So I started my lovely new job a week ago. And the first days went fine. Then today, I get phoned up, and asked to go in because someone has called in sick. "Okays," I said, "but you know its the first day I'll have done by myself." "Oh, you'll be fine," they said.

So, I locked myself out, crashed the till, continually ran out of coffee, never got time for lunch, managed to end the day with £20 more in the till than it thought it should have, and then set off the burglar alarm. And all the people I had to phone during their weekends, and other staff spent the whole time being nice about it. Why does that seem worse?

Does anyone else have days where they just feel totally incompetant?

On my second day in my first 'proper' job I managed to - over-ring the till, 3 times; leave the till unatended (in fairness, no-one had told me I shouldn't ); walk into a display, knocking it over; make a complete mess of filling in someone's account book and overcharge someone.

I'm pretty sure you're not incompetant, Tamsin.

Aww, it sounds like you work with a really nice bunch of people We've probably all been there, especially in a new job, and that's probably why they were sympathetic! It's the sort of day you'll have a good laugh about on your first anniversary, so try not to beat yourself up over it - you'll probably find that tomorrow is just the opposite and everything goes right

Have a good night's sleep and I'm sure it will look better in the morning

I felt imcompetant in my job today! completely messed up horses' feeds and made all 30 of them and THEN realised. Plus it's all stuff that has to soak for 12 hours so I couldn't just make another set.

I remember my first day in a new teaching job in a new area. It was shortly after we had moved there after getting married, and my husband had been very ill with jaundice since the end of the honeymoon, so I was going home at dinner time to attend to his needs. The deputy head gave me a lift home, but I had to make my own way back - a one mile walk. I hadn't got to know the area very well, since we hadn't gone out much, and lost my way back! I eventually found a petrol station where I was able to ring the school (no mobile phones in those days!) and ask how to get where I wanted - another mile's walk from a different direction The deputy head answered the phone, fortunately thought it was hilarious, and also looked after my class till I got there. Did I feel embarrassed! I was also embarrassed later in the week, doing my first playground duty, when I asked a boy who was playing up "Whose class are you in?" and the reply was "Yours, miss".

I think incompetence is more to do with not learning from such mistakes...

I suspect that the people who helped you had had similar experiences when they were new, and thus knew just how you felt.

At a music shop last summer, I sold a lady a CD, or at least I thought I had. I had been left in charge of the CD counter for the first time, and felt that I was handling things reasonably. The man in charge came back from his tea break.

"I sold a lady a CD while you were gone!", I reported proudly.

"You did remember to actually find the CD and put it in the empty case she brought to the counter, didn't you?..."

Don't worry!

I know its hilarious really, but I just felt such a twit standing there, with the burglar alarm making the most almighty racket, half expecting a security company to turn up and have to deal with that as well...

Anyone one of these things would have been fine, and I would have just laughed. But, to have such a catalogue in one day... I think my sense of humour has failed. Still, know it'll return.

Thanks for the reassurance. Though it doesn't sound like any of you can quite match me! Just hoping things work out when I start the next new job. (That'll be for my placement year in industry... "Opps, sorry, didn't mean to explode your entire oil refinery, I pressed a wrong button or two...")