Two days of my busy week - more to come...

I'm sorry for hardly updating this week. I've been quite busy. Remember this interview? Well. Let us begin:

Thursday
Early on Thursday morning (about 6.30am) the home phone rang. It was our kid from the telephone interview. He said that he'd arranged a face to face interview with a project leader here in Brisbane. I told him that I wasn't overly interested in the position as it sounded quite dull.

I went back to bed.

7.30am the phone rings again.

Him: "Hello again Jay! You sound brighter and breezier now!"
Me: "Well, since you woke me up an hour ago I've been unable to get back to sleep - strange that, eh?"
Him: "I woke you up before?! I thought you were a morning person?"
Me: "I'm anything but a morning person. Especially at 6.30am. And although I'm much more awake now I'm still not keen on sitting on the lounge floor naked talking on the phone...."
Him: "It was 6.30? No, it was 7.30!"
Me: "Mate, it's 7.30 now. Believe me"
Him: "Oh my God! I'm so sorry! I'm really bad at time differences!"
Me: "I know - you were a day early last time. But please - [I could tell by his exaggerated friendliness/chattiness that he wanted something from me] - before one of us dies of old age, could you tell me why you've got me out of bed for a second time?
Him: "Yes, sorry Jay, I should have made that clear in the first instance - we've got an improved offer. We can offer you $80k per year for the Brisbane position. Is that more appealing?"
Me: [Genuinly] "Hmm. Yes. That's more realistic to be honest. I'd prefer more money and a more interesting job, but I am interested enough to go the face to face interview, where and when?"
Him: "Today. 12 noon, any place within Brisbane that suits you."
Me: [thinks: They are desperate!]

We arranged a place and I went to the interview. It went super. I liked the woman interviewing me, I liked the job she described, we got on very well. She also mentioned that they also had three other positions, any of which I could fulfil. Then it went tragic:

Her: "The position I think you'd be best suited for is in Port Macquarie. Is that OK?"
Me: "I've no idea where that is"
Her: "Oh, it's here in Queensland"
Me: [laughs - I like someone that can try and bluff me] "Miss, I've flown from one end of QLD to the other and it took about four hours. Telling me it's 'here in QLD' isn't narrowing things down much!"
Her: [laughs too] "I knew you'd say something like that! It's actually between here and Sydney"
Me: "That only narrows it down a bit - Sydney is about an hour and a half flight from here!"
Her: "It's a lovely place...."
Me: "You mean it's a shit hole and it's miles away don't you?"
Her: "We'll raise the salary?"
Me: "You're being so vague I'm almost certain I don't want the job."
Her: "I'm going to just send back to head office that we hire you. I don't know what the position will be, but I think we need you! Oh, this interview has only been 40 minutes, it was supposed to be an hour. What have we missed?"
Me: "We've not missed anything, it just takes less time when you've got the perfect applicant"

Yeah, I kiss arse [subtly] when there's something I'm after.

So. I left. Half an hour later I got a call from our kid again, their "recruitment officer". He said he had received a glowing report for woman above and that I should be hired for the Port Macquarie position. He asked whether we'd discussed salary. I said we hadn't (cos it was true). He said that we'd briefly discussed $80k. I decided to push my luck...

Me: "But that was a bare minimum mate, to go to the interview. Having spoken about the job I think I'd need more."
Him: "Umm. How much more?"
Me: "Do you think I'm daft? Tell me your best offer and I'll consider it"
Him: "Well, I need to get clearance from the big man on larger salaries so it'll probably have to wait until Monday"
Me: "No worries."
Him: "So, are you going to commute to Port Macqarie or rellocate?"
Me: "I'm still on my way home, I don't even know where Port Macquarie is! Is it commutable?"
Him: "Er. Well, yeah. Sort of. You'd have to fly to Sydney and the get a jump to there...."
Me: "FLY TO SYDNEY EVERY DAY?! AND THEN BACK OUT?!"
Him: "The company would pay for it...."
Me: "MY TIME IS WORTH MORE THAN 4 HOURS A DAY ON A PLANE! I'M NOT DOING THAT!!!"
Him: "Umm. OK. We'll look at relocation then. What sort of house would you like us to rent you? How many children do you have?"
Me: "This is madness. I don't want the job. I've only just moved 10000 miles around the world to be with my girl. I'm not moving again. Bye"

Two hours later:

Phone rings.

Caller: "Hi! I'm Sarah from Port Macquarie x software! I understand you'll be joing us on Monday!"
Me: "No, sorry Sarah, no offence to yourself but I turned down the job"

Half an hour later:

Phone rings.

Caller: "Hi! This is Michelle from x real estates. Are you Jay?"
Me: "Um. Yeah?"
Michelle: "Great! Well, we've been asked by x software to find you accommodation in Port Macquarie! What kind of property are you looking for?"
Me: "I'm sorry Michelle, but I told x software that I didn't want the job. Sorry they wasted your time. And mine..."

How difficult can it be to reject a job????!


Friday
The phone rings at 10am. "Hmm. A reasonable hour" I think, "It can't possibly be x software again...." I was wrong.

Him: "Hi Jay! Grest news! We've got another offer for you!"
Me: "I'm not moving to Port fucking Macquarie. I've even looked it up on the internet since and it looks like a shit hole."
Him: "Nope, we're managed to find someone else in our Brisbane office so you'd be required to replace them."

He then went on to explain that the new job would involve managing a team here in Brisbane and pay a stupid amount of money. $4200 per week - isn't that fucking ridiculous for such a simple position? And this is after I've insulted them and tried to reject jobs from them for the last week?! This was the point were I made the last post.

I had the telephone interview and as I suspected, there was a catch. One of the technologies they view as essential I don't possess. I may be a computer nerd, but I'm not over 50 and therefore I don't know Unix. That's essential to them. I don't know how they overlooked it but somehow they did.

I'm now resolved I wont get the job although they're not going to officially "Yes or No" until Monday morning I've continued to apply for other positions since. The money would be great, but the job, in honesty, wasn't that great.

The biggest thing this little incident has taught me is "I'm worth lots. Especially if I act as myself rather than bowing down to bitches. I'm desirable..."

Well, sorry for boring you all with this shit, I supposed I could have summarised it as "I've had a good offer, but it's still pending", but that wouldn't be much of a post would it?