One More Step

I've just finished cleaning my "pending" (read shove everything somewhere) tray. I'm one step closer to being expendable...

One More Step

I've just finished cleaning my "pending" (read shove everything somewhere) tray. I'm one step closer to being expendable...

Squishy Like Kids

Yesterday my two colleagues (may I be so bold as to call them friends) and I went for one of our training runs. Being the adventurous and bored with roads ones we are, we decided to go Off Roading a bit and ended up running through a place with a typically British name: "Brook Farm Open Space" and encountered more mud and squishy bits than I have in a long, long time. After the initial "Oh dear, I don't want to sprain my ankle in this" bit, I realised that I haven't actively run through mud in a very long time and began to thoroughly enjoy myself. I came back with my trainers pretty much done in, mud all over my running attire and feeling much better for it. That's what washing machines are for!

I should go buy a pair of wellingtons soon and so some proper jumping, splashing and mucking about.

Life's too short not to, n'est pa?

Oh yes, and we also ran into (not quite literally - ha ha) the Chairman of the Board and possibly scored brownie points for our dedication to our organisation...

Habla Espanol (or English for that matter)

My amusing incident of the day is that someone who's currently in Peru had emailed me a link to one of those websites that do some handy translation for you. So I used it for a paragraph that went much like this (although I don't remember the exact wording 100%)

Your uniform isn’t as bad as I had thought it might be. I had imagined it to be much worse, although I can appreciate your not wanting to wear it for a night on the town! Do you have to wear long sleeves and trousers (I almost said pants – ha ha) year round, or is there a summer version as well?

And it gave me this:

Su uniforme no es tan malo como me imaginaba. ¡Los había hecho de alguna manera hacia fuera para ser mucho peores que son, pero puedo inmóvil apreciar su deseo hacer una tarde en la ciudad que lo usa! ¿Usted consigue una versión del verano también, o es mangas y pantalones largos (estaba a punto de decir los pantalones - ha ha) todo el año redondo?

I, being curious, decided to then enter what it had given me in Spanish to see what it would then give me in English, and I got this:

Its uniform is not as bad as it imagined to me. It had somehow done them towards outside being much worse than they are, but I can immovable appreciate its desire to do late in the city that uses it! You also obtain a version of the summer, or is long sleeves and trousers (she was on the verge of saying the trousers - she has has) all the round year?

It really made me laugh and laugh. Hooray for internet translation!

Quick Update

Hi,

Now it's sunny at the back of the building, but not at the front.

It's doing my head in.

It really is...

PS Today is Danni's last day at work, and I'm quite sad about it.

Like a Drowned Rat

Just to say that I'm sitting at my desk dripping (yes dripping) because in this country, one can leave for a walk to the bank in sunshine and come out 15 minutes later to a complete downpour. It's like the clouds hide behind the sun, pick their target and then pop out and rain like they've never rained before.

Oh, wonderful Canada, I think I'd gladly take your minus 25 temperatures and 5 foot hight snowbanks anytime....

I think it's beginning to hail.

Oh, help...

On Being an Adult

Well, it's only taken me a year since finishing my MSW, but I have started making steps towards being a financially responsible adult. Since my parents have left, thoughts of "What will I do in two years?" have started crossing my mind, and, upon the realisation that I will be just a few months shy of being 30 when I leave here, I decided that whatever I end up doing, it would probably be best to be doing it with some savings in the bank. It would seem that many of my friends have been buying houses, planning to have kids and doing other very adult things, and it has made me feel slightly panicky.

So, after debriefing all of this to my fiscally responsible fund-raiser friend Lisa, she gave me some very helpful tips and emailed me a budget plan - I just have to fill in the numbers and stick to it. It certainly can't be that hard...can it?

At lunch today I went to the bank to make an appointment to change some of my accounts around, and left feeling very responsible and very grown-up. I even bought a reduced-price loaf of bread for lunch to celebrate...

Homeless

Yesterday I had my first homeless experience. I had one of those days whereby you spend the day wondering what else can go wrong. I had thought my day of craziness was over, and I was heading off to choir rehearsal when, as soon as I shut the door, I realised that my keys were on the other side of it. I think that must be one of the worst feelings in the world, you know. That sinking feeling thinking of "Well, I'll look in my bag, just incase" as the other half of the brain is realising that you didn't actually grab your keys from your bed as you had planned...

All of this would not have been such a problem had my flatmate not been a few hours' drive away until Monday.

Hmmmm...

Well, to make a long story short, I realised that I have friends who love me enough not to leave me outdoors on a park bench. I had three bed (well, a floor, and a couple couches) offers. It was a nice, warm, fuzzy feeling actually! My parents will be back on Saturday and fortunately they have a spare key. In the meantime I'm wearing brand new socks and underwear and thanking my lucky stars I just happened to have a change of clothes at work!

Canadian Invasion!

Well, the PU is in town! I cannot believe how absolutely tired I was last night when I hit the pillow. It was so great to see them again though, that it was all worth it.

They're off to York for a few days now. It will give me a chance to recover!

Comments on my Blog

Well, I have received feedback from many of you, that you cannot post comments on my blog because you do not have blogger accounts yourselves. Hmmmmm...this leaves me in a bit of a quandary (did I use that word right?) I admit that I sometimes feel as though I am writing to a brick wall, but I'm not sure of the alternatives. Any suggestions? I say that realising, of course, that you cannot comment on my quandary for the reason my quandary exists. Oh, what a pickle.

I'll think it over later. Right now, I have £10 000 to spend. This is a rare opportunity for someone who works for a charity!

Am I expendable?

Yesterday at work I decided that my desk was far too cluttered and since I couldn't fit anything into my drawers anymore, I decided to have a good clean. As I was cleaning I was thinking about how, apparently if you're good at your job and organised enough, people should be able to carry on perfectly well without you. I would hope that if something tragic were to happen (or maybe not tragic - perhaps I'll find Mr. Perfect tomorrow and run off to Tibet to get married and live in perfect tranquility forever) I might be missed slightly. Maybe it's better to stick with messy drawers and a piled-up intray. It's a fine balance I suppose...

Me!

Hopefully this picture will be my profile picture someday, but I can't figure out how to do that yet.

Argh!

Tony's off the List

Well, for anyone who's familiar with the handsome old men list, after watching the BBC news this morning, I've decided that Tony Blair's off the list. He used to be handsome "in a pinchy British sort of way", but he's not anymore.

I wonder what disasterous affect my decision will have on his election campaign...

Quote a la day

In an effort to look at my colleague's blog I typed in the wrong address and got that of a complete stranger. However, the complete stranger had quoted a quote I quite liked:

Amputating and bandaging the arm took about an hour. Ralston said he was simply being pragmatic. "I felt pain and I coped with it," he said. "I moved on."

I thought that was great...

Charles and Camilla

Well, they've rescheduled the wedding so that Charles can both attend the Pope's funeral and get married.

Whew...I'm glad they got that sorted...

I've diagnosed my fish with some sort of fungal infection. I knew they were acting funny - they seemed depressed and unhappy. As it turns out, many of the symptoms I was telling my friends about (and being laughed at for being an over-imaginative social worker) were actually true symptoms of fish disease and not imagined at all. I knew something was wrong. Nya, nya, nya.

Sports in England

Well, I've found my new hockey I think. I have a friend who's constantly going on about how great Rugby League is and, (please don't kill me when you read this, Rich) most of the time I'd just nod and smile politely because it's quite important to him. However, yesterday it was on the telly and having not much else to do I decided to watch part of a game. And you know (I hate to say it), he was right. It really is quite fun to watch - and it doesn't seem to be the voilent-man-pile-up sport I once thought it was. It definitely seems more fun than football. Football consists of kick, run, run, run, kick, run, - turn the opposite direction, kick, run, run, pass, run, kick etc. But with rugby there's running and kicking, and sliding and throwing and tacking (tee hee) and the refs are miked so you can hear them reprimanding the players for doing this, that and the other thing.

The other highlight of sports-this-weekend was that there was a football fight that made headlines...because the players fighting each other were on the same team...at least hockey players have the sense not to beat up their own... Silly, silly boys...

Friday Holiday

Well, I'm taking a group of people to the Parliament Buildings today. I know that I should be excited, but experience has taught me that trying to coordinate a group of elderly people is much more difficult that coordinating groups of children. I haven't quite figured out why. I think it's because adults have opinions and want to add input and make suggestions. It's so much easier with kids who just do as they're told, and if they don't, will respond to threats of not having a bedtime story. Some remarkable similarities is that loo breaks still need to be coordinated, and they have a tendency to wander.

Hmmm...I could get fired for this, so I should stop now...