I’m tempted to say, ‘What About It…?’ It’s not like I’m even close to being bored. Being out of work has given me a chance to get on with a host of things I’ve been saving up to do for ages (almost like prematurely executing some form of retirement plans); it’s being in a job that’ll lower my spirits. How did that Smiths song go; “I was looking for a job and then I found a job and heaven knows I’m miserable now”? But then, that isn’t the attitude to take and I don’t want to be a burden on the folks so I’m going to have to find something very soon. And it’s going to be something awful, I just know it.

Whilst a lot of my skills are transferable and I can rewrite my CV so that it’s a bit more generic and it draws upon my wider experience, it still doesn’t look good to have been out of work as long as I have and given that I’ve absolutely no interest in working hard so that someone else can benefit from it I’m gong to have to make sure I move around a lot and keep myself from getting bored. And that means it’s back to temping. So with a heavy heart I took myself back to “Backup” last week. The place hasn’t changed since I was last there in 2002. It’s still depressing as hell (as Salinger might have said) and the same dispiriting wave of apathy still exudes from the staff whose practised grins still manage to make their faces look as if someone forced a coat-hanger into their mouths,  “And what sort of work are you looking for?” I don’t care. “And would you consider doing any industrial or catering work to tide you over?” I’d rather kill myself. Scratch that, I’d rather kill you, you insincere, vapid bint.

But again, this is not the attitude to take.  I’m currently waiting on some sort of monkey test that will determine my WPM typing and my initiative and grammar and spelling etc. Hopefully this won’t be as painful as I’m fearing and I’ll make a real effort not to whinge and moan on here. (Too late?). I might even have a job next time I post something. The real trick will be not allowing this to interfere with my Strategy For World Domination (henceforth to be known as SFWD).

So my Panasonic NV-GS300 arrived yesterday. Superior to the 280 I exchanged it for in that you can record from external digital sources. I still can’t get VHS and DVD onto it because I know not how. If there were some means of converting the analogue signal from VHS into a digital one or a digital cable you could plug into my computer from my DVD player then I’d be well away but I think the problem of people abusing this in order to pirate movies is obviously too great and so I can’t enjoy the music vids I’ve got on DVD in the same way I can with my music on iTunes. I can buy the videos again from iTunes but I can’t seem to put the ones I already own onto my hard drive. Most vexing.
I can however, now go out and film stuff onto DV and I can take snaps and transfer everything onto the computer so the whole thing hasn’t been a waste of time or money by any means.  Just need something film now. And to get my head around how Final Cut Pro works. That should take up the next few years!

That’s it, really. I just didn’t want to be accused of becoming a Grumpy Old Man ahead of my time and thought I’d venture something positive.

This last week has seen a dramatic change come over the garden and the nearby countryside. Having not been at home at this time of year since 1998 and having gotten used to the almost total absence of nature that only urban living delivers, you tend to forget how much the seasons really do affect your surroundings and your mood. Explosions of colour; the change of the light like someone has placed some sort of filter or lense between us and the sun; the altogether fresher and more uplifting quality of the air and the more hospitable temperature mean that Summer is fast approaching. There is the danger however, that I will be deprived of the comfort I derive from being cooped up in doors and wearing my Winter clothes. I definitely prefer my Winter clothes because I really have to think about what I wear in the Summer lest I show off either too much of my poor taste in Summery clothes, or worse still, too much of my pasty flab. Of course in Winter no one really cares what you wear anyway because we’re all too busy keeping warm. Summer seems to make you care about these things probably because the bus with all the girls on returns to deposit them pretty much wherever you go. This inescapable and inextricable factor of Summer does worry a laid-back chap like me and next thing I know I’ll probably be rushing around the place, like Bernard, yelling about how “I’ve got to get a girlfriend!”, and how “She’ll be a summery girl!” and the fact that “She’ll have hair!” and “She’ll have summery friends who know how to be outside” and “She’ll play tennis and wear dresses and have bare feet…” and frankly it’ll all be a bit too much of a hassle. Oh, no, wait! It’s just clouded over and it’s now started raining. Thank god for that.

This morning’s job-hunting yielded some rather intimidating vacancies amid the Grauniad’s arts and heritage section. Anyone reckon they could become “Keeper of Asia”? I assume you get deputies to help you, as the job must cover a lot. The other daunting position was that of “Director of Public Understanding” which sounds impossibly difficult and probably quite thankless. I think I’d prefer the former but then decided that at this point any job will do. This gave me the idea of putting my morning’s questing to music using the tune from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s (spit) “Any Dream Will Do” with more of a vocational theme. Then I decided that would just be silly.

Ah Bristol, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways… This weekend was another resounding success. Despite the struggle to actually get to the place - about three and half hours going through Hereford and Newport; contending with the hoards of Welsh fans off down to cheer Wales against France at the Millenium Stadium in Cardiff and the bitterly harsh winds on Saturday (not to mention the fascist ticket inspector that frequents the Hereford to Birmingham line) - I got there eventually. Rocking up to Number 8 I found that everyone was still asleep or in no state to emerge from their respective pits. The door was finally answered by a random. I introduced myself and stepped inside whereupon I encountered at least three more randoms. These strangers then proceeded to explain how they infact lived there now. It seems the change I believed the house to have undergone had been somewhat understated and these FNGs were not squatters but the new residents. And what lovely people there all were. Max and Rob have clearly landed on their feet and hustled themselves some very friendly and wholly charming new housemates in the shape of Jenny, Becky, Si and Annette. The apathy and quiet resentment that had been allowed to ferment in the house before had been replaced by something more positive and akin to mutual respect. It was a real breath of fresh air. It transpired that the reason everyone was feeling under the weather had been to do the previous night’s drinking session that had ended at four am and had comprised of the whole house apparently (apparently they had been in an establishment I know only too well called Sloanes). My Friday night had been somewhat more restrained in comparison but I did my best to enthuse about the solitary Guinness I’d enjoyed before dinner.

Rob was just about capable of sitting upright and talking (sometimes both at the same time) so we chilled out that afternoon. We then all got ready to go and out and er, went out. We stopped off in the Cotham Hill which had shed the “Cotham” part of its title and was now just known rather ominously as The Hill. Then we paid a visit to the Roo Bar which is an amusing Australian (no, really) Bar that has been installed in what was part of the Clifton Down railway station buildings. Feeling suitably brave enough to venture down to The Triangle we made a move and ended up in a bar called Mbargo which surely had the most pleasant bouncers anywhere on The Triangle (in that they didn’t refuse us entry and try and to break our arms) and got on with the serious business of having a good time. I think I must have blinked at around three because I suddenly found myself back at Number 8 with everyone who was from the house and everyone who wasn’t. The tunes were on and people looked as they still had a lot of energy in them so we sat around, smoked, drank and did a lot of laughing (not least when Max decided he wanted to do nothing more than climb into Jenny’s pink dressing gown and rampage around the house unloading a fire extinguisher at stuff). What a classic flourish! I think I got to bed (in what had been Shannon’s ridiculously small room) at about eight which was a good result for me. Since one wall of the room comprises of an entire window and is east-facing I was awake shortly afterwards wondering where I was, who I was, what year it was and who the president was. I then stumbled around trying to make sense of everything and generally feeling sorry for myself as one does in these situations. I could only now empathise with how everyone had been feeling the day before; except they were almost certainly feeling worse having been wrecked the night before and the night before that. And the night before that. This seems to happen to people in Bristol - it almost makes no sense to not do a lot of drinking. The place seems entirely suited to an alcoholic lifestyle and there are no shortages of great places to gather people together and drink till you’re sober again.

Fortunately it was a beautiful sunny day in Bristol (which really looks its best when it’s bright) and the addition of a heavenly breeze meant that starting the first leg of my homeward journey proved far more pleasant than I’d thought it would. I left knowing that the future of Number 8 was secure and I don’t doubt I’ll be back when my system has recovered. Thankfully the trains behaved themselves and I was home in time for the fantastic roast that my stomach had been crying out for. Everything it seemed was alright.

So I’m still between jobs. I think this is a kind way of putting it. Out of work; unemployed; surfing the sofa is more the state of things. I mainly patrol BBC Jobs, Guardian Jobs and I get individual job alerts from my subscription to Production Base. Today has once more yielded wholly underwhelming results. At the moment I’m sticking to my guns and looking for drama work only (as time progresses I might have to extend my search criteria). Today’s job alert from Production Base has brought Fremantle Media to my attention and their current search for Clarity Operators for “Quizmania”.

You can imagine how my heart sinks everytime I read something like this. Firstly, I have no idea what a clarity operator is. Is this someone who dumbs down the content to a more baby-food level than it was before? It probably airs on UK TV Pleb Dazzle at 3 in the morning and attracts lowest common denominator viewing and is cheap and unimaginative viewing made by people who “…have experience within quiz or shopping formats.”
Maybe I should just bite the bullet and go for something like this. It does have the advantage of getttting me to London but I know I’d be miserable, it would look bad on the CV and might limit my already poor chances or getting back into drama.

I think for the time being I’ll leave this exciting opportunity to people more keen to immerse themselves in “…the UK’s most successful live interactive gameshow.” Best of luck to them.