On the morning of her job interview Rona was awoken rudely by the piercing bleeping of her alarm clock. She flailed her arm out blindly, her head buried in the pillow; her hand struck the clock and knocked it to the floor, and the batteries fell out of it with a snap. It was as good a way as any of turning the thing off. She pulled the blanket back up over her head and went to sleep for another three quarters of an hour.

When she woke up again and shuffled into the kitchen to get coffee she noticed with a glance at the clock on the microwave that she was already late and may well miss the interview altogether. Oh well. It was a pain in the arse that they'd scheduled it in the morning anyway. It was very inconsiderate of them, she thought.

After breakfast she had a shower and went back into her bedroom to get dressed for the interview. She dragged a pair of jeans from under a pile of clothes on the floor and as a token attempt at neatness pulled a clean t-shirt from the cupboard. She decided she couldn't be bothered ironing it.

She caught a tram into the city and after a while found the office building she was looking for. She waited patiently for the lift and reported to the receptionist. The receptionist asked her politely to take a seat and wait. Shortly a door opened and Rona was called in by a thin, well-dressed man.

Inside the interview room she sat down again. There were two other people besides the thin man in there.

"Why don't you take us through your previous experience?" asked the thin man.

"Well . . ." Rona thought about this. "I've been unemployed for, I guess, the last two years. Basically I've been on the dole since finishing uni. I mean, I've done a little bit of waitressing, but I didn't like it."

"Okay . . . So, how . . ." The man frowned. "Uhh . . . what kind of skills do you think you could bring to this company?"

"Well, I make a great coffee!" laughed Rona. "But on the other hand, I don't like being bossed around too much, so I guess that wouldn't work out too well. I dunno, really." She grinned. "A relaxed attitude?"

"I see" said the thin man.

One of the other interviewers spoke up. "Precisely why are you interested in this job?"

Rona grinned. "I'm not" she said. "I have no desire to work here whatsoever."

"So . . ."

Rona interrupted. "I've gotta fill out my dole diary" she said. "I have a great jobs writing articles and review for a street mag and I really love it, but it's a volunteer job really. So I'm on the dole. Gotta go to job interviews to get the dole." She shrugged. "So sorry to waste your time, but now I've put in an appearance I'll get out of your way."

That, naturally, was the end of the interview. The thin man walked her out. Before she left he whispered to her: "We've interviewed a lot of people like you in the last few years. Good luck with the writing."