David Kirkpatrick
It’s cold outside, Christmas cards are on sale and I’m sitting waiting for a cheerful, white bearded old man to appear. There’s only one logical conclusion: it has to be the first seminar of term. But how did I get here? I’m in yesterday’s clothes and there’s a faint taste of rohypnol on my breath.
My arms seem to be bound and in another room I can hear Tom talking on the phone. Putting Katie Holmes’ autobiography aside, I get back to my own problems. How did I end up in my final year of university with nothing to show for it but knowing my bank manager on a first-name basis?
Desperately flailing for reassurance that it’s not all conferences, flip charts and thermal socks from here on, I call my now-graduated friends. Their talk of five day weeks, national insurance and salaries has me confused to say the least. As any bright reader will know, there are seven days to a week. The other two I can only guess at, but I’m fairly sure that salary is an ingredient of salad.
Looking out of the window at all of the wide-eyed freshers, eerily resembling the missing members of Alphabeat and serenely eating carrot sticks, I find myself reluctant to give up my student lifestyle. At what other time, blissful senility aside, is it ok to wear red jeans or feel that it’s acceptable to have a facebook page?
Then again, would it be such a terrible thing to go out and get a job? Never needing to write another essay, and having no real reason to go to a library has a certain attraction to it. Giving up reading altogether has an even bigger appeal, but it does tend to come in handy when the words ‘Danger, highly flammable!’ crop up near open flames.
If only the careers and lifestyles portrayed on TV existed — where one can be a high-powered lawyer while still finding time to get up to all manner of mid-afternnon shenanigans. Luckily, the tutor is here, so I don’t have to resolve this problem until the same time next issue.
Meanwhile, I can continue to board public transport, looking suspiciously at passengers of pensionable age, wondering why they’re not at work on a weekday afternoon. I mean, don’t these people have jobs?
