Like at least two before it this post comes to you direct from Melbourne City Dry Cleaners and Laundromat. If there is one benefit from the washing machine smoking itself it’s that I now have an occasional 27 minutes of normal warm washing time to type uninterrupted and free from guilt and wireless internet.
My desire to sit in front of a screen and write to you at night has diminished due to days sitting in front of a screen sending sports bras, boots and balls to a large chain of sports stores in New Zealand. I had been led to believe my sportswear temp job would finish after I saved the New Zealand economy but when I asked last Friday if they wanted me back on Monday my boss smiled, quite possibly malevolently and said, ‘Oh yes Greg, we have big plans for you.’
Her image wavered and for a second I swore I saw the Grand Beaver before she continued, ‘I think we’ll get you keying some orders and then train you up on the in house system that even has pretty pictures…how do you feel about that?’
I croaked something to the affirmative and she continued.
‘I think we’ll need you for another two weeks at least. Mark’s been here over a year now as a temp so who knows what could happen.’
Temping for a year! I didn’t know that was possible. I’d thought Mark was a full time sportswear careerist and had been all G.I G.I, likey likey, love you long time and now I find out he is just like me. What a little shit. There’s nothing worse than a temp who sells out, gets all permanent and chummy with the salaryites and still calls themselves a temp…which he didn’t to me. Oh no, he kept his temperance well hidden and pretended to be my benevolent supervisor, giving me patient and helpful answers to my stupid SAP questions. He even chatted nicely to me on the train back into the city. I showed him photos of my cat for God’s sake!
I backed out of the office and went and made a cup of Merrill Fernando’s finest with two bags to calm down. Nothing terrifies a temp more than the threat of permanency. The reason temps temp is because they fear commitment and prefer to whore themselves out on one week stands for rates of pay those permanent schmucks can only dream about…I think. We are jobbing journeymen, littlest hobos, wherever we lay our SAP, that’s our home. We sit at an empty desk to do work nobody else can be arsed doing and just when you finally remember our name you turn around and we’re gone again. Maybe tomorrow I’ll want to settle down, but until tomorrow I’ll just keep moving on and you’ll wonder who I was and how 340 sports bras ended up at Rebel Sport in Albany.
My washing has finished washing and so has this post. I refuse to pay $6 to use the drier so I will finish here and carry my moist undies through the streets of Melbourne.
My desire to sit in front of a screen and write to you at night has diminished due to days sitting in front of a screen sending sports bras, boots and balls to a large chain of sports stores in New Zealand. I had been led to believe my sportswear temp job would finish after I saved the New Zealand economy but when I asked last Friday if they wanted me back on Monday my boss smiled, quite possibly malevolently and said, ‘Oh yes Greg, we have big plans for you.’
Her image wavered and for a second I swore I saw the Grand Beaver before she continued, ‘I think we’ll get you keying some orders and then train you up on the in house system that even has pretty pictures…how do you feel about that?’
I croaked something to the affirmative and she continued.
‘I think we’ll need you for another two weeks at least. Mark’s been here over a year now as a temp so who knows what could happen.’
Temping for a year! I didn’t know that was possible. I’d thought Mark was a full time sportswear careerist and had been all G.I G.I, likey likey, love you long time and now I find out he is just like me. What a little shit. There’s nothing worse than a temp who sells out, gets all permanent and chummy with the salaryites and still calls themselves a temp…which he didn’t to me. Oh no, he kept his temperance well hidden and pretended to be my benevolent supervisor, giving me patient and helpful answers to my stupid SAP questions. He even chatted nicely to me on the train back into the city. I showed him photos of my cat for God’s sake!
I backed out of the office and went and made a cup of Merrill Fernando’s finest with two bags to calm down. Nothing terrifies a temp more than the threat of permanency. The reason temps temp is because they fear commitment and prefer to whore themselves out on one week stands for rates of pay those permanent schmucks can only dream about…I think. We are jobbing journeymen, littlest hobos, wherever we lay our SAP, that’s our home. We sit at an empty desk to do work nobody else can be arsed doing and just when you finally remember our name you turn around and we’re gone again. Maybe tomorrow I’ll want to settle down, but until tomorrow I’ll just keep moving on and you’ll wonder who I was and how 340 sports bras ended up at Rebel Sport in Albany.
My washing has finished washing and so has this post. I refuse to pay $6 to use the drier so I will finish here and carry my moist undies through the streets of Melbourne.
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