Tuesday, February 08, 2005

First day of school

We made potato prints, we did "show and tell" and at break we played kiss chase.

Not really.

Well first, I set a few ground rules for my new job:

No giving out my email address to friends or family
No giving out my direct line to friends or family
No blogging related activity, of any kind, at work
Make lunch the evening before to conserve money
One cup of coffee per day (from Pret - Starfucks is too expensivo)
Two cigarette breaks
Read two newspapers every morning before I do anything else
Get into work by 8.30am, every day

I have already broken five of these rules. I'll leave it up to you to guess which ones they are. But I will tell you that the most heinous and inexcusable rule-break was that I was half an hour late in - ON MY FIRST DAY!!!

It started so well. I was supposed to be in by 9am for a board meeting within which all the other directors would be introduced to this supremely talented, experienced, savvy (and uber dashing) PR pro. So I set my alarm for 6.30am so that I would have plenty of time to shower, get changed, have my breakfast and sip my coffee infront of Lorraine Kelly on GMTV. I did all of these and I got to the station at 8.15am, which should have given me plenty of time to ride the tube to Sloane Square and walk up King's Road to work.

Except that I had forgotten to top up my Oyster card. You might ask me why the plastic travel card we get given to ride the tube is called an Oyster card? I don't know the answer to that. Some London Underground think tank employee will probably tell you that it is because London is like an Oyster within which the tube is the pearl. Assholes.

Anyway, I look back at the queue and it's huge. So rather than going to the window to get my ticket, I decide to use the automatic machine, because I figure it's going to be faster. Only it's not, because the people infront of me clearly haven't mastered the fine art of putting the credit card into the little slot the right way round.

Ten minutes later I finally get to the machine. Except that there is this little sign that says "not accepting credit cards". Now given that this machine is a credit card only machine, you would be right in assuming that the sign should actually read "this machine is out of order". I decide that I don't have enough time to queue up at one of the ticket windows as there is still an enormous queue (never, EVER wait until the beginning of the month to renew undergound travel cards). So instead I decide to run across the road to the newsagent and top my card up there.

Except the shop doesn't take plastic so I then have to run down the street to the ATM (another queue) and get the readies and run back to the shop again. Eventually the deal gets done, by which point yet another ten minutes has passed and I'm back at the station, back at the gate.

C'mon little travelcard, all warm from being nestled next to my ass cheek, fat with my hard borrowed cash. Please work for little moi?

"Seek assistance!"

Evil, wretched travelcard.

At this point if Satan (who naturally would have been in the guise of a London Underground worker) appeared to offer me instant teleportation to my new office in exchange for my penis, I would have accepted.

I look around. No staff. So I ran across the road, again, to tell the guy that he couldn't have topped the card up properly. Only he proves to me that he did by showing me a computer printout.

I can feel any respect and admiration that my new seniors and colleagues may have had for me slipping away. I realise that I now have two options: I can join the queue of over twenty other plebs too stupid to have topped up their travel cards earlier and I miss the company meeting, or I can do the most despicable, pikey, irritating thing that one can do on the underground - wait until the moment that the person infront of you at the gate has scanned their card and then instantly press yourself right...up...against...them as they go through.

Which I did.

I did miss the company meeting. The MD's first words to me were, nonetheless, kind. But the disgusting gate queue pushing in thing made me feel dirty. A feeling that stayed with me all day long.

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