Another holiday

I didn't post anything last week as I was on holiday again. Saying again as people tell me I have a lot of holidays and I guess they're right. I do take as many as I can as I enjoy seeing different things, places, etc.

Last week I went to Norfolk and hired a cottage by the sea for the week. It was very 'by the sea' too as the cottage looked right out onto the sea with nothing in between.

Here is a photo from inside.

I do love the sea - there's something very soothing about the sound of crashing waves - I adored it at night to fall asleep by.

The weather in most of the UK was horrendous last week, but there was a nice patch in Norfolk where we were that kept it dry and mostly sunny except for one really wet day midweek. On the whole the weather was great.  I just walked by the shore, read  and ate.  Not much else. Visited Cromer (genteel!) and Great Yarmouth (too tacky!) and Redwings animal sanctuary. But that was it.

Archie wasn't very happy as there weren't any carpets and he is uneasy on hard floors - tends to slide and it makes him windy. Here he is sitting in the hall looking fed up.

On the other hand, he did love the beaches and the walks, which he managed despite his sore leg.
I was fairly relaxed, though there are always times when I get very stressed when on doing anything with M. She knows exactly the buttons to press to wind me up and I react every time.

Ah well, back to it now.

May 31st

It got a bit chilly yesterday afternoon after the very hot weather of the previous few days. I even had to put a bit of heating on in the car on the drive home - a bit drastic considering I'd driven to work with the air conditioning on.

I had every intention of going for a walk after my dinner, but as usual that all went pear-shaped as I sank into the sofa in a stupor, watched the TV for a couple of hours, then retired to bed. It is a short working week for me however, as Monday was a bank holiday and I am off on holiday on Friday. M & I have booked a cottage for a week in Norfolk, which Archie will like as he will be able to run out right onto the beach. It does usually take him a few days to settle though.

I'm hoping for OK weather, not the chilly rain of yesterday. Today has been better, so fingers crossed. Work has been fine today - I gave everyone a pep talk this morning about not giving up at the first hurdle so that when trials and results don't turn out the way you want them to, step back and rethink. There are other ways to approach problems without giving up. I'm very good at thinking that way when it's a practical problem at work, but can I hell think like that in my own world!

This evening I am planning to pack some stuff to take to Norfolk and to try not to sit in front of the TV all evening. Let's see how that pans out :-)
I do want to watch some news though, as I still haven't decided how to vote in the coming general election. I will need to send off my postal vote tomorrow as I will be away on polling day, so it's crunch time tonight. I have been torn between parties, but lately have found myself getting irritated by the labour supporters among my friends on social media.  They are the only ones who are getting personal and ranting about the opposition - to the extent that it is making me sway heavily towards the Conservatives. Surely, one can support a party without resorting to personal attacks on the 'others'?  I like to try and remember how lucky we all are in this country to be able to freely vote and freely speak our minds about pretty much anything. there are millions of people around the world who don't have that freedom and even if they do, many are too busy fighting to survive to think about who is governing them. So please, people, by all means support your favourite political party and state your views, but do you have to be so nasty about the other side?

Ah well, I will never win that argument - people get so heated that they forget to fist and foremost be human. I still don't know who my vote will go to - that will only happen as I put the paper in the envelope. but whoever gets the job of ruling the country, there isn't a whole lot of difference between them.

It's been a long time since I blogged anything and I'm not sure why I felt the desire to start doing it again. On the surface everything is back to normal and I'm sure if you asked most people who know me they would say that I am perfectly OK. But there is a lot of 'surface' happiness going on.  I do try every day to focus on the moment and while this can be successful, there is still a deep depression going on under the surface.

It comes to my attention on occasions like Saturday evening. One of my long term colleagues is retiring and threw a party for all her favourite workmates. I was invited. I have worked with her for more than 20 years and am very fond of her - respect her work and will certainly miss her when she retires. so why did I send her a text three hours before the party saying I couldn't go?

Ok, I'm not a great party goes, I've never enjoyed the jollity, I'm a rubbish dancer and I would have had to drive so drinking was out of the question. But those are not reasons enough for not supporting a friend are they? The truth is I couldn't face leaving the house. I went to get a haircut on Saturday afternoon and came back with a nice new short style, then sat down in my chair and thought about getting ready for the party. What would I wear? Of course, despite having loads of clothes, I had nothing suitable. It was all old fashioned and I look enormous in everything. Well, I'm enormous anyway, so what difference would the clothes have made? If I took my car out, I wouldn't get parked when I got back. Another excuse. The reality was I was afraid to go, afraid to leave the house, enter a room full of people, try to make small talk and enjoy myself. I couldn't do it. Once I'd made my decision I felt that knot of tension in my stomach recede and I sank back into my chair, picked up my phone and opened Candy Crush. Safe again.

Did it make me feel better in the long run? Not at all - I am here at work today and she is very cool with me, despite my apologies. After all, she thinks I couldn't be bothered and why should she think any differently? I won't tell her that I felt sick, that I was shaking, that I simply couldn't drag myself from my front door.  She will continue to think that I don't value her friendship.

And instead of partying the night away, I was in bed by 9 - the place where I feel the happiest. tucked nicely away from the world and in my own little space.

It's not as bad as it sounds of course. I'm functioning a lot better than when I was really depressed. I go to work every day and function quite well on the whole. It does take it out of me though and every evening I am in bed by 9.

Depression is a strange thing and I know it is still with me, though I will not go onto medication again. At least without that I am functioning, not numb. and anyway, being med free allows me to experience good things and enjoy them - the beauty of nature, art and music; holidays; etc.
And that is great!

Jeffers the kp...

It turned out to be a really good weekend, the culmination of weeks of planning, the 'last of the summer wine' evening at Rosehill.

I'm very fond of Rosehill theatre on the outskirts of Whitehaven. Unlike the theatre by the lake in Keswick, it struggles to get funding and customers sometimes! Keswick theatre has lottery funding and many well-to-do sponsors who like to have their names on seat and plaques....
Rosehill on the other hand is in the process of trying to get funding. In the meantime, a group of us have been raising funds for a particular Rosehill project, the community Shakespeare project. We  are fortunate to have two lovely ladies from London who travel up to coach us: Bardy, who used to be the principle of RADA and who has recently coached Lenny Henry and Catherine Tate for their Shakespearean debuts. And Jennie, also ex RADA, actress, director and mother-in-law of David Schwimmer. They charge Rosehill a fraction of what they would normally charge for coaching and we are really lucky to have their experience and skill. They make the characters come alive and the direction we get is phenomenal!

Why the fundraising? Well, although many of us have paid towards the coaching, the aim is to make these workshops accessible for everyone, whether they can afford to pay or not. There are so many young actors in the area who are keen and talented, not to mention the adults who find £50 for a weekend just a bit too much.

So we decided to have this event to raise funds. And as its not a charity, the idea was to give people an entertaining evening for their money. They got a 3 course meal, free glass of wine and entertainment all for £15 . Bargain!

We spent ester say preparing the food and what an enjoyable experience it turned out to be. All those hotel jobs I had years ago came into their own and my catering skills returned...
Chopping fruit for the fruit salad, boiling huge pans of new potatoes, great fun.
The guests all had a great time, with entertainment provided by Marianne and her open mic chums. She ended the evening with her favourite medley of wartime classics, which went down quite well.

While some of the team waited on tables, I stayed in the kitchen, washing up and clearing. Nobly assisted by Geoffrey, a lawyer who has never been that close to an industrial dishwasher in his life!
The highlight of the evening for me was showing Jeffers ( as he has now been christened by our RADA friends) how to be a kp, as we used to call kitchen porters.

With young Callum as compere, the evening was a success. Wish I'd had his confidence when I was 17...
We raised about £580, and enjoyed it in the process.

Roll on the next fundraiser :-)

Xx

A day in the life

It was a long, tiring day yesterday. I went to the PPMA show at the NEC, which is the Packaging machinery manufacturers Association... sounds enthralling I know, but I actually did find it interesting and was on the lookout for some new mixing vessels, along with some packing machines, plus I was on a mission to find out what's new in the world of extrusion technology! Even though it's 2012, a lot of these guys haven't yet got used to the fact that there are women in the engineering world, so I find that even though I address questions directly to them about the machine performance/spec, etc, they direct their answers back at my male assistant. And I'm stood there wondering if they actually want the business or not!

Anyway, that aside, it was a tiring day, mostly because of the 3.5 hour drive down and the 4.5 hour drive back again due to an accident closing the M6.
So I arrived at work this morning at 7.30 still tired after yesterday. Straight into business as usual - I had two contractors on site this morning and both arrived together - sod's law! One came to investigate a problem with our moisture analysis equipment, which has been throwing up an error message that isn't in the manual, so I delegated this guy and talked to the other one, an electrical engineer here to install a new plc in part of the plant, along with an ethernet connection to my office (so I can see what's going on!)

After that, I had the usual 30 or so emails to sort out after a day away, then I had to sit down with another of my staff as she's away for the next 2 weeks and we needed to cover stuff that will come up while she's away. Just finished that and another member of the team came in with a quality problem that happened yesterday; quite a serious one as the product involved is a new one due for launch soon and I expect it to be looking perfect for a launch!  I find out some details and go down to the manufacturing plant to see what happened.

As some of you know, my relationship with the Team leader down there has been a little fragile at times (understatement). When I was quite low, his attitude turned into almost bullying and I just didn't have the strength to fight back.

So I go down this morning and ask what went wrong and his immediate reaction is to snap at me and bang his fist on his desk. Now a sensible person might have handled it differently from me, but when was I sensible? He went on to shout that my staff had passed the fucking colour in the first place, so it was my fault.  I shout back.My staff passed the COLOUR yes, but that is not the issue - it's the finish of the damned item that's wrong and his staff are responsible for that - I have provided standards that they are supposed to use at all times.
He reacts - calling me a f**ing idiot, his staff are laughing at me, he says. I'm a waste of space and the products will be used anyway, because what he says goes and I'm too weak to do anything about it! He is 100 times tougher than me, he yells, smashing his fist down once more to prove it...

This time I bite back. Don't you f**ing swear at me like that. And do not bang the desk.  This product is rejected and if you want to see tough, watch this space and I will show you tough. with that I swan out of his office and immediately send all the faulty product back to him.
And this time I will NOT back down. I told the MD I am making a stand and that this time there is no going back from it. So we will see what happens on Monday...

But the good thing is that I will no longer be bullied by that man. From now on, he will see what tough looks like.

And by the time all that was over, it was nearly time to go home. Luckily we finish at 12 on Fridays, so a nice relaxing walk with Archie was in order for the afternoon.
My conflict has not upset me personally, but I am angry that my staff will now find it hard to do their jobs properly because of his territorial attitude. He's like an un-neutered dog peeing up the walls of his department to prevent any of us entering his territory!

I feel quite good about standing up to him though. The only thing that would have made me feel even better would have been to come home, tell someone I'd had a bit of a bad day and for them to give me a big hug and say "it's OK now, you are home with me!"
Instead, I got nagged about going shopping and spending more money, plus 20 questions about whether I was bad tempered or depressed....

Ah well, nothing's ever perfect! The afternoon was good with Archie and now I am enjoying a nice glass or two of Cote du Rhone and listening to some lovely music.

Peace to you my friends xx

Angry people

Today I witnessed a very angry scene in a car park. Not sure what triggered it, but when I arrived, there were several very, very angry people shouting at each other over what I assumed was a car parking space. I'm talking real, red in the face anger here, the use of obscenities that would make a navvy blush...

I had to watch for a minute or two in complete amazement. Why on earth would anyone get so angry about parking? Unbelievable.

It's not an isolated incident though. There's so much anger everywhere nowadays. Road rage, shopper shouting, it's everywhere. In meetings at work, the anger can be felt - its in the air...

One of my previous counsellors told me once that what I needed was to 'get angry' at the people who had affected me. When I argued that i don't believe anger does any good in any situation, she got a bit angry with me. I needed  to be angry, she said, so that I could see how I'd been treated and stand up and do something about it.   Like what- shout obsceneties and scream at people? Why?

I don't need to get angry to sort  things out. I can achieve more at work than those angry souls who seem to waste so much effort on their fury that they lose sight of the original issue.   Ok, I may be a softie, but nothing will ever persuade me that angers the best policy......

Cars and stuff

Bought a new car today. A red panda. Haven't got it yet cos it's brand new and on the way from Italy. Should be exciting, shouldn't it?

But it's just a car, just something that gets you from A to B.

The advantage of the new version is that the road tax is virtually nothing as its an 'Eco' car. Plus it's cheaper to run - more mpg apparently.

Had a lovely walk today, over walla and along to Ashness. Very quiet now the schools are back, and a nice moody sky, though quite warm. Archie is excellent at walking past sheep now without looking sideways at them. I don't need to put him on lead, he walks calmly by my side until we are past the sheep, then carries on with his sniffing and jumping...

Last weekend of the c-art exhibition too. It hasn't done as well as we hoped. We've all sold some cards, Sarah sold a painting and Angela sold some bits of jewellery, but quiet overall. Don't think I'll do it next year.
Enjoyed the pencil heads gathering this morning, a lovely demo by Shirley on skin and portraits in cp. very good indeed. Busy day all in all.   Hairdresser in the morning, it's all go.  Joy of joys :)

Don't get me wrong, I'm not falling back into depression, just monotony....  Anyway, it is possible to be lonely yet not depressed.

Wish I could upload photos onto this blog on this iPad, but it doesn't like it!
Maybe I should use the pc once in a while, but the iPad is handier....

This has been a garbage blog post, hasnt it?  Just bits of nowt!!!

Enough, already.....