Something For The Weekend...

I’m glad I’m not going to stay here now. I get treated as a part of the technological furniture and just an existential part of the bloody machine I keep banging away on day in, day out. I really wish today was my last day, but I suppose I get the pleasure of wrapping everything up throughout next week for when I leave on Friday. Leaving without another job isn’t great, but I’ve had enough now. I really want to get the Chelsea job. It’s not the best place to get to, it’s not as much money; but it is a sector that I know, and actually like and enjoy. That’s worth more than anything else. Not to mention that here I’m now being asked to do stuff that I haven’t been shown how to do, haven’t been trained for and know absolutely nothing about. I don’t know how these bloody places work – I was just dragged in to make their database clean and shiny on the inside so it made a lot more sense. That and about a decade’s worth of data entry.

I’m bored, and I’m not going to get paid on time – again. It’s really pissing me off now. At least this time it’ll be only a day late (hopefully) – even though it’ll be hardly anything because of Snowy Monday. That’s £80 down the drain… along with all that bloody snow. And all this really doesn’t make me want to work here. I want to go upstairs to the staff room, lie on their nice cozy couch, and stuff my nose in books and magazines for the next 5 hours.

At least my face doesn’t feel quite so bad anymore. I’ve got a 4.30pm appointment with 171 Salon on Upper Street tomorrow for a detox facial and a Swedish back-and-shoulder massage. £59 – but well worth it… Especially given a shrink would cost twice as much and wouldn’t be half as enjoyable (or even at all). I’m just glad my skin has stopped burning. However, I still look like the Bride of Frankenstein.

Working reminds me a lot of being at college – a lot of activities going on around me, and I’ve got my head either stuck in my work or up in the clouds. It’s what makes me happy; but it also reinforces the fact that I’m a very different creature to most people that are in this world. Sometimes it gives me pause for thought… Now, though, more often than not I just enjoy and get on with it. It’s genuinely what I’m happiest at, so why the hell not?? Do I have to fit into a pigeon-hole? Last time I checked, I wasn’t a pigeon. Maybe I should check again?...???

Looking forward to going for a little bit of shopping, after dropping Paris off at Charing Cross Railway Station tomorrow morning (I have my list all ready). Going to get something nice for myself to watch/play, and chill, go to my appointment, call the pizza place, and put what I want on while I stuff food in my face and enjoy my own company. Yey!! (Not that I won’t miss Paris like a dog misses licking it’s bollocks (I’m crude! … And???!!) but I may as well enjoy myself while she’s not here. When the cat’s away… Lel will kick back and do absolutely bugger all!!!

Looooong Week....

This is turning out to be just a horrible, horrible, horribly long week. I look like Quasimodo’s ugly sister – my face is swollen and eczema’d everywhere – my hair just looks like a 6-inch mess, and I just feel like a weak, fat frump, with no energy, or a shit if the world blew up in the next 20 seconds. I’m exhausted, dead, and met my match of boredom in this place. I’m pining for my old job – or something that at least resembles it.

Right now I’m just stuffed in a corner, banging away at the computer, barely part of the furniture, and probably even less useful. Or so they think. It’s not like I’m really capable of doing anything else around here. As soon as I’ve been trudging away obsessively at the vast amount of work I’m trying desperately to put a dent into for around an hour, I start losing all concept of the “outside” world. I can hear vague voices talking around me, and I only take any notice if it’s loud enough to actually disturb me. If anyone talks to me I’ve forgotten the art of interaction and socialisation, and can barely mutter incomprehensively while whatever they say goes in through one ear and out the other in nanoseconds. I feel like I’ve just become an extension of the computer… I’m thinking this is not good for me! Although I enjoyed the brainwork of sorting it all out, the arduous and tedious task of inputting all the data of the backlogged 3 months I have piled on my desk is somewhat of a miracle that not even his Lordship Jesus Christ could have pulled off in his heyday of curing lepers and making the crippled walk. One look at me and my caseload and he’d just run away, deeming it all a lost cause and crying for Daddy to come and take him home. In fact, I’m so head-buggered, I’m contemplating making all the female Christians Rabbis in the database just for the hell of it.

SOMEONE GET ME A TRIPLE-GRANDE SKINNY SUGER-FREE HAZELNUT CAPPUCCINO – I’M GOING MAD!!!!

I tried Jasmine Green Tea, but it looked and tasted of over-saturated piss. It really wasn’t a good idea, because I’ve felt quite nauseous since. And my headache’s just been getting worse. So let’s all blame it on the Jasmine Tea and forget about the fact I’ve just spent almost 3 hours straight in front of the computer with nothing but it to talk to. Nah… it’s got nothing to do that at all…

Mud-infused piss called Nescafe it is then… Shame it doesn’t cure headaches, insomnia, weight-issues, stress, depression, and whatever else I’ve got. I’d be well cured otherwise!!!

I’m getting lost inside the computer here. It’s like The Matrix, only my body is right here on the outside. I’m forgetting how to be an actual human in this place. People talk to me and I’ve forgotten how to talk back. I spend 7 hours a day staring at this computer. Now I’m no PhD Psychoanalyst (as it is, I only ever could afford to go no further than A-level psych and sociology – much to my life-long disappointment… at 28) – but I would definitely hazard a guess that the state I’m in is about as good as Nazis invading Austria. Maybe slightly worse, truth be told. I’ll not be happy to leave Anne Tayler Centre – the place is great – but I will be glad to be rid of this damned database… not to mention the damned agency and its inability to put money in my account for all my slaving. I might get £12 an hour, but, frankly, they could add a “0” on the end of that and it still wouldn’t be enough money for this huge headache.

I’m knackered, I’m over-stressed, and I’m just about ready to fall over. Oh yes. And I’m really pissed I haven’t had all the money owed from the damned agency for the work I’ve slogged my guts out doing for the last 2 ½ weeks. Apparently my [equivalent of] £22,000K job is actually voluntary work… I even just checked my bank and nothing has been put in it. So I’ve sent the payment company 2 strongly worded emails regarding where my money is. I can’t even begin to go into how far back in payments I am right now with everybody. Once again, it’s going to take me months to get out of this financial hole.

On the bright side, I got a call yesterday – a voicemail actually – from the Chelsea & Westminster Hospital about the job interview I went to there for Recruitment Assistant in HR. After getting the voicemail about 3 hours after it was left from a woman called Jaz at HR, I then accidentally deleted it and had to run downstairs from the staff room back to my desk to use my researcher skills to locate her contact details to call her back. Then when I finally got through, I was told she was in a meeting. I called back around 2pm and finally got hold of her, and she told me that apparently I had (at least – nice ego boost!) short-listed to the last 3 candidates – not bad! She asked for permission to give Occu Health form in to them and to contact references, which of course I said yes to. I advised them about the Learning Trust Job that was going on until 20 Feb, and then they said they would get back to me. We’ll see… But I’m still chuffed I’m the best except for 2 other people there! Not bad at all for a Leli-Bug..!! And at least if I got the job, I’d actually get paid…

It snowed again this morning, and it all turned to ice. It was almost impossible to walk on. I’ve got a horrible headache. I’m finding it hard to concentrate on the screen and tedious work because of it. I’m just so relieved it’s Friday (although I spent up until the time I signed into work thinking it was Thursday, and all day yesterday convinced it was Wednesday. I’m still in shock it’s the weekend after 5pm. It took over an hour to get to work thanks to some diversion or other that TFL hadn’t provided for at 8 o’clock in the morning, and we had to take a ½ hour detour before getting to Clapton. I eventually dragged myself in at 9.20am, and had a shock when I saw the time because I didn’t think it had taken that long.

Also had a late night last night – after going to “rescue” Paris from work because she had no money to go home on her Oyster Card, we went into Game and got the Xbox 360 wireless Steering Wheel and pedals for £69.99 (…yes, another reason why there’s no money to pay bastards like credit card companies!), after that afternoon she had traded in her Sonic Unleashed game for Project Gotham 4. Then we (well, she) dragged the huge box all the way home and then we set about that evening trying to figure it all out… Well, I stropped, she figured. Then when it finally got going, I had a ball careering around London and crashing into things J . It was way fun!!!

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow

Oh my god – I can’t believe how much snow there was here today! OK, I’m used to it back home, but here 6 inches of snow is a big deal!! Everything completely ground to a halt – no buses, no tube, a bit of DLR… No way to get to work. So I stayed here. It’s funny, coz when I saw it I never actually assumed everything would grind to a halt – it would never happen anywhere else! I was quite expecting to go to work – until on impulse I decided to check the TFL Website, and lo and behold! Click on buses and it displays “Buses suspended” in big letters.Suspended until further notice, naturally. They still are, too.

There’s at least 6 inches of it still outside now. At least it’s not thick while its falling now; just a fine powdery dusting. Although it’s still falling continuously. Apart from going to the shop, we stayed in all day. I played Tomb Raider: Underworld (such a cool game… although there is so much to be desired with it’s shitty camera, whilst Paris worked on music. Now she’s taken over on it from me and making a whole pig’s ear out of it - while throwing grenades at giant iguana thingies that keep turning up in it. The only other down-side is that they make you kill tigers in it. That’s really not cool. They’re just too cute to be mean things that you have to kill.

I’ve had a buggering time with my leg though. Somethings been pulled or torn behind my knee and it’s playing hell now. It’s all swollen and painfull and I can’t put hardly any weight on it. Made it 10 times worse buggering around Canterbury after Madam on Saturday without any support on it. And now I’ve got a support it barely does anything because it just rolls up on itself. That was a real waste of £6-somthing. Haven’t been bothered to use it all day, but the pain is, well… a right pain. Also trying to do online shopping whilst writing this and wating Paris play Tomb Raider (good and bad in certain measures!). I’m too tired for multi-tasking, so I’ve done about 80% watching, 15% writing, and 5% shopping. Right on track! The fact that there are man-eating spiders jumping all over Lara Croft doesn’t help – they’re really freaky!! Pooh…..

I’m so glad I bought that XBox now! I’ll even get to play the new CSI… When I get around to buying it! So far I’m rather addicted to this Tomb Raider (yes – me!) – it’s rather compelling! It’s rather feminist too, I reckon… A rather dishy and spunky brunette – a strong, agile gymnast who’s quite violent, scared of nothing, and an excellent shooter. And she can play the boys at their own game and win! She’s everything a “nice woman” shouldn’t be! What would the 1950’s twin-set, twin-tub Good-Little-Stepford-Wives Club think??!!! … This is probably why Paris can’t really get her head around it – she’s a bit of a ringlet-haired, Barbie-like honourary-blonde. And she’s killed poor Lara more times in the last 10 minutes (about once every 30 seconds is her avarage tonight) than Paris Hilton has handbags. It’s pretty unbelievable… She’s turned the Millenium’s She-Ra into a lemming…!

… I think I want some take out – Shame Santa doesn’t deliver pizza on his sleigh in February…!!!

Best Laid Plans - etc, etc

Got to go to Canterbury yesterday… And Rabbie Burns was right – “Best laid plans of Mice and Men” etc… It was really crap. Paris just had one big paranoid, bitchy hissy-fit the entire time and made my life a misery. I’ve pulled or torn ligaments in the back of my left knee, so walking is a nightmare and totally painful. And all I got to do there was see the Canterbury Tales museum. Oh, yes. And bought an XBox (which weighed a bloody tonne – who’d have thought?? It’s so tiny!). Got it with Sonic Unleashed (Paris’ choice – stupidly. She hates it), and Tomb Raider: Underworld (So cool! Again, Paris hates it). Also got a pre-owned one called Underworld – and that’s fan-tabby-tastic! And I’ve barely started playing it!



And the madness has continued. She’s been insane since Friday night, and now it’s Sunday night I haven’t had a sodding break. Not even a shower has been able to wash away the crap. It just makes my skin feel tight and unloved – it (my face) doesn’t like water. I’m so tired I’m beyond exhausted. I’m just so really glad I bucked down and made a good amount of pasta sauce to freeze and a giant pasta bake to eat over a few days – it’s make life so much easier this weekend. And I even get to take it to work tomorrow for lunch, so I don’t have to worry about that either. Thank god for occasional sense and forsight.



It’s now snowing in London. The cat’s gone out in it (I always knew he was completely insane). And I am ready to hibernate until the insanity is all over. I’m wishing I could go back to Canterbury, though, because it’s such a gorgeous city. I absolutely loved it. I hadn’t been there since I was about 11, but it was still lovely. And even there, Starbucks is being used as the new Student Union hangout, so we went and chilled in Costa instead (which apparently is completely British – originally set up as a rostary in Lambeth in 1971 by Italian brothers called Costa). I can’t imagine where these kids are getting all their money from that they can afford £5 a cup for some coffee. I used to think it was a rip-off paying 70p for a can of Fanta…