Complications

It's been a while again. Sorry, if anyone has been wondering what's happening.

So I still have no access to the internet at home. This netbook doesn't work with my wireless dongle and the "big laptop" is FUBAR. I'm currently availing of free wifi at the hotel near work.

I'd really like to have a rant here about something at work but that breaches the only form of self-censorship I've set myself. So I can't.

Suffice to say that myself and my Lovely Lady have discovered that someone appears to hold a grudge against us. Consequently, while at work, we're having to steer clear of one another. It's ridiculous, upsetting and frankly, I'm as angry as I can ever remember being. I'm a good friend to have but a poor enemy to make. My Lady and I are easily strong enough to get past this but someone is gonna get theirs one day. Big time.

We both have next week off on holiday and she's taking the chance to catch up with family a little. I approve. I'll miss her horribly but I wholeheartedly approve. She needs to be "away" for a while, I think and her kids will love it. So will she.

So, I will probably spend most of the week reading, sleeping, listening to music and working on my Voodoo Doll. I will resist the temptation to go out and get righteously plastered as I'll only get maudlin and, to be honest, I'm getting too old for that shit now.

There may well be more posts here than there have been of late. It's probably cheaper to pay for an hour or two in an Internet Cafe than to find somewhere with free wifi - that tends to involve my buying pints, just to be polite, you understand!

For now, that's probably all I have for you. I hope that Herself will be finished work soon and we can spend about an hour together before she has to go. The week before last was something akin to Heaven on Earth. This week has been far, far harder to deal with. Such is life, I suppose.

Googled

I seem to have bought into Google wholesale recently. I set up a new gmail account with a more "grown up" address than my previous one and set it to gather all my other email accounts to it. I imported everything into my Google Calendar (apart from shifts at work - gah! I'm going to have to find out what time I'm expected in next Monday) and Google address book. I just switched my feeds from Bloglines to the Google Reader and can now post at Twirling from the new account.

I guess this was prompted by not having a working computer at home. I needed to be able to easily find everything, preferably all in one place. It's helped but it's still very frustrating not to be able get online whenever I want without walking down to an internet café.

At least when I do have access at home again, I'll have the convenience, thanks to the work I've put in.

Doors of perception

It's really difficult to blog at the moment. My phone only seems to be able to create drafts, rather than published posts, which leaves either work or an internet café. Work has been kinda mad (especially today) and usually when I'm in a café I have other priorities.

As my Lady is finally enjoying herself a little before flying home, I thought I'd drop in at Twirling and blow the dust away. Things quickly start to look a little unkempt.

I had a sudden awareness today of being in a strange land. As both my PC and my TV are broken, my opportunities to connect with "the familiar" are few and far between. The PC gave me a chance to interact with the rest of the world and the television, God help me, was company - other voices, other faces. So I've turned to radio and I miss the BBC.

Tonight I went for Newstalk, as opposed to any of the RTE stations (which are, politely, not great) or any of the local radion stations (like local radio the world over - an acquired taste). At one point, they referred to a popular satirical show hosted by an Irish stand-up comedian. A panelist had asked, if the recent World Cup final had been between England and France, who would the Irish have hated most? The host said that he thought they'd have to go with the Old Enemy.

It was a joke. It was funny. I get that. But I suddenly felt very alone. I don't really miss England. I made my decision with eyes wide open and have never regretted it for a second. Just occasionally though, I get lonely. Both the TV and the PC were more than windows on the world, they were doors I could step through, away from the four walls of my lovely little house. Both those doors were slammed suddenly, in quick succession. To me, the joke about the "Old Enemy" was accompanied by soundtrack of a door gradually creaking shut.

I'll be fine tomorrow, I'm sure. This has just been one of those days when everything was subtly off-kilter, even before I'd switched the alarm clock off. No worries. I have a lot to be thankful for and a lot to look forward to. Including a better day tomorrow, hopefully.

Incidentally

It's absolutely chucking it down with rain. Even though it's not easy to blog from my phone I wanted to share that with you.

Waves

Feeling a little peculiar again today. I had a blazing migraine last night and couldn't settle in bed at all. It wasn't until waves of nausea swept over me at about 3.30 in the morning and I actually threw up (sorry for the overshare) that I was able to drift of into sleep.

I'm still not right. A little light-headed and very tense around my neck and shoulders. This would be the stress of my laptop breaking down when my lady is so far away. Thank God for Internet Cafés, one of which I'm in at the moment. The patop is in for a quote for repair but I fear that it might actually work out cheaper to buy a new one as that'll come with a warranty.

So I'll get my shopping home and put away and then, after making a phone call to an insurance company, maybe have a doze. Certainly a little light music and a few pages of my book, at least, and I'll take it from there.

A bright note is that one of the Tescos around the city has started stocking their not-from-concentrate Pineapple Juice that I've been missing so much while I've been over here. That's going straight into the fridge when I get home and I wouldn't be surprised if I've necked the lot by the morning.

Okay, I'm getting charged by the minute here, so that's it until I feel the pressing need to blog again.

Trauma

Nightmare. My computer finally chooses to breathe it's last while my Lady is on the other side of the world and our only easy form of contact (that isn't going to break the bank) is Skype. Yes, I have this small, pink netbook I'm typing this from but I can't use it at the house as my wireless dongle isn't compatible with it's Linux operating system and neither is Skype.

So I have the option of Internet Cafes, which I'm doing tonight, or replacing the computer. I know just enough about laptops to understand that to get it fixed (parts and labour) is going to cost me almost as much as buying a brand new one with a 3-year guarantee. Now to go speak nicely to financial institutions...

Unadventurous

Today, being Monday, was the first weekday of my week off. I didn't leave the house. I pottered around, did a little housework, a little laundry, you know the kind of stuff.

I'm going to go for a walk tomorrow. Nowhere in particular, just out for a walk. The only restriction I'm putting on it is that I'm not going anywhere that might involve spending money. I'm not actually skint yet but payday is looking quite a distance away at the moment and I don't want to run out of money before I get there. Besides little luxuries like food, I have to consider bus-fares as well, which is why time off is doubly welcome.

Having said that, I may pop up to my desk one day this week, early before anyone else is around, just to check over the emails to ensure that I don't find myself with hundreds needing my attention next Monday, and of course to see if there's any news on the job front, although if there was anything urgent I think I'd have got a phone call.

I've spent most of today immersed in Led Zeppelin. I'm not the biggest fan in the world but every now and then I feel like listening to some. Today was one of those days.

What tomorrow brings, who knows?

D'Yer Mak' 'Er?

It's a little ironic. Almost a year to the day since I arrived in Cork, my reason for reason flew out to Jamaica for a month, on work business.

Yes, I miss her horribly but we have Skype and have chatted a fair bit already. I'm more worried about her than myself. It's an awful long way from home to be, by oneself. If there had been any way at all for me to raise the fare then I'd have gone over too, so we could have bitched and moaned about the heat together. I know that she'll be fine - she's a smart, strong lady and I'm very, very proud of her, but everyone needs a hug now and again and she and I have got used to being able to turn to each other whenever we need (almost).

This is why July will be a long month. Unless the lottery ticket I have in my wallet is a winner, in which case there'll be a frantic scramble to cash it and book seats on the soonest possible flight out there.

It's getting a little late for this. I have all next week off work but I'm wilting a little now, so I think that is all for tonight.

Anniversary

As I have an important interview in the morning, this won't be a long one but I couldn't not post something.

July 8th 2009 I arrived in Cork. In the year since then I have been the most loved, best looked after man in the world. The future is bright, alhough July this year is going to be a loooong month.

Whoever said...

...that there was anything remotely easy about Sunday morning?

Unpaid.

So I'm sat at work on one of my days off. That's grand, though. I've come up to meet the most beautiful girl in the world out of work and she's just finishing off one or two things before we leave. She's nomming a choccie bar while working and has just giggled at my current Facebook status so I figure I have time to blog quickly, while glancing surreptitiously at her so as not to disturb further. She really does take my breath away.

I can't believe I have so much holiday time to take in the next couple of months. I guess that's because in the 11 months or so that I've been working here, I really haven't taken much time off at all. If I could find a way to raise the cash I would so be jetting off with my Lady somewhere.

We went to see Deep Purple Live At The The Marquee, in Cork last Wednesday night. Thoroughly enjoyable. If anyone is remotely interested, my review can be found here. There always seem to be some good stuff on there - last year saw both Chickenfoot and Anastacia playing, both of whom I'd have shelled out for tickets for but they were about a month before I arrived. This year has had Paul Weller and Blondie amongst others, but I didn't really have the financial muscle to manage more than one and that just had to be Purple. Can't wait to see what next year brings!

I'm only at work for about two days over the next three weeks so I must make sure that my Manager/Team Leads have my contact details to hand, should I be called for an interview for any of the jobs that I've applied for internally. Two of them are "interim posts" which would be cool but for a limited period of time. The other one is a permanent position involving a lot of writing, which sounds right up my street...

Fingers crossed.

Electrickery

There's something going on with the electrical appliances. Watch yourselves - their day may have come!

I could put the way my phone startled me down to circumstance. It very rarely rings. When it does ring it's usually my lovely Lady. This evening I'd just got out of her car and knew that she wouldn't be calling for 15 minutes or so. When the phone rang in my pocket I think I actually left the pavement! Accidental dial - she was trying to call someone else and accidentally pressed the "dial" button and called me. Stoopid phone.

When she rang me intentionally a little while later, I learned that their TV has lost it's picture. And this only a day after her laptop bit the dust. Hmmm. All coincidental, you may say. As my laptop has been acting the bollox anyway, then you could possibly stretch that point to include my first ever "blue screen of death". Fair enough. I've been running Windows PCs for years and this is the first time I've ever seen one.

It's surely not concidental, though, that further attempts were made on me when I got home. I went turn on the lights in the kitchen and was met with a BANG as one of the bulbs blew and threw the circuit breaker. Heart racing, I took out the bulb and reset the circuit. Then my shower unit steadfastly refused to switch on for a good 10 attempts.

There's something going on and it's more than mutiny. Rebellion is in the air, I tell you.

Back again

I should maybe be making more of an effort to blog regularly. In my defence, I've been filling another commission for articles for the website I sometimes write for. That's not much of an excuse because I've been leaving it until the last thing for the last two weeks to get the articles in just before the deadlines - I've had ideas brewing and initial drafts in process but it's been a rush to get the articles completed.

It's been kind of busy at work as well. Besides the hours-per-day, I've been keeping some anti-social hours to try to support a Lady who has been working horribly hard with very little acknowledgement. 

It's also been rather unpleasant here weather-wise. I have no problems at all with rain but the recent spell of hot, muggy weather has had me wilting completely. I'm exhausted through the days, battling headaches and sleeping less well than usual through the sticky nights. Seriously, though, how bad? I need to get over it and get on with things. There's worse things than the weather, right?

So I have this week off work, although I'll be popping in on Wednesday for another interview for an interim post and then off to see Deep Purple Live at the Marquee in Cork with my Lady. It's a little strange being off work. Since I started there I've had so little time off that I'm at a little bit of a loose end. Yes, I could take some day trips but I don't really want to be spending lots of money because I'm off work. I think it's maybe a week for just chilling and catching up on some reading and some housework and taking opportunities to see my lady whenever its convenient. It's nice not to be ruled by the clock for a week, though.

Vagueness

I tend to fight shy of blogging about work but here I sit blogging from work! I'm not being too much of a bad guy - I am now well outside my working hours and am just hanging around waiting for my lovely Lady and using the company's electricity rather than my own.

I'm not breaking too much of my self-imposed restriction when I say that I'm very excited about tomorrow as I have an interview for an interim post, doing more the sort of thing that I'd like to be doing. I'll keep you posted, albeit in a vague, cryptic manner.

For now, that is all...

And counting...

This won't be a long post as I've got to be up in just over 4 hours to go to work. Stupid boy to be up this late.

I've got to be honest, these 1-day weekends are starting to get a little old. I know that it's my own fault if I choose to work overtime but even so I think it's be nice to have a little time off. I know I've got some holidays coming up soon and it'll just be nice to have a few days off in a row.

That reminds me, I must try to "fine-tune" my holidays a little tomorrow. So I guess I should go to sleep.

Bank Holiday

It's been a Bank Holiday in Ireland today. Coupled with my having a day off work, it's made the day feel very like a Sunday so forgive me if I get confused about days, okay? I don't have a set theme in mind for this post so it might feel like a bunch of bullet point stiched together loosely.

Last week was (I nearly typed "this week has been") a very strange week in lots of ways. There were so many niggles and irritations going on that either my Lady or I were soothing one another's frayed nerves nearly every day. The weather was very hot and sultry too, which didn't make it any easier. I learned (or rediscovered) that even under the kind of stress that was going on I was more than capable of doing my job...and more. This bodes well for the future, more of which in a later entry, I hope.

I've been searching for somewhile for some free calendar software that meets my needs. I'd tried Outlook at home (works reasonably well but is too much or a resource hog - I don't need all those features), Thunderbird, with the "Lightning" calendar add-on (very disappointing - lots of issues with Thunderbird itself), Sunbird (which is effectively a stand-alone version of the aforementioned add-on) which is where I thought I'd settled but I've recently been very happy with the "ReminderFox" add-on for Firefox. I have it installed on Firefox both at home and at work, which is a good sign. I'll keep you posted.

I was supposed to be off work tomorrow as well but agreed to do a day's overtime. It'll help the old bank balance next month and it never hurts to show willing.

July will be a long month, I fear.

So if I'm at work tomorrow, I should go. I don't have to get up as early as I might, thanks to a beautiful lady offering to  pick me up but I do still have to remake the bed before I can climb into it.

Goodnight all.

Me 1 Monday 0

I've been sat here for most of the evening listening to the rain rumbling on the roof. After a few days of sunshine, someone has really decided to empty the watering can.

It's been an interesting day. For some reason I've been rather confrontational today. Not with any particular person, nor with people in general - more with the day itself. Quite why I decided that Monday might have it in for me, I don't know and it's certainly not like me to get my retaliation in first but that's how it happened. I got up, kind of launched myself at Monday and grabbed it by the throat.

Whether or not it was necessary, I'm not sure. Whether the day would have turned out any better or worse if I hadn't seen it as an adversary to be overcome, I don't know. It's some distance outside my usual perspective though and took a fair amount of energy to maintain.

So how do I meet Tuesday? Do I stroll up to it with a grin and offer it "five" or do I kick its lily-white ass as soon as I set eyes on it?

*sigh* Life is very confusing.

Event Horizon

So as it's now early Monday morning does this still count as the weekend?

I haven't forgotten about "Twirling" but I seem to have been crowded for time recently. I've been playing a fair amount of chess again, which can easily take up a whole evening if I get the right frame of mind. And of course, I've been spending as much time as possible with my lovely Lady.

Every time we have to go our own ways for a little while it gets a little more difficult. I think that we're getting closer to an Event Horizon; reaching Critical Mass. Every day is a day nearer being together all the time.

And today she bought me the coolest rainbow shoelaces!

Remember me?

Er...hello.

Sorry. It's been ages. And it's very late now.

I have two whole days off work at the weekend, so there'll be something here then, 'kay?

Promise.

Denial

I never have nightmares. Especially not the kind that wake me up in the dead of night, dry-mouthed, heart racing and screams echoing in my head.

So there's no need for me to have turned on the light and to be sat here cuddling a small, fluffy dinosaur, jumping at every car that drives by, flinching at every gust of wind, with the bitterness of unshed tears cluching at my throat with fingers as dry as the grave.

Just sayin'.