It's that time... and it came around quickly. Getting towards the end of my degree means it's time to start looking at jobs but I need a newly qualified nursing job that can provide a preceptorship and so really that means a hospital. You can go to community care as a newly qualified but I think acute care would suit me better to start off and as I don't want to move too far out of the area just at the moment there are three hospitals nearby to choose from: the Norfolk & Norwich (where I already work), the James Paget or the Queen Elizabeth. I'll have to move either way to a new house but I didn't really fancy moving to Kings Lynn so I only applied to the James Paget and the Norfolk & Norwich where I requested from both the respiratory wards. But when you're newly qualified you don't exactly get to pick... you apply to the trust and they assign you a job where they have spaces, that doesn't mean you can't ask but it doesn't mean you'll get. Also some areas in some trusts you can't go as a newly qualified.
Anyway, that aside, it's job interview time and this month I have both... well aren't I lucky. I don't like job interviews, they're so formal and scripted. But what I hate most is the interview clothes. I think it'd be far more telling if you asked everyone to arrive dressed comfortably, you could get all sorts of information from that. I refuse to wear a suit because a) nurses wear uniforms, I am not ever going to wear a suit to work b) I am not buying a suit to impress someone, if that's what gets me a job then I don't want the job c) they remind of 80s yuppies. I'm just not a suit person. But then what do you wear? I have black trousers or a black skirt, so I thought ok, I'll just buy a blouse. Naive.
So I set off into the city - here was my criteria for a blouse: cannot be white (don't want to look like a waitress), cannot be black (don't want to look like a ninja), cannot be slutty. Now I don't think that's asking too much is it? I went into approximately 12 shops looking for office wear of any description. The smart shirts were too short... like belly button short. And all the others were black white or see through! There were literally hundreds of different coloured pastel see through blouses or grey suit dresses with 80s shoulder pads in (ew!). I asked a manager in Debenhams if they sold any non see through shirts and after looking round for 5 minutes with me he concluded no... they had no shirts that were non see through... but that if I got a see through one it might help my interview, what sort of job was it? Nursing? Oh...maybe not then.... Uhhhhh you think?
I had almost given up when I went into a mens suit shop and said to the lady at the check out, I know you sell mens shirts here but where can I go where I can find women's shirts? She said she just wore t -shirts under her suit... but had I tried BHS?
British Home Stores I could kiss you! It was literally the only place that had sensible office wear that wasn't slutty or hideous and in the end I settled on a nice stripey dress and black crepe jacket. Thank you BHS, my saviour.
Anyways so my dear chum Sarah (who was also interviewing at James Paget) and I decided to make a little day out of it and after our interviews which were luckily scheduled for the same time and day we went for a little day out to Great Yarmouth where we had fish and chips.
And then we went to the arcades (yaaaayyyy).
It was a week day off season so it was just us and our little mate here but soon after we were joined in the arcade by a butch looking lady (I think it was a lady?) in a stylish Halls Soother fleece. Why not eh?
We saw our prizes, you have to select the 2p machines carefully, you need to go for prizes that are not too heavy or worth too much because you are never going to win those but these little beauties were right on the edge.
BAM, won it.
Then we had a wander about Yarmouth in the tat shops.
I do love tat.
Some of the tat was worrying though... surely people no one thinks an inflatable doll for £19.99 is going to look like that picture on the box?? Also could anyone really take that to the til to pay and not die of embarrassment on the way? 3 love passages? Bleurgh.
