It's been a little while!

I was sitting here, for a rare moment at my home computer, and remembered my humble little blog! Just thought I would point out that I am still here.

The new job that I have now been in for 5 weeks is soooo much better than my old manual-slavey-kitchen job but it is very different sitting in front of a computer all day every day. The metabolism is down, I can tell you, not that it's ever very up but sitting really takes it out of you! I feel knackered a lot of the time whereas before I was on my feet running around all day. Even so, I really appreciate being able to write and write about fashion, which is a major bonus! I didn't really expect to have so much input but it's really equal.
I absolutely love knowing what clothes are where all the time but it does mean I see a lot of stuff that I can't really afford. Still, looking at clothes all day is pretty much my dream, I can't get over the fact I'm paid to do it.

It's getting really wintery now and it is still just September, shocking. It's ok though, I'm embracing wooly socks, scarves and all things warm, it'd just be nice if we could get a New York style 'lights and snow' winter rather than a 'grey sky and soggy leaves' kind of British one.

A Big Change

My, my, my. I am sat here on New-job-eve wondering how on Earth I was picked out to join a team of clever people, in a quirky office, in a real job?!

I got a call four days before my birthday offering me an interview, which in itself was overwhelming. They told me over a hundred people had applied and that they were interviewing eight. Again, yet more overwhelmation! (Not to be confused with boasting, I really, really didn't expect it.) Then four days after my birthday I got another call. I was waiting for him to say 'I'm sorry, we're not going to offer it to you this time' etc etc My surprise was absolutely one of the best feelings of surprise I have EVER felt, let me tell you! I instantly phoned my Mum and Dad to let them know that, as of the 23rd August 2010, I am going to be a Junior Online Writer. Their response was much like my own, wooping and laughing and sort of kicking and air-stamping (I was still in bed when he called and embarrassingly, he could tell). What can I say, they must have been blown away by my fantastic sales pitch for their Big Green Calculator... (I was somewhat less convinced but proved again to myself that I am capable of spewing out a large amount of junk against the clock.)

So tomorrow is my first day, obviously my first concern is what I should wear. Second being, what I should buy after my first payday.

Scrap that.

After reviewing the last post, I have decided that using smileys in a piece of writing that is anything but an email or status update looks crap. It DOES take away from the reader's intelligence and, actually, from the writer's too.

I feel ashamed to have dirtied my blog with them...

I am, however, not opposed to slang, swearing or exclamation marks.

Too serious??

I think this blog seems to be written in a bit of a serious fashion, which is exactly what I was NOT going for! I mean I'm all for good grammer but I don't really think it's showing me as I really am. Or should that shit stay on Twitter?? :D See, I use smileys!

The smiley. A treacherous invention designed to portray:
a) A funloving character
b) A childish exaggeration of something meant to be happy/sad/tongue-in-cheek/cheeky that should otherwise be possible to portray in language
c) The need for speedy assessment of one's mood

Now, as a smiley can demonstrate all of these things at one time, who knows when it is appropriate to use them!? Sometimes when writing to university friends, I feel a fool if I use one. It's like they are looked down on by academics. I know you can't write to a future employer with a witty little joke and then stick a :P after it because it insults their intelligence but equally, what if they don't get your joke? Ah crap, did I just insult their intelligence?

New Blog...

I have been thinking about writing a new blog. Not abandoning this one, just making another one. So easy when it's all free. I'm pretty good at typing without looking at the keyboard so I think it'd be quite successful.

So, I quit my job. Don't know if I mentioned that? Was fed up of being taken the piss out of, expected to do a job I am not trained for and not being paid any more to do. I did it in a sensible manner though, gave them notice and everything. So now I'm really on the job hunt. It is difficult but I'm figuring I have to get lucky at some point because if I don't I'm, well, screwed frankly.

With this change I am hoping it will be the push I need to get going properly with my life. This blog is quite good discipline really. I mean, even though I hardly ever write on it, it is always there nagging away in my brain that I really should write. I don't want to lose that desire to write. It's strange, although I enjoy writing while I do it, forcing myself to sit down and patter away on the keyboard seems to be the hardest bit. Yet when I get here I find it very easy. Perhaps if I had a job that required me to do it in order to be paid, I'd be very good with discipline??

Anyway, yeah... So this new blog, I was thinking I really love fashion and, ultimately, I want to work in fashion. Publishing fashion magazines to be precise. I've been going on at myself for ages to do something worthwhile to prove I'm serious and blogging seems to be the most accessible way of doing that. It does mean pushing my boundaries, especially with directing traffic at it. Although, this blog is online, like I said previously, I'm pretty sure nobody reads it (again, 5th post, hardly surprising) so at the moment I have this all-encouraging knowledge that my thoughts are safe here. But I do want them to be seen, even if it means negative feedback. I want someone to bother, which means continuing the effort. I hope that the title of this blog will encourage people to see that I'm just going for it and not caring how academically gifted I am or, indeed, am not.

I hope people start reading this soon...

It's been too long

So, it would seem I have gotten lazy on this old blog here. It amazes me that I can login to Facebook and Twitter every day, express my opinions and thoughts in the space of a status update and completely ignore this place where I could simply ramble on to my hearts content. We have all gotten so lazy, us tweeters, status updaters, virtual-ers.

It is also amazing that, nowadays, while I'm searching for jobs and applying to different companies I can simply go on facebook or twitter and locate these people who are meant to be daunting. These sites have broken away the wall that used to stand between employers and the hopefuls. I can now often see (provided their privacy settings are at a minimum) their interests, their sense of humour, their family and friends. Is this the definition of stalker? Or is it a good thing that the fear of those in charge of whether or not you will have a future with them, has gone? Is it appropriate to approach them via these sites they have so willingly put their lives on? I don't know.

I'm pretty sure that nobody reads this blog, after all this is it's fourth post, I guess it takes more than that to build a following. I always find the things you think about and want to express can actually appear really quite dull to yourself. I often read things that I have written in the past and cringe. Maybe it's because the only time I feel inspired to write is when I have felt sad or alone and that, actually, I don't want to relive those times. Writing helps release but looking back on it can reawaken the feelings. I think it is healthy to leave these sorts of things behind but I suppose reminding yourself spurs you not to go through it again. This way we build up experiences and continue on to the next crater we will inevitably not see and fall head first.

My point, however, is that while we are our own greatest critic, others see it differently. So many people whinge about Big Brother, 'Why would you want to watch a load of people in a house?' I don't think I even know the answer to that. I can see why people avoid it. It takes up so much of your time and why waste time with other people's lives when you have your own to take care of? But the simple fact is that we do like watching others, we do like knowing what other people think. We are surrounded by people's thoughts it's just that we only see the ones who have gotten into the public eye. Everybody else writes in their diaries, until the blog was invented that is and who truthfully doesn't want to see what's in a person's diary??

Fuck you election.

I have no issue with people wanting to believe what they want or supporting others who believe the same but why attack those who don't share your views? It's as bad as Jesus freaks out in the street, handing tickets out for God< thanks Elton. Stop trying to impose everything you want on others. It just leads to pointless arguments and shouting and nobody wins. To top it all off everybody thinks that they are the intelligent ones and bandy around 'uneducated' to elevate themselves. And the real geeks trawl through the internet looking for clever little articles or statistics to prove their dying points.
This is why I used to avoid politics.

Should have done my homework.

Some of the most common advice I get is to 'apply for everything', so, I did. Needless to say I was not expecting a phonecall five minutes after I had applied at 8pm asking me to describe what the PR industry is about.
The stupid thing is I know what it is, well roughly at least, but I was so taken aback that anybody had even called and so quickly, I got flustered and turned into a repetitive, babbling fool. I tried to think on my feet and completely fell down.
On being told by the woman on the end of the phone that she had 'already spoken to other candidates who had more of a grasp of PR', I just felt that crushing realisation that to find a serious job you have to treat the searching as a job itself. Having no quick and witty answers stuffed up my sleeve is not going to work. Still I maintain, it is unfair to catch one so completely off guard.
As always, I was quickly struck down by heaps of self-loathing and punished myself by truly believing that I am useless and stupid. I think, at least I hope, that this is a common feeling among struggling graduates and that I am not really doomed to failure because of the occasional negative tendancies.
After a run in the rain and some more weeping I decided to go to sleep. Needless to say, I was back to my usual self the next day and fully prepared for another day of chopping vegetables and mixing sandwich fillings, wahaaay!

On the bus back from school when I was about thirteen, I asked a friend what word she would use to describe me. After a little thought, she decided 'honest' was most appropriate. From that moment on I prided myself on having this strong, and often feared, trait. I genuinely believe that it is the best policy. When you are honest, people know where they stand; honesty, ultimately, makes good things happen and that is what I aim for when writing this blog.
So, even though I read Derrida's theories (and Baudrillard and Foucault and Marx and Freud) I'm not too ashamed to admit that I have absolutely no recollection of their ideas at all! Although, having said that, nobody could forget Freud and his Oedipus complex babble. It only remained in my head because it amused me. Enough of it has clung in the recesses of my mind to allow me to have an opinion on something supposedly academic.
Freud? Yeah, he was a nutter!

The life and times of a recession-whipped graduate.

Hannah. It's a palindrome and so Hannindrome bursts forth, relatively quietly and inconspicuously into the unthinkably large land of the internet.

I keep being told that nothing literary is new anymore, that there is no originality. Everything is constantly being repeated, spewed, regurgitated. I definitely agree but it is a rather bleak outlook to take. Especially for all those writers just starting out. No longer do we embrace pen and paper with the wondrous optimism held by those who took all the good ideas centuries ago. We know London's streets are not paved with gold. Instead we just start something off one day and hope that it will be noticed somehow by someone who was also noticed once.

I graduated in September 2009 and even though we cringed when Take That's Greatest Day cried out over our parents applauding hands, we did feel that secret excitement, that quiet hope that the mortarboard perched on our heads would mean the one thing we all dreamed of, success. Yet here I am, nearly a year after completing my English degree, working in a kitchen of a garden centre restaurant. I like to throw around the term sous chef but, in all honesty, I'm making food that I was qualified to make while still at playgroup. It's a degrading and demeaning life to lead and I try not to feel too sorry for myself because I know I am far from being the only one. Even so, I was overcome with sadness when, on completing a crossword puzzle, I realised it was the first time I'd used my brain since my dissertation.

It can be hard to feel proud of oneself when in such a predicament, however, since finishing university I have had two (horrible) jobs, saved for and bought my own car, learnt to drive and have recently moved out again. So if that doesn't qualify for an Oprah style applause, I don't know what does.