CEX is Great

It's been a while now since I last posted anything about how my unemployed life was going, and I finally have some good news to share with you guys. CEX (Complete Entertainment Exchange) is opening a store in my local area, and my wife & I applied for positions there.

Sadly I didn't get the job, but Lindsey did!

It's a full time position basically working in a pre-owned/second-hand exchange store.

Lindsey is currently receiving training in a nearby store:

In previous posts I've made mention about Lindsey's Asperger's, and how this can greatly hinder her chances of finding work. Well, to all people with Asperger's or any other form of disability for that matter, check out CEX for the most wonderful and accommodating employers I've ever encountered. Since starting her training at the store, Lindsey has had a couple of panic attacks and had to phone in and say that she couldn't make it to work; their response? "Are you ok? Is there anything you need?"

Needless to say, our minds were blown...the first panic she had, she was so worried that she'd lost the job, but in the few weeks she's been working there, she's made friends and she's even now being considered for Supervisor Training (CEX try their best to only promote internally, so all Supervisors and Managers that work in their stores have had experience as Sales Assistants in the past).

This is the break the both of us needed, as I can now apply for literally any job going (and I have done, in the past few weeks I've applied for cleaning positions, Library jobs, receptionist jobs, etc). As long as the position is more than 10 hours per week, I can do it.

The next couple of months are going to be hard, for some very stupid reason her first paycheck will be almost completely taxed because she's been out of work for so long. She can claim it back, but that'll be a while, so the next few months we're going to have to cut back on a lot of expenses (and, would you know it, just as this has all happened our TV has died...so we're shit out of luck there).

In the mean time (here's all the rubbish and bad news), while also looking for work, I've been having to contact the JobCentre and Council about changes in circumstances that will affect our claim.

The JobCentre is run by the Department for Work and Pensions, these are the guys everybody has to go through to make any sort of benefits claims (whether it be Jobseeker's Allowance, Disability Living Allowance, etc).

According to Wikipedia:

The agency provides services primarily to those attempting to relocate an employer and to those requiring the issuing of a financial provision due to in the first case lack of employment, of an allowance to assist with the living costs and expenditure intrinsic to the effort to achieve employment, or in all other cases the provision of social-security benefit as the result of a person without an income from employment due to illness-incapacity including illicit drug addiction. The organisation acts from within the government's agenda for community and social welfare.

Now, I don't think anybody is ever going to deny that they do their job. The Jobcentre still does what it was designed to do. The big problem is the way it all works.

To make a claim in the first place is relatively easy, you go in to the centre, or phone them up, and they'll sort out a few forms to fill in with your details and bingo, you have a bit of financial help. But now you're in the benefits trap.

In the past 4 days, I have had to make 4 phonecalls to their service (often waiting in a queue for 15-20 minutes at a time), 1 trip up to the physical centre, and 1 trip to the local Council Offices, all so I can inform the right people about the change in circumstances so the claim can be stopped. In the mean time, none of the correct services are completely in contact with eachother, so at any moment one or another may completely screw something up and leave the wife & I in an even worse position than we were in before she got her job.

Needless to say, I find this quite backwards (surely, in my opinion at least, it should be far easier and more supportive to cancel a claim than to make one?), but it's all we can do really.

As it stands, for the next few months we will be quite poor and will have financial difficulties along the way, but by the end of it all I will hopefully have (at the very least) a part time job to top up our income, and we will finally be able to work towards our future goals.

Once again, all I can say is thank you to CEX for being one of the best employers I have ever encountered, a thank you to the few people at the JobCentre that have been genuinely helpful in this whole process, and a big fuck you to those at the JobCentre that decided to hang up on me halfway through a conversation for no reason whatsoever.

Have a good day.

Great Expectations or, "How I can't afford a HDTV you pretentious fuck."

For anybody that isn't aware yet, I'm a gamer. My hobbies and interests tend to revolve around a digital world filled with whatever else somebody has come up with me to explore, talk to, and occasionally kill.

Any hobby is expensive when you really think about it, so any purchase for that hobby generally has to be justified if you barely have the money to support yourself, so when Minecraft (an Indie game originally released in Beta for the PC) was announced for the Xbox 360 I was quite happy, but couldn't justify the purchase as I already had the PC version (which only cost me about £5 by the way).

Then they announced 4-player drop-in/drop-out co-op meaning that all my friends that enjoyed Minecraft, but didn't have a PC or the money to get their own copy on PC, could potentially come round mine and we could have fun building things, exploring a world, leading Creepers up to each other, etc, etc.

So that was the justification. Buy the game for the 360, have fun with friends for countless hours. I saved for several months to put the money aside to get the game when it was released.

The game was released yesterday for 1600 Microsoft Points (roughly £17), and I bought it immediately. My friends sat with their controllers in hand (which they'd brought themselves, not purchased by me), and waited patiently for the game to load up and for co-op fun to begin.

There was no option for me to have co-op. All the settings were there, but whenever I tried to invite anybody to the game, it couldn't be done.

A quick jump online lead me to THIS forum thread which in turn lead me to the tweet below from the developers:

So, hang on...I need an HDTV and component cables to be able to enjoy this in splitscreen with my friends? I don't remember reading this in any of the official advertising or marketing:

Yep, there we go, it says Offline co-op 1-4 player, but no mention of needing an HDTV to be able to play it like that. Usually something that important will be noted, like when a game needs you to play online to access the co-op, see how they note you need to be online to play 1-8 player co-op?

Needless to say, I complained about it. I've complained to the developer, I've complained to Microsoft, and I've been interviewed by Kotaku.

The developer didn't respond. Microsoft said they won't give me a refund. The Kotaku article lead to many people saying I need to get myself out of the stone age.

In response to 4J Studios:

This annoys me, mostly because it wasn't advertised. You have your reasons for not letting SDTV owners play splitscreen, but perhaps you should have also mentioned it in the advertising. The vast majority of people I know don't own a HDTV, and cannot afford one, so as far as I can tell you're blocking out a large group of possible customers. Like I say, that's fine, but some warning would have been nice.

In response to Microsoft:

You say you can't give me a refund because the game works fine. It doesn't work as advertised though does it? I don't want my money back, I just want my points back so I can purchase a different game that I can enjoy with my friends.

The Kotaku out-rage:

Believe it or not, there's more of this all over the comments section. People that seem convinced that money grows from trees, that having different budgets means you're lower than them, that not having the latest gadget means you're an idiot.

Is it genuinely hard to believe that it takes time for someone to save up enough money to treat themselves on a cheap game? Why? We're going through a recession, we don't all have jobs.

Why do these people seem convinced that it's ok to lord this sort of behaviour over other people? If my friend doesn't have the latest gadget, I don't laugh at them and say they're an idiot, I just ignore it, forget about it, whatever.

The main purpose of my complaint was that a game that I had saved up for, planned on buying for the big selling point (splitscreen co-op), was not advertised as requiring something else to play it. Like I've said multiple times, if I had known that it needed an HDTV, I wouldn't have bought it.

If I had a good job, I'd just go out an buy a HDTV, but I don't have a good job. What little money I have has to go towards more important things, and the one treat I get to pick me up when I'm feeling fucking miserable enough as it is? Can't play it properly.

Community reaction?

"Get a HDTV you jobless bell-end."

Thanks guys, thanks alot.

Have a good day.

Stumbling Around

It's now been approximately a year since I completed my Journalism course at University, almost 5 months since my graduation ceremony.

I am still unemployed.

At the moment, I feel like I am stumbling around with nothing to do. I am getting more and more depressed as time goes by, becoming less and less enthused about any application I hand in, any CV or Cover Letter I send off, or even any job that I find.

In the past year I have applied for jobs that I am qualified for, that I have trained and studied for, and that I have a real interest in doing; but at the same time I have also applied for any job that I felt that I could do, cleaning positions, positions with local stores or coffee shops, I've even been looking at care positions in my area (you get a fair amount of money for doing what should come naturally to most people, looking after someone, being there for them, etc, etc).

In that entire time I have had two interviews, both of which have gone nowhere.

I was overly optimistic for the first few months out of University; happy for the break from essay writing and interview sourcing, but looking forward to finally getting my hands dirty with some real life journalism (even if it did mean just getting the real journalists some coffee or tea while I wrote the obituaries and fluff pieces).

I have considered becoming a teacher (either in English, Religious Studies, or Media Studies), thought about joining the MOD's media section, and seriously considered putting an application into the Armed Forces, I am this desperate for something to do.

My wife (Lindsey) found a blog that inspired me to write yet another entry, it's about the 5 stages of UNEMPLOYdenialMENT:

So forget grief a second. (And the running… my legs are on hiatus) Here I am, four months post last exam, every day I basically do the job of a broadcast journalist at a very nice, local radio station. But I’m not paid, I have no written agreements and I can’t afford to move out of my mum’s house. It’s a strange and unnatural state, this unemployment. And I’ve come to view my own experiences in five phases – not so much the stepping-stone progression stages like the Grief journey, more like a haphazard cycling of which lottery ball is going to spurt out of Lancelot today…

 The rest of the entry can be found HERE, it's worth checking out because it's amazing how true it is...especially that she's a writer/journalist like myself.

But this entry isn't the only thing she's inspired me to do, she's also inspired me to get a bit more active on the writing front and hopefully get in some other writers for this blog. I have a hopeful for America, but I'm equally interested in writers from elsewhere, as I know for a fact that I am not the only writer that is out of a job.

On top of this, I recently started writing a new short story which I hope to group together with a bunch more and start selling for the Amazon Kindle, nice and cheap and to earn me a bit of cash AND recognition (here's hoping it isn't shit).

So yeah, I'm stumbling around at the moment, occasionally falling into pits of happiness and inspiration, and I think my cycle of unemploy-denial-ment is coming back round to optimism...maybe.

Either way, finding a job may not be looking up...but I'm trying my best to find things to do in the mean time.

Have a good day.

You Can't Always Get What You Want

When I was growing up, my earliest thoughts on my career path were to do with History and Archeology. I'd always wanted to be an archaeologist, and I think growing up watching Time Team and Indiana Jones probably helped push me in that direction. My parents would take me to historical places all the time, and in my odd little mind I'd try and come up with theories as to why things were the way they were, what the buildings were used for, etc.

I studied as hard as I could with History, and I thought I was doing pretty well up until the point where I started studying it for my A-Levels. All of a sudden I realised that I'm not very good at remembering important dates, or names; I can remember events, but rarely what order they took place in exactly.

So out the window that career plan went, forgotten were the dreams of the younger me; but it's ok, I had a back up plan.

I also happened to be studying Law, Philosophy, and Critical Thinking during my A-Levels. I figured I could become a Lawyer, work my way up the legal system and become a judge of some kind (not too high up, I liked the idea behind it all, but I didn't particularly want to weigh in on huge cases...I just wanted to make a difference).

I'd follow this plan, get into some money, have a nice home, and become a foster parent. I planned on making a difference to the world in my own way.

Turns out I wasn't very good at Law either. Same problem as before, remembering the names, dates, and events, which is surprisingly important for the first step into studying Law. I guess it also didn't help that it was around that time that I discovered drugs & alcohol, started hanging with the wrong crowd, and pretty much got into the mind frame of "Ah well, I'll do it later."

I failed College the first time round, and abandoned my hopes for both Archaeologist and Lawyer.

I came to realise that, although it wasn't what I wanted, there was something in my life that I was far better at. Writing.

I don't know if maybe this was an obvious thing to everybody else my life, but apparently I've always been fairly good at this writing malarkey. I'd never really considered it an option though, because it's up there with Art and Dance as one of those career options that can bring in money, but people still frown at. Add to that the fact that I'd still prefer to be doing something else, and you've got what I was thinking.

It took me 21 years of almost constant failure to realise that the only thing I was really good at, despite having huge interest in other unrelated subjects, was this; writing, journalism, blogging, reporting, ranting, arguing, etc.

Since then I've spent the past four years studying and training as hard as I could to perfect this apparently inherent skill, and this is where I am today.

- - - - -

It's been about four weeks since I last updated this blog, and this is likely to be the most off-kilter one I've written so far, I mean...what does my past have anything to do with unemployment?

Not much to be honest, but does anyone remember one of my earlier entries about Ben? The guy that's been unemployed for so long that he's getting to the point of giving up?

Yeah, both myself and my wife have reached this point. Try as we might, hope as we do, and want like we want, we are officially trapped in a rut.

There are so many things that we both want, things that we want for each other, and things that we want for ourselves, but in this current climate we can't get them. We can't get the steady jobs, we can't get the help that we need, society won't reform to accept differences, etc, etc, etc.

We don't want anything big (but hey, winning the Lottery would be grand), we don't want any miracles (but I say again, perhaps some anonymous millionaire could give me £600,000?), all we really want is to be able to live free of the burden of the benefits system...to be able to support ourselves off of our own backs, to get where we want to go, to occasionally be able to treat ourselves with our own money, to not have to worry about the future, and generally just to live life properly...not just exist.

That's my piece for today.

Have a good one.

Education, Education, Education

Pupils educated at comprehensive schools are half as likely to study mathematics as their counterparts in the private sector, creating a "massive problem" with social mobility, a Tory MP has warned.

Liz Truss, who helped run the centre-right Reform thinktank before her election as MP for South West Norfolk at the last election, said a failure to provide adequate maths teaching was leaving pupils ill equipped for the modern world.

Truss made her comments in a parliamentary debate, held in Westminster Hall, in which she argued in favour of a "subject premium" to boost funding of maths teaching. The MP said that the Young People's Learning Agency, which funds sixth form subjects, awards 12% more funding to media studies, psychology, physics and biology than it does to maths and English.

Truss told MPs that this lack of funding helps explain why Britain now lies in 28th place in the world ranking for maths teaching for 16-18-year-olds, according to the OECD programme for international student assessment (Pisa). This is leaving young people poorly prepared.

"Even for those who don't go onto study maths and science at university a good background in the subject is vital because it is the next generation of primary school teachers, of journalists and politicians who also need to know sure they know the basics of maths," Truss said.

"If their maths is not up to scratch then we will have a damaged ecosystem where we don't have the next group of children getting proper maths education at school, we will have poor quality numerical analysis in our press and in our media and poor quality statistics in our public life."

Full article HERE

Slightly different topic from normal, I know, as it has little to do with my employment status...but it's just one of those things that makes me really despair for our future.

As it stands, it wasn't until after I left secondary school that I learned more about science and maths; during my time at school I was taught the basics on how to pass an exam, or get my coursework done, but actually understanding the subject? Understanding the meanings behind the words I was learning? No, that didn't happen until I was left to figure things out on my own.

Already we're saddled with a media that can barely understand the most basic of Scientific studies, forgetting to check statistics, site sources, or even see if the study has been peer reviewed. Next up we're going to be saddled with a media that not only fails in scientific coverage, but fails at proper coverage of anything that requires mathematics (science, sport, economics, business, etc).

The media is a strong focus for me, but clearly isn't the only thing we should think about with this. The public as a whole has an even worse understanding of science (to the point where they blindly accept what the media tells them when they get it wrong), and I dread to think of what our society is going to be like if the people we deal with on a daily basis can't handle basic mathematical problems.

Hey, I'm probably blowing this way out of proportion here...well, not probably, I am blowing this way out of proportion, but given how bad the state of scientific literacy is in the world at the moment, I can't help but wonder why promises to support the education system at all costs is being forgotten.

It's probably safe to say that this generation is shit out of luck when it comes to finding decent paying jobs within the next couple of years, but the next generation should realistically be OK for finding jobs...if they have the education.

Have a good day.

Welfare For All?

David Willetts in his book, The Pinch, writes: "We know that each generation is going to move on… we know its chances of doing better… are greatest if it is standing on our shoulders." Standing on our shoulders, in this current climate, requires solidarity. Baby boomers, beneficiaries of a free university education and housing boom, the more affluent among pensioners should give up their personal tax allowance if it spares the young a further diminishing of their prospects. However, Willett's language of civic virtue, interdependency and mutualism needs to resonate much more strongly to wipe out the toxic aftermath of the bankers' excessive appetite for profit .

Their greed has torn the social fabric. A YouGov poll this month indicates that we believe the government spends too much on benefits; "scroungers" are an issue and the universalism that glues the welfare state – such as child benefit for all – needs modification. Recession always sees a reduction in empathy; greater prosperity improves it. Nonetheless, the demonisation of those on benefits, including the sick, the disabled and those unemployed because of structural changes to the economy, undermines us all. Gradually, every unemployed person transmutes into "the other"; the underclass, the dispossessed, victims of their own behaviour, not the catastrophic misjudgments of governments.

While the so called "underclass", living without what Adam Smith called "regard" , are easily damned, admiration is shown for the excesses of the "overclass", the stateless nomads, seeking the next tax-free domain, "earning in their sleep"; making money from money, contributing pitifully little to the public coffers. While few of us will ever meet the likes of Sir Philip Green, who spent £6m on his birthday bash, many of us will soon know men and women, trying hard, who have lost a job. Will that personal contact with those drawing for now on the welfare state help to revive social solidarity and draw some of the poison injected by political rhetoric?

When social cohesion is replaced with envy, mistrust and suspicion, we increasingly believe what we wish to believe rather than what the facts reveal. The sad truth of this budget is that it is the poorest who are proportionately paying by far the highest premium for the national albatross of the multibillion pound deficit. Once all the tax, credits and benefits alterations are churned in the budget mixer, the poor will be 63p better off a week; a couple with a joint income of £80,000 may benefit by over £8 a week while those on a salary of half a million pounds or more will have £357 extra in their pockets. Even given the Liberal-Democrats achievement in removing two million from paying income tax altogether, these figures – against a backdrop of the huge cuts still to come – do not add up to social justice.

Full article HERE

There is little else that I can add to this that I haven't previously said, of the rich getting richer, and of society feeling that anyone on benefits is nothing but a scrounger or a liar.

I think it's going to become a recurrent theme on this blog, and quite likely on The Guardian and numerous other newspapers.

"Osborne picks the pocket of pensioners," read the Daily Mail.

It's interesting that perhaps other, less reputable (in my honest opinion) newspapers are also joining in and trying to build some sort of solidarity between the public and those that are currently claiming benefits. Though I feel it's unlikely to last for long with these papers.

As a part of the welfare reform that is being pushed for at the moment, my wife received another form to fill in to see if her circumstances or her disability had changed at all. Many would probably find it funny that the government, the jobcentre, whoever sends these forms out, is of the belief that someone with Asperger's Syndrome will suddenly get better...we just find it infuriating, given that we last filled one of these forms in in December.

I am still searching for work, and I am currently attempting to increase my prospects by learning to drive (which in itself is costing a ridiculous amount of money). The job I applied for, and interviewed for, in London didn't come together in the end, so I am once again searching every day for work or experience.

Despite all of this, my wife and I are made to feel terrible for the lives we live, and it's building to the point where we stop even caring or trying anymore (for all the difference that it would make), leave the country, or end our lives.

It's great that a welfare system is able to push people to this point.

Have a good day.

Breathing Life Into Britain

Mary Portas' Bottom Line on 4OD

I apologise for directly linking the video instead of just embedding it, but for some reason Channel 4 don't want people to embed their videos into other sites. Sadly this is likely only viewable within the UK, so for those that aren't aware of who Mary Portas is, or why this has any relation to my blog, you can check out her official PR spiel here: About Mary Portas

Mary (Queen of Shops) has spent the past few years doing what she can to boost the economy of the UK, by working with the government, launching a new clothes line, and all round just trying to generate new jobs in the UK (which is one of her goals in her latest show Bottom Line).

Watching Bottom Line is interesting, insightful, entertaining, and also downright depressing.

Her goal is to create new jobs by creating an underwear range that is entirely British sourced (all items manufactured and created within the UK), but she can only start with 8 new positions and 9 months to prove herself. On the day of all the job interviews, over 300 unemployed people turn up, and most of them are in tears by the end of the interview as Mary probes into their reasons for wanting the job, or any job.

If this is successful, which I certainly hope it is,then this really could generate more jobs in the UK and ultimately lead to an improvement on every UK Highstreet (I hear Portas is also planning something new to improve the Highstreet in general which my local council appears to be placing a bid on tomorrow).

I guess it's nice to see that there are people with power trying to get something done, not ignoring the people that really need the help, but it's equally depressing that it has to be like this and that it has to start so small.

Have a good day.