Saturday 2nd February

They claim that in Spain, the rain falls mainly on the plain. Having been resident in this city for a week, I have come to the conclusion that in England, the rain falls mainly on Bristol. The past week has been filled with sheeting rain and 90 mph winds. Mr Z looked mildly offended when I suggested that Bristol was some kind of ark (he'd have been more offended if I had suggested that Bristol is some kind of Sodom and Gomhorra worthy of 40 days of flooding, methinks) but then backed up my theory just this evening by saying that Bristol has one of the highest concentrations of frogs and toads in Britain, on account of the higher than average rainfall. Proof of this can be obtained merely by stepping out of the back door - or, indeed, the front door, where a particularly monstrous specimen is lurking - of Mr Z's domicile, where one is literally slithering on a plethora of frogs desperately trying to get to the pond so they can ensure their species endures. Gah. GAH! Provided with a large frog club, with a handy light in one end, I ventured out in the rain to examine them earlier. I was careful not to get within mauling distance but they were hopping around in the rain like nobody's business. First days of rain, now a plague of frogs - what next? Death to all first borns? All who look back longingly in the direction of Portsmouth turned to pillars of salt?

Death to all first borns. This has become a rather more inviting prospect after the week I have just spent sitting in on secondary school classes at a local school. Disappointingly, nobody managed to come up with an original joke about my name - just the same old "Give us a hand!" and the dirtier variations; lots of teenaged girls pulled faces at me and spoke to me sneeringly which I put down to rites of passage. I have never, EVER appreciated my education as much as I did this week - and I have appreciated it a lot over the past few years. Talk about polar opposites. I heard the story about the girl who stood up to do her English oral presentation on violins and in all seriousness told the class that her playing would not be very good as she had broken her g-string. I heard about the English oral on somebody's tax disk collection. I heard a child arrive late in class and excuse himself by saying he had been fighting in the toilets. I experience first hand the enormous impact "Pop Idol" has on the adolescent population when I heard the name "Darius Darcy" used in a pastiche of Pride and Prejudice. I sat in on a variety of lessons, from A-level maths to special needs classes for 13 year olds, and they were all very interesting in their own way, often for class dynamics as much as teaching style. It was a bit weird not being able to yell at them (not my problem, not my place...) and I think I'm going to have to work on checking my impulse towards physical restraint - not only allowed but necessary when working with the likes of Bradley and other special needs kids, but of course totally illegal in mainstream schools. I somehow think I would end up on the front page of the Sun if I were to fireman's lift a child out of a classroom and sit with my arms and legs wrapped around them until they stopped trying to bite and/or snot on me.

Speaking of the Sun, I thought my five minutes of fame had come last week when all the Edexcel scandal broke. I was just dying to tell everyone how utterly crap they are and how it's not at all surprising they're messing everything up and they should lose their license and when I was working there some exam scripts were found stuffed under shelves etc etc...So I rang up the Sun (it being the only paper I knew of that actually had a newsdesk number on the front page), tracked down the correct journalist and told him everything I could think of. He told me it would go into Thursday's edition, but when I bought Thursday's edition, not only was there no sign of anything I'd said, there was suspiciously absolutely nothing about Edexcel at all in the entire paper. One has to wonder if they have been muzzled. Anyway, it looks as thought they're in a lot of trouble - time will tell. Bernie, who is still working there, tells me everybody's so incompetent it's just laughable, and that the other day he overheard some managers talking about a key skills paper about to go out missing the last page. I think this is what people are not getting - it's not just the error in printing - it's the fact that they KNOW the papers are going out wrong but just keep shtum in the hopes nobody will notice. Disgraceful!

But onto more about me. My last week at the care at home place was pretty tiring because I was teaching my successor my job - which was quite frustrating at times, although she did seem to be up to speed by the time I left. On Friday I spent lots of money on cakes and chocolates and we all gorged ourselves for most of the day. Then they gave me a box of chocolates to "say a big thank you" and then handed me an enormous box which was "just a little something" - ha ha. It was a huge slow cooker, to hold about 7 pints, and I'm really chuffed with it. I had to lug it on the train with me and the rest of my last minute luggage (why is there always more than you think there will be?) but I have been looking at it all week. The best part was, when I opened up the box and lifted the lid, there was a big bag of lentils inside (grin) how well they know me. I also got a very sweet card, in which Rita called me a lentil, Lesley told me to come back and make the tea, and Barry wrote "The best we've ever had - Ihope Bristol appreciates you". Bless! I was very touched. They also gave me a picture of all of them (Rita said they'd spent ages trying to get me to make the tea so they could take it which is a transparent lie cos they were all holding their mugs) which will take pride of place....at the bottom of my wardrobe..heh. Just kidding (grin).

What with all that chocolate and the doughnuts and carrot cake, and the fact I ate meat 2 meals a day every day last week to try and eat up everything I had in the freezer, I was rather dreading my weigh in this week. It didn't help that, when Wednesday came and I went off to my first Bristol weigh in, I tried two Methodist churches on the same road and it was neither of them - how it is possible to support three Methodist churches in a one miles radius I don't know, but anyway, I missed the 5 o'clock class and was wandering up and down the road starting to shake at the thought of missing my weekly confessional and having to wait another whole week to be weighed. Luckily there was a 6.30 class so I went along to that one and discovered I had lost a massive five pounds. This on top of the weigh in from the week before, when I had also lost five pounds. That's ten pounds in under three weeks - it doesn't sound particularly healthy but I'm not going to complain - I'm nearly back down to what I was when I left school now. I was also Slimmer of the Week amongst the new class. The average age is slightly higher than my Portsmouth class, and the scales there weigh in half pounds increments instead of full pound ones, and the Slimmer of the Week basket was a bit pathetic, but they seemed friendly enough and the consultant was really nice. She's already sent me a letter of support and it's only been three days since I saw her. So now we are on The Diet - day 112, which makes it nearly a third of a year, and I am missing pizza from Pizza Hut and battered fish deep fried spring rolls, but on the whole it's not been too onerous.

Bristol, apart from the rain, seems to be suiting me quite well, apart from feeling just a little bit like suburban hell. Have decided that Cadbury Heath is the Portchester of Bristol...or possibly even the Droxford. Somewhere in the back of beyond, anyway. Went into the town centre on the bus on Monday to sign up with Office Angels and have a little wander round. Office Angels didn't sound too positive, and when I rang them on Thursday the consultant told me, "We've had a lot of jobs in but they've all been filled..." to which I growled, "But not by ME" - since they hadn't called me even once. She didn't really know what to say to that. So I came home with a paper, rang up after nine application forms for admin positions all over the place, printed out another ten CVs for touting around agencies and wrote a few covering letters to send out to three specific companies. Was feeling a bit panicky and hacked off that my driving lesson money might have to be spent on rent; said to Mr Z that since I'd gone to all this trouble Office Angels were bound to ring me up the next day with something. True to form, they excelled themselves - they rang during my morning free period and offered me the A1 perfect job: Monday to Friday, nine to five, long term admin with the exact rate of pay I asked for. I start on Monday - some sort of pensions company in town. This morning, when the post came, there were seven application forms for me. Pity. But I feel better temping - it doesn't seem fair to get a permanent job knowing I'll be leaving in six months.

Mr Z is standing behind me playing with my hair. We have been sitting in his room now for an hour, him browsing the web and me writing this. He tells me he fears that if we get network cards for our machines we'll be communicating solely via email and ICQ, from across the room. I fail to see where the problem is with that (grin).

Oops, he's gone off in a strop now, I'd better go and apologise before the glass of water tilted over my head reaches a fatal angle.

PS - My personal review of 2001 can be reached here.

Saturday 23rd February

I have come to the conclusion that the world is as big as a postage stamp. I would say it was only England - and I'm sure an awful lot of people would agree with me - but after some reflection, I'm certain that it's actually the world. And the world is getting smaller, of course. Time was, in Eastenders, when Dot Cotton wanted to get away she'd go to Gravesend (a little coastal town just outside of London, I think). True, this time she went to Edinburgh which is a bit further afield, but now when people want to get away, they go to Las Vegas (like me) or Australia (like half of everybody else) or backpacking in the Far East (like the other half). Time was, you'd go down the pub to get away from the wife. Now you go to Amsterdam for the weekend.

Freaky supportive story #1 - A friend of Mr Z's went on holiday to Paris, and got chatting with an American he met at the top of the Eiffel Tower. Turns out, this American had recently "met" this guy's next door neighbour but one on ICQ. (That's my only international one - please feel free to mail me and I'll add them)
Freaky supportive story #2 - My new boss (more on my new job in a bit) grew up in Fareham, went to the same school as Sibling Hand (three years above me though) and went out with a girl in the year above me at school.
Freaky supportive story #3 - I finally plucked up the courage to walk into my local Bristol bell tower this week. The first man I saw looked at me, turned around - then did a massive double take. He is someone I have known since I started ringing, who ALSO went to Sibling Hand's school and who went out with a girl in the SAME year as me at school. He is now married with a baby on the way.

Judging from Friends Reunited, I thought that everyone from Portsmouth aspired towards moving to London or just stayed put (sensibly). Now it seems they either stayed put, moved to London, or moved to Bristol.

Am also starting to wonder whether I am being trailed by trend setters for major fashion houses/Vogue. I thought it was just coincidence, or that I had a good nose for future trends (HA!) but it's happened a number of times now that I've seen something I liked and bought it, and a couple of months later it's been EVERYWHERE. The first time it happened was with my knitted hat with the ear flaps, which I bought from a Polish babushka on the streets of Zakopane for 85p. I love that hat. Yes, it looks like a tea cosy but it's super warm, and it was, at time of purchase, like nothing anybody else had. Three months later, they were being sold everywhere from Top Shop to Selfridges. When I went out and bought three yards of broderie anglais to make a skirt, broderie anglais clothes suddenly became available all over the high street (and my broderie anglais is still in its original bag somewhere in storage - albeit cut and pinned). And now, it's happened again. Seasoned readers may recall my ravings over a pair of red cowboy boots I convinced Father Hand to purchase for me from a cowboy shop in Vegas before I left. When I got back, my friends all scoffed and threatened not to be seen out with me in such things. But I still love them - they make my feet look really narrow. And, flicking through Cosmo this week, I spotted a spread on cowboy boots...and what do you think? One of the featured pairs was from Office, same colour, same style, same pattern...same boots, ostensibly, although I doubt they were gringo-made in Mexico with a leather sole, and they are slightly dearer at £90 for the pair.

Freaky coincidence or Trumanshowesque? You decide.

Have been at the new job for three weeks now. Discovered this week that I landed it in much the same way as I landed the last one - the bloke who was doing it before me jacked it in on the Thursday, saying to was too complicated. I pity him slightly, since it seems the last temp before him had bade the company farewell by glueing a number of items to the desk - pens, ruler etc - so when he went to pick them up, he couldn't. But to be honest, it's not that difficult (the job, not picking up things that are glued down). Naturally I hated it on my first day and it has only really improved this week - because this week I'm seeing some results from the work I did in the first week so there's actually something to do. It's a pensions review exercise, digging around to discover if the company I work for owes hundreds of investors thousands of pounds due to dodgy pension salesmen who were giving bad advice in the '80s (they do). I am "gathering data". That's ok - but I'm not really sure what I'm doing yet. But I'm getting there. The worst part is having to get up at 7.15am every morning - it takes the best part of an hour on the bus, and Bristol is still cold and beset by storms, although I don't think it's been raining quite as much as it did in my first week here.

In my half of my wing on my floor, there are 27 work stations or "pods". 26 of them are staffed by men. The other one is staffed by me. The novelty is fantastic after working in a mostly-female office for five months. I have only made three cups of tea since I've been there, and those have been voluntary. The "pods" are arranged in groups of six, and the other five employees in my area are all pretty sound (including the boss from Portsmouth), although I get the impression that they have been toning it down a bit for my benefit - at least for the first couple of weeks: it's got a bit blokier this week. It's completely tame compared to what I heard working in the kitchens at Bennigan's, mind you, or on the chatlines, but I think it's quite precious of them to make the effort. It's interesting to see how much I am left out of group discussions, I'm not sure whether that's a girl thing or a new employee thing or maybe even a we-don't-like-you thing. Olly (new to me this week, following a fortnight's jury service) has twice questioned everyone on future children plans this week (maybe he's getting broody) but hasn't asked me..that might be a girl thing. Then there was the "Everyone should have a cutesie nickname" discussion, with no suggested name for me. I'm not at all offended, you understand - it's very interesting trying to work out whether it's the kid gloves approach or the she-might-sue-us-for-harrassment approach. Presumably it won't last much longer. Apparently previous temps have been teased mercilessly. Must find something to sharpen my tongue on.

You'd think, in an office mainly populated by men, there'd be little problem when a technical hitch arose. But no. In my first week, the printer did a Bob Marley as the saying there goes (jammed) and seven or eight blokes stood around it, fiddling with it, opening this drawer and twisting that lever and umming and ahhing and swearing and kicking the machine for about twenty minutes, before dispersing to go to meetings or print their documents on the printer in the other wing. Coast clear, I went over to have a look, and saw that the poor, abused machine was trying to give instructions on how to unjam it. These I followed, to the letter, and had it working within 30 seconds. Unfortunately there was no-one around to gloat at because they'd all gone off to the other printer or wherever, and it's a trick I have not managed to repeat since, but I had my moment of triumph, and sweet it was too.

I have also learnt this week, through Matt who sits next to me and is an aspiring DJ (so I surmise), the difference between house music, garage music (UK and US) and drum & bass. Apparently it's all down to something as sophisticated as the time - ie, house and garage are usually in 4/4 while drum & bass is in 2/4 (or possibly 4/8 - mind you, when I was doing my music theory lessons I never fully understood the difference between those two, which might be why I gave up after grade three). And there I was thinking like an old person that that thar moozik is jus' a stuck record, innit mind, and thar's no difference 'part from how annoyin' it is. Have surprised myself in recent months by developing - or I should say redeveloping - a taste for (what I now know to be) garage music, and have suffered a yearning for a night out in a cheesy nightclub I haven't felt since I was at school, or possibly a fresher. However, nights out getting pissed in the Tree (strange oxymoron that - getting out of my tree in the Tree) or until recently the King's are very satisfactory, and would be more so were the quiz machine to offer Battleships once more and were I to suddenly get extremely accurate when throwing darts. All in good time though, I suppose: my pool playing skills are actually skills now, albeit fledgling, rather than a mixture of flukes and blatant cheating. The Tree has been shut for refurbishment this week and as a result, Mr Z and I have been all at sea and ended up going to Asda at 10pm last night, where we bumped into Scott and Char (or Shot and Scar as I sometimes accidentally slur), who are also regulars. Evidently that's where everyone is going while it's shut. Char claimed she was only there for a bottle of wine but I glimpsed a cake in her basket as they were checkout bound. Mmmm, cake. I miss cake.

Which brings me neatly to The Diet - day 133. Have done very well, losing nearly a stone in the past month, but sabotaged myself a bit last week by not feeling like it and eating lots of chocolate. I think it was knowing I had only another pound and a half to go until I reached my two and a half stone mark; I always seem to lose it a bit when I near a milestone. Luckily only gained half a pound though, in spite of the curly wurly squirlies the sandwich lady stocks (only one and a half sins for two, but I do eat the whole packet), so only another two pounds to go. Seem to have fitted in quite well at the new class: most of the members are around the same age as Mother Hand (or older) with the exception of a queen on the verge of his 30th birthday and a couple of young(ish) mothers, but they're all very friendly and the consultant is really nice. Also, she weighs in half pound increments instead of whole pounds, so it's easier to lose. Also easier to gain, I suppose, but let's not dwell on that.

Mr Z and I have been out today trawling around estate agents putting ourselves on their lists. Have been given the pictures and details of a few houses which we have driven around to look at; some of them are quite promising, although one was very scary, being opposite a block of flats all boarded up and covered in rubbish. We saw the inside of a house last week, which was lovely - but I am likely to say that about them all. It had a fantastic garden and an enormous master bedroom, but the kitchen was a bit cramped, as was the bathroom - which was downstairs. No room for a piano, either. The area we are looking in is rather crammed with dwellings, but then I suppose you can't have it all. A detached house with a basement set in the middle of four acres might be a bit much to ask. Father Hand is also attempting to buy a house with Frankie - they have picked one they like, complete with a swimming pool. The only question I had was - when can we come and visit?