The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2459 by Angharad Copyright© 2014 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

Neither Jacquie nor I mentioned her bout of apparent mediumship. If my mother had been there, it would have thrown my map of the universe into some chaos. As it was I was struggling to cope with the strange experiences I’d had with goddesses and the blue light, not to mention the seemingly regular appearances of my deceased daughter.

We know that when your body is dead the brain dies very quickly and once that’s gone so have you as a personality. There is no survival after death in some form of afterlife, or no irrefutable evidence for it, so we currently have to accept the probability for the Elysium Fields or Paradise, Heaven, Valhalla or any other name purporting to be where souls went to spend eternity, is as close to zero as it can get. I mean, what would be the purpose? Being in the presence of whatever deity you worship—is that it? At least the Buddhists are green in recycling souls as reincarnation, all the others seem pointless, but then so is religion, unless you include the exploitation of the masses by a minority in fancy dress using superstitious fear as the controlling mechanism.

I mean did a lightning bolt that killed a group of tribal elders in their spiritual hut in Columbia, show god scoring an own goal? I doubt it but then I doubt the existence of any god unless of course, this was Zeus zapping some unbelievers or anyone else who’d peed him off. My little brain had had enough of trying to understand what was happening around me. I didn’t understand how slime balls like Cortez aren’t put away by the system simply for usury, which is illegal in this country. When the interest rate is less than one per cent how can these grabbers justify hundreds or more per cent? It’s iniquitous but then so was selling off public housing stocks without allowing the local authorities to use the money to replace them. No wonder we have a housing crisis, which was caused by Margaret Thatcher and her need to be accepted by the upper classes, which they never did. Despite the peerage, she lived and died a pleb, not the patrician she so wanted to be.

I went to sleep imagining I was interviewing Maggie Thatcher for a job, pity I couldn’t remember what happened, it would have proved quite interesting. However, I awoke feeling anything but enthusiasm for my day in work and the appointment of two people in posts on my staff. That was scary stuff. I dragged myself out of bed and into the shower before the alarm went off. It was still dark—no wonder—when I returned to the bedroom I discovered it was only five o’clock. I heard the door close on a car and the throaty roar of Simon’s Jaguar sounded from the drive. He’d left early, must have a meeting first thing or something.

At least I had time to sort myself out, drying my hair, shaving my legs that sort of thing. I dressed and breakfasted before waking the girls. It’s remarkable that as a boy, Danny was awful to dig out of bed unless he was playing football. Nowadays, as a girl she’s up and showered, does her own hair and makeup and is down as quickly as her younger sisters who squabble over hairbrushes and ribbons or who gets the use of the shower first.

I pulled on a pinafore and got Lizzie up, feeding her on a bottle, then some solid stuff from the local supermarket. It was supposed to be some sort of fruit in yoghurt but looked like flies which had drowned in vomit. She had no such illusions and gobbled it down like it was going out of fashion. Jacquie was last down, which was unusual but I was glad I’d been able to help her with the little ones. Trish got some cereal for Cate, which the latter swallowed like a plughole. She then gave out a huge burp, which got the others giggling despite my attempts to stop it.

“You look nice today, Mummy,” offered Julie before setting off for her salon. I thanked her and we had an air kiss so as not to spoil our makeup and I supposed I did look all right. I had on the navy blue suit with a white silk blouse and navy shoes. I usually wore it to funerals but decided I’d give it a whirl today. The straight skirt tended to emphasise my fat arse and hips but providing I kept the jacket on, that helped disguise the fact.

The interviews were scheduled to start at ten, it wasn’t quite nine. I looked at the notes I’d made from the CVs to remind myself about what I’d thought about each, good and bad points. One couldn’t spell ecology, but that might have been nerves in filling in the application form.

On the back of the form we invite them to say why they consider themselves suitable for the job, and or, what would they do if they got the job regarding innovative ideas in teaching biology/ ecology. Several had written short essays, some of which were interesting and some showed no idea of the budgetary constraints we currently have to endure.

At half-past nine, Isabel and Mike arrived and we had a coffee before wending our way to the interview room. We were using one of the tutorial rooms with a waiting area outside. Three of the candidates were already there and Delia was flitting about like a butterfly checking various bits and pieces. We were within sight of her desk and my office and I did think about using the latter for the job but then decided against it because the books on the shelves and my mounted skeleton of a dormouse also on the shelf, could prove a distraction.

We, three interviewers, had quickly run through the roles we’d play. As acting professor, I was going to sit in the middle and we’d interview across a coffee table. Delia was going to bring us in coffee at eleven. Each interview would last approximately half an hour, longer if the applicant had questions. We’d break for lunch at twelve having seen the four for my old job, then start again at one. I’d arranged for food to be brought in for us—a buffet type meal, from the university refectory, usually they’re quite good. The candidates were given a pass to get a free meal which would be billed to my department. Given that some weren’t actually employed meant that we did try to minimise their costs and refund travel costs, which is standard practice in the UK. For the temporary cover for my job, we would consider leasing a student flat for the six months, for the other post we’d assist moving house and so on.

We checked our notes and timetables and agreed that the other two interviewers would take it, in turn, to call in the condemned and show them out. This was going to be so much fun—not. At exactly ten o’clock we commenced the torture and Isabel called in the first interviewee.