'11% of staff feel sexually harrassed at work.'

Job hunting. It's swings and roundabouts, isn't it? Some days there's a lot to apply for, some days there's only the, 'NO EXPERIENCE? NO PROBLEM! EARN £60k+ A WEEK. MUST HAVE OWN CAR AND OUTGOING PERSONALITY' kind of adverts. Which are about as appealing as a case of crabs or hammering out your own teeth.

So, tonight was the jobs section of the Evening Post. Good news. 500 jobs inside, it boasted. I opened it, all anticipation, and was greeted with the headline, '11% of staff feel sexually harrassed at work.'

What a feature to have on the first page you come across IN A JOBS PAPER. Still, it didn't put me off, quite the opposite, and I've seen maybe two jobs I'm going to apply for.

Fingers crossed. (That an application is successful, not that I fall into the 11%).

xx

I can breathe through both nostrils again! What a treat. For the last week or so, I've been cold-ridden, waking up with a bone-dry mouth and my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth. Not nice. Horrible, in fact.

So, this week I've just been working really. I watched this programme last night, The Whistleblower, which was pretty distressing while I was having my dinner. If you haven't seen it, it's kind of 'journo under cover' reporting to The Whistleblower (a woman with a bob who, it seems, we only ever see the back of. I presume this is to avoid someone who she has 'unmasked' battering her should they meet at a zebra crossing). Anyway, last night was a look into nurseries of the child not plant variety. A woman went undercover as a nursery assistant and the findings were not good, least of all because all the kids she was involved with had Crimewatch fuzzy faces. She found out that staff were being underpaid, kids were being burnt left right and centre on uncovered radiators and, most worrying, were left around drills and other such tools while the builders were in. It was pretty uncomfortable viewing, especially when we found out she hadn't had a criminal record check and had been there for months. No one was hurt, but a lesson was learnt: DON'T TRUST ANYONE. (And don't touch uncovered radiators).

xx

'Shall I stay on the phone with you while you do it?'

I never, never want to be on the phone to someone from BT for 45 minutes again in my life. The other week, Ian got a wireless Hub delivered from them and all was well for, oh, about twenty minutes. We turned it on, it went green, we connected to the internet through my laptop and looked at websites just for the sake of it. Bedtime came and we turned the Hub off. A mistake, it turns out. When we turned it on again, it just flashed red (which is never a good thing) and refused to do anything else. We'd clearly upset it, but neither of us knew what to do, so Ian called them up and was told, 'Just put the CD into the computer.' So, we did that, no joy. So, on Sunday, I was given the task of calling them up since we both decided I was probably slightly more technicallu savvy. NEVER AGAIN! Ugh, it was horrible, like some kind of pennance for a sin I've forgotten. We went through everything.

'Have you turned it on and off again?'
'Have you put the CD into the machine?'
'Have you right-clicked this, that, the other?'

The most painful part though was when he told me 'keep pressing the resest button for thirty seconds', (which meant jamming it down with a pencil. It took ages to work out if he meant keep pressing it or keep it pressed. Anyway, neither worked but I had him breathing in my ear for the whole time before asking, 'What colour is it now?' 'Flashing red.'

We tried three more buttons. None worked. 45 minutes and nothing had happened. Then he said, 'Have you connected the Hub with the computer using the yellow cable.'

Realisation hit me like a kipper round the face.

'No,' I said, 'I'll try that now.'

'Shall I stay on the phone with you while you do it?'

NO! I couldn't think of anything worse, so told him I thought I would be okay now. It took another three hours last night to get it all working though. Horrible. I'd rather knock my teeth out with a hammer than go through that again.

Anyway, though it feels like I have been crouched down in front of the desktop for three weeks, that's not true. Since my last post, I have had two interviews for publishing jobs and was offered one job I didn't want and turned down for the one I wanted. Handing an application in for another tomorrow, so hopefully that will work out.

Things got from bad to worse at the temp place I was working in and I woke up on Monday thinking, 'I can't bear another week here.' Hurrah, then, that my old job rang and asked me back. Much nicer place, nicer people, wine. All good, and they know I am looking for something else so I won't have to pretend I want to stay forever.

Oh, I think my misery of Monday morning was also influenced by the fact that on Sunday night Ian and I went to see Into The Wild. It's a film based on a true story about a 23 year old, Chris McCandless, who gave his savings to charity before disappearing into the wild and ending up in Alaska. Everything about the film was amazing (apart from his watch being in so many shots, but that's a minor thing) and the ending was so moving that I was choked until we got back to the car. I bought us a Flake and a Ripple to cheer us up on the way home.

Anwyay, so, I need to get going. Meeting old itchy feet Bollive for a meal before she disappears off travelling again.

xx

It's a game of chance. Russian roulette.

So, it's been a while and I feel wracked with guilt. That sounds sarcastic, but it's actually the truth. There are a couple of reasons for my blogging absence, mainly that I have been staying at Ian's where I'm in a black hole when it comes to internet access. It's like being back in 1994. But without a homework diary or tipp-exed pencil tin.

Right, since my last posting I've been tackling my novel with (very) mixed results. At some points I wanted to just scrap the whole of what I'd written so far. I compromised and got rid of half. Ugh. I'm now working on a scene by scene plot breakdown because I've come to realise I'm the kind of person that needs to have a clear idea of what's happening next. So that's good. A decision has been made.

Aside from the novel, I've been job-hunting and working in the temp position I've been in since December. All okay and now working on a new campaign with a few of the hardcore crew I started with at the beginning. Better the devil(s) you know.

I'm looking forward to this weekend. My friend, Jo, is back from Canada and I'm catching up with her and some other friends in London. The big smoke, if you will. Should be good. I'm actually looking forward just to the coach journey. I bought a few good books the other week and so quite excited to have an excuse just to sit there and read for a couple of hours. I was moaning to Shakira at work the other day that I don't seem to have any time to myself at the moment. It will be nice to have some solitude forced upon me. Saying that, I'll probably end up on the coach beside someone whose legs are akimbo for the entire journey and I'll be putting most of my attentions simply into staying on the seat. Ah, public transport. It's a game of chance. Russian roulette.

xx

HARSH EDIT 2008

Ooh, I've been a misery guts of late, but I think I've reached a turnaround. Today is the first day in what feels like months that I've actually done something constructive. It's also the first day in what feels like months that I haven't donned a headset and harrassed members of the public. Yes, there probably is a connection between the two.

So, today I have started a new file in regards to my novel. It's called KYAS HARSH EDIT 2008. I've been going over my novel once again and getting rid of so much, killing off one character, axing the beginning and am about to introduce a whole new element that I think gives the whole thing a lot more credibility and realism: a funeral. Whoopo! When in doubt, bring in a funeral. It means getting rid of the coma, but that's all okay. This whole process is killing me a little bit but, like I said to Ian last night, it's only because I have had some time 'away' from it and have been beating myself up about it. When I was back in Falmouth, I had a spell during which I felt in control of everything and was being very productive, working on my novel for six hours a day. Since I've been back I've done so little, but am going to stop that right now. I was talking with Ian the other day about making a plan for each month, kind of like people do at the end of a year, and have decided that January has pretty much been a fun month (bar the call centre) and February needs to be a month of productivity (and some call centre).

I've decided that, by the end of February, I need to have a new synopsis and plan for the whole novel. I think that I'm facing problems because I keep getting to points where I think, 'And what happens now?' I need to have a clear idea of what happens in the story so that I can just keep going rather than re-writing and re-writing the same sections which, as well as driving me a bit mad, probbaly isn't the best use of my time.

Anyway, that's that for the time being. Back to the novel I go.

xx

The scary thing is, though, that I don't know where my novel is going next in terms of plot.

Good God, was it really the first of January when I last posted on this blog? That's ridiculous. Anyway, tonight I came back from work and finished off a job application I started working on last night. Fingers crossed I get asked to interview. It sounds like a good place to work and the job sounds interesting, so we'll see.

Aside from that, today has been pretty non-eventful. I'm in the temp job for another week, this time ringing people up and letting them know there is money available for them to claim from dividends. It's certainly nicer than the last campaign

I got back home tonight and realised just how hard it's going to be to carry on working on my novel while managing full time work. But, as I read on a horrible poster in the office today, 'To get what you never had, you must do what you have never done.' Good advice. I just can't believe that I have been so busy, what with work and seeing friends etc. I guess I just need to get my time better organised. I think once I start working regular hours, I will be able to get into a new routine and that will help matters. At the moment I feel as though I'm just bouncing from place to place and not really getting much done at all. Still, like I said, it's down to me to sort myself out.

The scary thing is, though, that I don't know where my novel is going next in terms of plot. That's not a good feeling. I kind of feel as though I've got to the end of the first third of the story and am about to tackle the difficult middle. I'm sure it will be fine and I need to just take a deep breath and get on with it. Once this temp job is over, I think I'm going to take two weeks to focus just on plot of the next chunk of story and decide whether or not to keep certain parts of the narrative. The main concerns at the moment are the coma and Daniel and Robin's jobs. I feel as if there needs to be more tension that could come for the jobs they have, but I'm rambling. I don't know. Gah.

xx

I'll use all three and let the customer choose which they like best.

So, I started a new blog, you can see it here. I had been meaning to do something like this for ages, and when better than the first day of a new year? The plan is to write under three hundred words about something I have learnt that day. People always say, 'You learn something new every day,' but can this be true? I'm going to find out. I say this now, but my commitment might wane. We'll see how things pan out.

Anyway, 2008, eh? How exciting. I just read my entry at the beginning of 2007 and I was very positive about the year. And I was right to be. I had a great 2007 and I think 2008 will be just as good if not better. That's if I'm still sane after two weeks in this temp job. It's very repetitive and I've only been in training so far! The best thing from that day was being told, 'When you call someone, you can see from your script that it says Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening. You will have to decide which to use depending on the time of day.'

I don't think I'll bother. I'll use all three and let the customer choose which they like best. I might even add 'delete as appropriate.'

xx