I've met enough people to know that people are bastards

So it seems I'm actually kind of okay at my job. Which, and I hope this goes without saying, is seriously fucking depressing. I'm good at sounding vaguely upbeat when answering phones and typing in town names and getting numbers of specific bank branches, or, in some cases, I'm good at sounding vaguely upbeat on the phone and then bullshitting an answer to a question I don't really understand and passing it on to some other poor soul who might be ever-so-slightly more informed than I am.

This is not what you might call a 'taxing' job.

Which I suppose, were I a rainbow-loving, unicorn-poster-owning, optimist, would be a good thing. Trouble is, I ain't going nutty in the presence of rainbows and I've never been moved to buy any posters depicting mystical creatures (as yet), and I certainly wouldn't describe myself as an optimist; thus I do not see this as a 'good thing', I see this as a 'for the love of God will someone please help me escape this prison-of-my-own-making' thing.

But then, sometimes it's fun to slum it for a while. Boredom can either inspire apathy so that you just give up and accept your fate or it can encourage passion to change your circumstances. For the time being, and despite all my belly-aching I'm taking the latter option. I may as well make the most of the fact that I still have some fire in me, I'm sure by the end of my amazing call-centre adventure all the fight will have been knocked out of me, leaving me somewhat akin to the bugs at the end of Starship Troopers.

Fuck. Maybe I am an optimist after all.

I think the main problem I have is that I'm trying really hard not to be labeled as 'the misanthrope' (or, and more likely, 'the lame loser'). You wouldn't think this would be hard. Every single person there seems intelligent (to one degree or another) and is nice and reasonably friendly. But this is me, so it IS hard. However, if you've been keeping abreast of Sazz's recent misadventures I've been trying to be less like me lately. For everyone's sake. Thus, I've been going against every natural urge and sitting with my colleagues in breaks and before work and trying to participate. Obviously this hasn't been going great, because I've forgotten what it is to care about what other people think of you and so my social dysfunction just keeps steam rolling faster and faster out of control... But at least I'm there in body, if not in spirit. However, what I really want to do is just go and read my book or write my stupid stories. I really just need a large portion of the day to be devoted to 'NOT TALKING'. Else I find it difficult to function (this is particularly important considering the fact that I'm working in a call centre TALKING all day). I don't know how much longer I can keep the charade up though. Not being a dick all the time is tiring.