Kari Goes to Work

All last week, and 5 hours the previous week, I worked at two companies doing temp office work. Quite the interesting experiences, they were...

The first company was a mortgage company located in Ashby, only about a 10 minute walk from our flat. I was a receptionist there, and mostly answered phones and processed outgoing mail. Which, in theory, sounds simple enough. However, the reality was somewhat different. I'm getting better at understanding people when they speak to me in the various UK accents. But, trying to understand them over the phone is a completely different story. In addition to having to ask people over and over "Sorry, would you please repeat that," I had to explain that I'm still getting used to the accents. Somehow, this seemed to be OK with most people and no one really gave me a hard time about it.

Many people asked me where my "accent" is from. I'm still getting used to people saying that. Of course, to me, I don't have an accent, but everyone else does! In the course of the days at the mortgage company, I've been called the following: sweetheart, sweets, luv, dear, darling, duck, miduck, and a few others I can't think of right now. Not quite the same as I'm used to in the US where if you even remotely use an endearment to someone you don't know, you'll have HR down on you faster than you can say, "harrassment." I actually find it quite nice when people say those terms--more friendly-like.

The other company I worked for was...wait for it...a casket company. And no, I was not a model (which Kevin asked me the first night I came home and has found endlessly amusing since). I helped them with a massive mailing they were doing for the upcoming National Funeral Exhibition. Charming stuff, let me tell you. But the people were super-nice. Even though I ended up with a minor case of repetitive stress syndrome from all the invitation stamping, address-label sticking, and envelope stuffing, it turned out all right.

The one big different between the two companies was the overall vibe. At the mortgage company, most of the people mainly complained a lot and there was a real negative attitude there. However, at the casket company, all we did was laugh and chat the entire time. Somehow, we managed to get loads done as well. Whether this was due to the natural human instinct to avoid the discussion of death I'm not sure. But it was good to know that not all the companies here are going to be grumpy. It gave me some measure of hope.

I decided to look for tech writing opportunities, which I didn't think I was going to do, since I discovered that the pay is way better than temping. Even more than electricians make! :-) So Kev might be a kept man here soon, if things go right. The only problem is that most of the jobs are in the South, nearer to London, so I may have to travel a bit to get there. We'll take it as it comes, but it does seem that tech writing work is everywhere but where we are!

We'll keep you posted on our work adventures as we go...