j4 | Thanks for all the fish

Right. Thank you very much for all the useful hints and tips. (Nobody actually sent me any fish.) You're all fab.

Anyway, I've sent the bloody thing in now on the basis that something is better than nothing, and while I could keep refining and revising it for the rest of my life I wouldn't actually be any closer to getting a job...

Wonder if the temp agency will come up with anything. They didn't sound very hopeful about getting me part-time work. :-(

Current Mood: oh, I dunno, fishy, whatever

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

j4.livejournal.com

a) have you a working knowledge of the Data Protection Act

Well, I know what it is, and I have a vague idea of how it works. It's also something I could read up on if I got an interview.

and (b) can you point to any experience of jobs done on either a hierarchical and/or strict need-to-know basis?

Not really, no. That's the problem. There were some confidentiality issues when I was doing the telefundraising stuff -- since we were asking about how much money people were donating, and how much they were earning, etc.! -- but it was all rather ad hoc and they didn't really tell us about the confidentiality stuff. I don't really think I could puff it up into something useful.

[...] you want to sabotage your own application by telling them you don't know what they want you to know.

Possibly true. <rueful grin>

Yeah, yeah, money, but if you don't start getting a practical handle on family structuring how are you going to know how much money you need, and for what?

Um, this really is a priorities thing: right now I don't have enough money to save for anything. I need More Money soon, for values of "More" that allow me to do things like pay the mortgage; preferably for values of "More" that also allow me to do things like chip away at the £2k of credit card debts fast enough that it doesn't all get added back on as interest. I want to get to that stage before I start worrying about saving for hypothetical future kids. Even if I knew right now that I didn't ever want kids, I'd still want to get that money sorted out & clear those debts. So I think it's a higher priority. Is that unreasonable?

What do you do when you are just as down as you have been lately but you STILL have a person on hand who has imperative needs when you need to go away and howl at a wall for a while

Hm, I've been in that situation before, though the person in question was four years older than me and was my boyfriend (after a fashion) at the time. Only I was worse than I am now by several orders of magnitude, and he was worse than me by a couple more orders of magnitude. That was ... interesting. But the thing I did notice was that I did a much better job of keeping myself functioning when somebody else needed me, than when the only person I was accountable to was myself.

I mean, I wouldn't want to rely on that effect long-term, but I do think I hold myself together better in the short-to-medium-term when I'm doing so for somebody else.

Thank you, as ever, for all the advice. :) BTW the "Parenting Plan" you mentioned -- is it this one (http://www.lcd.gov.uk/family/leaflets/parentplan-english/default.htm) you were thinking of? (I ♥ the webternet.)

From:

j4.livejournal.com

I wittered:
BTW the "Parenting Plan" you mentioned -- is it this one you were thinking of?

But, er, no, probably not, since that's for parents who are separating. Sorry, wasn't concentrating; it looked relevant from the index... Google is great, but it doesn't read the damn thing for you. :-}

From: (Anonymous)

I haven't my copy in front of me - but it looks oddly familiar. Given your present possibilities it might make excellent reading for you. A.N. Other probably knows it all already, or maybe doesn't, but it's a good read even if you aren't in the separation phase.

Your financial plans sound reasonable for the ST. Freeze your credit card in a bowl of water and then you will have defrosting time to consider your purchase. Size of bowl determines amount of consideration time.

Being accountable to/for another person is, yes, useful, but starting with a committed relationship with another adult is - IMHO - fairer on everyone. You could be more advanced in every way than most other people, but the more one learns with other adults in the way of cooling-off times, forgiveness, distractions, keeping perspective, being patient, and not letting the niggling little stuff finally push you over the edge, the better. It's the Niggles (tiny, irresponsible demons born of Carelessness, Haste, and Inattention) which get most marriages (sensu lato). If you can't detoxify the little beasts - and they will not change, some of them, ever, and worse yet their effects can be cumulative - then you will have your child's Niggles AND Pogrebins to fight as well as your own. Kicking your kid's personal pogrebin without kicking the child too takes a lot of skill. Needs lots of practice. :-)

Whilst you are looking for other Real Work have you thought seriously about becoming a classroom assistant a few hours a week at a primary school? Six-year-olds are an antidote to most adult BS.

"Although I've known a naughty child,
'Tis honester to own up:
I've never met a naughty child
as naughty as a grown-up."

His Honour Judge Edward Parry (1895) Katawampus, Its Causes and Cure. Alfred Nutt and Sons, London.

as ever

K

From:

j4.livejournal.com

Freeze your credit card in a bowl of water and then you will have defrosting time to consider your purchase.

<giggle> I like that idea. I stopped carrying my credit card around in my wallet, which definitely helped; the problem is I probably will need it now to buy Christmas presents for people (because I tend to buy stuff off TEH INTERWEB because that way I don't have to fight my way round shops full of shuffling morons and screaming kids[1]).

Being accountable to/for another person is, yes, useful, but starting with a committed relationship with another adult is - IMHO - fairer on everyone.

Well, I'm in a committed relationship with another adult... unfortunately said adult is currently living 400 miles away from me.

You could be more advanced in every way than most other people, but the more one learns with other adults in the way of cooling-off times, forgiveness, distractions, keeping perspective, being patient, and not letting the niggling little stuff finally push you over the edge, the better.

I don't think I'm particularly advanced. I think I've had a lot of relationships with a lot of fairly difficult people, and I think I'm getting better at being patient, though I still get really wound up when people Just Don't Listen, or Just Don't Try. Oh, and I do get frustrated by people who seem to have managed to get through 30+ years of adult life without ever thinking about anything. ... Actually, I'm an intolerant little bitch really, aren't I? <sigh>

$other_half doesn't cause me niggles, though. Or at least he causes me fewer niggles than anybody else I've ever met. I don't want to go all gushy on LJ, but I've never before found anybody whose mind just slots into mine so perfectly. Maybe this is still just NRE (7-ish months into the relationship), but it doesn't feel like that. It just feels ... right.

<sigh>

Kicking your kid's personal pogrebin without kicking the child too takes a lot of skill. Needs lots of practice.

I'm definitely much better at kicking other people's assorted menageries of creeping horrors than I am at kicking my own. Possibly because I have a lot more belief in other people's inherent worth than in my own... possibly also because it's a lot easier to say the right things than it is to actually change the way you think. I can deal with the 'words' side of it, but when I'm trying to deal with myself I know it's just words, so it doesn't seem to fix anything.

('Just' words. Ha.)

Words is the thing that scares me most about the idea of having kids, to be honest. The knowledge that one throwaway comment from me might turn out to be the self-esteem-destroying talisman that they carry around with them for the rest of their lives. :-(

Whilst you are looking for other Real Work have you thought seriously about becoming a classroom assistant a few hours a week at a primary school?

I'd love to do something like that, but all those sorts of jobs (at least, all the ones that I've seen advertised...) seem to require childcare qualifications or equivalent experience, and I have neither. :-/

(I do also worry about ending up with a CV that says very clearly "I have absolutely no idea what I want to do with my life" ... though I suppose I don't need to put everything on it.)

BTW, while I remember -- I've been meaning to ask this for the last few posts, but my brain has been replaced with a colander or something similarly holey -- do you want a LiveJournal of your own? I still have plenty of codes left -- email me if you want one.