You see them all walking to work in the morning, like tired zombies.  All they want to do is rest but they�re doomed to walk the earth forever, in their posh suits and ties (even the women).  Dragging themselves out of their beds and going to work in their stuffy, boring offices just so they can make even more money to buy their ungrateful kids and spouses EVEN MORE useless shit to fill their sad, empty lives with.  Another couple of foreign holidays a year, so the whole family can pretend they�re close and then, the rest of the year, everyone�s sitting in a different room in the suburban semi on their brand new computers, chatting to similarly squalid people in internet chat rooms.  You see them all walking to work and wonder if they�ve ever experienced an iota of natural, human joy in their entire lives.  You wonder if they�ve ever watched the sun coming up and said �Sod it.  I won�t go in to work today.  I�ll get on a train to the seaside instead and walk my dog and play with a frisbee or I�ll get drunk and fuck my beautiful lover.�  Maybe they have, but it doesn�t look that way, on this dreary British morning, when you see them all walking to work.

What�s with all this work shit anyway?  We all need some money to survive.  We need to eat and have enough to buy the odd thing we want/need, like a book or a bottle of cider, but why does anyone need to earn the big wage packets of the big bosses?  Do their shiny, new, powerful cars make them happier than the shopping trolley of the old trampette in the street?  Do they feel any freer, cooped up like battery hens in their air-conditioned offices, than the beautiful doleys, who jump, refreshed after a DECENT nights sleep, out of their beds just in time for the one o�clock news?  Do their holidays in Bruges and Turkey relax them more then the weekend in Skegness that the poor embark upon?

For nine months now, I�ve been working in a minimum wage office job and it�s coming to an end in three weeks time.  Redundancy.  At first I was all worried about going back on the dole and having less money and, to be honest, I still AM a bit worried about it.  But I also know I can survive on the dole.  It�s not like I haven�t done it before.. a lot!  I�ve been sort of half-heartedly applying for things and have even had a few interviews, but I�m starting to feel happier and more liberated the nearer the end of this job comes.  Right now, it�s 11.05am on Monday and I�m at work, writing this, listening to a CDR copy of the new Counting Crows album.  It�s kind of a joyful, Monday morning sound/feeling.  The sun�s out for the first time in a couple of days.  Things feel good.  I was up at 6am, cause I was at my  mum�s last night and it takes longer to get here than if I was at my flat.  I was on the bus and the driver was playing Radio 2 � Sarah Kennedy and then Johnny Walker.  They play some okay music now and again. - Ramones� �Baby I Love You�, the Beatles, etc.  I even like the Darius single! It�s  genius and makes me feel good and that video with him in the cornfield is hilarious!

It just doesn�t feel so important right now if I work or not.  I�m going to this girl�s party tonight and I know I�ll be really tired but I�m looking forward to it.  I want to be alive and you don�t need money to be alive. I�ve got lots of crap in my room I need to try and sell and, soon, I�ll have lots of time to do it.  I�m doing this zine because I�ve been writing so much lately. I feel like I can do anything I want.  Work, not work, write, not write.  I want to be creative and free, like a child again.  And what the hell is wrong with that?

�You just wanna have a good time, just like everybody else�- Counting Crows

Having said that, I AM a pessimist and no doubt lots of bad shit is about to hit me like a tonne of bricks.  But I want to turn a corner and make an attempt to be positive for perhaps the first time in my life.
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