A Pyrrhic Victory?

A week or so ago I wrote a letter of complaint about the on going bad treatment I had received at the hands of the Job Centre. I reproduce the letter and their reply below:

Able was I ere I saw Elba

I don't play many computer games, I generally get bored of them pretty quickly. One of the few exceptions to this was Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, I had it for the Playstaion 2 I had when I lived in Dublin. I would spend entire weekends with the curtains drawn playing for hour upon hour. Car jacking, mugging, ram raiding, robbing, executioning, mass murder in a tank, these were my weekends back then. I realised I was playing too much when I wouldn't see another human being for the entire weekend except for the corner shop owner. Also the walk to said corner shop was troubled with thoughts such as 'I wonder what would really happen if I just dragged that guy out of his car, beat him to death in the gutter and steal the vehicle?' I thought I had to stop playing or at least cut down.

'What you in for?'
'Too much GTA...'

Today I think my life may have changed. I was out shopping at Parkgate Retail World in Rotherham. This is a massive faceless mall style shopping 'outlet' that now doubles for Rotherham's town centre. Vast faceless warehouses crammed with pacifiers for Oniomaniacs, this place is the pits. All the frontages are grey except for the store name above the door. A feeling of automaton oppressiveness pervades the place as you are funnelled into you respective shopping experience. My experience today consisted of WH Smiths to see if there were any new magazines I was interested in and Homebase to pick up a carrier for a Great War British Army. Between these two places I was drawn into Game. I have no idea why, I usually have no interest in standing in a computer games shop whilst an assistant drones on at me about how much Ram a particular game needs, or what fucking video card I will have to buy just to be able to play Jet Set Willy. I don;t need to know about paying half my yearly income to purchase a store card that allows me 0.00000783% discount but only if I buy the game from their sister store in Namibia. No sir, I don't need that.

'Have you got the latest Intwat 234/89.r6 Processor? No? Then fuck off, you're barred!'

Anyway, for some compelling reason I found myself in Game standing in front of the single shelf they devote to PC games. Yes I know there are even less games for the Mac, but if there's a Mac owner reading this, don't come complaining and saying PC owners should feel lucky. You should stop being a cunt and join in the human race like the rest of us. Stick you Ipod where the fucking sun don't shine. And by that I mean: up your arse. I digress. Amongst the pitiful games section something caught my eye... Could it be, yes, it was Napoleon Total War. Wow, I knew the Total War series was very good, it all started with Shogun Total War back last century before we had flying cars and hoverboards and nuclear winters (don't write in saying that STW came out in 2000 and was therefore this century, the 21st Century didn't start until 2001, go ask a mathematician, sunshine. And stick your head where the sun don't shine. And by that I mean: up your arse, sunshine). The series went on to take in Roman campaigns and Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century warfare. But seriously, who wants to play that shit? Romans? I shit 'em! Boring square building bunch of wankers they were. The only reason the Roman Empire was so good was cos it was the Ancient equivalent of the British Army in the late 19th Century fighting dusky maidens armed only with jewelry and fruit.

'I say Broomhead, shoot that little one, looks like she's armed to the teeth with a pomegranate!'

I digress. People want to play games about Napoleon, the Little Corporal, the world's most famous Corsican. Well at least I do and this blog's about me, so suck it up, shit head. So I couldn't resist it, I handed over my money, withstood the barrage from the geek behind the desk asking me if I wanted a store card (no, I don't buy enough games), if the specs were all right for my computer (dunno, haven't the foggiest and I haven't checked. I'll bring it back if they aren't) and if I wanted to buy a gaming mouse (I didn't know they bred gaming mice. Are they like little familiars that sit on your shoulder telling you how to play?). Then I was away with my prize clutched to my chest like a Beauty Pageant winner holding her trophy.

This prize is mine, shitbags!

How does it play? Amazing, brilliant, it's like being old Boney himself. If I play it enough I think I will probably end up ruling a tiny island in the middle of the Atlantic, with only a Governor-General to annoy. Lead poisoning from the wallpaper will be my ultimate downfall.

A nation mourns a great warrior...

I was going to write about meeting Danny, Jaime, Archer, Bennett, Wilson, Barnsey, Sally and Brooke at the weekend but I was so incensed with rage at the corruption that struck at the heart of the Pylon Cafe competition judged by Salter. He told me with his own filthy sewer mouth that he only deemed Archer and Bennett's entries as winners so he wouldn't have to spend anything on postage as he could hand the books over to them at the pub. Filthy scum, everyone of them. I hope they all choke on their books.

Speaking of which, this is the only thing worth reading on that lame excuse for a webzone. An interview with me. There isn't even a News update page...

Come into the Garden, Maude

What did you do for Easter? I don't fucking care, this is about what I did. On Sunday afternoon I celebrated the death and resurrection of OUR LORD JEBUS CRUST by doing what all good people did and went to the pub. I met up with Danny, Jaime and wee tiny little Richard Bennett. Just before I arrived I received a text off Danny telling me they were sitting in the beer garden. 'What a pack of stupid cunts' said I to myself. It's a typical British thing that as soon as Spring is announced everybody strips off and starts sunbathing and going on about how nice it is to have the sun out again, despite it being -40 and blowing a gale. And snowing. And my cuntish friends were no exception, they were huddled together for body heat in a howling gale force wind. Tables were being thrown about by the blast and I had to duck several times lest I be struck about the head. My lips froze to my pint glass as I tried to drink it was so cold. I eventually coaxed them inside, but only after the sun had set and the snow lay thickly all around.

'Come on, let's go inside for a bit..'
'OK, we'll just have one more outside to get the last of the sunlight'

Back at Christ's Mass I had loaned Bob a book on Passchendaele as her Great-Grandfather had fought there. It was time to retrieve said book and as Bob was back up North for a few days it was decided we'd meet up. As it happens she was in Leeds for the night so I took the chance to tie in a visit to the Royal Armouries. Bob wanted to come along as well, so off we merrily wandered to stare at guns. Then the ubiquitous trip to the pub for a debriefing on what we'd seen and so Bob could give me a blow by blow account of her 'oliday out in the mysterious Far East. I put her on her train and made my way back home after a great day.

Guns get two thumbs up from Bob!

Tuesday afternoon followed a similar pattern, except for the freezing to death part. Ninjasaurus Rex and I had a few pints together in an empty public hostelry. He was drowning his sorrows after someone had probably lost three grand of his invoices. I was only too willing to step up to the challenge. So I guess all in all, Easter was celebrated in the time honoured tradition. Last night I was back in Leeds again, this time with Rhys and Mainy to see Eyehategod. They were fucking great and the crowd went pretty berserk. One of the support acts Dragged Into Sunlight were also fucking great. They were playing in a pretty small pub and by the end of it the room smelled like the burger van I used to get my chicken burgers from in Reykjavik. Great night.

Hail Ostara!

I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die:

John, 11. 25

Dead Christ

Let's get away from Arguing about the Dole and celebrate the Death and Resurrection of our Lord Jebus Chrust. I'll do it through the medium of video, HALLELUJAH!!

Reply to Comments

Well that last post certainly set a few furs flying. Here is my reply:

First off Danny said: 'what if you had found yourself unemployed in a society where there were no free handouts, and everyone had to fend for themselves? It's not that hard to imagine.' We don't; We live in a society where I pay taxes for such an occurrence. So this has no validity. If I was in such a society, I would be working. Simple as.

He also says: 'At the end of the day, I think it's a massive luxury to be given three whole months to sort yourself out at the taxpayer's expense, before they start applying a bit of pressure on you. People should be bloody grateful for it!' I would have been working for the past three months had there had been work for me. I am grateful for the pittance I am given by the Dole, I am certainly not 'sorting myself out' at the tax payers expense. I am doing it out of my Tax, that I paid whilst I was working. It is not like I have never worked and am just taking it for granted. Like Archer, this made me rather angry.

Darren is correct, rather than forcing me to work outside of my area of expertise the Job Centre should be forcing other genuine Dole scroungers back to work. You can see it when I go to sign on. I see the same faces and I see they don't even bother checking the computers for new jobs, which is something I do everytime I'm in the Job Centre. I know that the markets will pick up again soon and there will be work. I am currently weathering the storm.

Archer is also correct, Danny you were on the Dole for years back in the day, same as me. I'm not particularly proud of it, but we got away with it because we could. I am now genuinely out of work and have paid taxes in order to support myself during this hard time. If I want to go and stack shelves in Netto, that should be my choice. I am not a scrounger, I want to work, but I want to work in the Profession which I am trained for and which, incidentally, I ran up £12,000 worth of debts to train for. These factors are not taken into account by the present system. The reason is it is a JOB centre, not a CAREER centre, two very different things. To them we are just numbers and as long as the monkeys behind the desks punch enough numbers into the computers they don't give a shit about your circumstances, past or present.

Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?

I went to the Job Centre today for my three month 'review'. This is the point in the life of the unemployed that the Job Centre decide that you aren't doing enough to get work so they force a change of career on you. You are allowed three months grace to find work in one single preferred job, at this review they make you widen your search to include two further possibilities. If like me, you are a trained professional, weathering the storm of the recession, there is no hope. You are treated like all the rest of the unemployed scum. There are no concessions for people trying to do the job they are trained for. If they had their way, my eight year career would end today and I could look forward to a sparkling new career moving pallets around in a warehouse. There's always work in Warehouses.

A new career beckons...

I pointed this out to the Robot who conducted the interview for me and the interview went something like this:

Me: 'I have a Degree in Archaeology and eight years experience in the field. There is a recession on that is stopping me working, nothing else. I don't want to look for other work.'

Him: 'I AM A ROBOT'

Me: 'I'm not arguing with you, you're only doing your job, but the system is wrong in that it doesn't cater for people like me.'

Him: 'I AM A ROBOT'

Me: 'OK, a Steelworker who has worked in the steel mills for twenty years is in a similar position, but Thatcher made sure their industry closed down years ago whereas my profession is still going. The markets just need to pick up.'

Him: 'I AM A ROBOT'

Me: 'I'm not really getting through to you, am I?'

'I'll put you down for Warehouse work, yes? You have ten seconds to comply!'

As a back up plan I told him I would be signing off in a couple of weeks anyway when the job in Thirsk starts. This tempered him a little and we compromised by only adding one more job to my list of preferred work. He did actually agree with me that the system was wrong but in order to get my benefits (which I paid taxes for in the first place...) I had to jump through the hoops. Hoops made out of dog shit and set on fire.

You want your peanuts? You'll have to dance!

We got talking about how wrong the system was and he said that Gordon Brown has plans afoot to actually move all the Benefits System online. This would mean scrapping Job Centres, turning them into flats and saving the government a fortune being free of their upkeep and the staff. So in cruel twist of fate it looks like he'll be the one out of work and looking for a place in a warehouse.