Foul Language

I have been looking for a ‘real’ job, the kind that includes an annual salary and isn’t a 0 hour contract. Now this process has meant a lot of emails being written, a lot of emails being discarded and absolutely no responses. So the usual when applying for jobs. However, out of the sky shone a beacon of light! I received a phone call offering me an interview for an administration job ten minutes down the road. Wonderful! I literally jumped for joy, as did my step father who I have steadily been putting into financial debt from about the age of 8. Now I know ‘administration’ sounds shit dull, but this ‘office based, fast paced, no two days the same’ job would allow me to extend the abundance (a synonym for lack of) of skills I already have on my CV. The job I applied for asked for the minimum of a 2:1 degree, an ability to communicate and organisational skills. I had those so I believed I stood a good chance. Now this belief was destroyed after about a minute of entering the interview room.

“Florence?”

“Yes, hello, Mr Gold?”

“Yes, Yes. Come on in.”

Now at this point I still wasn’t completely sure why I didn’t feel very welcome, but I was definitely not comfortable. I think the main issue was Mr Gold’s appearance, he resembled the kind of man you could imagine having done some time as a sex offender.

“So Florence, I have read your blog.” Now this sentence I have heard a lot, and usually people have two reactions, 1) It’s a bit shit but keep trying! And 2) yeah it was funny. Mr Gold’s reaction was neither, and he was looking directly into my eyes. In the dog world this is seen as a sign of aggression, so I think Mr Gold was trying his best Rottweiler, and unfortunately for him I don’t think it took too much effort.

“Really Mr Gold. What did you think?” Now the Rottweiler was slowly turning into a Doberman as his nose was jutting forwards and his yellow teeth (a lack of dental treats I fear) were barking these words at me.

‘Florence, I DETEST foul language in the public forum. It was truly shocking. I have never read, heard or seen anything so rampant with expletives. I think you should remove it from the internet.’ Now I am all for saying your opinion, but fuck me! Has he never watched Nip & Tuck, Game of Thrones, or any kind of reality television show? Just watch someone reading the Daily Mail and from all the spelling mistakes you can’t stop ‘stupid bastards’ from coming out of your mouth. In Sex and the City Samantha physically sexes men to death, and here I was be chastised for a few less than civilized words.

Well to give Mr Gold his due it was a strong opinion, not one I was going to take a bit of notice of but still, I respected him slightly. But with his matted hair, moth eaten jumper and stuffed fish on the walls, my respect was starting to disappear. At this point his wife entered, the duo were suddenly transforming into a pair of under groomed Poodles, as her hair had clearly never seen a bottle of Frizz Ease. She piped in with a voice like she’d been inhaling helium ‘Oh no, how terrible, what sorts of words’. At one point I was genuinely scared they were going to turn around and start sniffing each other’s middle class, boring as shit arses, but instead they just stared at me. At this point I decided that I had no intention of working for Tweedle dip shit and Edward Scissor Hands.

To all of you job seekers out there do not let this put you off, it was an experience I will treasure and it gave me another story for this blog of mine. If people don’t like what you say, tell them not to listen, if they don’t like what you write, tell them to stop reading and if they don’t like you, two little words … Fuck off.