Meh...

E's gone home. I had tried to see her again before she left, but understandably she was seeing her family. We had a good night out at the weekend and it ended up being quite a late night.

E voiced some issues that she'd previously brought up when I was visiting her recently and she got quite upset. I should find out if she addressed those issues... I hope she has. I'll call her at the weekend and see what's up.

I'm a funny mood today, probably because E's gone home again. I did manage to email QC2 and hopefully she should be available for a drink soon, preferably this week. I'm due to be seeing AM next week, too, so things are looking up in that way.

Tsk.

This week, I was meaning to get in contact with QC2 about meeting up some night, perhaps for a drink, to catch up. I haven 't seen her since the start of the year and there's a fair amount to cover, from my own perspective at least. I never got around to it though. I did remember, quite a few times, but then got sidetracked at work and never sent the email.

Definitely next week, though.

E's family thing.

E Day has been and gone. I spent a rather pleasant afternoon walking around some shop before grabbing some lunch then retiring to the pub for a few drinks and some pool. Unfortunately, E Day ended early as E's mother had arranged a family dinner with a few relatives. I was actually invited along, but I can be useless at meeting new people and especially those outside of my immediate age range (e.g. I have no qualms about meeting brothers or sisters, but when it's mums or dads or aunties or uncles, then things are different). I did use the family angle to run away, too. I think E might have been a little disappointed (and I was too as we normally spend all afternoon and all evening in each other's company during these days out), but thanks to E's mum, it was unavoidable. However, we usually end up quite drunk and as I was in work today, this was probably a blessing in disguise (though it would have been nice if we'd extended the afternoon out by a few hours).

I will be meeting a load of E's friends this coming weekend though.

Change of plans.

Due to USHW's favourite subject, the weather, I've decided not to go in to work today. It's pissing down with rain here and blowing a gale so there's no way I'm standing at the bus stop waiting for the unreliable bus service to turn up.

I reckon I need about an hour to do all the things I need to do to be able to take a day (or possibly two) off next week. I reckon I could go in a little earlier tomorrow and stay a little later and still be in a position to take the time I need to see E. I pretty much know what I have to do, it's just a matter of getting it done.

Sorted.

Two E-related things happened today... firstly, E's birthday present arrived in the post. Initially, I was disappointed in it as it seemed to be nowhere near the quality of the same items I ordered a few weeks back. I took a few hours out and came back for a second look. The content is fine, but the craftsmanship of the item is certainly of a lower standard than my own. I'm contemplating complaining about it, but with only a short time before E returns home, can I afford the time if the company ask for me to return the item and wait for a replacement?

I got a call from E this afternoon arranging our day out. I'll definitely have to go in to work tomorrow to sort out some things so I can get the time off.

Oh for a lottery win!

It's cold and wet outside, though I'm quite comfy here. The heat put out by my laptop and desktop PCs are enough to keep the room comfortable. I can't settle though. I spend a few minutes doing something, get restless and move on to something else. I'm bored but not bored. I've books to read, films to watch, games to play, personal stuff to sort (finances etc.), stuff to write and my website to tinker with. It's not as if I don't have anything to do, but I'm lying on my bed, with the laptop, thinking about other things...

I'm thinking about a lottery win... my lottery day dreams come in four flavours.

The really big one! A huge Euro Millions lottery win... €60 million (approximately £45 million or $90 million) and just do what I please for the rest of my life, give a ton of it to my immediate family and not worry about work or anything again.

The big one! A good weekend jackpot on the lotto these days is about £8 million and that'd be just dandy thank you. After making sure the family were taken care of, I'd still have enough to live well. I'd probably not have enough to retire on, but I after an initial spending spree, I could invest the rest wisely enough to supplement any future income and certainly live extremely well.

The moderate one! £250,000 or thereabouts. I'm not sure what these moderate lotto wins are these days, but the price of a decent house/apartment in a decent area of my hometown is about a quarter of a million quid. I wouldn't share any of this... I'd be entire selfish andpay off my own debts before ploughing the rest into my own place to live.

The small one! A couple of grand... enough to pay off the majority of my current debts which would make me better off. The debt situation is something that sits at the back of my mind, though I am getting rid of it albeit a bit slower than I would have liked. A small lotto win would probably cut it in half and the rest could be paid off fairly quickly after that.

It's weird that I do get these lottery day dreams because money is not a huge factor for me. Yes, I have debts, but they're not crippling and I am paying them off. I don't have that many overheads and I am still able to afford a fair amount of luxuries like going to gigs, foreign travel etc. Guys in work are forever mentioning how much people get paid in other firms that do the same work, but I like our company and the money's adequate.

Ah well... I'm getting restless again. Back to my book...

Countdown...

The Dark Knight opens on July 25th in the UK.

Woooooooooooooh!

"Do her!"

So, it's the end of the working week. It hasn't been too bad, even though I'm trying to talk myself in to going in for a few hours on Sunday, though that's all for the greater good of getting a day off to see E. It ended on a good note with a bit of banter with SSCW about various things including a planned work night out and she was teasing me about my plans with E, hinting that I want to "do her" and when I denied any romantic involvement but admitted that E was single (to the best of my knowledge), SSCW said I should "do her" anyway. 

Either way, it was a good way to end the working week. I hope the weekend is good, though to be honest, I don't have anything planned. I have a new game to play for the PC, a new DVD to watch and a couple of downloads on the hard drive as yet unwwatched. Maybe it's a weekend for chilling in front of the telly?

More dreams.

I slept quite well last night. Somehow, during recent years, I've become quite a light sleeper. I don't know why that it... wrong bed? This sleep apnia thingy that I've been told I have (by E and FA2)? Who knows? Either way, it doesn't take a lot to wake me most nights.

Anway, I came off bout of deep sleep last night with memories of a dream involving E and a group of my friends and my friends telling me that I had to tell her. What this was I had to tell E was something I never found out. I dropped off to sleep again and awoke on cue to get showered for work.

It's now too late for E to get in contact. I believe she arrives back in the UK tomorrow, but I really needed to arrange my time off next week before the weekend so I could clear everything with my boss. He knows I want  to take the time (and why it's important to me that I do take it next week), so he should be accommodating. I might have to put in a few hours this weekend, though.

Boo!

The work thing's getting tricky again. Nothing's gone wrong as yet, but I've been given a project to do that was supposed to be quick and it's turning into something that's a lot more complicated than anyone first thought. Usually, that's no big thing because we work around them, but there are time constraints involved and it will clash with time off I want to take to see E. If E ever gets in contact that is.

I was also kinda hoping that QC2 would get in contact this week as her obligations finished on Monday, but I've not hear anything as yet. If I don't hear from her by next week, I'll drop her a line.

Yay.

The worriesome potential issue at work never raised its head, so I was able to get proper work done on my new project which is going well, and if E ever pulls her finger out and gets in contact, I should be able to spare the time next week to take a day off work for E.

Contact.

Having missed talking to E at the weekend, I had sent her an email trying to get confirmation of upcoming plans. I've not heard anything back though, but I hope she gets in touch shortly... time is of the essence here  and I remember how hard it was getting something out of her before my trip earlier this year.

Sigh.

Today, there was a potential issue flagged up at work with the project of mine that went pear shaped last week. It shouldn't be a problem, but my professional confidence has taken somewhat of a bashing since Christmas, mostly through no fault of my own. So, I'm seeing issues where there are none. This is partly the reason I'm looking elsewhere within the company. I may spread my wings a little later in the year and look at other firms or even other countries.

Growing old... (Part 2)

Following on from this post, I did go and see my GP about my knee. He does have a background in sports medicine/treatment, so this was one time that I was sure he'd be able to help. After prodding away at my knee for the best part of ten minutes, he really couldn't see anything wrong and gave me a basic prescription for anti-inflammatories.

He also weighed me and took my blood pressure. It appears that I've put on about 4 kg since I was last weighed in 2004. However, I was quite pleased as this actually meant I'd lost about 4kg (about 8/9 lbs) since the start of the year. I've no idea how or why as my diet hasn't changed enough to warrant that weight loss and I know that my increased football isn't responsible because that's only been ongoing for about 4 weeks and I know that I lost 2kg alone when I was travelling with E. He never said much about the blood pressure, so I assume that's OK or better!

It's given me a boost though and I can hopefully lose the same weight again to get me down to roughly 82 kg. That was kind of my goal when I was seeing GC semi-regularly at the gym and there's no reason to change that.

Dreams

I woke early this morning, before 6 AM, having slept well. I went downstairs and got a glass of water and returned to bed where I slept for another four hours. Awaking this time, I remembered parts of a dream I'd been having that involved QC3 and I having sex... a lot of sex. However, even though I can't remember exact details, this wasn't a sexy dream. I seem to remember a lot of fear or tension, but can't remember what in the dream would cause it to have that kind of atmosphere.

It's weird because I haven't thought of QC3 in a long time and it's been even longer since I thought of her in any kind of sexual way.

Cause and effect

With the huge cockup at work last week, I've spent all my time creating the solution to a problem that wasn't mine. In turn, that's eaten into time I had set aside for another project I've been allocated which is currently putting my planned, but still un-requested, time off for the near future in jeopardy. Ordinarily, that's not a big thing as I only take time to chill out without any real goals, but this time off was carefully planned to coincide with E being home. She's already agreed to take day out with me and we only need to hammer out the dates, but I now have two deadlines to meet in the week she's home which always ties up a lot of time in finalising the work and preparation.

I could potentially make that easier by doing long hours this week, which should mean less work the week after and has the added effect of putting a load of hours into my account to take later (or perhaps immediately with E). However, QC2 should be finally availablte this week and I'm half-expecting her to want to meet up which kind of goes against my plan of getting the work done before E-day. 

I like QC2 though, and I've not seen her in months. She'll want to catch up and unusually, I've a lot to tell her about my trip away and various other things. Plus, she used to be a keen photographer and I've got loads of holiday photos to show her, a lot of which I'm really proud of and I kinda want to show them off as the feedback thus far has been disappointing.

Meh.

It occurred to me today that FA2 has never mentioned anything about my trip to her neck of the woods. There's no reason that she wouldn't have seen all the evidence... I've posted some travel photos on Facebook and not really made any secret of my travels or where I was travelling to. Still, in the three months I've been home, she's said nothing at all.

I suppose that doesn't really say much because it's not as if V's been talkative, has it? So, why would FA2 be? Saying that, FA2 is the type to say something (you only have to look at how quick she was in contact when she smelt gossip about my personal life to know that she still does take an interest in my life), but perhaps in this case, she'd know that she'd end up hearing something she wouldn't like.

The thing is, I think I kinda want her to notice and say something...

[untitled]

I've finally managed to get my hands on all of E's photos from my trip out to visit her. It took a fucking age to get them all because I had to download them manually from her Flickr account. I guess, somewhat ironically, some smart bugger will pop up and post the first comment I've had in years about some tool that'll do it all automatically.

Anyway, now that I've got all that sorted, I can start putting together E's birthday present. I've got about two weeks in total to get it sorted, but I want it done and out of the way by this time next week.

I think it'll be great, especially considering the responses from people in work. It would be nice if E showed something similar. I doubt it though. She's showed no signs of anything like that in the time I've known her, though according to her friend that I speak to, she has been very grateful about presents I've bought in the past.

Sweat over!

I've just taken the plunge and installed Windows XP Service Pack 3. Thankfully, the laptop rebooted OK and the lovely Catherine Bell was soon smiling at me sexily once again.

Steps forward?

SSCW was asking me today about work. She's going part-time later this year to study Law at university. SSCW is someone that thinks she knows all the answers (or rather she gives that impression although I'm convinced most of it is an act). She was accusing me (for want of a better word) of not being pro-active enough about looking elsewhere for employment.

I explained that, despite my frustrations from time to time, I was happy in the industry and fairly happy within the company and that I'd be more likely to seek a move to another department and while my skills would remain relevant, my knowledge would then be obsolete. (That's a good thing though, because the knowledge I'm picking up in this current team isn't transferable anywhere else, so I'd require completely new training etc.)

I've had this conversation with SSCW before, but I'm not sure she knows me well enough to understand what I'm trying to say.

Anyway, a few hours later, my boss comes over for "a chat". I'm a bit apprehensive because there's currently a project in work that's gone over time (not my fault), so I'm wondering if the client is kicking up a fuss. However, it's nothing bad and he actually offered to send me on a training course later this year with some new technology we're going to start using. I mentioned to him that I was currently frustrated and explained why and mentioned that I was actually considering requesting a transfer to another department. He was quite supportive, to be fair because in the past I've actually wondered if he even knows what goes on in the team if he's not directly informed, so this was a nice surprise.

Still the good thing at this point is that he knows I'm not 100% happy. I suggested the place on the training course was given to someone else as I couldn't give any long-term guarantees and actually, the lack of my core technical knowledge means that I'm unlikely to get locked in to the team as some of my work colleagues have found themselves. The silver lining for the cloud!

Good looking women are stress relievers...

My "admiration" of Catherine Bell has been documented before on Baby Needs and although I've had a stressful day at work when I fired up my laptop when I came home, this greeted me (it's my current desktop on my laptop):

Look at her... *drool* Brings a smile to my face (and not a fair amount of frustration as you can imagine the fun you could have with her in the sack).

Still... *drool*

Work. Moan.

Work, again. Sigh.

I've got 48 hours to turn around a gap in a project that really shouldn't have happened had our clients paid attention to the law and been much better at communication. Shoving a requirement into a little-used tool with only a few lines of text to let us know of a reasonably important update is not the way to get work done. Now I have to try and turn it all round in 48 hours. It was 36 hours, but fuck it, I'm not staying in work until all hours and if this thing slips, then it slips. That mkight teach them to communicate better.

Fishing from the company pool...

On one of my other internet haunts, someone recently posed this question:

How many members of the opposite sex work in your office and how many would you sleep with?

Well, for me, the answer is twelve in total (out of about 70 people total) and I think I'd sleep with four of them, including SSCW.

A busy few days.

It's been a busy few days. On Thursday, I was drafted in to a footy competition in work, which was enjoyable even though we were eliminated in the early rounds and didn't get anywhere near where we'd hoped to. Still, if it is run again, I'll definitely put my name down.

I've been to Wembley and back, to see the Foo Fighters (it was totally excellent) and had the proposed night out with D and that crowd (no FBS though).

We met a couple of girls at the concert and ended up having a couple of drinks with them once we got back into the centre of London. Despite one of them talking about a boyfriend, FP was convinced there was potential there between me and the younger of the two girls, but I was just enjoying myself and wasn't really interested in taking it somewhere physical. Mind you, had she made an offer, maybe I would have thought differently.

E's home in two weeks, so I really need to pull my finger out with regards to getting her birthday present sorted.

The internet...

Looking for a song? Not interested in torrents or entire albums?

try:

http://worryaboutyou.com/

Memories

The sun was rising over the mountains to the east. The sky was clear and even though it was not yet 8 AM, it was obviously going to be another clear, beautiful day. I stretched out my legs and settled back for the journey, putting in my earphones and selecting shuffle on my iPod.

As we entered the mountains, on one of those winding roads you rarely see outside of a film, a new tune started playing. "Everything goes around the water" by The Delagados. It was a song I'd forgotten I had, but it just seemed so apt, musically (though maybe not lyrically). I was halfway through my trip and the tricky two weeks that I had been travelling on my own was at an end as I'd be meeting up with E later that day and another friend of mine the next day. I was chilled, happy and looking forward to the last phase of my travels.

That's the memory that stirred today when, just like above, I had the iPod on random and "Everything goes around the water" appeared once again. I remember reading one post on Belle de Jour's blog that just reminded me of something really cinematic and my own memory above is exactly the same (probably made even more so with the added soundtrack).

More!

More contact today, this time from E. We chatted on Skype for an hour or so and I re-enforced my desire to see her when she comes home in a few weeks. I got good vibes off of that and it looks like I might get to see her quite a few times that week - a day on our own, doing our normal birthday stuff (drink, shoot pool etc.), plus she's got other mates visiting from all over the U.K. which will mean at least one night out to celebrate her birthday. I'm looking forward to it!