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

bit nervous

slept v well - this is unusual - must be resigned to my destiny

but now i am wasting time on the internet when i ought to be getting ready to go in

i hope they don't laugh at my pic of m and mara

i wonder what i can do today

i wonder if i'll be allowed to go to the exciting M&C meeting - fingers crossed

heyhey!

Hope you have a real fun time at your new job!

*happy hug*

H&K
Z

thanks Zed! good to see you!

first day was pretty good - happened to be the first of the day long training-type meetings that they are having for all my kind of staff bi-monthly, so i sat in meetings most of the day and then had my first stop-work meeting to deal with some pay issues in the afternoon! Gave a good idea of some of the intra-organisational dynamics, eg who likes who, who doesn't, what their reactions are to certain ways of talking, presenting info, etc.

i currently have a desk, a puter, a chair and a cupboard full of someone else's crap. i have no filing cabinet, rubbish bin, drawers, window (all internal walls), and had just two red pens, an empty stapler and a box of paperclips (oh and a five cent piece) (now have two blue pens and a pad of paper also).

will be interesting to see how it all pans out - despite the fact they wanted me to start asap (two weeks ago when they offered me the job) they don't seem to know quite what they are going to get me to do yet...

which kind of matches the fact that i don't know what to do, quite well

Good luck, span! I admire your cool in the face of a new job - it's always a nerve-racking time. Who are you working for, and what's the job? And what's an M&C meeting - manicure and chocolate?

M & C is the union you join to represent you when the union you work for is the union that all the other unionists join to represent them. does that make it any clearer ?

although the organiser in the office next to me gave me chocolate today, and she's the M & C delegate at our site mmmmmmmmmmmm

the job is education coordinator for a working class union - basically i'll be coordinating a lot of the delegate and member training in how to be effective union members, bargaining for a collective contract, empowering themselves, that kind of stuff. in reality most of my work will be auditing current courses, fixing what's broken, producing and collating resources, and generally doing the stuff that the union is legally required to do.

it's a semi-dream job for me - i get to use a lot of the skills i have developed and the particular union is a great place to learn about progressive union culture (called "organising") and so on.

day two was pretty good - i got to sort out a lot of the little details, like rearranging the wall furniture, and then did some proper work in the arvo.

Hey, that's brilliant. Good to know that you're not going all conservative now that you're getting married!

It is so important to have a job you can feel good about. At the moment I'm waiting impatiently for news of an application I've made for a permanent job as administrative assistant at Mind The Gap, the theatre group I was on placement with last year. That was such a great time - I got on brilliantly with the (mostly female) team at MTG, enjoyed the varied administrative work I was doing, and felt very proud to be part of the great shows they produce with learning-disabled actors. I really think the job should be mine - I'm pretty certain that I did well last year.

But the job is being sponsored via the UK government's New Deal scheme, so everything has to be sorted out via the local Jobcentre, and it seems to be rather a slow process. I keep thinking of an old Tom Petty song: ' The waiting is the hardest part...'

definitely not getting conservative - DF (which is internet talk for Dear Fiance) works for the union upstairs from mine... (although his is more middle class)

there is a bit of a funny work ethic at the union - i'm a "specialist" (supposed to just focus on education and training) so i am like admin, in that i work 8/8.30 - 5, but like the organising staff in that i basically have lunch and breaks whenever i want and (so far) little structure to my day beyond the self-imposed. but that might just be because they haven't totally worked out what they want me to do yet.

good luck with the MTG job - let me know how you get on, it's sounds very worthy, but also fun

Good - I'm glad to hear that you haven't gone from spanner grrl to hedge-trimmer respectable married lady! Have they decided what your job is yet?

I have heard today from my contact at the Jobcentre that Mind The Gap have said they're going to give me an interview, but they haven't said when yet. That's fine by me - there's no hurry. The company's on a nationwide tour until the beginning of May, so it may well be that they won't get round to it until after that. I can wait, now that I know I'm going to get my chance.

i think i've decided what my job is instead. which is to carry out this contract that we have.

first step of that is getting the thing actually signed! argh! i was off work on friday and it should have been signed while i was away...

yay for getting interviews i have a friend who i have fingers and toes crossed for - she and i worked at the library tomorrow and she needs to escape to retain her self-respect and her sanity good luck with yours, please let me know how it goes (and when it goes!)

for the good wishes!

But, er... 'she and i worked at the library tomorrow...'

You mean you're time travellers?

oops - getting a bit ahead of myself there

i meant, of course, together

(although there is a little known division of the library that does time travel specifically to correct gramatical mistakes in books at the proofing point so that pedants have much less to sharpen their pencils for)

and she got the job - yay!