Blog: Job Hunting

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For the past 18 months or so I have had a DELIGHTFUL time Not Going To Work. You know when people (Tories) claim that work is good for you? They are talking out of their arses - NOT going to work is BRILLIANT and you get TONNES more done!

The only downside to not going to work, I have found, is that you don't get PAID. At the start of my sojourn into Basically Retirement this was FINE - I had my REDUNDANCY money (I worked for Birkbeck for 11 years, so I got a LITTLE bit of CA$H) and then those fine folks at the New Enterprise Allowance Scheme gave me sixty five quid a week for a few months for, let's be honest, turning up to a meeting on time, filling in a form, and then not appearing on the unemployment figures. You know when George Osborne goes on about "new businesses" forming? One of those was ME!

However, that has all come to an end now and I am left with my SAVINGS, or rather I am left with what's LEFT of my savings after SPENDING them at a fairly rapid rate. I don't MIND spending savings - after all, having time off to do The Writing was pretty much what I was saving it FOR - but I'd rather not spend the LOT of it and so I am JOB HUNTING again.

"But Mark!" I hear you cry, "What of this The Writing of which you speak? Surely THAT is an income stream?" Theoretically yes, but in actuality: not so much. I mean, I've got loads of The Writing done and I'm very pleased with how it's all gone (see my writing site for EXTENSIVE showing off about it) but it hasn't actually led to much in the way of CA$H. INDEED the most lucrative thing I've done is re-writing the words to popular songs for satirical purposes occasionally for Newsrevue - one time they used one of my songs for three weeks and I got over eleven POUNDS!

THUS I am interrogating jobs.ac.uk, the Universities job site, on a daily basis. I want to go back to academia partly because it's what I know but MOSTLY because the thought of re-starting my USS pensions fills me with EXCITEMENT. Actual, genuine EXCITEMENT - what have I become?!?

I've applied for a few jobs and even have a JOB INTERVIEW next week, so hopefully I'll be able to get something sorted quite soon, and in a funny way I'm kind of looking forward to getting back to it. Filling in applications and re-writing my CV has reminded me of all the interesting stuff I used to do - there's nothing quite as satisfying as getting a multi-layered SQL query to return EXACTLY what you want, right kids? - and I think it would actually be fun to have a reason to do it again. The money, also, would be quite nice, and there's the whole meeting new people, seeing new places and LEARNING new things.

Mostly though it's re-starting my pension, OBVS. Oh BABY!

posted 23/9/2015 by MJ Hibbett

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Comments:

Where did you land an interview for? And best of luck, obviously :) I know there's a few jobs going up North if you fancied them but I suspect any academia places in that London are your weapons of choice.
posted 23/9/2015 by Warren

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