Job Hunting?

A-One and I had an appointment with his employment consultant again yesterday.  He had been given 'homework' - to have 8 employer contacts (submitted his resume) in the preceding fortnight.

Since the last appointment I had been reminding him about looking up the job sites in the way his consultant had shown him, or heading down to the local shopping centre to hand in his resume.  Despite his insistence to the contrary, as far as I could tell not much had been happening because he usually asks me questions when he's perusing jobs.

I woke him at 11:30am for a 1pm appointment.  At 12:30pm, he stepped dressed from the shower:

A-One: We should go down to the shopping centre before our meeting.

Mum: We don't have time for that now.  We have to leave here by 12:45pm at the latest to make it to the appointment by 1pm.

A-One: Yes, we'll have time.  I can't really go with nothing to show.

Mum: I'm glad to see you realise your obligations, but it needs more time than we have right now.  We simply won't make it by 1pm if we go down to the shopping centre now.

A-One: How do you know that? All I have to do is eat my breakfast and clean my teeth and then we can go to the shopping centre.

I left it as a rhetorical question until he had finished his food and cleaned his teeth.  By that time it was 1:45pm.

Mum: Are you ready to go now?

A-One: Yes.

Mum: You realise we're only just going to make it to the meeting?

A-One: Okay Mum.  You don't have to keep going on about it.

I went out to the car with A-One following me. He then rushed upstairs saying he'd forgotten something.  By the time we were backing out the driveway, it was 4 minutes to 1pm.

A-One: What will I say?

Mum: What do you think you might say?

A-One: I don't know.  That's why I'm asking you.

Mum: You'll have to call (consultant) to let him know we will be late.  (This happens for just about every meeting.)

A-One (on his mobile): Just calling to let you know we'll be a bit late.  We're on our way ... No, I didn't get around to that ... yes, we can talk about it soon.

A-One (off the phone): So, what should I say?

Mum: Well, what have you done in the last fortnight?

A-One: I've been looking, but I don't see jobs I'm interested in or think I could do.  (Pause)  ... I could tell him what I've done. And we could go down to the shopping centre on the way home after the meeting.  So I can tell him what I plan to do too.

Mum: Sounds good to me.  Still, it's better to be able to tell what you've done than what you plan to do.