Hooray!

I'VE PASSED MY PROBATION!!!!

Words cannot explain how relieved I am. My boss came back from holiday, we had a catch up & he passed me without further ado. It's so great to get rid of this uncertainty. It does not, however, make my main client any easier to work with. But now that I don't have to constantly fear that one bad step will cost me my job, I can be a bit more relaxed. Also, my boss won't be going away again that soon, which makes things easier as well.

Not much else to report, really. I'm still packing my stuff for the move on Saturday, man&van (+John) are sorted for early afternoon. After lots of calls to our competent *cough* *cough* call center & FINALLY getting someone who knows their stuff with the third call, I've now got phone & broadband for the new place sorted. As in I'm paying for it for now, as it turned out we need an active (i.e. with number) phone line before any of the free staff offers can apply. I'm hoping that getting the rest set up won't take forever, but at least I'll have interwebs within the next 10 to 15 days. With all of that I'm surprised we're still wondering why sales are down.

I'm going to the dentist tomorrow to get the ugly temporary crown replaced with a shiny, permanent gold one. Happy days.

Oh, and two people I met on the playa in the Lost Penguins camp are coming over to London & staying at my new place. I'm excited & their visit happened just at the right time as now I've actually got sofa space to offer & understanding cooperative flatmates.

There actually seems to be a chance that I'll be back to my usual, happy, relaxed self end of this month.

Plans for when that finally happens are:

- loose weight (no excuse for chocolate binges anymore)

- go clubbing (should tie in nicely with the weight loss plans)

- catch up with everyone I've neglected due to being stressed/miserable/too busy

Yes, indeed.

The Edges Of The World

This week has been a totally mixed bag. I think I might've messed up my probation *again*, due to sending out a report with data that I thought was ok, but actually it wasn't. Apparently one department had known all day, but had neglected to tell anyone else. I thought the data looked a bit dodgy, but it had been looking like that since a week ago, so decided to send out the report. Big mistake. I don't know if they can really hold me responsible for this, as I honestly didn't know about the missing data logs that were causing problems, but they're probably going to say I should've spotted discrepancies etc. etc.

Due to all of that, I've spent the last 4 days nervous & quite anxious & really not very relaxed. I do like the job, although working with a certain person is hard, stressful & not very fulfilling at the moment. But the rest of his team are nice, I feel like I can move something. I'm very worried that my boss is going to tell me tomorrow that they're not going to make me permanent.

I have decided that, no matter what happens next week or on the 23rd (the official end of my probation), I'm going to try & get certified as a translator. It'll mean studying & exams again, something I thought I had left for good when I started working, but it would also give me a second leg to stand on, career wise. I'm not sure if I'm actually cut out for corporate life.

So, at the moment the light at the end of the tunnel quite possibly could turn out to be a train.

In addition to that, I'm preparing for moving to Acton next weekend. I've packed half of my room, have to sort out actually details for the man&van early next week, the furniture is built & as soon as Lynn has the hoover fixed I'll clean my room to get it ready to move in.

Oh, and I'll get the permanent crown fixed next week as well.

Not sure if that's what they mean when they say when it rains it pours. I'm glad when August is over, no matter which way things go, at least they're settled. This uncertainty is killing me, I just want to sit down & relax & just not have to worry anymore.

To get my mind off things for a little while, I met up with John today to do some culture. We hit the Hayward for Ernesto Neto's "The Edges Of The World", which also featured some Design exhibition which threw up the age-old question what actually should be considered art. We weren't exactly sure, but we were certain that none of the exhibits excited us much. Ernesto Neto, though, was stunning. You could touch it, smell it (cinammon, lavender...), walk through it & over it. It was so much fun!

To round the day off, we ate some al-fresco sushi at SoBa. While all of this didn't totally relax me, it was nice.

My boss is back tomorrow, I'm very apprehensive going to work & having a meeting with him. I so hope that everything turns out alright.

Wish me luck!

Adventures In Flatpack Land

I went to IKEA & bought things last Tuesday. I then spent Friday evening & Saturday afternoon assembling my purchases, helped by John who turned out to be astonishingly skilled with the (electric) screwdriver. It actually was kinda fun & strangely rewarding to build something that I can now use to put stuff into. Also, John & I were a good flatpack assembly team.

This means that my new room is now more or less ready for me to move in. Well, it still needs a proper hoovering which I'll hopefully be able to do on the coming weekend, provided Lynn has managed to fix our hoover.

After spending quite some time in the new flat it has somewhat grown on me, I feel quite positive & happy about the move & I think my room might be about the same size as my current one, which means I should be able to fit all my stuff in it unless I randomly buy more things in the next few days (not planning to do that).

Other than dealing with move/flat related issues, not that much has happened. I've been to the movies twice in the past 7 days. I've traveled all the way to Wood Green to watch Inception with Stu, Benjy & some others last week Wednesday. Unlike the others, I wasn't too impressed. Not sure about everybody else's dreams, but mine are a lot more surreal, exciting & weird than the ones they were dealing with in the film. I was expecting more mind-bending landscape action & some weirdness. It was rather bland & boring instead.

And I went to see Toystory 3 (in 3D) with John last night. It was good, I'm not (& have never been) a huge fan of the Toystory franchise, but the story was gripping & it was well executed.

This week so far is looking rather uneventful. I'll have to start sorting out stuff for the move soon, I'm planning a trip to the Hayward on Sunday for the Ernesto Neto exhibition. Might hit the park or the shops (depending on weather) on Saturday. I'm really quite happy not going out for a month or so, September will be busy on the party front again & after all what my body went through in the past month I think I deserve a bit of rest.

Oh, on that matter, my arm's healed now & is 99% functional again. My tooth now has a temporary crown, which will be replaced with a full gold one next week. I had some sleep issues lately which seem to have been sorted out by taking some 5 HTP before going to bed. Now all I need is to get my weight back to a pre-London figure.