Goodbye Vodafone. Forever

My telephone contract with 3 ran out yesterday and after nearly 13 years with them as my mobile provider, I told them to get lost. Really I wasn’t telling 3, I was telling Vodafone to get out of my life.

Vodafone took 3 over earlier in the year and ever since I have been having issues with coverage, billing and everything that can go wrong with a mobile phone. I had many arguments with the ‘customer service’ department about incorrect bills, tariff increases without approval and no service in the Sydney CBD.

Of course I use the term ‘customer service’ loosely because when you call the Care Line you are diverted to a call centre in India manned by men and women calling themselves Betty and Bruce so they can ‘relate’ to you as they call you by your name at the end of every sentence.

Yesterday I was able to tell one of these Bettys I no longer wanted to be a customer. When asked why, I explained the many and varied.

[Please read the Betty with a thick Indian accent in mind]
Betty: ‘As you’ve been with Three for a while and we’d like you too switch to Vodafone, would that be acceptable to you?’
Me: ‘There is no way on this earth that you could entice me to stay.’
Betty: We would like to offer you a discount.’
Me: ‘NO, unless you could offer me a free mobile service for life and 100% coverage.’
Betty: ‘I’m sorry Jodie, we are not able to offer that level of discount.’

That level of discount!?

They are idiots. I am please to say that I am no longer a Vodafone customer, whether by self-infliction or takeover. I have left them behind and anyone that asks of my experiences as one of their customers I shall shout from the rooftops to avoid them at all costs (and it would cost you $$).

Let’s see how Optus do over the next few months shall we?

In the Words of ABBA...

...Money Money Money

Maybe I'll quote Sally Bowles from Cabaret instead, 'Money makes the world go around, the world go around'.

I’ve been through my fair share of impoverished times. I’m still coming out of one actually. So it’s something I don’t like being reminded of, day in, day out.

While I am by no means rolling in it, or even dipping a toe into wealth, I am no longer struggling each week, fortnight or month to rustle up the pennies to pay the bills, and I have started to see the worth in paying a little extra for something that won’t break the second time you to try and use it. I no longer HAVE to shop in $2 shops. The spatula lasted three cook offs before the handle snapped.

This brings me to me weekday surroundings. They depress me.

The pavements and waste bins are dirty, not just dirty, but putrid.
There are vagrants sitting in their own filth swearing at passers by.
The ratio of $2 shops to shops that don’t have big flouro hand written sales signs is 100-I don’t know, I can’t find one without any.

I feel like a snob. I’m not, but I just like things cleanish and items and food to of a certain quality.

A very good friend of mine would need to shower more than the 2-3 showers he already has in a day. I’m sure he’d roll out his ‘I see poor people’, t-shirt.

I was in a shop today buying cable ties, those $2 shops are handy for some things, as I was paying, a man, missing teeth and smelling like he had peed his pants three days ago barged to the front of the twelve person strong queue, pushed his way between me and the counter and demanded to know where the watches were.

They were in the cabinet in front of him. ‘I have to buy a gift for a friend and she wants a watch.’ He announced.

I have no idea whether he procured a watch, or how long he had to wait, but I’m guessing his prevailing odour would have seen him served almost as quickly as my twitching nostrils had me out of the shop. This isn’t an unusual occurrence in Ashfield.

Despite being able to drive to work, I think I’d rather be back on the trains to the city. In the city I can run errands as everything is available. If I need to buy a birthday card, I have a choice of something other than Frangipanis for a dollar. If a gift is required the choice of smellies stretches beyond cat pee masquerading as Vanilla and Cinnamon. Lego® instead of Leego and Post-it® not StickyNotes by Bob.

I don’t really want to get used to this. I don’t want to get used to thinking that I deserve to be screamed at by the checkout crone because I have a note instead of the exact change.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask people to pay back a bond loan borrowed from the government, but apparently it is. The government should just keep giving them money…They don’t give me any, in fact they keep taking it, even when I’m in hardship with barely enough to feed myself.

I don’t think I'm cut out to work in an environment where I’m surrounded by a ‘give a battler a fair go’ mentality, when on the odd occasion I’ve really, and I mean REALLY needed help, I’ve been back handed and told to go and get a job.

It’s taken me six weeks to figure this out. I don’t want it to become the norm, I like that the locals still surprise me with how cheap things are, ‘Ohh eight dollars for the Pho at lunch that was as big enough for a family of four, awesome, here have ten.’ I don’t ever want to get to the point where I’m surprised that things are expensive, because in the real world, i.e. away from Ashfield, everything is, but I want to be back in that world!

Confrontation

I've come to the conclusion that I don't handle confrontation well. It causes me extreme stress that knocks my immune system for six, allowing in bugs and illness to take hold. When illness is already in residence, the addition of stressors just helps the illness settle in for a longer stay and even bring his mate Cujo to stay as well.

After my weekend of strolling to the lavatory on a regular basis and either sitting or bowing to Harpic of the Bowl I really wanted to spend Monday resting at home and fully recuperating. I was still very weak in the morning after having only managed to add half a cup of dry cornflakes to my extremely tender tummy.

Due to work commitments I didn't have the luxury of having that extra day, so I arranged to go in a little later than usual and wrote the Key Message Comms document that was required by the end of the business day. I was a struggle because talking to the people I needed assistance from were extremely busy.

At 5pm I handed the document to the requester. 'It needs detail!'

So my question is this: If you're asked to provide Key Messages or Points would you submit, bullets or detailed paragraph?

I spent the next two hours trying to flesh out my bullet points and most of today working on it. I was and am particularly unimpressed. This isn't the first communications breakdown that I've had in this role and I have a feeling it may be the last.

I'm not going to pass all the blame, I may not have asked enough questions, but not being able to ask them has made that difficult. Of the six one-2-one I'm supposed to have had, I had one. I've been given seven projects to learn about in my short time. I have a pretty good learning curve, but I think I've found my limit.

Tomorrow will be a telling day. He wants to 'talk about your work'.

House of Horrors (no graphic details)

I had an interesting weekend. I found out to my detriment what happens when you eat food that is one or more of the following:
• Prepared in an unclean kitchen
• Less than fresh
• Reheated to the incorrect temperature
• Kept in the wrong conditions
• Anything else that makes food bad for you

On Friday I had prawns and boiled rice for lunch at about 1pm in a little noodle house a couple of doors down from the office. It wasn’t the first time I’d eaten there, but it sure as hell, will be the last.

About 3pm, I started to sweat.
Half an hour later I went to bathroom, all was not well.
I left the office at 5pm after being to the bathroom a further two times.

The car ride home was forty five minutes riddled with tension. I needed to pass wind, but I wasn’t game.

I got home and immediately went to the bathroom. I didn’t even bother to chase Cara out for a wee, I just had to trust she’d know what to do. She did. Of course Puss and Oren followed me and started asking for dinner. Food was the last thing I wanted anything to do with.

I fed the animals at arm length, put a log on the fire, then sat on the sofa, feeling considerably better and thinking it was over.

At six o’clock the violence began, and continued until four in the morning. At this point I was exhausted, I wanted my Muv, while I didn’t need anyone to hold my hair, I would have like someone to rub my back and tell me it would OK.

When I have a migraine I want to be left alone. I don’t want anyone telling me to keep my fluids up or asking me if I’m still alive.

When I’m sick, and I mean SICK, while I don’t really want anyone to see the indecision about whether to sit or bow, but I would like it if there’s someone outside the bathroom waiting to tuck me back onto the sofa or into bed and tell I’ll live to see another day. I would love to have someone else tell the cat not to try and sit on my tummy and this weekend I’d have loved it if someone else could have got log in and kept the fire going. Those buggers are heavy when you haven’t eaten for two days.

Saturday I spent sleeping and drinking the Powerade that had been brought in to replenish my electrolytes (Thank you SI). I failed to keep the first bottle down, but then it was over. Healing time.

Now began the aching, the muscles pulled for unusual activity of the non fun type. Shoulders, back, neck and chest. It hurt to drawn a deep breath and anyone calling to ask me how I was, was asked not to make me laugh. The restless sleeps invaded by dreams of jack-knifing trucks and being stuck in a bubble on the roadside unable to escape. It’s a classic for me, been having it for years and a true indication that I’m anything but well.

On Sunday I started to feel somewhat human again, but I didn’t venture out and a tenderised tummy kept me on fluids only until I braved half a head of steamed broccoli and a scrambled egg about 7.30. It was too much and I couldn’t eat it all.

This morning I had a cup of cornflakes without milk for breakfast. Weakness is the word to describe my current state. Ohh and about 5kgs lighter.

I find it remarkable how being sick can reduce even the most independent person into a blubbering child that wants their mummy, because MuV always knows best and exactly what to do.

Muv would have tucked me into bed.

Muv would have popped to the shops and brought Ribena or Lucozade.

Muv would have almost certainly made me dry toast with Marmite.

Muv would have cleaned the loo up and taken the bin bag out when it needed to be done.

Muv would have stroked my back and told me it was OK to cry.

And after two days Muv would have told me to ‘get up now, have a shower, start moving around, it’ll make you feel better.’

It’s a weekend I don’t wish to repeat anytime soon, but I know there where people out there that suffered worse than I, Tradie Trady being one of them and SI with a gastro bug.

But for the record, to ensure no one else goes through this I have reported the Noodle House responsible. I’ll keep you posted.

14/9/11 Update - The New Taste Noodle House was closed for lunch yesterday and it's looking shut up right now. Someone asked me yesterday, 'Did you close down the Noodle House?' My response was, 'No, they did, by not having a clean kitchen or food handling practices.' Not guilty, I still have a dodgy tummy!

Get Clucked

As I lay here recovering from a nasty bout of prawn poisoning I can hear the chickens clucking. I can tell at least one is in the process of laying a egg by the distinctive drawn out sounds.

I've been considering asking my neighbors if they find them to to too noisy.

Then the sound of the barking dogs over the back fence comes to forefront of notice. My senses have managed to develop a drowning out mechanism for the sound of two overweight bull masstives barking at each other and every loose leaf that flutters to the ground.

I think I'll wait until the neighbors come to me

Gold Plated Chooks?

So, due to demand for home grown eggs from work colleagues and friends I decided to add a couple more chickens to the flock on Saturday, making the total six channels on CatTV.

The flock is called CatTV as a collective because, Oren, the cat can spend hours watching them. Whether they are locked up in the coup, or roaming free in the garden, she’ll watch, faux stalk and run away when chased. The last one happens more often that you’d think.

The first four where first purchased on the day Jeff Conaway finally lost his battle with drugs and alcohol, I thought it would be fitting to call them Rizzo, Frenchie, Jan and Sandy. I called the new additions Marty and Channing (having run out of female character names and I didn’t think Waitress was very nice as a name).

Fittingly enough, the Pink Ladies took exception to the new additions and decided to show them who was boss. The pecking order is very fitting as Marty and Channing really have had a stressful few days.

I first noticed the wound on Marty’s foot on Tuesday. It was red and open, not dissimilar to a cut you may get from a nasty scratch. I took her inside and bathed it. I didn’t get a chance to look at the wound on Wednesday, and yesterday I made a point of looking in the morning. Her toe was black.

I went to work, and on the way I made an appointment with the vet. Luckily it was pay day.

When I got home to put up Marty, I notice a small scab on Channing’s cheek, so I put her in the box. Better safe than sorry.

Both birds had a shot of penicillin, Marty had part of her toenail cut away to see if the limb was dead already, but a spot of blood showed that it was possible it may just be saved. Channing had a blood clot on her face. I was informed that production anaimals are pretty hardy and cope with this sort of thing quite well. While it may not be visually pleasing as a pet, we can't just put them down for any old thing. I never intended to have them put down unless they were suffering. I don't allow suffering in my house. I paid the bill...cough, clear throut, we shall speak of this no more...

Fallout, no eggs can be used until the foot is healed. If Marty has septicaemia, then it can be passed into the eggs, and that wouldn’t be a good thing to eat.

I have to keep a close eye on both birds until their check up next Thursday. Puffiness, not eating, sitting and no walking are all bad things

This morning I let the Pink Ladies out in the rain for the day, giving the sickly duo a day in, on their own to potter about the coup, have a bite to eat and generally have a day off. I’ll do the same for the next week. As I was leaving both were eating and moving around.

Wish them improved health and that other leave them alone.

So Not a Morning Person

I have often been told that you can train yourself to be a morning person.

I would like to refute that nasty piece of propaganda.

After many years of having to rise at 0600 in order to catch a train to London, I never once went to bed with ease before 10pm and I never, ever, ever woke up before my alarm.

To this day, and during periods of unemployment, as I often have due the fickle nature of being a consultant, I research the natural sleep patterns of my body.

1. I need eights or more hours of sleep
2. If I don’t get a minimum of eight hours, I have a week before I NEED to catch up that sleep deficient
3. My body will fall into a rhythm of bed at midnight up at eight or later.
4. I snore

When working I often have sleep to catch up on by the time the weekend comes around. This weekend will be no exception, but this week through no fault of my own.

I am fortunate at the moment in that my job allows me the luxury of rising at what I consider to be a fairly civilized time. I rise between 0730 and 0800. Shower, sort out the family feeding requirements and drive to work. I still arrive between 0845 and 0915. Almost, the perfect arrangement, perfect would be being able to work from home.

So as you can imagine, I was somewhat perturbed this morning when I was awoken, not by the sounds of harps coming from SleepCycle® but the bleating of trucks reversing down my street, followed by crunching sounds of tarmac being scraped into a digger bucket and blokes yelling instructions. When the cockatoos screech I can block that out as it is classified in my head as a ‘sound of nature’, not so with trucks, tradies and tossers at 0600.

I went to bed at midnight last night.

As I was up, I tried to leave early. I couldn’t because the road was blocked. I had to wait before I could get my car out of the driveway.

I asked one of the men in flouro if anyone had thought to let the residents know that the perfectly good road was going to be dug up.

I was informed that a letterbox drop had been done a week ago. I assured them that I had received no such warning and neither had my neighbours and that perhaps that the powers that be should speak to the person responsible for said drop to find out where they had dumped the flyers. I know my neighbour knew nothing about it because I know that the local gossips would have been having a field day on something happening in the street and when I’d been caught outside weeding on the weekend it would have been mentioned. I know about Lisa from round the corner having a baby with webbed toes for crying out loud and I don’t even know (or care) who Lisa is!

I’m working on six hours sleep today. Could be interesting

Chicken Gizzards

I’ve been at my new job long enough now, to be able to make what I believe, to be fairly sound comment on the working environment.

The office is in a part of town that is renown for it ethnic leanings. Most shops on the main street are labelled in Chinese before English. Being a big fan of dumplings, noodles and adventures in food land this isn’t really much of a problem. Where it does become a problem is if you want or need to buy anything (apart from food) of quality. The local shopping centre has a Best Buy, Franklins, and a Dick Smith (remnant warehouse). All the other shops, except the Post Office and leased out to market stall type shops that sell jewellery for a dollar and fry pans for four. The local butcher sells gizzards, skin, feet (of chook and pig) and the best cut of beef is blade. No Scotch Fillet for my dinner. Having said that, it does mean I can’t spend on M.A.C make-up (I’m sorry, did you say one dollar for the eye-shadow?) or clothes.

When I am at work, I have delays in computing. They are doing a roll out of new PCs, which is good, because when the machine can’t keep up with my typing speed you know there’s and issue. Stop. Plus I think I have the tiniest screen possible, it reminds my of the old DOS days when you have a massive off-white brick on your desk with a screen no bigger than a credit card. In my line of work, which currently involves extensive Copy/Paste activity I am really hoping I’m next on the list. However, I have feeling I’m going to have scraped the documents together only to find a geek standing at the end of my desk saying, ‘I’ve come to replace your tower’.

I’ve never been to so many meetings. Seriously. I swear they would have a meeting or ‘workshop’, … and I have put quotes around workshop because, often they have a ‘workshop’ to discuss things, but don’t actually have any workshop activities. I’m getting really close to widely distributing the definition of workshop.

Back to point. They have meeting for everything. So far I think I’ve been to three meetings that actually proved to be useful.

I do have a nice big desk.

Cara can come with me and be stealth, as she is today.

I can drive to the office in less than 45 minutes.

The people I work with are a nice bunch…I haven’t found any stand-outs as yet, but they are pleasant enough. I don’t have to work with the woman behind me, so she has no affect on me except I feel I need to channel warm, happy feelings in her direction. Being in such close proximity I haven’t seen any glimmer of smile crack, I am afraid though that I may cause damage if she does smile….so maybe I should stop that?

All in all, I don’t have a problem getting out of bed each morning at the moment. I even thought about putting my swimming cosie in the car for an after work swim at Homebush, then forgot this morning.

Things are on the up! :-)

Hell’va Weekend

My weekend felt like it started on Wednesday last week. Not because I wasn’t working, but because my Sister, Little, arrived from Melbourne for a few days. Her flight landed fifteen minutes early, just to keep me on my toes.

We haven’t stopped, since. She, even though she has a cast on her left wrist, due to a DIY accident last weekend, clean my house from top to toe on Thursday while I was at work. She was supposed to put her feet up in the sun drenched garden and read, but she decided to clean the windows in the kitchen instead. Incidentally, you have to stand on the bench tops to get to my kitchen windows. D’Oh! And that’s all I have to say about that. Except, thanks for cleaning Little.


On Thursday night, we popped to OfficeWorks to get new school stuff. Pencil case, pens, highlighters and Post-its®. Just like we did as gals. Muv would take us to WHSmith before the start of the new school year and stock us up with the required goodies. This may be where I got my love of stationary from, by the smell of new pencils, rubbers (erasers) and the sight of protractors and set squares are like heaven to me. Anyway, we stocked up on things to write with and in.

On Friday we caught the train to North Sydney and commenced our training to be Wedding Celebrants. There were 14 of us in total in the class, four boys, ten girls and the teacher. I was, quite frankly, the most exhausting weekend I have had in a very long time.

We listened, we shared, we role played, we conducted ceremonies. I got married twice, held the hands of a stranger and Little was my son. It was weird. But we passed that part of the course.

Now begins the paperwork part.

Reading, writing and filling in online forms.

But first, I need to catch up on my sleep because 12 days with no weekend is taking it's toll.

Poor Service

I have been confused by the apparent lack of ‘service’ in Sydney. Being somewhat service orientated I am often surprised that business manage to survive, let alone thrive, considering treating their customers as an inconvenience rather than a precious commodity to be nurtured in order to keep them coming back.

I experienced two such examples today in a 45 minute period.

The first was a SheepSkin sales place that have the rather lovely heeled Ugg Boots. When I went in to ask the price last week I was told, ‘two fifdy’ by the Asian lady behind the counter. I went back today to try on and purchase, ‘two seventy nine’, I was told, less than a week and they had gone up in price by $29…pretty good inflation rate.

As I have been looking at them for so long I requested to try them on…’you lean’. I was told, ‘no seat for try on’. So I found myself perching on the sideboard removing the shoe and sock from my left foot. This is no mean feat for someone with the balance of a wobble toy. The shoe that I had selected (my size) was tiny, I couldn’t even get my heel through the ankle part of the shoe. When I asked if they had a larger size, she yelled to the guy in back in Cantonese, he appeared, looked at the boxes lining the wall behind me and said to me, ‘no big feet shoes’.

I replaced my own sock and shoe and left.

The next incident was in a discount store, I needed a small box for people to put money when they buy eggs (I have chickens, I sell the eggs at work). I knew the discount place had those little gift boxes, which are perfect for my need.

I selected a box, about 10x5x5cm and took it to the counter. The girl scanned it, the machine bleeped and she turned to the Indian guy on the phone next to her. He snatched it from her, placed it on the shelf behind him and said, ‘no sale’, completely ignoring the dumbstruck customer (me). The girl informed him that a customer wished to purchase the box. He yelled at her, ‘we don’t know price, we might get wrong, no sale!’

I was a little ticked off by this and said, ‘you can’t do that, the product was for sale, I wish to purchase that box and there are no others like it or even that size.’ He tutted and waved his hands at me as if shooing a fly away. I decided to ignore him and deal with the girl. I paid $1 for the box. Seemed fair to me considering how rude the manager had been.

These are two stores I shall not patronise again. I do that you see. Provide me with woeful service and I take my money elsewhere.

Just like there are plumbers, electricians, and petrol stations I will not frequent.

I don’t understand how in this time of a record decline in retail sales why every shopkeeper isn’t doing everything their power to lure and keep customers. Think people:

happy customers = good word of mouth recommendations = good sales = you don’t lose your livelihood

Facebook

Facebook has it moments.

Moments of annoyance; such as when you click on a video that you friend posted, only to find it’s actually a virus that is self replicating, and you realize you have to warn all your friends not to click on the video you just posted.

Moments of sadness; when you read that a friend has lost a loved one. Even ‘friends’ that you have never met, you still feel a pang of grief, because inside you know what they are going through, but you know you can never express how you feel for them.

Moments of jubilation; A baby has been born, a child has graduated, the test results where negative (in the good way), the rescue puppy has stopped peeing on the carpet. These are time when you happily click the ‘like’, because you genuinely feel a glow inside.

Moments of hilarity; that picture your friend posted made you laugh so hard, you wet your pants slightly. pmsl has never been more apt.

Moments of disappointment; when you realize that ‘random’ you added because they made you laugh on other friends profiles, turns out to be a God-bothering psycho that is just trying to convert everyone.

Moments when you just want to delete your profile; no-one has commented on anything you’ve posted, for HOURS!

And then there are moments when if forces you to reflect. A status update today gave me such a moment.

What my Mother taught me:
Religion: ‘You better pray that comes out of the carpet’.
Logic: ‘Because I said so, that's why’.
Irony: ‘Keep crying and I'll give you something to cry about.’
Wisdom: ‘When you get to my age you'll understand’.
Justice: ‘One day when you have kids, I hope they turn out just like you’.
Repost if your mother taught you right

I added, Discipline: ‘You’re never too old to be put over my knee’, because it felt right.


Here’s the situation where each of these (or near as) happened to me.

I was given some silly putty as a gift for Christmas. I decided to take an impression of my hair crown because, as it’s on the back of my head, I had never seen it. The silly putty got so stuck in the hair, nearly two hours of combing, Surfega, sunflower oil and finally diesel, saw it out. But at the beginning of the two hours Muv said to me, ‘You better pray this come out or all you’ll be left with is a tuft of hair.’

‘Why shouldn’t I shave my legs Muv?’ ‘Because I said so, that why. Plus, do you want your legs to feel like this?’ Quickly followed by a hand being run up her stubbly leg.

When I started my periods, I bit*hed and moaned about the pain and cramps. ‘Keep crying and I'll give you something to cry about.’ I kept crying, so Muv took me to have my ears pierced. That hurt much more.

I like to think I understand a lot more now I'm the age she was once. Life does indeed suck, and yes, you will die.

I’ve never had two legged children (as discussed in other posts) but my fur and feathered kids, sleep like me, eat food like me and love me to bits. Even the chookens. So in many ways…they are just like me.

When I was 18, we where having a laugh about something…I can’t remember what it was, but clearly I over stepped the bounds of the Mother/Daughter freedom of speech act, because she said the line. Despite being a couple of inches taller and wider than Muv, she could still say the words, 'You're never too old...', and I knew it was true.

So I had many moments all rolled into one today, and for that I an thankful to Facebook and a random add friend that didn't turn out to be a psycho, God-bothering or otherwise.

Moral Compass

There have been a few items in the news recently that have got me thinking about my own level morality.

I like to believe that I was dragged up by the scuff with quite a high moral grounding. My Muv and Dad instilled in my brother and sisters a belief that lying was bad, stealing was wrong because you have to earn the things you have and being a pyromaniac, while it fun to watch flames licking around logs in the fireplace, it’s not good burn things that aren’t in the hearth.

We were also taught to respect your elders, even if they are being a git. Smile and move on.

Don’t put your feet on seats, in public or your own home, you don’t know what you’ve stepped in. I never really understood this one, I got the public part, but I was pretty sure I didn’t have mud (or dog poop) between my toes. So I often engage in feet on sofa heresy, but never with shoes on.

***

I recently read that with the hike in banana prices in Australia, people using the self serve check out are putting bananas through for the price of carrots, or whatever is seasonally cheaper than $17 per kilogram. The question the press was asking was, is this stealing?

I say a resounding yes. It is stealing.

But when surveyed, the general public leaned more towards no, it’s not. The reasoning was that they had been paid for, even if not the full price, therefore it was OK. Before I read about the banana switch, it hadn’t even occurred to me that I could just press a different button in the check out. Even now it has been planted in my mind, I find the idea deplorable. I know that big business will bear the brunt of the theft, but do I know what other the consequences are?

Will the check out chick who’s supposed to ensure the self serve checkouts aren’t abused retain her position, if not job? Will prices elsewhere in the store rise? Will the banana farmer be screwed down on price? Will the truck driver who delivers them to the store be expected to drive that little bit quicker to ensure timely delivery…did I suddenly get into the Butterfly Effect?

My point here, is: I don’t do it, because it never occurred to me in the first place, but when I think about it, it makes my brain hurt.

***

Meanwhile, in the UK, scumbags where rioting in towns across the small island. One victim was Aaron Biber, no relation to Justin. The 89 year old barber survived the Second World War only to see his shop ransacked by looters, just for the hell of it. He didn’t have anything of value to steal, no plasma telly on the wall, no expensive hair product and even his scissors and certainly his door curtain, would have been older than most of the vandals.

Why would people do this. To me, and most of my peers, it’s unfathomable. We simply cannot comprehend the idea of trashing a place just because.

Don’t get me wrong, I have felt the rush that illegal activity gives you, but I’m a firm believer of ‘Make love, not war’. ;-)

It’s a thrill, but running through the streets setting fire to things, stealing things, smashing, just to smash and worse, running someone over that was trying to protect their property, leaves me scratching my head in a way that could leave scars.

Where these people not taught basic morality in their formative years? Video of a boy being helped with the right hand and being robbed with the left hand makes me think not.

Can we blame politics for taking away the rights of parents to give their kids a good clip round the ear? I had many, and worse, and it never did me any harm.

I know several people that have been too afraid to speak up in adverse situations for fear of harm. Instead, they have put their head down and kept quiet, unnoticed.

Are adults now being bullied by children in a passive aggressive way? Sometimes that’s how I feel. I have been on trains where teenagers in a group have had their feet on the seats, I desperately what to tell them to put their feet on the floor, but simple eye contact has lead me to think that I would be smacked or verbally abused if I dare to say something. Isn’t that bullying? We’re too sacred to stand up and say, enough is enough.

In the UK, they have. We used to complain about CCTV camera popping up all over the place like mushrooms. ‘It’s an invasion of privacy,’ was a common cry. Now they are being praised.

People are taking up brooms to battle and clean. It’s fabulous. In some ways I wish I was on the tiny island right now.

From a few nights of bedlam a mighty uprising of good has occurred. I hope this continues. People of all nations coming together to improve relations and the moral fabric of society.

I would never dream of saying my moral compass faces a firm North, but I do believe in thinking about my actions and the outcomes before I do them. I hope we can all learn a lesson for the last few weeks, think about the outcome of your actions. You’ll be surprised how often you cease to do what you were about the do.

Thank you to the following for the images:
Compass
Aaron Biber (this is a good story too)

Missing Kids

They have charged a 41 year old father of three for the murder of 13 year old Daniel Morcombe, that went missing nearly eight years ago.

I’m very pleased to hear that someone will finally pay for this shocking incident.

The parents have appeared on every news program this evening and some reporters have been saying by way of introduction to the story ‘For a parent, it’s the worst nightmare…’

Why does it just have to be the worst nightmare just for a parent?

Aunts, uncles, grandparents; are these not close enough to be affected by a child or family member going missing?

Un-frinkin'believable

It was my day off between gigs today. I went to the doctor for a check-up and blood test. While I was waiting to see the delightful Dr. Rosemary, I got a text message from the mole;

‘Hi, sorry to bother you but I can’t find the updated training report and I need to provide it as part of the handover. Can you tell where you saved it? Thnx KB.’

So I did tell her and that I was at the doctors.

I went into the doctor’s office and had my blood pressure taken. 131/90. She wasn’t happy with that. My phone blipped again. I looked, like a fool.

‘Hope u r ok.When you r done, can you send me your network password and I will retrieve it. KB.’

MY NETWORK PASSWORD!! Are you frinkin’ kidding me!? No way in a million years!

My doctor took me BP again. It had gone up to 142/110, all from a simple text.

This is what I put up with for four months, the woman contacted me, an ex employee, who for once in her career had not left an employer with the words ‘If you need anything, call me.’ I couldn’t give a rats bottom where the document was, despite spending 2 hours updating it and including all her nit picky edits.

My Doctor expressed concern over my weight gain, then immediately said, ‘but if you’ve had that for four months, it will drop off now you’ll stop comfort eating’. What a wise woman!?

Anyway, after my appointment I had a blood test, so now have a bruise like I’ve been shooting up.

I got another text, ‘Unfortunately the last version on the shared drive was modified on 5 Aug. That’s why I need to retrieve it s I don’t think it saved.’

I ignored it, but rang my friend Bling Bling. ‘could you please sort this out?’

I’m pretty sure she did, because I didn’t receive any more texts or emails. But seriously, who the hell does KB think she is.

After that, Cara and I had a nice day wandering around town. I brought myself a book that reminded me of my childhood, and a t-shirt for the little lady. We popped in to see the Chocolate lady, but after being told by the doc I had gained 6kgs I declined the kind offer of some free Rocky Road.

Tomorrow I start my new job.

Exit stage right

It’s my last day in the land of the mole. I would like to say that not everyone here has been awful...just the mole.

Bling Bling gave me a very nice leaving gift of a scented candle and a bling bling peacock, which I have called Homer, after the actual peacock that I had a few years ago.

Knitter had a good ole giggle when I demonstrated the noises that CatTV make when they laid the eggs I had just given her.

Mr Benefits and the rest of the office near me enjoyed the truffles I made on the weekend, they ate the calories I cooked and will no doubt be glad when I am gone, because there will no longer be anyone cooking sweet treats in the name of research.

I finished up the couple of documents I had to do, cleaned out my inbox and bequeathed RubberBandBall MkII to Bling Bling and Knitter. It left it at 62mm in diameter; I hope it continues to grow. I buried a small note beneath its layers, it said: ‘A symbol to those left behind, you too, can escape’


As I was coming in from lunch, I saw mole. She smiled, and i hoped it was the last I’ll ever see of her. Some people just bring out the worst in me.

Have fun in my absence.

Growth

Getting there. 51mm in diameter and growing. Two days to go until I leave it behind as my legacy :-)

Same designer you think?

images from www.imdb.com

A night at the museum

On Tuesday night I was lucky enough to attend the 2011 season of Jurassic Lounge at The Australian Museum.

A few weeks ago I put my name forward as a photographer for an evening or three. I was asked to come along on opening night and snap away.

This I did. I went in not really knowing all that much about the event, but really it a marketing vehicle to encourage people who wouldn’t normally go to the museum to go. Having been to the museum, I was familiar with it, but to see it lit differently with games, activities, bands, DJs and artists or the painting and performing types amongst the exhibits, the whole place came alive, which was nice, because it usually has a kinda stuffed feel about it.

I would encourage you all to get along to one of the evenings if you can, it was really fun.


Burlesque eyelashes


Pluck those strings


Create your own 'zine


Skeleton gallery


Mayor Clover arrives


Self portrait by funkyfotobooths (careful, this site has music!)

More photos can be found here, including a few more of mine :-)

That’s not real!

Next week I shall start my new job with a government agency. I’m looking forward to it.

I preparation for the start, my new agency are asking me to fill in all sorts of paperwork. That’s pretty normal. What isn’t normal is being asked to complete an online learning module about OH&S.

I used to teach this going back a few years, so it’s not that I know nothing about the subject it just strange because in all the year since I taught it, I have never been asked to sign an agreement that I understand my obligations under the work place safety act.

While doing the module I came across a couple of things that made me think, ‘That’s not a real thing.’ But it turns out they are both real, only one is completely the wrong use of the word.

The first was during the page of information about wrist rests. It says, ‘Wrist rests should not be used while typing or mousing – only while resting’.

Mousing, what the crap is mousing? Oren does mousing, Puss sometimes helps. Cara plays with Mousey Mousey and I use a mouse. Being the curious bunny that I am, I looked up the word ‘mousing’ and found that it has nothing to do with the use of a computer mouse, but more to do with fishing.

Should I tell the agency that their eLearning module is wrong?


The second thing was Occupational Overuse Syndrome. WTF!? RSI has been renamed it appears. I don’t know when this name change occurred because it hasn’t been communicated to anyone but the internet and quite frankly, it sounds rubbish. Everyone knows what RSI means. It’s called what it is, a repetitive strain that has caused an injury. This makes sense to me.

It sounds made up, like runcible. When Edward Lear made that up in the 1870s he was ridiculed, and it still get picked up by spell checkers despite being in the dictionary, now it appears that making things up is fully acceptable. Benifer, sexting, mousing and OOS...please stop making names up for things that already have perfecting good names.

It makes me smile, because it’s given me something to do for twenty minutes and I enjoyed reading about the life of the master of nonsense.


Thank you to this site for the graphic image of what my cats think mousing looks like.

Creative time wasting

I realised today, as I added another 40 rubber bands to RubberBandBallMkII that I have become a master of killing time on the job.

I am usually a very productive employee, but on occasion there are times when a lull in work causes the use of imagination to look busy. We’ve all done it; we take advantage of the slow days to refresh the brain for the onslaught that is bound to happen due to poor time management (by others and yourself). Having said that, I don’t think the following has every interfered with me actually getting something done on or before the required deadline.

The following are a few of the things I have done to occupy my time during the hours of 9 – 5.30 Monday – Friday.

- Internet shopping (I curse Amazon.com)
- Make Christmas cards (yes, I actually made cards one year, many moons ago)
- Read novels (with the advent of e-books came the chance to read a saucy novel in .pdf format that looks like a business document)
- Complete Uni assignments, and therefore my Masters degree (I know I’m not alone with this one)
- Write blog entries :-)
- Make paper clip necklaces (one colleague actually wore one out)

It takes a somewhat active imagination to do some of these things...but I’d be interested to know what you do to kill that down time when you can’t just get up out of your seat and walk out and do something more interesting.

Incidentally, RubberBandBallMkII is now 47mm in diameter.

Liar liar...

...pants on fire.

Last week I went to see a tax agent to submit my income tax for 2010/11. I had spent a large proportion of the weekend going through receipts, calculating percentages and generally going around in circles. Numbers are not my forte.

I presented the agent with three pages of spreadsheets, salary summaries and contributions to health fund. All she had to do was plug the information into the tax offices systems and it should have all been done. An hour and a half later, several explanations of why I claimed this, and why I claimed that, I signed the return, paid my $125 and left, thankful that it was done for another year.

Today, I received a call for Roman (name has not been changed to protect the douchebag), he explained that he was overseeing my return and he was ‘not convinced’ that I was eligible to claim certain items.

‘Are you calling me a liar?’ I asked.

‘No, I am just trying to clarify if you are claiming a home office as a convenience?’ he said.

I won’t go into the following conversation, but I ended up walking into the office, stating in a loud voice that I did not appreciate being called a liar, and demanding that all my paperwork be returned to me.

It’s been a while since I have been so offended. I don’t offend easily, but to be called into question about deductions that have been a repeated item for some 10 years, really p*ssed me off. I don’t claim charity donations (I could) and I don’t claim car expenses (I could). I have never in all my life tried to avoid paying tax, despite the fact I seemingly get very little in return for the 43% I pay.

To have some jumped up git who has no idea who I am, what I do or understand my circumstances doubt my honesty, well, let’s just say I was remarkably kind.

Park Life

I've had a very busy, productive but good weekend. This has facilitated by the fantastic weather we have experienced considering it's still winter. On Saturday it was 21degrees. I had what I consider to be a Ferris Day on Saturday, I got so much done, you can look at it and think, how!? especially as I didn't even get up until just gone 10am.

I took some lovely photos of the family, see ‘Back to Front’ below.

I went into town to pick up a camera flash; I’m still replacing bits from when my bag was stolen in Kenya. Cara got to walk on George Street and didn’t freak out.

We went for a walk in Lane Cove National Park, well next door really as dogs aren’t allowed in the park. We relaxed and chilled for about half an hour.


We popped into Eden Gardens for some garden stakes.

Went home and started digging a veggie patch. CatTV got to eat fresh worms, Cara got to roll in cow manure and Oren stalked the chooks. Puss, being wise old man that her is, just lay in the sun and supervised.

I wasn’t feeling great on Sunday, but pottered about in the veggie patch and planted the seedlings I had. About four o’clock I went inside, showered and sat and watched Food Inc. while I was eating a sandwich. This is a disturbing documentary about the food industry in the US. While it isn’t directly related to what goes on in Australia, I’m sure there are some similarities.

Footage of cows being unable to stand and being folk lifted to the killing floor made my think of the recent ‘live export’ footage of Malaysia and the uproar that that caused. Do similar things happen here in a bid to grow food fatter, faster, and cheaper? I’m sure they do.

One thing the movie did do, was reinforce my choice to buy meat from my local butcher and fruit and veggies from my local market. I really don’t need images of thousands of naked hanging chooks flying about an air-hanger sized warehouse on a conveyer belt, in my mind when I tuck into my grilled chicken salad. And did you know, that much raw meat in America is treated with ammonia or chlorine to kill off any potentially harmful bacteria, such as e-coli and salmonella (at least it was in 2008 when the film was made).

After the movie I gave Cara a bath, and then we cuddled up in the warm house and watched the evening movie, Iron Man 2. It was a good weekend.

Back to front

It's such a beautiful day in Sydney today. The sun is shining, the animals are all outside and I'm soaking up a few rays myself. A hearty dose of Vitamin D before the sun has the power to fry me in 30 seconds flat.

I had my camera with me and I managed to get a few snapshots of my babies, but I decided to show you a different side to each of them...


This Is Rizzo. She is the Leader of CatTV, and one of four chooks that roam around my garden at the weekend, and currently, the only one laying eggs.


This is O-Ren. Youngest in age of the four legged children, and the one that causes the most heart-ache. Loves to climb trees, hang out under cars and keep CatTV on their toes.


This is Cara, also known as 'The Killer', not because she vicious, just because. She's the smallest in the house. She like eating, sleeping, and the occasional walk on the beach, oh and sleeping.


This is Puss. The oldest, biggest and grumpiest. He's my boy in a house of girls.

New Friends, yet to meet

I noticed a while ago that I now have six followers here. This pleases me.

Four of you I know well.

Two of you not at all. I shall ask you a couple of questions, be honest, open up, you’re amongst friends.

I’m curious, how did you stumble across my random ramblings?

Which post inspired you to click the follow button?

Thank you, please leave your responses in the comments ;-)

The perils of Winter entertaining

Many years ago, when I first visited the shore of this wide brown land, I decided to go to the movies. My host asked me, ‘Why tonight, it’s raining?’

I was confused. In my native land of Britannia, if you didn’t venture out wearing an over coat and wellies you would never leave the comfort of your home. It rains much of the time in England, it still amuses me when folks back home say, ‘Where did summer go?’

Really!? Just except it, Great Britain never has and never will have a reliable summer; Global Warming has not changed this fact and never will. Anywho, I digress...

Winters in Aussie tend to be kinder, with chilled days and clear blue skies. This year has been a bit strange. It appears that Al Nino has decided to throw us a curve ball and make it cold, wet and windy, all at once. Facilities Management doesn’t know what to do, turn the air-con off, heating on, then back on with the air-con, then off again. So we have, for the first time since I’ve lived Down Under had a proper winter.

It takes months of grey skies and early darkness before a weather hardened Pommie starts suffering the winter blues, in Aussie it’s a matter of days. Seasonal Ambience Disorder hits here and hard. A nation that spends months in the sun and heat, the slightest dip below 10degrees and you’d think the end of the world is nigh. Doors gets locked, coats come out and social lives go into hiatus until the sun come out again and the world defrosts.

The Tupperware party I have booked for tonight has become a victim of this. In fact, I’ve started to refer to it as a Tupper-where party. Because where are my guests? It didn’t even start out as my party...I agreed to have it at my house for someone else.



Many are suffering from ‘Blurgh’. While not technically an illness, it is a reason to stay at home and recover. So they shall miss out on the mountains of funky plastic storage wear and me being the hostess with the mostess.

Others simply got a better offer.

I’m going ahead tonight as I have made food and cleaned my house, and the Tupperware Lady said four including the hostess (that would be me) is a nice number. I think she’s being kind. I was hoping for more than just a Tupperware party, I was hoping for a girls night in where we would continue after the TL lady had gone.



I have learnt my lesson and will never attempt any kind of entertainment in the winter again. I too shall hibernate and get with the Aussie winter program and embrace the feeling of Blurgh! Bring on BBQ season, I say :-)

Get well soon.

First picture from here, funny article to go with it.
Second picture from here.

News Flash!

Yesterday I was lucky enough to secure a new contract. This means I can I exit stage right from my current nightmare and start afresh in the hope that a new location and different environment brings better mental health.

In the mean time, of course, I shall continue my current general admin duties, I have been collating training documentation today, and in my considerable down time I shall blog and continue to develop the lifestyle of the rubber bands on my desk.

RubberBandBall MkII hit the 35mm diameter today, and as you can see, there is plenty more weight just waiting to be added.


Ps. The Pink Lady apple I just ate was really tart!

Embryo

I had a plethora of rubber bands on my desk after collating several training documents today. What to do with these poor lost souls of the latex variety?

I decided they needed a purpose in life, so I have given them a calling.
In an attempt to stave off madness and to kill time during the next couple of weeks I have decided to start RubberBandBall MkII.

Watch it grow, from tiny seeds, mighty RubberBand Balls grow :-)



Last time I did one of these was in 2007...amazing how things come back into vogue.

Club 27

Amy Winehouse died over the weekend, at the age of 27. It makes her eligible to join other famous singers that have passed away at the same age. Kurt Cobain, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Brian Jones and Jimi Hendrix. Current speculation is that it was a drug overdose, there has been no official cause of death released.

I’m not sure it club anyone would aspire to be a member of.

Amy Winehouse was an undeniable talent that deserves to receive the tributes she will receive. If the news was a contest there would always be a more deserving case in someone’s eyes. But I would like to say, every life lost is a tragedy, no matter what the circumstances. If a death is proceeded by years of addiction, eating disorders and every wrong move being reported in the press then I hope peace has finally been found.

But what has really interested me about this death, while tragic, she was after all a woman in her prime with a talent that a lot would kill for, is the online reactions of some people on groups, social networking sites and in the comments spaces under online media. Frankly, I’m disgusted.

It appears that it is completely acceptable to write derogatory comments about the way she lived her life. Apart from I have gleaned from the media coverage of her career and troubled private I wouldn’t dream of assuming that I know anything about what was REALLY going on in her life. Therefore, all I can say is:

Rest in Peace, Your music will be your legacy.

I wish others could have been as neutral, but sincere. Comments such as ‘Glad she’s dead, hope Lady Gaga and Beiber are next’, are simply uncalled for. The amount of, ‘she wouldn’t go to rehab, no, no, no’ is astounding, and the number of folks saying she choose a life of drugs and alcohol and she choose her end so she deserved to die, makes me think that they were probably puffing on a cigarette as they typed.

I have seen this before and it always annoys me. People hiding behind their computer.

Whenever a posting from NSW Police tells of a death on the roads, posters start blaming the driver that died. I’ll never forget the day that the wife of a truck driver had also posted early on in the thread saying her husband was driving that route that day. She would have been alerted every time a nasty comment was posted, because so many don’t read earlier posts, he’d crashed into a car and all had died.

I have a personal policy. If I wouldn’t be prepared to say something to the originator’s face or the family of the victim, I don’t post.

Isn’t this one of the cardinal rules of Netiquette?

Please people, if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything.



Pinched the image from here

Seek and you shall find

I don’t have a full time job. As in, I’m a contractor, so not on anyone’s books from a payroll point of view. In the past this has caused issues due to extensive periods of unemployment, but in line with attempt of finding the positives in everything and my new mantra of ‘Mah Na Mah Na’ I have found the silver lining of being a contractor.



I have made many lasting friends.

Goddess, The Director, Tiger, Bling Bling, Knitter, Cat Lady, Pho, and a couple of others I can’t think of witty nicknames for right now. Of course I do have a few other friends that I have met through alternate means: interwebs, friends of friends and talking to strangers.

So despite have moments of desperate financial distress, I have become rich with friendship

Thanks to this site, for the image

Recommendation

I had dinner with a good friend tonight. He came into my life as an employer and boss, so it comes in handy to be able to give his number when I need a reference for a new contract.

Agent: And what would you say is Jodie’s weakness?

PH: She doesn’t like or handle being micro-managed very well. I found it best to give her a task and point her in the direction you wish end up in and you get results better than you expected.

The Rules

Yesterday I had the privilege of presenting to a Communications group about keeping presentations simple, but engaging. I think it went well, at least 18 of the 20 strong audience took a card, I figure if I’d been boring, they wouldn’t have taken a card, but then they are very spiffy cards.

I took them through my 10 rules of creating a MS PowerPoint presentation, it took an hour, they asked questions, they laughed (very important), I said OK a lot at the beginning (always do, it’s the nerves) and they left feedback, but didn’t nick my post-it notes. It was good.

The issue was I had to get back to the office in a different suburb. I’d already had a two hour lunch break, so I decided to get a taxi rather than take the train. It would save me about half an hour. Ohh how wrong can you be?

My driver was a middle aged Asian man, fairly standard for Sydney, who had little grip on the English language, also fairly standard for a Sydney taxi driver. After he had run over more than his fair share of cats eyes, I asked him if it was knocking off time soon. Change over happens at 3pm, it was about two fifteen. He pointed at his face, shook his head and said ‘nose’. I had noticed he’d been sniffing, but that wasn't my question.

We got onto the Warringah Freeway, barely mind you, he had to swerve to avoid the concrete barrier. At that point I decided I would ask him to let me out at the first possible stopping point. 30 seconds later, I realised he wasn’t following the rules. The Goddess of Driving Rules (an American friend of mine) includes a rule that states, ‘You can never drive faster than the car in front of you’.

Clearly my driver did not know of these rules and tried to drive faster than the Lexus in front. He realised what he was doing and slammed on the anchors, unfortunately the extremely wet weather outside the vehicle made the stopping process somewhat slower than normal and we hit the shiny silver Lexus in the backend at about 30kph.

Having been on the receiving end of a couple of rear-enders (get your mind out of the gutter JH) I know that bracing for impact is the worst thing you can do, so I exhaled, relaxed into my seat and did my very best impression of a jelly.

The following 45 minutes involved a woman in her 50s wearing more labels than a rally car and a face that looked like a leather handbag that had been stretched out of shape, shouting at a tired Chinese man that shouted back. Neither of them understood each other.

I got back to the office later than if I’d have caught the train and I even had to pay the taxi that picked me up from the side of the road.

New Rule: If you err at taking a taxi...take the train.

Today, I feel like I’ve been run over by a bus but I’m riding high on Voltaren flowing in my veins. I know it’s muscular pain only, nothing broken or sprained. Another hot bath tonight, so can someone please remind me to buy bubble bath!

With age

There are many sayings about age and wisdom, most ring true, some not so.

True:
Boys will be boys, and so will a lot of middle-aged men.
Kin Hubbard (1868 - 1930)

Wisdom is what's left after we've run out of personal opinions.
Cullen Hightower

Could be agued:
Wisdom doesn't automatically come with old age. Nothing does - except wrinkles. It's true, some wines improve with age. But only if the grapes were good in the first place.
Abigail Van Buren (1918 - )

I’d like to add one.

‘If you’re a woman a few things happen with age. You get breasts, the ability to have children and a desire to build a nest. You also learn to control your emotions. No one tells you you’re going start sprouting hair from your chin and you’re going to need a plastering qualification to fill the cracks next to your eyes. That was not in the advertising materials!’

It never rains...

...but it pours.

In good times and bad. As you’ll no doubt be aware I’ve had a pretty rough few years, well it seems to be changing, at last.

I’ll whisper the next bit in case the Gods of the Short, Sharp, Shafting with a Big Stick hear, but I’ve have four job offers in less than a week. Five if you include the part–time photography gig and six if you include the wacky Board of Director thing for a community radio station.

Fingers crossed this good fortune continues, I have placed money trees at my back and front doors to help with my feng shui, so maybe it could :-)


Picture borrowed from here. Thank you!

It's been a while

I have been travelling by bus lately. I like it because it slows down the inevitable arrival at work. Last night I was sitting my favourite seat (back row right). I was nearly home for the evening when the driver hit the curb for the sixth time on the journey.

‘Dude, stop hitting them, they’ve always been there.’ I muttered under my breath.

The guy sitting two seats away starting giggling.

I looked over at him, he looked back and said, ‘Hi’.

He looked like he should have been wearing school uniform. He had short wavy hair on the top of his head, a silly mullet thing growing out of the back. He was wearing jeans and casual jacket with trainers on his leg ends.

We started chatting, he had to take a bus and two trains to get to his job in Marrickville, he was a storeman.

He asked me about my job, I told him I was a corporate trainer, he asked me ‘what’s that then?’ I explained.

He asked why I didn’t drive to work, I told him I liked taking the bus because it meant I could read.

He led the repartee, when I fell silent he’d think of another question to ask. Being polite, I replied and tried to engage in the conversation.

Then I asked why he didn’t drive. ‘I’ve just got my Ls. I’m 17.’

My stop arrived.

As I climbed off the bus I heard, ‘I catch this bus every day, hope to see you again.’

Women!

Over the past few days I've been giving consideration as to why there's an issue with the woman I work with. I can't even begin to guess what's going on in her head but I do have a clear insight into my own.

While others support me by saying things like, 'she's insecure because you're better at your job than her' and 'she's a skank', yes, someone (other than SI) said that and while I tend to agree, not really all that helpful, but thanks.

My thinking and over-analysing has led me to this conclusion.

I don't work well with women.

History has taught me this, not just the current issue. Every time I've ever had an issue at work, it's always been a woman. Except once, when I worked for a guy in his 60s and he told me women should stay at home to cook, clean and have babies. That was 1999 for you.

Back to the ladies. I don't think like a girl. I've been told this by many a female and male acquaintances. I have no burning desire to prove myself capable of being able to hold down a full time job. I don't live to work. I work to live, but it needs to be a job I enjoy with people who know how to relax.

I'm pretty sure I've never manipulated anyone to do something they didn't really want to do. In any part of my life.

I don't have and have never wanted babies. I like other people's kids 'cause you can give them back when they start crying. I'm a sucker for a broken animal though.

If I have an issue with the way someone is behaving I try to address it. I do not passive aggressively try to control the situation. I wear my heart on my sleeve and deal with it, if it can’t be dealt with I will extract myself from the situation at the first possible opportunity.

Which brings me back to my point.

I speak up. And as I said in my last post, I internalise a lot.

Let me explain the history of working with ladies in reverse. Only a couple of things per person, I don’t wish to bore you too much.

LC: was supposed to hand over all project work and move to another project. Hasn't, is still directing me to do admin tasks, took me aside and bollocked me for doing what I'm supposed to be doing. Got me to do 'urgent' report then told me the data I'd been working from was incomplete and I had to number crunch again. Constantly chases me and makes a point of saying, 'GOOD MORNING', while looking at her watch.

RA: After 3 years of employment I started to report to a new manager. This one completely rewrote everything I wrote and started to check where I was. Luckily, I left before this one started to really became an issue.

DJ: gave me Whooping Cough because despite being really sick considered herself indispensable and coughed on me for two weeks before proudly announcing the doctor had officially diagnosed her. When I got back from three week sick she had a go at me for being behind in my work. She clock watched. She knee capped me in a meeting, I handed in my notice 20 minutes later.

Of course I always second guess myself and think I'm imagining this behaviour, am I just being paranoid? Until someone else spots it and brings it to my attention, I’ll torture myself that it’s all in my imagination, because what could they possibly be getting out behaving in such a manner? On the occasions that I have confronted passive aggressive behaviour, it just gets worse in the following days, such as yesterday's phantom report that prevented me from attending a training session for the project I'm working on.

I've never had these sorts of problems when working with/for a guy. I find if guys have a problem, they just tell you. Men are upfront. 'You're crap! Because of X Y and Z' and this conversation is likely to take place at lunch, in a pub.

Women, especially those with children, start talking to you as if you have an IQ of 10. They always do this in front of people. I apologise if you are not such a woman, this is from MY experiences in horror employment.

'Oh, well done, Jodie!'

Condescending Biatch!

They explain things to you as if it's a completely new concept to the world.

'Now, I'd like you to make up an address label for this box, addressed to XYZ and then, get a trolley and take it up to the mail room for posting'.

Really, I need to let the mail room know where I want it to go? Why don't I make the address label up for someone completely different, surely ESP will get it to the correct person?

Supercilious Biatch!



Now granted, I've got an attitude about this, but despite getting sick to my stomach with stage fright, I'm a good little actress when I need to be. I take it for the sake of reducing chances of escalation. Confronting it, always, leads to escalation.

I'll bide my time, perform like Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side (and maybe a bit of Miss Congeniality) at any up-coming interviews and get the hell outta Dodge and remember, work with men.


Thank you to this website for the image :-)

Mangy Mongrel

For nearly 15years I have suffered bouts of depression. It’s what my doctor refers to as ‘reactionary’, meaning that something triggers it rather than it occurring for no apparent reason.

For the last few years I have constantly struggled to get the black dog to back off and leave me alone. Six months ago I resorted to trying to kill it with a daily dose of 50mg of Zoloft, but I figured something out last night. The mongrel really doesn’t like being slowly poisoned to death, it knows you’re trying to do it, and it bites back. Hard.

Being brought up with a stiff upper lip and not showing emotion in public I have developed a stoicism that often leave completely in the dark as to my mental state until I crash. I’ve crashed. I want to retreat from the world, tell everyone to get lost and stay in bed surrounded by the family that gives me comfort.

Unfortunately, one of the reasons this black dog is following me my every waking moment is money worry. Nearly 18 month of unemployment in the last three years has made a massive dent in my finances that I am desperately trying to claw my way out of. This month, I’m going from fortnightly to monthly pay, after all my bills got paid the day the cash hit my account, I now have just $100 to last me until the end of July. Just another reason to retreat.

I was doing OK until yesterday, my brave face has held up mostly, but an incident at work yesterday, sent me sliding down the spiral into the jaws of the pi*sed off dog.

I got told off for doing my job by a woman who isn’t even supposed to be working on the project anymore.

I know it sounds insignificant, but without going into the whole long, back story, you’ll just have to trust me that it’s just another thing from a long line of controlling behaviour by a woman who thinks she owns me.



While I acknowledge I have quite a dominant personality. I really don’t have a competitive bone in my body. I just want to do a good job and go home at the end of the day. However, I have come across the odd colleague that sees me as a challenge. They win of course, because I don’t have the fight in me, I can’t be arsed. It’s not that I can’t fight, I have in the past I just find it’s not that important to prove I have the biggest testicles and that I can be a wife, mother and high-powered executive. I don’t care, no, really. I simply do not care. I really just want to do MY job, do it well, get paid for doing said job and go home to my life. So when I come across someone who wants to control me, by clock watching, checking up on me and generally limiting my ability to do my job effectively it has a profoundly negative effect on me. It makes me not want to get up and go to the job. It makes me not want to do anything while I’m at the job and it really makes me wanna bitch-slap the biatch that’s making me wanna bitch-slap them. Of course I do get up, I do do stuff once there and I don’t resort to physical violence.

While dominant, I’m fairly mellow, good natured and generous (time wise and financially when able) to those that treat me well, even those that I don’t know are gonna turn on me and stab me firmly in the back when I turn to pay for lunch. Once you F#ck with me at work (I’ll always try to find out what’s going on with friends), I shut down. I become uncommunicative (for a Communications specialist this can be an issue), I become withdrawn and I will not engage with your behaviour. I will not confront you, it’s what you want, fight. I will moan to others (sorry others), but mostly I will internalise. And we’re back to the dog.

Time has come for me to withdraw from the world again. Heal. Deal with the shemozzle that is my life for the next 36 sleeps (my dealing with the dog breeder ends in 12th August), I need to focus on securing a new contract, and sorting out my house. Once the black dog moves in all facade of houseproudness flies out the window. I need to sort out my tax paperwork.

It’s likely you’ll still see me around, but it won’t be out and about town, it won’t be Farmville and it won’t be at any social events organised through work because I can tell you I can hear that fake laugh at 1000 paces, see the annoying hand gestures through concrete walls and most of all I can feel my air being polluted by it’s breath.

I will continue to smile. Never fear, I have a fur family that would miss me too much.

Anniversary

Yesterday saw the third anniversary of a day that affected my life in a way that cannot be described. I became motherless. Clearly I had a mother, but on the 4th July 2008 mine, Sally, ceased to exist in this world and moved into one where she could wear red shoes all the time, drink G&T with more more G than T and cook up a storm at any time of the day.

In memory of my Muv, I finally figured out her Bread and Butter Pudding recipe, I think.



The weather wasn't rainy in Sydney, in fact the sun was shining, but I thought I share this picture of Muv and me on the Isle of Wight in the early 80s, because it reflects the feeling in my heart on the day that marks her death. Rain, muddy knees and a desire to stop waiting

MasterChef

I've been taking in the odd episode of MasterChef this year and I've enjoyed what I've seen. I saw this episode the other night and I absolutely love this recap, because it's true. It's all taken so ridiculously serious by so many people :-)