I've spent a lot of time this week with my head under the bonnet. I've spent a lot of time this week sitting anxiously in traffic watching steam coming out from under the bonnet. You see that bottle on the left, with the yellow lid? That's where water goes. I keep putting water in and by the time I get home from work it's all gone and I drive up the road looking as if I'm making a grand entrance through a romantic cloud of dry ice. Of course, the romantic image on Friday was spoiled as I wound down the window and yelled at the woman getting out of her car that she had chosen a 'fucking stupid place to park'. She was right across my drive. She said she would only be a couple of minutes and went to deliver her brat to a house 2 doors down. I was steaming as much as the car by the time she came back, I can tell you! There are times when I wish I had a tank, then I'd simply ram people who got in my way ...

So my poor thirsty car is going to the garage tomorrow and I'll be feeling down the backs of sofas and chairs trying to find the money to pay for it. The new job is great, but it's inaccessible without a car, so I'll be completely stuffed if there's something major (expensive) wrong. Hey ho, I'll try not to think about that now.

Whenever I've started a new job - and there have been a few! - it hasn't been long (usually only a few hours) before someone has said, 'We're all mad here!' Well, the new job is no different. I can't remember who it was who informed me that they were, 'All mad here!' but someone did on my first morning. Actually, no-one's mad there that I've noticed. I think it's something people say to make you think they are wild and wacky and fun-loving. The only place I've worked where I've come across people who I consider to need serious long-term therapy and/or sectioning under the mental health act and/or electric shock treatment is the University and, funnily enough, no-one there ever uttered the phrase, 'We're all mad here!' And yet, most of them were ....

Weird that, or should I say WIHRD?

(In joke ... if you work there you'll know what I mean!)

A sign that I'm much happier where I am now : it's Sunday and I've cleaned the kitchen and have a roast dinner in the oven. When I was at the University I'd spend Sundays in bed under the duvet trying to convince myself that I didn't have to go back on Monday...

Fly in the ointment

... or rather, turd in the loo!

It didn't take long. We have pristine, ladies-only, immaculate toilets here in my new place of work, unlike the frankly disgusting cubicle we were forced to share with males and females at the university. To add insult to injury, the uni-loo was above the kitchen, so from about 10am it stank of boiled cabbage, even if cabbage was not on the menu. I suppose the smell of cabbage masked the smell of whatever was left floating in the pan ...

Well, unfortunately there is someone here who has difficulty in managing a total flush and I did actually find something that had only gone halfway round the U-bend last week. I decided not to put up one of my now-famous posters reminding people of the need to successfully flush all bodily waste, seeing as I've only been here 2 weeks and I would like to make it to the end of my trial period (end March). After that, the posters may start appearing ...

Apart from that, and the fact that my boss has left me such a complicated spreadsheet to complete that I don't know if I'll make it to the end of the day, let alone my trial period, everything is going swimmingly. We're bringing a radio in tomorrow because it's so quiet at the moment.

I'm betting I win the choice of radio station so this time tomorrow we should all be listening to Ken Bruce on Radio 2, joining in Pop Master ...

Day 2

This is me, skipping down the corridor at work today. Happy feet? Happy all of me!

I'm using someone else's computer because mine hasn't arrived yet, but apart from that all seems to be going well. I haven't felt the need to swear at anyone so far, but give it time! The journey there and back is different every time as I get into the wrong lane at roundabouts and end up on a different road from the one I expected but I'm sure I'll get the hang of it, and it will be easier in the summer when I can see where I'm going - at the moment it's dark when I leave the house, and dark when I leave the office.

I'm touching wood as I'm typing this (who, dear? Me, dear? Superstitious, dear? Yes, dear!) but so far, so good!

Long may it continue!

Happy New Year!

I hope your 2006 went out with a bang and that your 2007 started with one. Wait, I mean bang in the sense of the noise of fireworks, not bang in the American sense of ... oh well, either way, I hope you had a good one!

I spent a lovely evening with Jools Holland, since my dear friend Bunny was poorly and we had to cancel our plans which had involved dozens of mini spring rolls and wontons, washed down with lashings of champagne. Alas, Bunny was dripping snot and talking through great throatfuls of phlegm over the 'phone, and as I start a new job TOMORROW I didn't really want to catch it, thank you very much, so I stayed a safe 20 miles away at home.

I sent my mobile happy new year texts well before midnight to avoid the rush (I'm so organised I'm told it makes people sick) and turned my mobile off before I went to bed, so as to avoid any disturbance in the wee small hours when the glut of messages finally got through. No-one would be foolish enough to risk my wrath by 'phoning my home line! The fireworks stopped around 1am. I couldn't sleep a wink and ended up getting up and making some (decaff) coffee and playing a couple of rounds of Spider Solitaire before finally going back to bed and to sleep around 3am.

Oh, the joy of being awoken at 6am by the telephone - the land line. I ignored it. It rang every 20 minutes until, at 7.40, I dragged myself out of bed, promising to hang, draw and quarter whoever it was unless they had a very good reason, and discovered that it was a text message, sent at midnight by someone who shall remain nameless, but readers of earlier posts will recognize his Red Indian name of Fights-With-Neighbours. Bless him (not what I thought at the time though) he's got my home number instead of my mobile programmed into his 'phone, and he sent me a Happy New Year text at midnight, and it had taken until 6am to get through. My 'call minder' facility on my landline rings every 20 minutes after a message has been left. Oh bliss!

I can't claim that I then stayed awake and cleaned the kitchen to greet the new year with an array of sparkling surfaces - no, my new year's resolutions do not include exchanging my slut crown for that of domestic goddess - I went back to bed until noon. Now, though, the coffee is drunk, the eyes are fully open, and so are the shops. One last chance to grab a bargain before going back to the world of work tomorrow.

And a word about my new job. I'm looking forward to a fresh start with new people who, I hope, will not treat me like the office junior/dogsbody/janitor. My mistake in my last job was assuming that the managers I worked for knew that PA stood for Personal Assistant, and not, as they seemed to think, Piss Artist. Maybe I should take several copies of my CV with me and distribute them to the people in the new department? Maybe not ... Have to work out first if they are likely to get my sense of humour/irony/sarcasm ...

I have high hopes that everything will go smoothly but I know myself. I know I'm a cup-half-empty kinda gal. How long do you think it will be before this blog turns into a rant about my new colleagues?

I'm taking bets ...

In the meantime, HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!