Just Another Blokes Blog

Well, I’m back again — and pleasantly surprised, if I’m being honest.
Logged in to see my first blog got 14 views and 7 likes — which might not sound like much, but it means a lot to me. So thanks to everyone who viewed, liked, and hopefully stuck around for the next edition!!

Carrying on from yesterday’s post, I’m currently out of work nearly three weeks now — and I’m already cracking up.
Not gonna lie, the first week felt like a mini-holiday. I caught up on some very important things I’d been putting off… like finding out what that horrible smell in my car was.
Spoiler: it was a bag of orange wedges that had fallen under the seat.

I then spent a shocking amount of time disposing of said oranges and researching how long it takes for oranges to go mouldy. Time well spent.

But that honeymoon phase didn’t last long.
I updated my CV (several times) and started sharing it with some of the agencies I’d used before.

Funny thing is, a month before I lost my job, I was getting calls and emails every other day about new roles.
But now? Crickets.

One job I spotted on LinkedIn had over 70 applicants within the first hour. You could even see who was applying — Masters degrees, PhDs, folks with more letters after their name than a government agency… all going for entry-level roles.

And then there’s me — no formal education, but loads of on-the-job experience — throwing my hat in the ring.

After two or three days of silence, I got hit with a s***load of rejections.
Obviously AI-generated. No reasoning. No feedback.
(And yeah, I censored that bit — not sure how touchy these snowflake sites are, but you get the idea.)

The agencies? Same old “the market is booming but roles are filling fast” rubbish.
So I went old-school — jumped onto a local jobs site, hunted down companies myself, and applied directly.

That method has worked before — and sure enough, two days later I landed an interview.

BOOM.

I was back… or so I thought.

The Interview (aka Red Flag Central):
It was over Teams. The two guys interviewing me? Dicks.
They asked questions about stuff completely unrelated to the role and gave me attitude when I couldn’t answer.

Needless to say — no second interview.

But then… hope!
Another company emailed me for a face-to-face interview. Sounded promising.
Got my suit dry cleaned, hair cut, and got into the zone.

The Day Of:
Got up early. Breakfast. Shower. Nice crisp white shirt.
Looked in the mirror — and let’s just say, it was something like this:

Showed up early. Thursday afternoon. Office buzzing.
Grabbed a coffee. Reviewed the job spec. Hyped myself up.

Then… the plot twist.

I introduced myself to two security guards, reminded me of these two muppets:

Told them who I was there to meet and they looked at each other, confused.

“He doesn’t work in the office on Thursdays,” one of them says.

I nearly left. No joke.

But just then, a woman walking past overheard and said he was in. Saved by the bell.

Eventually I was called upstairs. Three interviewers.
Usual intros, overview of the role, everything going well…

Then — my stomach starts making noises like I’m about to drop a freestyle on Funk Flex.

Gurgles, pops, full beat drops.

I’m twisting in my seat trying to silence it. At one point, the hiring manager forgets what he’s saying mid-sentence.

I wanted the floor to open up and swallow me whole.

Still, interview ended and I felt confident. I thought: “This is the one.”

They ticked every box. I ticked every box.
So confident, I even stopped applying elsewhere.

Big mistake.

Two days later:
Rejection.

“You were great, but someone slightly more qualified…” — blah blah.

I was crushed. Back to square one.

I got over it. Eventually.
Today I applied for 16 jobs, and already got rejected by 2.

But — there’s a silver lining:

I’ve been invited to another interview next Tuesday.
I’m cautiously optimistic… but I’m not getting my hopes up. Lesson learned.

🎬 Bonus Story: Watching Black Mirror With My Parents

You know that feeling when you’re watching TV with your parents, and a sex scene comes on?
You suddenly become very interested in your shoes, or your phone, or your drink.

Well, I had one of those moments — but on hard mode.

Myself & my dad like very similar TV shows and movies so if theres something new that we’ve found on Netflix or whatever we usually set them aside and watch them together whenever we have the time. We literally have tons of shows earmarked there to watch but we’re both so busy (him working, me throwing out mouldy oranges) that we don’t get much time to sit down and watch them.

Tonight was one of the nights where we both had time. “Pick something to watch dad. Anything you want, whatever floats your boat.” He picks a show called Black Mirror. Now for anyone who knows Black Mirror, you probably know where I’m going with this but for those of you who don’t know what Black Mirror is about, I’m going to be sharing some light spoilers in the next paragraph so stop reading now.

SPOILERS BELOW – YOU’VE BEEN WARNED!!

Black Mirror is basically a show where each episode is different, theres no linear storyline going from one episode to the next (based off the episodes I’ve watched so far anyway), each episode it based on ideas of what life could be like given our current level of technological advancements or social behaviour.

Well the first episode of Black Mirror revolves around a member of the royal family being kidnapped and the prime minister of the UK being forced to do something to save her life. Now, as I mentioned above, watching a sex scene while in the same room as your parents can be uncomfortable however watching a sex scene which involves a man pegging a PIG is like torture (just to point out, you don’t actually see anything explicit) I would actually rather be waterboarded than go through something like that again.

I literally didn’t know what to do. My mam was sitting there with her head in her phone and I could see her head lift in the corner of my eye to see what exactly was happening on the TV and she literally just said:

“What shite are you watching?”

And without missing a beat, I threw my dad under the bus:

“Don’t know, he put it on.”

I literally threw my dad under the bus even though it was both of us who had said we’d watch it together. The look of disbelief on his face when he looked at me was something I never seen before and I just burst out laughing, I didn’t know what else to do!!

The episode finally ended after what felt like an eternity, my dad went out for a smoke and I made myself a coffee. He came back in and said will we watch the next episode. Thinking to myself, can’t get much worse than what we just endured, I said:

“Yeah, go for it.”

The next episode featured adverts for p**n every five minutes as part of the story.

Needless to say I won’t be watching anymore Black Mirror in the presence of my parents.

That’s all for tonight, I’ll be back tomorrow for another daily dose in the life a broke bloke. Leave a comment below and let me know if you’re enjoying my stuff, ask some questions or let me know if theres anything in particular you’d like me to write about.

I’ve also create some social media accounts under the same name (Just Another Blokes Blog) so if you could give those a follow I’d appreciate it. If I hit enough followers I might look at doing some live videos where we can actually chat.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/just_another_blokes_blog/

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@just_another_blokes_blog

Enjoying the ramble? You can keep the coffee flowing here ☕

buymeacoffee.com/justanotherblokesblog

Thanks again to everyone who takes time out to read and like my blogs, I may be The Bloke but you folks are the Legends.

Peace out and much love,

The Bloke