Job Interview

I've only ever had two job interviews in my life; one that was years and years ago, and one the other day. I can't remember the first one much, drink and drugs have eroded those memories, thankfully. But as of late I've been detoxing [because of financial reasons, I haven't matured – and don't intend to] so my most recent interview is fresh in my mind … and seeing as it was only two days ago it probably should be.

Job interviews are hard, like a virgin's penis in a strip-club. It's difficult to go that long without swearing and suppressing the real me [a complete cunt]. I spend most of my time in the company of people that know me, so my attitude, language and cuntishness [Shakespeare made up words, so I'm having a crack] aren't a problem. They're all part of my 'charm' in the eyes of my comrades/friends/family members. But when I'm in the presence of someone new I have to over analyse every sentence I'm about to utter to make sure it's suitable for the situation. Of course in a job interview this is hard, as I'm expected to seem professional and be up to the challenge of answering these questions in a timely manner.

It's important to gloss over certain details in job interviews too. For example; in the interview I had the other day the interviewer asked; “What do you get up to outside of work?” A simple question, the simple answer is; “Drinking large quantities of alcohol, smoking marijuana, illegally downloading films/music and writing hate-filled rants on random subjects from Religion to Capitalism.” As I'd bothered to shower, iron a shirt and wear a suit for this interview [yes, I did “Suit Up!”], I wasn't going to say that. Instead my mind went into a spasm attempting to grasp at any half-believable lie I could spout out of my mouth. In the end I went with; “Go out with my girlfriend, to the cinema or a meal, maybe sometimes to the pub for a drink.” I think in the confusion I actually said 'girlfriends' instead of 'girlfriend', making me look like some ubber-cool mack-daddy-pimp [the proof that I'm not an ubber-cool mack-daddy-pimp, is in the fact I've just written 'ubber-cool mack-daddy-pimp'].

Of course in the interview the subject matter of my University studies [; Media Studies] came up. I've talked about this many times before with people and it always seems to go down the same way. I tell people the aspects I liked; writing, print production [magazine/website design] and the aspects I wasn't too fond on; broadcast production [making a TV show] and all that boring shit [semiotics – don't bother researching it, unless you're an insomniac, because semiotics is the cure]. Then people ask what I'd like to do with what I learned, my answer is; “I'd like to write.” to which they always respond; “So you want to be a journalist?” [honestly, 100% of the time this is the follow up question] to which I have to say; “No, I'd like to write for TV, radio or maybe a magazine.” This is the point when facial expressions change. When people think I'm going to be a journalist they seem filled with hope for me, like there's a chance I could actually do it, when I shoot that idea down and explain my actual dreams, people seem to dismiss me as some kind of lunatic. It's like they think anyone can be a journalist, just walk into a newspaper's head office, get a job and start churning out propaganda for whichever tabloid/broadsheet you've aligned yourself with. But when I express my ambition to write for TV people assume I'm just some fucking idiot that has no idea what the fuck I'm chatting about. This of course happened in the interview. There was a few seconds of uncomfortable silence. The interviewer than asked me if I'd had anything published, I haven't but I was tempted to tell her about My Blog, then I quickly decided not to mention it. Although I'm extremely proud of my Blog, the content of it is not going to appeal to a future employer.

The fact is interviews are all about talking yourself up, making yourself out to be better than anyone else applying for the job, acting like your shit doesn't stink. Well guess what; my shit does stink. I've never been one for bigging myself up. I'm more about tearing other people down to the point that they're so low I just seem better because I'm still at the same level. There were plenty of applicants for this job I was going for. If the interview had been conducted in a room with everyone that applied, I'd have happily torn them all to pieces to make myself out to be the best one for the job. But sadly it doesn't work that way, instead the biggest shit talker will more than likely get the position. But congratulations to them, because they have learned how to play the game.

Usually I'd compile a list of helpful tips to aid anyone in interviewing techniques, but sadly I have no knowledge of this subject matter, well not enough to put a list together. So you're on your own, sorry.