one way street

Constantly heading up a one way street.
The flow is going the other way.
The prevailing sensible choice is going the other way.

But somehow you keep on going, against the tide. Hit it headlong and like a bull at a gate, and the force of everyone else will throw you back, like surf breakers on a beach.

Make your way, gently, slowly, building confidence as you go, bringing people on board gradually so that they understand what you want, and why you want it, and that, even if they can’t understand, they can see that you desire it so much that you’re going to carry on regardless. Eventually, you’ll get to the top. Won’t you?

The top, where it’s busier, the traffic is flowing in both directions, but despite that, there is a natural sense of harmony. Everything just feels right some how.

But, when you’re still on the one way street, there’s something missing. A glimpse of the light at the end of the tunnel, the much needed sense of tranquil calm and satisfaction which the top promises is enough to spur you on.

A hint, a touch, a kind word. It’s enough.

Wipe out

I am shattered... just finished my second 14+ hour day in a row, and I'm set for another one tomorrow too.

I'm counting down the days... 8 working days until it all changes, and therefore hopefully improves (although it's a shallow hope, I think it'll just be different rather than better)... and 22 days until Vegas. I've not quite gone to the extreme of working out the amount of working hours left to go yet, but give me time!

Wireless

I'm beginning this post thinking it will be a long one, but let's see what happens...

I'm currently sitting on the sofa, drinking wine and watching West Wing. A regular Saturday night in then... albeit that I've not actually done this for longer than I can pin point to remember. My Saturday nights are usually spent in various places not involving being at home, so it's quite refreshing to be here. I feel like I'm catching up with myself. I was originally planning to spend this weekend seeking the assistance of Marty to wash, t-cut and polish my old car, ready for it to be sold, but he's visiting parents... so I've diverted to a favourite pastime... painting!!! We're having a red wall in the lounge, and a nice cream colour in the bathroom, probably with a Griffiths original painting on one wall.

I love painting and decorating. Sad huh... but, there's something very theraputic about spending a few hours making a radical transformation to something and then assessing the effect at the end of the day, and for however long it lasts into the future, until you decide to change it again! Whilst I would most love to be decorating my very own flat/house, I'm content for now to be helping Stephen out.

As I said, I'm currently in the lounge... very much enjoying my new laptop with the cool wireless technology. I've got this and my old desktop linked so that I can access everything from both... and I was even able to have MSN conversations from the bathroom earlier - whilst I was painting, rather than doing anything else!

It has, as usual, been a big, bad, mad week at work. But, I'm counting down the days, firstly to the end of March (10 working days), when everything changes, and secondly to the 13 April, when I, along with Na and Helen, will be Vegas bound! Can't wait. The high point from this week though was that my manager managed to get some feedback about me out of the big boss. Who, apparently, although I think this makes him certifiable, thinks I'm exceptional, performing astonishingly well, tackling difficult issues which no one has ever taken on before, and he can't think of anything negative at all.

I was quite literally gobsmacked and speechless, which as anyone who reads this knows (as does my manager), is a very rare thing. A pretty good way to end the week though, and a very good boost at a difficult time.

In celebration, I toasted Tim's birthday with a number of these. They are passionfruit beer, from a rather good Belgian bar called the Dovetail in Clerkenwell, which has the biggest range of Belgian beers in London, including the rather amazing passionfruit one in the picture. Had I not been totally knackered from the night before, many many more of those would have been consumed!

And, the final paragraph. My last post was rather emotional... and rather jumbled up and confused. I was also in danger of revealling rather more than would have been sensible about some of my inner most thoughts... and I remain very thankful today that I didn't.

Normal service is resumed.

Take a look at me now

You're the only one....

We've shared the laughter and the pain, we've shared the tears.

There's so much I need to say to you, so many reasons why.

Ahem.

Just spent a fab girly night in... with my male flatmate. Steak and chips and red wine for dinner, finished off with plenty of red wine, Baileys, and season 1 of Cold Feet. It's been emotional. He's split up with his girlfriend, and there was nothing for it but a good girly cure all session. He's gone to bed much happier, which leads me to conclude that girly treatment can work for boys too.

And, above all, it proves that girls are not, contrary to the opinions of some, evil.

Hasta la vista baby... hasta luego amigos

Yum

Managed to escape from work at a reasonable time today, so have just cooked myself this:



Totally yummy. One of my favourite meals ever... and the best thing is that it involves using a glass of wine to flavour the rice, so what's a girl to do but drink the rest!

Obsessive

I’ve been thinking about this post for a while, and have been prompted to put it up today by an incident with coasters on a coffee table…

We have laughed for some time about Marty’s obsessive compulsive disorder-esque obsession with having the remote controls neatly lined up on the coffee table… so much so that he once gathered four remotes from completely different places in my lounge and left them lined up on the sofa for me! The portable phone must always be on the stand in their house too (unless it’s in use of course), and today I learnt that the coasters must be in the four corners of the coffee table.

Others have similar obsessions too… Richelle can’t bear the toilet roll being on the wrong way round, or sunlight breaking through curtains in the morning, Steve can’t bear wearing crinkled shirts and must squeeze the toothpaste from the bottom (not to mention the fact that he can’t bear polystyrene and cotton wool) and Rich must have the rug at the bottom of his bed straight…

I think my equivalent oddities are that when I’m reading a book, I always turn over the corner of the page at the mid point, and when I’m at work, I always have to have my bottle of water in exactly the same place on my desk, no matter how cluttered it is.

I think the second one is partly to stop me from knocking it over and ruining all my papers though!

We’re all odd.

Normal

Wellllllll........ after a truly horrendous and amazingly complicated week, this week has at least started off a bit better, and I'm hoping (very much) that it's going to stay that way.

Had a very good weekend doing nothing very interesting, including recovering from a stomach bug which gave me the most delirious dreams ever... like changing the time and stopping the Home Secretary from doing a speech... WHAT?!

Also had some fun on Saturday night (photos on Flickr as usual). But actually, the best thing about the weekend was that I did normal things, like washing, ironing, cleaning, sleeping, going out for a walk... you know, all the kind of stuff you take for granted, at least until you come close to losing your possibly already a bit fragile grip on all the balls in the air, and then the boring stuff becomes the most important stuff in the world, because it's normal. And being normal is good. I realise now that I was probably very close to breaking point last week (well, I was closest at 3.30am on Friday morning when I was convinced that I was never going to feel well again, and that I was also never going to be able to sleep again!), and I'm kind of glad in a way that I had the bug, because it forced me to stop and sort myself out. I just hope things don't get that bad again. I don't think they will, but well, you just can never really tell in this job.

Still, on reflection, I love my job, and I love my life, and everyone and everything in it. And I utterly value my friends and my guiding lights in getting me through and allowing me to be me, offering encouragement, support, comment, constructive critism and praise at the right time. I've said it before, but I'll say it again, thank you all.

Big hug x