Interview at Royal Exchange Buildings and 1.5 pints of beer

(7th October 2012 Signing on at 14:21)

My first proper contact with British Steel was before I went to University or sat my A Levels. I can’t remember when exactly it was, although I may be able to work it out. For some reason which isn’t really clear to me, I had decided that I wanted a sponsorship deal for going through University. This may have been because I fancied the money, but I think there was something else going on. Anyway, I wasn’t particularly fussy, so I applied to all the companies I could find who were sponsoring students taking degrees in the subjects I was interested in (that means Chemistry and Chemical Engineering). I know I got a fair number of interviews.

My interview for British Steel was in Middlesborough. Looking back, It was quite an adventure getting the train up there. Tube from Hatton Cross (I expect), train from Kings Cross up to Darlington and change there for the local train to Middlesborough.

I can remember looking out of the window at the industrial landscape from Darlington to Middlesborough. At the time, the buildings seemed huge. Enormous, corrugated iron sheds, with fierce glowing lights visible through gaps.

At that time the British Steel Offices where in Royal Exchange buildings which were very close to Middlesborough station. It was only a short walk.

I don’t remember much about the interview, but a couple of things stand out:

The interview as in two parts: an interview and then an aptitude test. The interview I can’t remember at all! The aptitude test was after lunch, and lunch had not been provided. I went out into town and visited a pub to get lunch. I was only just eighteen. The first pub had no food, neither had the second, and at the third they had pizza. So, that was lunch; three halve of beer (surely not three pints?) and a slice of pizza.

After lunch I had an aptitude test which included what I think was an IQ test, plus things involving doing tasks with both my right and left hands. Whatever the effects of the beer were, they weren’t too detrimental  because I got the job! 

Fifteen Minutes Writing

(Sunday 7^th October 2012 12:17)

I’ve got to put the potatoes on for lunch at 12:30. Okay, that isn’t exactly 15 minutes, but then cooking potatoes isn’t an exact science and neither is writing

.

This is the first time in a little while I’ve tried the “free association” writing exercises. I wonder if a quarter of an hour is long enough for anything interesting to surface.  Last night someone’s name came into my head. Someone I hadn’t had anything to do with for thirty-five years, and I decided to put the name into Google. It is an unusual name and it looks like they wrote a book in 1974! The name is unusual and the location matches. It’s surprising what can surface unexpectedly. It is doubly surprising what you can find when you combine what surfaces from the unconscious with the search power of Google (or the search engine of your choice of course).

That’s better! I can feel the muscles or pathways inside my mind starting to loosen up. It is getting easier to write. I know I have only allowed myself 15 minutes now, of which only five remain, but I will continue this in the afternoon. After a little while of stuck-ness, things are starting to move again. I shouldn’t expect things to be easy. Even small amounts of movement help. That is why I do these exercises. Write and write. There does not have to be a subject or a reason. Simply write to get it out of my system (whatever “it” is). I’m not sure if I even have a reader in mind. The reader does not have to be me, it does not have to be anybody. Keep going, keep writing. Something may emerge from the depths. Already I find the most surprising things. Some are good, some are less so. Just now, without warning or planning I managed to correct a little problem with had been irritating me for days. Now it is fixed. The mental energy it was using can be directed to something more useful.

(signing off 12:30)  

(signing on 13:28)

Okay, it’s no longer going to be fifteen minutes but it is going to be writing. Let’s see what happens. I just distracted myself by looking up Herman Miller chairs. They may be ergonomic and comfortable, but they are also very expensive. I don’t think I will be buying one of those for a while. Back to the writing, but thinking about ergonomics; I think I will take a bit more action about getting a footrest. I find that my posture is better when I have a footrest. That means that I write more easily even using the fairly basic (but fundamentally comfortable) chair that I’m using at the moment. On my next maintenance trip to Feltham I may collect the office chair that was left there. It was comfortable too. Even when new, I doubt it cost as much as a Herman Miller, and I bought it very second (or third) hand, many years ago.

The little bit of tidying I did in the kitchen was a real surprise. It came out of the blue. To one side of the hob there used to be an accumulation of spice bottles. It’s nice to have them handy, but even the most complicated recipe only ever used one or three. For no particular reason I looked in the cupboard beneath that section of the worktop. It was empty. A quick rummage upstairs and I found a plastic basket which fitted nicely into the cupboard. Now the spice bottles are in the basket in the cupboard and the work-surface is clear. It was only ever a minor irritation, but now it is gone and I feel good about it. Similarly, I’ve moved a laminator with has been sitting abandoned on the landing for months to a shelf in my study. A tiny change, but again it makes me feel good. I’m not a particularly tidy person but I like tidiness. It makes me feel comfortable. I don’t like clutter or noise. I’ve liked noise less since I became hard-of-hearing and I think that perhaps the dislike of auditory noise has spilled across into my dislike of visual clutter.

(pausing, to do the washing up: 13:46)

(Washing up done, restarting: 14:05)

While doing the washing up I started thinking about how one thing, or thought, leads to another. Better be careful about names. I’m not going to write down the name I looked up. It is too recognisable, if you recognise it! I don’t know why it came into my head. It certainly wasn’t really connected to anything I was doing or thinking about. That in turn has made me start to think about what I did when I was working for British Steel, in particular at Lakenby and Redcar. That is a period in my life when I was quite optimistic and excited by the prospects for the future. I liked the work I was doing and I liked the people I was working with. I was ambitious. I also liked where I was living. Yarm was, and is, an attractive little village. It’s not too far from the Teesside towns either. The only cloud on my horizon at that time was the economic situation (rather like now). It was clear that, right or wrong, British Steel was no longer going to receive the support it had been receiving and that meant that it was going to contract.  I have set aside titles elsewhere to write about things to do with British Steel. Perhaps I should go there now. Yes, that is what I will do. Continuing elsewhere.

(Ending 14:15 950 words, 1.5 pages)