Working girl

The last post took a while and this post is here to explain why. At the same time, this post explains why this post was so late. So, I'm killing many posts with one click.

I have a job! After four months, I have a job. So, I'm sorry to say, but my knitting has taken a back seat.

I am officially working as a freelancer at Woman & Home and if I impress the superiors, they might discuss something more permanent. Either way I have a job. So you can imagine the sorry look I get from Winston every morning as I leave for work. Both him and Juno (my mom's Great Dane) are highly unimpressed that they have been locked out of the house for the duration of the day - I think Juno's just unimpressed that she has the misfortune of being alone with Winston all day, but more of that in my next post.

Entering the working world has come with some fun experiences that I thought I should share with you. The first being traffic. I have resigned myself to the fact that I will be travelling an hour each morning to work. But I'm still not used to the arseholes that plague our roads and my greatest fear is I may become one. I don't ever want to be one of those arseholes that speeds up during the orange and can clearly see there is a queue of poor right-turning drivers sitting halfway across the intersection at the mercy of your right foot on the accelerator.

So I've tried to keep a level head, by respecting my fellow commuters on the road. It does take a lot of energy and patience, but I find a good radio show does the trick in keeping me distracted. However, you have to be careful. You need to create the perfect balance of distraction, entertainment and critical engagement when you're listening to the radio in the morning. I usually flick between John Robbie's show on 702 and 5fm with Gareth Cliff in the morning. I find that I can listen to the headlines on 702 to provide me with a well-rounded knowledge of what I should know to critically engage with my world. After the headlines, I listen to Gareth and his team to put a smile on a shitty morning spent in traffic. I also switch to 702 if I'm getting annoyed with the increasing amount of dubstep breaking into the mainstream via the 5fm frequency.

But you have to strike a balance between the two. I find that if I listen to 702 too much, I fall prey to the "if I was in charge, I would" syndrome. There's nothing wrong with having an attitude of wanting to make the world a better place, but some times it can become counter productive. Our mindset changes and we tend to whine and moan, are blinded by our own opinions and retreat to our armchairs never to rise and take action again. So, I indulge my sense of humour and swallow a teaspoon of salt in the mornings when listening to Gareth. We always need to remain mindful of the society we live in, but we also need to be able to laugh at ourselves - especially in Joburg traffic when we are at our most volatile.

My next working world experience has to be the office coffee cups. For the first two days I remained chained to my desk, I only ever got up to go to the bathroom. I didn't take a lunch break and I didn't go looking for water. I ate lunch at my desk and rationed my supply of water in my green bottle. I wanted to make a good impression; show them I was a hard worker and wouldn't be slacking off in the kitchen splashing about in the office gossip pool.

By the third day, I decided to test the waters and made myself a cup of tea. And by the end of the week I was pouring myself water from the office water cooler.

I think I was concerned about some sort of coffee cup initiation.


I didn't know if there was some sort of process and I was definitely concerned I would be punished for using someone else's mug - and what I mean by 'punish' is the owner giving me dirty looks. Thank goodness my office doesn't have any of those things and all the paranoia was in my head.

My final working experience, which will be a long term one, is nesting. I'm in a temporary position at the moment. They've asked me to stay on for another month at the same rate. So no signs of a contract... Yet.

Because I'm only temporary, I have certain commitment problems at my desk. I know it's not mine to have and to hold, however, I have allowed myself a tissue box. I'd like to bring my pins and paper clips, but I don't want to be too presumptuous. I'm treating this like a new relationship, because we all know how it can be a tissue box one day and the next you've got a personalised mug, motivational quotes stick to the computer screen and a stationary kit occupying the top draw. So I'm taking this new job one step at a time. I'm being cautious, because I don't want it to be a one night stand.