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Through to the job interview…

I have a bloody interview. I’m not occupationally insane after all. I have been assessed and found stage-one (of three) employable. Everything else is bonus from now on – I always assumed that it was just getting me in a room with people that was the problem. “Ah well he looks good on paper, but in person – eeeeesh….” or “Subject: Tom Coates – Makes inappropriate jokes at assessments about Jamie Theakston’s sex life – Do not employ“. But it turns out that I’m just not good enough for the jobs – not that I’m mad! What a relief!

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Even the BBC loves The Strokes…

Even the BBC loves The Strokes. Where’s your stuffy English public service broad-caster now then? Eh?

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Curry, caipirinha and sleeping on the floor…

I got home last night around 1am, after an accidental curry and caipirinha and slumped immediately into a couple of episodes of Buffy and Farscape. I’m not going to defend my choice of late-night TV – I’m just telling it how it is. Anyway – next thing I know is that it’s five in the morning and I’m asleep on the sitting-room floor, and I have that moment of indecision when you think to yourself that just staying where you are would be better than moving to go to bed, but then I gave in to my sedate impulse and lay in bed wide-awake for two hours thinking about all the things I need to sort out in my life.

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Waiting to hear from the BBC…

Today’s crisis of indecision regards the BBC. I was supposed to hear from them about this first interview yesterday. But I have not. Does this mean that I can expect a letter from them through the post in a few days telling me not to give up the day … er … – or does this mean that the message got lost when my phone was stolen and the SIM card transferred. Or does it mean that they simply haven’t had time to get around to it? This whole process has felt like torture and I’m more than slightly frustrated with them for not making it an educational and smooth-running application. But of course I can’t be frustrated – because I as yet do not know if the failure of communication is at my end.

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How the card trick works…

I wonder how many people actually don’t realise what’s behind this card trick. It’s obvious right? Addendum For those who have not as yet figured out the trick – none of the second set of cards were in the first set. So whatever you chose would no longer be present…

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Internet Explorer’s sex-toy constellations…

To a user of Internet Explorer on Mac OSX, the “What Sex Toy Are You?” quiz is a beautiful set of constellations. Oooooooh. Pretty….

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The Google robot of the future…

Google of the future? “I am Google! I find many good things. I find that pair of underwear with the little dice printed all over them. And I watch the tape of you with the life-sized Stallman puppet. These are good unique things. Many keywords and links! My masters will say ‘much good job, little robot!’ Many searchers will find happy links of Stallman puppet see you! Ahhhh.”

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Waiting on the BBC interview…

So strictly speaking, it’s now the day when I found out if I’m through to the first interviews for a job at the BBC. We were supposed to find out on Friday, but for various reasons they weren’t able to get the information to us. Each interview will be one hour long – and they’ve allocated three hour slots per job – so that’s fifteen candidates in total going through to the second stage. Or at least that’s fifteen interviews – I don’t yet know whether people will be represented in more than one of the categories. Twenty-four first-stage candidates narrowed down to fifteen second-stage ones – will I be on that list? I doubt it, frankly. I really do.

I haven’t felt so invested in the outcome of a job application for ages – I think it’s a job I could do well, and perhaps more importantly, that I’d enjoy – but weirdly I don’t think that’s why I’m so nervous. I’m very uncomfortable with the idea of these psychologists analysing my responses. I have become increasingly convinced that they’ll declare me unfit for work in general – and what do you do then? Start a sheep farm? Live in a commune? Take up politics? I’m relatively sure that I can acquit myself well in an interview as well – but my performance in that interview is less important to me at the moment than getting to it.

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The Anne Widdecombe item under threat…

Get it while it’s fresh – or more to the point, get it before it’s ripped from the internet’s bleeding womb by the stainless steel tongs of threatened legal-action… Because Anne Widdecombe is not going to be thrilled about this one…

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Mapping Marvel’s social networks…

Proposal for a grant? “Dear Dean of Stuff, I work at your University and I’d really like to do a study of the social networks in the Marvel comic book universe. I hope you will understand how important and useful a piece of research this could be. Yours, A. Nut.”