permunnication

well, i can proudly announce that as of yesterday i am a permanent employee of the South Tyneside Council. i had an interview on thursday afternoon that i came away from only semi-convinced that i was any good, only be told yesterday that i was being daft and in fact had done really well in the interview.

which of course leads me nicely into my chosen discourse this week which is communication. there is something i've noticed about northerners. well, more specifically, given the test group i've had to work with over the last few weeks, people from the north-east.when they talk to you they leave out vital information for you to be able to know what it is they're talking about.

I asked jeff about this once and he said that up here everyone expects you to know what they are talking about so will often start talking mid topic. in a pub situation this can be very entertaining, but not so much at work.

but it seems to go the other way too. what i've found is that i will ask a question about something, but they will have already half filled their head with what they think i'm talking about, and so their answer has nothing to do with what i'm actually asking! it makes for some long conversations.

but on the fun side (well, mostly) i've been getting slowly better at understanding the northern accent. i find that if i ramp up my aussie accent then they're a lot more sympathetic, and dumbfounded too that i would choose to live in stanley rather than summer bay!

here is a little video of a geordie accent.