h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

In the course of my wage slavery I encountered this gem -

"Waste that does not have a designated skip or container is placed in a suitable container and labelled with the contents and placed in the designated waste storage area by the sulphide effluent plant."

Questions:- How is the label made from the contents? How does the sulphide effluent plant, which is presumably not a plant because it can move about, move the containers?

I know posted this a long time ago, but what job do you do? It sounds very bizarre.
Or maybe it's just you that is very bizarre.

Talking of bizarre, when I first went to boarding school I was very perplexed by a note attached to the inside of the wardrobe that talked about fire drills. It read something like "the assembly point is outside front of house beyond ha ha."
I thought it was a really cryptic comment with someone giggling at the thought of me searching for the "house beyond" until someone told me a ha ha was a ditch thing. Oh well, I felt stupid. It must have made an impression as I can still remember the wording 14 years later.

Only 'posh' people have ha has. I think they were supposed to keep out the hoi polloi without spoiling the view. The rest of us have fences or walls.
This seems as good a place as any to carry on the conversation from RPG without being too tied to the topic (Oh dear, another excessively alliterative sentence).Ambiguity seems to me to be a reasonable heading under which to continue.
My job title sounds mind numbingly boring but the job is actually quite interesting. The things I have to deal with vary from the funny bizarre to the bureaucratically ridiculous. Some of them are quite important to some people. I work in the manufacturing sector. That is enough clues for today. I do not think I want you to know in any case!
I am not bizarre. I just have a very complicated life in which I have to make sure that some of the people with whom I spend time do not know about some of the other people. And fit in mundane things like paying the mortgage and turning up for work.
I have now told you more about myself than is either wise or interesting. Have a nice weekend.

You've really confused me now.
What's wrong with some people in your life not knowing the other people? And as for not wanting me to know what your job is, is it really embarrasing?
Hope your Bank Holiday Weekend went ok, I had to search through about 4 pages of forums to find this one again as it got a bit buried.

There is nothing 'wrong' with some of the people in my life not knowing of other people. From my moral perspective it is the only practicable solution to a particular dilemma. Maintaining the situation is sometimes rather awkward.
With regard to my job, see my article 'professionism'. No, my job is not on the list but I suspect that it might appear on other peoples lists - if they could be bothered to write them. I am a little disappointed that there has been so little response to that article. It was a genuine attempt to conduct a poll. I think that the title was just too boring to catch anybody's attention. Perhaps you would add your list of the ten most odious professions?
Actually my job title is only embarrassing in that it sounds unutterably boring and bureaucratic and, as you must be aware, all communication is about creating an image. If you tell me that I have already created a boring and bureaucratic image then I may consider divulging the job title - or I may be so vain as to disbelieve you.

If this forum got buried you must have a very busy virtual life. However do you find the time?

I find the time as I am a single mum that only works one or two days a week. I have to sit indoors most nights, so I might as well be online talking to people as staring at the TV.

I read the article that you mentioned, but I didn't really understand what you were talking about. Maybe I shouldn't have read it at 1am after I had friends round for a drink.
I'll try again tomorrow.
Your particular dilemma sounds very odd, and a little intriguing. My life is such an open book that other people's secrets are always interesting to me.

I do not know what you were drinking, but it must have been good stuff. I hope that you find 'Professionism' more comprehensible on further examination. It may be that you do not have the habit of carrying a sackfull of convenient labels around in your head - for instance Dentist = person paid outrageous amounts of money for manipulating teeth; or non-executive director = person paid any amount of money for doing absolutely nothing; or psychoanalyst = person who thinks he\she can help you by dragging all the trivial dross from the back of your mind to the front and charging you money for the privelege. Personally I think that such labels help us make sense of a fast moving world, as long as we remember that they refer to the general and not the particular.
I am always a little suspicious when people say that their life is an 'open book'. The metaphor is usually taken as meaning that everything about them is public knowledge. I find that parts of 'the book' are written in a foreign language and that there are ambiguities and hidden meanings.
I must tootle off and do some work now. 'Bye.

I don't go around labelling people or jobs, maybe that is why I had trouble with it. I take everyone as I find them, which means I don't like to think of people as part of a group. I prefer to think of people as individuals.
By open book I guess I do mean that everything about me is public knowledge, but you are right, there are parts about me that are probably incomprehensible to other people.

Well I am an individual who belongs to that group 'hard working male who drinks too much' and at 17.00 I am going across the road to the pub. And tomorrow morning I am coming back to work because I have to write my monthly encyclopaedia of success and disaster for my boss, who has made quite certain that there was no time to do it today.
In the mean time you might enlighten me as to why you chose the sobriquet 'muse of bondage'?

It was suggested to me by a friend that I apply to be a Muse, and that Muse of Bondage would suit me fine. So I went ahead!
Enjoy yourself in the pub, I hope you embark upon an evening of swearing at the boss because you have to go back in to work tomorrow.
Of course, Saturdays are the only day I work atm, but when my son starts school next week, I will have to go back to working Thursdays as well.

You have obviously managed your working arrangements to accomodate the school holidays successfully. Won't it be tragic when the little darlings go back next week? I am taking a day's holiday on Monday to look after my two because my spouse returns to school a day before they do.
For some incomprehensible reason talking about muses inspired me to write a poem and, as you were the cause of my thinking about muses, I have decided to inflict it upon you. If you find reading amateur poetry embarrassing please ignore the rest of this posting, forgive my presumption and pass on to something more interesting.

So would you like a poem?
A work for you alone?
A verse made up of flesh and blood
Of sinew, skin and bone?

Every man is a poem,
His every breath a verse,
His every kiss a eulogy,
His death, inscribed, a curse.

Thank you for posting that poem, I did like it. I normally only like humerous verse, (and even then not much), but this was good. Maybe it is because I inspired it, which I have never done before. Thanks.

I have the convenience of working for my dad, which is how I manage to arrange work around my child. I will miss him when he goes back to school, as he has a few problems, and being at school makes them worse. He is going to a party this afternoon, and as the mother is a great friend of mine I will be helping out for 4 hours. Then I have to go straight to work, so by 3am when I finish I expect I will be ready to collapse.
Then I have to get up early to go to Camden town tomorrow, which is always fun.
Are you going to take your kids out for the day? I don't think I know where in the country you are? (Or have I just been rude and forgotten?)

No, I didn't take them out for the day. I offered, but they did not want to go anywhere! Alex spent most of the day cycling around Honley and Holmfirth with his friends and Philippa spent some of the time playing with Alex, some of the time calling him a 'Pooh Head' and the rest of the time regaling me with stories about squigs and pickled onions - don't ask! So now you know what part of the country I live in.
I sympathise with the 'party helper' scenario. I've done that a few times, but never stayed up 'til 3AM afterwards. I suppose I shouldn't ask what you do until that hour, having not told you what my job is, but hey - your life is an open book.
I am pleased that you liked the poem.

I drive a taxi, so Saturday nights are the best night. As I only do one other day in the week, I make sure I stay out working til the last possible job.

My son only stayed an hour at his party, then insisted on coming home, so I managed to get out of helping to clear up.
(How old is your daughter? It sounds like she is the youngest. But I'm probably wrong.(
He started school again today, with a new teacher. I was upset they wouldn't let us into the classroom with them. But they know best. So I had to discuss his problems in the playground. I wasn't happy about that! Especially as we had no chance to meet the new teachers last term.

You are not wrong. Philippa is nine (ten in October). She was quite keen to return to school today, but doesn't think much of the teachers that get assigned to her class. As you will be aware, getting assigned a good teacher, both from the parent's and the child's point of view, is in the hands of the good luck fairy.
I think that teachers have a formative effect on four to seven year olds - thereafter it is probably too late. Is your son still five, or has he had a birthday since you told me his age?

He is still 5, he will be 6 in December. As far as I am concerned he is a year behind at school, as he has only just gone into the 1st year. They work it all differently now, but he started at nearly 5 in the same year that someone who was only just 4 and they are supposed to go through school together. It is just madness. They just want all the money from the Government, they don't care that the kids are a year different in age. If he turns out to be a little sod when he is older, he will be able to leave school before he does any exams. It's so stupid.

~gets off soapbox~

His teacher seems firmer than his last one, and he needs firmness and routine. I think that's why he didn't get on so well in reception class. Although she looks young, she also looks like she knows what she is doing.
Has your daughter got more than one teacher? As you said "doesn't think much of the teachers that get assigned to her class"

- Climbs onto soapbox -
Last year her teacher was sick for more than half of all the term time. Philippa experienced the teaching styles of several different supply teachers and was not impressed. In fairness to the supply teachers it cannot be easy to build a rapport with a class in a very limited period. In my opinion infant and junior schools should have a far higher level of funding so that they can cover staff illness with other permanent staff who are familiar with the pupils.
- Climbs down from soapbox -

I have to go to a meeting now. I shall witter on some more later on.

In that case I shall refrain from answering until you finish.

Although you are right, illness that goes on that long should have the teacher replaced with a permanent teacher.

Idling at my desk again. I have just visited 'Mina's House'. So maybe your life is an open book. I am not sure whether I find it refreshing or frightening that people like you exist.
I have not forgotten the 'Fairies' article. I have found, almost by accident, some great poems by Walter de la Mere to link to the site. I was really looking for a poem I saw posted on the wall of a pub in Wales. I was so struck by it at the time that I thought it might appeal to you, and it has a certain fantasy element -

TARTARY

If I were Lord of Tartary,
Myself, and me alone,
My bed should be of ivory,
Of beaten gold my throne;
And in my court should peacocks flaunt,
And in my forests tigers haunt,
And in my pools great fishes slant
Their fins athwart the sun.

If I were Lord of Tartary,
Trumpeters every day
To all my meals should summon me,
And in my courtyards bray;
And in the evening lamps should shine,
Yellow as honey, red as wine,
While harp, and flute, and mandoline
Made music sweet and gay.

If I were Lord of Tartary,
I'd wear a robe of beads,
White, and gold, and green they'd be --
And small and thick as seeds;
And ere should wane the morning star,
I'd don my robe and scimitar.
And zebras seven should draw my car
Through Tartary's dark gleades.

Lord of the fruits of Tartary.
Her rivers silver pale!
Lord of the hills of Tartary.
Glen, thicket, wood and dale!
Her flashing stars, her scented breeze,
Her trembling lakes, like foamless seas,
Her bird-delighting citron-trees,
In every purple vale!

Is that romantic or is it?

Yes, I did like this poem. I remember reading Walter de la Mere when I was a kid at school, but I don't remember this one.

I don't mean to scare people with my web site, I always like to get stuff off my chest in my diary. It has been read a lot more since I started posting regularly to H2G2 than it ever was before, so maybe I will not be so open on it. Although it does mean if ever I meet anyone that has read it, they will know exactly what I am like, and hopefully not be suprised or horrified by the RL me.

"people like me"? Not sure I'm keen on that comment.