Not life-changing but...

I've gone part-time and am now working three days a week.

Well, after health scares last year and earlier this year, plus some niggling work issues, I sort of thought 'What's the point in going through all this if I'm still just plugging away working full-time'. So, after a fraught weekend considering a rival job offer, I accepted my current employer's offer of job-share - the current employer was offering 3 full days Monday to Wednesday, which makes things much tidier and means a nice long four day weekend. I like spending more days at home than I do at work :0). Not that I'm doing anything exciting on my days off - painting doors, pottering in the garden, doing the cleaning, looking at the weather forecast and working out which day will be the best to put the washing out, that sort of uber-feministy stuff ;0). But it does mean that we shouldn't have to spend all of our weekends doing the chores and we can get out of the house occasionally. Although I am beginning to wonder whether working three days a week is interfering a bit too much with my sofa time, we'll see...

Anyway, whilst I was pondering all this The Staves 'Teeth White' was being played incessantly on the radio and I was surprised that a group of children (when seen from the vantage point of nearly 50!) could capture the essence of mid-life crisis quite so well as they do. Now I'm not claiming that the record influenced my decision unduly, but it did strike a chord.

And, in my small way, I do now feel like I'm 'sticking it to the man' as our colonial cousins would say.



There's another version of it here on a really rather brilliant set with 'Black and White'. Or am I just biased/jealous 'cos it's in a pub and they're drinking pints of proper beer?

New Toy/New Job

Well, after a frankly dreadful summer, we managed to get out in the garden the weekend after getting back from the Southern 100 in July to do some tidying up. It was the first time this year that it had stopped raining for long enough for us to do weeding, hedge trimming and to get rid of the compost bin that we'd made from old fencing several years ago.

To be honest the old bin had become a bit of an eyesore and was far too big for the space, so I hunted round for a replacement and finally landed on the 'Green Johanna'. This is some kind of miracle pod which can heat the waste to some fantastic temperature and so can take almost anything and turn it into crumbly black compost; or so the accompanying documentation claims, "...bones, bread, dairy, eggshell, fish, fruit, meat, soup and vegetables can all be used and composted, as well as coffee filters, teabags, household papers, egg cartons, wilted flowers and dead pot plants." We'll see. However, it is far more handsome than the the old one, it's huge (about 4 foot high) and was delivered free along with a 'stirring stick' with a folding propeller on the end and a mini compost bin for in the kitchen to collect scraps. It's also worth over £100! When I say 'worth' you'll understand that I didn't pay that much, as I bought it subsidised via the council for less than £25, but I've seen it on the Interweb for prices between £108 and £140 - I'd be wary of buying anything that I'm going to leave out in the garden at that price! I was particularly glad not to have paid that much when the package arrived slightly damaged and all the screws had escaped!

But, of course, after we'd worked on the garden in July the weather and other weekend committments meant that the debris from the old compost bin and the general garden waste couldn't be moved from the patio for another 6 weeks! It finally made it to the dump last weekend.

Oh and I've got a new job. I'm going to be working for the uni rather than a private company and, despite not actually working for the uni at the moment but being based there, I'm only moving a short distance on the campus. Last day in the old job is next Friday. After 18 months I've finally managed to get away from the job which has 'manager' in the title (which I took for several reasons when the organisation was in a state of flux last year and instantly regretted) and I'm back to data entry, phew... Wish me luck!

Free at last...

Well, it's been 3 months since I left the college and I've got to say, it was the best decision I've ever made. The first couple of weeks were a bit traumatic, I hadn't realised how such a big change would affect me - foolishly I thought I'd walk out of my old job and feel wonderful straight away, and was then disappointed when I didn't! But I'm feeling great now and managing very well on the reduced budget. I love not being a manager, not having to make decisions, not having to enforce decisions made by others that I didn't agree with, not having to manage and timetable staff, not having to work evenings, not having to play politics and I've not missed libraries or education one bit.

I'm enjoying my new job. I'm not responsible for anything and it's great! Being paid to watch the Olympics was fun but I've not managed to get my hands on the silver 'we' won yet - I did get two mugs brought back for me from Bejing though!

I've especially enjoyed booking a holiday to Austria for the first week of what would have been the start of term, as well as booking a fortnight in Egypt for the middle of next January (2 weeks for what it would have cost us to go for 1 week during college holidays).

This blog is interspersed with just a few photos of very well-named vehicles we've noticed on our travels. The car is in the Haynes Motor Museum in Sparkford and the scooter was spotted in Spain a couple of years ago. Obviously motor companies know class when they see it...