in blankets and mass avarice.
Let's go back to Facebook for a moment and leave the clumsy, rambling, overly-elaborate similes to one side. My own personal ventures into 'the book' lately have resulted in shared YouTube videos and anecdotal asides that could only be collectively described as "shit my 4-year-old nephew says". Meanwhile, others have used the medium to point out good things that have occurred in their respective existences. Okay people post bad stuff too, but screw the bad stuff. It's not that time of year. It should more "Merry Christmas" and less Very Shitness.
People post the positive developments in love, career and wealth; that's the Tarot card holy trinity right there. Anyway, as is human nature, when I become aware of someone else's good news, I feel something akin to happiness for their cause. Unfortunately, such a feeling lasts for much less time than an ice cube does in an oven, before it's taken over by a mix of jealousy, selfishness and the need to continually come up with rubbish bits of rhetorical extravagance like a vomiting dictionary. I start to examine my own current state of being and compare my relatively crap lifestyle to that of those others who actually have exciting news to share.
As it stands, I live away from family, with a select few friends in a fairly dilapidated portion of the country. My current financial stature has me now in a position where I'm earning enough to live comfortably, but still dealing with the spectre of outstanding, backdated rent, thus forcing me to stay in a co-dependent situation without the freedom to go it alone. Regarding freedom, I lack mobility in terms of long distances. I'm unable to drive an actual vehicle and thus rely on others to move me across vast spaces, namely railway companies. The full-time retail work I'm currently associated with seems to hold a kind of monopoly on my life since it's my only source of steady income but restricts me to one particular place. The problem here is that any future career prospects are most likely going to require me to relocate, which is something I simply can't afford to do since without my current job and steady income, I'm kind of screwed.
Back in the virtual realm, my escapades in the written word - mostly coming from this perpetually stagnating blog - have attracted the attention of a former college tutor of mine from way back. When I say "way back" I really mean 2008, but a fair bit's happened to me over the last five years, meaning that a sudden inbox message from someone I knew for one term and have kept on the periphery of my digital contacts ever since actually took me by surprise.
"Hey," said he. Well probably not really, I'm just paraphrasing to give you the general impression of the message I received. "How's it going? I see you've graduated. I see you write a fair bit. What kind of forward moving career trajectory have you got going on now?" It was as if he knew misery and wanted to caption it for me. However, he works in the field of creative arts where work is never easy to get into and never stable enough to cling onto. I felt the warmth of his sympathetic sentiments as he offered a few words of encouragement in the form of handy job-recruitment websites. I told him I'd have a look at them and then went and did the exact opposite.
I suppose I have to cling onto the hope that time will solve everything and I'll get to a more comfortable career-wise position eventually. The only problem I'm facing right now is that time seems to be moving so slowly, yet it's constantly racing away; every day that I'm not thinking about where I'm going to end up or how I'm going to get there is just another day wasted in the grand scheme of things. Part of the problem is I don't even know exactly what kind of career I want to pursue and haven't quite taken the time, courage or initiative to consider it. That's why, after typing all of this, I'm going to dig out that list of handy websites, take comfort in the fact that figures from my past still have some shred of faith in me, and start exploring where and how that career trajectory can actually start hurtling forwards for once.
To put it in simpler, and more seasonally appropriate terms:
Dear Santa, I have been a good boy this year getting my degree and not murdering anyone, so pretty please can I have a new job for Christmas? Well, not a new job for Christmas, but can you at least give me the strength and encouragement and enlightenment as to what it is I want to do with the rest of my life, because I sometimes worry that if I stay working in retail over festive periods, I'll turn even more and more bitter towards life and all its human inhabitants and I'll end up on the naughty list. Oh, and a clockwork train too. Cheers mate.
P.S. Forget the train. Even though it's clockwork, it probably won't run according to schedule anyway.
Wednesday 25 December 2013
Wednesday 11 December 2013
Spent More Than Enough
Money-wise, I'm on my last ass right now. I would say I'm on my last legs but my bank balance is far too low now that not even metaphorical legs can save it. And as far as figures of speech go, the last ass seems more fitting. According to Andy Williams, it's the most wonderful time of the year, although sadly, I'm forced to disagree with the late crooner on that. Daylight hours are shorter, gas consumption is larger and retail establishments are crammed to the rafters with people throwing money about in exchange for pieces of tat they're not even buying for themselves, all because social and cultural protocol says so. Season's greetings.
Anyway I'm not being bitter about the festive period or retail, or indeed the festive period in retail. I've actually managed to reach a point where I'm fairly comfortable about the impending holiday, and to be even more accurate, I reached that point on Sunday night. All of my gift shopping for other people is done and all of those bits have been draped in colourful paper and shiny ribbons. I'm actually done with it early this year, or at least earlier than normal. Last year I did virtually all of my shopping on December 21st then spent a solid evening wrapping the heck out of it. The fact that this year I've managed to get everything finished whilst the month was still in single digits (i.e. the 8th). Go me!
In order to complete the task at hand, though, I've had to go a bit spend happy. In fact, over the last four days my debit card's seen more action than I have over the last twenty-four years. Slutty little bit of plastic; inserting itself into every slot it sees, ejaculating money like nobody's business. There's a mild chance I'm sexually frustrated right now, but then again that's nothing new. And as much as you probably don't want to be reading about such a topic... well... to be honest that's really what the internet's for now. Quite frankly, if you didn't want any of that, you shouldn't have come online in the first place. Weirdo.
Having such low funds right now means that I can't really splurge (which still hasn't stopped me from buying presents for myself alongside presents for others). Having to live on bread and water seems to be the order of business up until Christmas though now. Okay, it's not as drastic as that, but I think I'm allowed to exaggerate a fair bit if I want to continue utilising words in my life as some sort of career path. As it stands, though, my current working lifestyle is getting in the way. In fact, I'm probably supposed to be doing that right now. You know what, forget "probably". That is actually what I'm supposed to be doing right now. Besides, I've spent more than enough words today. Any more and I'll surely be facing some kind of word debt very soon. I should stop before I fall into any overdraft.
Bye.
Anyway I'm not being bitter about the festive period or retail, or indeed the festive period in retail. I've actually managed to reach a point where I'm fairly comfortable about the impending holiday, and to be even more accurate, I reached that point on Sunday night. All of my gift shopping for other people is done and all of those bits have been draped in colourful paper and shiny ribbons. I'm actually done with it early this year, or at least earlier than normal. Last year I did virtually all of my shopping on December 21st then spent a solid evening wrapping the heck out of it. The fact that this year I've managed to get everything finished whilst the month was still in single digits (i.e. the 8th). Go me!
In order to complete the task at hand, though, I've had to go a bit spend happy. In fact, over the last four days my debit card's seen more action than I have over the last twenty-four years. Slutty little bit of plastic; inserting itself into every slot it sees, ejaculating money like nobody's business. There's a mild chance I'm sexually frustrated right now, but then again that's nothing new. And as much as you probably don't want to be reading about such a topic... well... to be honest that's really what the internet's for now. Quite frankly, if you didn't want any of that, you shouldn't have come online in the first place. Weirdo.
Having such low funds right now means that I can't really splurge (which still hasn't stopped me from buying presents for myself alongside presents for others). Having to live on bread and water seems to be the order of business up until Christmas though now. Okay, it's not as drastic as that, but I think I'm allowed to exaggerate a fair bit if I want to continue utilising words in my life as some sort of career path. As it stands, though, my current working lifestyle is getting in the way. In fact, I'm probably supposed to be doing that right now. You know what, forget "probably". That is actually what I'm supposed to be doing right now. Besides, I've spent more than enough words today. Any more and I'll surely be facing some kind of word debt very soon. I should stop before I fall into any overdraft.
Bye.
Wednesday 4 December 2013
Still Here
When Internet historians in the distant 45th century take off their headsets, disable their brain chips and discover our primitive mesh of information transfer, they'll probably wonder how we managed. They'll marvel at how people had to use their fingers to manually input individual characters to spread the word. They'll wonder how a static, two-dimensional 100x100 pixels thumbnail could possibly be used to represent a person's entire personality. And when they find millions upon zillions of homebrew blogs, they be astonished at how so many people seemingly dropped dead immediately after their first and, tragically, only entry.
Back in the now-most times, however, we understand that people create blogs and neglect them very quickly when they run out of either stuff to say, energy to say it, or memory to stop and go "shit, I've still got that blog somewhere in the technological ether". I have - at one point or another - done all three. Not all at the same time, that would be ludicrous, illogical, contradictory and possibly lead to the explosion of brain matter. But at various times, I've done each of the three. As it happens, I've not been here for a while, not written for a while and if I hadn't started typing this one, those 45th century historians might've looked back at this time when I roamed the planet and naturally assume I ceased to exist at some point in early November. I didn't though, I'm still here. These words prove it. Furthermore, my brain matter is still intact as far as I can tell.
I wish I could inform the great wide everywhere that the last few months have been filled with numerous wild adventures that have prohibited me from heading over this way and actually bothering to make words about it. I wish I could tell you that I've traversed dangerous mountainsides, swam long and winding rivers, and collected all kinds of exotic treasures along the way. To be honest, I kind of have been doing that whenever dipping in and out of brand new The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds. The real world truth, however, is that my wild adventures have amounted to nothing more than working, sleeping, occasionally eating, farting, and trying to come up with another thing to make me sound moderately interesting, but failing. This, evidently, is a feeling that has plagued my entire existence over the last however long or so.
My enthusiasm for writing something, anything in this space has waned due to a lack of exciting things to mention in the here and now, alongside a strong sense of fatigue that comes from picking up extra hours in convenience retail. In future, I may well have to rely on my past. The problem with the past is that I can barely remember it well. Hell, I don't even remember what I wrote two sentences ago, but it probably had something to do with hypothetical historians of the future or the existence of a fickle attention span. It's apparent now, though, that I'm going to have to have a sit down and good long think about things that have unfolded before my eyes over the last 24 years and pick out the interesting ones. At the risk of turning this webspace into a bad sitcom-style clip-show episode of my life, I regret to inform you that the more exciting stories aren't really happening this season. Maybe a look back into the past will remind me of how the show used to be back in its heyday whilst also attempting to improve those sinking ratings and angering the critics at the same time.
Hey, at least I've written something here this time. Don't cry to me if you find it crap. I know it's crap. This is my personal crap space where I come to write crap. My theory is that I have a certain amount of crap within me, so if I write out all the crap first, that'll only leave good stuff left to write about later. Meanwhile, all this talk about getting the crap out has made me notice that shifting sensation in my bowels so away I go now. I hope that, as you're reading this, you're now imagining me sitting on the toilet doing some natural - if a little bit icky - business, because that's actually probably where I actually am right now.
Back in the now-most times, however, we understand that people create blogs and neglect them very quickly when they run out of either stuff to say, energy to say it, or memory to stop and go "shit, I've still got that blog somewhere in the technological ether". I have - at one point or another - done all three. Not all at the same time, that would be ludicrous, illogical, contradictory and possibly lead to the explosion of brain matter. But at various times, I've done each of the three. As it happens, I've not been here for a while, not written for a while and if I hadn't started typing this one, those 45th century historians might've looked back at this time when I roamed the planet and naturally assume I ceased to exist at some point in early November. I didn't though, I'm still here. These words prove it. Furthermore, my brain matter is still intact as far as I can tell.
I wish I could inform the great wide everywhere that the last few months have been filled with numerous wild adventures that have prohibited me from heading over this way and actually bothering to make words about it. I wish I could tell you that I've traversed dangerous mountainsides, swam long and winding rivers, and collected all kinds of exotic treasures along the way. To be honest, I kind of have been doing that whenever dipping in and out of brand new The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds. The real world truth, however, is that my wild adventures have amounted to nothing more than working, sleeping, occasionally eating, farting, and trying to come up with another thing to make me sound moderately interesting, but failing. This, evidently, is a feeling that has plagued my entire existence over the last however long or so.
My enthusiasm for writing something, anything in this space has waned due to a lack of exciting things to mention in the here and now, alongside a strong sense of fatigue that comes from picking up extra hours in convenience retail. In future, I may well have to rely on my past. The problem with the past is that I can barely remember it well. Hell, I don't even remember what I wrote two sentences ago, but it probably had something to do with hypothetical historians of the future or the existence of a fickle attention span. It's apparent now, though, that I'm going to have to have a sit down and good long think about things that have unfolded before my eyes over the last 24 years and pick out the interesting ones. At the risk of turning this webspace into a bad sitcom-style clip-show episode of my life, I regret to inform you that the more exciting stories aren't really happening this season. Maybe a look back into the past will remind me of how the show used to be back in its heyday whilst also attempting to improve those sinking ratings and angering the critics at the same time.
Hey, at least I've written something here this time. Don't cry to me if you find it crap. I know it's crap. This is my personal crap space where I come to write crap. My theory is that I have a certain amount of crap within me, so if I write out all the crap first, that'll only leave good stuff left to write about later. Meanwhile, all this talk about getting the crap out has made me notice that shifting sensation in my bowels so away I go now. I hope that, as you're reading this, you're now imagining me sitting on the toilet doing some natural - if a little bit icky - business, because that's actually probably where I actually am right now.
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