That's A Monday

http://mancunianmatters.co.uk/content/pie-ling-pounds-pakistan

There it is, my first article up since I started the course! I wrote the *cheesy* headline too, and think I'm slightly prouder of that than the actual article.

Had a good day today, one of a few in the class who managed 40wpm at 100%.  I can get 50wpm too, and this is really my building block, so I'd have been mortified if I'd not passed this first "class test".

Talking of which, shorthand made me seem like a burke last week...
...was asked to do a 2 minute talk about something I'd achieved that day (Thursday), put on the spot, I, for once, was speechless and caught on-the-hop. And the only thing I could think I'd done that day was nail a 50wpm shorthand piece at 100%; so I promptly blurted that out in front of the whole class.  I'm surprised I didn't get things thrown at me, I know enough people in the class are struggling with it. Oh well, ho hum!

Being A Student : Parts 1-3

After a typical student weekend that included political meetings, football, beer, partying and lots of vodka I found myself trying to write shorthand at 4pm on Sunday.  Think maybe I need to get my head round this out-of-hours studying lark.  Never been much good at it previously.  Then again some would say that is why I am where I am, but I’ll leave it to my mother to lead the prosecution’s case on that one!

Two weeks gone (or 10% if you prefer) already and quite scarily the shorthand teacher announced today that “we’ve covered all the basic theory”. Finished the book in other words.  To be honest I’d almost lost the will to live at that point – studying anything in two and a half hour blocks is taxing at the best of times, never mind on a Monday morning.  Then again one half an hour break in an 8 hour day could surely give the EU Work Time Directive a run for its money.  No wonder one of the guys is on two cans of Relentless a day – I kid you not!

Prior to all this I had my first day on placement last Friday.  I took the initiation test which involves being told “there are no jobs. And don’t believe those people who say the job market is on the way back up. It isn’t.  For those jobs that are there, there are far too many qualified people. So don’t think you’re getting one.  And just in case you somehow pull it off, don’t forget, the money’s rubbish.  So don’t expect to live.  Well, you can live.  But you can’t visit Australia.”  I batted this off with my usual “Yes, I know.  And yes, it’s still what I want to do” He finished his cigarette went inside and ordered fish and chips.  I followed suit (minus the fag) and figured I’d passed.  Either that, or convinced him I was crazy enough to keep on until the end of January.  

It would be so ironic if I was to find a job wouldn’t it. Personally I thought that’s why I was doing this!

Need to crack on writing some articles for my portfolio this week.  Got one in the pipeline now regarding the selection of the candidate to fight the local elections for the Labour party in Dewsbury West.  Not that there’s any potential clash between my politics and my career.  Not even now I’ve been elected as Constituency Press Officer, although that happened on Friday before the weekend’s beer kicked in.

IN OTHER NEWS...

Not been selected to attend the Labour Party Conference, which is a bit gutting; thinking of going to some of the fringe meetings around the city to dig out a story or two though.

Talking of which, I’ve yet to root out a Tory in the class – sure there must be one somewhere. There’s a surprising number of ‘socialists’ actually.

Got a log-in for the NCTJ website last night, logged in and promptly logged back out again; it has my abysmal scores on there from when I took the exams at uni. Not something to dwell on. Although the one I passed, they’re still making me re-take, despite telling me in interview I wouldn’t have to.  But then again, that was the same interview where they said there’d be 20 people in the class. Maybe I was actually interviewed by a figment of someone else’s imagination and it didn’t really happen?

After lectures tomorrow we're having a quiz and drinks ‘in the building’ – hmm, watch out for drunken Facebook status updates somewhere around 8pm. And not just mine.

Oh, and I found the cool spot in the room.  Suprisingly, it’s near a window.  Only downside? The dreadlocked guy who decided to piss against the parked car at approximately 4pm.  Some of the girls were a bit shocked when he turned back round, I didn’t dare ask why!!

A coffee fueled tour of Manchester (and more late trains)

If you’re ever lost in Manchester, you won’t go short of coffee.

Either I was going round in circles, or Manchester is home to all the world’s caffeine addicts.  At one point I looked around to find Starbucks to my left, Costa dead ahead and Café Nero right next to Costa! How many coffee shops can one city take? My spontaneous walking tour this morning tells me at least eight. You can tell this isn’t Yorkshire – if it was they’d all be tea shops!

Of course for the cost of a beverage in one of these shops you could probably get a taxi to the place you were supposed to be going when you realised you were lost.

The smell is so inviting but I must resist, I’ve already had a tea AND a coffee today, anymore and I’ll be lost but in desperate need of a toilet.  Not a good combination I don’t think.  Then again, maybe these up market coffee shops have toilets themselves? The last one I went in did, but it was locked.  And I needed to be sick.  But back then I wasn’t lost. And I wasn't in Manchester.

Being lost can actually be quite liberating, you can go where you want at your own pace because no one is expecting you to be in a certain place at a certain time.  I was supposed to be in a certain place at a certain time, namely the GMEX centre at 8.45 for the TUC Conference, but that was many hours ago, before the trains let me down again…

….you know it’s going to be a bad day when you get up early, to get an early train, and you arrive at the station before the early train you intend to catch, and the board tells you, early, that the train isn’t coming.  Neither is the one after it, just like the one before it and the one before that. But the man who operates the information boards is having fun this morning.  He doesn’t put cancelled or delayed on all the trains; oh no, he puts a time on some of them just to make you think one will turn up.  Then, and only then, when it gets to the allotted time, does he type in the magic words on his computer to tell you that it’s not coming at all.

The helpful fella from the course told me to turn up at the Conference anyway, whenever the train got in.  And I intended to, I really wanted to. But then I got lost.
I was quite looking forward to Mervyn King’s speech this morning, I like this bloke.  Mainly because he supported Labour’s economic plans before they were summarily kicked out of office.  I was hoping he’d tear the Con-Dem-Ed administration apart when he got going. But it doesn't look like he did, in fact he did that most un-public of things, he apologised.  You can tell he's not a politician.

He really should have had a go and got his kicks in early because there won’t be much of this governement left to kick when the Unions have had their feed this Winter. I hope.

Anyway I missed the speech and the conference because of the trains.  But this time it wasn’t the train companies fault.  Some scroat nicked the cable at Batley – personally, I hope he got electrocuted.  Lets face it, that would be more of a punishment than anything he would get from British Justice.

Ps: They're buying some fans! Just to rub it in a bit more the girl sat by the window today complained she was cold so that's why the window was shut.  While 5 of us on the otherside sweltered like we were in the Sahara.  The Doctor said he was concerned about my weight before I started this course - I daren't go back now!

Late trains, sweaty rooms, broken speakers and a bit of speed dating

“Tuesday 7th September at 9:30am. Please arrive in plenty of time” screamed the email.



“Be on time every day and everyone’s a winner” makes it sound like some American kindergarten chant. But of course, at approximately 9.28 I was still on the train. A late train. Again. Every day I wake up and think today will be the day that the trains run on time; every day I am left with shattered dreams. To steal a line from Tim Booth, lead singer of James: "Gotta keep faith that your path will change, Gotta keep faith that your luck will change, Tomorrow".  Now, where did I put that timetable?

By the way, do you know what’s worse than a late train?


A late train that runs slow!

Leaves on the line? No. Cable theft? No. Overhead line problems? No? Too hot/wet/cold/slippy/icy? No. Just slow. Slow as in S.L.O.W for no foreseeable reason. And we weren’t even treated to one of those faux-apology-announcements over the PA system – not that I’d have heard it with the Levellers attacking my ear drums – much too loud for this early on a morning!

For being late you get a special treat – the last seat in the room, or almost the last seat because someone came in after me, but I have no idea where she magicked a seat from because it sure wasn’t there when I looked – if it had been she’d have had no chance! Yeah, sit at the front, where everyone can see you and realise that you are the dumb ass who was almost late on the first day. But not as late as the girl who came after...

35 nervous people sitting down in a room, all doing that classic first-day-of-school thing i.e.: trying to look at everyone whilst making out you’re looking at no one. With all the blokes checking out who’s hot and who’s not, and the girls obviously doing the same although they wouldn’t admit it. Another thing - 35? 35? Seriously? 20 people you said at interview! I know at £3,000 a pop you want as many of us in as possible, but there are serious personal space issues going on here, I hope no one’s claustrophobic. Plus all those people in a room that hot, hmm, not good! Although £100,000 in the company bank accounts must look good eh? That would buy a hell of a lot of fans though - do you not realise how cheap they are these days?


First things first, an introduction to the course followed by a video. A video with sound that can’t be heard because the speakers are rubbish. So what shall we do? Bright idea Number 1: shut the windows. Either the person that chose to do that has ice in their veins or is on some kind of revolutionary sweat-it-out diet.  I take it you didn't realise how hot it was in there before you shut those windows? Never mind afterwards!
Or were you just trying to give a couple of us heat stroke, in the hope that we would leave because you realised you over-subscribed the course?
Bright idea Number 2: plug the video into the computer with better speakers. Yes, if you’d done that to start with we could still have had the windows open couldn’t we?

Did I mention the refreshments? No shyness here; no sooner were the croissants, Pain~au~chocolat and juice on the table than they were gone. Typical students!


After that it was onto shorthand...letters, alphabet, special outlines and dictation. I had two different female shorthand tutors in three years at uni and neither of them got me close to 100wpm. But this fella thinks he’ll take me there in less than 5 months? Good Luck Pal, you have my very best wishes!

At least no-one did a Jennie Drury; copying the alphabet from the back of the book then claiming they already knew it.  Most people were too bamboozled by all these symbols.  I mean seriously, how many ways are there to write the letter A? Never mind E! And don't get me started on M!

I've never done speed-dating before, but that was the beginning of this afternoon's activities.  Basically instead of doing the totally embarrasing stand up, "I'm Paul from Basildon with a fetish for blow up dolls and an unhealthy interest in Freddie Mercury", the idea is that you spill your best (worst?) bits to the person sat next to you, and they embarrass you instead, great eh?  So according to Kieran I think it was, or maybe Kevin? I knew one of the 7/7 bombers, although only by sight and not by name he hastily reassured the class! No, that's not what I told him but it's what he told everyone else.  Can we stick to the basics like age, name, football team next time please? Mention politics and pacemakers if you have to, but Bombers is a bit dark for 2 o clock in a room full of strangers.  Do you want SWAT teams crawling  down the windows? Fool!
Oh, roll on January 24th...

Journalists Are Historians Of The Here And Now

One of the beauties of journalism, and of being a journalist, is the power it enables you to feel. Journalists are without doubt, historians of the moment. The written and spoken word provides a commentary and analysis of the modern world and its associated events and happenings which will be recorded for years to come and will be read by future generations.


The brilliant thing about history being documented in this way is that it can’t be changed – people can try and put a different spin on it, a different recollection maybe, or they can even tell you “that wasn’t how it occurred”. But there is something so definite about the written word as a document.  Who has ever tried to dispute The Book of Kells?

This point has particular resonance with the publication this week of Tony Blair’s memoir, The Journey. Many people, anti-Blairites mostly, will tell you that this book is his attempt to re-write history. They will tell you that in fact the world is not, and should not be seen to be as grateful to ‘Tony’ as he would have us believe, and not everything that has been achieved in this world post 1997 is down to him alone.  Even people in the Labour Party would try and tell you it was more about 'Tony' and less about 'The Party'.


However there is one point that I would like to make. This world that we now live in is, undoubtedly, a better and safer world now that Charles Taylor, Slobodan Milosevic and Saddam Hussein are no longer in power. That is a fact, and that fact is part of the legacy of Tony Blair’s time as Prime Minister.


Blair’s legacy can be Iraq if you wish it to be, but don’t lose sight of the one fact that The Tories would have you conveniently forget – they voted for Iraq just as much as Labour did. Had they been in power back then, things wouldn’t have been any different. So let them posture and pose with their ‘holier than thou’ attitude. But the truth of the matter is something that although forgotten, will be recorded for all of time for people to recall. Why? Because the vote for war was recorded in all its details by the journalists of the time.


Funny that, isn’t it?

Re: Contacts and my little black book

Are you superstitious? Look back at my second post "Contacts and my little black book".  Do you know what happened last week? Yes, my computer crashed! And was any of my information backed up? Oh no.


£60 and a new hard drive later I'm hoping against hope that the data from my old one can be recovered.


Damn this technological age...now, where did I put my slate and chalk??