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The good morning, good night thread

Started by Ed, October 22, 2007, 03:49:05 AM

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delboy

In Gloucester the Tories were up in arms over the boundary change which took a huge chunk of the Gloucester Tory heartland and moved them, inexplicably to another constituency. It supposedly made it almost impossible for the Tories to win. Nevertheless, they did - turning over a sizeable labour majority into a 2000 tory one.

Derek
"If you want to write, write it. That's the first rule. And send it in, and send it in to someone who can publish it or get it published. Don't send it to me. Don't show it to your spouse, or your significant other, or your parents, or somebody. They're not going to publish it."

Robert B. Parker

Rev. Austin

I've got an interview this afternoon at a school about something called 'positive playworking', which is basically like watching over kids and playing with them (steady on!), and I'm a little nervous.  It doesn't help that it's absolutely pissing it down  :P
facebook.com/waynegoodchildishaunted
Stay in touch! I don't mean that in a pervy way.

Ed

I hope it went well for you, Rev - let us know the outcome. Sounds like my idea of hell, but I get the impression you're better with kids than I am :afro:
Planning is an unnatural process - it is much more fun to do something.  The nicest thing about not planning is that failure comes as a complete surprise, rather than being preceded by a period of worry and depression. [Sir John Harvey-Jones]

Rev. Austin

I've got another meeting with the people involved in a couple of weeks!  W00t, as they say on teh internetz.  And the cool thing is, there is a distinct lack of male role models in the 'positive playwork' area (it's not quite an industry) which means I'm more likely to get a job  :afro: though some of my friends might show alarm at the thought of me being a role model to impressionable five year olds hahaha

Also finished selecting stories for DOOMOLOGY.  Cor blimey it was tough!  I had to hittle down a list of about 30 decent stories to just 11, and even then I had to drop one really good one because there simply wasn't the room for it.  I should be sending out acceptances, etc soon, and/or Bill will be.  w00t x 2!
facebook.com/waynegoodchildishaunted
Stay in touch! I don't mean that in a pervy way.

delboy

QuoteAlso finished selecting stories for DOOMOLOGY.  Cor blimey it was tough!  I had to hittle down a list of about 30 decent stories to just 11, and even then I had to drop one really good one because there simply wasn't the room for it.  I should be sending out acceptances, etc soon, and/or Bill will be.  w00t x 2!

I must say, Rev, your judgement has been remarkably brilliant in this regard!  ;)

Derek
"If you want to write, write it. That's the first rule. And send it in, and send it in to someone who can publish it or get it published. Don't send it to me. Don't show it to your spouse, or your significant other, or your parents, or somebody. They're not going to publish it."

Robert B. Parker

Rev. Austin

facebook.com/waynegoodchildishaunted
Stay in touch! I don't mean that in a pervy way.

delboy

Going through another phase of being extremely busy at work again. I don't mind hard work, and I don't mind putting the hours in, but I don't get any extra money for doing it, and it's starting to annoy me, stress me out, and affect other areas of my life. I feel like I'm being a fool and a sucker - after all, it's my life I'm giving away - yet where I work there's a culture of working all the hours God sends so it's extremely difficult not to do this. I really want to get on and do some writing at the moment. I was building a little faith and confidence a few months back but unless I can sit down and produce something soon it'll count for nothing. I knpow when I'm not at work I can write a couple of thousand words a day. Whilst at work, a couple of sentences is about it. Ah well. Rant over.

Del
"If you want to write, write it. That's the first rule. And send it in, and send it in to someone who can publish it or get it published. Don't send it to me. Don't show it to your spouse, or your significant other, or your parents, or somebody. They're not going to publish it."

Robert B. Parker

desertwomble

Quote from: delboy on May 19, 2010, 02:33:38 AM
QuoteAlso finished selecting stories for DOOMOLOGY.  Cor blimey it was tough!  I had to hittle down a list of about 30 decent stories to just 11, and even then I had to drop one really good one because there simply wasn't the room for it.  I should be sending out acceptances, etc soon, and/or Bill will be.  w00t x 2!

I must say, Rev, your judgement has been remarkably brilliant in this regard!  ;)

Derek

Just seen the Doomology table of contents, Mr. Rutherford.

One thousand congratulations as they say here!

Must be a confidence booster, eh!

DW :cheesy:
http://chaucers-uncle.weebly.com/

www.paulfreeman.weebly.com
 
Read my most recent winning Global Short Story Competition entry:
http://www.inscribemedia.co.uk/assets/october-ebook.pdf

delboy

Cheers Womble!

Yes, very pleased with this one. Tis a story I'm quite fond of. Always nice to place such tales.

Derek
"If you want to write, write it. That's the first rule. And send it in, and send it in to someone who can publish it or get it published. Don't send it to me. Don't show it to your spouse, or your significant other, or your parents, or somebody. They're not going to publish it."

Robert B. Parker

Russell

Quote from: delboy on May 20, 2010, 03:26:22 AM
Going through another phase of being extremely busy at work again. I don't mind hard work, and I don't mind putting the hours in, but I don't get any extra money for doing it, and it's starting to annoy me, stress me out, and affect other areas of my life. I feel like I'm being a fool and a sucker
Del

I know what you mean delboy.  I'm doing my own job managing my own team whilst being two-people down.  I'm also caretaker-manager of another team where the manager left recently.  That manager was paid nearly double my pay but while I am caretaking the team I don't seem to be caretaking any part of the ex-manager's pay.  To top it all I helped my boss draw the new organisation chart... and it doesn't include my role.  Whilst it might be the right structure it doesn't quite seem fair.  I must check in the mirror to see it I have the word 'MUG' on my forehead.  Hopefully "Plan B" emerges sometime soon.

Ed

What you both need to do is look for another job, then if you particularly like where you are, use it as a bargaining chip to get a pay raise and better conditions/more holiday, fewer hours, whatever. If you don't particularly like where you are, then take the job that's offered. Unfortunately, the job market is much like motor insurance - it never pays to be loyal. The high achievers move around a lot, and each time they move, they go up a pay grade. Stick around too long and you'll get stiffed, every time.

My wife landed herself a job a few weeks ago, and it turns out she's on higher pay than the other women who do her job. The reason for that is they've lagged behind the market, and while the bosses will pay the higher rate to recruit the people they need, the long serving folks get what they get, unless they make the right noises. You need to arm yourself with a list of your achievements, so you can tell them how invaluable you are to them, and then tell them you need the extra money - you don't just want it, you need it.
Planning is an unnatural process - it is much more fun to do something.  The nicest thing about not planning is that failure comes as a complete surprise, rather than being preceded by a period of worry and depression. [Sir John Harvey-Jones]

Russell

Your right Ed. Loyalty up to a point is OK and yup I'm looking! :cheesy:

delboy

Alas, the only workplace skill I have is moaning and there aren't a lot of vacancies for highly paid moaners. On the bright side, it's Friday.  :cheesy: The sun is shining  :cheers: Payday is a week away  :(  But that's better than a fortnight  :afro: Tomorrow morning I plan to do 50 miles on the bike, some writing, and some guitar strumming.  :smiley: And tomorrow night it's barbeque time  :P

Sorted!
Derek
"If you want to write, write it. That's the first rule. And send it in, and send it in to someone who can publish it or get it published. Don't send it to me. Don't show it to your spouse, or your significant other, or your parents, or somebody. They're not going to publish it."

Robert B. Parker

fnord33

Quote from: Ed on May 20, 2010, 04:54:38 PM
What you both need to do is look for another job,

Me three. I was "honored" today for five years of service (actually six, but who's counting). You know what they did. My manager screamed at me from across the building to follow him back to the office where he handed me a big envelope and said, "You've been here five years." I opened the envelope to find:

2 instruction cards telling the manager what type of things they should say to honor "Employee."
2 blank cards that said "Congratulations" on the front.
1 certificate of achievement with my name on it saying, " Thank you for your commitment and dedication. Your contributions are important to the success of our organization."
1 for letter which basically congratulates me for not having been fired yet.

That manager that likes me. I think I'm his favorite non breasted employee. I got a good laugh out of it. For those of you who don't know, the average time that a server spends at a restaurant is about 2 months. 6 years is a really, really long time to work at the same place. In that time I have seen the health care package get worse while the price went up. The 70% discount that I got after three years has been reduced to 50% and then further reduced by restrictions. I'm making the same $2.13 per hour that they paid me from day one. So, as you can imagine, when the multi-billion dollar company that I work for gave me this envelope of crap for five years of not getting fired I got a big ol' case of the warm and fuzzies.

I'm not actually bitching. I could care less about recognition. If they really wanted to thank me for working the equivalent of 720 years (in normal job terms) a raise or anything of value would have been nice. I can't think of anything that they could have done to make me feel less appreciated. Again, I really don't care. For all they care I can fuck myself with a splintery pointed stick until I bleed out and the feeling is mutual. I just thought it was funny. It's hard to imagine how a company as badly managed as mine is still in business. 
Life is an entanglement of lies to hide it's basic mechanisms. - William Burroughs

delph_ambi

That's the sort of thing that makes me thankful to be self-employed, even if I barely scrape a living.