Another day, another dollar, and in order to earn my pittance, another early morning. It was dark outside when I strolled down the hil. On my left was the Old College site, looking a little forlorn behind its white painted plywood fence behind the impromptu hedge of brambles and discarded rubbish.

I always remain astounded by how quickly trees emerge from the seed. There's a small one that's growing just the other side of that white fence, only a year or two old. Birds have nested in it and as I walked by, one resident gave a merry chirp. Good morning to you too little birdie, but honestly you're better off staying quiet this close to a main road.

Talking about old buiildings, I see in the local paper that the owner of the Mechanics Institute (A large and famous railway social facility now disused) is again a matter of controversy. Never has one building proven so difficult to repair or indeed come to a decision about its future. The Council have given the owner three months to carry out essential repair work or else.

Personally, I doubt it will make any difference whatsoever. They'll still be arguing about the sites future when the rotten edifice finally collapses.

Oh No My Head's Come Off

I was working by a gangway when I noticed one young lady from the ground floor pushing a replenishment trolley through the narrow gap between piles of cardboard boxes in the overflow area. To be frank, she was a typical woman driver and failed completely to negotiate the obstacle, but did not do anything worse than come to an abrupt halt. If that had been a bloke, whole piles of cartons would have been falling everywhere. Trust me. I do things like that all the time.

"Oooh" She said. A little embarrassed by the scrape and noticing my amusement, she patted her head. Yep. Still attached. There are times when you really cannot help laughing.

Red Tape and Red Faces

The smile was well and truly wiped off my face later that afternoon. I received a letter from HM Customs and Excise telling me my benefits had finished and please find enclosed my P45 (for foreigners, that's a document telling your next employer how much tax you're liable for). What!!!!

Needless to say I was furious and began the usual round of visits to offices shaking fists and demanding to know why my payments had stopped. I've since been assurred that they haven't, but that for tax reasons the government don't want to pay me benefits on placement and prefer to apply a training premium.

What it actually means is that whilst on placement I'm officially off the dole. In other words, the government is hiding long term jobless people in the workplace, thirteen weeks at a time. So my tip is to laugh out loud when the government release jobless figures in the news. You might as well. The government is laughing at us.