Before and After

The grand unveiling lol

This was the before shot. It was crinkly because in order to keep it tidy (and out of my way) it spent most of its time in a plait and when you undo it this is what it looked like.

I am lucky in where I work we have a training salon, and the student who cut my hair is a level 3 student who had a great sense of humour. We agreed a length and style although I did warn her that my hair has a mind of its own and it is not always guaranteed to obey.

After a splendid hour of pampering the results are shown here. It looks lovely but also having been straightened looks lovely and sleek; it won't be like that for very long.

The best bit about it was the cost.. a magnificant £4.00 - I will be going back there again when it needs a trim.

October Dawns

The dawns are happening later and later, the nights are drawing in and the mists are more frequent. I don't mind, the side benefit is the glorious golds and reds in the fields and trees. Saturday saw me go with SOH over to HMS Seahawk (or Culdrose to the uninitiated) to watch him referee the navy boys against a local village.

It is nice over there as their clubhouse is open, so I was warm, dry and comfortable and had the space to lay out my paperwork and crack on with some college work. Culdrose drew 1 all with the other team, but were not the politest team on the pitch.

Me, I enjoyed a cup of coffee, while watching from afar (which suits me) I prefer rugby and hope to see some more local teams playing this season. When we got home, we watched the very disappointing England's performance (or lack of it) against France, and enjoyed a chinese take-away for tea.

A good day, was had by all... shame then that Sunday the Sun didn't make an appearance we had misty weather pretty much all day, but I was busy downloading audio books onto many mp3 players ready for holiday which is fast approaching.

We have finally taken the cage down, which has been Jasper's home since day one. He now has a plastic dogbed with his quilt in it and he accepts it as his new bed, although he would prefer to sleep upstairs with the rest of us.. Sadly for him, as he can't stay still for more than 5 mins... can a dog suffer from adhd? .... he gets to sleep downstairs in his posh new pad but finally I could hoover up all the loose dog hair hiding behind the cage. We are now in the process of selling the cage which has done us proud over the past year and a half.

Invigilating

I had my first session of invigilation on Wednesday.. I can honestly say it was the most boring thing I have done in my life to date...

It does pay good money, however I don't think I will be counting on doing much of this sort of work...

Back to the drawing board

Word of the Week : Amaze

a·maze

–verb (used with object)

to overwhelm with surprise or sudden wonder; astonish greatly.
Obsolete . to bewilder; perplex.
 

–verb (used without object)
to cause amazement: a new art show that delights and amazes.
–noun

Middle English amasen, to confuse, stun, astonish.

1. astound, dumfound, stun, flabbergast. See surprise.

 

This follows on from Stupid being similar to Amazed.

 

I found this lovely quote on a website and thought to add it to this post

"A schoolmaster should have an atmosphere of awe, and walk wonderingly, as if he was amazed at being himself" Walter Bagehot (1826–1877), British economist, critic

I still wake up each morning enjoying my job, though at times I doubt my ability I try to do well and encourage my students to do their best.

Keep your fingers crossed

My first observation for my Teaching course, the PGCert, is this afternoon. Only an hour in length out of the 3 hours I am teaching but it is important that it goes well.

A Quiz for Thursday - No Prizes tho :-(

1.What was mined extensively in Cyprus in Roman times, which took its name from the country?
2.Name Jepser Christiensen's character in the James Bond films Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace?
3.Hyacinthoides is the scientific name for what protected (in the UK) spring flowering plant?
4.The equal combination of green and blue light, and the C in CMYK color printing, are what?
5.What sea has the port city Arkhangelsk (Archangel in English) and Onega Bay?
6.What is the longest river in South Africa?
7.What comes from the seed of the tropical Theobroma cacao tree?
8.What semi-precious stone decorated Tutankhamun's burial mask, and is the colour of the American Robin's eggs?
9.What is normally green, but can be yellow too, after a French herbal liqueur, introduced by Carthusian Monks in the 1700s?
10.What colour is Tyrian, a dye highly prized by the Romans?

Answers tomorrow or Friday and where you can see more of these quizzes which I am looking at for work

Cooking on Gas

Perhaps one of you readers out there will explain why some things cook better on gas than others. I made two cakes yesterday, one was ever so slightly underinflated and the other came out perfectly. Same recipe, same oven temp etc. The later one was the one that came out perfectly, the earlier one came out flatter and less inviting though I am sure it will go down just as well.

There isn't the luxury of telling me when the oven is up to temperature, do gas oven's have such a thing? Should I leave it on longer to warm up? Are there any tips you use to tell when your cooker is hot enough to cook a cake perfectly?

I need to cook some chocolate brownies, for my work buddies, who have been helping me with a huge mountain of work which is going to be resolved by a new colleague who starts work on Monday and with relief I will go back to just doing two jobs again.

nowydh da

I didn't have to wait too long to hear the results of the interview, and from September I will officially be a Key Skills Tutor responsible for teaching ICT, Literacy and Numeracy across Cornwall so I will be doing a fair amount of travelling (which is good) and making a lot of use of the Sat Nav initially while I find my way around the county.

It is only part-time, hence the reason for joining Kernowflex which is bank admin to top up the income a bit, though I also hope to pick up some sessional teaching hours as well as private tuition in Computer Skills which should bring in the money. Then I need to have some good record keeping, along with book-keeping skills just in case the tax man cometh. If you are in a similar position, just starting out please drop me a line with any hints, suggestions etc.

After nearly a month of asking, I now have a BT landline installed, not perfectly working but there seems to be a slight problem with the circuitry that leaves the line pulsating. Doesn't bode well with the need to have broadband installed but I have every confidence that BT will resolve it :-) .

Finally, I have ordered the cooker I have chosen, not without it's own problems as ordering on-line is a bit hit and miss as the postcode is not always recognised by the various addressing systems so had to go into the store but who were very helpful in providing me with the on-line prices, and I have ordered a desk for the study from them as well one with a storage shelf system for files and should be all set for the start of term.

The weather has been glorious, blue skies and sunshine wall to wall and late on until the evening. England can be a lovely place when the weather gives us her blessing and none more that we have at the moment. SOH and I went down to Portreath beach on Tuesday evening and walked along the beach with the numerous dog owners and surf rescue trainees; the only thing that would have made it better would have been to have had a nice cold pint of one of the local ales lol but we waited to get back home and open a bottle of Black Tower to celebrate along with a chinese.

Interviews

My temporary contract comes to an end shortly, and I am busy looking for more work hopefully involving some more teaching work; though this one has provided me with some and I am very grateful for the opportunity.

Yesterday I had an interview with Kernowflex, at Truro hospital. A short interview was held with someone from HR who documented my skills : PA, IT support, Admin, Data Processor etc... I have completed the next stage of the process where they ask for references and CRB checks etc. It should take a couple of weeks and then I have to attend a 'free' (aka unpaid) induction day and training day as well as learn the hospital system then I can accept contract work on an ad hoc basic. It might yet suit me to do this at the moment rather than a full time job for reasons I can't say at the moment.

Today I had an interview at Truro College for a part-time Skills for Life tutor, teaching numeracy, literacy and ICT skills to a range of learners from drop in sessions to workbased participants and I now have to wait and see the outcome. It would certainly provide the necessary teaching hours for the PGCE course but much more than than it will be what I want to do and though I can always fall back on admin work I want to give teaching a go. I have already picked up clients for private tuition, and will register for what I need to do if I take on more private work.

I will miss where I am working, though it has been a challenge sometimes, it has been very satisfying and some of the people in the office have already said it is a shame I am not staying on, to those people thank you because you have restored some if not the majority of my self-confidence which I had lost sight of last year.

Exhausted

Not me the car!!

Coming home on Tuesday I thought the car sounded a little noisier than normal, and when I got back home one of the family said the exhaust has gone and the car now sounded like a tractor. I groaned... I didn't need this now, nor in the future, but the car is almost 10 years old and hasn't really had many problems at all during that time. Good job too as I am not an aspiring mechnanic and rely on garages etc to keep me sane and on the road

SOH lent me his car for work, as I have further to go, I have only driven it once and being an estate car I have felt a little nervous about driving it before. I only managed to stall it once and that was trying to reverse into a car parking space at work but in my defence the car was on full lock and apparently is a bit more tempramental. I made to work, and home again and even felt a little more comfortable.

Yesterday, SOH took mine to work and en-route the hole in exhaust developed into a fracture. He coaxed it home yesterday where hopefully at the weekend a family member might be able to weld it back together again, but now we have one car between us and his start time is earlier than mine so I get to take him to work and then come back for an hour or so before I need to get to work myself. Needless to say I managed to find the time to catch up with the news on the BBC and watch an episode of Heartbeat being too tired to do much more than tv watch this morning. Still it could have been worse, he might have still been on the 2am job rather than the 5am job.

I managed to leave my mobile phone at work yesterday evening, and today he left his at home... For those of you wondering about the bikes, and not using them, the storage area where they are being kept is boggy and my chances of getting the bike in and out is zero.. a nice couple of days of dry warm weather wouldn't go amiss right now.

What a Weekend!

We set off up country for a visit to the old house, to make sure all was ok and to collect some things, like extra bike gear etc. So Thursday night after work, SOH picked me up and he drove all the way up to Bedford. I was no use whatsoever in driving as I was already tired, and drained and my only role was to provide things as and when he needed them.

We picked up a KFC en-route to the house, when we finally understood the very thick accent of the guy serving, and our meal was thrown at us we headed for the house and hopefully at least a comfortable night.

What greeted us was a silent, dark and very cold house as the boiler had stopped working, my mind went immediately to how much was this going to cost. Nothing could be done in the dark, so we had a couple of portable fires to warm up the bedroom and living room but were still very cold when we went to bed in an icy cold bed.

Made a mental note to myself to use the electric blanket next time!

Friday dawned grey and dreary, and to add insult to injury Cornwall had blue skies and sunshine.. life just wasn't fair. SOH did his genius thing with the boiler and soon the hot water was doing its job and warming up the house which was soon toasty hot.

A drip, drip, drip from the bathroom alterted us to the next problem.. a leaking toilet seal; age and cold had meant that the seal had contracted and hardened and no longer kept the water out. Time to call a plumber.

This led to us finding the third and hopefully final problem, no phone.. just a whole load of crackling on the line. Luckily we both have mobiles and soon Steve the Plumber was enroute with his magic bag of tricks to resolve the drip in the toilet and I used the hub phone to contact BT to try and get a fix for the phone problem. The online test showed there was a problem and that an engineer would be dispatched by Monday at the latest - No good to us as we had no broadband at all nor a working phone line mostly.

Still, there were things we could do like reorganise the garage of boxes, finding the ones we wanted and putting the others in some sort of order. I made roast chicken for tea, with roasted potatoes and carrots (trust me if you have never roasted carrots please try them they are absolutely gorgeous) and served with some mashed swede. I should have also done some runner beans but forgot.

We did a bit of shopping at the weekend, at Milton Keynes, I think I have got used to the pace of life down here now, and I couldn't deal with the amount of traffic while trying to drive the Volvo which was new to me. We visited a couple of shops, and I also dropped in on my Aunt who was full of life, and having hydrotherapy on her bad knee at Bedford Hospital. It was good to hear her being so cheerful.

We had a chinese from the local shop, on Saturday evening with a bottle of wine, but it wasn't too successful in fact we both said how bland it was and we didn't really enjoy it. It was late when we both went to bed, and we had to be up early Sunday morning to pack the car, clean the house and travel back down. Even so it was 10.30am by the time we left.

The view from my window is lovely

I can see the football fields of a nearby school, and being based on the first floor means lots of stair climbing all day... great for toning legs, bums and thighs.. see positive things here in Cornwall. The workplace even have reserved parking for motorcycles, so come the next few months, Max and I will be winding our way to work where he is registered already. Just need to think about where I can put all my bike gear at work.

Chest is distinctly not improving but will give it another day, in case the steroids kick in; one effec they do have is to make me less tired at night, so I even managed to watch some tv last night without wanting to fall asleep through lack of oxygen.

The weekend coming is my first real weekend as a working girl in Cornwall (last weekend didn't count as I only managed 2 out of 5 days at work), so what to do and where to go.. I feel the need to visit Portreath and sit and watch the surf.. so if Cornish Beach Brummie and Cornwall by the Sea are still visiting this blog perhaps we can meet up one morning/afternoon for a coffee and a chat.

Betcha thought I had gone awol lol

Actually I had, gone awol, for a little while. Lack of access at the office, means limited to evenings on the 'puter and that is dependant on my access to the internet as well as trying not to cough over everything and anything in my path.

After enjoying a few milder days, my asthma decided to turn nasty, so much so that a trip to the doctors last night saw me exit with some steroids to see whether it will settle down as they couldn't make up their mind whether or not there is a chest infection.

This morning saw me take the first of the little red pills, all six of them in one go, and washed down with some water and filled up with toast before slipping up the hill merrily to go on the way to Truro. This morning was the first morning I wasn't in early due to the fact that the A30 had a number of accidents with people not driving appropriate to the icy conditions, though to be fair it was mild apparently until about 6am when it dropped 7 degrees to minus 3 (SOH had to tell me this as I was still in duvet time).

Still I sat in a queue of traffic from Redruth to Truro, but this workplace accepts that sometimes people are unavoidably detained en-route to work and there were no complaints - or none in my earshot.

Enough of this now, lets get back to normal and blue skies and sunshine... all comments will be forwarded to the asylum where I will be based in the very near future.

Hmmm more slippy and sliding

Snow overnight, has frozen and the road out of here is like an ice-sheet. A 4x4 and a car were going down the hill and only the 4x4 was going in a forward direction; not good. I have had to phone in work and say I will try and be in later but it doesn't look very promising.

The road is on a hill and if, very much if, you can reach the top you get to another road that will take you into towards the town of redruth; however many cars are parked at a point up the hill not making the top but not able to go back down either. Still we are so much better off than the people up country who have got it so much worse.

Makes you wonder why snow paralyses this country, when the US and Canada has so much more snow than us and they don't it grind their country to a halt?

Still at least we are warm, dry and safe with a roof over our head; much better than being stranded in the car or at work.

Slip Sliding Away

Cornwall is having it fairly mild compared to the rest of the country, but still is prone to frost, snow and ice. When I left for work this morning it was 2 degrees C, but the roads were slippery and while I am still fairly new to the area I am using the main roads but it didn't stop me from having a few hairy moments of my own this morning.

I had a towel over the windscreen this morning, but it wasn't really needed as I said it was sleety snow falling because of the warmer temperatures. No my disaster happened at work, as I sat in the car waiting for 8am (yes I will start leaving a little later, as I don't actually start work until 8.30am) I noticed a van pulling in and turning a little sharply in to a parking space, the women inside said she was sliding towards me (and my car) and it had been a bit too close for her. Nuff said, I thought thinking if she had driven a little slower and more carefully it wouldn't have been a problem.

I picked up my bag, and walked across to the office building, and en-route my feet slid out from underneath me leaving me in a heap on the floor, but luckily enough there was nobody around to view my embarassment. It wasn't a hard fall, but I know my knee will be a bit sore tomorrow where it banged into the pavement. I have to write it up in the accident book, as it happened on work premises but I don't think I need to worry about accident insurance companies at this stage.

Work is proving interesting, and other than not always knowing what I should be doing I seem to be busy enough trying to suss out the systems and databases in use. This morning I managed to access a database and set up some data sources with no information showing me how to do it, even the person who asked me to do the task was surprised that I had managed it. I guess that is what happens with 29 years of experience of IT systems under your belt, you do a fair amount of suck it and see experimenting.

Fitting In

Its been fun, being the new girl but with some experience means fitting in is easier than if I had no experience of working with IT systems and means I can get on with the work without having to be micromanaged.

It is a lovely office to work in, and surprisingly warm given the colder temperatures it has been today, we even had to open the door as it was too hot. My working space is small, but perfectly formed, and the free tea and coffee is sheer indulgence; I haven't worked anywhere that you have free drinks and even a staff room where you can take lunch.

I enjoyed a stroll at lunchtime, to explore Truro a bit more, and was glad of the warm jacket I had taken as Jack Frost didn't really let up all day :-) then a quick cup of hot chocolate, a few pages of my book and then back to the Office.

Once I settle down into a routine, of understanding the work, I have been challenged with automating as much as possible so that less data has to be entered by hand as that is where errors creep in.. I like a challenge.

One other challenge is the drive in the morning, it isn't far from the caravan, but the frost last night managed to ice the car doors shut and this morning was a performance in trying to get into it to start it while I defrosted the ice off of the windows.

Luckily tonight, it was cold but not quite frosty and the drive home was fairly fast, taking a little over 20 mins but I am sure I will soon be getting Max out for the ride to work, and enjoying the experience; far better than the original mile and a half I used to ride when taking him to work.

The end of an era

Today is officially my last day of employment with the University at the back of beyond; one of the advantages of a job in HE is the hols and I gave enjoyed having a long holiday to recuperate after getting a sinus infection. Still it was nice to sit on the seafront at Portrearh yesterday, hot chocolate in hand, watching the surfers in the sea and I am looking forward to having a go later next year.

This is also the end of the first decade of this century, if you take 2000 as year 1, and it is a good time for a fresh start leaving all the problems behind where they belong. No bad thing, remember the good things that have happened and leave the bad things behind and use the new year as a new beginnning.

I have some work lined up, and am looking forward to neing the new girl on the block. I brought a large diary to use for work details and feel as excited as I remember I was when starting a new year at school, just thankfully no homework.

I dont make many new year resolutions, but this year I am making an exception. Mine is Carpe Diem or sieze the day and moment.

Hpw about you?

Some good news

I have got some work to go to on 4th Jan, only a temporary contract for a few months but better than nothing and will continue to pay the bills until the house is sold. I am looking forward to being the new girl on the block, just wished 'i had remembered to bring my lunchbox with me. Still I did remember to bring the plastic containers.

Gus and Barnie have settled in to their new home with Raz, Gus was happy to be held and has quickly settled down, Barnie is more nervous but I think will love it and I feel confident at leaving them with Raz who has another 20+ rats and is wonderful at handling them. I haave to think of their welfare not mine and the are only 30 odd miles away so I can visit them and have some rat time.

Still sorting things out, need some plastic containers for storage, no matter how many you think you need, you will always need more. I'm sure there is a scientific name for this but for the moment I am calling it Sage's rule lol

New Shoes

I decided that a new pair of shoes for my venture into the job market was in order, normally I shop at M&S who produce Footglove shoes which are amazingly comfortable but the cost of a pair was nearly £40.00, and while they fitted I didn't think they looked particularly nice. Instead I walked along a little way to the Clarks outlet, and lo and behold they had a sale on, I am now the proud posessor of two pairs of shoes for the price of one at M&S and they will be more comfortable than the pair I use for interviews.

Just need to sort out the rest of the packing and get the rats accustomed to their temporary home while they go into foster care, they are going to be missed but Bodmin isn't too far away and I will be able to visit them.

I am hoping to spend a lot of next year by the coast as I will be living in a caravan only 6 miles from Portreath and it is going to be a splendidly hot bbq summer next year according to the met men so I will be investing in a souwester lol

An Event and an Achievement

Kathy pointed me in the right direction to Mr Toast's Blog and the 1st Annual Christmas Tea in Aspen Colorado.

I need to be there by 3pm local time, and it wraps up at 10pm so I figured that my fairy godmother would ensure that unlike Cinderalla that I would be back in time for work tomorrow and kit me out with something absolutely magical to wear and arrange the transportation too.

She came up trumps, the fairy godmother (FG), I have a black velvet gown and warm red velvet wrap which matches the shoes. Apparently I can get concorde direct to Aspen and arrive in time even leaving after work. FG has also arranged for hair and make-up to be done on the flight so I am going to look stunningly gorgeous. I love having a FG, and am looking forward to meeting up with some blogging friends.

I have always wanted to visit Colorado, it is just a shame that I won't have any time spare to look around and see the beauty. At least I will have a fun time meeting all the blogging faces I see are attending.

Yesterday saw the end of NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month (all you had to do was write 50,000 words - simples), I had fun with this but it was incredibly hard work and not helped by me having a crisis of confidence a week in resulting in me starting again from the beginning (though I have kept my original 20,000+ words in case I want to revisit it. I tried to do as much as I could daily but even though the daily target was 1666 when it was hard to even think of 50 words to add to a story it was difficult enough. I took a week offline (except for blogging) to concentrate on what I had and my final tally stood at 56,211. I could have had more but I edited a lot of rubbish out in the end and felt it didn't matter as long as it was over the 50,000.

Time to put the writing tools away for a short while, think about other more pressing things..