Monday 22 October 2007

holding my breath

sniff. sniff.

This Summer England enacted their very own strict anti-smoking laws. No more puffing in pubs. No more reeking up local restaurants. Smoke free. Aaaaaah.

As it was, our workplace was already smoke-free. Sort of. Basically it meant that anyone wanting to inhale their nicotine fix had to scoot out the door a few feet and then commence with their cough-iriffic habit. This consequently meant that our lovely boardwalk along the lake was frequently dappled, not just with the usual goose poo, but with folks clinching and sucking on cancer sticks. You could go sit outside to enjoy the infrequent sunshine amidst the incessant smoking ... if you dared. Likewise, walking out most of the doorways to the “car park” was destined to dump you in a tobacco haze.

That was before the big change. The new, stricter laws were going to further protect employees from the hazards of other people’s second-hand smoke.

Good, right? Except.

The deck is now devoted to sun-seekers (along with the geese and their droppings). [Here's a view of the deck at the front of the building; it continues the length of the building and there's a bigger deck with tables and such on the other end. Pretty, isn't it?]

The administration, in accordance with the new laws, allotted a singular spot for the smoking masses. It appears, however, that this one locale that they’ve designated as the permissible smoking place is smack-dab next to our intake air vents. So now instead of having to actually go out of your way to breathe incidental toxins, you can sit at your desk and have it brought straight to you via our air system.

Fantastic.

A number of emails, from a wide variety of people, to our facilities department (who fields, or doesn’t as the case may be, these questions) have gone unanswered.

Thursday 18 October 2007

Scary Stuff

It seems that I have neglected to rave about my new favorite thing: my widgets. Even the word is cute. I’ve reigned in my widget impulse and am now only using seven (you can count them below). If you don’t have them yet, do yourself a favor and get some. At the very least get the weather one.




Right now, I also have a seasonal widget -- my Halloween countdown clock (there he is the lower right corner). It’s an adorable jack-o-lantern and tells me, down to the second, the amount of time remaining between me and the scariest day of the year. I’ve had it for a while. I think when I first added it, we were about 40 days out. Now that we’re getting closer, it was time to change the entire background. Some google image-searching turned up some really creepy stuff. I now have a haunted house scene gracing my PC monitor (which is gigantic, by the way – only newly so, which is why I have to mention it because I am still in love with it. See below). Around the corner (or above in these two shots), is an even spookier graveyard scene on my Mac (well, when I say corner, they’re really side by side, but at slightly different slants).


But here is the most terrifying part about all of this. When I had it all set up (see yesterday's post), I proudly thought to myself “That is WELL scary!”

Huh?

Yeah. See, it isn’t unheard of over here to use the word “well” to mean very or quite. You might even hear someone say that something is “well good.” Which gives me pause, I have to say. I don’t think I like it and yet, there it was, popping right into my head of its own accord.

Spooky.

Wednesday 17 October 2007

Nice Work if You Can Get it

There’s a new craze sweeping our office. Perhaps you’re already hoisting a banner on your own local bandwagon. As with most new things, I am a late adopter, being ever so un-hip. I like to come in just after things hit their peak, when the trend is waning and exhibiting the beginning of death throes. Still, I am throwing myself into this one wholeheartedly. Or at least, as I do, intermittently wholeheartedly. You know, when I can be bothered.

For the past six months or so we have been hearing over and over again that our department is being restructured, our job roles will be changing. We’ve also been privy to a wide range of implications and suggestions about whether we will all even still have roles (jobs, that is) and even blatant assertions that some of us will be unhappy with the changes. In spite of what were undoubtedly the best intentions of our higher ups, this has amazingly had a quite negative effect on the work habits, attitude, and morale of the troops.

And so it ensues… The name of the game these days is do as little as is feasible over the course of the day, which many have industriously shortened to as little as six hours. Which is, after all, really more efficient and shows acute resourcefulness. Why string out a day of not-working to eight or nine hours when you can get just as little done in fewer hours?

While at work, it takes a surprising amount of ingenuity to find things other than work to fill the day. This is sometimes made even more difficult by the non-team players who might actually want you to do some work. They have a very selfish way of interrupting you when you’re playing Halo or expecting you to actually attend the meeting that you arranged.

Yes indeed, it’s hard work not working. I mean, anyone can not work, but to do so without suffering immense boredom is no mean feat. Some are bound to fail. Some will get railroaded into actually completing projects. Some will fall victim to that widespread modern-day office malaise, namely staring into space, drooling in front of their monitors. Others will aimlessly wander the paths of the Internet, trolling for tidbits of even modest appeal and feigning more interest than is in fact warranted by the “information” they uncover. But a valiant few will prevail and fill their hours with amusing coffee breaks, exciting game-playing sessions, incessant instant messaging, l-o-n-g lunches, and even the occasional bout of sport and exercise. Not a very lofty goal? Perhaps not, but in these days of rampant disillusionment and passionate cynicism, we all must do our part.

Thursday 11 October 2007

I'm Still Not Doing Them

I thought about coming clean (after being inspired by Jo's ducks neatly aligning themselves) about all of the things that I am completely in denial about and avoiding... my taxes, my car reg is which is paid up and current (thank you), but for which they didn't see fit to actually send me a tax disc , my lease which is ticking away toward expiring (though I think I should also get credit because I did phone the agent. She's just never phoned me back. Harridan.), my perpetually anaemic finances, my grandmother's birthday (3 days ago), my nephew's birthday (11 days ago), my non-existent exercise regimen (again, if my yoga instructor nips off to teach in Australia for months on end -- well?) ... and the list goes on and on.

But I don't know that I am actually even going to pretend to try to make myself do anything about them, so perhaps confession is pointless. Denial is working for me. For now.

Here's what's not working for me -- all the freaking spiders. I know I've said something about this before, but let's get real. How many spiders can one small house and garden actually NEED? Well, let me tell you, regardless of what it needs, it can jolly well support a truckload.

This morning I left the house just before 9, and it was a misty, foggy morning... all the better to see the virtual forest of cobwebs, my dears! My front garden looks like something out of a Halloween story. And it's true, I love Halloween, but come on. In hindsight I also realize I should apologize -- I should have taken photos, but I was 1) underwhelmed and not a little disturbed, and 2) lazy. Perhaps I will be lucky enough (ha!) to see them again tomorrow and get a second chance.

I keep telling myself, "yes, but there's no snakes in England," (sometimes even in a self-congratulatory sort of tone) and none of these horrifying infestations either. So I got that going for me.

Wednesday 10 October 2007

Real Dan and the Return of the Swiss Miss










Me and Real Dan, at Carluccio's in London. Photo courtesy of Brian, who is a better photographer than I am anyway.


It happened again. After a wonderful reunion with “Real Dan” a few months back (and sadly my last post as I have been horribly remiss in blathering on about my not-quite riveting life), I got a message via Facebook from another dear friend from my past. Stefani (the “Swiss Miss”) was an exchange student at my high school briefly and then she moved to Southern California and then back to England... and we regrettably lost touch. But through the magic of Facebook she’s back! Hurrah! It’s so super-fantastic that I feel like we could be an advertisement for them.

I’m slotting her right back into my life and “we mustn’t drop off like that again!”

In other news ... hmmm, what other news? Exactly. Everything at work is still up in the air and irritatingly quasi top secret. Which brings me to this rant: if you want to keep things under wraps, why not be discreet for godsake? And if you’re not going to tell people, shouldn’t you at least not tell them that their jobs will be changing, that they won’t be happy, aren’t going to like the changes... but hey, don’t worry about it all, there’s nothing you can do so just get on with it...?!

Interestingly, I am only de-motivated part-time. On those days, I drag Jo downstairs to drink tea (or another soothing hot beverage of choice, hot chocolate also works) while we sit and look out at the lake. And I try not to moan the whole time (honestly I do) ... without a huge amount of success it must be said.

In between my whinging episodes, I’m “getting on with it” ... mostly, I think, because the work I am doing has nothing whatsoever to do with the higher up who did actually say those words above to our entire Creative Services team. I’ve been up to my eyebrows in city-building (new SimCity title), island castaways, and some other forthcoming Sims-alicious bits.

There. That about catches things up. I can now pretend that we’re up to speed. (The 2 or 3 of us who might still be reading!)