I was at a charity ball on Saturday night for Vimba, which aims to support children in Zimbabwe. It’s a highly worthwhile charity, and they hosted a fantastic event which raised a lot of money.
And I won the men’s hamper in the raffle! I never win anything!
Seriously, the last thing I remember winning is the Manager’s Player of the Season in my football team when I was about nine years old. I think that trophy is still at my parents’ house somewhere. It’s been a barren 16 years since then.
The contents of the hamper are a little wasted on me in terms of excitement, I guess. There’s loads of South African and Zimbabwean foodstuffs which seemed to elicit rapturous memories from the Saffers and Zimbos on my table. “Oh my god, you got Thingzzz”, “Cheesy Nik-Naks!!!”, “Mint Crisps?!?!?!”, etc.
Oh, and there’s enough hair/grooming products to last me a lifetime, and randomly two pairs of family tickets to the London Dungeons, which is cool because I haven’t been. The blue bottle in top-left is a Swedish vodka that is apparently very expensive and very fashionable. That’ll last about a week…
The girlfriend’s Zimbabwean gran has just won her appeal against the British government, which had refused her indefinite right to remain here earlier this year. It means she’s not going to be sent back to Zimbabwe and forced to live by herself over there. This is fantastic news, and I’m almost welling up at it.
The girlfriend has been really stressed and upset about the whole issue, especially as she had to give evidence in front of a High Court judge as part of the appeal. So I’m really pleased for both her and her gran, as well as the rest of the family.
We’re round at her family’s house this weekend for a big party/barbeque, and this news means that it’s going to be one hell of a celebration. I might have to go buy a bottle of champers to take round!
For some reason, I am being relentlessly chipper this morning. Work has been one FAIL after another so far, but I’m somehow very upbeat.
This doesn’t usually happen. My enthusiasm for everything wanes pretty quickly, until lunchtime which is just plain great.
Maybe it’s because I’m signing the contract for my new apartment this evening, and picking up the keys. Can you say “Wooooo!”?
Woo! Our HR lady has told me I still have 18 days of holiday left this year. I thought I was down to 15, so this is a bit of a result.
It means I can do my planned trip to the States in November and still have a couple of long weekends before then. Time to go find some flights. Montpellier, Frankfurt and San Francisco are my planned destinations. Maybe Geneva too if I can squeeze it in.
This has genuinely cheered me up after a shitty day yesterday.
Just rediscovered this one amongst my holiday photos. I think this is possibly the happiest I have ever been when a meal has been put in front of me.
This is one of the best working weeks ever. Firstly, it’s only for 4 days because of the Bank Holiday on Monday. That’s an immediate plus.
I did some great business on Tuesday, earning a stack of money for the company, so my reputation has taken an upswing.
Yesterday and today were also really productive, and I played a big part in helping my colleague to secure some more business.
And on top of this, I went for a 3-hour lunch yesterday and for a 4-hour one today. All in the course of business, of course.
Sometimes work is great!
In other news, I actually managed to do something at work today which once more was of value to the company. I feel like so much less of a leech on their resources, and like I’m actually earning the money they pay me. Hopefully a little more too, as it’s the right time to start getting noticed, as the annual pay review is in July.
Some days, it feels like I do nothing except browse the web for 8 hours, but then there are those times like the last week or so, when I’m really busy, and starting to get more out of the job in terms of understanding the bigger picture and applying it.
Yes, all very vague and cryptic, but I like to keep the work / life thing very separate. Especially the work / web footprint thing.
