thanks tamsin.

i feel that my supervisor is particularly harsh on me. i have to confess i'm not the most academic music student in the department (i fair much better at recitals and performance), but i can be pushed. at the moment, other than my organ playing, all i think about is dissertation...dissertation and more of it. it drives me mad at times, for example: i can't sleep till around 2 or 3am even when i'm in bed hours before that trying to sleep.

w/c 16 March - off work sick for four days with a really really nasty cold
w/c 23 March - back at work but feeling grotty for most of it
w/c 30 March - the obligatory 'one whole week at work feeling perfectly well' that I have to drive (by agreement with husband) after any illness.

This week: Hurrah! I can start cycling back to work again, I'll drive Monday, see if my training I have all week to 5pm is really going to last until 5pm, then in all likelihood cycle on Tuesday [if the training finished before about 5.30pm, no problem time-wise].

Woke up this morning, tickly throat. Have been hot and drinking a lot of water. Tickly throat is still tickly, but really getting quite sore...

Argh, feels like there might be a new cold coming...

My Dad (88) was rushed to hospital in the small hours of Saturday. Looks as though he's going to be OK though.

Hope all is well F#.

Argh. I failed my grade 8 treble recorder exam.

oh no..... hugsssss.....


meanwhile, i'm trying to write my final dissertation chapter: inspiration is needed.

Bad luck!

Straight back onto the horse, now! better luck next time.

Thanks. I will wallow in self-pity for today with a cup of herbal tea ( ), and start re-practising pieces/scales tomorrow.
Just came on a baaaddd day, with doctor appts (yes, plural ) and my sister and brother having noisy friends around, so I had to act happy. Meh!

Hope all works out f#m.

pcf : that's a pity - commiserations.

Cheer up and whatever happens get back in there for another go. You are doubtless an excellent player and just had a bad day.

Self-indulgent rant...

My head hurts enormously.
The office seems very very loud.
I definitely have a new cold coming and it's only a couple of weeks I've felt vaguely human after the last one

On top of all that, it's another hour until I can take my next medicine.

And I have to concentrate on bloomin' four hours of training this afternoon, which is being done over the phone / by net meeting type thing. I have it every afternoon this week, apparently we are squeezing five whole days of training in to four half days!! Mind you, for the pace of yesterday it really didn't need to be whole days, it was a good half-day but didn't need to be longer.

More annoyingly, I'm supposed to have done some prior training, eLearning from IBM, and will IBM give me the access details for the training? No they will not. I've phoned and chased them and they've told me my customer number doesn't exist (it has too many numbers in it, apparently!) I just know my manager is going to ask me to chase them again some time in the next half hour, and I'm going to have to be really controlled and not snap at him and say 'Leave me alone, my head hurts'.
The training IBM is going to give me tells me how this software works; the training I get the next three afternoons this week tell me how we use it in our company, but will not cover any aspect of the functionality, as we've already been trained in that by IBM.

Really tempted to go home sick, though I don't think I'm actually that ill just yet [there's always tomorrow]; that way I attend the training next time it is on, by which time I might have been able to pry the eLearning out of IBM...

- you don't feel great, so might be best for you and your colleagues if you can go home adn rest and be properly focused for the next one.

My rant: I am rubbish at breathing whilst flute playing and it just puts m e off playing at the moment, arghhh.

Aaaarrgghh! Definitely not my day!

This morning I put in a load of washing and then realised the washer was leaking, so I now have a wet floor.

Lunchtime, son went to borrow the car and brought me the joyful news that I'd picked up a £45 parking fine last night (our council has just started charging for evening parking, which I'd forgotten about) - I hadn't seen the ticket in the dark.

Now son has rung up to tell me he's had a small accident resulting in damage to my wing mirror and someone's car door. At least no one was hurt, thank goodness.

It's been an expensive day so far!

Eeek!!

Glad all are ok! Hope your day improves soon.

We haven't even had Easter yet!



Hope your fortunes change soon BM

oh dear. hope the rest of the evening would improve.

Thanks for the sympathy, nicki, Barry and l_k.

Not looking good so far - Hubby came home with the news that there are to be redundancies at his firm and they should find out tomorrow who is going. At nearly 57 all he needs is to lose his job. It's obviously destined to be "one of those days"!

Sorry to hear that Berk. My Barry loses it in July.

Poor Barry! And poor you - last time Hubby was made redundant (1991) he was like a bear with a sore head for the three months it took to find another job. Hope your Barry can adjust OK.

I'll post when we know what's happening; trying to feel optimistic this evening.

I'll keep my fingers crossed BM...

More of a Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr than an Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr but it means much the same. I spent ages trying to get MSN to work on my laptop and it was fine for a while. Now it doesn't seem to be working. (or it could just be that all of my friends hate me and aren't talking to me of course!) I have reinstalled it and it looks ok but no messages are coming in or out so Ggrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr a lot. There are far more serious things to worry about I know. I should be practising accomps. for the exams tomorrow but they can wait. They were good this afternoon.

Argh! Things are such a mess atm! My head is all over the place and I fear I could have possibly ruined one of my best friendships

As I've said before, Ratty - 'opeless!

Good friendships are not easily ruined Ben old bean.

And HG. Yes I know. It may be the laptop's way of telling me to go and practise!

True - but I think there are some things that could easily ruin...

Well, then....

Ok. But I'll be back.

Pre exam firkin in the tavern when I know them all.
Fido, Biggles, the towel elephant and me!

Just to say that today's news was good for us. Only one person out of the 8 in Hubby's section will lose their job - and it's not Hubby. 14 jobs going overall though, in a not enormous company; sad for those not so lucky as us.

Even more good news: the problem with the washer was due to a hose having worked loose, presumably after much vibration from the washer when in use. So that could have been much worse!

Very pleased things worked out OK for you BM and family : it is sad for the people who weren't so lucky though, yes...

Glad to hear that Berk
Just off to hospital, as Step-Dad has taken a big turn for the worse and has a very severe chest infection
Poor Mum and Bern.
Bev.

Worrying time for you . Hope things improve soon.

THanks. Managed to make him laugh by planning break-out to the chip shop over the road for chips in the bag and then a pint at the pub, before getting back into bed and the nurses won't even know he's gone. He is going to blame it on the old chap in the opposite bed who is 102 and say he led him astray Bern and the old chap were in fits of giggles.

Hope all is better soon, Bev xx

Thanks Daisy.

I am sorry to read this, Bev, as I had hoped things were looking up for him again after the last bout of problems.

Argh!

Why, when I have a rare tidying spree, does it always involve being completely at a loss to where I've tidied something important to a couple of months down the line?!?!

Hope you've found whatever it was by now, Sarah!

I did in the end! I found the sheet of FP4 notes stuffed in the middle of about 100 loose sheets of paper inside my last years chemistry book, which was under a whole stack of old computing stuff behind a box full of year 7 work, under my wardrobe. Why I put it there, i have no idea!

I still haven't managed to locate my pack of STEP papers though. (and yes I have checked behind the piano and in the dog's bed!) Hopefully they'll turn up of their own accord in the next couple of days.

Shoved in a cupboard/in a bag/behind the sofa/in a music folder?

Hope you manage to find the papers.

Have you looked in the freezer?
Anyone who has written a PhD thesis will tell you that towards the end you get paranoid about losing it. Someone I knew used to put his work in the freezer every night on the theory that if the house burnt down during the night his thesis would survive in the freezer

The really weird thing is that I can't have tidied them anywhere. I've definitely seen them in the last week, but haven't had a cleanout since I moved my piano into my room in November, so they should be somewhere obvious like in my bag, or on the shelf with all my other college stuff, or possibly somewhere in the kitchen, but they're not.

*wonders if she should be sticking the draft of her dissertation in the freezer*

*still thinking*

In the car maybe?

It wouldn't be in the car...

It's not on a shelf, it's not in my bag, its not on (or behind) either piano, it's not in any of my other subjects' books or folders, it's not in with my recorder or piano music, it's not on my desk, it's not on my music stand, it's not under the bed, it's not in the kitchen or on the dining table...I've even checked in my violin case... it's not in any of my textbooks... hmm, where haven't I checked?!?!

In a bookcase...erm...under any other furniture?....

Aaaaaaaaaaaaghhhhhh

I would REALLY like a piece of chocolate this afternoon and everybody gave me tons of 'Lindt' this year and I hate the stuff!!!


(Not that I'm ungrateful for gifts of course .. but a nice bit of Cadburys would really hit the spot )


Swoppsies anyone?

I have a Lindt bunny! Not much use to you though I'm afraid, Lottie. I also have a Thorntons egg with my name on it. To use a local phrase... "Well chuffed like!"

Bah