Lucky and delightful

time off.

Grandma Zilla came to visit and we all got delightfully squiffy on wine and had a good laugh.

Godzooky 2 went for her innoculations, which I was dreading. When we arrived at the surgery pandemonium had broken out. There were children crying because they’d had their jabs and there were kids crying because they were about to have their jabs!

I was waiting for Godzooky 2 to start, but she was good as gold. Even having her jabs she was fine, no tears.

A good couple of days all round, which makes a very pleasant change. 

Success

with electrickery. I managed to put in some new wall lights and a double dimmer switch, without frying myself.

There was a small pop at one point, but the fuse box did it’s job!

My brownie points have been topped up now, along with my sense of manliness and ability to tackle jobs I dread.

I’m now off for a day and a half: Grandma Zilla is down to visit tomorrow, and this afternoon I’m taking Godzooky 2 for her latest round of innoculations. Can’t wait for that…..

Time to lighten

the mood round here. Too many angst filled posts recently, so here’s some genuine Country and Western song titles which sound like they would be great:

I Hate Every Bone in Her Body But Mine.

It’s Hard to Kiss the Lips At Night That Chewed Your Ass All Day.

If the Phone Don’t Ring, You’ll Know It’s Me.

I Liked You Better Before I Got to Know You So Well.

I Still Miss You Baby, But My Aim’s Gettin’ Better.

I Wouldn’t take her to a Dog Fight ‘Cause I’m Afraid She’d Win.

I’ll Marry You Tomorrow, But Let’s Honeymoon Tonight.

I’m So Miserable without you, It’s like You’re Still Here.

If I Had Shot You When I First wanted To, I’d Be Out Of Prison By now.

My Wife Ran Off With My Best Friend and I Sure Do Miss Him.

She Got the Ring and I Got the Finger.

I Ain’t Never Gone to Bed with Ugly Women But I’ve Sure Woke Up With a Few

I’m not a violent man

but sometimes people just do things that need to be acted upon.

Last night I was making my way home as usual, on the tram and it approached my stop. I made my way towards the doorsin preparation for disembarkation along with the other poor unfortunates who live in my area.

As the doors opened this, I’ll call him a young man, but in reality I would call him something else, started to elbow his way onto the tram before letting people off.

He literally elbowed a couple of women  in front of me out of the way.

Now normally I would just ignore such behaviour, as I don’t go out of my way to have confrontations, but given my current mood I couldn’t help myself.

Now this lad must have been about 17, skinny and around 5’8″, considerably smaller than me (which looking back makes me feel a bit of a bully) but fully deserving of taking down a peg or two.

It’s the lack of thought and respect for others that he displayed, which in my opinion is one of the major flaws in today’s society.

As he approached me he clearly just saw a man in a suit, and he tried to elbow his way past me too. However seeing what had happened, I made sure that my elbow connected with him first.

The look of surprise on his face was a treat, and he responded with a witty, cutting remark, calling me a dickhead.

My reply also caught him by surprise I think, because I responded with “You’re the fucking dickhead, sunshine!” I don’t think he expects people in suits to swear at him.

So he was slightly non-plussed I think, but challenged me to get off the tram. I took great delight in telling him that I was getting off the tram anyway and I would love the pleasure of his company to discuss the issue further.

Suddenly I “Wasn’t worth it” and sadly the tram doors shut before we could continue our exchange of views.

I’d like to think that he might change his attitude, but in reality I know that people like that never will.

Knee jerk

reactions are never very good, are they?

I came very close yesterday to walking out of my job.

A sleepless Sunday night, where I turned things over countless times in my mind, left me feeling severely aggrieved and wanting to create an impact.

Walking out would have meant leaving a trail of devastation: with no-one fully conversant with exactly what I do.

I even got as far as talking with my boss, expressing my displeasure and mentioning that I was thinking of quitting.

It became clear to me that he was powerless to help me, and he begged me to reconsider and seek alternative courses of action.

With a breathing space, I can see that I would only really be dumping the crap onto my team, those who I would like to hurt would merely blame me and then expect the people left behind to sort out the problem.

I’m not really sure what my way forward is. Clearly my boss is impotent or lacking the balls to fight my corner further up the food chain.

So at the moment I’m in limbo, waiting to see what our personnel dept have to say and thinking of alternative strategies.

I may well dip my toe into the pool of “other jobs” and see what is out there, how badly is the credit crunch hitting I wonder…. 

Today

I am mostly pissed off, right off.

As if not getting paid enough

wasn’t bad enough, the general air is one of despondence in this country right now. House prices falling, food costs rising, credit crunch biting.

It struck me last night, just as I was filling the car with petrol. Well, I say filling, but in reality I hardly ever fill it these days. I don’t drive that many miles a year; probably around 6,000. Which is just as well with fuel prices these days.

I tend to put it in in dollops of £20, as this earns me 1 air mile. Sad, but true.

I remember, as a child, being allowed to pump the petrol into my dad’s car. Easy enough to do, but exciting for a small child all the same. He’d set me a challenge to get it exactly on  the £10 or £20 amount, which was tricky but not impossible.

These days I find it tricky as an adult to manage that: the trickle required to move it on a penny these days can be the pressure exerted by a hair on the pump trigger!

No surprise really since the prices have gone ridiculous: £1.11 per litre.

Now when I was a kid, everything was done in gallons, not European bloody litres.

I sat down this morning to work it out in “old money”.

I gallon = 4.546 litres

so last night I paid £1.11 x 4.546 per gallon = £5.05

or for my American visitors $10.05 ish a gallon!

Ouch!

Anyway, at least the weekend is here, and in honour of Friday here’s another funny graph…

 
see more funny graphs

To lighten the mood

I’m posting this, in spite of the maelstrom whirling round me at the moment I can still find some things funny…

 

 

I’m trying

to start being positive about the situation I’m in. What’s happened is history and it’s up to me now to change the current into what I want it to be.

I’ve investigated that opportunity in another department, and the head of that seems keen, but tempered it with the warning that the head of my department could prevent my plans.

I’ve tracked down another opportunity though, working for a different company, through another contact I have.

Time to get my CV updated…..

….and breathe

I guess I don’t want that last post to be the first thing anyone sees, so I’m posting this bizarre story, which, if it does nothing else, serves to prove, that when it comes to eccentrics, we Brits do it best….

 The Human Mole