Catch Up Blog

Haven't been able to blog for a few days as the link through our website was broken so lots of catching up to do........

Had a great weekend. Went to Shirley on Saturday for a mooch about and got some amazing bargains in the charity shops including a new sofa !!! Before we went out I went online to search on Ebay for a really obscure record that my dad used to play to death at Christmas (from 1968 onwards); so myself and my brother are very fond of it. Anyway, amazingly found it on Ebay and set my highest bid. A couple of hours later, went into a charity shop and I never look at the records section normally, but flicked through the first few in a box and there it was for £1.00 - what are the chances of that – it’s sort of obscure Tijuana stuff………… Needless to say I won the Ebay bid for £8.55 plus postage which is the only time I haven't been happy to win a bid.

Anyway, the last shop we went to was Oxfam which sells furniture. As soon as we walked in I instantly fell in love with a sofa they had in there – right colour, right shape – just what I had imagined in my mind would fit in our front room. I spent so long looking at it longingly that Peter said ok we could have it – unfortunately it won’t be delivered until 19th December (and I’m now worried it won’t fit through the doors of the house but I’m sure we’ll force it in somehow).

On the way back we went to The Range and bought a few Xmas pressies in there and discovered they had a coffee shop too!

Yesterday (what a day with the weather!!!) mum and dad came around for the day and we had lunch and during a break in the weather went to Blashford lakes http://www.wessexwater.co.uk/education/sub_centres.aspx?id=895
near Ringwood which has some excellent bird watching. One of the hides is right by a forest area where they have bird feeders and we saw two woodpeckers, pheasant, loads of chaffinches, tree creepers, nut hatches, black birds, song thrushes, squirrels (the fattest squirrels you ever did see!), blue tits, robins …………. I can only describe it as a feeding frenzy of birds – I highly recommend going. Didn’t get back until dark and had tea in front of the fire – bliss.

Today our roofer has been again and I have booked Building Control to come out on Friday – I’m taking the day off to be there as I’m going to get very firm if there’s any further hassle.

Not really a good morning at work – I had put a lot of hard work into organising the Secretaries/PA's Xmas lunch and I’d had to persuade some staff into switching days so that certain people could go on the same day as they had asked (we go over two separate days). Well 2 of them suddenly turned round today and said they had booked the day off as leave - can you believe it? Well sod them, I didn’t invite them to the alternative day as it’s clearly a ‘hidden message/protest’ type of thing in there - there's still a lot of resentment about post merger. I don't think I shall bother organising it next year – sad sign of the times.

I also have inherited organising a birthday card for all the PA's/Secretaries which everyone is invited sign for each other. This has also got very awkward – I’ve kept the group going and used my own cards for now and some people take part and others, don't – so very awkward when their birthdays’ fall and they get a card but don’t sign anyone else’s. In the New Year I’m going to email them all and ask if it’s worth bothering with so to speak and select the revised group from there – what else can you do?

Catching up with yesterday's papers this evening as we didn't really get chance yesterday. What with taking this Friday off this week I have only 8 more days of work until I break up for Christmas - god I so can't wait. I have 19 work free days to look forward too - bliss indeed.