Monday, February 16, 2009

Good Job Hunting



My Owner currently is currently engaging in a strictly human activity: Job Hunting. For years, I have heard this word bandied about and imagined that the procedure was far more active and adrenaline pumping than the depressing, corporate grey reality. I pity humans. Sometimes. I used to imagine my owner creeping about the city, clad out in brown and grey in order to blend in with the surroundings, whilst keeping an eye out for Job Vacancies.

These Job Vacancies manifested themselves in a physical furry form and pottered about the urban prairie in groups, sniffing the air and snuffling the ground from time to time. I imagined that my owner would be keeping a look out for lone or unaware vacancies caught off their guard. When that moment happened, my owner would snarl into action, leaping over cars, rolling over pavements, chasing after the Job Vacancy as it bolted into bushes and sewers. Once the vacancy had been caught, my owner would clutch it, feeling it wriggle as it struggled in her hand, gaze at the job description written on its under belly and feel satisfied. Then she would march to the nearest job centre to get her job.
My ummm imaginings of a Job Vacancy


You know, I really had a whole world worked out based on this concept. I assumed the job market was where you could go and buy a Job Vacancy if you didn’t have time to hunt for a job, or you could maybe trade a Job Vacancy you had caught previously. When I heard that the current job market was bad, I assumed that this would just mean more people hunting for Job Vacancies on the streets. I had always assumed it was hard to trade your Job Vacancy at the job market and that feral Job Vacancies were fairly scarce, so it was just better to catch one and make do. This would explain my owner's rather weird and pointless job history.


So, you can imagine my utter surprise, followed by extreme embarrassment at my cat-brained stupidity when I realised my entire imaginings about this were, in a colloquial sense, complete bollocks. Yesterday, I stumbled across my owner looking at Job Vacancies online. The conversation went something like this:

“Miaow, what ya doing?”
“Job Hunting.”
“I thought you had to be out and about to do that?”
“No, I’m looking at Job Vacancies online?”
“You can do that? Is that so you know which type to hunt down?*flexing my claws*Maybe I can help?”
“Err yeah…hunt…*sideways glance*…I guess…..more like ‘apply for’ though.”
“Apply? You have to apply to catch one?!”
“Well yeah, but it’s not catching one. You find a job vacancy on line, apply once you find one by writing narcissistic, inflated crap about yourself, maybe then you get an interview, then maybe you get a job.”
"Oh so it's all digital....you don't have to hunt them anymore?"
"Tabby what are you talking about? There's no hunting involved, I mean, ha ha, it's not like Job Vacancies are alive, like little animals that roam about the streets...."

It must have been my eyes widening, my mouth dropping open whilst the rest of my face stay completely expressionless and the little grey cloud of reality that formed about my head, that gave me away.

“Aww Tabby what’s up?…Did you think….? Job…Hunting….aww..here, come have a look. This is a job vacancy….here’s the application…..here’s a person specification.”

At that moment I wanted to cry at how dull the existence of humanity can truly be. Here in front of me weren’t fuzzy, communal animals with jobs written on their tummies, but pages and pages of words like, ‘Communication Skills,’ ‘Person Specification,’ ‘Administrative Procedures,’ ‘Competancies.’ That last one, competancies; having to write how you meet the competency for: ‘Encourages coworkers to ensure a new version is effective,’ or ‘Facilitates systems for knowledge transfer between teams and departments’, must be the dullest thing one can do with their spare time because I don’t even know what they mean.

The moment I first saw a person specification

But there was one that truly stood out. One of them was listed as ‘Is self aware.’ Nothing else added. All I could think was luckily my owner is conscious being and able to recognise her own reflection in the mirror so hopefully won’t have any problem with that. Also she obviously has the added bonus of having self-awareness flow through her in bucket loads, where she scrutinizes herself to the point of neuroticism. Maybe they want it to be at some objective spiritual level and will just be expecting a cloud of thoughts to appear at the interview instead of her physical self, because she is so self aware that she no longer needs her physical body. Or something. But no, because that would be vaguely interesting and interesting is clearly something that Job Hunting is not. I will no longer continue my imaginings about Job Vacancies.


However....Tax Returns….now that is something that sounds cool. It sounds like a film. I really want to find out who Tax is. It sounds like a cat’s name. Maybe he’s a hottie?

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