Happy New Year

OK, yesterday was a bad day and it was good to get some stuff off my chest, but now I’m going to try and do my annual retrospective. As per, I’m not sure how this is going to come out but we’ll see where this goes.

Work

So January rolls around and I was working. I was on my final month of my 3-month contract and was kind of looking forward to it. Despite it being money in my bank every week it was kind of a thankless job. I was working alongside someone who, despite the fact I was there to help her, really didn’t want to hand anything over to me to take the pressure off so I was glad when 31st January ended and I could escape out of there. Yes it meant I was out of work again but this time it wasn’t for long and after a month or so of chat shows I was back at work again doing credit control in Beverley.

Again, not the job I really wanted, but needs must and I got another months pay or so out of it. It’s not a commute I’d want to do every day. As I mentioned in one of my previous blogs, a trip that was meant to only take 30 minutes wound up taking an hour every day, and having to do that every evening with a headache from staring at a computer screen all day trying to make heads or tails out of the hash that someone had made of their sales ledger did me no favours. I’d already started to build up some resentment at my agency contact for being worse than useless and bugging me every couple of days. She kept arranging me interviews during work time which meant I was losing out on quite a lot of pay and I got consistently irritated. While working that contract I worked out that after tax and NI I was working simply to get to work. I had very little disposable income left afterwards. I was, in essence doing 10 hour days and all the pay I was earning when she wasn’t sending me to interviews on works time (which cut my hours by nearly half), seemed to be going on Bridge tolls and petrol.

After another month or so on the dole after that I started another job which lasted 8 weeks and was purely so I could get some breathing room. I was a stop gap for the company that Mum works for who needed someone urgently. They’d been advertising the post for a couple of months with no takers so the fact that I was available for work meant that I could step in for a little while. It was only doing admin but it was what I needed …… a job with little or no pressure which allowed me to give some thought to whether accounts was where my future lay. I decided that at the moment it wasn’t and set about hunting for another admin-based job. Around the same time I also chucked in my AAT course. I couldn’t get the time off work to go to the classes and as a result I wasn’t getting the support from the tutor and was getting further behind so I threw it in. It was going to take forever to get caught up and I wasn’t being kept informed of things like the exercises he said he’d provide or exam dates – y’know, really unimportant stuff!! *rolls eyes*

Which brings us pretty much up to date in terms of work. In September I started a Maternity leave cover job at Nisa-Today’s in Scunthorpe – a “retail buying consortium” that probably supplies your local corner shop – if you see anything with a label that reads Heritage, Costcutter or Nisa-Today’s Value, then that’s us. I’m working as support in the QA department. We make sure that the places that supply the own label products are up to scratch in terms of production conditions and labeling. Of course there’s more to it than that but I’m on holiday until tomorrow so I don’t have to think about it just yet. ;) At the moment it seems I stand a pretty good chance at staying on when the contract ends, but we’ll see what the situation is come August.

It seems that although I spent a lot of time out of work last year (that’s gonna feel odd to say for a little while!! Lol!!) I’ve actually worked for about 8 months out of the 12. Guess it just felt like less because it was so ‘bitty’ and random.

Hobbies

The big one this year has been the photography. I’ve taken way too many photos this year but I think I’m getting a better eye for it. I even went so far as to trawl around eBay and get me a really posh Canon camera kit from the US for about half the price it would have cost over here. I’m not sure it’s got as much of a workout as I would like. It’s a lot harder to smuggle into gigs, but the photos I have taken I’m very pleased with and seem to have got a good reception. Hopefully in the future I’ll get to take it somewhere other than my back garden to use it. ;) I did attempt fireworks last night but I haven’t looked to see how successful those were yet. As per everything is on the Ol’ ‘Bucket

I’d also been toying with the idea of learning guitar and taking piano up again. So much so I’ve been buying up sheet music by the bookful and now have to get back to it. I was learning piano 20 years ago so no doubt I’m a little rusty, but I want to try and learn that and guitar again. I tried taking guitar up about 8 years ago and didn’t get very far – one of the downsides of having a poorly Dad: noise wasn’t really appreciated. To encourage me, Mum bought me an electric guitar and mini-amp for Christmas …… now need to dig the Play Guitar books out of the garage. Saw them a couple of months back but to find anything in there you need a map, a Sherpa and some breadcrumbs and supplies. ;)

Jaunting

The big one was Bon Jovi twice in June. They were absolutely awesome and I had a fantastic time and took loads of photos (which we’ll get onto later ;)). It makes me a little sad that I missed out on seeing them live for so long but at least I’ve had the opportunity. :) Kerry and I also took a chance on Starlight Express at the beginning of the year. We were pleasantly surprised and wanted to see it again only to find that we’d caught one of the last shows …… gutted, but I think we’re going to keep an eye out. Also on the cards this year was Oh What A Night and a lap dance from a policeman. Saying nothing else. You can read all about that in Kerry’s blog, along with the time I almost got knocked out by a stage door when we went to see Dave Spikey at Grimsby in April and the time I forgot we were meant to go and see Russell Howard …… what can I say, it’s been one of those years. I suppose thinking back a bit there have been a few little jaunts: a few Paddy gigs, some Russell Howard, Jason Manford (which aside from the performance we gloss over!!), Michael McIntyre, a few others and a blast from the past in Mike McShane at Paul Merton’s Improv show. I think the difference this year is that last year I did so much mileage with jaunting (and have the credit card bills for petrol to remind me!!!) that it doesn’t feel like we’ve done much. No, we weren’t in a different location every couple of weeks, but I think we’ve averaged one a month. I’ll have to check the stubs. Kerry’s blogged the jaunts so much better than I can so I’ll let you read them on her ‘Space, but as I’ve said before you’ll have to befriend her first …… tell her I sent you. ;)

Well that’s what 2008 brought in a nutshell. What’s the plan for next year?? At the moment the only things I’ve booked are Sweeney Todd and Nickelback tickets. There was going to be Extreme Jaunting in the form of a hop over the Atlantic for a week or so in February to go to Philadelphia for dinner with one Jon Bon Jovi amongst a variety of Philadelphia Soul events which I was really starting to get into the idea of. Unfortunately, those with the votes cancelled the Soul’s 2009 season so the other events have been cut. Made it less cost-effective to go so that’s been knocked on the head, and I now have to find another use for my 9 remaining leave days from work. Guess I’ll have to wait until my 30th for my cross-Atlantic trip. ;)