Forever Unemployed

Hey there! As we all know, I've been searching for a job for... a very very long time! Well a week or so I get told that Woolworth's is looking for "longlife fillers" which is a fancy way of saying reshelf things. Now. Yeah I'm not above being a shelf stacker OK? A job is a job and even though my brother also wanted to apply to it, I was confident I could get this job. Seriously, what competition could I possibly have? So I handed in my resume even though I had excluded any references at all...

GUESS WHO GOT A GROUP JOB INTERVIEW! My brother!...... Me also! Yeah what's really bizarre is how on my resume I listed my contact details to include my hotmail email account... and yet they contacted me via my gmail account. OK that's one thing that Woolworth's did wrong so far! (Oh yes, let's count them!)

Well I go to the group job interview and I thought I was the oldest one there until someone else showed up. Apparently they weren't just interviewing shelf stackers so that person actually wanted a proper job. I was the oldest one wanting to stack shelves... Oh well right? Job interview went well. So well that...

GUESS WHO GOT A CALL BACK!... My brother!...... Me also! Well OK I got the one-on-one job interview which was pretty cool. I went there all smartly dressed and looking good, ready to be interviewed on time. I thought you were meant to show up 10-5 minutes before an interview for some reason. To show punctuality skills required for working at Woolworths like all employees are expected to have? Yes the fact that I had to sit around and wait for my interviewer after the appointed time means nothing, they have a job to do so that doesn't count as a mistake on their behalf. Wait for it people! Woolworth's a perfectly respectable company! Stop urging me to slander them and point out all their flaws! They're bound to make a few mistakes once in a while.

Job interview went well. I answered all the questions quite well except the last one which was "Why do you think you're suited to this job?" which confused me. Hadn't all previous questions actually been this question? Seriously what does that mean!? I hate interview questions because they're always so utterly pointless. "Why do you want this job?" "FOR MONEY!!" (I actually answered for money and to earn valuable working experience) and "what skills do you have that will help you with the job?" answer: capable of heavy lifting and can work independantly. The fact that I appear confident enough to apply to this job and talk to you should suggest I am not so shy as to be unable to work in such an environment and taking one look at me will easily determine that I have more muscle mass than any of the other applicants. You don't need to ask that question for the job. Job interviews for jobs that only teenagers take aren't filled with poignant and important questions. They have questions for the sake of there being an interview process. It serves two purposes, it prepares you for real interviews later on in life, and it shows you are capable of interacting with another human being for ten minutes without stuttering or mumbling. That's it. They know their questions are pointless, it's just how well you give pointless answers is what they rate you on. So yes, I was confused that they asked me such a redundant question that to me was "so, repeat all your answers to me please in a slightly different way. I want to see if you can make up an answer as to why you are suited to picking things up and then putting them down." (By the way, I don't like repeating myself when asked similar questions because it feels like I'm spouting tautologous nonsense which shows very little intelligence) Well I'm suited to in the sense that... I can do it? (Because really, it's SHELF STACKING) So my answer was "............because I am capable?" It's simple, it's truthful, it's really the only thing you can say at this point in time when the past ten to fifteen minutes has been thinking that the person across the table seriously needs to trim their nails because they're so long there are very noticable differences in the lengths and they have made less eye contact that you have. Seriously, how are they going to judge my eye contact and general body posture if they look down at the piece of paper most of the time, pausing to think about the question written down on the sheet of paper before reading it? Read the question! All you do is write down what I say!

Well even though her pause made me feel uneasy as if I had just shattered my perfect facade with an oddly bad answer, I was still confident I had done well. Sure, my interview didn't really reveal any of my actualy real traits or skills. I said "I'd say I'm intelligent, but I don't suppose being able to critically analyse and deconstruct literary texts helps with this job does it?" which a subtle way of saying "You don't need to be smart or skilled to do this job. Hence I am overqualified, but should get it anyway." I don't want to seem vain and think I'm more awesome than anyone else, but I honestly believe I am a very employable person who is wasting their talents as a shelf stacker. But a job is a job and hence not below me. No job on earth requires %100 of a persons skills so the fact that I have many that aren't needed for it doesn't matter. I left and then waited for my call back to see if I had gotten the job.

GUESS WHO GOT A CALL WHILE SITTING IN A CAFE NEAR THE BEACH THE NEXT DAY!..... NOT my brother! (damn right he didn't get a call!) Well it was the lovely HR whatever who was at the group interview (but not the personal one) who had called to inform me that I hadn't got the job unfortunately because they were looking for someone who was going for more long term employment...

"Wait..." I interject, not wanting to sit and be told things without actually talking back and going "excuse me! What the hell woman? Let me justify things before you tell me I failed!" Before she could continue I went on. "3 years is not long term?" Because when I was asked how long I was planning on staying at this job I answered "At the most 3 years. Not staying around forever. 3 years max to pay for some of my uni fees." "And so not just a few months?" (replied the interviewer) "Oh no. Not just a few months, that's far too short. I don't know how many months but more than a few." "OK so 3 years maximum?" "Yes, 3 years maximum." OK.... did you get the underlying theme there? The strong undertones of my point expressed by my repetition of the word "years" complimented by the other persons verbal confirmation of what I JUST SAID? Good! I'm glad you got it from just that because the real conversation was actually a few sentences longer and hence harder to miss what I was saying. "Sorry... I've got written down here you said 3 months." "No I most certainly expressed 3 years quite strongly." MISTAKE TWO! BIG ONE! "Oh, well sorry..."

OK I thankfully picked up on that and mentioned it. I get annoyed when I let people think they're actually right when they're logic is faulty. Just like with my drivers test... which I failed. Sure I actually failed legitimately but she said one of my mistakes included this one time I went onto a road without being able to see oncoming traffic. The person testing me thought it was amazing how I was able to not run into anything when she thought I was unable to see oncoming traffic easily enough. Well maybe the reason why I stopped was because there was a pedestrian crossing at the end of the intersection so wanted to let potential pedestrians past before driving on. Then as I approached the rest of the road I didn't need to stop because as you approach the road you can see onto it! Duh! She also said I made traffic slow down because I cut in without being able to see oncoming traffic. That was a faulty judgement on her part also, there was a truck. You see if a vehicle is slowing down to turn into the same road you're coming out of then no one can actually go past it so you're free to go. I don't need to see oncoming traffic because it's blocked by a truck. It was slowed because it needed to slow to prevent crashing... something I never ever do.

Doesn't matter, I didn't fail on those points, I lost due to a rather nasty instant fail involving a double laned roundabout and a potential hazard.

Anyway, where was I? OH YES! The reason why I'm currently still unemployed! :) Yes, I had forgotten to point out the obvious "well the person who did the interview is INCOMPETANT... that or you can't read. Thanks." But I had made my point that someone screwed up not me. She basically backtracked at that point in time trying to find a reason why I can't be employed anymore at this point in time... but in the future... because she's already given the job away to someone less physically suited to this job. "Oh... well it says Uni study may affect availability. Have you got your uni schedule yet?" "Not yet." "When do you get it?" "End of February I think." "OK well you call me when you get your new availability and then we'll see what we can do. See if we can fit you in." So thank you! Thank you for realising you made a mistake and that there isn't actually anything stopping me from being employed and then offering me the same job in the future to make up for it.

So it's not like I'm completely unemployable... it's just that they won't do it right now. So in a month I will call them back and they will most likely tell me they don't have any positions available and I will be still unemployed! Of course they might actually still employ me after all. Who knows?

I'm still going to apply to other places instead while I wait. Like hell I'm relying on people who either can't write or can't read! (Some people would be bitter after this happened to them... not me though... of course...) So now it's back to printing resume after resume! Now it's back to getting physically exhausted walking around all day looking for places of interest to hand in resumes into. No one ever calls me back, I don't think the whole "handing in resumes" thing actually works unless there's a sign asking for help. There's never any signs! Oh what fun it is to be unemployed...

...gives me time to work on my novel.