Update: Job Search, Missing You, Bracelet & Ghost Plushie Backpack

I wonder if I can write what I wanted to earlier or yesterday, I am mentally exhausted. I do not recall ever being this permanently tired. My workplace is completely draining me, but not because of the workload. That is the one thing that I can handle. It is the politics, and every single time the HR lady and Works Manager talk in the boardroom, the atmosphere makes everyone think that they are going to get sacked on the spot, because that has been happening a fair bit lately. You are constantly left thinking, “Am I next?” and Gemini has become the HR lady’s best friend. All of the written warnings and new policies come straight from there (they are all written in America English and I used both ChatGPT and Gemini, and I can clearly identify the writing style from Gemini, in exactly the same way that someone would notice my writing style compared to a colleague or friend). In fact, the HR lady made me so mentally unstable that the doctors told me to take a week off work. I can’t afford to take a week unpaid, but I did take off two days (the last Monday and Tuesday of the last full week of August). The doctor that I spoke to over the phone was incredibly unhelpful. He said take a week off work, as you can self-certify for seven days. He said that if I continue to struggle at work, they will put me on incredibly strong anti-depressants, so that I no longer feel anything. I don’t want that. I like having emotions. I spoke to the Works Manager about it, when he did my return-to-work and he said they just make you constantly drowsy and you literally feel absolutely no emotion at all.
          I was lucky enough to get a job interview on Thursday afternoon for a Business Support role. I have never tried so hard for a job interview before. I researched and had ChatGPT help me work on possible questions that they could ask me and I hand wrote out four whole pages of notes, and I came up with five questions to ask them. Oh and the recruiter said there was going to be a numerous and literacy exam, so I had it give me percentages and ratios that they could, potentially ask me. The interview was very weird. They only asked me to give a brief overview of my career history and that was it. It was more of a personality based interview. The literacy questions were easy, but the numeracy questions were for babies – what is 10 + 15, 30 – 12, 6 * 4, if one tin of paint costs £5, how much do 3 tins of paint cost, and if you start work at 08:30am and leave work at 04:30pm how many hours did you work. Well, I found out yesterday evening that I didn’t get the job. Not because I wasn’t good enough. I was apparently the candidate with the most and strongest experience. They didn’t hire me in case I wouldn’t react well if a colleague shouted at me. Hello! Why didn’t you ask me how I cope with conflict in the work place or if I have handles difficult personalities before? Guess what? I worked at a solicitors for four and a half years. I got shouted at, swore at, told that I was pathetic and didn’t deserve my job. I was told regularly that I have the world’s most annoying voice and if clients hear me speak then I would lose the company business, and that they had hired people with an annoying voice before, but the difference between them and me is that people actually liked the previous person. And guess what again? They hired a guy. Despite this being incredibly sexist, most men do not stay in administration roles longer than six months. They progress. You didn’t ask, “Where do you see yourself in five years?” like everyone else does. Because I saw the guy who you hired. He is a cocky guy in his mid-twenties, who very likely lacks attention to detail, will smooth talk his way to a higher position, make lots of mistakes, but you ill keep him, because you are a flirt and you like how he speaks to you. However, you will need a new administrator.
          On the way to my interview, my brain imagined my ex-partner hugging me. It really made me smile, and it gave the confidence that I needed to get through the interview.

          My doctors appointment on Friday was completely pointless. Yes, he said I don’t need antidepressants, but he also made me feel like my current situation is all my fault. He said to take two weeks off work, unpaid. I said I can’t. One) HR will say that I am not mentally capable of my job and sack me and two) I need income in order to pay my mortgage and bills. The doctor said to look for a part time job. Again, I said I can’t. I have a mortgage, insurance, council tax and utility bills to pay. He said, “You should have thought of that before you bought yourself somewhere.” Yes, I know that a lot of autistic females only work part time, as their husband earns enough money for the both of them, but one) if I had a partner I would never make them have to be the sole provider so that I didn’t have to struggle and two) not having a partner isn’t my personal choice. I want a relationship, to be married, to have special anniversary years, to have known each other more than half of our lives. I am just not lucky enough to have ever met someone that wants that with me - and it’s not through lack of trying. Even the doctor agreed that it was too late to make that happen. I’m always going to struggle, because I need a full time job, in order to pay my mortgage, tax and bills. I don’t understand what else I am supposed to do. It isn’t my fault I am stuck at a company with incredibly low morale, the managers admit daily that they hate the place and want to leave, one manager admits to applying to other jobs daily, a handful of people cry at their desks, because the atmosphere makes everyone fear for their jobs and HR gloats that she loves the power that she has over people and the thrill that she gets from sacking people. She has sacked 8 people in less than a year and three others have resigned. The HR lady exclaimed throughout the day, “Ooow, I love it!” I am trying to leave. I really, really am. I am applying to jobs with my exact same job title and am getting a no back within an hour.
          I really wanted to find the time to write up the dream that I had about a week ago. I did start, but I scribbled too many parts out. Then I wrote it out again yesterday, when I was in a teeny-tiny bit of a better mood, because I thought that I might be leaving my workplace, but then it got wet on the way home, and some of the writing smudged, and I spent last night applying to 14 jobs and another one this morning. I had wanted to take a picture of my writing, and have Gemini translate it into text, which it has done wonderfully before. It even tells me that my handwriting is incredibly clear and easy to read! I haven’t had the mental energy to re-write it or type it. Nor have I really found the time to. I am typing little bits of this in between answering my emails, because the middle day of the month is always the slowest. So far, only three hours have passed, and it really feels like five should have, because it feels like it should be lunch time. How is it only 10:38am?
          I really wanted to reach out to my ex-partner to ask if his is okay, but I know that I can’t. I miss the person that he was when we first met. I did not like the person that he became. Part of me hopes that the old him is still in there somewhere, but the scary realisation that the old him may no longer exist and the new version of him responds and makes me feel mentally unwell is too much of a risk to take. Maybe the person that I met was the person that he thought he wanted to be at the time. Relationships are incredibly hard work, but when someone puts in 180% of the effort, when the other person only puts 20%, and to be met with, “There isn’t any point in texting you, because we just say the same thing,” when I communicate with the same level of effort is completely heartbreaking. I was never after a lot, just the bare minimum of communication for a relationship to work. You can’t treat the communication of a long-distance relationship in the same way that you can if you live together. If you want the low-level no-technology check-in of an in-person relationship, but you do not see each other to experience the none-spoken communication, there isn’t anything left. I really do miss the old you. I want to send him a cuddle. I know I told him that I couldn’t cope and I had to stop talking to him, and it is true. The situationship style of communicating makes an non-anxious person anxious, so for someone who struggles, it makes me mentally unstable, and I can’t have someone in control of me like that. I do not want that version of him back, and if that is the only version that exists, then I do not want to hear from him ever again,
          I had to clear my cubbyhole out for the water meter to be replaced (I use too little water, and they had to fit me with a meter that I can’t alter, despite me not doing that, but they thought that I was). While moving everything out, I found the box of my ex-partner’s things. They are things I had bought for him that I never got to give him, presents that I did give him that he left at mine, and things that he gifted me. I want to hold onto them, in case there is a way that we can be friends. I know he very likely has someone new (and from my experience of people moving on so fast, he is probably already lives with his new partner and is engaged by now, because everyone moves on that quickly after how slow I take things) and I would never want to interfere with his deserved happily ever after. It doesn’t mean that I don’t want to ever rule out us begin friends one day.
          The water meter replacement went relatively smoothly, in the end. It was a good thing that I stood at the window from 7:45am until he turned up at 11:15am, because the engineer drove an electric van (so it was silent) he did not phone before hand or when he arrived (like I was told they would) and he would not have been able to contact time, because the intercom doesn’t work, and I have paid a £125 bill for the intercom to be looked at, but no one ever came. Anyways,  the engineer was very smiley and polite. In fact, it has just occurred to me that he reminds me exactly of the woodman from ‘Hoodwikned.’ I asked him if the meter was broken, but he just replied that it was old. He cleaned up after himself, he had blue roll with him, to ensure he did not leave a mess, and he made sure that my water was working again, before leaving. I think I am now supposed to take a meter reading every fortnight, for a while, so that they can check my water usage. Well, since Saturday morning, I still have not got to number 1 yet, I am still in the decimal numbers.
          I had a rather huge argument with someone last week regarding invisible disabilities. This person said that if you have a physical disability, you must have a walking stick, so that fully abled people know whether you truly are disabled or not. I have never had such a fully blown argument with a person in all of my life. I can’t believe some people do not understand how discriminatory they are being. They wouldn’t like it if whatever medication they might be taking was forced to flash above their head for the world to see. It is none of your business whether someone has a disability or not.
          Today has gone by so incredibly slowly. The office is uncomfortably warm too. And why isn’t it raining? I thought it was supposed to rain for the whole of September. Now there will be people everywhere on my walk home and loads of screaming kids in the estate off my road.
          Vic was back at work today. He is one of the warehouse colleagues and has just had two weeks holiday in Turkey. I was at the airport, with Darren, when Vic flew out and me and Snuffles waved to him. He is in his 70s and was worried that might be his last holiday, because he is losing his vision. I have known Vic since the day I started at my job and he was always the one that I would talk to or confide in. He went part time last year in the summer, so he only works from 7:30am until 12:30pm on Tuesdays to Thursdays now. He has always said that I am the unluckiest person that he knows. He jokes that I must have been Meg, Hades assistant, in Disney’s Hercules, in a past life, as I must have made a deal with Hades and I now am cursed with bad luck. He bought me a bracelet on holiday; he said it is the Turkish evil eye and will ward off the bad luck for me, which I thought was incredibly sweet of him.

 

           I applied to 14 jobs last night, one this morning before I even left for work (that one I am most excited about. It is to work at the café/bar that I used to go to with my ex-partner. I remember telling him this time last year that I thought I could do it, and I have just applied to a 48 hour week job there). I heard from a recruiter today, who has recommended me a brand new job that she was just handed this morning, which I have looked through. Bartley Green is kind of get-able, so I am applying to their Sourcing Administrator. I find it funny that I had an automated rejection email this morning to a job that is literally my current job title, but I can be recommended to apply to a job that I only have transferable skills in and it isn’t really anything like my current job.
          Oh and completely off topic, there was a lady walking in front of me, part of the way home, and she had an incredibly cute, fluffy ghost backpack. I had to take a picture of it, because I love it so much. I have no idea if I might be able to find one… but knowing me, I would be too scared to use it, as I wouldn’t want to get it ruined or dirty.

 

 

- Josie -

Dream 20.08.2026 - Jane in Arcturus High

(Josie Sayz: I finally got around the writing the dream that I had just over a couple of weeks ago. I was wearing my current uniform, holding the keys to an old job, while using them to unlock the doors to my secondary school… and this seemed a completely normal thing to do. However, I kept bumping into my ex everywhere, and I was scared that he would think that I was following him, when I wasn’t. Oh, and I have written all of this as a part of my Jane Chronicles series.)

 

A fast-paced, soft thud vibrated the ground. Elongated shadows engulfed her. As the sun attempted to creep over the horizon, her path lightening enough to see where she was going. Wind gusted around her. The red head clawed her fingers through her flailing fringe and clipped it back against her temple. Tugging at the cuffs of her siren factory fleece, Jane increased her pace down the dark and dreary streets.

Keeping her head low, Jane focused on the path ahead. She sidestepped a loose slab and strode over several puddles. A pair of shoes came into focus. Flickering her sight up, Jane felt her cheeks burn a deep scarlet, as a familiar person crossed her path. A stern daggered glare on the stubbled face, of her ex-partner, James, burned into her vision. Forcing a swallow, Jane returned her sight to her shoes and increased her pace. ‘He seemed so angry with me,’ Jane worried, as she kept her head down. ‘I didn’t mean to see him on my walk to work. I didn’t do it on purpose,’ she told herself. The corner of her eyes glanced to her left, in the direction he was plodding. His silhouette grew smaller. Lowering her shoulders, Jane released a breath that she had not realised she was holding.

The dark night sky brightened to an illuminous blue, as she arrived at her destination. Towering above her, twenty, six-foot tall windows lined the ground floor of the first half of the building before her. Protruding from its centre, a six-story high, cylindrical tower glistened against the glow of the rising sun. As Jane neared the centre of the building, the tower’s black brick work gleamed, as though sparkles of precious minerals were lodged inside the stone structure. To the left of the entrance way lay another stretch of twenty, six-foot tall windows blocking out the symmetrical structure of the building,

Pulling out a ring of keys from her pocket, Jane looked down at the set in her hand. Multiple chub keys were wrapped in a piece of paper, each highlighted in a different colour, and were sellotaped to the stem. Two other chub keys, one brass, the other silver, in colour, remained uncoloured, as did two yale keys. A smirk poked into the corner of Jane’s mouth. ‘These are the keys from ‘The Neverlandian News’ office that I used to work at.’ As she approached the front door, Jane looked up at the sign: ‘Arcturus High School’. Her right hand moved by itself, inserting the correct key into the lock. The front door opened.

Unlocking the front door to Arcturus High’s main entrance, with her keys to ‘The Neverlandian News’ office, while wearing her siren factory uniform, Jane arched her head around at her surroundings. To her left, the same cobalt chairs that she remembered sat in the receptionist area, just as they had done over twenty years ago. The receptionist's hatch was still the same wooden board, as it always had been. To her right, a photographic collage of year groups, classes and teachers, throughout the ages, decorated the noticeboard.

Stepping through the reception area, Jane let herself into the main school corridor. A deep admiral blue carpet, with slate-grey flecks lined the floors, complete with chewing gum stained blobs. Jane's eyes danced with a soft flutter, from left to right, as she observed her surroundings. The main school hall entrance remained opposite the reception area. Along the corridor, to her left, lay empty classrooms, and to her right was the teacher toilets, the staircase, the Drama Studio, and then the courtyard leading towards the boys locker area. A soft smirk prodded into the right corner of her cheek. 'Just as I remember it,' she mused.

With the ring of keys in her hand, Jane unlocked the side entrance to the building. Then, she traversed towards the back of the school, trapsing through the science department corridor. A tingle emanated from her chest, as she passed the marble staircase, then crossed over the courtyard and towards the canteen. Here, the carpet changed to a deep bottle green and the lighting overhead grew ominous. A small shudder crept up her spine. ‘There are a lot of dark memories attached to this corridor,’ Jane remembered, as she reminisced of her time at Arcturus High.

A small stroll down the PE and library corridor led Jane back around the school in a large circle. Ending her main door unlocking duty at the last front entrance, Jane unlocked the English corridor’s entrance and made her way up the staircase.

Chatter began to build, as students made their way inside. Bodies bustled about, bumping into one another. A soft puff of air exhaled through Jane's nostrils, as a warmth spread from her chest. 'Who would have thought a buzzing building full of teenagers would spark a warm memory,' Jane mused, as she retraced the steps of her childhood. The right corner of her mouth prodded into her cheek, as the red head climbed the steps of the English corridor. Glancing into each classroom window, as she walked by, the warm tingle spread. 'It hasn't changed a bit'.

The floor, underfoot, vibrated, as herds of teenagers stampeded down the floor below. As Jane approached the corridor containing the year group noticeboards, she slowed her stride to admire them. The same five colours that represented the five year groups, from twenty years ago, still remained. A pastel sapphire-blue outlined the year sevens’ notice board. A soft blush represented year eight. Year nine were met with a cheerful shamrock green. The bright dandelion yellow, with a hint of metallic, still reminded Jane of gold. And last amongst the noticeboards was the iridescent glow of the platinum-snow.

Returning her attention to the corridor ahead, the colour drained from Jane's face. The dark, stubbled hair. The shuffled walk. The daggered glare. Jane’s heart dropped to her stomach. ‘James… again?’ As a fierce thumping beat in her chest, Jane’s feet rooted to the spot. ‘Oh no!’ she cried to herself. ‘James is going to think that I’m following him. I’m not!’ Lowering her head to her PVC charcoal dolly shoes, Jane powerwalked into the modern foreign languages corridor. ‘What on earth is James doing inside Arcturus High?!’ Jane cried to herself. ‘I didn’t see him on purpose. I didn’t see him on purpose. I didn’t see him on purpose,’ she repeated to herself over and over again, as she peered into the next corridor. Students were already lining up outside of their IT classrooms.

Turning back on her heels, Jane followed some students inside the end modern foreign language classroom and took a seat at the back of the room. A cheerful, warm, robust lady, with a nest of greying blonde hair stood at the front of the classroom. “Guten Morgen, Frau Burgman,“ announced the students in a monotone singsong tone. Beaming to herself, Jane joined in, as a flurry of warm memories in Frau Burgman’s classroom fluttered to the front of her mind.

“Heute ist Donnerstag, der 20. August. Heute werde ich deine Lieblingsfarbe erfahren,“ Frau Burgman addressed the class. A warm grin stretched from ear to ear across Jane’s face, as this was one of her favourite sentences to learn, way back when she was in Frau Burgman’s classroom. “James, was ist deine Lieblingsfarbe?”

Jane blinked hard in disbelief. The stubbled, dark hair on the head of the male sat in front of her. Lines puckered Jane’s forehead. Stretching her spine as tall as she could, Jane peered down over the person in front of her’s shoulder. The markings of a stickman holding a rainbow was tattooed to his left wrist. The icy shudder that Jane had felt moments earlier, down the corridor, returned. ‘No!’ Jane cried to herself. ‘Not James again.’ As if James could read Jane’s thoughts, he threw his head over his shoulder, snarled his nose and daggered his eyebrows.

Then I woke up.

- Josie -

Diamond Paintings

(Josie Sayz: I have completed three of my eight diamond paintings. The aeroplane is for Darren, as he takes me plane spotting every Sunday. The German Shepherds are for Tracey H, as this is the breed of dog that she has. The French Bulldog is for Tracey C, as this was her daughter’s dog, and I believe she used to own one years ago too.

And finally some positive news, I have an interview next week on Thursday. Okay, so I have had an interview at almost every single company in the entire world, at this point, and I hardly ever get the job. I was once told by a company that did not choose to hire me that if they could employ me based on me having a heart of gold then they would have done. That lady is where my line, “When having a heart of gold isn’t good enough, write your own happily ever after,” comes from. But still, I actually have an interview. It is only for another really small manufacturing company. The manufacture the coatings for mechanics in modern day planes and old steam trains. It has to be better than a company who only care that you exist if you have a partner or a child, and who constantly accuse me of spreading HR information to the manufacturers.
          The manufacturers know more HR gossip than I do, and I sit next to the HR lady. I found out from the manufacturers today that someone is suing the company, they have experience in suing companies and the most immature bimbo I have ever had the indecency of meeting is attending the court case as backup for the person suing the company. This is the same bimbo who thinks that the word sausage is spelt, “sossig” and who I had to explain to her how her body will know not to give birth to a worm or a cat or a dog, when her and her fiancé decide to have a baby. People with such a low IQ one) should never have children, but two) really do not deserve to have a job.
          I am not really intelligent. My IQ is 136. I dated someone with an IQ of 154. I have also dated someone who thought that they could correct my comma placements, when they were definitely incorrect. There are very specific places that commas go. There is no arguing about it. Different people cannot be correct. If you live in the UK, you follow the Oxford comma, in addition to regular grammatical and structural commas. Every clause has a comma. Every unnecessary word requires commas. Lists require commas. I think before you date someone, couples are required to learn their future spouse’s IQ. Some people obviously don’t mind dating someone who has no idea how to cook anything that isn’t a microwave meal, doesn’t know how to wash clothes, change a bed sheet or even look after themselves, but people like me cannot abide those of low intelligence. I know I am not particularly intellectual, but at least I can hold a somewhat decent sophisticated conversation.

Anyway, rant over. Here are my diamond paintings so far…)

 

 

 

 

 - Josie -