You Are Being Unreasonable - 096 - Misremembering Vimto as 'Vimpto' and the strangest job application process

Episode Date: March 18, 2021

"Where did the Stacys go?" Enjoy this episode of You Are Being Unreasonable... or else. This week we ask if '... or else' is a fun, flirty thing to text or a weird threat, whether you need to tell people where you work as part of a job application, whether people who have been furloughed need to be more productive when they return to work, and we discuss the Mandela Effect, a term which should refer to being a revolutionary anti-racism activist and pioneering reconciliatory statesman but actually refers to slightly misremembering trivial things.

Hello, driving on drugs feels better when their prescription. All I know, the world looks beautiful, the world looks so damn beautiful. I feel fantastic, and I never felt as good as how I do right now, except for maybe when I think about I felt that day, when I felt the way that I do right now, right now. I feel fantastic, and I never felt as good as how I do right now, except for maybe when I think about I felt that day, when I felt the way that I do right now.

Hello, welcome to you are being unreasonable. about people being unreasonable on mumsnet.com with me, Helms. And me, Simon. What's up, Simon? All right. How are you? Yeah. Tough week for women in the UK.

Yeah, it's being shit. Being really shit. Which has made trying to find lighthearted threads. A little challenging, but here we are. Here we are. We're recording this on Sunday, the 14th. So, by the time this comes out, I dread to think what might have happened. With that, should we just launching?

I've played a police report. Well, maybe, maybe. You have a level of optimism that I've long since. had battered out of me by patriarchy. Let's go. Am I being unreasonable, desired salary? No, you've got to state your needs, state your desires. Am I being unreasonable to have collected stamps in my analogue childhood?

No. Didn't everyone have analogue childhoods? Except computer programs. I was simply uploaded to the cloud until I was 18 to get out of my parents' hair. It's a good service. Am I being unreasonable to wonder why my DH is downplaying my injury? Sounds like a gaslighting prick And Amma Being Unreasonable

What's you eating tonight? Chew eating tonight What's you eating tonight? What's that some soup? Is that some celery soup? What is that? You get some celery soup, girl. No.

Should we do a thread? Yes. Am I being unreasonable? The Mandela Effect. Has anyone experienced it? I'm currently sending my head backwards and forwards because I thought Vimpto. So shall we explain the Mandela effect?

Yeah, you look like you've got a cross to bear here, an axe to grind. An axe to grind. Go on. I just think the Mandela effect should refer to years of activist struggle to free the people of your country, rather than remembering something wrong. I just don't think it's a great use of Nelson Mandela's name. What about that of limp, the freedom fighter, the activist who literally went to prison for his beliefs and his struggle, and is now becoming best known for misremembering how big an opal

fruit pack it was or something. People getting needlessly angry about the colour of Walker's crisp packets. It should be the Walker's effect. That's the axe to I think it's a disrespectful name to Nelson Mandela. But the effect is, this is about memory, right? It's about when you have false memories of things that happened. And the people who believe in the Mandela effect, stuff like that Nelson Mandela died in prison.

Yeah. And they remember that being reported. They remember that on the news and stuff. That one's been rapidly overtaken by people who think that Walker's changed the crisp colour packets. Yeah, people think that salt and vinegar used to be blue and cheese and onion used to be green. Yeah, and it was golden wonder guys, just grow up. There's no evidence of that. Anyway, so a lot of people believe that this is actually evidence of parallel worlds

and people having slipped between parallel universes and stuff like this. It's a thing. Yeah. It's a thing. There's a conference about it that takes place each year, although I guess it probably got cancelled last year. I hope so. that there's a conference where all these people come together and it's just conspiracy theorists and looms.

Yeah. Oh, I remember the Berenstein bears with an A. I remember the Berenstain bears. It's an American one, but that's a common one. And this person thinks Vimpto was Vimpto with a P. Yeah, which... It's just like the way that a lot of us string words together, an M sound followed by a T sound often comes across like it has a P there. No one thinks that historically hamsters were called hamsters.

that this is a big rodent conspiracy. When I was growing up, it was always called water. It wasn't water. It was always water. And then a few years ago, when I moved to London, suddenly I slipped into a parallel universe, where it was suddenly water. Yeah, and when I was growing up,

you couldn't be in a room without there being three people called Stacey there, and where did all the Stacey's go? Where did the Stacey's go? There's even a song about Stacey's mom. She had it going on. Yeah. Where's she?

Nobody knows. I think this one is so transparent. not even, like... This is just a mispronunciation. Yeah, they're not even saying they remember it differently. They're literally just saying, I thought it was called Vipto. This is a story worthy of the Leaser Tarbock show.

This is something you might phone in to a radio drive time show about. Like, oh, what are your misheard words? You've misheard. It's not the same. What other examples have the Fred come up with? We can debunk. Looney tunes was definitely loony tunes.

No, it wasn't. It was always loony tunes. Because it was based on Merry Melodies Which was the cartoon before that So Looney Tunes comes after that Two people are about crisps now No I remember clear as die

No you don't There's a podcast about this What's it called The Walker's Conspiracy or something Yeah There's a fairly good podcast Six episode limited series Looking into the Chris packet

The Walker's Chris Packets in the UK Yeah, it's nothing I swore blind that Muhammad Ali died in the early 2000s, which apparently is quite a common one. No, he didn't. My friends and I also collectively misremember 9-11, which is odd, given we were all together when the news broke live. We need more details on that one. Yeah, like what? What do you misremember?

Someone has said, I think the Mandela effect is when lots of people have the same false memory, which is a good point. That's true, that's true. Every time you've misremembered something, you can't be like, it's the Mandela effect. Where are my keys? It's a Vandela effect. Nelson Mandela took them. Got a new colleague and you're like, oh, um, love, could you? Sorry, your name is the Mandela effect.

Sorry, it's Winnie Mandela. She took my memories. I was surprised when Roddy Barker died about five years after I was sure. He'd already died. So lots of people just think people are dead. Yeah. Everyone just thinks people are dead. I killed Jimmy Greaves off the other day.

This is not the most. Mandela Effect. It's not a special effect for when you don't think about someone and therefore assume they are dead. The other day I wondered if David Blunkett was dead. I don't know why. I just wondered. So then I looked up David Blunkett. That's not an example of the Mandelaire effect. Every Blunkett was a cabinet member in Blair's cabinet? Yeah. Yeah, years ago. Yeah. But not dead. No, not dead. A lord. No. Thriving. He is thriving. They're not able to come up with very many. Everyone just thinks that people are dead. or they're uptight about crisps. Somebody has said,

in what way to the person who misremembered 9-11? Hannibal Lecter fucking absolutely did say hello, Clarice. I'm as sure as that. He says hello, Louise, in Hannibal, the film that came after

The Silence of the Lans, but he didn't say hello, Cloose in the Silence of the Lamp. Yeah, someone's just posted a clip, like, that's fine, but if it's not a clip from the right film,

that's irrelevant, isn't it? So he does say it. Someone said, Is the Mandela Effect where you misremember something? I could have sworn that Walker's Crisps used to have blue bags for salt,

and vinegar and green bags for cheese and onion. Then at some point, Walker switched the colours to how we know them since the 1990s. However, until the colours never got switched and have always been salt and vinegar of blue and cheese and onion, and then the sentence ends. Mandela girl. The ghost of Nelson Mandela. Someone has said that memory is ridiculously unreliable and it's hilarious how people who think they've entered an alternate universe rather than accept the truth bar memories are

unreliable and easy to manipulate. Well, no, this is it. This is the crux of it. They're just wrong, and you need to grow up and accept you're wrong, rather than the world around you is wrong. And also, some of these, like, they're not even misremembering things. Like this person said, I'm sure Worcestershire sauce used to be called Worcestersource, and I think that's just a thing. There's a different thing.

Some people just say, yeah, that's fine. I think the crisps are called Worcestershire flavour. Worcestershire? Worcestershire. Yeah, I mean, it makes no odds, doesn't it? Whatever. Like, come on, we all just use brand names. We're all just saying Liam Perrin.

anyway. I mean, lots of people are talking about who is or is not dead. And someone has said that the thing about Worcestershire sauce is a bit like saying Heinz tomato ketchup versus tomato sauce. And that's not the Nelson, Nelson, that's not the Mandela. That's not Nelson Mandela's fault. That's not Nelson Mandela's legacy. Nelson Mandela did not die for this. Uh, yeah, I mean, it's literally just crisps and who died. And that's, that's all it is. Someone says, I thought that Pikachu from Pokemon had a Black Tiff on his tail. Apparently that's quite common with the Mandela effect. Stop saying things to the Mandela effect. That is quite a common one, though. I have heard that, but he doesn't.

And it's probably just like one misprinted drawing that went out. Yeah, someone got some knockoff Pokemon cards. Yeah, early Pokemon, yeah, early Pokemon cards or whatever. Knock off down Woolwich Market. Yeah, no. Hand drawn. Hand drawn by a chancer. Now people are blaming Nelson Mandela. Freedom of nicer. The legacy he should have. move on. Are being unreasonable? Is this flirty? Is texting someone or else flirty?

In the context, it's opposite sex saying, I thought you were doing blank. Get it done. Or else? This is incomprehensible to me. Read it again. Is texting someone or else? Flirty?

So is texting someone or is it, is texting someone the words or else, flirt? You're struggling because you're looking at the screen and there's no punctuation. I struggled a lot. But then when I realized what was going on, I was like, this is a great. great question. It was the Mandela effect. It was the Mandela effect. It's when you read something about punctuation and you get confused, like Nelson Mandela did in prison. I think we need to be

mixing up our freedom fighters. There's a lot of Nelson Mandela to be carrying. We need someone else to be responsible for the Jerry Adams effect. I feel like that's when you're allowed to hear someone's voice. You can experience the Jerry Adams effect right now by turning off this podcast and deleting it. Or by listening to this podcast as this is not Jerry Adam's voice. The Jerry Adams effect is when you hear any voice that is not the voice of Jerry Adams. Wouldn't know, because we weren't allowed to hear it for so long. I don't know what he sounds like.

The question is, is texting someone or else, flirty? So if, and then they say, in context, it's the opposite sex saying, thought you were doing whatever. Get it done or else. So I think they're saying, is putting or else on the end of it a flirtatious thing to do rather than saying, I thought you were doing such and such. So I tell a friend to don't forget to be. bring the bread or else. Is that flirting? It's a question. Well, no, because is that how you use

or else? It would be bring the bread or else. Yeah, bring the bread or else. Yeah. Yeah, I think that's the question. So I'm texting a friend of the opposite sex, bring the bread or else. That's not how it works. There aren't too, yeah, doesn't. Yeah, okay, fine. You're texting. Is that flirty? Yeah. That's the question. No, that yeah was, we've got to the crux of the question. It wasn't me just declaring that it is. We can start to answer the question. I wouldn't have thought so. If you received a text from a friend,

and so you're a man, so if it was from a woman, a woman sends you a text, and it says, I thought you were talking about Jerry Adams, get it done, or else? Would you think you were being flirted with? No, it sounds like a fret.

It does, doesn't it? Especially when you put Jerry Adams in there. Well, I think that's actually quite bigoters. It's problematic is what that is. Fine. If someone said, I thought you were cleaning the windows, get it done or else. This entirely depends on context. Yeah, if they say get it done or else, and then with the or else, they do that big Catherine Hahn wink.

Yeah. The big wink from Wondervision. Yeah. Is that a good all along wink? A big mean wink. The big mean wink. Then, maybe. I wouldn't take kindly to someone flirting with me by saying or else.

No, it sounds like a threat. It does, doesn't it? It's not a very respectful way to speak to someone. Or else what? or else you'll sex with me. Because, like, without consent, that's a crime. That's a hideous crime and not a flirtation. Because I didn't bring the bread.

I just don't think that's ever appropriate. I can see a context in which it is flirting, but there's so little information here. What's the context? It's the context one in which you're already flirting and it's someone that you're already pursuing a sexual relationship with. Let's say you're flirting with someone over text and you say, I have to go now,

I need to clean the dog. Yeah. And then you text back. immediately. Then they say, I thought you were texting the cleaning the dog and get it done or else. So in the context of an already flirty conversation, it could be flirted. It sounds like you're saying the context has to be about cleaning a dog. No, that was an example. It's only flirting if they're cleaning the dog. That's an example. Okay. Yeah, so if you're already flirting, then if you're already flirting, then pretty much anything could be construed as flirting. Well, exactly.

That was what, yeah. But if the text before this one, says, I don't know, like... Let's do it. Text before this one says, never speak to me or my son again. Then it's different. So someone said very little info here. Could be flirty from what you say, yes.

And then they've said, Sorry, to explain more, D.H has said this to a female colleague, who there has been inappropriate things said to and from before. I hate it when you say things from someone. Yeah. The previous message have been deleted.

the go and do, blank or else? I honestly don't know if I'm overreacting time of the month, or am I right, thinking it's a bit flirtatious? Oh, okay, so it sounds like your husband has already been flirting with this person, so now, yeah, maybe. Maybe, it sounds like he's entered a sub-dom relationship, she's the dom over text. No, the DH has said to the colleague, or else. Oh, the DH is the dom. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, we need to be clear on the facts, otherwise it doesn't make any sense. It just seems odd that the other messages have been deleted. That seems like it would all make more sense if he hadn't deleted the previous string of nudes. If it's followed by or preceded by a nude, it's probably flirting.

I would hope so. It would be terrible, wouldn't it, if you sent someone a nude and you got a message back that was like, can you pick up some washing up liquid for the office? Or else. Like, oh, I put my boobs away. Put them away. I don't know. Maybe it's flirting. It's not very good flirting. I don't think this alone is flirting Yeah, someone said it depends Put the bins out, not flirty

I'd like to see you naked, flirty That's fair you flirting I think I'd like to see you naked As past Flirty That's into harassment territory Someone sidled up to you And they're like, I'd like to see you naked Put the bins out

Um I do want to know what the blank is She said, you're coming to help me With then something about work This person's terrible at writing She said, you're coming to help me with Then something about work Then he said, I thought you were doing, whatever it is, go get it done, or else.

I feel like now, if rewrote it down, it doesn't sound like any, this person cannot write. It doesn't sound like anything. No, it's got that right. This is nothing. It's not flirty, but it's really threatening and not at all appropriate. Yeah, absolutely. If my boss sent me a text, like, you need to write that application or else. I'm like, Jesus.

Rude. I've worked in some hostile environments, but no one's ever said or else. I know. That's too much. It is too much. It's not fun and flirty. No, not fun and flirty, bit threatening. Makes me worry about the state of the OP's relationship

that they've come to perceive this to be flirty. Maybe this man is bad in other ways. Got to have higher standards. Let's move on. Am I being unreasonable to complain about an employee's productivity after so long? I've employed someone for nearly seven years. Over the last year, my employee has been furloughed for periods due to our work decreasing in lockdown.

During these periods, I've carried out the work usually done by this staff member as my own usual workload has also been reduced. In doing so, it's become very apparent that this employee is somewhat slow at their work. I'm typically achieving two to three hours what normally takes them a full day. This is not a role that I've worked before this year, and so I had no real expectation of productivity, and was always very happy with their work. They joined us when we first opened the business, so it was very new to all of us. However, I'm now realising they really need to work faster, and that I'm paying more than twice

the wage I need in order to get the work done. But I'm finding this very hard to address, given they've been doing the job for so long, and until recently I've had no complaints. I must say they're exceptionally reliable, with mistakes being very few, not that I've made any either by working at a faster pace. I think they'd be mighty offended when I've raised concerns about their work,

given that until a year ago, I've never done their job, and they've been doing it for seven years. So, am I being unreasonable to bring this up when they return to work, or should I just accept it, as I should have realised earlier, that they work slowly.

So this person, Person A, works slowly, and person B, got a chance to do the job and did it quicker. And person B is now like They can be more productive Yeah It's a long shot Yeah

Is that postman Pat or Simon Sam Or Mr Ben show is Mr Ben is where Yeah so I guess I guess person A owns a costume shot And person B is faster I don't know Person A does this job

They've been put on furlough Because there's not enough of their work To keep somebody employed full time right now And so person B has picked up the limited amount of their work which is available and wonders why their full-time quantity of work takes longer. Seems to be the way I've interpreted it. Because there's fewer work all around. Right. Yeah. These aren't ordinary times. You just said they were put on furlough because they want enough work. So no wonder you're doing the work quicker. Because there's not as much work.

Right. There's so little of their work that you have put them on furlough. And so now you think... So you're not doing their work better or quicker. You're just doing less of it. less work because of the pandemic. Because of the pandemic. I'd be furious if I got put on furlough because there wasn't enough work for me. And then the person who picked up what little work of mine was left was like, I can't believe you're not working at three times at speed. I'm paying you too much.

Yeah, that's not great. I don't feel like on 80% of my wage the last year. Go to hell. Honestly, I would be so mad. No, I mean, this is bad. I just, they've been doing it for seven years. Okay, they might work more slowly than you. The other thing that I think I need to consider is this person owns this business, and so they're probably more invested in this.

If you've given them this much work and this person's managed to do all of their work in the time they've had available, then who cares, really? It's not their business. We have so many friends from small business owners who are like, why does my employee need to take toilet bricks? Why can't they go at home? Why doesn't my employee need to have a lunch break? Why don't they just eat a Mars bar while working? Why does my employee want to use a kitchen? Yeah, it's always small business, though, and it's trying to get around employment rights.

Yeah, and they make out that they're so important to the economy, but clearly their business is rubbish. Like, if your business lives or dies on whether or not your employees, allowed to have a wee occasionally, your business isn't viable. Yeah, it would help to know what the business is. Yeah, I had a look, and it doesn't ever really become apparent. They say that... Is it making biscuits? Is it McVitties? No, they say they provide services to an industry which has been badly affected by lots of. down so I imagine that they do some sort of outsource professional services for the hospitality

industry or something is what I'm imagining. Yeah, maybe they run secret cinema. Yeah, I mean, those people are baddies. They got all that money from the government to preserve secret cinema, the cultural institution for rich middle class people. Yeah, there's a really good episode of Trash Future podcast about that, isn't there? Is it? Yeah, I'd recommend it. I have to listen to that. Um, let's say they work for Secret Cinema. Okay. The employee is putting together, I don't know, the posters or whatever. I guess there's no posters, because it's a secret. The website.

Yeah. I don't know how you get a secret cinema ticket. I think maybe they could be the employee and it's their job to source all of the pointless props. So it's like the person who bought all of the umbrellas for that one or... Yeah, sure. They're buying a Deloian for a Back to the Future screening or whatever. Yeah, but...

There's definitely one evening a few years ago I was coming back home on the tube and there were a load of pricks dressed like Marty McFly. Like, you can't all be Marty McFly. There's only one mark. like you look fly. Well, maybe multiple if you go backwards and forwards. Maybe you can be multiple

multi-mic flies. Maybe that's the point. It doesn't change the fact that you look like pricks. Nothing can change that fact. Yeah, there was one that they did and it was a zombie film of some sort, can't remember,

and there were absolutely loads of people just roaming around North Greenwich Station in sort of bloodied scrubs. I'm like, what are you doing? This is terrible, terrible. We get a lot around North Greenwich anyway, because, like, Comic-Con and stuff are at the Excel, which is just across the river. So you get a lot of cosplayers.

Yeah, but they're not pricks. They're not pricks. No, they're going to a con. Yeah, like... I'm not going to Secret Cinema. You're only a prick if you go to Secret Cinema. Okay, yeah, so this person at Secret Cinema has picked up some work from someone who didn't have enough work to do, so whatever. Now they're like, why are they so slow?

Wah, wah, wah, wah, I'm paying them too much. But you paying them that much, has never had any impact on your. your business before or on your quality of life. So you're transparently being a prick. You really portrayed them as a baby there. You made out that they were a baby. Roasted. Yeah, absolutely roasted them. You did it. I would not roast a baby. It's actually very compassionate and caring person. The first year birthday party is the baby roast. You invite all the family and friends around and they all roast the baby. We said baby roast and Leon came in like, oh, what are we roasting a baby?

No, Leon, why not? You're a meme cat, you're a baddie. Mew, me, me, I've come to roast a baby. Someone said, I think it depends what the ultimate objective is. Do you want them to take on more work, in which case, when they return, start adding extra work? Sometimes people naturally slow down if there's no imminent deadlines or there's nothing else needed to be completed. Or do you feel the job could be done by employing someone to work less hours? This is a lot more difficult to handle and depend on contracts, employment legislation, etc.

Are you getting all the work done that you need to do? If so, no problem. Yeah. Can you afford to keep someone else on staff, to pay them, to keep their livelihood going? If so, no problem. Just chill out. No one needs to be productive 100% of the time. Yeah, absolutely.

And then they've come back and said, Ultimately, I'd be looking for them to finish their usual work by lunchtime, freeing them up to help in another department for a couple of hours in the afternoon, where we could really benefit from a bit more manpower, especially once lockdown is lifted. But I can't really afford to employ someone else in the current climate. Based on my experience of covering this job, it would be easily achievable. No, you can't just give someone twice as much work, half of it being in a team they've never worked in

because you did a bit of their job once during a pandemic. You can't as change their contract. No. Oh, so I had a job, like pretty much my first grown-up job was part-time, and they would quite often ask me to do stuff that was in no way relevant to my job, and I would say, like, that's not my job, I'm not going to do that, because I only had a finite amount of time. we all do. But then they'd be like, well, I don't

understand, why don't you just stay a bit later? I'm like, I work part time. You only pay me for part time. I'm not going to stay later to do work that is not my job. And at the time, I was seeing this terrible consultant at Accenture type. The kind of type we talked about last time. Yeah, exactly that.

The hypercapitalist alphas. Yeah, exactly that. They were big into Bitcoin, like that's too early to have been big into Bitcoin. I must have made a fortune of that, though. Nope. is why I'm getting into NFTs of getting in on the ground floor goodness me

they also built the universal credit calculator you know that doesn't work anyway so and I was like you know I've just outright said that's not my job I'm not going to do it and they were like oh I can't stand those not my job people they make life so much harder for the rest of us like no no

do you what makes life harder for the rest of you but that you don't say it's not my job also me not doing it harder for everyone else extra hours at the arts charity where I work Does it give you more universal credit calculators to build, does it? It's not impacting on your life. So, yeah, I feel like this person comes from that, like,

oh, no one should ever say it's not my job background, and I suspect their employee who's found that they've got enough work to fill maybe four days, and they just sort of long it out over five to collect a full-time paycheck, is very much going to say, it's not my job. Yeah, maybe you should be striving for a four-day working week, like we all should. Yeah, maybe. You can't just give people random work that's not their job. I would start with saying they need to help in the other department from 2pm every day and trial it for a month.

Can you do that? Can you be like, you need to help? No, that's changing someone's contract. If they can't manage that, then you may have to make their current role redundant and create a new one that's part-time, or a full-time one, which is part-old role and part-other work. This sounds illegal. Yeah. To be honest, after an initial shock, they may be happier having more work and the pressure that comes with it. Yeah, I love pressure.

Yeah. I love being under pressure, pushing down on me. pushing down on you. People on streets. People on the streets. And then a lot of people saying, you're obviously more senior than this person and you've made a point of climbing a ladder

and setting up a business, so you are probably motivated in a different way to them. Why don't you just leave it? Yeah. And then the OPs come back and said, there is much less work at the moment. I'm covering their job.

Working on it every other day, as well as my own job. So, oh, let's just give up. Less work. That's why they're a very little bit. Yeah, yeah, this is ridiculous. They're saying it's taking them like two days in a week to do the work of this other person. But that's because there's not enough work.

Let's do one more, shall we? Interviewer asking where I live. Am I being unreasonable? I had an interview today. During the interview, I was asked where I live. I didn't want to tell them my exact location in an interview setting. So I said, Buckinghamshire. The interviewer then said, where do you live in Buckinghamshire?

I then replied, I'm living in X village. It's not the one I live in. It's the next village five miles away. Then they said about giving my CV to their client. This involves using my CV details on their corporate paper and then sending it out to their client. In all honesty, I just sat there and thought, you have no right to give out my information

when you have not even made a job offer or even asked if it's okay to do that. They even asked me to detail information which I had told them I am prohibited from disclosing due to the nature of the work I have done in the past. As I went through an agency, they do not have my home address. It's the fact they thought they could just give out my details that got my backup and being unreasonable.

So this interviewer asked for details, like a CV and stuff. Yeah. Because they were applying for a job. Yeah. But because this person hasn't been offered a job, she's not willing to share the CV. Right. Because it has confidential information on it. But sharing a CV is like normal.

Yeah. Like when you're going through a job. Yeah. And putting in your address is pretty standard application forms. I'm really perplex about the back-to-front nature of this process. First you do an interview and then... When you send your CV? Then maybe you go.

get an offer. So when you go through recruitment consultants, very often they won't send you any meaningful information until they've phoned you. And sometimes they want to have a chat with you. Yeah. I wouldn't call it an interview. I'd call it a chat. Yeah. I mean, sometimes they do catch you off guard though and they talk at you for 40 minutes. Like you send them an email. They call you immediately. You're in the middle of something and they're like, so why are you the best candidate? Yeah. Sometimes you have a Zoom call that you thought was a chat, but it's more of an interview. Yeah. And you're wearing a t-shirt that says, bitch, please. No, that's not how it happens.

During the interview, they asked where they live. Yeah. So in an interview, I don't think I'd feel comfortable saying where I live, but I would just say, I don't feel comfortable saying that. Right. Or look at my CV or whatever. I wouldn't lie. Yeah.

I don't imagine they're saying, like, what is your home address? We want to come round. It sounds like chit-chat. Yeah, exactly. In the context of chit-chat, I think I would say. Yeah, sort of South London. Yeah. Yeah, I've had this.

Like, I was in a conference the other day, and it was people from all over the place, and someone was like, oh, yeah, and like, whereabouts are you at the moment? Everyone sort of went round and said vaguely where they were, and it was fine. But the guy facilitating was in Manchester, so while most of us were able to be like, oh, South London, oh, yeah, I'm just in Bristol. Got to Manchester, like, whereabouts in Manchester? Oh, Tameside, where? From the people in Manchester seemed a bit like, oh, goodness, is he going to come over?

I don't find out where. And that was a bit much. Yeah, that is a bit much. But I think he thought it was a bonding exercise. Yeah, so in the context of chit-chat, you'd say like, yeah, South London, been here a few years, blah-b-b-bough-boh. Yeah. If it was a formal interview question, I wouldn't be comfortable answering that. Competency-based.

How competent are you at living in the area that we want you to live in? Less important than ever now that a lot of people are working from home. Actually, that would get my backup. If they were really keen on knowing where I was, I would worry that it was a sign that they were about to drag me kicking and screaming into an office in an impractical location. See, that's what I mean. In that case, you might want to say, I'm not comfortable saying that. Yeah, yeah, but I'm still confused about, so they haven't shared the CV, but they've had the interview. And one of the interview questions is, where do you live?

And then they won't tell them. And then their CV has confidential information on it, so they don't want to do that. Why have they put confidential information on their CV? So they've got a reason not to share it until they've been offered the job. Yeah, I worked for the MOD. I was developing their secret weapons program. 15 years. Yeah, I was based in the secret location that the MOD hasn't disclosed yet, just off the coast of Scotland. It must be very challenging if you do work in one of those types of industries or sectors or whatever.

And then you try to get out. It's like, oh, I just worked in a little office in Vauxhall. Like, okay. I hear you. But, you know, tough. You shouldn't have been a spy then, should you? Yeah, I worked for a company that was a military contractor for a while when I was younger And there were limits to what you could sort of say and talk about Well, tough, you shouldn't have been to spy then So I don't know why I brought it up

I can't say what the limits were What about if I just ask you questions And you can give yes or no answers I really don't understand Like if you go through a recruitment agency They mess around with your CV so it's on their headed paper This all sounds like very normal going through a recruitment agency staff. It doesn't sound like an interview, for starters.

It sounds like a chat. Yeah. Then you sent your CV, which is normal. Yeah. And you do have to send your CV to get a job offer. Yeah. I'm afraid. The recruiter will be keen to share your CV with any client that you hope to have a job with, because otherwise...

You don't have to put your address on your CV. I don't think I do. My CV doesn't have my address. I don't think mine does. There's some contact details. Yeah. And if you don't want to share those, then I don't know, start your own business. Yes, employ someone on an exploitative contract.

Be your own boss. Someone has said it's quite normal when job hunting to give out your address or location. Can't see what the issue is. Is the client the people who you'd ultimately be working for? They'd probably go on and want to know where you live. I think the location is relevant. Someone said, Buckinghamshire is a big place. Your location is relevant in Lesterol is home-based.

I feel like it's up to them though. If they want to commute from the far end of Buckinghamshire to wherever it is, that's on them. I don't know. That doesn't seem entirely appropriate. If you want to be what jobs are heavily location-based, a fire lookout. Yeah. If you want to be a fire lookout, you need to live near where the fires are going to happen.

If you want to be a lighthouse keeper. Yeah, lighthouse keeper. You need to live in the lighthouse. Farmer. Yeah. Tied to the land. Tide to the land. Someone said, O.P., forgive me, but are you very young?

The O.P. is a child. A simple boy. The Ope is only 11. A little boy. Just before we started recording, I saw a picture of the deputy. Prime Minister of Poland, who looks like Vincent Adelman from Project Cossmann. He looks like a little boy. Yeah, someone said if the company is pitching for a project or a large piece of work, it's quite common to submit to see these are the team as part of the beard, at least it is in my sector.

It just, I don't know what's going on. Yeah, and then someone said, as someone in my early 20s, what are you insinuating? It doesn't sound like the OPE is very young. Young people are able to apply for jobs without needing the basics spelled out, thanks. Which is a good point. Yeah. Yeah, and then someone... People are more likely to be applying for more jobs.

Yeah, this is ridiculous. Lots of people are saying, this is a breach of GDPR. I don't think it is a breach of GDPR to ask for a CV if you go for the job. This is bad as when I worked in that place and wanted to ban the post room because of GDPR. The worst thing about GDPR is now everyone thinks they're some sort of data protection expert, and they're not. They've just heard some initials and they apply it to any situation that makes them feel a bit icky. That's absolutely a breach of GDPR.

not. It is. I think we need a new thing that we can all get hit off about and say it's that. I think we should start claiming everything's piracy. Yeah, we had the EU, we had GDPR. What if everything is NFTs or if it's on non-fungible tokens? How would that work? I'm sick of these fungible tokens. Only they were less fungible. This is terrible. Yeah, and then people are saying, it sounds like you're interviewing for a consulting firm and that's just what consultants do. So we're back to the point about consultants. Why, though? Terrible, terrible.

Should we do one more speed round? Yeah, let's do it. Am I being unreasonable to think a musician should know how to pronounce Bowie? I mean, it's difficult, isn't it? Is it Bowie or is it Bowie? Yeah, people ask me that every day. And every day I say, I don't care. I don't care.

Thanks no odds. Did we think about this before we got married? No, someone at our wedding, it was like... Someone at our wedding mentioned it. How are you going to pronounce it? And then we looked at each other like, oh, hope we say it the same way. Yeah, I don't know. We must have said it out loud, but I never thought about it.

I've only been half listening. It's very busy planning a wedding. Amma being unreasonable, annoying job search button. This is what that person needs, just to press the job search button. But you search for an annoying job. Press button for annoying job. Am I being unreasonable? Any hematologists here?

I'm not. They might be on mum's net. No, there are no responses to that. I can see it from the... It seems like the wrong forum. Seems like the wrong forum. Reddit slash R slash hematologist. Maybe you just go to a doctor.

If you feel that you would benefit from a hematologist's opinion, don't do it online. With that, should we call it a day? Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for listening. Thank you. I want to plug the Cynotopia podcast.

Yeah. Which is a film criticism podcast based in Edinburgh. In the March edition, I'm going to be on it. You? Yeah. Talking about Judas and the Black Messiah, the columnist, Preparations to be together for an unknown period of time and Palm Springs, the new Andy Sandberg film.

Amazing. So listen to that and listen to my opinion. Yeah, fan favourite Sremem and Bowie. Great. I fell behind on the admin on my linktra.orgia slash Helen Seelis Bowie. I'm in the latest how to be bad and it's amazing. It's beautiful. It's a scene about anger, which is something that is very close to my heart.

So go read that. Yeah. Great stuff. Great. Thanks for listening. Thank you. Bye. And I never felt as good as how I do right now,

except for maybe when I think of how I felt that day when I felt the way that I do right now, right now, right now.