Dear Readers,
It won’t have escaped your careful attention that I occasionally wander off for, oh, up to a week or so. Should any of you be so very sweet [and/or touched in the head - Ed] as to mind my absences, I apologise unreservedly. I am a lazy little toad who cannot cope with more than a handful of claims on my attention without becoming, on the instant, inert. Like a possum.
As it happens, while I was doing NaNoWriMo, I was also applying to A Prestigious University, to do an MA in Librarianship. I hate application forms with the loathing terror that most people normally reserve for Neo-Cons. But I completed it and the 50000 words, and felt jolly pleased with myself, if slightly frayed. And then of course Prestigious University spent December driving me mad by pretending I hadn’t sent in my references, and then, oopsie! finding them, and then, writing to say, oh, but you haven’t sent them, and I’d phone up and point out they’d already told me that they had arrived, and they’d promise to check and then email me to say they hadn’t got my references and I’d hyperventilate a little. In the end, they agreed that they did have my references, and had had them all the time, and asked me to come for an interview.
I’ll spare you the running about in small circles, the frantic revising [And why the revising? Surely the point of going to Library School is to learn cataloguing, not to sit bored mindless while everyone else learns cataloguing?], the odd bout of disorientating self-pity.
I had the interview last Friday. And yes, I got lost looking for the Library department, but made a cute joke about how finding the interview room was obviously an intelligence test, and everyone laughed nicely, and yes, I twiddled my hair, but only once, and yes, my throat was tight and I got increasingly husky as the interview went on and I can only hope the interviewers were keen on Eartha Kitt. And of course I sat in a tea-shop afterwards very nearly beating my head on the wobbly table with frustration when I realised all the things I had said and all the things I hadn’t said and the beautifully impressive way I tripped over my own scarf on getting out of the chair at the end of the interview.
Anyway. Either I do get in, which gives me eight months to perfect the Beastly Detective Novel, and, incidentally, chat to you lot, before my life goes super-crazy for a year, working AND studying all together in one glorious I-have-no-social-life extravaganza. Or I do not get in and have all the time in the world to faddle about with the Writerliness and of course feel small and silly and worthless. Either alternative is bloody terrifying.
What about a Plan C?
Interviews are sooooooo stressful, aren’t they? *hug*
Meanwhile, if you haven’t seen this already you might want to reconsider a writer’s life.
Left by azahar on January 29th, 2007
I’m sure you were impressive in all sorts of ways that you haven’t thought of too. Good luck, I’m holding thumbs.
Left by Charlotte on January 29th, 2007
Wah! This is so exciting! If it’s any reassurance, I once found myself rambling on about personal hygiene in an interview, on a complete tangent to the question I had been asked, then realised, too late, that the interviewers were staring at me in horror. I analysed that interview to pieces. I wanted to hit myself over the head with a mallet and collapse under the floor. I wished I could bleep that moment from history. I was convinced I wouldn’t get the job… but I got it… and I was still so embarrassed I turned it down! And one of the interviewers stayed on the phone to me until she had persuaded me to accept. Whoa. I loved that job so much and was very disappointed when I left it two years later. So the moral of the story is 1) what is meant is meant, and 2) never analyse an interview!!
I hope you get in. Prestigious University will be mad if they turn you down.
Left by Helen on January 30th, 2007
I am trying to think of a plan C, Az. And I liked the Writer\’s Life leaflet - jolly amusing.
Thank you for the good wishes, everyone.
Helen - they probably thought you utterly charming, human, and interesting. So many people turn into robots during interviews and appear to have all the personality of a boiled turbot. And who the heck wants to work with a boiled turbot? I\’d go for the amusing woman babbling about personal hygiene simply BECAUSE she\’d started babbling about personal hygiene, thereby evincing character and humour. And therefore proving I wouldn\’t have to hide whenever she came into the office in case she bored me to death.
(One of my colleagues is the Official Trade-Marked Most Boring Man in London. I would auction my soul in segments so as not to have the desk next to his. Which I do have. Dang).
And now we wait. Waity waity wait wait wait.
Left by Reed on January 30th, 2007
Good luck. I hate interviews. This is probably why I am self employed. If my life changed in such a way that I had to approach the “real world” work place again, I would probably have a nervous breakdown. Just going to the store and deciding what pair of pantyhose to buy would probably send me over the edge. I don’t think I even own more than one outift that is suitable for “the real world” workplace.
Side note: we watched “The Devil Wears Prada” the other night and I wonder what 16 is? the new 32W size? I enjoyed the movie without really understanding the motivation of any of the characters.
Left by healingmagichands on January 30th, 2007