Sunday, October 28, 2007

Crumbs and a baking tray

You find me fidgety and awake. Is it two or three am? The clocks are changing.

I’m listening to the music of Akron/Family. It is uplifting and positive and beautiful. It soars above cynicism and criticism. It is good.

And yet what is going on?

I am dreadfully awake. Hot and bothered. The heating has been on too long and I collapsed into bed far too early to be able to remain prostrate and sweating; half awake on my sheets and by my overheated girlfriend. I sit with weak lemon drink and try to get my head together.

And what is bothering me? Disappointment. People and situations that baffle me. Here’s an example. A promoter contacted me asking for my musical services to provide an unpaid supporting set for a band from Montreal. Sounded like a nice gig. I obviously agreed to it immediately and started spreading the word. I sent an email to the guy just confirming that all was good – and I get a reply saying that he thinks he’s already booked two other support bands for that gig, sorry. But he’ll try to get me a slot soon (a wink and a double thumbs up, I presume).

What exactly is that all about? It sucks on so many levels. Aside from the obvious disappointment, the time I negotiated off work, the fact that I’ve already posted the gig on my website and told loads of people – what really pisses me is the fact that he asked me to do it! It wasn’t like I begged him to let me play this gig. He contacted me and I agreed. And now I feel like my soul has been molested by a tramp.

I just sent him a shitty email pointing these things out.

Time wasters!

I shouldn’t get started on that subject.

I was supposed to go to a Halloween party this evening. I even spent pocket money on bits of crap from Woolies to decorate my face with white and red stuff. Then I went for drinks with some guys from the company I work for that nearly rhymes with The Gristling Bets Curio. We attended the Beesmouth, the first pub that I’ve been to that played an entire Belle and Sebastian album just because they felt like it. Next was Tom Waits. I could get used to it. We got merry and drowsy and by the time I’d eaten Mexican food with Effie and got home to change for the party, it was unfortunately time to drift into a half cut, untimely slumber.

And here I am awake and pissed off at myself for being sleepy and pathetic and at promoters and idiots who run recording studios and people who say they will do things and won’t.

And that sham of a company I work for.

I used to enjoy the madness of it. Sitting in a constantly changing office, watching the management drift in and out in a flurry of surreality, while I sit by the front door saying knowing things like:

“God, I’m bored. I wish a cat would get run over.”

But no. After weeks of speculation, I think I can safely assume that I had better find alternative means of income. Yesterday I was sent home four hours before the end of my shift because it was felt that it was not worth keeping the office open. It is ominous to say the least.

The entire company is run on charm alone. (And the charm has worn through to the pavement. And the rain is getting in. And my socks are wet. Everyone's socks are wet.) Especially when the people who are paying a lot of money for this service that promises a lot, actually want to get involved with it. We just can’t cope with it. Barely anyone in the company who works on a practical level (doing the all important admin, data processing, customer servicing) has been there for more than about three weeks. The blind are leading the blind for a snack in a large pit filled with recently-discovered roadkill.

There are so many holes with the service that promises so much. Here’s one: the website. The all important part that supposedly details all the wayward animals of the moment – doesn’t work. I am supposed to know how to republish it. But I don’t. Or rather I do in theory, but given the many many hideous glitches in the system, every time I try, it crashes monumentally. And unfortunately, no one else knows how to do it. Or they do but they haven't really got the time or energy to sort it out. I mean, what's the point anyway? The bloody cats are probably all dead anyway...

This is a bad sign. This particular website is quite a selling point. If it worked, it would be a great thing. A place for people to post details of the puppy that was stolen or the cat that has legged it. It is genius. But to get your details on there, you need to fill in a form on a website which then requires me to copy and paste each field one by one into our database (oh the waste of time and resources!). We then need to email them, requesting a photo. And once this ordeal is complete – we need to publish the website. Except no one has done that for about two weeks now.

Meanwhile little Millie has long since been destroyed by some rescue centre who couldn’t find her owner.

Oh dear. To any right thinking company this would be a drastic problem that would need urgent attention and the website would have to be fixed as a matter of duty. This place, however, are just so desperate to recruit, train and keep good salespeople to hawk the flimsy ‘product’, they have no time to actually make sure we are delivering it. And thus the place collapses like a flan in a cupboard. Just a baking tray and some crumbs turning blue.

And the worst thing is, if the place does completely implode (and doesn’t get set on fire for some elaborate insurance job), then I’m apparently not even able to claim some kind of redundancy compensation because I’m still employed by an agency.

Let’s hope Sunday morning, when I see it properly, has something good to offer.

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