An arbitrary post

I sat down and finished my 3rd OU assignment, one week late, and covering an incredibly boring subject, taught in an incredibly boring and disjointed manner by the author of the book we have to read. The writer is a veggie, and boy doesn’t it show. In fact she alone has probably done more to persuade me to go on Atkins for a couple of weeks with her pompous and patronising views. The question for which I had to write 2000 words (finished on 1986 eventually) was….

Which theory offers better safeguards for animal welfare – contractarianism, or the indirect duties view?

I went for contractarianism, well its obvious innit?

What I really wanted to say was

“How dull is this subject? How much duller could you make it?”

.......and then gouge out my eyes with a rusty spoon before marinating them in Masala Sauce and feeding them the local feral cat, whilst walking in acid filled boots after pulling my toenails out! That’s how boring it was!

Today, I met with M, my mysterious boss. Well, it was for my Bi-annual Review, a sort of sham process whereby you write down what you think of your performance over the last 6 months, and then your manager tears you to pieces “as part of your development”. They then set unrealistic and vague objectives with which to knock you down next time, this then goes up the management chain and then to HR, where it is completely ignored. I used to do these for my team, but quite honestly I used the time to have a good old chat with them – sort of extended one-to-one. That way I learnt more about their fears and aspirations, and was able to form a good judgement on how they had performed. The critique was always constructive as destroying someone is usually counter productive.

Anyway to my sheer horror and surprise it went very well. In fact he was quite inspirational in his objectives and goal settings. He was very kind about my abilities and the work I have done in my new role (I wasn’t aware that I had done any!). But the biggest shock was when we discussed The Sandman, and I swear that word for word he said everything I have said.

About how ruthlessly ambitious The Sandman is.
About how The Sandman has no other life than work, even when on holiday
About how socially inept The Sandman is outside of work because he has nothing else to discuss!
About the general control freakery of The Sandman.
About the trail of destroyed people left in the wake of The Sandman as he climbs the greasy corporate pole.

At one point M actually said – “Why the fuck doesn’t The Sandman just do the fucking work himself!” It was great!

Now, the cynic in me says this could be a cunning ruse, in which the Grocer is encouraged to show himself and consequently incriminate himself and they can then show him the door! I will tread carefully, but this is a very encouraging sign.

I thought I’d add to my Desert Island List by listing 10 women I would also like to be stranded with. I have left out my wife and daughters because this is fantasy stuff, but it might give people another angle from which to judge me.

Island Women

Denise Van Outen – Essex girl, slightly saucy, who just gets me every time
Jennifer Aniston – need I say more?
Julia Sawalhia – Saffy in Ab-Fab
Natasha Kaplinsky - BBC morning presenter
Kate Winslet – a real woman with real shape
Penny Smith - GMTV news reader
Lisa Maffia – gorgeous R&B star
Kate Garraway - GMTV presenter and simply beautiful, my current number 1
Linda Barker – just seems genuinely nice
Catherine Zeta Jones – a bit of an egotist, but drop dead gorgeous


Later, Grocerjack