Thursday 6th September

I have once again joined the ranks of the unemployed. It doesn't matter really because I'm going on holiday tomorrow, and Human Factor, that agency that I slagged off after they gave me work in the plastics factory, have actually proved to be worth more salt than Office Angels or Classic (at this moment, anyway) because their office temp booker rang me up today. I was quite surprised, and even more so when I reached the phone and he said, "Oh hello - can I call you back in a minute?" I was like, um...didn't you just call me? But when he did call back, he said he thought he'd check in as I'd told him to call at the beginning of September, and was I available for four weeks office admin off the Eastern Road?

Am I impressed? Very. Obviously I said no - holiday - but when I get back I've got to give him a ring and tell him if I want to take it for the last two weeks. I hereby apologise to Human Factor for thinking so badly of them - out of the agencies I signed on with, Classic sent me a P45 even though I told them I'd be available again after the end of August. Office Angels haven't really done anything wrong apart from trying to lure me into a 6-day working week on the sly, so I won't bitch and moan about them. Yet. In addition to my career as an office temp, I am applying to Royal Mail as...wait for it...an office temp. They were advertising for temporary data entry positions which could turn out to be quite the ticket. I fear that there are no positions at Cliffdale - which is probably for the best as it would have been quite a struggle to save if I was only working a 27-and-a-half hour week.

I've just drawn my curtains for about the second time since June (the Sally likes the dark) and I've noticed that the house that backs onto next door has solar panels on the roof. How very ecological of them.

To think! I nearly forgot to mention my fabulously exciting news that has had me twirling around singing for the past week or so.

Well, not physically, obviously. But it's true. I am now the proud owner of www.bunny-land.com. It's me! It's mine! All 500 meg of it! No, I don't know quite what I'm going to do with all that space either, but very soon Bunnyland as you all know and love it will be moving into its new spacious quarters. I've been overhauling and working out which of the 100+ html files will be retiring, but when I come back from my holiday, since its likely that I'll have a week off, I should have time to upload it all. Here's another cool thing - I get unlimited webmail accounts. Anybody want a yourname@bunny-land.com email address? Heh heh heh. I have to thank Mr Z profusely for finding the hosts and, really, for everything. Freeserve, we like. Bunnyland has had some happy times here. But when Freeserve made an alliance with the evil ones - aka British Telecom - and thus cut us cable users out of the free calls market, they did rather sting the bunnies.

The last couple of days at Playscheme were a bit of a dream - Sheila obviously decided I'd done some sterling work and gave me Charli on the Thursday - who likes to lie on the ground and twiddle with straws. So all morning, we lay by the bouncy castle while she twiddled, and all afternoon, we lay in the quiet area while she twiddled. Then on Friday I had Lexi, who's very sweet and easy to look after, and Haydn, who you might remember from day 1. We all went out to Netley country park again and I spent the day with Sheila and Bradley - indeed, I spent quite some time watching Bradley, watching him climb trees, watching him try to escape...which he did, while Sheila and I were talking. She suddenly exclaimed, "Where's Bradley?!" and I turned to the exit of the playground to see Jessica, a volunteer who was working with me on the Friday and who had been making her way back from the toilets, flying in the opposite direction. "He went that way!" I screamed, already moving, and raced down to where she was standing, at the crossroads for the mini train. "He went that way!" she yelled, pointing up the tracks. I turned to see Bradley flying up the tracks in pursuit of the mini train, so I began stumbling after him - quite a feat, as the track was about a foot wide with slopes either side, which made running a bit of a problem. By the time I caught up to him, he was clinging onto the back carriage grinning like a monkey and they'd had to stop the train. I man-handled him off and carried him back up the tracks while he yelled his displeasure into my ear. Sheila meanwhile had gone to the mini station, her plan being that one of us would catch him in such a way, and after that the drama was over. It was hot day and I had already been sweating - after that burst of energy (I still don't know how I managed to run that distance so fast and not keel over - I mean, it wasn't far, but I'm not exactly fit) I resembled a very ripe tomato recently drenched in water. "Feeling a bit hot, Sally?" became the catchphrase for the afternoon. Yes, har har har.

I was sorry to see him go, I must say. Sheila seemed pleased - his mum had written a thankyou note in his home book, which she apparently never does. I managed to get some nice pictures after we got back to the school, so maybe I'll put one up when I get back, so you can all see who I've been harping on about.

That evening, all the staff went out for a meal at Rickshaw's. I got a head start on the drinking by going down to the Atrium on my own beforehand and drinking some cheap cocktails. When I got to the pub, there were already people there so I managed to persuade Kathy and Louise to come back over for another cocktail while it was still happy hour - admittedly, I was already very rosy by the time I got to the restaurant, and Louise's generosity with cocktails during the meal pushed me even further down that track, in spite of the three vast bowls of food I managed to consume during the meals (it was all-you-can-eat - just trying to get my money's worth, you see). By the end of the meal, I had decided I'd like one of the stainless steel dishes to take home, and so slipped it into my top. Everyone said it looked quite natural but lopsided, so I put one the other side; Sheila then kindly aided me by making me a pair of very realistic nipples out of orange peel, and I got a lot of mileage for the rest of the evening asking everybody if they liked my new breasts - including people in the street and a couple of gay blokes in Alldays when I went to buy cigarettes. Indeed, they were so realistic that I managed to get out of the restaurant with them in place. Richard boss-man even came over and commented on them, asking me if I liked the extra support, much to everyone's amusement (obviously, being the boss, he doesn't often get to join in on everyone's little jokes). Yesterday he rang up to ask Mother Hand something about a minibus, and he said to me, "Ah Sally! The dishes from Rickshaw's..." and my blood ran cold, because I thought he was going to say, "They rang and they want them back or they're going to charge us for them" but instead he said, "Still giving you the extra support?" so I grinned a sigh of relief and replied, "Oh yes - I don't know how I ever did without them." Mother Hand said she was pleased she hadn't been there but one thing's for sure - I won't be forgotten in a hurry.

Instead of going clubbing afterwards, a lot of us went back to Lianne's house for more drinking and some play of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? and some passionate discussion of travel writing with Dorothy, Claire and Justin (admittedly, that was mostly me). Was slightly gutted to find that a few people had actually gone clubbing - namely Charlotte, Colin, Kathy, Mary and Richard boss-man - because if I'd known I would have joined, but there will be other times I suppose. In the end, Dorothy gave Catherine, Claire and I a lift home and I was in bed by 2am which meant that I managed to get up by 8am to catch the 9.22 to Bristol, and I wasn't too crabby and mean when I got there - as I had been the weekend before. I spent a very relaxing five days in the company of Mr Z - we went to Chew Valley lake (near Wookie hole - Chew(ie)? Wookie? Mere coincidence?), walked around Bristol and heard Robbie Williams singing live (possibly - it might have been one of those star doubles - we didn't see him so we weren't sure) and I even managed to coerce him (Mr Z, not Robbie Williams) into taking me to Ikea to buy picture frames. He was not a happy bunny when we got there as it took us 45 minutes to find the place, and then a further 10 to find the entrance, as we'd accidentally gone to the exit. It was packed inside - surprisingly, for a Wednesday, I don't know, Bristolians are weird - but I managed to get what I wanted and when we came out he had to admit it was cheap, but he'd never buy furniture there. I think he might be right - although my bookcase is still going strong. The computer desk was a bit rickety though. I managed to beat Mr Z and Wayne at pool (they played me two against one and I still won! Admittedly, Mr Z was playing one handed, but still..) and I beat Wayne at darts, with a spectacular double-two the like of which will never be repeated. Mr Z didn't see it, because he was chatting to someone, so I'll let him off - but nobody tell him, because I told him I'd never let him off. Matt and George, of the memorable June party fame, were in the pub for the first time since the memorable June party, and Matt came over and apologised profusely for about ten minutes. He said he'd been too ashamed to come to the pub since then, in case Char had a go at him. Char's only little, really - but she makes up for it. Didn't see her while I was there - her and Scott have moved into a little love nest and they're either shacked up not shagging (on account of them not going out) or it's too far from the pub, because apparently they're not around much anymore. I made a variation of strawberry cheesecake ice cream, with ginger biscuits and mixed fruit, for the Parents Z, and it was much approved of. Phew. I also bought some new shoes - my DM sandals sort of died after pounding up the train tracks so I had to buy some more...had to.

On Wednesday, Mr Z and I caught the train back to Portsmouth together - we got to spend nine whole days together as he'd wangled a week off, which was really nice: it's the longest time we've spent together all in one go. We were going to go to 80s night but in the end I chickened out (am I weird, or does anybody else think that clubbing isn't really the sort of thing one does with one's significant other?) so we went and played on the red pool table at the King's instead. On Thursday night I took him ringing with me, and on Friday we went out for drinks with my old "posse" - Zoe was down from London, and we met up at Gunwharf with Caroline and Dave, and Leila and some of her mates from uni. Caroline and Leila moved on the same weekend - Caroline to a house she and Dave have just bought (Go Caroline!) and Leila to a flat round the corner from her old flat, with Mother Kamenica and Brothers Kamenica. We went to some over-priced bars; Caroline went home and Leila went to Tiger Tiger so Zoe and I stayed in Bar 38 and had a very long girlie chat. So long, in fact, that Mr Z got a bit fed up (understandably) and disappeared - I thought he was in the toilet until I realised it had been half an hour. Felt a bit ignorant and had to do a lot of apologising about that. One day I'll learn to treat my wonderful man as he deserves to be treated. It was nice to see everyone again though - got some pictures (of course!), and it was nice to see Leila and Caroline in the same room together for the first time in, oo, ages. They only ever meet up when I ask them to. But then, horses for courses.

On Saturday we listened to the football on the radio...5-1!! Those Germans must have been well and truly gutted. The commentator was very amusing, he was getting very excited over all the goals scored - I think the classic lines were, "It's birthday, Christmas, and New Year's Eve all! In! One!!" and, after Gerrard scored a goal, "How hard? GERR'ARD!" A great day for England, especially Portsmouth which I might have mentioned before can be rather patriotic when it wants to be. The headline in the News of the World the next day read, "Don't Mention The Score" which I thought was another classic line (somebody told me that - I didn't buy the News Of The World, I hasten to add). When I watched the England-Albania match round Caroline's last night (2-0! will there be no end to our successes...etc etc) they did some close-ups on the crowd, and there were fans wearing t-shirts with the three lions on and "Germany - 1, England - 5" printed on them. Sibling says that down at Tacos, where he works, they've had German customers in and the waiters have been saying things like, "So you want FIVE burritos and ONE beer? Or was it FIVE beers and ONE burrito? Oh I'm sorry, I could have sworn you said FIVE and ONE...."

Afterwards Mr Z and I went down the Kings again (the local...I think I might start calling it the local if I remember) and the doors were locked, with a big sign on them saying "CLOSED". We were a bit non-plussed and hung around outside for a few minutes wondering what to do, when the landlord came out and said, "Oh, it's you...come in, come in.." So in we went - there were others in there - and he locked the door behind us. It was very cool - definitely worthy of being a local now - the barstaff even remember what we usually order. Mr Z asked if he could purchase some of the red chalk (he was not impressed with the red pool table at first, but then said the chalk was the right grade)..in fact, he asked on Wednesday and the landlord said he'd dig him some out for Thursday, but we didn't go in on Thursday. So I went and reminded him on Saturday and he said we could have the lumps off the table. I can definitely reccommend this place. Even if I can't spell recccommmend.

This week has been lovely and quiet - I've tidied things, cleaned the kitchen, spent time painting my toe-nails..very girlie things. Mother Hand and I leave for the Czech Republic tomorrow morning around 7am - we'll arrive at Brno Lakes, our final destination, around lunchtime on Saturday, but I'm really looking forward to it, and the coach journey doesn't seem so irksome after all the Greyhounding I did in America. Especially when you consider that we probably won't even get on the coach until 5pm, taking into account the ferry crossing. Trying to work out how many countries we'll pass though - we land in Calais - but I think it might only be France and Germany. But then, I was always crap at geography. Anyway, it will be nice to get away - I've been cooling my heels here now for, ooooo, all of three months - definitely time for a holiday (cackle).

Monday 17th September

Well! This past week has been very busy in the world news, and very busy in my news, so this might be another one of those bumper entries.

Mother Hand and I arrived back from the Czech Republic last night, after travelling for about 30 hours by coach, boat and train. It was a lovely holiday although, admittedly, the weather wasn't quite up to scratch, but then you can't win 'em all. Unlike Poland, I wasn't the youngest person on the trip - Neil and Katie, a couple from Kent, won that dubitable honour, and we ended up sharing living space with them for the week. I imagine we were the only four to not book private facilities, and as such ended up in a two bedroom apartment sharing a bathroom - but it was far preferable, as we also had a lounge equipped with a sofa, two arm chairs, a TV and a fridge. We spent every evening sitting in the bar drinking with other New Millenium holiday makers - all of whom were at least forty but very friendly - and then going back to our lounge for slivovice (plum liqueur of some kind) and CNN. Drink was incredibly cheap - the local Tesco's sold slivovice for as little as £1.50 a bottle; beer meanwhile went from 8p for half a litre upwards, although one had to pay an extra 6p for the bottle, reclaimable at the recycling booth. As such, I took all the bottles we'd used back to Tesco's on Friday and reclaimed all my money (it was 40p or so) much to the amusement of the recycling man and the drunken loafers lounging in the vicinity. The Czech Republic is also the home of that wonderful spirit Becherovka, or "liquid Christmas" as I call it - on account of the fact that it tastes and smells exactly as you imagine Christmas would, were it corporeal. I think it's the spices. Anyway, I was thrilled to discover it sold very cheaply in all bars and supermarkets, and brought a couple of bottles home with me for my quaffing pleasure, along with a bottle of 8p beer because it has a pretty label.

We managed to squeeze in three day trips during the week - one to the Punkva Caves, one to Prague, and one to Vienna. The caves were full of stalactites and stalacmites and also included the Machoca Abyss, which is this unbelievable drop into a rocky, wooded hole - which had originally been a cave but had lost its roof thousands of years ago. Machoca is the Czech for stepmother, and according to the folklore the abyss is named after one of the wicked variety, who attempted to push her small stepson over the top whilst out picking bilberries. Luckily his clothes snagged on a bush and some woodcutters came running to his aid; then they set out to search for the wicked stepmother - who either threw herself over in desperation or was pushed over by an angry mob, depending on which version you believe. I tend towards the latter because I can't think of anybody willingly jumping off the top. During this trip, our guide, Robert, took quite considerable interest in the corduroy trousers of one of our party - Robert - and this became a recurring theme during the tour, which Robert himself led. Thus, at the mirror pool, he was telling us what wonderful things would happen if we put various quantities of money into the pool, and for thirty pounds one would receive lifelong love and a pair of corduroy trousers. When we reached the wishing stone, the only stalacmite one is allowed to touch, he said that all wishes would come true as long as they were spoken out loud, and in Czech, and then told us what the Czech for corduroy was (it sounded like manchester but I'm sure it wouldn't be spelt like that). For the rest of the week I couldn't help but refer to this gentleman as "Corduroy Robert" - which stopped anybody confusing him with the tour guide, anyway. He turned out to be a gentleman of the virtually extinct variety; he and his wife would come to the bar most evenings, and on one occasion it was very hot in there, and he asked Katie and I if we would mind if he took his tie off. The next night, Mother Hand finished her coffee and got up to leave, and he stood up too. It was quite fascinating really. There were a couple from Leeds called Bruce and Sylvia who really reminded me of Mod and Fod; there was a man from Keynsham, which is where I get off the train when I go to Bristol. There were a lot of people who were very well travelled and it was very interesting listening to their collective experiences. There were also two couples who happened to be in Poland with us two years ago - although they went to a different resort to us this time - and they came and said hello when we got on the ferry. Am ashamed to say I didn't remember them, but they remembered us alright..."You're Mummy and Daughter aren't you? Yes, I remember..." One other couple couldn't believe we were mother and daughter, much to Mother Hand's delight.

On Tuesday, we went to Prague for the day, which was very picturesque but so crowded with tourists I felt quite uncomfortable. There were hundreds of little stalls selling wooden toys and I finally managed to get the Russian Dolls I have wanted since I saw them in Poland - the Russian leaders, ranging from Putin to a tiny Nicholas II. For some reason there is no Brezhnev - the dolls skip straight from Gorbachev to Krushchev (I'm sure I've spelled that wrong, shame on me) (I miss out Andropov and the other one because they are hardly ever mentioned) - and I was surprised that they would include Nicholas II and not Brezhnev, but very happy anyway. I also bought a wooden tulip for Mr Z; Mother Hand bought me one of those falling-over toys that one operates with one's thumb..y'know what I mean...the things, with the pressy bits on the bottom. Anyway I'm supposed to forget about that because it's going to be a stocking present. We climbed the tower at the end of Charles Bridge, and walked through the Jewish Quarter, and up and down Wenceslas Square where we bumped into a crowd of Hare Krishnas and both found ourselves helplessly singing their theme tune. We saw the famous astrological clock and the statue nearby of a man who burned books - our orientation tour was quite short so I don't remember as much as I should, sadly. We sat outside a cafe and drank hot chocolate and ate apple strudel. When the day got chillier and we ran out of things to do, we got directions to an internet cafe - and lucky I asked, because it turned out to be through a little wooden door in a big gate, and down an alleyway past a wine shop, totally off the map - and I checked my email whilst Mother Hand sipped coffee and wrote postcards next to a radiator. I was quite impressed with the city, the architecture was fantastic and, although it wasn't as cheap as Brno (where we stayed), it was still a lot cheaper than most European capitals. The only minus points were the throngs of tourists flocking all over the place - it seemed every other person I walked past was speaking English.

On Thursday we went in the other direction, across the border to Vienna. Given a map and thrown into the centre of the city to fend for ourselves, we managed to get a lot of sight seeing done and it was relatively warm and sunny, with considerably less tourists, which might be two reasons why I preferred it. There were some fabulous Gothic cathedrals; in addition, the Houses of Parliament, the Opera House and the City Hall all made a lasting impression in a city packed with architectural delicacies. We visited the Jewish Museum which had a repository upstairs for all the Judaica saved during the Holocaust, and other things - including a dazzling array of Menorah ranging from bottle tops glued to a piece of wood to a blue stuffed toy with candle holders sewn into it. There was an exhibition relating to the Jewish diaspora, which comrpised of artefacts collected from eighteen different cities around the world, to demonstrate how widespread the faith is. That was full of interesting facts, such as that two-thirds of all Jews live in America, with two million in New York; and that 330 000 lives in England, with two-thirds of those living in London. In contrast, cities previously overrun with Jews, such as Cracow, have just a few thousand left. There was also an exhibit of holograms relating to Jewish life in Vienna through the ages. Some of the quotes written with them were quite moving; I will have to see if I can find them on the web.

This entry is far from over, but I really want to get it uploaded to my new site because then my move will be complete! You will be reading this from the dotcom - enjoy!

Tuesday 25th September

I apologise for aborting the previous entry, but I really wanted to get the bunnies properly settled in at bunny-land.com, and it seemed a pity to do so without adding a new entry to go with it. So! Here we are, and it's very exciting. I forgot to say before - for all my readers with fancy WAP technology, Bunnyland is now available to you through your phone! Never go without the diario again! I don't quite know the details of this yet, not being a WAP user myself I don't understand how it works, but details will be forthcoming. What with all this space, I have a multitude of ideas. If you got here via the index page, you will already have noticed Father Hand's Letter From America; also look out for Ask Mr Z - coming soon! And, thanks once again to the wonderful Mr Z, the Bunnyland image is now mapped to other parts of the site.

Where was I? Ah yes, in Vienna. Many of the banks there had big clocks fixed to their outer walls, revealing a countdown to the Euro - which will be introduced in real money form to fifteen countries in Europe at the beginning of 2002, including Austria. I made sure I kept my Austrian coins in a safe place because they will be interesting things to have in a few years, I expect. Mother Hand and I ate lunch sitting on a fountain and then, when we got to the opera house, we sat in a little cafe and had coffee and cake - something I particularly wanted to do since it seemed like such a cliche, and, of course, because it involved cake. After that we set off walking for Freud's old house, which is now a museum. I was stood on a pavement with my head buried in a map when Mother Hand said, "Sally....don't....move" so I looked up over the top of my map to find out why not and realised I was standing right in front of a point where two tramlines met, and there was a tram coming right at me. It was good advice - I didn't move, except to quake a little bit and squeak for comic effect. We walked down a hill to Freud's house, which took some finding, and took some pictures - whereupon I ran out of film. No matter, I thought, I have another film with me, and promptly started rummaging in my bag, only to end up with a sticky hand. I couldn't work out what it was until I realised, with a sinking heart, that in my haste that morning (we had had to leave the hotel at 8am) I had grabbed the film canister full of hair conditioner off my bedside table, instead of the film canister with film in it. Doh, doh and doh again. Thank goodness for digital cameras.

After that we found a post office so that I could send Mr Z a postcard from Vienna (he is what you might call a child of the 80s and I felt it would be appreciated) and then I saw a SPAR and had to go in and buy Mr Z a souvenir (maybe I am just a little obsessed...) so we started back for the coach slightly later than we intended, and were hindered by a toilet stop in McDonald's (the only place you didn't have to pay) which meant that we got back to the meeting point about 10 minutes late. Everybody else had been there for at least half an hour and all seemed slightly hissy but I feel we got our money's worth - the trip cost an extra £22 which seemed a bit steep considering we didn't have a guide, and we went on a minibus. When we told Corduroy Robert of our escapades in the bar that night, he said that if he had been in charge he would have left us there to fend for ourselves, which seemed terribly harsh, but then he was a military man.

For the rest of the week we did some sight-seeing around the area where we were staying. We got a boat up the lake to the next village and had lunch in a tiny pub - a beer, a juice, 2 bowls of goulash and a basket of bread came to £1.20 - and hypothesised about what the land would have looked like before it was a lake - it was flooded during the thirties for a hydroelectricity plant, which is still there although I'm not sure if it is in operation. There is a village down there somewhere..the rest of the resort is quite typical, lots of little bars with more tables outside than in, a yacht club, watersports club, lots of restaurants, and further up the lake lots of little holiday homes - some with people in residence, people who swam in the nude and then got out and waved at the passing ferry in full glory, or so we heard. The local nightclub - the TeePee - had a swimming pool: goodness knows what sort of wild parties they have in the height of summer. I had drinks at one of the outside bars with Neil and Kate on a couple of afternoons - on one occasion I tried the local equivalent of pickled eggs - something in a jar on the counter which turned out to be soft cheese in olive oil and herbs, much like feta. The food was fantastic for the whole week in fact - I was able to satisfy my current blue cheese fetish (it was all the salad with blue cheese dressing in America that did it) with a variety of dishes, and they didn't spare their peppercorns in the sauces on the other dishes (mmm...peppercorns), and they had pancakes with bilberries and curd cheese which were yummy, and they served cakes and soup for breakfast - basically, I ate far too much but I suppose it was only for a week. I am giving serious thought to joining Slimming World or something because I am starting to look pastier - something I could attribute to losing my Vegas tan, I suppose, but I try not to be too kind to myself or I let myself get away with murder. So to speak.

We did quite a lot of shopping in Brno, the local town - which is actually the second biggest city in the Czech Republic - and struggled up the hill to see the castle, and sat and watched opera rehearsals outside for a while. There were for some reason a quite ludicrous number of underwear shops in the locality, it was quite surreal to walk around and find every third window was floor to ceiling bras; in addition to this, our guide taught us, unsolicited, the Czech for "undies" along with "hello", "please", and "thankyou". A national obsession, perhaps? There were also lots of little stalls selling something which looked like pressed apple juice, the kind that sells for a small fortune in Waitrose, but which on closer inspection turned out to be the fermenting wine which is a speciality of the region - it was very nice, not too sweet and a little bit fizzy. Sadly, Mother Hand mislaid her gold chain on one of our trips and had to go back into town on the Saturday before we left to file a police report to send to the insurers. While she was there, her translator Milan - who is also a New Millenium rep - translated the conversations of some of the people coming into the station around her by way of amusement, and she said there were quite a few women who came in to complain about the camp outside the city - whether it was Romanian refugees or Romanies she couldn't be sure, but they were complaining to the police about their begging and their crime, who in their turn were saying there was nothing they could do about it. It seems that whatever differences Western Europeans think there might be between the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and their own, apparently to the refugees - or the gypsies - there is very little to choose between them. Admittedly it might be easier to get across the Czech border than the British one, especially these days. I read in the paper before I went away that the number of child refugees in the care of Kent County Council is in danger of surpassing the number of British children under the care of the same local authority.

So, I suppose, that was my holiday. The journey back was pretty uneventful, and much more comfortable because when I realised that the seats facing the stairs were empty I asked the rep if I could move on account of my "bad knees" (cough cough...although I did suffer terrible cramp on the way out there) and so ended up with a double seat to myself and lots of leg room. I managed to sleep really well, once I had removed the rubbish bag filled up by the couple sitting behind me, which absolutely reeked. They had been sitting in front of Neil and Katie on the way out, and carried similar smelly food and reclined as far as they could without asking, and used the spare seat next to Neil and Kate (who were in the back row) for storing their bags. What got me was that we'd had a dinner stop in the Prague hotel before setting off on the journey and so there was no need for them to carry their little picnic, which consisted of beer, some sort of spreadable smoked cheese, pickled fish, tomatoes, yoghurt...in fact, it was as if they had walked into the supermarket and said, "What is the most obnoxious food we can buy for the journey home?" I could put up with them eating it but then they put all the rubbish into the rubbish bag attached to my seat, and 6 hours later that thing HUMMED. I likened it, in a very loud voice as I removed it from the bus at the next rest stop, to pure alcohol and very old cheesy feet mixed and concentrated, and dumped the thing in the bushes since there were no obvious bins. On the way back to the bus everyone was asking me what the smell was, since we were lining up downwind of it to get back on; a lot of people thought somebody had actually been sick - it was that strong and disgusting. My only surprise was that it didn't get up and walk away of its own accord. Anyway, I tried to get Silver Fox and his adulterous partner back (we're sure it was an affair - they were all over each other like teenagers, neither of them had rings on, and my prolonged eavesdropping confirmed that she knew very little about his life) by eating garlic crisps, using both the lights above me (their nearest lights) to read by, and reclining both seats back as far as they would go. I figured I had some karma to spend after all the things I put up with on the bus trip around America.

Once we'd got back to England it took us seven hours to get back to Portsmouth, thanks to engineering work at Waterloo which meant that all trains from Kent were going into Victoria, and then to some cock up with the timetabling. They really are so incompetent. The worst part of it was, that because we were going and returning more than five days apart, we both had to buy two single tickets - which totalled nearly £120, and that was with three of them discounted by a third (Mother Hand had to pay full fare on the way there because we left so early, and they wouldn't accept her discount card). Full price would have been, for the two of us, more than it cost for one of us to get all the way to the Czech Republic and stay half board in a hotel for 10 days. And for this, we get terrible service and a freezing cold train. Don't even get me STARTED on the Portsmouth to Bristol line, or I really will be here all night. I am going to Bristol this weekend so I will see how the journey goes - if ANYTHING goes wrong, I'm going to write a huge flame in here next week. I've noticed my hits have jumped a little in the past few days, maybe now I am a dotcom my opinions will count for more (grin).

I thought to have the whole of last week off, especially when I got back to find no reply from the Post Office about the data entry job I had applied for, and when I rang Office Angels on the Monday, I was told I might have to wait until the next Monday - ie, yesterday - because everything for that week had been filled on the Friday. Yet, three hours later they rang me back and asked if I could start the next day - and so I did. As of last Tuesday, I am the latest administrator for the Isle of Wight section of a Home Care Agency - luckily the job is based at St Mary's hospital so there's no going to the Isle of Wight every day. They provide care at home for the elderly and disabled, as well as running a number of residential facilities across the country. I thought this was quite ironic, considering Mother Hand is a community link worker for people with mental health problems, and that I worked with special needs kids all summer - some of whom we doubtless provide care for. My job is to check the timesheets and mileage sheets for all the carers on the Isle of Wight, make sure they match the computer (they never do), if they don't find out why and update the system, sort out the invoices to make sure social services pay us and that the carers are paid the right amount...you get the idea. It's quite a staggering amount of responsibility and at first I found it a bit frightening - apparently the last girl left after a week and put in a complaint about it because she felt so overwhelmed; but that was good for me because when she didn't turn up on Monday I was in the right place at the right time and got her job. It's been going quite well - I am busy most of them time, sometimes with very mundane things - but, most importantly, I don't have a lot of time to sit and do nothing, so I don't find it boring. When things got a bit slow yesterday I sent out blank timesheets to all the carers, realising three-quarters of the way through that I had neglected to include addressed envelopes in the bundles - so I had to send out a second letter to all the people I'd already written to. That took me from first thing until 2pm. One morning last week was entirely spent going through all the timesheets for the month of August trying to find 105 minutes and 15 miles a carer thought were missing from her pay cheque - I found 14 miles and 15 minutes, but everything else was just as she'd originally claimed. Still, it passed the time.

Today I was a bit stuck because I can't start entering timesheet data in for a particular week - in this case, last week - until I have the diary entries explaining any changes. So I called the Isle of Wight and asked them to fax them over, and then I waited. I wrote lots of helpful little documents in Word explaining some of the things I'd wanted to know when I started; I reorganised the weekly folder, cleared the shelf, went through my drawers and threw out everything that wasn't needed, stamped our address on lots of different sized envelopes to save time in the future, fiddled with the settings on my machine until they were as close to the ones on my home machine as I could get them...and waited. Finally, at 4pm I rang up again, and was promised they would be faxed right off. So I waited a bit longer, wiped the coffee stains off my machine, cleaned the coaster and my fingernails. 4.30pm came, and Barry-the-IT-man had said I should do a backup at 4.30pm so he could do something technical overnight. Doing a backup meant I could do no timesheet work afterwards, so I left it as late as possible and then started it. I'm not kidding - less than a minute later, the fax rang and there were my diary sheets. Still, at least I have that to look forward to tomorrow. It's the perfect job really - 9-5, Monday to Friday, the people are friendly (I share desk space with Rita who very kindly covered up the time on the phone with a post it when I pointed out it was wrong, and nine times out of ten will say good morning when she means good afternoon when answering the phone, and vice versa) and it's ongoing at least until Christmas, so I won't have to worry about finding a different job before I move. Yey me! Bristol here I come!

Office Angels have turned out to be pretty decent too. Admittedly, I feel a twinge of guilt about not calling Human Factor back - but actually I only just remembered I was supposed to so I can't really be blamed. One of the temp bookers came in to check on me yesterday, she brought a big bag of swag for the office manager (mouse mat (which I swiped), fountain pen, etc etc) and a big bag of doughnuts. She said, "There are ten - I hope that's enough to go around.." Barry, Rita and I exchanged glances - everyone else was at a staff meeting all day so there were just the three of us. Better still, next week is temp's night out - all Office Angels temps are invited out for a Balti courtesy of Office Angels. Free meal? I think so.

My social life seems to be improving too, if you could say that. Last Thursday night ended up being a drunken one, as Sarah turned up in the pub after ringing, and I squeezed in taxi home with Charlotte, Lee and Pete (a student) after much pub merriment after Lee went and "emptied his handbag" in the ladies and then tried to get me into the mens to witness the shocking lack of carpet - I got caught, of course. Last night the four of us and Gail, also from ringing, went to bingo. It was supposed to be 10p bingo, but it was actually £8.60 bingo, which has left me totally skint and unable to go out until Friday - although that is probably a good thing because I can stay in and write Diario. None of us won anything but it was a lot of fun - I knew it would be, but it's such a blue rinse thing to do I could never get anybody to come with me when I lived in London. I suppose it is a bit pensioneresque - between that and my avid knitting I am in danger of being old before my time. Everyone on holiday was most amused at my knitting, but Mr Z and I have a kind of bet on - he is always saying that when we move in together I must go all respectable and join a knitting circle, so I said I would knit him something for his birthday. I'm actually doing really well - I've used up a whole ball of wool already. Sadly it was his birthday yesterday, but at least I'm on the way to finishing it. It was a great thing for the coach journey - I can't really read for fear of puking, but knitting had no such effect on me.

Anyway, after bingo we went down to the Firkin; Charlotte, Lee and Gail stopped for the one and Charlotte and I played Battleships - we put in £1.50 and won £1 which wasn't half bad, in my opinion (I am so addicted to Battleships it's not even funny). Then they went home and Pete and I decided to stick around for more, and even though I only had about four pints I was reeling. This I attribute to not eating since lunchtime. He was going to get the train home (Portsmouth and Southsea to Fratton - ?! It's about a ten minute walk) but I managed to get him to walk with me by ridiculing his lazy student ways - was quite relieved to be honest because I'm not fond of walking through that part of Somers Town on my own, although I don't like admitting it. He only lives round the corner so the plan seemed to hold water. Had a rather drunken discussion with Mr Z about the merits of Steps but remember giving up in the end because I was frustrated at his inability to see my point - although in the sober light of day I fear it might have been his inability to agree with me, which isn't a very fair thing I know, especially since it was his birthday yesterday. I made him a cheesecake when he came down for the weekend, and some lemon curd to go with it, and Mother Hand made a special beef stew for Saturday night, and we went to the pub and on Sunday we went to see Moulin Rouge, which was my choice but luckily Mr Z really enjoyed it too. It was a fantastic film, so fast-moving - and even though it was heart breaking, I knew what was going to happen because it's told at the beginning, so it wasn't too much of a shock.

This is my life thus far. As I've been sitting here typing this my cat, the twigletish one, has been sitting on my lap watching, and I am reminded that I've been trying to get a little webpage with her on it working for months now, so I think that instead of ranting on for another ten paragraphs about the World Trade Centre and how I was there taking pictures of it exactly six months before it happened and my opinions on Bush and so on and so forth, I'll go and work on my cat page and talk to Mr Z some before I go to bed, and come back to this tomorrow. Admittedly, The Blue Planet is on BBC1 tomorrow night so that will filter an hour out of my evening (it's fab...I am so impressed...they had that underwater lake on last week and I didn't think it was real until I saw a fish swimming over the top of it) but all being well I will be back here tomorrow night with another entry.

Wednesday 26th September

Blue Planet starts in thirteen minutes but I'll do my best (grin)

I realised after I was reading last night's entry over again that I'd forgotten to mention something else about me being old before my time. The trinity of aging - knitting, bingo and preserves. For yes, I have been no less than a preserving maniac the past few weeks. I can't tell you why, exactly - but it started with a double quantity of mango chutney in August, along with some strawberry jam, and progressed through spiced pickled runner beans, preserved pickled peaches (Mother Hand has severe reservations about these because they are savoury and I misread the recipe and left the whole spices in the jar instead of straining them so she thinks they will be horribly strong, but nevertheless they look pretty in their big jar and if they turn out to be foul that's one less Christmas present for someone I'll have to worry about) and finally, last week, picallilli, which was lots of fun to make because I had to cut up six pounds of mixed vegetables, salt them, weight them and leave them overnight. When I came back the next day they were quite two inches deep in water. Anyway, that was in deference to Mr Z who professed partiality for the preserve, as was the triple quantity of lemon curd I cooked up on Friday. I am constantly looking through preserve sections in Mother Hand's cookbooks, eagerly anticipating mincemeat making time, which will be followed by Christmas cake making time (mine is so alcoholic it has to be made a month in advance or it doesn't solidify in time), which will be followed by Seville marmalade time...after which there is a lul I might have to fill with other marmalades, but then it will be gooseberry season and I can start all over again. I don't know anybody else my age who preserves things - sometimes I think this is a shame and wonder whether it is a dying art, whether I only do it because my grandmother taught me to make gooseberry jam when I was seven, or because I made one jar of mango chutney a couple of years back and became so addicted to it with toasted cheese that I can't do without it; but sometimes I wonder if I am just a big freak and the reason my generation doesn't preserve things is because there's no need. It has to be said though, I will only eat my own jam - if desperate, I have to buy the most expensive kind because otherwise it just tastes wrong. And the mango chutney....(whistle) Sometimes you can't beat it. And although Mother Hand and Sibling find themselves choking as I boil vast quantities of malt vinegar, they love the jam smell, and the peach smell, and I find the whole thing very relaxing.

Something else that struck me the other night as I was watching TV - they've reintroduced that horrible advert about wearing seatbelts in the backs of cars, where the schoolboy catapults into his mother's head and kills her and his sister's just sitting there screaming. *Shudder* it's so horrible, every time I sit in the back of a car I think of it and it's got to the point now where I am actually uncomfortable sitting in the back seat of a car without seatbelts. I'll say one thing - very effective, if very very horrible. I have to turn over when I see it now. Actually, while I'm on the point of TV, can I have a little whinge? Whilst staying with Lisa I happened to catch one of her favourite programs, Freaks and Geeks. Imagine my delight when I caught the tail end of an announcement on Channel 4 about it being screened. But alas no, Freaks and Geeks is only being screened on E4. Why is it that the decent shows go on digital television? Obviously I can understand them pushing the subscriptions but it seems a little carrot/stickish to advertise digital programming on terrestrial television. And I mean, let's face it, until the end of the series all E4 showed was Big Brother 20 hours a day and a series of discussion programs about Big Brother for the other four, and who'd fork out for that? Apart from Stu of course. Sorry Stu, but you should have known that admitting you'd stayed up until 4am watching them sleep was a bad idea.

And now for something completely different. Yesterday at work the co-ordinators in the next office - who were all care workers before they usurped their superiors - took it upon themselves to demonstrate to Rita and I how to use a convene (I believe that is how one spells it). Delicately put, it is a sort of non-invasive catheter for use on men - to be blunt, it's a condom with a hole in the end. To attach it, one has to wrap a strip of double sided sticky tape around the base of the organ in question, then roll the convene on, attach it to the tape, and then attach a bag via a nozzle to the end, which is then strapped to the leg. The manager demonstrated it to us on the end of a rubber stamp, and it made me happy to (a) be in full control of my bodily functions and (b) be female. She said that in training sessions, she told her carers that the client had to "oblige" - and that if they "obliged" too much the choice was to flick the end (demonstrated with her finger nails against the rubber stamp which made even me wince) or throw a towel over it and leave the room. Obviously it is not a matter of amusement for the clients but we were laughing so much we had to shut the door to the rest of the social services building. Then Barry-the-IT-manager came out and said he could see why the girls got paid so much if that was what they were doing and that just made us laugh more. Then, by way of a cautionary tale, we were informed of one incident when a carer - male, at that - had gone to remove one of these things and rather than soaking the double sided tape - which is very, very sticky, having to support the convene and, in some cases, the leg bag - and gently removing it, he'd just leaned down and ripped it all off in one go, taking the skin with it. The client in question was bedbound for two weeks. *SHUDDER*. Anyway, it's certainly an amusing job. One or two people professed disgust at my incredibly tidy desk today, until I pointed out that less junk made it easier to find the biscuits I've stashed. Cathie got me started on that at Lucas Sails - "tuck drawer". I'm sorry I showed the biscuits now though because I only have four left and there were 15 this morning. But, I suppose the more they eat the less I do, and I am supposed to be losing weight, or something.

OK, it's late. I cheated and went and watched Blue Planet (fascinating footage of marlin feeding on shoals of sardines, and these birds that can swim to a depth of 15 metres after fish, and the sea looking like it was full of confetti as the silver scales left of fish eaten in a feeding frenzy drifted away, and an enormous whale swimming over the top of a totally unprotected camerman to take a vast mouthful of water and fish...) so it's late now and I want to get to bed, but I can't without getting my Bush rant out of the way. It's not fair, I know, and he's not my president, I know, and I'm not an American so I can't really know what it feels like to have my country invaded for the first time ever, I know, but he has just been making me more and more angry and I want to get it out of my system. It started with the first words out of his mouth. "We're gonna hunt the folks who did this down and bring them justice," he drawled, spitting tobacco onto the ground before spurring his horse off into the sunset. Bah. Not, "This is a horrible tragedy and my heart is with the families of the missing," or anything else remotely sympathetic. I am still antsy over the entire war issue (and was pleased to discover an American who agreed with me on Sunday) because I don't see how it can be justified when there is no undeniable evidence that Osama was behind it - which, admittedly, will most likely never be got - but isn't anyone else afraid it's going to be another Vietnam? The Russians didn't succeed against the Taleban and Osama (possibly because they had US help?) and I can't help wondering whether Dubya is just going to war to be like daddy. Then he came out with that "You're either with us or you're with the terrorists" comment which had me practically jumping up and down and screaming. Whatever happened to neutrality? Am I wrong or didn't the US maintain its neutrality in both world wars until it was directly attacked? What right has he to take away anybody else's neutrality? And what about that poor congresswoman who was held up as a national traitor for being the only person to vote against giving him absolute power? What was that - "How dare she have her own opinion and the guts to stick by it?"?!!

When he said that Great Britain was America's greatest friend, I damn near went and hid under my bed. That the attack was very carefully planned over many months, if not years, is clear to me - but I wonder if it came now because of the Republican president. Would a Democrat have done differently? Eventually, maybe not, but there is little doubt in my mind that it would have been handled differently. Admittedly, one feels for Bush. He's fairly new in the presidency, and how he handles this will make or break him in the next election. The world is watching, his country needs him, and not being there I can't effectively gauge national sentiments - although what isn't reported in the media can be as telling as what is. On CNN, it was glaringly obvious that the identities of the hijackers were being deliberately concealed: although they interviewed people who had spoken to their loved ones whilst still in the air, none of them made any mention of what these criminals looked like - which would have been one of my first questions. We were lucky enough to get full coverage on CNN ("America Under Attack" 24 hours a day from almost the moment it happened; the second plane hitting the second twin tower from three different angles replayed over and over until I couldn't watch anymore) which happened to be the only English language channel on the television in our hotel. We heard when we got back on the coach after our Prague trip - Robert-the-guide got on the intercom and said, "I take it you have all heard of the terrible terrorist attack in the US....no?....well, one plane has hit one World Trade Centre tower and a second has hit the other, and both have now collapsed.....a third plane has crashed into the Pentagon....and a fourth...." and at this point he paused, and I sat with a grin on my face waiting for the fourth plane to have done something amusing to form the punchline to this fantastical joke. Then Milan, who was sitting a couple of rows in front, turned around and said, "No, he is serious - it's true". We got in and watched CNN for ages. The footage that will always stay with me was that taken by an amateur cameraman of a huge cloud of dust and rubble sweeping across a block perpendicular to him, and approaching him up the street he was standing on a little, like a scene from a horror film; then the camera starts to shake and he spins around in time to see himself being enveloped with an identical dust cloud from behind, whereupon he starts to run. I had to watch it about five times (endless CNN repeats...) before I completely stopped expecting to see Godzilla emerging from the dust cloud.

Enough of this, now, though, because it's talked about so much by people who know what they're talking about that there's no need for me to ramble on. I just felt like airing my opinions, and I suppose I had better say that I mean no offence to anybody who might be reading this - these are my personal thoughts about the situation and I am not trying to represent the opinions of anybody other than myself. On that rather sober note, I'll close for this week. Working infringes on Bunnyland time, sadly, so I can't update as often as I'd like, but I do my best!