Shredding CVs Like The Americans in Saigon

Sorry for my absence over the past month and a bit: I've been closing down a bookshop.

No kidding. It's the least amount of fun you can have without a trip to the dentist.

Not only is it lousy fun it's also hellishly busy. You have no idea of the sort of things you have to consider. Have you, for example, shredded every single speculative CV and customer complaint letter? I don't know about you but, because our glorious industry is regarded by young arts graduates with such warmth and affection (ie. they think it's a doss), I used to get inundated with CVs. A worrying trend had developed whereby we'd all be standing at the till in clean shirts and ties and a 22 year old with a proto beard and jeans that smelled of wee would shamble up to the counter and hand in a CV. On closer inspection this document would reveal his extensive experience as a waiter/barman; it would refer to his MA or PhD thesis; and list, amongst other interests "travelling" whilst neglecting to mention books or reading once. Not only that but I was left to ascertain for myself, using the divination properties inherent in Gardner's discount structure, what sort of job he actually wanted. Full time, part time, Xmas temp.

Anyway, rather than file these things in the bin, I dutifully kept them and never sifted through to throw out the really old ones. So now, even though the writers of these awful documents have succeeded in irritiating the tits off me, I feel compelled to protect their personal data for them. I hate being me.

The complaints are in many ways worse. At least the CV writers believe that they may be of service to you wheras the complainers are all of this ilk:

"I arrived at the David Attenborough signing at the advertised time only to find a queue of people stretching right around the block. What is the point of me arriving puntually if you then expect me to wait in a queue? I run the largest firm of solicitors in the city and I have never been treated so poorly. Kindly send me £50 of book tokens forthwith or I shall come in on Saturday and make all of your weekend staff cry with my shouting."

I comfort myself by imagining that I am feeding their gonads through the shredder.

More on the whole closure thing later. I need some distance so I can write without weeping like a footballer who's been ever-so-slightly brushed against by another footballer.