Do you ever get those working weeks where you feel everyone is on your back? “Have you done x, have you done y, why isn’t z done yet?”. I just wanna say “bog right off!”. I really don’t think I’ve been slacking recently either.
Can’t wait for the Christmas holiday!
My friend from work, Rob, is planning to do the Etape on his bike (well obviously) next year. He’s started a blog tracking his preparations so I thought I’d give it a plug for anyone interested in similar things.
This is the only pic I could find of him on his bike. He’s the luminous one on the right.
Dad’s funeral went really well yesterday. Tomorrow I’m back to work. Wonder how things went whilst I was away! Obviously didn’t make any preparations for a long break!
Yep, the end of another financial year is here again. This is the busiest time for most of us. Not only are we trying to get all the bills in before we close the accounts, but we are trying to set up the programme for a new year.
As at close today, we are still about £4.5million under!! Not just one big wodge either, but loads of various stuff across the whole programme. We are trying to feel confident it’ll all come through tomorrow morning but it’ll be one of the tighest years ever.
The main problem is getting invoices off the contractors. Anyone would think they didn’t want paying for the work they have done! That’d be ok if they told us they were going to do it for free from the outset - then we could have spent the money on something else, like developing laser guided busses or hover cars. Ok, so the hover cars aren’t real but the laser guided busses are a definite possibility and have been mentioned. I have no real idea how it works but I assume drivers won’t be out of a job. I think it’d be a long time before people were confident to go on busses with no drivers! Could be good for the drivers to be equiped with lasers considering all the reports of bastard violent passengers. They could shoot lasers at them - “You expect me to pay for this crappy bus?” “No Mr Chav, I expect you to DIE!” *laser*
Anyway, tomorrow isn’t just the end of the financial year, it’s also the end of the week. Yey! I think tomorrow I will head off to the pub after work with my trio of hunks - James, Dave and Reags. Tis unlikely that it’ll be a quadrangle of hunks - Damo has not graced us with his presence in several weeks now, preferring instead to stay at home. He must have found some really good porn or something.
I am doing ok this week so far with regard to general healthy eating however I haven’t done much exercise other than walk to and from work.
Today my right hip was giving me a bit of pain. I’ve had that a few times before. Not so much pain I suppose but more stiffness which makes walking a bit irritating and actually difficult at times. I wonder whether it is seizing up from not doing exercise for about a week. I took some cod liver oil when I got home today because it was almost so bad I thought I was going to have to stop on the way home. Perhaps the weather is affecting my joints. If it doesn’t go I might go to the chiropractor and ask him to do something with it. It’s probably just a bit stiff from general lugging around of my fatness. I think if it was anything serious it would be a different kind of pain. You know the sort. I think most people have had a stiff joint at one time or another. It might actually be the hip I bashed on the ground when I did my fall in the middle of the road that time. I can’t remember which it was.
Lent has now begun and it seems to be one of those times where people have an excuse to make some kind of resolution. I have decided that for Lent I will attempt to give up food at work (other than lunch). I will resist all biscuits in meetings (which to be honest I’m quite good at already because of my now weight loss ‘reputation’ I have to maintain), and resist all team related foods such as celebratory cakes.
Note this is not forever. One thing about my eating regime is to note that cakes and biscuits are not evil. You can work them in so long as you aren’t a prannock about it and continue to stuff your face repeatedly. This is just a ‘fun’ thing for Lent with a hopefully a small bonus on the scales each week. Let’s hope it works!
As we all know, Lent ends with Easter. Perhaps I will have an excuse to treat myself with a delicious Easter Egg if I do well.
This weekend was filled with Christmas frivolities!
Firstly on Friday afternoon/evening we had the Work Christmas Party. This was at The Buckerell Lodge for a second year running. The photos can be found here. I had a really good time and it was a bit of a shame that I had to leave so early. I think it was for the best though as I was just starting to feel a bit tipsy at that time.
Then James and I went off to Aunty Lizzie’s and Uncle Peter’s house for the Seward/Whiting Family Christmas. I really enjoyed it and we had lots of fun catching up and playing games. The photos of that can be found here.
As a result of these very enjoyable activities, I am certain that I will have put on weight when I visit Weight Watchers tonight. I am therefore trying to go to the gym every day this week as a one-off, especially considering there will be more eating and drinking the coming weekend!
Today marks 2 years that I have been working at Devon County Council.
I feel like i’ve been here forever…but not in a bad way. I like it here. It was difficult to begin with. The first 6 months were really hard, but now I am properly settled in and feel quite at home.
\o/
Can’t wait for the weekend. This week has dragged by so slowly!
Wow i’m so glad it’s the weekend.
Work has been pretty hectic. With feeling pretty rubbish for almost an entire week after the seizure, I got quite behind on things. Had a few emails where I’ve had to explain why I haven’t done a few things and generally I feel quite bad about it. Will DEFINITELY pull my socks up over the next couple of weeks though.
Tomorrow I am taking James to the chiropractor with me. Hopefully he can help free up the joints in James’s back and shoulders like he did for me. I have developed a strange grinding in my neck since my last seizure so i’m hoping he can fix that for me. I think he will be able to. Just feels like it is a bit impacted or something.
Then for the rest of tomorrow I think I will have a look around the shops for some trousers for work. I seem to have 2 pairs that have disintegrated at the same time. They are very old however. Hopefully we can pick up James’s wedding ring whilst we are in town as well - it is supposedly fixed.
The weekend before the one just passed was of course the annual Queen Convention. Everyone else set off for Prestatyn early on the Friday morning however this was when the Exeter DLTP meeting was due so James and I stayed behind for the morning so that I could attend. I was so eager to leave that I think that was one of the slowest meetings ever known! Eventually we were off to Prestatyn and we arrived around 7:30pm. We got some chips from the nearby chip shop and headed to Pontin’s.
It was a really fun weekend and we took part in loads of activities. The tribute bands were pretty good and I got myself a Queen t-shirt.
Pics of the Convention can be found here: http://gallery.jamesoff.net/v/Events/Outtings/Conventions/Convention2006/
Oops no update in a while. It’s just been quite busy yet uneventful and I don’t want to bore people with rubbish updates!
Briefly, the things that have happened since I last wrote are:
Chicken Yakitori – 3 skewers of chicken in bbq sauce. £3.20.
We ordered some of that and it was delicious.
Next weekend is the Queen Convention and I am really looking forward to that. Sadly I can’t get the whole of Friday off work because I have a meeting that morning. I have booked the rest of the day off as flexi-leave which will enable me to leave as soon as the meeting has finished, rather than a half-day leave that would require me to stay until lunch-time if the meeting was shorter.
UPDATE: tyepyedong Noodle Bar have updated their menu. tyepyedong Menu
Work has been getting better this week. I’m glad. It wasn’t a job-leaving problem, just a blip. Confidence in the quality of my work is now returning.
Work is still very depressing at the moment. It’s a sudden loss of confidence - i felt so strong in what i was doing before.
Last weekend we visited my parents in the north, taking with us their new PC that we had built for them. So far it seems to be working well and they are enjoying webcam conversations with us. Their old computer is still a pile of rubbish and refuses to work correctly. Disgraceful effort by PC World and terrible customer service.
This weekend i plan to try and get some housework done. Priority is bathroom cleaning this time and hopefully a quick-clean of the kitchen. Must try and find ‘homes’ for more objects. Too much stuff gets dumped on desks, tables and the futon.
This has been the worst working week for a long time. Thank God I have tomorrow off. I’ve just had all my enthusiasm robbed from me.
Work probs just got even worse. God, it’s a depressing week. So glad I have Friday off.
:(
Yesterday’s day at work was pretty depressing. Didn’t really like the way something was done but you just pick yourself up and carry on don’t you.
Yesterday was also Valentine’s Day and a round-about 6 year anniversary for James and I <3
James took me to see Starlight Express at the Princess Theatre in Torquay. Took us a bit to find the place and we had to run to not miss the start but we got there in the end. It was brilliant. They did a really good job of it despite having such a small stage. This was the 3rd time I’d seen it and each time it has been a different revision of the show. Of course I prefer the original version (which was much longer) but it’s all still good.
At the weekend James and I bought two new fish – Teeny and Blackie. Both are algae-eaters. Teeny has been put in the little tank and Blackie in the larger tank. Blackie disappeared for a while but he’s started coming out and swimming about a little bit now. I have realised that he isn’t as black in colour as I thought and actually has quite a few speckles. I’m now thinking of changing his name to Spotty instead. We shall see.
This weekend we are off to the North with Mum and Dad’s new PC. We have installed everything we can think of and it seems to be working really well. Google Earth runs brilliantly so Dad will be pleased. I have booked a flexi day off work on Friday because I have a lot of flexi time on my clock and it seems as good a time as any to use some of it up. The weekends where we travel go so quickly anyway. Hopefully I will be able to force myself down the gym at some point. Maybe if I wake up early and get James to drop me off at the gym on his way to work it will make the day longer. My gym regime is going pretty well and I’m still enjoying it. My legs feel quite strong now although I’m not fit yet – running for the theatre last night proved that!
Before explaining the title, will just mention that last night we went round to Kev and Cath’s place for tea. We gave Cath her present and ate pizza whilst watching a couple of dvds. Twas v nice to see them as we don’t really see them as often as everyone else in Exeter.
Anyway getting onto the title. James and I have now been members of Fitness First gym for officially a week today. I want to stick to this exercise regime as i basically haven’t stuck to anything before that is vaguely health related. So far i am actually really enjoying it! Last Sunday we went for our induction so it wasn’t a proper work-out. We just had a few goes on the different machines and then tried a bit of the weight machines. This week i did 40 minutes each on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday on the bikes, treadmills and cross-trainers. I haven’t done any weight stuff because i’m trying to do a little bit of fat burning to begin with. Then i think once i’ve shifted a few pounds, i will introduce toning as well.
The place is great. The changing rooms are really swish and there are free drinks and papers in the lounge bit. They even have a free dvd/video library! Cool. Anyway i will be hopefully doing another 4 days this week too! It’s a good thing to do whilst james is at badminton on Mondays and Thursdays (otherwise i just end up sitting at home in front of the computer/tv) and then james will accompany me to the gym on Tuesdays and Fridays. Yey! I’ve briefed james that i have no excuse to give him for not going other than being properly ill or suffering the aftermath of a seizure…i guess that comes under properly ill though. Basically in the past i’ve made up excuses such as ‘being tired from work’, ‘it’s raining’ and other unacceptable things. During the week i travel around Devon, i do feel tired from work and often work until 6:30pm or later, however i’ve found that if i get off my butt and actually go to the gym anyway, i feel less tired and have more energy. Sounds crazy to me but there is probably some explanation that the fit people know about heh. Fitness First is open until 10pm on a weekday so obviously there’s still plenty of time to get to the gym and do a proper workout. Because they have TVs you have the added benefit of being able to watch a programme whilst you work out so no excuse to stay at home so you don’t miss it. Most of the time i’ve been listening to my ipod whilst at the gym but on Tuesday whilst James was away in London, i went down there early and watched Neighbours on the treadmill. There was actually quite a lot of competition for the machines near the TV that was showing Neighbours. Proof that it’s a brilliant programme you sceptics!
Well it just flew by didn’t it? One minute I’m rejoicing that it’s time for the holiday and the next it feels like we are back at work again. Ain’t that just the way it goes?
At work on the afternoon of Thursday 22nd Dec we had a ROC (team) meeting – pretty relaxed with mince pies, so a nice way to round off the ‘term’. I walked home and made sure everything was ready to set off to my parents’ house.
We arrived fairly late but we had drinks and chatted for quite a while. Then we had a lovely lie in the next day. I went to Safeway in Harwood (actually now Morrisons) with Mum in the morning and we bought a few final Christmas items. She took me in her new car – the SLK. It was fantastic – such a lovely colour. James tried all day to fix mum and dad’s broken computer but to no avail so on Saturday (Christmas Eve) we drove down to PC World to get them to fix it. I went in the car with dad and James went in the SLK with mum to experience its coolness.
PC World were basically pretty rubbish and we ended up leaving it with them after hours on the phone in the shop to the PC World help desk people. I joked that maybe one day James could drive the SLK and mum surprisingly said “well you could drive it home now” !! Fantastic! James drove the SLK home and seemed to really enjoy it. Sadly there was quite a lot of traffic so he wasn’t able to get up to decent speeds and see it’s acceleration.
That evening, I went to the Christmas Carol Service at Hawkshaw St. Mary’s with mum and dad and Matt. Dad was singing in the group at the front so I took a video on my digi cam so he could listen to it back. Saw a few old faces there and have since decided I could probably handle never seeing some of them ever again! Most people were lovely though.
Christmas Day was lovely. We had some great presents and a wonderful lunch cooked by mum. Afterwards we watched the Queen and Toy Story 2. In the evening we had a bit of Christmas Cake and then James and I charged off down to Princes Risborough in the car where we met James’ parents and brother. We had drinks and exchanged presents. Coincidentally, James and Dave had bought each other the exact same present! This caused great amusement. They are more similar than they realise!
The next day, Boxing Day, was John Seward’s 60th Birthday. Carys joined us in the morning. We gave John lots of presents and drank champagne before piling into the mini bus with Fine Arts to go to The Angel for lunch. We had a lovely meal and I took 150 photos. Afterwards we went back to Joy and Martin’s house and had cake, buffet and lots more drinks. James and I walked home with Dave and Carys to get to bed for as much sleep as possible.
At 3.30am the alarm went off and by 4am we were on the road towards Gatwick. I slept a little in the car as well. The plane flew on time and we arrived at Malaga Airport in time to get our amazing van-mobile (pics of which are on the gallery). The apartment that the Sewards have is a perfect size and setup with an amazing view of the sea.
We had a very relaxing few days there filled mostly with leisurely trips to beaches and restaurants and a lot of reading. It’s such a nice change to have time to do some reading so it was really enjoyable. The weather was lovely and warm in the sun but often a jumper was required as the wind could be a bit nippy. It was hot enough to give me a little bit of pinkness on my cheeks.
Sadly the flight home was not as on-time as the outbound flight. This was the only thing that went wrong but thankfully it wasn’t a major delay and was only a couple of hours. This gave me lots of time to browse the duty free shop and get a present for Reagan who had been looking after the fish whilst we were away.
We got back to the Sewards’ house at about 3am and went to bed immediately as we were all really tired. The next morning we headed off to Bristol to spend New Year with some of our #exeter friends. We played games and drank a lot and on New Years Day ate much food in the form of toasties and Full English Breakfast butties.
Finally we headed home and flopped. We needed a holiday after that! We got a bit of washing and stuff done on Bank Holiday Monday but basically it felt like it was straight back to work!
Hope you had a good Christmas and New Year. Happy 2006!
Today is my last day of work before the holidays and it should be a fairly easy going day. I’ve done some of the work I intended to do today already and have a few things left to do this morning.
Then this afternoon we are having a team ROC meeting which is normally very stress free these days. We will probably have coffee and mince pies and people will mostly discuss the work that the Dream Team do (waste stuff). I normally say a couple of words about what i do but not much because no one is really that interested.
Then as soon as it is 4pm I am going to race home and get the last few things i need into my suitcase ready to go. Must remember to take the rubbish out to the bins, switch the dishwasher off standby (it is washing now whilst i am at work), shut down my PC, turn down the heating thermostat slightly and give the fish some food. Also must remember to go and get the fish a feeding block on the way home and drop the keys off to Reagan so that he can feed them whilst we are away.
Crazy stuff happened yesterday after work! Quite an exciting evening. Firstly, I left work and walked over to Polsloe Road to the Doctors. On Tuesday morning we had dropped off my repeat prescription request so I was going to go and pick it up. Got there after 20 mins walk and they told me that they had sent it directly to Boots as normal despite me crossing that part out on the request. They said i should have specifically said i wanted to collect. They are probably right. Anyway it doesn’t make much difference as we have to go to Boots to pick up the pills anyway. I called James and told him what had happened and he said he’d stop off at Boots to pick them up.
Walked another 20 mins into town - a nice waste of time in all. I realised that really i should get something nice to wear for John’s 60th Birthday party so I popped into Monsoon. I’ve seen quite a few nice skirts and tops in there recently but resisted because they are pretty pricey. In the end I got a skirt, top and wooly cardigan to wear for his party. Whilst i was there i also got some jeans because my current pairs are threatening to all wear out at the same time. All in all came to just under £200 but I haven’t bought any clothes in ages and this should last a while. I made sure i bought clothes that were nice enough to wear out to stuff but also not too dressy for work, so double usage!
Popped into M&S and witnessed a mother having a right go at her 3 children in the hoisery department. Some people are weird. Intended to go to the fish shop but totally forgot so will have to go today. Went home and caught the last 10 mins of Neighbours and watched the news a bit.
It was about 6:40pm and i was watching the beginning of Spotlight whilst chatting on IRC a bit. James was still out because he was picking up parcels and going to Boots to get my prescription (which incidentally they didn’t have because it had been sent to the High Street Boots first and wouldn’t arrive at the normal Boots until sometime today *sigh*). Suddenly there was a massively loud crashing noise that really startled me and it sounded like it was coming from just outside my window. I stood up and looked out and a bus had crashed into the blue Cannon Hygiene van that is always parked in the loading bay outside the Devon County Council community centre building accross the road and careered into the the building. It had pushed the van out into the road and smashed in the back of it. The front of the bus was all mangled and the windscreen was totally shattered. Bricks had crumbled away from the wall and the building windows were smashed. Later i saw that the wall was dangerously buckling inwards.
I stood shocked for a second and then grabbed for the phone that was on my desk. I could see people moving inside the bus but i was pretty sure no one would have managed to call 999 yet so I thought i better had do. I was so shocked seeing what had happened that i was pretty rubbish when calling. The guy said “do you want police, fire or ambulance” and i said “I don’t know! There’s been a bus crash!”. The man calmly said “Ok, you’ll probably want the police first off.” and put me through to the police. I told the police what had happened and that there were people on the bus and stuff and they said they’d send round a unit straight away.
I looked out the window again and a few people were off the bus and running away because they thought it might blow up or something. I grabbed my keys and home phone and mobile and went out to see if i could help people. I was shaking and could hardly get the key in the door to lock behind me. The police arrived within about a minute and started stopping traffic further down the road and sorting out passengers. It soon became evident that everyone who’d been on the bus was pretty much ok. The driver was looking pretty startled as most of the front of the bus where he would have been sitting was destroyed. Here is a pic that i took from the window. It doesn’t show the damage quite so well because it was dark but you can see where it’s gone so high that it’s taken bits off wall out. When they moved the bus you could see that the wall was pretty much fubared.
The police called for the fire brigade because the bus and van were obviously going to need moving but the fire brigade would have to make sure there wasn’t any chance of it blowing up and stuff. I decided to go back upstairs because no one was hurt and stuff and they just needed to clear it all away. I searched my pockets for my keys and couldn’t find them! I was well worried. Luckily the front door of Augusta Court had done it’s typical thing of not swinging shut properly so i was able to get inside. A woman was just entering the building as well and i blathered something about losing my keys. She gave me a funny look as though i was mad. When i got upstairs i saw that i’d left the keys in the door! I’d locked it and then just left the keys in the lock! I was obviously quite distracted!
Inside, I put the webcam on to it and a few people on IRC watched it with me. Some rubble clearing men arrived and a tow truck to take away the van. Later they managed to pull the bus away by tying some string round it and pulling it off somewhere.
After a good cup of tea i calmed down a bit but i didn’t manage as much packing for holiday as i hoped to because i felt a bit freaked even though no one was hurt. It was a strange accident really. Market Street is one way. It has loading bays on the right hand side with a full lane to pass by them so no need to swerve. The bus should have just sailed past to the left of the van. The road narrows to the left hand side a bit further up because of a pedestrian crossing with signals. They only recently put a load of anti-skid road surfacing there also. The bus however didn’t impact the van on the left hand side as if it just clipped it due to an inexperienced driver. It’s as if the driver fell asleep at the wheel or passed out or something because he impacted the van on it’s right hand side, wedging the bus into the building and pushing the van out to the left (as you can see on the photo). Unfortunately i didn’t see it happen but there were plenty of witnesses on the bus itself who could probably say whether the driver just seemed to lose it or something. Maybe it will be in the news if it turns out there were strange shinanigans other than just ‘accident’. He could have swerved to avoid a pedestrian of course or something similar.
Well it was all very exciting. Not sure i’ve ever had to ring 999 before!
Yesterday was the Work Xmas Party as my entry noted. It was quite enjoyable and the photos can be found here:
Work Christmas Party 2005 photographs
I took a few videos but haven’t uploaded them yet because they are quite large and i need to work out how to reduce the file size.