January:
The addition of fish to our Christmas-present-to-ourselves aquarium. Glad to be able to report that we have only lost a very few over the intervening 12 months, and the ones who are still there look happy. Well, as happy as fish ever do. They've grown, and their colours are bright. And I think one of them was smiling at me.
Snow. Lots of snow. Inability to get to work, which started off as fun and exciting, and rapidly became irritating and constraining. No snow animals, though. Fail.
Chest infection. Yes, another bout of the Black Lung.
Ongoing SSFH fuckwittery from the police, proving that basic administration CAN be impossibly hard if you really work at it.
Sausage making. Oh yes. Oh yes indeed. Watch and be impressed, dear readers. The hands belong to our friend the chef, the splendid camera work was down to me. I didn't realise my camera recorded sound. Until I filmed that.
February:
More fuckwittery from the police. I suspect that I could say that every month, to be honest.
My blog was stalked by a mad optician for a bit, they added semi-literate comments to the same post over and over. Fool.
Big, long, fantastic holiday to the US of A was booked, which cheered us both up after the horrible year we had just had.
Joined Slimming World, after deciding that I really couldn't pretend that I was fine as I was any more. That was a surprisingly hard thing to do, it felt like an admission of defeat and failure somehow. And now, 10 months on, two and a half stone lighter so far, I realise what a fucking idiot I was for not doing it years ago.
March:
I had my hair cut at a posh hairdresser in Salisbury. And it was great. I will continue with that for the forseeable future I think. Well, at least for as long as I have a job and can afford it.
There was a lot of whining about trains. Again, I expect that is true for every month.
Minor domestic appliance chaos, and a huge crack in Mr WithaY's Landrover windscreen made it an expensive month.
April:
April was ALL ABOUT the visas. Following the SSFH, we discovered that we now need visas to travel to the USA, so we had weeks of incredibly stressful and depressing paperwork and expense. It all came right in the end, but I can honestly say that if we hadn't already booked the flights and hotel we would not have bothered.
Mr WithaY went off to Wales for a fortnight to help run the outdoor activity stuff with work. I don't remember any major domestic appliances breaking while he was away, for a change.
There was also a degree of ranting about fuckwits on trains.
May:
May saw the continuation of the Black Lung, which had stuck around on and off for about 5 months. Nice.
The weather improved and we did work on the garden.
Poor brother in law was taken ill, which was very frightening, but thankfully he is making good progress now.
Father in law was also taken very ill, rushed into hospital several times, all very upsetting. Oh, and the nursing home staff dropped him on his head, which didn't help matters. He is still with us, though, battling on and watching murder mysteries with glee.
Holiday preparation continued, having the visas meant that we actually started looking forward to it.
June:
We went to AMERICA. Hurrah! I can't believe it was 6 months ago.
We also had the house insulated - been much warmer this winter, so that was worth doing - and did lots to the garden.
Oh, and I got chatted up by the man who works at the rubbish tip. Bonus.
July:
AMERICA AMERICA AMERICA. We were over there for a month, it was marvellous. Best holiday ever.
I fell over in Nantucket like an idiot and fractured my ankle, not realising I had done so for about 3 weeks. Gah. Well, a bad sprain looks like a fracture, and vice versa, apparently.
The weather had been boiling hot the whole time we were away, we returned home and the rain started. Ah well.
August:
I started my new job, still in London, still in the same department, but in a different team and with a different role. Still enjoying that. Good chance that I will be made redundant though, next year. And to be honest, that would mean that I wouldn't have to spend 6 hours a day travelling, and would probably pay off most of the mortgage, so hey, not all bad.
Had the plumber in to do some minor work on the bathroom. Ended up with huge holes smashed in the walls and a craving for whiskey. Looks ok now.
September:
September is all about the Frome Cheese Show. I am already looking forward to the next one.
We persuaded father in law WithaY to sell his house, and spent many weekends travelling to Dorset to clear his stuff out and take photos for the estate agents. It's still on the market. Anyone with £300K to spare, drop me a line.
October:
Had a mini holiday in St Ives with some mates, the weather was lovely, the sea was blue, we saw a seal, Mr WithaY fell over backwards into a stream. Oh, and there were cream teas. Perfect.
Went to see our MP to try to resolve the ever-present SSFH aftermath.
I lost my blogging mojo for a bit, but not to worry, it came back. Like Lassie.
November:
Rained.
Return of the Black Lung. 4 weeks off work, antibiotics, chest x-rays blah blah fucking blah. Again.
Also, visit from two senior police officers to discuss the rather excellent letter which our MP wrote to the Chief Constable. Had almost 2 hours with them, explained exactly how their actions had affected us, and how incredibly fortunate we are to have a close group of friends and neighbours who looked after us when the SSFH broke over our heads, and basically made sure we didn't do anything stupid at a time when we felt as though we might.
Police apologised profusely and heartily. Police also said they would pay us a small token amount - NOT compensation, that would imply fault - but as a recognition of what we had suffered as a result of their "poor decision." We agreed that we would let the matter rest. We are waiting for a cheque.
Feel as though a line has been drawn under that now, which is a huge relief.
December:
Snow snow snow. Frost and fog as well. Very seasonal.
Catastrophe in the kitchen with a shelf collapse, and about £500 of china and glass smashed all over the floor. Waiting for a letter from the insurance company. Gah.
New curtains though.
SSFH:
So, yeah. We were arrested last summer. The police turned up at our house at 0630 with a warrant and a battering ram (thankfully not used) and arrested us both on very serious, very nasty allegations. We were held in the cells for 10 hours, photographed, fingerprinted, questioned under caution and finally released on bail. Our home was searched, a lot of our property was confiscated for examination, and we both felt as though our world had come to an end.
A week later we were told that the police would be taking no further action, and all our property was returned. I was off work for over a month with post traumatic stress, we were both very badly affected, and without the love and support of our friends and neighbours, I really don't know that we would both still be here.
We've spent a lot of time over the last 18 months trying to get an explanation as to how this could have happened, and why, and who was responsible for the original malicious and unfounded allegations. We'll never know, as it turns out the police didn't know either. But they decided to act anyway. As they said to us last month: "It was not our finest hour." No, it really fucking wasn't.
As a result of that, we now have to get a visa to travel to the USA. We have managed to get our DNA, photographs and fingerprints deleted from the central police database, and we have had an apology from the Chief Constable.
It should never have happened.
And the saddest thing, to me at least, is that we no longer trust the police.
But, at least we now have closure, to use a dreadful pseudo-psycholgical term. And as a result, next year will be a good one.
Thank you to all our friends, neighbours and family who got us through what was undoubtedly the worst few months of our lives. Onwards and upwards.
Hurrah.
Happy New Year, everyone. Thank you for reading, commenting and hopefully enjoying spending virtual time with me. Looking forward to the next chapter.
Showing posts with label shitstorm from Hades. Show all posts
Showing posts with label shitstorm from Hades. Show all posts
Friday, 31 December 2010
Friday, 10 December 2010
Crystallised
Well, here we are, a mere two weeks from Christmas. Are we all ready for it, dear readers? Have we got the mulled wine on a low simmer, the Christmas pudding clamped into the workbench ready to be chiselled into, the turkey nervously fingering its collar out in the garden?
Me neither.
Although, to be fair, Mr WithaY and I have already made more festive effort than we did over the entire holiday season last year. We have written and posted our cards, bought a Lidl pannetone, discussed what we want for Christmas lunch - we're hovering on "duck" at the moment, but it may well change - and we plan to put the tree up this weekend.
Last Christmas we did almost none of that. No tree, as we weren't in the mood to put it up, very few cards and a festive season spent mostly sniffling and coughing at each other. The aftermath of the SSFH* went on for a very long time, but now we both feel in the appropriate frame of mind to celebrate stuff again. So that's nice.
All it needs this year is the annual Dinotopia-fest and I will feel as though we are back to normal.
Anyway. Hasn't it been cold? I'm well aware that we soft south-western pansies get very little in the way of severe weather compared to those in the frozen wastes up North, but what we do get we make the most of. We had about a week with real snow on the ground, which was very pretty, and then another week or so of ice on top of that, turning the roads into glass. GLASS.
Last Sunday, we thought we might pop over to Salisbury, as I was getting stir crazy from a month of housebound coughing due to the ongoing boring chest infection. The sun was shining, and the snow was melting, and the roads looked fine. Traffic was moving normally on the main road past the house.
Mr WithaY's Landrover has been in fine fettle**, so we hopped in and headed off. As you drive out of our village on the non-main road, there is a sharp bend before you get to the junction with the slightly bigger road. We went into that bend doing about 20mph, maybe less. We started to turn the corner, then we lost it and went sideways on a sheet of black ice, sliding gracefully towards the wall.
Fortunately, there was nothing coming in the opposite direction, and we came to a halt before we hit anything, but it was quite unsettling. We reached the junction, made an executive decision and turned in the opposite direction to Salisbury, opting instead to pay a visit to father in law WithaY at the nursing home.
Our trip to the local hospital was less slidey, but it was still pretty cold and icy out there. I'm glad that they keep X-ray departments so warm. Having to strip down into a saucy open-backed hospital gown for a chest X-ray would have been miserable otherwise. I get the results next week sometime, something nice to look forward to.
The doctor referred me for an X-ray because he was a bit concerned that this is the fourth significant chest infection in two years. He asked me lots of questions about foreign travel. Had I been anywhere exotic recently? Did I do much air travel? Do I have any close friends who have come back from the Far East lately?
Other than the flights to and from Boston this summer, I haven't been on a plane for ages. None of my friends have been anywhere exotic as far as I know. The closest thing to foreign travel is the bus from Waterloo to the office, which sounds like a lively debate at the UN most mornings, I suppose.
Apparently it's my lower right lung that was "rattling" - the same one that was badly infected last time, so I have a feeling it never went away properly. Anyone would think I smoked 60 a day. I have NEVER smoked. Ever. Gah.
So anyway. As my car died, and the roads were too icy anyway, I went for a short stroll the other morning. I took my camera, because the hoar frost was incredible. I wore the hat with ear flaps, in case you were wondering.
It was bloody freezing though, so I didn't go very far before realising I couldn't feel my fingers.
How Christmassy is this, eh? Very, that's how.
I saw some herons and egrets in the river, but by the time my frozen sausage fingers got my camera out, they had buggered off.
Look, there he goes, buggering off.
Brrr.
Now I need a cup of tea. And possibly a crumpet. With butter and jam.
Which reminds me, the ongoing weight loss has stalled a little, probably due to 4 weeks of chest infection and 2 courses of antibiotics. And shitloads of crumpets.
The last lot of antibiotics I was on apparently cause "spontaneous tendon rupture" so I am still half expecting my arms and legs to fall off.
I'll let you know.
*Shit storm from Hades. Yes, I am stilll going on about it.
**Unlike my car which died after three days of the cold, and had to have its battery recharged. I know how it felt, to be honest
Me neither.
Although, to be fair, Mr WithaY and I have already made more festive effort than we did over the entire holiday season last year. We have written and posted our cards, bought a Lidl pannetone, discussed what we want for Christmas lunch - we're hovering on "duck" at the moment, but it may well change - and we plan to put the tree up this weekend.
Last Christmas we did almost none of that. No tree, as we weren't in the mood to put it up, very few cards and a festive season spent mostly sniffling and coughing at each other. The aftermath of the SSFH* went on for a very long time, but now we both feel in the appropriate frame of mind to celebrate stuff again. So that's nice.
All it needs this year is the annual Dinotopia-fest and I will feel as though we are back to normal.
Anyway. Hasn't it been cold? I'm well aware that we soft south-western pansies get very little in the way of severe weather compared to those in the frozen wastes up North, but what we do get we make the most of. We had about a week with real snow on the ground, which was very pretty, and then another week or so of ice on top of that, turning the roads into glass. GLASS.
Last Sunday, we thought we might pop over to Salisbury, as I was getting stir crazy from a month of housebound coughing due to the ongoing boring chest infection. The sun was shining, and the snow was melting, and the roads looked fine. Traffic was moving normally on the main road past the house.
Mr WithaY's Landrover has been in fine fettle**, so we hopped in and headed off. As you drive out of our village on the non-main road, there is a sharp bend before you get to the junction with the slightly bigger road. We went into that bend doing about 20mph, maybe less. We started to turn the corner, then we lost it and went sideways on a sheet of black ice, sliding gracefully towards the wall.
Fortunately, there was nothing coming in the opposite direction, and we came to a halt before we hit anything, but it was quite unsettling. We reached the junction, made an executive decision and turned in the opposite direction to Salisbury, opting instead to pay a visit to father in law WithaY at the nursing home.
Our trip to the local hospital was less slidey, but it was still pretty cold and icy out there. I'm glad that they keep X-ray departments so warm. Having to strip down into a saucy open-backed hospital gown for a chest X-ray would have been miserable otherwise. I get the results next week sometime, something nice to look forward to.
The doctor referred me for an X-ray because he was a bit concerned that this is the fourth significant chest infection in two years. He asked me lots of questions about foreign travel. Had I been anywhere exotic recently? Did I do much air travel? Do I have any close friends who have come back from the Far East lately?
Other than the flights to and from Boston this summer, I haven't been on a plane for ages. None of my friends have been anywhere exotic as far as I know. The closest thing to foreign travel is the bus from Waterloo to the office, which sounds like a lively debate at the UN most mornings, I suppose.
Apparently it's my lower right lung that was "rattling" - the same one that was badly infected last time, so I have a feeling it never went away properly. Anyone would think I smoked 60 a day. I have NEVER smoked. Ever. Gah.
So anyway. As my car died, and the roads were too icy anyway, I went for a short stroll the other morning. I took my camera, because the hoar frost was incredible. I wore the hat with ear flaps, in case you were wondering.
It was bloody freezing though, so I didn't go very far before realising I couldn't feel my fingers.
How Christmassy is this, eh? Very, that's how.
I saw some herons and egrets in the river, but by the time my frozen sausage fingers got my camera out, they had buggered off.
Look, there he goes, buggering off.
Brrr.
Now I need a cup of tea. And possibly a crumpet. With butter and jam.
Which reminds me, the ongoing weight loss has stalled a little, probably due to 4 weeks of chest infection and 2 courses of antibiotics. And shitloads of crumpets.
The last lot of antibiotics I was on apparently cause "spontaneous tendon rupture" so I am still half expecting my arms and legs to fall off.
I'll let you know.
*Shit storm from Hades. Yes, I am stilll going on about it.
**Unlike my car which died after three days of the cold, and had to have its battery recharged. I know how it felt, to be honest
Friday, 19 November 2010
Austerity measures for Dummies
I went to the supermarket today. That felt like a bit of an achievement, given that I can hardly breathe half the time, and the rest of the time has me coughing repulsively. Anyhoo, I went in armed with too many re-usable bags and no shopping list, never a good combination.
I resisted the temptation to buy bargain hot pies, or huge 25-bag multipacks of crisps, or gallon vats of cheap ice cream (a decision I have been regretting on and off ever since, I might add) and stocked up with all manner of sensible meat-and-potato meal makings. And vegetables. And washing up liquid. Yes, I am that sensible.
In my trolley were two tubes of Pringles (plain flavour) for Father-in-Law WithaY, who has recently developed a taste for them. All seemed uneventful as the shopping was scanned and beeped and tagged and tracked* by the nice till lady.
She scanned the two tubes of Pringles (plain flavour) then said "There's a Buy One, Get Two Free" offer on these. Do you want another tube of the same flavour?"
Me: No thanks, I only want the two tubes.
Till lady: But there's an offer on! You can have another one and get three but only pay for one!
Me: (packing potatoes and washing up liquid into a bag with grim efficiency) But I only want these two. Really.
There was a slightly accusing silence as she carried on scanning groceries and I packed bags, the two tubes of Pringles sitting folornly on the end of the conveyer belt like unwanted game show prizes.
Till lady: Well then, I will take off one of these tubes from the bill so you get one free. But you could have two free. Do you want two free?
Me: No.
I must admit that by this point I was interested to see what happened next, and prepared to argue cogently for my right to have just two tubes of Pringles if I wanted to.
This happened next:
Till lady: Oh! Gosh, that's strange.
Me: What is?
Till lady: It's taken both tubes off the bill. So...um...you get them both free. I think.
She fiddled about with the till for a bit, then slid both tubes down the counter to me as I continued cramming tins of beans and pots of probiotic yogurt** into the bags. There was a queue forming behind me, which may have affected her decision making.
Till lady: Yes. You get them both free. We'll just have an extra tube on the shelves now.
Me: (Warily) So...I get them for free? Are you sure?
Till lady: Yes. You can take them.
Me: (not touching them) Really? I don't want to take them without paying for them.
Till lady: (pushing them towards me encouragingly) But you get two free! So you can take those.
I relented and put them in my bag, paid for the shopping - not the Pringles, though, obviously - and left the shop without setting off any alarms.
All the way home I tried to work out how she had arrived at the conclusion that "buy one, get two free" can be converted into "buy two, don't pay for either of them." I am still not convinced by her logic, and am waiting for a knock on the door from the Fraud Squad.
Other news: I have bronchitis. Again. I went to the doctor on Tuesday. He listened to my chest, told me cheerfully that he's heard me sounding much worse, and gave me a prescription for the scary syphillis pills he prescribed at the end of my last bout of Black Lung.
He said "Chest infections usually only last five days or so. Let's see...how long did your last infection go on for? Hmmmm....December till.....oh. May. Well, yes. You were obviously a bit unlucky, weren't you?"
Yes, in the same sense that Cornwall is a bit wet at the moment.
He also commented "Oh, you've lost weight." I nodded, and was about to expound on my slow but steady progress when he said sternly "I hope it's not because of all the stress*** you've been dealing with?"
No, not stress, but thanks for asking, doctor. Eating fewer pies and drinking less cider, mostly.
I told him how much weight I intend to lose in total in order to be a non-overweight person according the the BMI scale; he advised me not to pay too much attention to BMI figures, and to weigh "as much as you feel comfortable with." Interesting advice, which I intend to ignore.
I am still up and writing my blog at 1am, by the way, because when I lay down in bed I start coughing hard enough to make my eyes shoot out of my head and slam into the bedroom ceiling. And that gets old fast.
Big day tomorrow. The auction house is coming to Father-in-Law WithaY's place to take out all the stuff that is going to be in a sale next month. So, hopefully I will be able to get in and give his place a bit of a clean and spruce-up once it's a bit less crammed with antiques. And then who knows, we might even sell it.
Which would be nice.
*I'm sure that we are all being monitored via our shopping.
**I'm on antibiotics. I have bronchitis again. Yay me.
***Shit Storm From Hades, although that is receding a bit now. More on this anon.
I resisted the temptation to buy bargain hot pies, or huge 25-bag multipacks of crisps, or gallon vats of cheap ice cream (a decision I have been regretting on and off ever since, I might add) and stocked up with all manner of sensible meat-and-potato meal makings. And vegetables. And washing up liquid. Yes, I am that sensible.
In my trolley were two tubes of Pringles (plain flavour) for Father-in-Law WithaY, who has recently developed a taste for them. All seemed uneventful as the shopping was scanned and beeped and tagged and tracked* by the nice till lady.
She scanned the two tubes of Pringles (plain flavour) then said "There's a Buy One, Get Two Free" offer on these. Do you want another tube of the same flavour?"
Me: No thanks, I only want the two tubes.
Till lady: But there's an offer on! You can have another one and get three but only pay for one!
Me: (packing potatoes and washing up liquid into a bag with grim efficiency) But I only want these two. Really.
There was a slightly accusing silence as she carried on scanning groceries and I packed bags, the two tubes of Pringles sitting folornly on the end of the conveyer belt like unwanted game show prizes.
Till lady: Well then, I will take off one of these tubes from the bill so you get one free. But you could have two free. Do you want two free?
Me: No.
I must admit that by this point I was interested to see what happened next, and prepared to argue cogently for my right to have just two tubes of Pringles if I wanted to.
This happened next:
Till lady: Oh! Gosh, that's strange.
Me: What is?
Till lady: It's taken both tubes off the bill. So...um...you get them both free. I think.
She fiddled about with the till for a bit, then slid both tubes down the counter to me as I continued cramming tins of beans and pots of probiotic yogurt** into the bags. There was a queue forming behind me, which may have affected her decision making.
Till lady: Yes. You get them both free. We'll just have an extra tube on the shelves now.
Me: (Warily) So...I get them for free? Are you sure?
Till lady: Yes. You can take them.
Me: (not touching them) Really? I don't want to take them without paying for them.
Till lady: (pushing them towards me encouragingly) But you get two free! So you can take those.
I relented and put them in my bag, paid for the shopping - not the Pringles, though, obviously - and left the shop without setting off any alarms.
All the way home I tried to work out how she had arrived at the conclusion that "buy one, get two free" can be converted into "buy two, don't pay for either of them." I am still not convinced by her logic, and am waiting for a knock on the door from the Fraud Squad.
Other news: I have bronchitis. Again. I went to the doctor on Tuesday. He listened to my chest, told me cheerfully that he's heard me sounding much worse, and gave me a prescription for the scary syphillis pills he prescribed at the end of my last bout of Black Lung.
He said "Chest infections usually only last five days or so. Let's see...how long did your last infection go on for? Hmmmm....December till.....oh. May. Well, yes. You were obviously a bit unlucky, weren't you?"
Yes, in the same sense that Cornwall is a bit wet at the moment.
He also commented "Oh, you've lost weight." I nodded, and was about to expound on my slow but steady progress when he said sternly "I hope it's not because of all the stress*** you've been dealing with?"
No, not stress, but thanks for asking, doctor. Eating fewer pies and drinking less cider, mostly.
I told him how much weight I intend to lose in total in order to be a non-overweight person according the the BMI scale; he advised me not to pay too much attention to BMI figures, and to weigh "as much as you feel comfortable with." Interesting advice, which I intend to ignore.
I am still up and writing my blog at 1am, by the way, because when I lay down in bed I start coughing hard enough to make my eyes shoot out of my head and slam into the bedroom ceiling. And that gets old fast.
Big day tomorrow. The auction house is coming to Father-in-Law WithaY's place to take out all the stuff that is going to be in a sale next month. So, hopefully I will be able to get in and give his place a bit of a clean and spruce-up once it's a bit less crammed with antiques. And then who knows, we might even sell it.
Which would be nice.
*I'm sure that we are all being monitored via our shopping.
**I'm on antibiotics. I have bronchitis again. Yay me.
***Shit Storm From Hades, although that is receding a bit now. More on this anon.
Sunday, 14 November 2010
Covers
Welcome to the inside of my head.
Today it has mostly been full of the echoing sounds of lung-searing coughs and whining.
There has also been a bit of guitar music as I tried to master the intro to "Weather With You*" and gave up, moving onto the far simpler and more satisfying chord sequences of "Nothing Else Matters**" segueing (sp?) into "Rocking in the Free World***" and "Your Decision****" by way of light relief.
The day started early, when I woke up, coughed a bit, then gradually slid into the full heaving paroxym, ending with streaming eyes and panicked racing heartbeat, imagining I was about to die. I didn't. I expect you worked that out.
Mr WithaY went and made me a cup of fresh ginger, hot lemon and honey, which was great until you got to the last inch or so, which was startlingly fibrous. Next time, I think we will deploy a sieve. The reaminder of my morning was spent in bed, wheezing and watching Star Trek Deep Space Nine on tv, wearing what was effectively a bed jacket. Ok, it was a really little cardigan/shrug thing, but by wearing it over my nightie I think it turned into a bed jacket.
I was WORKING it, baby. Working it like an OLD LADY.
Tomorrow is a bit of a big day. We have a visit from Her Majesty's Finest***** to discuss the ongoing repercussions of the SSFH******, so there's a fairly high stress level chez WithaY today. Once it's all sorted out, if it ever is, I think I will write a book about it all. With a gritty dreary black and white photo on the front cover, and some quotes from Serious People saying how enthralling it is.
Once you get the cover sorted, the rest is easy. I expect.
People do judge a book by it, they say. Need to get it right.
*Crowded House
**Metallica
***Neil Young
****Alice in Chains. The timing on that is a bugger, and as soon as I start to sing it, I lose the ability to play the chords. Not that I was singing today, mind.
*****Ha.
******Shit Storm From Hades
Today it has mostly been full of the echoing sounds of lung-searing coughs and whining.
There has also been a bit of guitar music as I tried to master the intro to "Weather With You*" and gave up, moving onto the far simpler and more satisfying chord sequences of "Nothing Else Matters**" segueing (sp?) into "Rocking in the Free World***" and "Your Decision****" by way of light relief.
The day started early, when I woke up, coughed a bit, then gradually slid into the full heaving paroxym, ending with streaming eyes and panicked racing heartbeat, imagining I was about to die. I didn't. I expect you worked that out.
Mr WithaY went and made me a cup of fresh ginger, hot lemon and honey, which was great until you got to the last inch or so, which was startlingly fibrous. Next time, I think we will deploy a sieve. The reaminder of my morning was spent in bed, wheezing and watching Star Trek Deep Space Nine on tv, wearing what was effectively a bed jacket. Ok, it was a really little cardigan/shrug thing, but by wearing it over my nightie I think it turned into a bed jacket.
I was WORKING it, baby. Working it like an OLD LADY.
Tomorrow is a bit of a big day. We have a visit from Her Majesty's Finest***** to discuss the ongoing repercussions of the SSFH******, so there's a fairly high stress level chez WithaY today. Once it's all sorted out, if it ever is, I think I will write a book about it all. With a gritty dreary black and white photo on the front cover, and some quotes from Serious People saying how enthralling it is.
Once you get the cover sorted, the rest is easy. I expect.
People do judge a book by it, they say. Need to get it right.
*Crowded House
**Metallica
***Neil Young
****Alice in Chains. The timing on that is a bugger, and as soon as I start to sing it, I lose the ability to play the chords. Not that I was singing today, mind.
*****Ha.
******Shit Storm From Hades
Wednesday, 27 October 2010
May I take your trident, sir?
Having been made aware of the "stats" part of Blogger, including the "Who uses what phrases to find this blog" feature, I was rather alarmed to find that someone located me by googling this phrase:
"is cavity insulatyion appropriate by the seaside"
Reader, if you're out there, I have no clue. Not a scooby. Also, why, WHY do you need to know? Are you planning on insulating a sandcastle? Are you a hermit crab who feels a bit chilly? My advice is to use seaweed.
The last week has been a bit emotional, and completely exhausting, hence yet another long hiatus between posts.
The still-ongoing SSFH* fallout continues. Mr WithaY and I had a meeting with our local MP on Friday, which was interesting, if a bit stressful. He was extremely kind, and is going to help us as much as he can.
We were early, so were invited in to sit in the bar of the Conservative Club to wait. An elderly gentleman was sat at a table, smart in a blazer and cravat, waiting to see the MP too. He was chatting to one of the staff there. He was ANGRY about many things. And loud.
"People speeding - that's so antisocial. They should be stopped on sight by the police." (I think he said "stopped" - he may have said "shot". Either seemed appropriate, given his outrage.)
The barman chappie nodded politely, clearly not very interested. Encouraged, the old gentleman expanded on his theme.
"Littering! That's another thing! People who litter are the lowest of the low! It should be a criminal offence!" (I think it might be, actually, but he was on a roll...nobody was going to try to stop him.)
"And people who litter from cars! Throwing rubbish out of the windows! They should be stopped on sight and fined - a hundred pounds. For a first offence." I was intrigued as to where his scale of fines had come from. He'd obviously given it some thought.
The barman nodded again, rearranging crisps in a silent and discouraging manner.
"And for a second offence...." the cravat-wearer paused, thinking what would be suitable punishment for a second offence, then triumphantly came up with: "They should have their car confiscated. On the spot. And then crushed."
Yes, crushing cars is an ideal way to prevent littering. Just don't chuck the crushed cars in the river afterwards.
In sombre work-related news, I found out on Friday that our Department is planning to shed between 30 and 40 percent of staff over the next two years. I have to say, the thought of being paid off is rather appealing at the moment. It would save me 6 hours travelling a day on the 3 days a week I am in London, would save me £5000-ish a year on my train ticket, plus the bus fares etcetera etcetera etcetera** and would save me a lot of stress.
Of course, having no money coming in would open up a whole new world of different stress, but at least I'd be doing that in the comfort of my own home.
It's definitely something to consider.
I was sat at my desk on Tuesday, eating my lunch, when I realised what I was doing.
Yes, dear readers, I was eating apple sauce with a spoon.
When did I turn into Ruprecht?
Better news though, possibly as a result of the apple sauce. I put on one of my suits for the meeting on Friday. I did the trousers up. The trousers fell straight back down again, in approved Carry On Film stylee. If Mr WithaY had been playing a Swanee whistle, it would have been perfect.
I tried on a different suit. Those trousers fell down.
I tried on all my suits, including one that I bought two years ago, tried on, was too fat for, so hung in the wardrobe and forgot about***. All of them were too big.
Inspired, I then tried on the outfit I wore when we got married, 16 long, long, oh so very long years ago. I wouldn't wear it if I was going out for a big dinner, but it was perfectly wearable. So hurrah.
But I need some new suits. Bugger.
*Shit Storm From Hades. I promise to be less crypic once it's all over.
**(c) King of Siam
***because clearly I wasn't going to go to all the bother of sending it back, was I?
"is cavity insulatyion appropriate by the seaside"
Reader, if you're out there, I have no clue. Not a scooby. Also, why, WHY do you need to know? Are you planning on insulating a sandcastle? Are you a hermit crab who feels a bit chilly? My advice is to use seaweed.
The last week has been a bit emotional, and completely exhausting, hence yet another long hiatus between posts.
The still-ongoing SSFH* fallout continues. Mr WithaY and I had a meeting with our local MP on Friday, which was interesting, if a bit stressful. He was extremely kind, and is going to help us as much as he can.
We were early, so were invited in to sit in the bar of the Conservative Club to wait. An elderly gentleman was sat at a table, smart in a blazer and cravat, waiting to see the MP too. He was chatting to one of the staff there. He was ANGRY about many things. And loud.
"People speeding - that's so antisocial. They should be stopped on sight by the police." (I think he said "stopped" - he may have said "shot". Either seemed appropriate, given his outrage.)
The barman chappie nodded politely, clearly not very interested. Encouraged, the old gentleman expanded on his theme.
"Littering! That's another thing! People who litter are the lowest of the low! It should be a criminal offence!" (I think it might be, actually, but he was on a roll...nobody was going to try to stop him.)
"And people who litter from cars! Throwing rubbish out of the windows! They should be stopped on sight and fined - a hundred pounds. For a first offence." I was intrigued as to where his scale of fines had come from. He'd obviously given it some thought.
The barman nodded again, rearranging crisps in a silent and discouraging manner.
"And for a second offence...." the cravat-wearer paused, thinking what would be suitable punishment for a second offence, then triumphantly came up with: "They should have their car confiscated. On the spot. And then crushed."
Yes, crushing cars is an ideal way to prevent littering. Just don't chuck the crushed cars in the river afterwards.
In sombre work-related news, I found out on Friday that our Department is planning to shed between 30 and 40 percent of staff over the next two years. I have to say, the thought of being paid off is rather appealing at the moment. It would save me 6 hours travelling a day on the 3 days a week I am in London, would save me £5000-ish a year on my train ticket, plus the bus fares etcetera etcetera etcetera** and would save me a lot of stress.
Of course, having no money coming in would open up a whole new world of different stress, but at least I'd be doing that in the comfort of my own home.
It's definitely something to consider.
I was sat at my desk on Tuesday, eating my lunch, when I realised what I was doing.
Yes, dear readers, I was eating apple sauce with a spoon.
When did I turn into Ruprecht?
Better news though, possibly as a result of the apple sauce. I put on one of my suits for the meeting on Friday. I did the trousers up. The trousers fell straight back down again, in approved Carry On Film stylee. If Mr WithaY had been playing a Swanee whistle, it would have been perfect.
I tried on a different suit. Those trousers fell down.
I tried on all my suits, including one that I bought two years ago, tried on, was too fat for, so hung in the wardrobe and forgot about***. All of them were too big.
Inspired, I then tried on the outfit I wore when we got married, 16 long, long, oh so very long years ago. I wouldn't wear it if I was going out for a big dinner, but it was perfectly wearable. So hurrah.
But I need some new suits. Bugger.
*Shit Storm From Hades. I promise to be less crypic once it's all over.
**(c) King of Siam
***because clearly I wasn't going to go to all the bother of sending it back, was I?
Monday, 19 April 2010
That'll do nicely
Today was interesting. Mr WithaY and I were up at the US Embassy for our visa interview, to see if we would be allowed to go on the holiday we booked before realising we now* need a visa to go anywhere even slightly exotic.
We've spent several hours over the last few weeks negotiating the obstacle course that you must complete to get as far as the Embassy. I'm fairly sure it was designed by the same people who develop those logic/warfare computer games, where you have to solve complex riddles and hack scaly monsters with cleavers to progress and achieve points.
There are confusing electronic forms that you have to fill in, after which you wait for a reply to let you continue to the next level of form-filling. If you tick certain boxes they send you links to more forms to fill in.
You send them scanned copies of relevant documentation so that they can decide if you are allowed to continue the process.
You have long, long telephone conversations with them (at £1.20 a minute) during which they tell you to do more, different, form-filling. During these conversations you have to go into painful detail about the reason why you now need a visa. They are not unsympathetic, they probably hear stuff like that dozens of times a year, but it still smarts to have to justify yourself to a stranger as if you are a criminal.
Degrading. That's what it is.
One of the forms you fill in has to include a scanned passport photograph. They decide online, as you are filling it in, if the photo is acceptable or not, and if it is you get to submit the whole thing. If it isn't, I assume that they send a painful electric shock through your keyboard while a disembodied voice tells you to start again at Level 1, back with the smaller monsters and slightly easier riddles.
Finally, FINALLY, they email you and tell you to phone them (still £1.20 a minute, remember) to arrange a date for your interview. You do so, and the fact that it clashes with a long-planned training course that your husband has been booked to attend for the last three months is a mere bagatelle. He arranges to arrive at the training event a day late, and you both book a day off work to trek up to London** for the interview.
The US Embassy has VERY strict rules about what you are allowed to take into the building. You can't take mobile phones, Blackberries, iPods, laptops, or keyfobs with electronic clickety things to open your car while you stand far away***. We assumed that guns, knives and sharp sticks would also be frowned upon, so left all those at home.
If you turn up with any of the banned items, you will NOT be allowed in and your interview will be CANCELLED. You will LOSE your fee of $131 (about £80) and have to make a NEW appointment which you will have to pay for AGAIN.
They use a lot of CAPITAL LETTERS to make this point in the emails they send you.
What they don't do is send you a list of what you need to take. That would be handy, if any of the Embassy staff are reading this. A checklist of everything, all the various forms, passports, associated documentation and additional passport photos would be helpful. Oh, and please ask the reception and security staff to use the same terminology when they talk about the forms, that would avoid a lot of confusion when they ask you if you have brought them with you.
Anyhoo. We arrived at the Embassy building, a veritable fortress in the heart of London, and went through the first two perimeter checkpoints. Unfortunately, when they put my handbag through the x-ray machine they saw my headphones, which I had forgotten were in there. The list of BANNED items didn't mention headphones. But they are banned, apparently. What made it especially annoying was the fact that we had already travelled halfway across London to my office to drop off the car keys and my iPhone in my locker, to ensure we complied with the rules.
I was within an ace of saying "Just throw the fucking things in the bin then," as I was exasperated and stressed to the eyeballs, but the security guard told me that there was a pharmacy down the road which offers storage for contraband (for a small fee). I legged it down there, handed over my headphones, got a cloakroom ticket in return and made it back in time for the 11am appointment.
That pharmacy must make a small fortune renting locker space.
The lady on the main reception desk told us we only needed one appointment ticket as we had an appointment for both of us at the same time, so we took it, and skipped upstairs cheerfully.
That didn't last long.
When you open the scarily heavy door to the Visa Room, there are about 400 chairs set out in rows on either side of the room, facing the screens in the middle. It's like a very, very depressing cinema, or a squalid airport departure lounge from the 1960s. It also made me think of something out of Brave New World, or possibly 1984. There is a palpable atmosphere of despair and anxiety. I felt myself ageing by the second.
They were announcing ticket number 274 as we walked in. We were number 440. Fuck.
We sat and waited till they called our number, then went to the bullet-proof, axe-proof, dragon-breath-proof window. The girl there checked our documents and said "Can I have your additional passport photos please?"
What? Seriously?
We hadn't brought additional passport photos, as the online application process had said our pictures were fine. But no. They weren't fine at all, so we had to pay another £4 each to have new pictures from their machine. She then told us we needed another ticket, which Mr WithaY ran down to reception to fetch, and we were asked to go and sit down again and wait to be called to the next stage of the interview process.
She gave us another form to fill in, in case we were getting bored.
The form she gave us warned that we should expect a wait of "some hours" for this next part of the process to pass. Fuuuuuck. We sat on the horrible hard chairs, along with dozens of other stressed, nervous, miserable people, and we waited. And waited. And waited.
One bright spot was a chap who had just bought some food from the snack vending stall at the back of the room. He had been there a fair while, the same as us, and had obviously decided to have some lunch. He had literally only just started to unwrap his Cornetto****, and they called his number. He walked out laughing to himself, his Cornetto in his hand.
I hope he sat and ate it while they interviewed him.
So. The long day wore on; we eventually got summoned to the Room of Delinquents and Scamps to explain to a very nice young American chap exactly why we needed a visa. That was lovely, as you can imagine.
He was very professional and polite, and very very thorough. After we had explained all the horrible, depressing, nasty circumstances he said "I am not going to punish you for this, it doesn't seem fair, so I am authorising your visas."
I could have hugged him. If the bullet-proof, axe-proof etc glass hadn't been there.
We had to queue up in yet another long line, and do a bit more paperwork before we were allowed to leave, but the end result is that we should be getting our envisa-ed passports back in the next few days, and will be able to go on holiday as planned in June.
Hoo-fucking-ray.
This week I am mostly going to be looking for a lawyer. I think the police ought to be footing the bill for all this, at least the money we have had to spend, if not the additional time, anxiety and indignity of it all. I'll let you know how I get on.
*Thanks to the Shitstorm From Hades
**To be fair, they did also offer us Belfast. Very helpful.
***I forget the technical term
****That's not a euphamism. A Cornetto is a type of ice-cream in a wrapper, non British readers.
We've spent several hours over the last few weeks negotiating the obstacle course that you must complete to get as far as the Embassy. I'm fairly sure it was designed by the same people who develop those logic/warfare computer games, where you have to solve complex riddles and hack scaly monsters with cleavers to progress and achieve points.
There are confusing electronic forms that you have to fill in, after which you wait for a reply to let you continue to the next level of form-filling. If you tick certain boxes they send you links to more forms to fill in.
You send them scanned copies of relevant documentation so that they can decide if you are allowed to continue the process.
You have long, long telephone conversations with them (at £1.20 a minute) during which they tell you to do more, different, form-filling. During these conversations you have to go into painful detail about the reason why you now need a visa. They are not unsympathetic, they probably hear stuff like that dozens of times a year, but it still smarts to have to justify yourself to a stranger as if you are a criminal.
Degrading. That's what it is.
One of the forms you fill in has to include a scanned passport photograph. They decide online, as you are filling it in, if the photo is acceptable or not, and if it is you get to submit the whole thing. If it isn't, I assume that they send a painful electric shock through your keyboard while a disembodied voice tells you to start again at Level 1, back with the smaller monsters and slightly easier riddles.
Finally, FINALLY, they email you and tell you to phone them (still £1.20 a minute, remember) to arrange a date for your interview. You do so, and the fact that it clashes with a long-planned training course that your husband has been booked to attend for the last three months is a mere bagatelle. He arranges to arrive at the training event a day late, and you both book a day off work to trek up to London** for the interview.
The US Embassy has VERY strict rules about what you are allowed to take into the building. You can't take mobile phones, Blackberries, iPods, laptops, or keyfobs with electronic clickety things to open your car while you stand far away***. We assumed that guns, knives and sharp sticks would also be frowned upon, so left all those at home.
If you turn up with any of the banned items, you will NOT be allowed in and your interview will be CANCELLED. You will LOSE your fee of $131 (about £80) and have to make a NEW appointment which you will have to pay for AGAIN.
They use a lot of CAPITAL LETTERS to make this point in the emails they send you.
What they don't do is send you a list of what you need to take. That would be handy, if any of the Embassy staff are reading this. A checklist of everything, all the various forms, passports, associated documentation and additional passport photos would be helpful. Oh, and please ask the reception and security staff to use the same terminology when they talk about the forms, that would avoid a lot of confusion when they ask you if you have brought them with you.
Anyhoo. We arrived at the Embassy building, a veritable fortress in the heart of London, and went through the first two perimeter checkpoints. Unfortunately, when they put my handbag through the x-ray machine they saw my headphones, which I had forgotten were in there. The list of BANNED items didn't mention headphones. But they are banned, apparently. What made it especially annoying was the fact that we had already travelled halfway across London to my office to drop off the car keys and my iPhone in my locker, to ensure we complied with the rules.
I was within an ace of saying "Just throw the fucking things in the bin then," as I was exasperated and stressed to the eyeballs, but the security guard told me that there was a pharmacy down the road which offers storage for contraband (for a small fee). I legged it down there, handed over my headphones, got a cloakroom ticket in return and made it back in time for the 11am appointment.
That pharmacy must make a small fortune renting locker space.
The lady on the main reception desk told us we only needed one appointment ticket as we had an appointment for both of us at the same time, so we took it, and skipped upstairs cheerfully.
That didn't last long.
When you open the scarily heavy door to the Visa Room, there are about 400 chairs set out in rows on either side of the room, facing the screens in the middle. It's like a very, very depressing cinema, or a squalid airport departure lounge from the 1960s. It also made me think of something out of Brave New World, or possibly 1984. There is a palpable atmosphere of despair and anxiety. I felt myself ageing by the second.
They were announcing ticket number 274 as we walked in. We were number 440. Fuck.
We sat and waited till they called our number, then went to the bullet-proof, axe-proof, dragon-breath-proof window. The girl there checked our documents and said "Can I have your additional passport photos please?"
What? Seriously?
We hadn't brought additional passport photos, as the online application process had said our pictures were fine. But no. They weren't fine at all, so we had to pay another £4 each to have new pictures from their machine. She then told us we needed another ticket, which Mr WithaY ran down to reception to fetch, and we were asked to go and sit down again and wait to be called to the next stage of the interview process.
She gave us another form to fill in, in case we were getting bored.
The form she gave us warned that we should expect a wait of "some hours" for this next part of the process to pass. Fuuuuuck. We sat on the horrible hard chairs, along with dozens of other stressed, nervous, miserable people, and we waited. And waited. And waited.
One bright spot was a chap who had just bought some food from the snack vending stall at the back of the room. He had been there a fair while, the same as us, and had obviously decided to have some lunch. He had literally only just started to unwrap his Cornetto****, and they called his number. He walked out laughing to himself, his Cornetto in his hand.
I hope he sat and ate it while they interviewed him.
So. The long day wore on; we eventually got summoned to the Room of Delinquents and Scamps to explain to a very nice young American chap exactly why we needed a visa. That was lovely, as you can imagine.
He was very professional and polite, and very very thorough. After we had explained all the horrible, depressing, nasty circumstances he said "I am not going to punish you for this, it doesn't seem fair, so I am authorising your visas."
I could have hugged him. If the bullet-proof, axe-proof etc glass hadn't been there.
We had to queue up in yet another long line, and do a bit more paperwork before we were allowed to leave, but the end result is that we should be getting our envisa-ed passports back in the next few days, and will be able to go on holiday as planned in June.
Hoo-fucking-ray.
This week I am mostly going to be looking for a lawyer. I think the police ought to be footing the bill for all this, at least the money we have had to spend, if not the additional time, anxiety and indignity of it all. I'll let you know how I get on.
*Thanks to the Shitstorm From Hades
**To be fair, they did also offer us Belfast. Very helpful.
***I forget the technical term
****That's not a euphamism. A Cornetto is a type of ice-cream in a wrapper, non British readers.
Thursday, 25 March 2010
Losses
Remember I said I was starting a weight loss regime? Yeah you do.
I am happy to report that to date I have lost nine and a half pounds. Doesn't sound much, but it's 19 packets of butter. Or nine and a half bags of sugar. Or a shedload* of satsumas.
It doesn't really show yet, as proportionally it is a mere drop in the ocean, but it's an achievement and I am pleased.
Other news: Visa application saga continues, and is stressful, depressing and expensive. I ended up having to take the afternoon off work as I was weeping uncontrollably after having to rummage through all the paperwork relating the the SSFH** to find the bits that the Embassy need. So that was nice.
Tonight, by way of light relief, Mr WithaY and I are off out to see some mates for dinner and to participate in a mass Folding. The parish magazine doesn't just staple itself, you know.
*The research team are still working on the details of this one.
**Shit Storm From Hades
I am happy to report that to date I have lost nine and a half pounds. Doesn't sound much, but it's 19 packets of butter. Or nine and a half bags of sugar. Or a shedload* of satsumas.
It doesn't really show yet, as proportionally it is a mere drop in the ocean, but it's an achievement and I am pleased.
Other news: Visa application saga continues, and is stressful, depressing and expensive. I ended up having to take the afternoon off work as I was weeping uncontrollably after having to rummage through all the paperwork relating the the SSFH** to find the bits that the Embassy need. So that was nice.
Tonight, by way of light relief, Mr WithaY and I are off out to see some mates for dinner and to participate in a mass Folding. The parish magazine doesn't just staple itself, you know.
*The research team are still working on the details of this one.
**Shit Storm From Hades
Wednesday, 24 March 2010
Cracking fun
It's been a week of trains. Trains, trains, trains. Interspersed with the Tube.
Things I have seen on my travels of late include:
Two very excited West Ham fans on the Tube. As the journey progressed they donned more and more kit - hats, scarves, shirts. By the time I got off they were eagerly examining one anothers tickets for the match, and talking loudly about what a great night they were about to have. They both looked very young, and were clearly having the time of their lives. One of them gave up his seat to a lady, which I thought was polite. Although, now I think about it, she was very attractive, and neither of them gave up their seat to a much less attractive lady later in the trip. So, maybe an ulterior motive there.
As an aside, I often see people offering up seats on the Tube. It's less common to see someone ofering up a seat on the train out of Waterloo, but that would mean standing up for the bet part of an hour at least, so I can understand the reluctance.
I saw this on Tuesday night. A man got on the train at Salisbury and proceeded to eat his way through a whole pack of chocolate mini rolls. I have seldom seen anyone get less enjoyment out of food; he looked as though it was an exercise in energy restoration and nothing else.
I also took some pictures of Mr WithaY's crack. So to speak.
It was HUGE. It's all been fixed now, but it was exciting while it lasted.
Thanks a lot, Police State UK (TM).
I'm still very angry about it all. When I have stopped being so angry I might even blog about it, but not yet. Too painful.
Things I have seen on my travels of late include:
Two very excited West Ham fans on the Tube. As the journey progressed they donned more and more kit - hats, scarves, shirts. By the time I got off they were eagerly examining one anothers tickets for the match, and talking loudly about what a great night they were about to have. They both looked very young, and were clearly having the time of their lives. One of them gave up his seat to a lady, which I thought was polite. Although, now I think about it, she was very attractive, and neither of them gave up their seat to a much less attractive lady later in the trip. So, maybe an ulterior motive there.
As an aside, I often see people offering up seats on the Tube. It's less common to see someone ofering up a seat on the train out of Waterloo, but that would mean standing up for the bet part of an hour at least, so I can understand the reluctance.
I saw this on Tuesday night. A man got on the train at Salisbury and proceeded to eat his way through a whole pack of chocolate mini rolls. I have seldom seen anyone get less enjoyment out of food; he looked as though it was an exercise in energy restoration and nothing else.
If you look closely you will see the reflection of the naughty photographer in the window behind him.
Heh.I also took some pictures of Mr WithaY's crack. So to speak.
It was HUGE. It's all been fixed now, but it was exciting while it lasted.
This one looks like an arty album cover.
This one makes it look like we live in Bavaria. We don't.
Other news: I have been partaking of some Culture. We watched The Hurt Locker the other weekend. It was ok, felt more like a documentary than anything else, but without any kind of editorial focus. I'm not sure why it won so many Oscars. I didn't engage with any of the characters and thought it was far too long. Maybe that was the point, I dunno.
Also watched District 9 last weekend which I thoroughly enjoyed. Much bleaker and sadder than I expected, and a lot more interesting to me. I daresay that tells a story about my psyche, but frankly I don't give a rat's arse, amateur psychologists. Ha!
A colleague lent me a book called Stasiland by Anna Funder which I read on the train, and thought it was excellent. It's all about life behind the Berlin Wall. The author is a lovely writer and a damn fine journalist. I recommend it.
I'd love to go back to Berlin. We lived there when I was little and went back for a visit a few years later when we went and looked at the Wall. It made a big impression.
I am waiting for some v important paperwork to show up this week, and when it does I need to book Mr WithaY and I an appointment at the American Embassy. Thanks to the SSFH* of last summer, we are no longer eligible for the Visa Waiver Programme, and need to get a tourist visa from the Embassy. In person.
So, $131 each for the interview (which is about £80), plus the cost of the train, plus £70 each (the cost of the Official Stuff from the police) on top of that...almost £300. And if we want to go to Canada, or Australia or South Africa, or America again, we go through it all each time.
Thanks a lot, Police State UK (TM).
I'm still very angry about it all. When I have stopped being so angry I might even blog about it, but not yet. Too painful.
Tra la laaaaaa.
Still on the weight loss plan, but annoyingly have put a pound and a half back on, which is not the right way round. I will stick with it though, I am determined to lose at least another stone before we go on holiday**.
*Shit Storm From Hades
**Assuming we get a fucking visa, of course. Gah.
Wednesday, 3 February 2010
Big Brother
Well, this is interesting.
A million or so people on the DNA database who have not committed any offence. Only 377 deletions in 2009. Bloody shameful.
The police can arrest you, take you to the station, fingerprint you, photograph you, take a sample of your DNA, decide they didn't need to arrest you after all, release you, send you on your merry way, and then retain all the photos, fingerprints and DNA samples for 12 years if they arrested you for a serious enough offence.
Then, unless you can make a compelling case to the relevant Chief Constable that the records ought to be deleted, you remain on the database. If you ever encounter another police officer, and they check up on you, there you are.
According to a police officer of my acquaintance, they won't look at your record and assume you were wrongly arrested, and that's how you ended up on the database. No. They will look at your record and assume that you got away with it last time, and then arrest you again.
Because, clearly, you are a criminal. Well, you must be, you're on the database.
Innocent until proven guilty? Hardly.
I know the police have a bloody awful job. That it's dangerous, frightening, tiresome, stressful, complicated, depressing, soul-destroying. I know all that. I wouldn't do their job for ten times what I am currently paid. And I know that the law, and the officers of the law are probably all that stands between civilised society and terrifying violent anarchy. More so in some places than others. I know that.
I just think they need to be a bit more careful about who they arrest, and why. And that they should offer to delete the records immediately and with a good grace when they release people without charge.
It might save a few lawsuits. It might have saved that poor bastard in the news report's life.
Welcome to the future. Every bit as scary and dystopian as I thought it might be.
A million or so people on the DNA database who have not committed any offence. Only 377 deletions in 2009. Bloody shameful.
The police can arrest you, take you to the station, fingerprint you, photograph you, take a sample of your DNA, decide they didn't need to arrest you after all, release you, send you on your merry way, and then retain all the photos, fingerprints and DNA samples for 12 years if they arrested you for a serious enough offence.
Then, unless you can make a compelling case to the relevant Chief Constable that the records ought to be deleted, you remain on the database. If you ever encounter another police officer, and they check up on you, there you are.
According to a police officer of my acquaintance, they won't look at your record and assume you were wrongly arrested, and that's how you ended up on the database. No. They will look at your record and assume that you got away with it last time, and then arrest you again.
Because, clearly, you are a criminal. Well, you must be, you're on the database.
Innocent until proven guilty? Hardly.
I know the police have a bloody awful job. That it's dangerous, frightening, tiresome, stressful, complicated, depressing, soul-destroying. I know all that. I wouldn't do their job for ten times what I am currently paid. And I know that the law, and the officers of the law are probably all that stands between civilised society and terrifying violent anarchy. More so in some places than others. I know that.
I just think they need to be a bit more careful about who they arrest, and why. And that they should offer to delete the records immediately and with a good grace when they release people without charge.
It might save a few lawsuits. It might have saved that poor bastard in the news report's life.
Welcome to the future. Every bit as scary and dystopian as I thought it might be.
Sunday, 24 January 2010
Collections
All the cool kids did it ages ago, but in my own traditional "better late than never" stylee I have lumbered aboard the retreating bandwagon.
I joined Twitter.
If you want to check it out (and I have no idea if I have even set it up so anyone else can see my profile, or whatever it is, sorry), I am there as livesbythewoods. Yay me.
Look, here: http://twitter.com/livesbythewoods
So far, I am stalking Simon Pegg. Not because I have any particular reason to, but his was a name I recognised, so I clicked on it in desperation. It's a bit like Freshers Week, where you latch onto people so you aren't the only one with no mates, and then spend the rest of the year shaking them off again.
I will see how long it takes for the novelty to wear off.
What else have I been up to, other than finding more ways to waste my few remaining years online?
Yesterday Mr WithaY and I went to Salisbury, the first such visit since (I think) late October last year. We picked up the jewellery that Goldsmith's have been repairing and restoring. Mr WithaY had to have his wedding ring made bigger, as since his accident last year he can't get it onto what remains of his ring finger on his left hand. (Dan, don't read that post again, you know it made you go wobbly last time.)
I had a gorgeous diamond ring in for renovation and resizing, that Father-in-law WithaY gave me last year. It belonged to his mother, and is stunning. And now it fits me, and is all clean and sparkly, and looks completely fantastic.
I was hoping to have had it back in time to wear to the drinks parties and things we were invited to over the festive season, but it was not to be. When I took it in (in October) they said it would take about 6 weeks. Back in time for Christmas, in fact. Excellent. Mr WithaY got a phone call a couple of weeks later saying that his wedding ring was ready, and we decided to put off collecting it till my ring was done too. Save an extra 25 mile drive to the Big City. We're all about the environment in this house.*
I waited a few more weeks, Christmas came and went in a haze of coughing, antibiotics and terrifying breathing problems, and my ring was put to the back of the "things to think about" shelf in my head.
A couple of weeks ago I rang the jeweller to ask when my ring would be ready, it having been with them for more than 8 weeks by then.
"Oh! We haven't sent it to the repairer yet," they told me.
I asked them why not, given that they had said it woild take 6 weeks to fix, and they'd already had a lot more than that.
"We never received your written confirmation to proceed," they explained.
Wait just a minute...they phoned me a week after I brought the ring to the shop, and told me how long it would take to fix, and how much it would cost, and I said "Ok, yes, go for it." But that wasn't sufficient, apparently. No. They sent me a letter (which never arrived, oddly) which I was supposed to sign and send back. As I never received it, I never sent it back.
Instead of then calling me to check why I hadn't returned their letter, they just sat on my ring (so to speak) and let several weeks drift by. I assume that if I hadn't chased them about it, they would just have kept hold of my ring (so to speak) indefinitely.
Gah.
Sadly, I have to wear it on these hideous hands. This is my incredible turkey-carving scar. Healing up nicely, as you can see. And admire the lovely dehydrated wrinkled skin too, it's incredible what gastroenteritis can do to you.
No sign of it yet.
No fucking wonder people don't feel safe on the streets when even a basic admin task like getting a letter from A to B seems to be beyond them.
Anyhoo. Deep breath. I can do that now my lungs are working properly, what a nice change.
Let's think of something lovely. Kittens. Chocolate.
How about kittens AND chocolate all in the same package?
Amazing. It was like the box designer was channelling the spirit of Barbara Cartland, but with less pink.
Also, today I made a cake. I am definitely feeling more like my old self.
I plan to tell anyone who asks that it is a duelling scar from my days in the Prussian Army. In 1875.
Talking of letters not arriving, we are still waiting for a very important and official letter from Wiltshire's finest, which they promised me in October, told me they had sent out in mid December (registered post, no less), asked me to chase up at our local sorting office (which I did, they'd never seen it) and then promised to hand deliver two weeks ago.
It's a box of chocolates with kittens on it. Could it be any sweeter? In fact, the chocolates were rather nasty, but the box is a work of art. Here's a closer view of those little kittens.
Mr WithaY asked me what the green stuff on the icing was. "Celery," I told him. He wasn't sure if I was telling the truth or not**.
Look, it has layers! I've never made a cake with layers before. Jam and everything.
Other excitements over the weekend. We went to the health food shop and I bought a huge stack of various supplements to help me get back to full fighting strength:
- Echinachea - boosts your immune system, I have to take it 3 - 6 times a day.
- Cod liver oil with garlic - boosts your immune system and wards off vampires. One a day. Before sunset.
- Hemp oil - boosts your...um...heart, or maybe skin. The girls in the shop were a bit vague about it but I liked the sound of it. One a day.
- Valerian - helps you sleep, one a day, before bed. Presumably it's to make sure you don't wake up to fend off the vampires when the garlic capsules fail.
I'm also taking Actimel every morning which is (presumably) doing me some good.
I expect to develop superpowers by April.
And back to London tomorrow for work. It feels like ages since I was last there. Well, it is. December the 10th was the last time I went into the office, so it will be a bit weird having to get back into the meat grinder commuting routine again.
Steve Wright was talking about ways to meet a new partner on his radio show this morning. Apparently you should look around at the other passengers on the train on your commute, and consider whether they are likely to be potential partner material. I will have to have a good gawp tomorrow and see what I can see.
I'm not getting my hopes up.
*No we aren't.
**It's angelica. But it looks a lot like celery.
Tuesday, 17 November 2009
Hidden agenda
There's been a lot of fuss* in the press this week about a shocking survey which claims that most working mothers only have nine recipes in their regular repertoire.
Even more dreadful, they sometimes cook the same meal on the same night of the week. How do these people live with themselves? Their families must be rending their garments and crying in the wilderness at the pain and woe caused by having the same meal on the same night of the week.
But hang on a minute.
Let's have a think. How do they define "meal" anyway? One of the press pieces I saw covering this scandal listed the "Top Ten Meals." The list included things like "Curry", and "Meat and Two Veg" and "Roast Dinner".
If I was in a restaurant and the menu said "Roast Dinner" I think I'd be asking a few questions. What exactly did you roast? Is it chicken? Pork? Beef? Snake? Cat? A bit more detail would be welcome there, thanks.
The same with Meat and Two Veg. That, to me, covers about four hundred different meals. Especially if you include sausages. Which I do.
Curry. Just look at a menu in any half decent Indian restaurant. If there was just the one entry - Curry - they wouldn't get too many people coming back for a second visit. Unless that one dish was incredibly fantastic, I suppose.
When you look at the actual survey results and the accompanying press release, it transpires that the whole thing emanated from Uncle Ben's.
It seems to be ok to have a small repertoire of meals, as long as some of them include ready-made sauces.
I quote:
"Nutritionist, Juliette Kellow said: ''Parents should feel reassured that kitchen shortcuts like ready-made sauces are the perfect solution to expanding your repertoire with exciting and nutritious meals all the family will love.'' "
But where, oh where can I find a selection of ready-made sauces? Tell me, Uncle Ben!
Gah.
Other news: We have a gardener! Yes, the Servant Question became more complicated today, as we added him to the long list** of people we pay to come and do stuff for us.
He is a very nice chap, and is going to give our poor old gnarly apple tree in the back garden a good hard pruning. He looked at my horrible weedy overgrown flower beds, at the ivy-infested hedge encroaching out across the mossy lawn, at the sad excuse for a vegetable patch, then asked me, "Shall I just come in and do what needs doing when I have time?"
God, yes. Yes. Come over whenever you can, and make my garden look nice. PLEASE.
We've been putting off doing any kind of serious work on the garden because we want to get all the hard landscaping torn up and re-laid, so spending ages on the plants seemed like a waste of time. However, the gradual decline of the garden into a dank, frog-infested, weedy, mossy wilderness has become too depressing, so the very nice gardener is going to help us fix it.
I'm quite excited actually.
We've been living in this house almost 8 years (I think) and have been gradually getting all the serious stuff done - electrics, roof fixing, central heating, replacement windows and doors, bathroom, kitchen, all that, but now the house is more or less finished, so we can turn our attention to the extensive grounds***.
Next Spring could be very lovely. And boy, it's nice having something so pleasant to look forward to after this, The Year of Unmitigated Shit.
On that note, for those of you who have been bored witless by us talking about the SSFH****, we have had an apology. And we are being deleted from the databases. I should fucking well think so.
Maybe one day when I find it all less horrific, traumatic and heartbreaking I will talk about it on here. For now, though, we are trying to move on.
In the meantime, life goes on and we will have flowers in the Spring.
*I've seen two articles
**The hilarious and brilliant cleaners. And I suppose Kevin the Decorator.
***Front and Back gardens. Oh, and the bit on the side. Fnar.
****Shit Storm From Hades
Even more dreadful, they sometimes cook the same meal on the same night of the week. How do these people live with themselves? Their families must be rending their garments and crying in the wilderness at the pain and woe caused by having the same meal on the same night of the week.
But hang on a minute.
Let's have a think. How do they define "meal" anyway? One of the press pieces I saw covering this scandal listed the "Top Ten Meals." The list included things like "Curry", and "Meat and Two Veg" and "Roast Dinner".
If I was in a restaurant and the menu said "Roast Dinner" I think I'd be asking a few questions. What exactly did you roast? Is it chicken? Pork? Beef? Snake? Cat? A bit more detail would be welcome there, thanks.
The same with Meat and Two Veg. That, to me, covers about four hundred different meals. Especially if you include sausages. Which I do.
Curry. Just look at a menu in any half decent Indian restaurant. If there was just the one entry - Curry - they wouldn't get too many people coming back for a second visit. Unless that one dish was incredibly fantastic, I suppose.
When you look at the actual survey results and the accompanying press release, it transpires that the whole thing emanated from Uncle Ben's.
It seems to be ok to have a small repertoire of meals, as long as some of them include ready-made sauces.
I quote:
"Nutritionist, Juliette Kellow said: ''Parents should feel reassured that kitchen shortcuts like ready-made sauces are the perfect solution to expanding your repertoire with exciting and nutritious meals all the family will love.'' "
But where, oh where can I find a selection of ready-made sauces? Tell me, Uncle Ben!
Gah.
Other news: We have a gardener! Yes, the Servant Question became more complicated today, as we added him to the long list** of people we pay to come and do stuff for us.
He is a very nice chap, and is going to give our poor old gnarly apple tree in the back garden a good hard pruning. He looked at my horrible weedy overgrown flower beds, at the ivy-infested hedge encroaching out across the mossy lawn, at the sad excuse for a vegetable patch, then asked me, "Shall I just come in and do what needs doing when I have time?"
God, yes. Yes. Come over whenever you can, and make my garden look nice. PLEASE.
We've been putting off doing any kind of serious work on the garden because we want to get all the hard landscaping torn up and re-laid, so spending ages on the plants seemed like a waste of time. However, the gradual decline of the garden into a dank, frog-infested, weedy, mossy wilderness has become too depressing, so the very nice gardener is going to help us fix it.
I'm quite excited actually.
We've been living in this house almost 8 years (I think) and have been gradually getting all the serious stuff done - electrics, roof fixing, central heating, replacement windows and doors, bathroom, kitchen, all that, but now the house is more or less finished, so we can turn our attention to the extensive grounds***.
Next Spring could be very lovely. And boy, it's nice having something so pleasant to look forward to after this, The Year of Unmitigated Shit.
On that note, for those of you who have been bored witless by us talking about the SSFH****, we have had an apology. And we are being deleted from the databases. I should fucking well think so.
Maybe one day when I find it all less horrific, traumatic and heartbreaking I will talk about it on here. For now, though, we are trying to move on.
In the meantime, life goes on and we will have flowers in the Spring.
*I've seen two articles
**The hilarious and brilliant cleaners. And I suppose Kevin the Decorator.
***Front and Back gardens. Oh, and the bit on the side. Fnar.
****Shit Storm From Hades
Friday, 9 October 2009
Appointed
Told him. Am being referred. And I only wept a little bit, which is an improvement. Yay me.
He said I need to be aware that depression could strike me down like a huge, mace-wielding vengeful demon* once the SSFH** is no longer foremost in my mind, though, and I have to watch out for that. So I will.
Fingers crossed that tomorrow will be a nice day as we are planning a trip to the Wood Fair. See the link over on the right there to the one we went to before. Under "Grand Days Out"...it's called "Wood." Can't miss it.
I also need to pick up my Rickenbacker from the shop. Apparently the bridge needed raising, as somehow, mysteriously, it was too low. Hmm, how can that have happened I wonder? Might it have been when it was restrung a few months back? We shall see what, if anything, they try to charge me for fixing something that I think they broke in the first place. Heh.
Other news: I have made several deeply moving recordings of Mr WithaY making beautiful music on his didgeridoo. Now I need to work out how to install them on the blog.
*I paraphrase slightly
**Shit Storm from Hades
He said I need to be aware that depression could strike me down like a huge, mace-wielding vengeful demon* once the SSFH** is no longer foremost in my mind, though, and I have to watch out for that. So I will.
Fingers crossed that tomorrow will be a nice day as we are planning a trip to the Wood Fair. See the link over on the right there to the one we went to before. Under "Grand Days Out"...it's called "Wood." Can't miss it.
I also need to pick up my Rickenbacker from the shop. Apparently the bridge needed raising, as somehow, mysteriously, it was too low. Hmm, how can that have happened I wonder? Might it have been when it was restrung a few months back? We shall see what, if anything, they try to charge me for fixing something that I think they broke in the first place. Heh.
Other news: I have made several deeply moving recordings of Mr WithaY making beautiful music on his didgeridoo. Now I need to work out how to install them on the blog.
*I paraphrase slightly
**Shit Storm from Hades
Appointment
Today is the day I go back to the doctor and ask for a referral to a shrink. I've seen one before, although last time I had to be more or less ordered to do it, believing as I did then that depression was something that weak-willed people allowed to happen to themselves.
Ha. How very interesting it is to learn about these things first hand.
Anyway, I'm not depressed again. I know how that feels and that is not what is going on. The doctor talked about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder when I saw him last, but having no previous experience of that I have no frame of reference. What I do know is that I am still hugely unbalanced* and that it takes very little to set me off on an uncontrolled, prolonged weeping fit. Which is nice.
I am also struggling to get back into my normal work routine. The long, long, oh so long commute now feels like a hideous obstacle whereas before it was an inconvenience that I was dealing with successfully. I have lost a lot of my ability to focus, which is a bit of a shame given the job I am doing, and I am completely exhausted after a day working, to the point where I come in, collapse on the sofa and am usually asleep by 9.30. That is not how I usually am.
Right. Time to go and tell all that to the doctor.
*More than usual, I mean.
Ha. How very interesting it is to learn about these things first hand.
Anyway, I'm not depressed again. I know how that feels and that is not what is going on. The doctor talked about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder when I saw him last, but having no previous experience of that I have no frame of reference. What I do know is that I am still hugely unbalanced* and that it takes very little to set me off on an uncontrolled, prolonged weeping fit. Which is nice.
I am also struggling to get back into my normal work routine. The long, long, oh so long commute now feels like a hideous obstacle whereas before it was an inconvenience that I was dealing with successfully. I have lost a lot of my ability to focus, which is a bit of a shame given the job I am doing, and I am completely exhausted after a day working, to the point where I come in, collapse on the sofa and am usually asleep by 9.30. That is not how I usually am.
Right. Time to go and tell all that to the doctor.
*More than usual, I mean.
Wednesday, 7 October 2009
Hump day dump day
Ah, Wednesday. Known to some as Hump Day, according to the radio. Why? Are we all supposed to be out there humping people's legs like unruly dogs? I'm sorry, but I am simply not prepared to do that.
Plus it's raining really hard and I don't want to go out and get soaked.
In fact, it's been raining all day. Luckily for me I have not had to go out and walk around in it much. I popped out to the local garage this morning to get the be-beep key fob thingy for my car sorted out. It was becoming excitingly unpredictable, not unlocking (or indeed locking) the car on the first, second and sometimes seventh click of the button. I had nightmarish visions of getting off the train from London at 9pm one dark night and not being able to open the car, then having to walk all the way home, crying piteously.
So, a new battery seemed like a good idea.
They are lovely down there. They replaced the key fob battery and then refused to take any money for it, saying "We'll sort it out next time, love, don't worry about it." What nice people.
I then scooted to Morrisons and picked up a few groceries. Washing powder! Bleach! Onions! My life is a whirling fun-packed carousel of delight.
What else have I been doing lately? Apart from slowly getting myself back to what passes for normality, post SSFH*, I mean.
I spent Monday and Tuesday in Bristol, helping with a training/familiarisation course, which was interesting. Always nice to meet people who work in related but separate fields**.
There is a HUGE difference between the trains that go from my local station to Bristol, and the trains that go from my usual station to London. The people! My dears! Such dreadful, dreadful people!
I suppose the big difference is that the London train is stuffed to the gills with city types in suits, settling in for the 2-hour ride, reading their newspapers or working on their laptops quietly. They all have their usual seats (me included) and there is a degree of placid tranquil acceptance that we are all in it together. We simply chill out and tolerate the journey as best we may, each trying to be inconspicuous and productive. Well, I tend to play Scrabble and listen to loud rock music on my iPhone, but you get the picture.
The Bristol train, now, is a different kettle of fish. Indeed, the one on Monday smelt as though one of the many slack-jawed mouth-breathers crammed in there was actually carrying a kettle of fish. It was a dump.
The train was the same size as the London train***, but there were fewer seats, meaning that while those of us who had found somewhere to sit were not too cramped, there were many people forced to stand up for the duration of the journey. And they were bitching about it.
There were several people for whom the term "dangers of rural inbreeding" might have been coined. Four people sitting around a table had only 5 eyebrows between them. It wasn't pretty.
Anyhoo. People hop on and off all the time, only going one or two stops, so it's a constant stream of bags and coats whacking you as they shuffle past, knuckles dragging, personal steroes blaring, phones cheeping and chirping. Was worse than being in the cinema with a huge crowd of unruly teenagers.
Still, it took less than an hour and a half to get to work, and I was home before it was dark, which made a nice change.
Other news: Mr WithaY has been diligently practicing his didgeridoo since he got home from Egypt. I might make a recording and put it on here if I can work out the technology.
*Shit Storm From Hades
**Not like farmers, but in a professionally-related way
***Obviously
Plus it's raining really hard and I don't want to go out and get soaked.
In fact, it's been raining all day. Luckily for me I have not had to go out and walk around in it much. I popped out to the local garage this morning to get the be-beep key fob thingy for my car sorted out. It was becoming excitingly unpredictable, not unlocking (or indeed locking) the car on the first, second and sometimes seventh click of the button. I had nightmarish visions of getting off the train from London at 9pm one dark night and not being able to open the car, then having to walk all the way home, crying piteously.
So, a new battery seemed like a good idea.
They are lovely down there. They replaced the key fob battery and then refused to take any money for it, saying "We'll sort it out next time, love, don't worry about it." What nice people.
I then scooted to Morrisons and picked up a few groceries. Washing powder! Bleach! Onions! My life is a whirling fun-packed carousel of delight.
What else have I been doing lately? Apart from slowly getting myself back to what passes for normality, post SSFH*, I mean.
I spent Monday and Tuesday in Bristol, helping with a training/familiarisation course, which was interesting. Always nice to meet people who work in related but separate fields**.
There is a HUGE difference between the trains that go from my local station to Bristol, and the trains that go from my usual station to London. The people! My dears! Such dreadful, dreadful people!
I suppose the big difference is that the London train is stuffed to the gills with city types in suits, settling in for the 2-hour ride, reading their newspapers or working on their laptops quietly. They all have their usual seats (me included) and there is a degree of placid tranquil acceptance that we are all in it together. We simply chill out and tolerate the journey as best we may, each trying to be inconspicuous and productive. Well, I tend to play Scrabble and listen to loud rock music on my iPhone, but you get the picture.
The Bristol train, now, is a different kettle of fish. Indeed, the one on Monday smelt as though one of the many slack-jawed mouth-breathers crammed in there was actually carrying a kettle of fish. It was a dump.
The train was the same size as the London train***, but there were fewer seats, meaning that while those of us who had found somewhere to sit were not too cramped, there were many people forced to stand up for the duration of the journey. And they were bitching about it.
There were several people for whom the term "dangers of rural inbreeding" might have been coined. Four people sitting around a table had only 5 eyebrows between them. It wasn't pretty.
Anyhoo. People hop on and off all the time, only going one or two stops, so it's a constant stream of bags and coats whacking you as they shuffle past, knuckles dragging, personal steroes blaring, phones cheeping and chirping. Was worse than being in the cinema with a huge crowd of unruly teenagers.
Still, it took less than an hour and a half to get to work, and I was home before it was dark, which made a nice change.
Other news: Mr WithaY has been diligently practicing his didgeridoo since he got home from Egypt. I might make a recording and put it on here if I can work out the technology.
*Shit Storm From Hades
**Not like farmers, but in a professionally-related way
***Obviously
Tuesday, 29 September 2009
Rolling rocks
Clearly this is going to be a difficult week. It's only Monday (well, for another 15 minutes) and it already feels as though the days have been dragging on endlessly, running into each other like headless chickens on a windy day*.
I spent much of the weekend weeping and swearing, the aftermath of a trying day on Friday, related to the recent SSFH** stuff. Things are slowly being resolved but boy is it hard to deal with while it all happens. And, of course, with Mr WithaY away and unreachable on his luxury dive boat*** in the Red Sea, it's all felt far harder than I expected it to.
So. How am I dealing with all this, you ask? I managed to get through to the doctor's surgery on the phone eventually this afternoon and made an appointment. A week on Friday. I couldn't bring myself to lie and say I was an emergency, but having to wait 10 days to see the doctor is pretty poor I think.
Anyhoo, I am going to ask him to refer me to a psychiatrist/counsellor again. It helped the last time I went bonkers, so hopefully it will help get me through this particular episode of stress and horror. I have hardly slept since Thursday last week, so I decided not to go into London today, as originally planned.
Instead, I had a long and embarrassingly tearful telephone conversation with my colleague (who is an absolute star), then went through my email with the laptop, and then went off for a restorative cup of tea and sandwich at lunchtime. I came back to a message telling my that my password had expired and I need to login to a different machine to set a new one. Fucking great. So I need to try and call the system administrator tomorrow and ask them to sort it out remotely for me.
But their phone number is on the computer. Which I can't login to. But I need to login to get the number to call the help desk to tell them I can't login.
There's a hole in my bucket.
Actually no. I feel like that bloke who had to roll the giant rock up the mountain every day, then watch it roll back to the bottom every night. Who was that? Except my particular rock at the moment is made of cat shit and broken glass****.
*I know it doesn't make much sense but it's a great image.
**Shit Storm From Hades.
***It has a hot tub. In my book that equates to luxury.
****Worst combination ever.
I spent much of the weekend weeping and swearing, the aftermath of a trying day on Friday, related to the recent SSFH** stuff. Things are slowly being resolved but boy is it hard to deal with while it all happens. And, of course, with Mr WithaY away and unreachable on his luxury dive boat*** in the Red Sea, it's all felt far harder than I expected it to.
So. How am I dealing with all this, you ask? I managed to get through to the doctor's surgery on the phone eventually this afternoon and made an appointment. A week on Friday. I couldn't bring myself to lie and say I was an emergency, but having to wait 10 days to see the doctor is pretty poor I think.
Anyhoo, I am going to ask him to refer me to a psychiatrist/counsellor again. It helped the last time I went bonkers, so hopefully it will help get me through this particular episode of stress and horror. I have hardly slept since Thursday last week, so I decided not to go into London today, as originally planned.
Instead, I had a long and embarrassingly tearful telephone conversation with my colleague (who is an absolute star), then went through my email with the laptop, and then went off for a restorative cup of tea and sandwich at lunchtime. I came back to a message telling my that my password had expired and I need to login to a different machine to set a new one. Fucking great. So I need to try and call the system administrator tomorrow and ask them to sort it out remotely for me.
But their phone number is on the computer. Which I can't login to. But I need to login to get the number to call the help desk to tell them I can't login.
There's a hole in my bucket.
Actually no. I feel like that bloke who had to roll the giant rock up the mountain every day, then watch it roll back to the bottom every night. Who was that? Except my particular rock at the moment is made of cat shit and broken glass****.
*I know it doesn't make much sense but it's a great image.
**Shit Storm From Hades.
***It has a hot tub. In my book that equates to luxury.
****Worst combination ever.
Sunday, 27 September 2009
Disjointed
So, long time no see. To be honest, it's all been a bit too stressful and depressing here, so I haven't felt much like writing anything.
I'm cold. And tired. And grumpy. And a bit sad because Mr WithaY has headed off to live on a boat in the Red Sea for a week, for more shark-tagging high jinks. He's back at the end of next week and I am really looking forward to it. The house feels too big. And the cold I had last week that seemed to fizzle out has fizzled back in, so I am snotty as well. Nice.
Anyway. It occurred to me the other day that the funky visitor counter that I was all excited about is merely recording the number of times this blog is accessed from that particular country. So arse. I might only have 4 readers in the UK, but they check back often.
Thanks to the lovely people who responded to tell me where they at, though. The Canadians, especially. Aren't you all polite?
Today I have mostly been cleaning up, as Kevin the Decorator has finished. The hall, landing and stairs look lovely. The walls and celing are pale cream (yes, alright, magnolia) and the woodwork and doors are all white. The loft hatch, which has been a grubby stripped wood eyesore for 8 years is now a thing of beauty. I put the pictures back up yesterday, and that was nice. Moving them all round a bit means you look at them as you go up and down the stairs, they look different somehow. Trouble with all the decorating is that everything in the house is dusted with very fine, well, dust.
And, talk of the devil, he just came to drop off the house key and his invoice. Money well spent I think.
I'm off to see Father-in-Law WithaY, who will be fretting about shark attacks. It's a rock and roll lifestyle I lead here.
I'm cold. And tired. And grumpy. And a bit sad because Mr WithaY has headed off to live on a boat in the Red Sea for a week, for more shark-tagging high jinks. He's back at the end of next week and I am really looking forward to it. The house feels too big. And the cold I had last week that seemed to fizzle out has fizzled back in, so I am snotty as well. Nice.
Anyway. It occurred to me the other day that the funky visitor counter that I was all excited about is merely recording the number of times this blog is accessed from that particular country. So arse. I might only have 4 readers in the UK, but they check back often.
Thanks to the lovely people who responded to tell me where they at, though. The Canadians, especially. Aren't you all polite?
Today I have mostly been cleaning up, as Kevin the Decorator has finished. The hall, landing and stairs look lovely. The walls and celing are pale cream (yes, alright, magnolia) and the woodwork and doors are all white. The loft hatch, which has been a grubby stripped wood eyesore for 8 years is now a thing of beauty. I put the pictures back up yesterday, and that was nice. Moving them all round a bit means you look at them as you go up and down the stairs, they look different somehow. Trouble with all the decorating is that everything in the house is dusted with very fine, well, dust.
And, talk of the devil, he just came to drop off the house key and his invoice. Money well spent I think.
I'm off to see Father-in-Law WithaY, who will be fretting about shark attacks. It's a rock and roll lifestyle I lead here.
Wednesday, 16 September 2009
Decorated
Hell of a story on the news lately about the young Army officer who ran out of ammunition. It's very easy to imagine conflict going on at arm's length, all remote and technical like a video game, till you hear about this kind of thing. Blimey.
I was at Salisbury hospital a while back, hanging round the plastic surgery department while they assessed how well Mr WithaY's fingers were healing.
He got the thumbs-up* from the surgeon, and we headed back to the car. To get out of the hospital you had to walk along a huge corridor, passing many different side wards and rooms and so on.
As we walked, a nurse came out of a side corridor pushing a wheelchair. In the wheelchair was a young man. Well, most of a young man. He'd lost one arm, one leg (on the opposite side to the arm), most of the fingers on his remaining hand, and his face and body were a network of scars. He looked about 21. As they passed us I heard the nurse asking him "So, what medal are they giving you?"
I had to stop in an alcove and blow my nose for a few minutes.
I'm feeling a bit grumpy and out of sorts today, with a scratchy sore throat and a headache. It may just be because I am tired after the weekend and a couple of bad nights since, but if not, then I am getting a cold. Which, with my track record is bound to turn into chest infection. Ah yes, look on the bright side, I always say.
Other news: Kevin the Decorator is back! He is doing our hall, stairs and landing....walls, ceilings, woodwork and all. We bought the paint ages ago, and were full of good intentions to do it ourselves, but what with everything** going on over the summer we just didn't get round to it.
* heh
**involuntary amputation, bereavement, SSFH, all that stuff.
I was at Salisbury hospital a while back, hanging round the plastic surgery department while they assessed how well Mr WithaY's fingers were healing.
He got the thumbs-up* from the surgeon, and we headed back to the car. To get out of the hospital you had to walk along a huge corridor, passing many different side wards and rooms and so on.
As we walked, a nurse came out of a side corridor pushing a wheelchair. In the wheelchair was a young man. Well, most of a young man. He'd lost one arm, one leg (on the opposite side to the arm), most of the fingers on his remaining hand, and his face and body were a network of scars. He looked about 21. As they passed us I heard the nurse asking him "So, what medal are they giving you?"
I had to stop in an alcove and blow my nose for a few minutes.
I'm feeling a bit grumpy and out of sorts today, with a scratchy sore throat and a headache. It may just be because I am tired after the weekend and a couple of bad nights since, but if not, then I am getting a cold. Which, with my track record is bound to turn into chest infection. Ah yes, look on the bright side, I always say.
Other news: Kevin the Decorator is back! He is doing our hall, stairs and landing....walls, ceilings, woodwork and all. We bought the paint ages ago, and were full of good intentions to do it ourselves, but what with everything** going on over the summer we just didn't get round to it.
* heh
**involuntary amputation, bereavement, SSFH, all that stuff.
Sunday, 16 August 2009
Men in tights
We've had a Weekend Away. This has become rather a rare event, at least for both of us to be in the same place at the same time, so it was a bit of a treat.
We went up to see some mates in Nottinghamshire (*not* pronounced Nodding-Ham Shire, American readers) which entailed a nightmarish drive up on Friday afternoon/evening. It took 4 hours. FOUR!
Our plan to stop en route for a cup of tea and a bun were abandoned and we chugged along in slow, slow traffic all the way instead. Once we got there all was well, though. We enjoyed seeing our lovely mates, we drank a lot of wine, and we ate like fat greedy kings.
We went ten pin bowling on Saturday. I can't remember the last time I did that, and due to the unfamiliar positions adopted, both Mr WithaY and I were limping around with Bowler's Buttock for a couple of days afterwards, which was rather depressing.
Our mate took us into the nearby town (I can't remember which one) to run a few errands, and we ended up sitting outside a local pub having a cheeky lunchtime drink, watching another pub over the road being demolished. On the way back to the car we were accosted by a wild-haired woman who demanded that we come into her shop for a glass of champagne.
Well, it would have been rude not to.
It was the opening day for a new estate agency, and they were having a bit of a celebration. We had a glass of not bad pink fizz, gawped at the property prices (£150k for a three bedroom detached house!) and idly wondered if it was worth buying another house up there to rent out to students*.
On another note:
My blogging has been curtailed of late because frankly I am too hot and tired to think of stuff. I keep starting posts and then going "Oh arse to this" and going to sit in the garden or make a cup of tea or do some washing.
I'm hoping it passes and my usual ability to blather on about all the dull stuff that makes up my life will return soon. Being stressed out of my head over the last few months hasn't helped.
Mr WithaY and I have made some progess on the SSFH** aftermath, and that has made us both feel better, but we are waiting to see what happens next.
We have been trying to socialise a lot more, and keep each others' spirits up, which has worked to a large extent. I have recently realised how much my job in London has affected our social life, though. Mid-week entertaining and socialising has pretty much stopped, which was a big part of our lives before I took this job. I can't see a way around that, though. Not at the moment anyway.
I am not socialising in London nearly as much as I had thought I might, too, so it's not as if I am making up for it elsewhere. Might need to be more pro-active about meeting people in town.
And on that note, time to go and sort stuff out for the morning, as we have decided to invite some friends over for an early supper, to try and rejuvinate the mid week social life thing.
*No.
**Shit storm from Hades
We went up to see some mates in Nottinghamshire (*not* pronounced Nodding-Ham Shire, American readers) which entailed a nightmarish drive up on Friday afternoon/evening. It took 4 hours. FOUR!
Our plan to stop en route for a cup of tea and a bun were abandoned and we chugged along in slow, slow traffic all the way instead. Once we got there all was well, though. We enjoyed seeing our lovely mates, we drank a lot of wine, and we ate like fat greedy kings.
We went ten pin bowling on Saturday. I can't remember the last time I did that, and due to the unfamiliar positions adopted, both Mr WithaY and I were limping around with Bowler's Buttock for a couple of days afterwards, which was rather depressing.
Our mate took us into the nearby town (I can't remember which one) to run a few errands, and we ended up sitting outside a local pub having a cheeky lunchtime drink, watching another pub over the road being demolished. On the way back to the car we were accosted by a wild-haired woman who demanded that we come into her shop for a glass of champagne.
Well, it would have been rude not to.
It was the opening day for a new estate agency, and they were having a bit of a celebration. We had a glass of not bad pink fizz, gawped at the property prices (£150k for a three bedroom detached house!) and idly wondered if it was worth buying another house up there to rent out to students*.
On another note:
My blogging has been curtailed of late because frankly I am too hot and tired to think of stuff. I keep starting posts and then going "Oh arse to this" and going to sit in the garden or make a cup of tea or do some washing.
I'm hoping it passes and my usual ability to blather on about all the dull stuff that makes up my life will return soon. Being stressed out of my head over the last few months hasn't helped.
Mr WithaY and I have made some progess on the SSFH** aftermath, and that has made us both feel better, but we are waiting to see what happens next.
We have been trying to socialise a lot more, and keep each others' spirits up, which has worked to a large extent. I have recently realised how much my job in London has affected our social life, though. Mid-week entertaining and socialising has pretty much stopped, which was a big part of our lives before I took this job. I can't see a way around that, though. Not at the moment anyway.
I am not socialising in London nearly as much as I had thought I might, too, so it's not as if I am making up for it elsewhere. Might need to be more pro-active about meeting people in town.
And on that note, time to go and sort stuff out for the morning, as we have decided to invite some friends over for an early supper, to try and rejuvinate the mid week social life thing.
*No.
**Shit storm from Hades
Friday, 31 July 2009
Black like a raven's wing
It's been a rather odd day today, one way and another.
The shitstorm from Hades aftermath continues to make life more stressful than it ought to be, despite people being very helpful.
I did some ironing in the late afternoon, trying to use displacement activity as a means to stop myself fretting. It worked up to a point, but while I was doing it, I ended up watching "How Clean Is Your House" again. Gah. There were two episodes, back to back, including an update on the idiots who lived in ankle-deep shit that I saw the other week.
A year on from the first programme, they live in slightly less shit, but are still idiots.
Had a fab guitar lesson tonight, which lifted my spirits considerably. We played a very nice version of "Paranoid" which was great fun, I learnt the riff for "Communication Breakdown" and we played (and I sang) "Son of a Preacher Man" a few times, and it sounded lovely.
So yay for music being a soul reviving joy in a dark bleak world.
I'm hoping the weather tomorrow is dry as we need to get the hedge out the back tided up. It's encroaching wildly into the garden and makes the place look dreadful. It'll only take an hour with the hedge cutter* but we haven't had a dry enough window of opportunity for about 3 weeks now.
And, of course, we have a Village Fete competition entry to start thinking about.
*assuming we have no trips to Casualty, of course
The shitstorm from Hades aftermath continues to make life more stressful than it ought to be, despite people being very helpful.
I did some ironing in the late afternoon, trying to use displacement activity as a means to stop myself fretting. It worked up to a point, but while I was doing it, I ended up watching "How Clean Is Your House" again. Gah. There were two episodes, back to back, including an update on the idiots who lived in ankle-deep shit that I saw the other week.
A year on from the first programme, they live in slightly less shit, but are still idiots.
Had a fab guitar lesson tonight, which lifted my spirits considerably. We played a very nice version of "Paranoid" which was great fun, I learnt the riff for "Communication Breakdown" and we played (and I sang) "Son of a Preacher Man" a few times, and it sounded lovely.
So yay for music being a soul reviving joy in a dark bleak world.
I'm hoping the weather tomorrow is dry as we need to get the hedge out the back tided up. It's encroaching wildly into the garden and makes the place look dreadful. It'll only take an hour with the hedge cutter* but we haven't had a dry enough window of opportunity for about 3 weeks now.
And, of course, we have a Village Fete competition entry to start thinking about.
*assuming we have no trips to Casualty, of course
Thursday, 11 June 2009
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