spacemonkeygaz.com

 

Irony

In literary terms irony (also called dramatic irony or tragic irony) is a technique, originally used in Greek tragedy, by which the full significance of a character’s words or actions is clear to the audience or reader although unknown to the character.

 

A friend of mine gets especially annoyed when people misuse the term irony.  It is, by his own admission, his bête noire.  Irony is not a footballer scoring a goal after having scored an own goal earlier in the same game.  It’s definitely not rain on your wedding day, a free ride when you’ve already paid or, indeed, good advice that you just didn’t take.  It’s not even ironic that the programme Gavin & Stacey is not a comedy about the characters Gavin and Stacey, but more a self-serving vehicle for writers James Corden and Ruth Jones to hog all the supposed best jokes for themselves.  “Oh.  What’s occurring?”  “Gav-lar!” etc.

 

It’s also not ironic when someone hands you a job application for your PERFECT JOB three days after the closing date for application of said job expired.  That’s called just plain fucking annoying.

The job itself has attracted widespread interest due to this article on the Telegraph website.  For those who haven’t work out that the blue words in bold are relevant and fascinating links that enhance the spacemonkeygaz.com experience, I will pick out the salient points from said article.

 

“The University of Leeds is advertising for a lap dance researcher…”

 

“…prior experience of conducting research in the female sex industry is essential.”

 

THIS WOULD BE MY PERFECT FUCKING JOB.  And I’m almost convinced it’s not a wind-up, due to it appearing on the University of Leeds job vacancies website.  It could of course be a honey-pot to catch sex offenders, but it’s got to be worth the gamble.

The job title (and how good would this look on a business card?) is Research Officer – The rise and regulation of lap dancing and the place of sexual labour and consumption in the night time economy.  That even rivals “Joe Bastardi: Long Range and Extreme Weather Expert” (although he now appears to have been promoted to the less impressive-sounding Expert Senior Meteorologist), in the how-good-would-that-look-on-a-business-card stakes.

 

From the Job Description:

You will work on an ESRC funded study on the rise and regulation of lap dancing and the place of sexual labour and consumption in the night time economy. The post will involve qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis. It is based in Leeds, although some travel to other cities may be necessary.

 

I can do Leeds, although the thought of toothless, tattooed Yorkshirewomen gyrating to R&B is less appealing than, say, Prague, Las Vegas, or Inside My Head.

 

 

The JD continues:

 “Blah blah etc blah…  good interviewing, communication and organisational skills…  female sex industry…  interviews will take place on December 14…  £31,513…  equal opportunities etc blah.”

 

But like I said, the closing date has been and gone, so I decided to send a begging e-mail to the brilliantly named Dr Teela Sanders.

 

 

Then I decided not to, because I neither have a relevant degree nor any research experience, and while £30-odd grand for interviewing strippers would be pretty good I’d quickly find it a chore and it would completely ruin the strip club experience for me in future. 

Plus the e-mail would be a complete piss-take and I’m sure I wouldn’t be the first ‘hilarious’ individual to send a jokey speculative e-mail describing in detail my vast experience of conducting research in the female sex industry and so on.  I am prepared and willing to work long and hard hours, I’d decided I would write, but then I realised that sometimes the obvious jokes just don’t need to be said, something the writers of Gavin & Stacey would do well to note.

 

On a completely unrelated note, the stats package on this blog shows me all the search engine terms, i.e. “terms people used to find your blog.”  Yesterday someone had stumbled upon the blog having typed in “jedward appearances December 2009” and today I notice someone found it by simply searching for “cheeky girls.” 

 

Brilliant.