Lurking · subconcious · musings

Anyone out there planning on going to the goth ball tomorrow who may be willing to share a taxi to somewhere south of the city in order to save costs? We are thinking of going but don't want to blow too much cash on taxis if we can help it (July has been an expensive month so far...). Get in touch if you are willing to share a route home.

Lancelot

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Of course today's feeling may also have been compounded by the agency end of term party yesterday where it turned out I was the only person who drank red wine and so drank a whole bottle to myself in less than 2 hours. It was fun, though, as I got to network a lot and also got given a mug and a rather nice pen set. I failed to win the prize draw and get a Sat Nav, however, which is a shame.

On the job front, little has changed. I failed to get either of the jobs I got interviewed for last week so this week has been an intense apply for as much as I can. I also took steps to temporarily sign onto unemployment again to at least preserve my national insurance over the summer drought. I have a few things in the works at the moment including a Library assistant job and an Analyst for the ONS.

The Cuddleslut

40% Anxiety Over Abandonment and 25% Avoidance Of Intimacy

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A few people at the wedding were keen to see the covers for the project but we couldn't let anyone see them because (due to convoluted reasons linked to there being no suitable gift bags) we had to wrap them properly rather than do things the lazy way. So, I promised to post images of the covers for you all to see.

The two sets of covers were partly designed by Dave Lowry (the excellent front covers) and partly designed by me (the less professional looking back covers) though I did all the lettering on the front so blame me if it spoils your view of Lowry's excellent work. The photos were taken from a variety of sources and I think I managed to credit all photographers and models involved. If I haven't and you spot yourself in the shots or a photo you have taken, please feel free to shout at me in order to point it out and I will apologise (though I cannot afford to pay you anything in recompense...).

Also, in the original version as printed the colours on the Artificer cover match a lot better. This is a version copied and pasted to paint to turn it into a jpeg for posting and the background colour never seems to copy over from publisher to any other software...

This is the Artificer one.

And this is the Riftworld one.

The tracks on the listing are probably familiar to most of you though you may not have heard any of Martin's compositions for Riftworld nor the Riftworld remix of Ride of the Valkyries. If you are that interested, you can ask and I will let you have a listen...

I may know tonight if I have it or not.

The job itself is an unusual one and needs explanation. Its not a 'science technician' role involving setting up lab classes but a science specialist IT/AV technician. Basically, they are already a Humanities specialism (and have one techie for that) and have recently acquired science specialism and this job is to be the specialist for that. From talking to them today I have worked out that they actually need several people or a gestalt of the following:

Me for the science knowledge
Redhillian for the lighting/sound tech duties (part of it is running the sound and light deck for assembly and school plays)
Dave Lowry for web design and publication layout
Iain Jackson for AV technical duties
Salyavin or Myki for sound/video editing duties.

If i get it, it is inevitable that I will have to learn html and possibly java as well as sound/video tech stuff (some of which I know from waypoint and DJing.

I'll let you all know if I get it when I know...

I may also have eaten too much chinese food and aquired either wine or tea poisoning....

Interview is next thursday at 1130. I need to sort out a means to get there but I suspect that the best way would be to head into town then get a bus from there as there are no train stations anywhere near the place.

Great Barr is looking like it will be a trek each day (but I am sure there are ways and means...) but if I get this it would be good. I have heard that there is this strange concept called 'money' and I wish to explore it more, preferably while lying on a silk bed, sipping good red wine and surrounded by naked... er Sarah.... :)

I need to go and look at travel options and re-read the job description now...

Full report may happen later plus photos will be loaded to Flickr at some point...

Secret project has apparently not been opened yet so I won't report on that yet...

a) there are people who have read 6 or less of this list
b) that this is considered to be the top 100 books. I mean, mixed in with the classics are things like the Da Vinci code which was remarkable only for how naff it was compared to its sales. Hardly great literature.
c) that whoever compiled this list was idiotic enough to include several books twice (once alone and once as part of a collection) and to list any of the books as collections rather than individual books. I'd understand it if all those book swere available as collected editions (a whole trilogy in one book like Lord of the Rings can be bought, for example) but they inlcude all 7 books of the Harry Potter series in this. While you can buy all the HP in one purchase it is hardly one book but all the books together.

Had they included every book as a seperate one, I would probably have scored higher than I did...

I am also wondering how I managed to avoid reading 1984 or Brave New World at school as many I know seem to have done it as part of their English education. We just got Far From the Madding Crowd, possibly the most tedious novel in existence.

First of all, I had a call about one of the jobs I applied for on Friday. IOt was basically a phone interview and they want me to go in tomorrow at 3.30 to see them. Its an agency doing the interview so chances are the job I applied for has already gone but 'they'll keep me on their books' however it is worth going for. Pay is terrible (£10 an hour compared to the £20+ I get teaching) but it promises to be interesting work - Youth Offending service. One of the phne questions was 'have you worked with unmotivated youngster and.or young offenders?' My first thought was 'Duh! Have you read my CV? Birmingham schools are full of both'. Didn't actually say it, however... :)

Will have to see how it goes tomorrow.

Other job thing was an application form for the lecturer job which is the one I am really interested in. From the job description I am even more interested... 8 hours a week teaching with the rest of the time divided between research interests, teaching assistance and Masters lectures. £13K a year plus all the students I can eat. With obvious progression to full scale lecturer at the end of it all. So, let me see... teaching adults (well, university students) so none of the discipline problems of schools plus learning stuff plus research? Sign me up, please! :)

In other news, secret project one has achieved completion ahead of schedule. Many thanks to all who helped, even those of you who did not know you helped. Especial thanks to secret operatives one and two who produced some excellent work over the weekend and managed to deliver it to me well in time. Remind me later to post about this more openly and explain why there is only one of something and who the rest of the band are...

My opinion? I wish something would be done about those annoying dog owners who leave thier dog's crap lying around so Eddie can roll in it (as he did yesterday, the little so... darling). £1000 fines are not working, mainly because there is no way to enforce this unless you have a policeman/dog warden/RSPCA officer at every dog walking place and, frankly, the police/council/RSPCA do not have the money/interest/power to do that. Note the reasons follow - the Police haven't got the money, the council haven't got the interest and the RSPCA haven't the power. There are only 3 dog wardens for the whole of the city of Birmingham and we are considered one of the larger cities, the police haven't got the resources to catch real criminals and the RSPCA have enough on their plate with all the animal cruelty going on.

The solution? Well, how about this...

When I was at Download I saw something that I have seen at a number of other organised events (Re-enactment fayres etc) and it seems to work remarkably well. They put a deposit (or a bounty) on every paper cup. This means that there were hordes of people wandering around collecting them and taking them to the authorised collection point for the bounty. Its not much cash but it is a lot to random children and teenagers who seem to do quite nicely from it. I even saw some people diving into the large bins looking for the cups.

So, how about applying this to dog poo? A small amount of money for every bag collected? I mean, it could even be recycled for fertiliser as it is a source of organic ammonia and other resources. Even if the person who owns the dog doesn't pick it up, you can bet someone else will cos they get money for doing so.

And why stop there? Why not horse manure as well? I remember the times when people used to follow horses around the streets with buckets to collect it for the fertiliser. And what else can be picked up in the street that can be recycled? Broken glass? Paper? Electronics? Plastic bottles? I've seen all of these thrown in the street. The council street cleaners don't get to them fast enough (if at all) but if you put a bounty on every piece of recyclable rubbish taken to a special depot somewhere you can bet there would be clean streets in a very short space of time. Plus, recycling, as we are told, is good for the environment.

The hedge is no longer a threat to passing traffic. It can no longer bash them in the head as they walk past nor can it poison them with its evil spores of mind control or its temptingly green berries. I am win. Like the Doctor in Seeds of Doom, I stand victorious over evil alien plants. No damn triffid hedge is going to get the better of me!

In other news, the secret project has proceeded to satisfactory levels thanks to one of the secret operatives. I got full updates from him yesterday including a photo of one of the final products. It looked damned funky to my eyes. Waiting to hear if the second product is complete and to see what that looks like. Also waiting on operative two to report completion. Hopefully sometime this week...

( Dr Who: Cut for spoilers )

In other news, Sarah is away this weekend so I am all alone (with Eddie). So, I am looking for things to do tomorrow day or evening to stop me degenerating into a cycle of walk dog, eat, internet for the entire day and night. Needs to be easy to get to and cheap (preferably free) as I have no transport and no money. I had planned cinema trips but the money thing is sort of stopping that at the moment.

Today has been a productive one all round. Apart from packing Sarah off to Centreparcs I have:

- pushed forward my complaint about a fraudulent transaction on my credit card over tickets I ordered for last week's Download festival and did not arrive in time (forcing me to buy another set and thereby leading to the above mentioned money crisis).

- Applied for many, many jobs including an interesting one which may suit. Birmingham City University are looking for lecturers. You need a degree in a relevent subject (I plan to argue the case for Sports science being intimately linked to Applied Physiology at Sunderland and so apply for the sports one) and preferablt some experience teaching and that is all. They put you through an MEd in further education and pay you a small salary to work under a more experienced lecturer. At the end of it, you are qualified to teach further education. Very interested in all that as it gets me out of the current 'no qualifications to teach properly therefore stuck in supply' rut that I am in at the moment.

- Progress on a secret project has also been made. The outcome is now in the hand of two special operatives whose specialist skills will, I hope, lead to a successful conclusion before the deadline. I will talk more on this after the deadline when the secret is no longer a secret...

- Kicked off the LRP writing project with a good start and lots of interest. Those who are interested who may not have seen the facebook info can get all the info they need from http://www.savefile.com/projects/808652823. Download the guidelines file (if you haven't already) and remember that the synopsis deadline is the start of August when we will start reading and commenting on them.

- Today is also the last day of a long running project I have been working on for a while. The Paranormal anthology submission deadline is today and we already have 7 stories submitted to the publisher for consideration. Expecting a few more as the day progresses. I'll let you all know if anything comes of this.

And that is all...