Fagged & Shagged & Fashed & Bashed
Mood:  hungry
Now Playing: Tropicalia
Topic: Stephen Says
It's like all the residents conspired to save everything up for MO & I to come back to work and all kick off at the same time being angry/ violent/ depressed/ suicidal/ need furniture to be built. So instead of a Fun Friday, it turned into a Fighting Friday where I was inside all day building things, sorting things, cleaning things up and filling out incident reports instead of playing badminton in the back garden and taking in some of this frankly fantastic weather.

All the same, after two days of being talked to like a child, it's nice to realize that you're not crap.

World Cup starts tonight. It's also evictions over in the Big Brother house. I hope Nikki isn't sent home.

XXX
Oh for crying out loud, this it ridiculous, this entry still hasn't appeared on the blog and I posted it hours ago...

Things I learned in management training:
Mood:  incredulous
Now Playing: E upstairs on the piano
Topic: Stephen Says
1) Everyone can be categorized into 4 types of workers. Even if they don't fit into a category, they're still of the category.
2) You can't fire people because they're crap.
3) You S.M.A.R.T. after you W.A.Q. (And numerious other management-speak acronyms & jargon-related B.S. that I'll never remember or apply)
4) Humour is not appreciated.
5) Lateness will not be tolerated.
6) Useful group discussions will not break up the days agenda or slow down the timetable. The tutor will carry on teaching the course while her pupils continue to have productive dialogue.
7) Explain the meaning of every word. Not matter how ovious the meaning of that word is.
8)You CAN fire people because they're crap.
9) Your shenanigans will not be tolerated.
10) Blu-tack requires warming up before it can work effectively.
11) Fierce boredom nulifies the effects of alcohol.

All in all two horrible days of learning things that I already know or will never need to while being talked down to by a lady with a little turned up piggy nose who has never actually managed anyone or worked in mental health and whose idea of tutoring involves reading the policies & procedures manual with emphasis and defining every major word that she reads out in seeming obliviousness to the vacant (and dozey) looks of those trapped in the room with her. As my manager pointed out, it shouldn't hae been called Managing Performance, it should have been called Managing Boredom.

The politics of T-Fal
Mood:  hungry
Topic: Stephen Says
Ok, this is irritating. All our T-fal frying pans are simultaneously going from non-stick to super-glue. Granted they get heavy use but we take good care of them and they're only about a month shy of being 3 years old. Any ideas? Or are fairies sneaking into our kitchen at night and rubbing them down with steel wool?

E is in Reading today at some heating conference in a stadium. Boy o boy it sounds exctiting. Just think: all those radiators, boilers & plumbing equipment in one space. Plus sales reps, marketing people and sales administrators. Fun for all the family or great big cosmic joke? My heart goes out to her because unless something totally bizarre happens, it sounds like the kind of day that will add 5 years to her life.

As for me, I finished Garth Nix's Sabriel and am onto the sequel Lirael. I imagine that, come the end of the month, I'll be reading the final book in the series, Abhorsen. So much for coming across as some kind of quiet intellectual for our trip to the States, I'll be reading a fantasy book. A children's fantasy book at that.

At least summer is here at last... I'll be working out in the garden today (I hope) and working on my tan. My goal for the next few weeks: Get a base tan before hitting the States so that I don't burn to a crisp while I deal with the South's God-forsaken heat and humidity. I'm sure that by the time I've spent a few hours in the Carolina's, I'll be nothing more than a puddle.

***
Ugh, Angelfire's doing that irritating thing again where it doesn't post blog entries right away. Could a move over to Livejournal not be far off?

The return of
Stephen Colbert.
And you thought we'd forgotten.
Heh.

Thank Goodness...
Mood:  lazy
Now Playing: Fabriclive.26 - The Herbaliser
Topic: Stephen Says
It's the end (for me) of another busy week and it was capped off with a fun football match in the back garden at work followed by a well deserved pint (or 2) at the pub with E & Suzannah afterwards.

Yep, it's World Cup fever over here... Will Wayne Rooney be able to play? With that 17 year old twat live up to the high hopes that are being imposed on him? Who cares? There have been rumblings around Parliment that it's every MP's duty to root for England and the Scottish MP's have pointed out that, since there's no Scottish team playing, what's wrong with rooting for other countries that have a majority of Scottish players playing on them? BLASPHEMY! says Gordon Brown - Traitors! he says. Send them to Guantanimo! God bless the flag of St. George.

And of course every chav car has at least two England flags fluttering from it and manky England flags are hanging from peoples window sills and every clothing / sports / food store is selling England shirts, trousers, shorts, flags, stickers, bags, and so on and so on and so on to celibrate the Great English Football Team.

That doesn't stand a hope in hell of winning.

That said, I can't wait. This is big and I can't wait to hit the pub for the England matches and get caught up in the excitement and the stupidity and the fun. The is going to be World Cup fever in Montreal times 10,000.

I stumbled across this this morning and I think it's pretty cool:
Topic: Stephen Says
Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny ipmortnat tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Sunny Saturday
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: Elisabeth's Entries
It's actually warm and sunny, and that's news enough.

But here's an update anyway:

-Stephen's working hard and welcoming the first murderer into the residence.
-Susannah (my friend) is still in town and we met up Fri, night for movie & dinner. We saw "Friends with Money" which was good for shutting off the mind. A positive aspect of the movie is that the main actresses are not flattered by the camera so wrinkles and lines are in abundance. Thank god some people think aging is a normal process that happens to everyone, including actresses.
-Today I had a lot of hair cut off, and I finally bought the right dress for my brother's wedding.
-My skin is really dry.
-We've got wine & cider and are now going to watch Ghost in the Shell...a japanimation?
-I've realized I'm addicted to food, and I can't go cold turkey.

Big Brother Musings
Mood:  energetic
Now Playing: Nick Cave - Abattoir Blues
Topic: Stephen Says
Been quite busy lately and with that comes a degree of productivity, it seems. Still there's always more that needs doing; I can't beleive we're only a few weeks away from summer and the second half of 2006.

Of course, that time of year also means that it's Big Brother time. And there's a Canadian in the house which lends it'self a balance to the excessively flrtatous & smutty young Brits all vying to have sex live on air first. Of course, the Canadian is also vying for that but at least he's going about it in a way that I can relate to.
Uhhmm, sort of. Yuh'know?
Of course, this year's Big Brother isn't as good as last years, which wasn't as good as the previous years (Whose winner was a Portugese transexual from - you guessed it - Woking), ad infinitum... But this year has a dude with tourettes on (Click me for a sample) who is charming, fascinating and hilarious, so it's only a matter of time until he wins.
Right?
Anyway, voyeurism at it's best and it keeps me busy during my sleep-in's and keeps me off the streets.

Staying Grounded
Mood:  happy
Topic: Elisabeth's Entries
Life has been very exciting (comparatively) as of late, and so I am struggling to stay grounded. And struggling to stick to a budget.

The Neko Case concert was fantastic, as to be expected. Her singing voice is angelic yet raw at the same time. But when she speaks with an American accent to a British crowd, it was met with a little misunderstanding I think. She's excellent when it comes to heckling the hecklers and funny anectdotes, but it seemed she ran into some culture clash with this one. But she's unphased and professional and eventually won everyone's hearts, and got everyone to stand up (the whole concert was seated--and I agree with Stephen that it sucks...) and had 2 encores, which were fab.

On Friday I left work early and met up with Susannah, my high school friend, and we had dinner at the Barbican before watching The Changling. This was an excellent production by Cheek by Jowl and I will try to go back to see their other production running at the moment of Twelfth Night. After the play we had a few drinks and crashed at her hotel.

In the morning we had a coffee/pastry breakfast before setting off towards the south bank where we met up with Stephen and the proceeded towards the Borough Market.

Susannah on the South Bank:

Stephen being Stephen:

Unfortunately a stubborn rain descended and so we ducked into the Tate to see what was in the main exhibition hall. It was Surrealist Saturday and this is what we stumbled across:

Not very impressed, we left the Tate Modern only to see a fellow casually walking down the side of the building, suspended by a bungee cord.

The rain was bad so once we got to the market we tried to find a place to eat, but London is so damn crowded it took a while. Finally found a pizza place and took refuge there for a while.

After chilling out we wandered around the market sampling cheese, oils, and a very fine brownie indeed. We checked out Neal's Yard Dairy, and found a queue of people for their famous cheese and breads:

Some of the cheese:

We decided to go for an indoor activity and so headed up to Islington and watched the film "Brick" which was very good. No doubt about it. I, however, didn't find it was my cup of tea. So sue me.

We then found a place to eat where the waiters were hell-bent on confusing us, but managed to get out alive without having been charged for everything. Bizarre.

Sunday, Susannah came out to Woking for the afternoon, was greatly amused by the aircraft on a stick and the giant alien. It's refreshing to be with someone seeing Woking with new eyes, as it confirms just how weird it really is.

And now it's Monday. Bank Holiday! Stephen's off to work though, for a sleep-in as well. Tomorrow I'm off to London again to see Susannah, so only a 3 day work week.

My head's just spinning from all the fun.

Neko Case
Mood:  rushed
Topic: Elisabeth's Entries

NEKO CASE CHARMS LONDON AT THE SHEPARD'S BUSH EMPIRE:

More details later...but wow...she's fab.