That was the week that was

So I did the education thing last week, and now I am back, and while I did all the usual handover and cover thing that a chap is want to do these days to ensure continuity for a chap's customer and to be seen to be continuing the perception that we are indeed a seamless and infinite resource. 

It is like having a week off, except without that "not being at work" feeling, mostly because either side of the educating and exhausting day, I was working anyway.  The bit that is the same is the pile of work, all tagged urgent, waiting for me when I returned today.  I am following the Luge principle, and am trying to ensure that every minute of every hour of every working day is moving something forward in a meaningful way, and if that is not enough, which a couple of the things on my plate are not, then so be it.  I can only deal with the possible, and anything more is, but definition, impossible. 

I also had a little chat with Golfy today.  It was something like the X Files, or maybe The Twilight Zone, or maybe even Tales of the Unexpected.  But enough of Golfy's life.  "Check out what my location is on the chat screen", says the Golfmeister, and blow me if he was not in London, at my last customer's office, sitting pretty much in the same seat as I did when I worked there.  I am beginning to think he is following me.  He has been drafted in for a time-boxed period of a month, in which time he will no doubt be working on the considerable backlog, just like I did as part of my exit plan.  And the team is even the same.  I have given him the low-down on the people to watch out for, although on reflection I didn't mention the woman who laughs like a chimpanzee who has just been told the best orangutan joke she has ever heard, complete with the snorty-hiccup at the end as she draws a breath in to her cavernous lungs.  Let's not mention her, and that can be a joy for him to discover one fine afternoon.  I can still see the face of, let's call him Jock, who was much disturbed by the said laughing and who needed restraining on more than one occasion to stop him decking her.

Anyhow, back go Golfy.  He now has a 2.5 hour commute each way to get in to the office, although he seems to have negotiated a part-time attendance pattern which should ease the travel pains.  I wish him luck in the role, and would very much urge him to get down the Subway for an Italian bread sarnie, six inches for the waist-conscious, or a full foot if you just don't care.  I also recommend the chocolate-covered coffee beans in Nero next door to the office.  Pound a box, and if you eat them all you can bounce off the ceiling.  The guys who clean the Gherkin use them to wash the upper windows.  Honest.

And..... relax

I know I have used this heading before, but if you are going to plagiarise, the do it from the best (huh? Ed).  Or at least do it from the one least likely to sue.

However, it really is how I always feel come Friday.  The week has been manic, living the life of a city boy when I really much prefer, if not the country, then a small place you can get your arms round.  London is full of busy people in suits who are smoking, drinking and generally, in their eyes, kicking the wotsit out of life.  The truth is, and maybe it is age, but when I am away I miss my family, so for me, London ain't all it's cracked up to be.  Just ask three of my colleagues who, on Tuesday, after our "little drink after work" decided to go to a late night drinking establishment and consequently got to bed at 2am.  Let's just say that they were in on Wednesday morning in body, if not soul, and definitely not mind, and even then the bodies were looking a little worse for wear.  The two older colleagues who have kids will now take two weeks to recover, whereas the younger, single colleague was "same time next week?".

Another thing that really gets my goat in London, and doubtless in many other places in the country, is that everyone is on their phones.  Give enough monkeys enough iPhones and eventually one will get the world's highest score in Doodle Jump.  Give enough monkeys enough typewriters and eventually one of them will write "wey hey we're the monkeys".  But that is another story.

Anyway, phones.  The day they put Google Maps, Grinder and social networking apps on phones was the day that people ceased communicating with anyone in their physical vicinity (except for Grinder of course. So I have heard. Ed.).  And when you are walking anywhere, and there is an annoying person in front of you going just a bit too slow (80% women, 18% men, 2% dog) you can be damn sure they are on their phones, updating their Facebook status to "doing exercise" or some other vacuous pursuit.  I understand that in and around the city, the number of A&E admissions for people with mobile phones stuck in one orifice or another has increased 250% over the last 3 years.

If you are detecting any wistful reviewing the last 4 months kind of vibe on this blog, then that would be for a very good reason.  Today seems to be my last day on my London assignment, and I am moving, as of Monday morning, to another assignment, one that I spent an emergency two weeks on about a month ago.  This new assignment will mean me returning to my car to get to the office, and it also means me not needed to spend nights away from my family, which I am very happy about.  Being in the car means I can catch up on all my podcasts that have been building up in to a sizable backlog, and it also means a welcome return to story CDs, which are the best way I have found of making you look forward to an hour drive home.

Have a great weekend one and all, and speak again next week.

Twenty three years ago

Twenty three years ago I left college, having spent the final year in a rented house with three friends.  Last night the four of us met up in London.  Our calculations have determined that it has been five years since we were all together, but that did not stand in the way of us having a great evening.

Everyone was just the same as they always were.  Perhaps a little thinner on top and a little wider at the belt (speaking for myself at least) but overall it was as if we had never been apart.

I have always described us as the tortoise and the hare, with the other three being the hares.  They have all made the way fast in the world; big jobs, second marriages, probably a fairly ordinary story of ambitious people in the smoke. 

I on the other hand am the tortoise.  I have made a slow and steady progress through life, away from the Capital, with every step a steady and measured one.  It works for me, and I am certainly happy with my lot.

They all seem happy too, and we didn't even spend too long reminiscing about the past.  Well, we did a bit, looking back fondly on those reckless and carefree days, bemoaning that "we didn't know how lucky we were". etc. etc. etc.  However, we are mostly happy with our lot and where we are in life, looking for the the good bits in every situation, and we should, I think, be creating a sense of pride in our college's career advisor.  If we had had one.

We went to a very trendy pizza restaurant in an old tea warehouse.  The interior decor retained the warehouse feel; steel and concrete abound.  The seats were long benches with circular seats on a swivel arm.  Just like the dining tables at the maggots' school.  So far, I can tell that I am not selling it to you.  It was very busy, and we had to "have a drink" waiting for the pager to vibrate.  Taff did do his usually blagging routine, saying he had booked the night before etc. etc., and maybe it worked coz we had a table in 15 minutes.  I still don't think I am selling it to you.  However, and here is the clincher, the food was absolutely amazing.  Quite simply the best pizza I have had in a long long time.  Not that large, thinnish base with a bulbous crust, but the flavours were amazing.  A very fresh and very tasty pizza.

Promises were made to meet up again, and we are hoping to plan a get-together.  The others were urging a lads' night away, but I really am not sure.  It sounds a bit soppy, but I don't really like doing things without my family, so I was urging them instead for a group get together.  My suggestion was camping, which was rather vigorously poo-poo'd, so it may be something else altogether.  Time will tell.

It's all downhill from here

I refer to us being at the middle of the week of course, a phrase borrowed from someone, maybe Chris Evans, not sure.

The weekend was pretty successful.  Legoland was full of lego, and people.  We rode the big rollercoaster, at least it is the biggest there, as a family and Maggot 2 did have a couple of flutters during the ride, but by the end was talking about doing it again.  We even, for the first and probably last time in our lives, bought the photo taken during the ride, since it just captured our delight beautifully.

Sunday saw the UK-based family, my in-laws, visiting for Sunday lunch.  My mum was also over for a few days, but her knee pain kept her at home on Sunday, although she did come round for supper on Monday and it was great to see her.  Walking is not easy, but she is doing all her exercises, and the consultant (nearly a personal friend, don't you know) was very pleased with her rehabilitation.

I am now in London doing my Tuesday to Thursday stint.  We are in week 3 of our backlog clearing exercise, and are probably behind the curve with stuff closed, but with a large tidal wave of nearly finished stuff that may get us back on track by early next week.  It is hard work keeping it going, and our need to drive everyone in the chain to deliver means we are probably being viewed as a right royal bunch of wotsits, but needs must and the devil drives a Volvo.

We had a team meeting last night in a couple of pubs, the latter with the footy on, followed by a nice meal at an owner-run pizza place.  As for the footy, the least said the better.  We never really got out of third gear, and maybe can just about frame an excuse in that our opponents, Montenegro, have yet to lose a game.  In addition, Venus was in the ascendant, the tea leaves spoke of frustration and several commuters walking across Tower Bridge stepped on the cracks.

On the edge

No, not some caffeine overdose, unlike dear old Golfy who needs to watch what he is ingesting.

You know the feeling.  You are on a roller-coaster of some persuasion, probably best if it is somewhere hot like Florida, or California, or maybe even west of Paris, or somewhere else altogether.  You are at the start of the ride, and everything is pretty straightforward, but you are right at the top and just about to go over the edge in to the first and biggest drop.  

Well, that is where I am just now, on Monday evening just waiting to go over the edge in to Tuesday morning, when I shall be in London and probably getting all the roller-coaster stomach in mouth sensations as well.  

Am I building it up too much?  Of course, where would the fun be without a bit of imagination.  Fear is false experience appearing real and all that, and anyway, I have had a sense of how normal life can be so I have a right to be a bit concerned about how things will go back on the old account.  And I have a tricky solution that should have been done months ago by others, but has not for many good and bad reasons, and right now I only have half a boozers what is needed, and I know that I will need to speak to my customer to get the other half, and that will require the eating of a large slice of humble pie, and also with the expectation that I might get shouted at a bit.  

I hope your day is going well, and that tomorrow follows the same pattern.

Ta ta for now.

That Madness song

I am a bit of a believer in bits of NLP, especially the stuff that says if you spend your day saying "today is going to be miserable" then the forces of a yet to be defined piece of physics work to try and make a day that would have otherwise have been average, turn a little the worse.  

And this is why I am not prepared to name the Madness song about how they expect their day to start.  Needless to say that my stint of being "emergency re-prioritised" is at an end and today sees me back at my old account.  Off to London tomorrow but today at home, wondering the best (i.e. most effective for my contribution, sanity and general usefulness to the account) way to re-engage with my colleagues.  I think the next couple of week will be instrumental in determining my true "status", as anyone who has yet to cancel their Facebook account would put it.  In fact, it may well be the period when I start humming the Clash song "Should I stay or Should I go?", which will probably bring a smile to the inside of my face.  It may also be a variation of that mind trick you are taught that when faced by an angry or unreasonable person, just imagine them naked and you cannot then take them seriously.  Having tried this once or twice, I can report from the front line that it can be in equal measures effective, vomit-inducing and utterly discomforting to do this, the precise mix of that heady cocktail depending on the attributes of the person to which you are applying the technique.  i.e. your fifty-five year old male boss engenders a different internal response than a young (that is, younger than me) female colleague.  The latter of course could be construed as both sexual harassment and "typical man" depending on the extent of the imaginings.

In case it is occurring to you like it is just occurring to me, I did watch, for the first time, the film Up at the weekend, so I may have unwittingly recharged my squirrel gland.  As for the film, rather good actually.

I also watched Ghost, which has Ewan McGregor and Pierce Brosnan and was also a pretty good film, with one of those trying-not-to-be-predictable endings that are almost too cool for their own good.

So, another week, another chance to shine, and to become the fulsome human being, reaching my potential and at one with my spiritual and physical being.  Think I may have gone too far this time.

Until next time.

A meeting of minds

So I did in the end manage to attend the afternoon sessions of the technical conference, and it was great to catch up with Grinderman and get an update on the London situation, and of course Golfy and Stretch, as well as a number of other colleagues, friends and ne'er do wells.  

The planned Ruby had to be called of due to a number of factors:

• Stretch had to wax his legs or something, and some other stuff about getting plastered
• Golfy just could not be bothered.

So Kenobi found himself driving home at the normal time to spend a rather pleasant evening with his family.  We had cous cous with roasted veg, feta and a delish harissa source, the remainder of which I shall be taking to work today for lunch.  If you are in the Horsham area, drop by and marvel and the wonderfulness that is my lunch.

Back to what might just be nearly my final day today on my current short-term assignment, so may well be back on London duties by the end of this week or early next, which means back to the train commute and overnight stays, which do not fill me with much pleasure.  Maybe it really is time to make some positive noises about moving on, to lay down the seeds of an exit.  Should give me time to leave my mark without it leaving its mark indelibly on me.  If you know what I mean.

Have a good day . . . until the next time . . .

Oh how quickly things change

I am reminded of the old Tommy Cooper joke where he asks the doctor how long he has to live.  "Put it this way", says the Doctor, "I wouldn't put on an LP". 

So it is with my working life.  Just as I am getting my feet back under the desk, finding the lay of the land and have run it up the flagpole to see who salutes, I am told that I have been "re-prioritised".  Now, in the Orwellian future, I am guessing that is either painful of life-limiting, but in the wonderful world of Starfleet it means that a group of people, some of whom one knows, and some of whom one has yet to encounter, sit on a conference call to make a "breakage call", which in layman's terms means they decide which customers they are happy to pi$$ off a bit so that the can pi$$ off another one a bit less.  And I am the pawn in that pi$$ed offness transference process, in that I am now to spend two weeks on another new account ensuring some big stuff gets done while the incumbent trooper is in sunnier climes.  The fact that the DPE commented earlier in the day that, as an observation, it did not look like me and my team were particularly busy, could be a contributing factor.  In fact others have already asked the question "does this mean they don't like you?".  The honest answer is that I don't think that that is the issue, however it is always good to retain a bit of paranoia just in case they really are talking about you.

So, tomorrow, I will be off to another office, without my tie (yay) but with a now-defunct train ticket for Thursday.  I wonder if the train operator will refund it?

I will also miss my usual breakfast of organic porridge, smoothie, seeds and falafal sandwich.  Oh well, I am sure someone in this city can sell me some food tomorrow.

London, again

It is hard to believe that just five short days ago I was drinking red wine in France, beating the girls at Canasta and getting ready for another fantastic evening meal.  Right now, I am looking out the hotel window at Primark in Oxford Street.  

To be honest, this is the best room I have had for a while.  At least it faces outwards, and not inwards to the inner "courtyard" which contains the hotel's air-conditioning units, and I am talking the size of two London buses with every seat taken.  I feel blessed.

The first 2 days back at work were not so bad, but that is because the real thing has yet to kick in.  I plan to spend this second honeymoon period addressing some of that important-not-urgent stuff that gets stuck down the to-do list and never gets done, just before the full weight of chores are back on my plate.  I just need to find out what the hell they are, and I will get right to them.

In the meantime, and in case you did not see them, I thought I would reproduce the Top 10 jokes from the Edinburgh Fringe 2010.  I know you like a laugh (or else why would you be reading this) and the certainly made me smile.  Enjoy.

1. Tim Vine: I've just been on a once-in-a-lifetime holiday. I'll tell you what, never again.

2. David Gibson (as Ray Green): I'm currently dating a couple of anorexics. Two birds, one stone.

3. Emo Philips: I picked up a hitchhiker. You gotta when you hit them.

4. Jack Whitehall: I bought one of those anti-bullying wristbands when they first came out. I say 'bought' - I actually stole it off a short, fat ginger kid.

5. Gary Delaney: As a kid I was made to walk the plank. We couldn't afford a dog.

6. John Bishop: Being an England supporter is like being the over-optimistic parents of the fat kid on sports day.

7. Bo Burnham: What do you call a kid with no arms and an eye-patch? Names.

8. Gary Delaney: Dave drowned. So at the funeral we got him a wreath in the shape of a lifebelt. Well, it's what he would have wanted.

9. Robert White: For Vanessa Feltz, life is like a box of chocolates - empty.

10. Gareth Richards: Wooden spoons are great. You can either use them to prepare food, or if you can't be bothered with that, just write a number on one and walk into a pub.

Elementary, my dear Watson

So I read with interest Golfy's review of Inception and will get it on my growing list of films to see.

I also saw his review of the new, Modern Sherlock Holmes.  I seem to be in a minority of one about the show, although that is between, me, LO and Golfy, so still a healthy 33% of the vote.  I didn't like it.  All the fast camera stuff and intensely clever things Holmes noticed left me cold, and I also was unsure about the modern setting.  The only thing I did like was how it was set in modern times, yet at the same time with the chinese circus, it did have a sense of the old at the same time.  Perhaps I need another episode to persuade me.

I am about to take the train to London for my usual Tuesday to Thursday stint, and am looking forward to my porridge tomorrow for breakfast, and also to finishing Thursday evening, getting the train home and packing for our 6.30am departure Friday morning.

Have a good day/week, and speak again later.

So where the bloody hell are you?

Not me losing control of my editorial style, but obviously an old advertising tag line for Australia.

It is also of course what my vast readership has been saying about me.  It is true;* my blogs have been just a tad sparse of late, but I do have an explanation.  Not a good one mind, but the truth, which is sometimes good, sometimes bad and sometimes fish**.

The reason for my bloglessness is, simply and rather boringly, due to work.  Long hours in the intense environment of the City, followed by a walk, a tube and a walk to the hotel.  And then I have to put up with the hotel messing me about.  Again.  A long wait to check in, a lift ride up to my room, only to find the "key", or bit of plastic wot is programmed for the technical readership, did not work in my door.  "Bother" and "dash it all" and a few other Bertie Wooster's carried me back to reception.  "Oh yes, that doesn't work does it" said the receptionist, with what probably equals the highest level of understatement I experienced all day.  A pair of new keys later and I was in my room, twice.  With the noisiest air conditioning I have ever heard.  Now a chap can bunk down with the best of them, but dash it all to hell, a poorly working air-conditioning unit is against my basic human rights.  And being a proactive person, I took off my socks and put up with it.  In the morning I did complain, to be told I needed to pack all my stuff up in my room "... because our porters cannot touch your stuff..." ready to be relocated.  I am writing this from the sixth floor, the highest I have ever been in this hotel.  I certainly know how to live.

I have also had the a missing breakfast from the 30th June just added to my Amex on 6 July, for which I now have a receipt, since I am happy I did have it, but at the time the receptionist said don't worry, it is on us.  And I also had some bar drinks that were definitely not mine, and have been left for the manager to sort out.  Which if every other complication I have had here is to go by, will go nowhere fast.  In fact, I am just now ringing reception to see where it has got to.  I am on hold for the manager.  Still on hold.  Yep, still on hold.  I have now gone back to a receptionist.  Chocolate teapot.  Back on hold.  Lovely lady telling me about the "... unique experience at the Cumberland.  For a sneak preview at our breath-taking services...".  Then I was being asked to press 0 to speak to someone.  Now back to the same chocolate teapot to tell her again what I just told her.  I am finally with the manager, explaining for the fourth time.  So I finally get to the nub of my problem, rather than theirs, and it is kind of sorted.

Anyhow, I would love to stay and chat, but I have some TV to watch.  Have a good evening, and don't be a stranger.

*For those who like to know these things, that is the first use of a semi-colon in the Kenobi blog.  And that is a fact, in real life and in this country.

**A little joke for the abstractionites amongst us.  And don't bother trying to argue that there is no such words as abstractionites, you flognatites.

hot, hot, hot

I know what you are thinking.  When Derran Brown says that, you are inclined to believe him, and a person likening himself to someone who has Jedi powers you may also be inclined to believe, however, and I am letting the jabawaki out the bag here, I am just an ordinary bloke.

However, in this instance, I really do think I know what you are thinking.  You are thinking "Arrogant beggar, talking about himself again."  But no, dear reader (and I fear you are in the singular now), I am referring to the weather, of course.

Us Brits are obsessed with it.  When it is cold, we want it hot.  When it is hot, we want it cold.  When it is wet, we want it dry.  When it is dry, we want it wet.  You get the idea.  Right now, it is fair to say, it is pretty hot.  Combine the fair weather with a life spent in London, then the effect is magnified.  And don't even get me started on the Central Line.  That is global warming all on its own.  If you throw in the need for a tie and suit, then you have the makings of one very hot little Scobi Wan Kenobi.  My whole day is spent being either a bit hotter or a lot hotter than I want to be. 

So what is a guy to do.  So far, not a lot, except perspire quietly and long for that French holiday home with its magnificent swimming pool.  Being off the beer during the week just adds to the injustice of it all.  I just thank all that is good in the world that my hotel room has a good air conditioning unit that, on entry to said room, is turned up to eleven, to cool the room and everything therein.

I just thought I would let you know about that.

Off to London for 3 nights now, and already cannot wait for the weekend.  Will no doubt have a chance to blog from my hotel room, with my meal-for-one room-service watching some dodgy bit of TV.  Or I may read.  Or have a bath (cool of course).  Whatever it is I will be doing, you can be assured that it will all be carried out at an even nineteen degrees centigrade.

Somewhere different

Today I will be venturing to somewhere different.  This particular somewhere different is a Starfleet office up in the smoke that is, let's say, not on the north of any particular bank or building society.  The purpose of the visit is to indoctrinate a number of new recruits in to the ways my little part of the universe and its associated customer.  The end game will be a larger number of troops able to manage some of the growing workload for which I am my fellow troopers are responsible.  This will set me much more firmly in the role of troop commander, and much less as a trooper, and how that will sit with me has yet to be determined.

What I know right now is there is a job to do, and things I need to achieve in order to satisfy "up the chain", and I am keen to do that.  Whether I have found my next career step is yet to be seen, but watch this space.

And if all that confused the hell out of you, then I am not surprised.  All this talk of Starfleet and troopers and other space-related analogies certainly improves the names-changed-to-protect-the-guilty aspect of the writing, but do not help any with understanding.  I therefore hope that you fall in to one of two camps:

• you are a Starfleet trooper yourself and use similar language - you know who you are Golfy, Bad Man and Stretch ;-)  
• you are seeing me shortly and can ask what the bl00dy hell I am talking about.

If you are in neither camp, then firstly, welcome, and thanks for reading, and secondly, feel free to leave a comment and I can try and enlighten you*.

Until next time, adieu.

*not forgetting the Scobi code of conduct.  Not too much abuse, and spell the words properly.  There are still two S's in to$$er.

Comparisons

I have wired internet in the hotel, freeman's for a member of Starfleet.  Hurrah for technology, although it is ethernet running at 10mbps, which is I believe the network connection speed for the ZX Spectrum.  

So, I am drawn naturally to comparing my first day back in the Smoke with my week off in North Norfolk.  I think it is fair to say that Londoners have less fingers (cheap joke, Ed) but more time for you.  There is certainly no underground system, except the Roy's underground fanbase,  of which I count myself the founder, and only, member.  They do have an extensive Broads network, the maximum speed on which is six miles per hour, four in built up areas.  This is about fifty percent faster than most traffic in London.
A portion of chips in Ken's of Wroxham (probably bitter rivals of Roy, but fair play to the fellah, he has stuck it out) is one pound twenty.  A portion of fries anywhere in London is seventeen pounds ninety-nine.  Probably.


The only other difference is that in London I am staying in a fancy hotel, and in Norfolk, a little white box.  The view from my room window today is rather impressive, though.  I am looking over Oxford Street, and just to the right I can see Marble Arch.  The only view from our 'van was the hairy @rse of the woman opposite doing her "morning stretches".  All I can say is, Marble Arch is slightly smaller, but not as white.


Second day back at work, first in my customer's offices, and the predicted "hard day" was just that.  Left the office at a quarter to eight, but had a simple six stop tube ride and then a one minute walk to the hotel, so it is an improvement on the Novotel, which had a tube change and a fifteen minute walk the other end.  The only down-side is I am not collecting any loyalty points staying here.  And breakfast is £18.95.  Rather a lot, so I had better make sure I eat my own weight in full English.  Unless my wife is reading this, in which case it is fruit, yogurt and a cold bath and flannel wash for afters.


I may well end up blogging every day this week, so I hope that I can attract back some off my many readers, who, it has to be said, have rather dwindled since I have been off on holiday, and working in London.


Come back dear readers, all is forgiven, and all is to be played for.  Now that is a topic for tomorrow.  Football.  You either love it or hate it.  Golfy is broadly neutral, which makes him probably a bit, you know, but I absolutely love it.  The Wan Kenobi clan have their England shirts, flags and age-appropriate drinks at the ready for the first game on Saturday.  

COME ON ENGLAND.

I can't get no sleep

Deep in the bosom of the gentle night

Is when I search for the light
Pick up my pen and start to write

 So say Faithless, and so say Scobi Wan Kenobi.

I am off to London this morning, and as is often the case, when the alarm is set for 05:30 I wake up at 04:11, lie in bed for a while trying to stop thinking about stuff, then give up and 04:45 and come downstairs for a cuppa.  

Having updated my podcasts for the train journey ahead, checked the weather over the next three days - warmish but raining every day, dilemma* for dress code coz I am always too hot in London - and even had a quick peek at Facebook.  I did listen the new Faithless single as a result, one friend being a fan, and was thus inspired to start this blog with a Faithless reference.

It is now the time I would normally be getting up so I must go get myself clean and dressed.  

And on the subject of dressing, I do find myself once again with a dilemma on what to wear.  I have been dressing in "business casual" clothes all this century and so only have one suit to my name, and that is the one I was wearing when I was married in 2000.  Where I work is in the City, and the general dress code is blue shirt and dark suit, most with a tie but some without.  I therefore started with a tie, dropped it as soon as I could coz I am not a fan, but kept the suit.  The problem with a suit is the heat.  Walking everywhere, riding the tube, being in an office with poor air-conditioning and having a body that is a human radiator means that I am always too hot, so end up carrying the jacket, which is the last thing I need with a rucksack for my laptop and a wheelie "trolley dolly" suitcase for my stuff.  It then sits on the back of my office chair all day, only to be carried over my arm to the hotel at the end of the day.  Today therefore I am experimenting with a smartish business casual look and see how uncomfortable, or not, I feel dressing thus.  Let's call it a social experiment, albeit one that is unlikely to be causing any kind of ripple on the pond of human knowledge.  If I was going for my Cub "Rebel" badge, I am not sure I would get it, however the thing about clothing is that it shouldn't matter, but of course it does, and there is no doubt that I make all sorts of assumptions about a person by how they are dressed, so everyone else does too.  

Whatever they think I am, that is what I am not**.

 

* I had to Google the spelling of this word, and find that "dilemna", which is how I would have been tempted to spell it, is wrong.  There are 16,700 pages discussing the correct spelling of it, thus making the choice of spelling one of two options, which is one of those thingies where the word is itself.  Hmmmm.

** Another film and music reference.  Traffic light lolly for anyone who can name both.

Another week, another challenge

Another week is nearly over, and I have a whole bunch of new challenges.  I have been up in London for four days and three nights, and that does take its toll.  To put it simply, I miss my family.  I also cannot continue to have three courses at every meal.

Work is hard right now.  I should be grateful I have a job, and mostly I am.  I should also be grateful I am doing a job that, in the main, I enjoy doing.  I am certainly very glad that I do not pluck chickens for a living, or any other kind of job that is based on doing the same boring thing over and over and over.


However, man is never content.  Give me a million, and I want two.  Give me a nice watch, and I want an iPhone.  Give me a pair of ladies underwear...  Sorry, that must just be me.  I find life in the City a hectic, frantic, crazy time, with people everywhere, and no time of day or night whether there is not at least one group of suited beings drinking alcohol.  Do these people not have jobs to do?  They obviously do, to pay for the flash suit and the expensive lager, but it is a job that is obviously heavy on expense-paid lunches, heavy on networking, but light on clocking in and out.  Good on them.

The weekend draws near, and I for one am very keen to get in to it and enjoy some R&R. This weekend we have friends over for the night, and a new cub to be invested. Should be a good one, and with the weather likely to hit the high twenties Celcius, it has the potential to be a great couple of days.  I hope you enjoy yours, and we will speak again next week. 

As a final note, you should check out Golfy's blog.  It has an amazing YouTube clip watching a hand draw a series of cartoons to tell a story of what motivates people.  It is quote a remarkable video.

Sorry seems to be the hardest word

Sorry, dear readers, for not writing for a while. Starfleet has moved my base to London and I am currently working mostly at the customer offices, which has a pretty vigorous web blocking system, which, you guessed it, blocks my blog. I also have not got organised yet for any kind of internet connection when mobile. So for the two or three days I spend on account are blogless. I feel positively negative about the whole blogfast, yet find myself today not entirely sure what the hell to write.

Oh well, it has not stopped me before. Just start the sentence with "So" and see how it goes.

So, my working week this week has been spent "laying the foundation stones" of the process we need in place to get control of our workload, and we had a very successful time doing just that.

Socially*, I had a quite evening in the hotel room with room service. After three weekends of over-indulgence, what I needed was no beer and some rest. And I got both. The hotel and room were very nice, the room-service a bit limited, but I had a right old time and arrived at the (full English) breakfast the next morning refreshed and ready for day two.

I did manage to miss my connecting train home by being on the phone to a work colleague, so spent half an hour longer than I needed to on East Croydon station. To be honest, one station looks a lot like another, and this one was no exception. All the people on the various platforms had a uniformly similar expression that said "I would really rather be anywhere else but here", and most were engaged in some activity of other involving either a Blackberry or an iPhone. I have been doing my own Scobi poll of hand held devices used by the natives of Londinium, and can confirm that 94.75% of people either had a Blackberry or an iPhone. Having used a friend's iPhone to check my eBay sales, I can confirm that it is a natty device, but still not the perfect browsing experience**. As a Blackberry user myself, albeit one without any data services***, I can also confirm that it may be very good at many things, but being a phone is not really one of them**.

It was good to be home, and roasted veg and halloumi with special Harisa source on cous cous was a fine home-coming meal, and it was lovely to see the family again.

I am at home for the rest of the week, so you can expect more regular posts until next Tuesday, when I am up for two nights and three days. I really must sort out connectivity.


*does that count as starting with "so"?
** Yes, that is considered understatement you are sensing.
*** I know, that does not compute. What is the point, you ask, of having a Blackberry without any data services. That is most definitely an oxymoron. We call it Starfleet logic. Which is also an oxymoron.

Blinking

I have just blinked and it is Friday. How did that happen? I must try blinking more often.

It happened, of course, because the week has been very busy. I spent a couple of days and one night in London, as I have already told you, and had some train issues on the way home, something that is frustrating beyond belief, but something I think I will have to get used to. The final leg was spent sharing a taxi with three other fellow travellers to get home. I remember reading the definition of how you complete the Luge is "Lie flat, don't die" and you need a bit of that to get through a week like this.

So Friday it is, and this Friday sees me with a half day off to go, yes you've guessed it, 'vannin'. I shall be dragging the big white box down to Lyme Regis to stay at a campsite by the sea. It is also a site where our friends, let's call them Brad and Angelina, are also staying, in a static caravan owned by Brad's mum. When it comes to big, white and ugly theirs knock ours in to a cocked hat.

And in best squirrel tradition, I just had to Google that expression, because in black and white, it does look strange. The definition taken from several sites seems to settle on something like this:

"The game of Cocked Hat was similar to ninepins except that only three pins were set up, in triangular formation. It took its name from the three-cornered hat with the brim turned up (i.e. cocked) worn in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The expression implies a comparison between something in disarray after a defeat and the way in which pins are sent flying in a game of Cocked Hat."

So there you go.

We are very much looking forward to being away in the 'van, to spending some time by the sea with our very good friends. We are not, however, sure we like the weather men (and women) very much. They keep insisting it is going to rain over the long weekend. What's that all about? I for one shall do what I always do in such situations, and ignore the reports, simply believing that it will "probably be all right where we are." I shall report back as to how this highly scientific experiment goes.


I have just caught a news item about a sixty-seven year old man from the US who accidentally got his foot caught between the accelerator and brake, and managed to reverse fast in to has parking space, punching a hole in the wall behind the space. Oh, and he was seven floors up in a multi-storey car park. No people were hurt, but a couple of cars have had their pride and bonnets dented by falling rubble.

I hope your long weekend is enjoyable, and your imagination and weather-altering powers are as good as mine.

The bright lights

I was personally not a great fan of Terry Wogan's breakfast show, but I am very aware that a lot of people were, and I have it on good authority that a subset of his followers like to call themselves TOGs, which is either Terry's old Gits or Terry's old girls, depending on what dangly bit you do or don't have.

I am wondering whether I should make up something for the followers of Scobi Wan Kenobi. Having given it almost no thought at all, I have come up with SWKers. I think it has a rather cheery sound to it, and can see both my followers getting t-shirts printed forthwith saying "I am a SWKer".

If you have been wondering where I have been for a couple of days (yes, both of you) then I can tell you that I have been up to the capital of our country, the Big Smoke, up in Town, namely Londinium. I can confirm a couple of things:

- the streets are not paved with gold
- there are a lot of people up there
- I decided to walk from station to office and from office to hotel, so can confirm that I really did take myself by the hand and led myself through the streets of London.

I am transitioning, a fine word and one that does not even begin to describe the difficulties found therein, to a new account. If you have ever watched You've Been Framed, and based on polls carried out by Worrie, they have defined my demographic as "the sort of people who are likely to watch You've Been Framed", so I am guessing you probably have, then you may remember one of the key themes that are repeated QUITE A LOT, is the theme where the person, usually a bit older and a bit un-nimble and more than a bit overweight, is stepping off a jetty and on to a small boat, and as they have one foot on each, the boat begins to move away from the jetty. As any physicist will tell you, action and reaction are equal and opposite, and boy there is some action in a 22 stone person stepping on to a boat, and the finale is a rather wet person. Oh how we laugh.
Anyhow, ... squirrel ... that is what it is like when you are "transitioning". It can be quite an emotional tug of war with your old account still wants a piece of you, and your new account is so happy to have finally got a body, want you at least 100%. More often, it is just a pain in the bum that is a lot less fun than ending up in the drink as you try to step on to a boat.

London is an interesting place. There are people everywhere, from my small poll sample, there is no time of day after 11am when someone isn't in a pub or bar having a drink, and they always have a suit on. Don't they have work to do?

I think it is fair to say that I do enjoy a visit to London, but I am not a natural city boy. I don't know whether I am actually chewing on a bit of straw, but I do feel a bit out of sorts with all the bustle. Our office is pretty flash, lots of glass and marble, but once you are inside there are seats and desks and I am staring at a partition wall, so I really could be anywhere.

Nevertheless, my new account is full of interesting problems and I am relishing the challenge of something new. I just hope I can be as effective as my managers are hoping, and I make a success of things.

I stayed up for the night, so met up with a very old friend from college. Since we like to give pseudonyms for people, let's call him Taff, a name that, to my best knowledge, he has never been called. We have not seen each other for a couple of years, but we just slipped back in to a comfortable and very enjoyable evening of drink, food and chat, catching up on what we had both been up to since we last met, which did give us a vast tableau of topics to discuss.

I am working at home today, hoping that the garage can fix my car by tonight so that I have it for our planned 'vannin' trip down to Lyme Regis.