Felt I should update - no I'm not dead....
I am, however, extremely lazy, so I shall post the round robin I sent my family to let you know what has been going on in my life recently to save me having to write it all again:
Thanks so much for the birthday money - I shall put it towards the new speakers I want to get for my mp3 player, so I can listen to music in my little Bio room at work. I get a little isolated in there at times and completely lose track of time if I’m not careful (rubber gloves covering up my watch). On Monday I’d worked for about three hours before I noticed I hadn’t moved the wall clock on and so was working an hour out of sync with everyone else!
Work has been hectic, with many of the sixth form teachers wanting to run mock practical exams to help prepare the students for the finals in May. This has meant I’ve been doing a lot of overtime at short notice, though because Rhys only comes to us on certain weekdays I can actually be more adaptable than most of the technicians, all of whom have children too. We’ve also had a lot of staff off sick, which means running around first thing in the morning cancelling practical equipment set up the day before and trying to find enough books to set work for a cover supervisor. I think the whole department is totally exhausted.
Chris has been working very late, sometimes up until 10 at night. They’ve had a major project which was overdue and the whole section has been working overtime for no pay. Chris wouldn’t mind, but the root of the problem lies with his boss, who insists on stopping everyone doing their job in order to have a play with the equipment himself. Chris has been fuming about it, especially after the man accused the section of poor time management!
I’ve been trying to encourage him, for some years now, that he could find work outside of QinetiQ (who used to be the Admiralty Research Establishment when Chris and I originally signed up for our engineering apprenticeships), but he has been institutionalised for so long I don’t think he really believed he could afford to. However, QinetiQ have been planning to shut down the Bincleaves site in the middle of Weymouth and move its staff to Winfrith Business Park, out near Wool. They planned to offer a subsidy on fuel expenditure for three years, to soften the blow for those who will have to travel for two hours a day. But that doesn’t really help those of us that walk to work because we don’t have cars, and who can’t afford to buy one. Happily for us, the option has arisen to take voluntary redundancy, and we are now waiting with baited breath to find out if Chris can go with the first phase, which should mean that he’d leave by the end of April. It would mean a lot of money to pay off our debts and time for Chris to find more work in Weymouth. The irony is that afterwards we shall probably be able to afford to run a car, which would be very useful!
Last week we had to rely on my father-in-law, Nick, to help us drive our small black cat, Amber, to the vets when she stopped eating suddenly and lost loads of weight. It seems her teeth (which she has refused to let me see for 8 years now) have been getting into a really bad state and we had to have seven taken out under anaesthetic. I was appalled at how thin she’d become, but because her fur is so thick you don’t really notice till you stroke her. She’s been off her food for a while, but since fat Boddington eats anything that’s left we hadn’t realised how little she was getting,
However, since the op she’s been a different animal, running around the house and playing, on and off people’s laps and wolfing down any food offered. I have no worries now that she will recover her normal weight - she’s even started pinching Bod’s food - now that’s fighting spirit!
This year seems to have had one of the longest, darkest winters I can remember. The sun coming out this last month has boosted our moods considerably and leaves me wondering if I ought to get some work done on our poor neglected garden. The climbers needed cutting back in the autumn, but we were so busy I didn’t get round to it. Another job I keep putting off, but life does seem to whiz past at the moment.
Luckily we now get two weeks off school for Easter and so we may be able to sit out there by the end of the month without being attacked by the honeysuckle, or tripped up by the passiflora.
Mum and Dad came down to Weymouth to celebrate my birthday and we went out for a meal with Chris’s parents to the Elm Tree in Langton Herring. They all get on well and it was nice to have an occasion in which to relax together. Next week I’m planning to go up to Yeovil and take Mum out for a belated Mother’s Day lunch, so I hope the weather holds.
Well thats about it. I did spend a sunny day in Dorch last week, largely because, like a fool, I got all dressed up to take mum out for lunch only to realise I was a week out! I felt that Dorset should not be denied the efforts I had gone to (looked almost presentable in my new sage green wool skirt and chocolate boots - even theBig Issue salesmen said so!). Of course I bought a TON of books in Ottakers and WHSmiths sale, but having spent my birthday money on food for the Boys, I rather felt it was time to spoil myself. I got the next Robin Hobb book 'Fool's Errand' - I adored the first series and am now hungry for more. I the was intrigued by a couple of hardbacks in the sale - one is a modern 'goth' comedy about an aspiring witch and her long suffering teenage family, various familiars and a subtle cast of characters highly influenced by Mervyn Peake and J.K. Rowling, but neverless entertaining and different. The other is a strange combination of diary entries and stories from an 18th Century traveller, describing life all over the globe and the people he meets, the travelling conditions aboard a sail ship and the concepts and conceits of the era. I shall update as I read them.
Oh, and fantastic to hear from evilsalamander again. I'm sorry I don't look at my hotmail account very often - try using my btinternet account - thats the one I open every day! Got your WAYN stuff, but proly won't keep the page updated much. I'm not even on here that frequently and its on my homepage!
Take care to all you lovely ppl and have a fantastic Eostre festival!
Thanks so much for the birthday money - I shall put it towards the new speakers I want to get for my mp3 player, so I can listen to music in my little Bio room at work. I get a little isolated in there at times and completely lose track of time if I’m not careful (rubber gloves covering up my watch). On Monday I’d worked for about three hours before I noticed I hadn’t moved the wall clock on and so was working an hour out of sync with everyone else!
Work has been hectic, with many of the sixth form teachers wanting to run mock practical exams to help prepare the students for the finals in May. This has meant I’ve been doing a lot of overtime at short notice, though because Rhys only comes to us on certain weekdays I can actually be more adaptable than most of the technicians, all of whom have children too. We’ve also had a lot of staff off sick, which means running around first thing in the morning cancelling practical equipment set up the day before and trying to find enough books to set work for a cover supervisor. I think the whole department is totally exhausted.
Chris has been working very late, sometimes up until 10 at night. They’ve had a major project which was overdue and the whole section has been working overtime for no pay. Chris wouldn’t mind, but the root of the problem lies with his boss, who insists on stopping everyone doing their job in order to have a play with the equipment himself. Chris has been fuming about it, especially after the man accused the section of poor time management!
I’ve been trying to encourage him, for some years now, that he could find work outside of QinetiQ (who used to be the Admiralty Research Establishment when Chris and I originally signed up for our engineering apprenticeships), but he has been institutionalised for so long I don’t think he really believed he could afford to. However, QinetiQ have been planning to shut down the Bincleaves site in the middle of Weymouth and move its staff to Winfrith Business Park, out near Wool. They planned to offer a subsidy on fuel expenditure for three years, to soften the blow for those who will have to travel for two hours a day. But that doesn’t really help those of us that walk to work because we don’t have cars, and who can’t afford to buy one. Happily for us, the option has arisen to take voluntary redundancy, and we are now waiting with baited breath to find out if Chris can go with the first phase, which should mean that he’d leave by the end of April. It would mean a lot of money to pay off our debts and time for Chris to find more work in Weymouth. The irony is that afterwards we shall probably be able to afford to run a car, which would be very useful!
Last week we had to rely on my father-in-law, Nick, to help us drive our small black cat, Amber, to the vets when she stopped eating suddenly and lost loads of weight. It seems her teeth (which she has refused to let me see for 8 years now) have been getting into a really bad state and we had to have seven taken out under anaesthetic. I was appalled at how thin she’d become, but because her fur is so thick you don’t really notice till you stroke her. She’s been off her food for a while, but since fat Boddington eats anything that’s left we hadn’t realised how little she was getting,
However, since the op she’s been a different animal, running around the house and playing, on and off people’s laps and wolfing down any food offered. I have no worries now that she will recover her normal weight - she’s even started pinching Bod’s food - now that’s fighting spirit!
This year seems to have had one of the longest, darkest winters I can remember. The sun coming out this last month has boosted our moods considerably and leaves me wondering if I ought to get some work done on our poor neglected garden. The climbers needed cutting back in the autumn, but we were so busy I didn’t get round to it. Another job I keep putting off, but life does seem to whiz past at the moment.
Luckily we now get two weeks off school for Easter and so we may be able to sit out there by the end of the month without being attacked by the honeysuckle, or tripped up by the passiflora.
Mum and Dad came down to Weymouth to celebrate my birthday and we went out for a meal with Chris’s parents to the Elm Tree in Langton Herring. They all get on well and it was nice to have an occasion in which to relax together. Next week I’m planning to go up to Yeovil and take Mum out for a belated Mother’s Day lunch, so I hope the weather holds.
Well thats about it. I did spend a sunny day in Dorch last week, largely because, like a fool, I got all dressed up to take mum out for lunch only to realise I was a week out! I felt that Dorset should not be denied the efforts I had gone to (looked almost presentable in my new sage green wool skirt and chocolate boots - even theBig Issue salesmen said so!). Of course I bought a TON of books in Ottakers and WHSmiths sale, but having spent my birthday money on food for the Boys, I rather felt it was time to spoil myself. I got the next Robin Hobb book 'Fool's Errand' - I adored the first series and am now hungry for more. I the was intrigued by a couple of hardbacks in the sale - one is a modern 'goth' comedy about an aspiring witch and her long suffering teenage family, various familiars and a subtle cast of characters highly influenced by Mervyn Peake and J.K. Rowling, but neverless entertaining and different. The other is a strange combination of diary entries and stories from an 18th Century traveller, describing life all over the globe and the people he meets, the travelling conditions aboard a sail ship and the concepts and conceits of the era. I shall update as I read them.
Oh, and fantastic to hear from evilsalamander again. I'm sorry I don't look at my hotmail account very often - try using my btinternet account - thats the one I open every day! Got your WAYN stuff, but proly won't keep the page updated much. I'm not even on here that frequently and its on my homepage!
Take care to all you lovely ppl and have a fantastic Eostre festival!