Are You Not Entertained?!

The Shire
If you've (singular, probably - don't think my readership has been holding up lately) been reading this blog recently, you will have noticed my frequent criticism of Ayrshire and rants about how I miss living in the city. You may wonder "well why don't you move back then and stop moaning?" Well, I won't go into the details but I had recently lost my job and was paying £430 a month for luxury accomodation I didn't really need (only my ego desired it). I realised that there was no way I could afford the rent from then on. So, I decided to move back to my parents', in South Ayrshire, for supposedly a short while, until I found another job.
Months passed, and I was still unemployed. Eventually, I saw an advert for a database developer in Ayr, and, being desperate for employment, I applied and luckily, got the job. It was initially a 3 month temporary contract. Eventually, it was extended, and around the end of last year I was encouraged to apply for a permanent position which was coming up. Despite not intending to stay in Ayrshire for any further length of time, I applied anyway just to keep my options open. Around the time of interview, I started applying for other vacancies in Glasgow. Anyway, as it turned out I was offered the permanent position (2 year contract). After weighing up the pros and cons I decided to accept the post. I think it was the right decision and the overall package - salary, the project itself etc is very good. It would in fact be a great opportunity for me in the long term and could lead to better things than if I'd just accepted some graduate job in Glasgow. Admittedly the location isn't ideal for me but after time spent in Kilmarnock / Irvine I realise it could be a damn sight worse. It's not permanent by any means. I almost feel that the position was created with me in mind and if I'd turned it down I'd be betraying the man who possibly saved my career. So I think there's a bit of loyalty to it as well (get the violins out).
As for Ayr itself, I've tried hard to like the place but I know now for a fact I never really will. Despite probably being nicer than the likes of Killie I just know I'll never be satisfied fully until I'm back in Glasgow, such is my attachment to the place. Everything about city life (to me) just seems so much bigger and better and of a higher quality. Living in a rural town after that has been analogous to going cold turkey on heroin (only the cold sweats haven't subsided).
In fairness Ayrshire's hardly bad, and I can appreciate that for families, retired people etc it's a great place to live and the quality of life is good. I'm in no way professing that my personal opinion is hard fact. It's just that I remember when I first left and moved to the city and how much more positive and enthusiastic I felt thereafter. I felt more at home, for the first time. My whole perspective seemed to change for the better. I felt more inspired. That sort of impression never leaves you. Granted there are some real scum and lowlifes there, but you will find that in any town - the proportion of neds / criminals etc to overall population is probably not so different, and in a city, because there is more people, it's easy to focus on a single group and get the impression that there are more proportionally than there actually are. Equally there are plenty diverse and interesting people as well. It's that big mixture, that idea of a city being a cultural melting pot which appeals to me; in a small rural town the natives are much more single-minded but in a city you have such a huge mixture of culture, religion, background etc. You've got much more of a cross-section of society as a whole, and it's far more interesting.
Although it pains me to say this, a good analogy for places like Kilmarnock is that it's like an orange which has had most of the juice squeezed from it. That may sound cruel, and apologies to any Killie lovers but it seems to be a sad fact that most of the better people, prospects etc tend to get sucked towards the cities. Not all, but most. Martin touched on that point previously. Personally I will always feel a strong pull towards where most of the "juice" has ended up - especially because I know it exists and where to find it. City life is not for everyone but I feel much more in my element there. Rant over.



AES10 - Cancelled
Sadly no soccer this week as there weren't enough players. This is the first time since I started playing 10 weeks ago. Personally I needed the break this week, but I hope this isn't the shape of things to come. If it goes on like this I may start getting withdrawal symptoms and I'll have to check into Soccerholics Anonymous for real. The first step is admitting you are an addict...

Power League Renaissance?
It looks, however, that there will be 14 in the squad next week, and so for the first time since I started, it'll be 7-a side. That probably just means that I'll be giving away possession more often than usual.



Moans About Moans About Moans...
Anyway I'll conclude by saying there'll be no more moaning about Ayrshire in this blog; I've committed to working here for a bit longer so will just have to live with my decision and make the most of it. I'm afraid that if there is nothing to moan about then I could well run out of blogging material.
In fact in general I've been moaning a bit too much lately. Surprised? Not if you've been an avid follower of this blog for the past few years. You may have noticed how I always seem to end up moaning about stuff, even after proclaiming (on several occasions) that I'm going to stop. It seems to be a behavioural pattern I haven't yet shook off. Does anyone out there know of a "Pessimistics Anonymous" out there which I could join (the first step is admitting you're a miserable bastard)? All this negativity could well be down to lack of physical fitness as well (I have been doing woefully little exercise and have often felt lethargic and moody these past few months). I feel like a shadow of my former self (actually, more like a shadow of a shadow of a shadow..!).
Anyway the fact is that I've finally secured a decent job, with a better salary than I've ever had. As I've said the location may not be ideal and if it really doesn't work out after several months then there's nothing keeping me here. I'm going to try to make a real go of it as my CV needs something decent on it (at the moment it's littered with call centres and gaps of unemployment). What I need to do at the moment is hold down a job, which should ultimately help me find the direction I want to go in. Ultimately I don't have much to moan about so I'm going to stop, I promise. If I'm to move forward I will need to forget my snobby city aspirations for now and concentrate on the task at hand. I suppose part of me is worried that if I'm down here too long I'll become set in my ways and start to even take a shine to Ayr, and eventually forget I liked city life so much. At the moment I can never ever see that happening, but I can just imagine myself, here in 2 years time, sitting in a coffee shop in Ayr, drinking my Victory Coffee, gazing out at a bus shelter...

"And it was then, when gazing out at the filthy bus shelter with its broken window, that it appeared to suddenly take on a subtley different appearance, one that suggested character and a sort of austere beauty which was hard to put into words. Normally, the junky on the street corner would appear to be just another lowlife soap dodger, but he suddenly felt great empathy with him, a deep understanding of the chain of events which turned the poor man to drugs. He wanted to help him but realised the man was probably quite content to live out his life on the streets of this... colourful town, which was fast becoming the cultural epicentre of the picturesque and tranquil county of South Ayrshire. It was then, that he realised he loved Ayr."