Things to contemplate.

1. They’ve stopped making smarties lids
2. A pint of Guinness on a Thursday lunchtime
3. God.

Right. So there’s the agenda people. This could be a long post.

Smarties lids. Nestle have stopped making them. Now, I’d just stopped boycotting them having finally got around to doing my research. I may have to reconsider. Surely if nothing else, the lack of Smarties lids is an educational disaster! Lets not think too hard about the nutritional implications – however, if people aren’t exposed to e numbers they might get really ill if they are suddenly exposed to them later in life. Therefore they should be fed Smarties from a young age and learn to spell with the lids. Of course with no lids involved we might have to resort to skittles which limits the spelling significantly to "ssssssssssssssssssss"

Guinness. Well, need I say more? And at lunchtime too. A great combination. Well, perhaps not from the perspective of my hydraulic calcs, but in terms of me feeling good, and the main reason for it – feeling warm in this freezing cold office it is indeed a success.

God. He Rocks. Well and truly. However, I probably ought to apologise to housemates for being a moody cow when I got in yesterday and not praying about it (and therefore turning into a human being) until getting to youthnet last night. However, youthnet was really cool. Was a bit apprehensive as I hadn’t met my group before and one of my group couldn’t come because she’s broken her elbow (excuses excuses). Although I had to bite my tongue as her friend explained what first aid treatment she’d received (kicked by a horse, lands on elbow, losing sensation. Lets take her home for some dinner before going to A&E. I really hope she didn’t need surgery!)

But yes, God rocks. One of the kids – first time I’d seen her, now wants her very own street bible for her birthday. Personally I like the sound of the pop corn maker shaped like a duck that she has at home!

I’m currently collecting smarties lids at work.

I have 7. Six of them are orange. One is blue.

And I already have doubles.

So go on people… what words can I make out of the letters F, F, Y, Y, P, C and Z?
And in what language?

Houses

I recommend spur of the moment decisions. But it’s useful to know what else is going on at the same time… one of these days I’m going to factor in sleep. Honest.

On Saturday I ‘popped’ up to Warwick for a pint (or as it turned out - 4 pints) with a mate who I haven’t seen in two years. We’ve been trying to organise this pint for two years now so it’s a major achievement really. Problem is Mike lives in a really nice area. It looks all grown up and stuff. Not a lot like my road. As mum pointed out, I live in the wrong part of the country. I’m looking on that statement as more of the ‘lets get the kids as far away as possible’ theory that the parents seem to be working on.

So do I move or not? Do I hang around in Wokingham and hope that one day I could afford a house/flat of my very own, or do I move closer to work and rent in, say, Woodley or maybe Twyford? Not sure whether I really want to move into a shared house with strangers though. But also not sure that I want another winter of driving 25 miles (ish) to work every day in the dark and ice.

Chances are that I’m too lazy to do anything about it. But then given that Helen is talking about moving out maybe I should go at the same time she does. If she does. And that all depends on her job interview in Winchester.

Crickey! Too many things to consider. Think I’ll go back to my tea!

Apparently....

Apparently most engineers don’t collect Smarties lids on their desk and consider making it a professional objective to get the whole alphabet by retirement. (They go well with the paper penguin and the plastic ‘computer’ wizard)

And apparently most engineers don’t get excited about multiple coloured pencils, and colour in their design sketches.

So apparently most engineers are boring. Or is that just the geotechnical guys…. ;-)

oh I’m so funny…. Boring – bore holes…? Never mind…..

Pretty Handbag

So tell me... is £25 too much for this bag?

It's the perfect colour to match my dress for Saturday, and I *could* use it on other occasions too.

It's soooo pretty..

All I need is for someone to say "Yes, that's reasonable, buy it"

And so it contines

My brother is currently in Texas… and they’re messing about getting him a social security number. It’s almost reassuring that it’s not just this country’s systems that are incompetent at times. Almost, but not quite. Sounds like some prayer needed there.

Other than that let’s see… I seem to be running out of sleeping time again, and I don’t know how it happened. Other than the fact that schools are back so the commute is an extra 30 minutes a day now :-(

Still, I have a funky new dress for Clare’s wedding J Happy Mary. Problem is that it’s green so doesn’t match the jacket I was going to wear. Amusingly my mate Charlie has also got a green chiffon dress to wear to the same wedding. All the way through school we used to accidentally buy the same stuff. It’s kind of scary that we can still do it despite not seeing each other above twice a year.

I’ve achieved nothing today. That’s bad isn’t it. Better go home I guess.

So lets see… Life.

I seem to be back at work. But it’s been an eventful week.

Wednesday – hysterical tiredness

Thursday – travel to Greenbelt, collecting Alice on the way. For some reason pillows seem to be the most important thing to be packed. As it turns out, this was at the expense of silly little things like pyjamas.

Friday – Still at Greenbelt. Meet the rest of the ticket office team. They’re crazy. Sounds of Salvation play Ska mass at 0015 on stage 2. They rock. They seem to be well received, and I make it all the way through the event without bursting into tears. This is a great achievement. Well, it is for me.

Saturday – Sounds of salvation play again at 0915. Drag myself out of bed to go again. Alice doesn’t bother. She spends most of the day asleep. Apparently this is the point of holidays. This doesn’t stop her pointing out that I can sleep more than she can. Particularly at Christmas. I’d like to point out for the record that I was doing night shifts that year – give over!

Sunday/Monday/Tuesday – Still at Greenbelt. Chilling. Saw some call bands. I recommend ‘one nation’ live. They were awesome. I don’t recommend Jazz Jamaica, although Alice liked them. Motown songs in a Jazz style with just too many instruments. Not my cup of tea. Speaking of tea, genius idea to have the main stage projected on screen above the tiny tea tent, so that you can sit in the sun on the grass with a cup of tea and listen to music…. Bliss…. Discover that holiday seems to suit me. Maybe I should try it more often. Actually feel relaxed and not shattered. This can’t be normal.

Almost forgot the Organic Ale tent. A new concept to Greenbelt, but a great place to sit and catch up with people. Which, if I’m honest, is mostly what I spent spare time at greenbelt doing. It’s great going as a worker, because you haven’t paid you don’t feel the need to rush about and see stuff. So you can just potter. :-)

Wednesday (back home) – Optician points out that I’m not going blind and I have hair cut off. These two items are not really related. Honest. Optician is going to give me a new contact lens. Apparently I should be able to read text on screens. I thought it was normal until Alice pointed out that Greenbelt wouldn’t have a massive screen with text on it if no-one could read it. It’d be a bit of a waste of resource… ho hum.

Thursday - back to work. Urgh. Feels like a Monday. Two day weeks are the way forward however.

Friday – Still at work. Apparently all future leave is cancelled. So much for that theory. And the process engineers have changed the design again. I wouldn’t mind, but they’ve done one of those fundamental U-turns again. Lets get the most explosive chemicals we can find and put them near people. Yes, that sounds like a great plan. Never trust chemical engineers – I’ve had bad experiences with them since that project in third year uni…