Happy Birthday to Me!

Gosh, another year older and what have I done?

Not a lot really, except that this year hasn't been too bad for me so far - got a couple of challenging months coming up that are going to stretch me both mentally and financially but I'm confident I'll take it all in my stride, although at the time, I may not feel it! Does that sound like 'corporate speak'? Dear me...

Out tomorrow night with the girls, starting early at 2.30pm and then staying out for the England v Italy 11pm kick-off - I hope I remember to pace myself!

London Calling

Further to this post, I went down to London (travelling first class on company expenses, woohoo) for a 3 day course last week.

It was very intensive, all about self-awareness, self-development and career progression. I probably didn't network as much as I should have, keeping to the people who I work with but as I don't work with them on a daily basis, I got to know them a lot better. I also got to chat to various members of the senior leadership team, including our CEO, who is one sassy lady (and into 'Breaking Bad'!)

The second evening we were there ended up being a big night - fortunately, I slowed down my drinking but rolled into bed at 3am. My friend SW didn't get in til 4.30am so you can imagine what we were like at 9am the next morning - I was seriously falling asleep!

All in all, it was a good experience and I took some useful hints away with me and found out about myself and how I 'tick' at work (sort of).

Now we have a project to complete in 4 months, on top of our normal day jobs.

Plus I'm still catching up after my annual leave.

A few more early mornings methinks :-(

On a lighter note, I made the most of the hotel freebies:

Grand National 2014

100 Happy Days - Day 47: Out with the girls for JR's 40th and AM and HW's birthdays, we watched the race at Walkabout of all places and me and AM backed the winner Pineau de Re (plus I also backed the horse that came 3rd).

Ate in The Living Room, drank too much wine, wasn't well, good job we decided to call it for an early night (we did start at 2.30pm...).

But woohoo, I'm in profit, plus my non-league side Slough Town FC won - get in! :-)

Cheers!

100 Happy Days - Day 46:  The company celebrated hitting quarter-end targets by laying on cakes and drinks for all the staff.

Surprisingly, there was beer on offer and I was quick enough to snag the last bottle!

Bud isn't my usual tipple but I wasn't going to complain!

#100 Happy Days - Day 19 and Day 20

Out with the gym girlies again (100 Happy Days - Day 19) - instead of going into city centre, we met up at LM's house. Her mum turned up while we were there - she was fab, a shame she didn't stay longer!

We then ate at Ambiente, a local restaurant.  The tapas was great, best I've had in a long time, I'd definitely go back there again.

Home at a decent time (ie before midnight) with a fuzzy head after a top night out.

100 Happy Days - Day 20: The pesky squirrel didn't manage to dig up all my bulbs after all. It was a lovely spring day today - my hangover was mild enough to allow me to venture outside into the sunshine so I had this nice surprise waiting for me.

Dead Head

Suffering badly today after a night out with the girls in Manchester (100 Happy Days - Day 5). Was a fun night that took a bit of a serious turn towards the end involving malicious rumours about my friend SW but hopefully no real lasting harm done. However, that tequila shot I had seems to have done some harm to my head!

100 Happy Days - Day 6?

A very exciting season - a title challenge for once!

Well that was 2013

Blog-wise, I was exceedingly rubbish with this blog - my resolution for 2014 will be to fill in a few gaps from 2013 and make at least one post a month - that's not too much to ask of myself.

Not a great year, but neither can I say it was a bad year - I'd say it was mostly a happy one, though not very eventful.

Need to sort out the book thing that I usually do. Maybe later, depending on how many beers I've had!

Any resolutions?

Go to the gym on Sunday every other week (or two Sundays a month) - will be trying to keep that one as long as possible.

Happy new year all - may it be a healthy and wealthy one! x

Exceeds Expectations again...

Gosh, months have flown by already, so let's start with my annual appraisal at work where I was marked as 'Exceeds Expectations' for 2012 so that's two years in a row now - not bad, considering I didn't think it was such a great year for me work-wise.

As usual, no team bonus for me but....I'm going to be eligible for 2013! I think I was a little dumbstruck when my boss broke the news to me as I never thought that the powers that be would ever change their stance on this.

I asked why the change of heart/policy - apparently, they decided  to "reward me" because despite my knowing that everyone else got a bonus these past few years and I didn't, I continued to graft without complaint,   actually increasing my work output, which hadn't gone unnoticed - that was the bit that shocked me more, that anyone actually noticed! So a great result for me, quite unexpected, I'm well happy about that, though will be happier when I see that bonus in my bank! Next....ask for a pay rise but that might be hard with the economic climate as it is.

So, the coldest March in a long time - been snowing in bits here but as usual, missed out on the big snowfall everyone else is getting, although it's bloody cold.

Not been up to much these past couple of months - been on a few dates, wined and dined in posh restaurants but nothing more than that; I'm not certain I could cope with more than that right now.

I've been catching up on a lot of tv/dvd watching - 'Walking Dead' is probably my favourite programme at the moment, closely followed by 'The Following' (hehe!)

Been out a couple of times both with the usual girlies and also the gym girlies - I swear my hangovers are getting worse with age!

Leeeeeeeeeeeds!

Oh my, how did we end up mid-September already?

Anyway, Friday at Leeds Festival (several weeks ago!) was awesome - Bullet For My Valentine were great, The Black Keys brilliant, the Foo Fighters...I cried with joy and drunken emotion during their performance but fortunately, none of the girls saw my tears in the rain - they were unbelievable.

Been 5 years since I was last at Leeds, much of the same, weather was ok at first, didn't get wet til gone 9pm. Hotel was nicer, we stayed at the Marriott haha!

Would love to do the festival next year but now that I've finally seen the Foos, I have actually now seen all of my favourite bands live - it's only a matter of seeing them all over again I guess and Muse are on that list later in the year!

Venture

As mentioned previously, I now have a new car - it's a Mazda 2. Not driven a Japanese car since I passed my test - bit of a different drive from my Clio but I'm sure I'll get used to it. Lots of kit thrown in eg sat nav, alloys etc but no CARPETS!? (I didn't want to pay £300 for their 'rug set'). Looks rather sporty but I'm no girl racer!

Out on Sat with JH and a couple of girls (LS and LM) that we know from our Body Attack aerobics class. It's funny that we stand next to each other in classes, being polite and saying hello before and after the class, and after a while, we realised that we really got on and instead of just talking about it, actually arranged a night out.

It was really enjoyable day/night out (early start at 2.30pm as usual), chatting and finding out stuff about new people and I for one feel that I've made two new good friends. Lots in common despite different upbringings, different opinions but same sense of humour.

I'm afraid I overdid it on the proscecco and couldn't eat my delicious food but at least I knew when to stop drinking so wasn't too bad by the time I went home!

Today, my hangover was severely tested by being woken up early by my 5 year old nephew (he's over with Big Sis) and then playing football in the garden!

June Round Up

Gosh, the past few weeks have been a real blur.

Witnessed England getting dumped out of the Euro competition by the usual penalty shoot-out, celebrated a birthday (yes another year older dammit!) with the usual outing with the girls but also a meal out (yes really) with Boom. Also got to hold an Olympic Torch (guy at work was a torch-bearer and brought it in, and yes, that's my arm!) - it was pretty heavy!

Also, my parents are visiting for the first time in two years - aha, now I know why it's all been a blur lately..I've been too busy TIDYING UP! Anyway, must have done an ok job as my mum mentioned it to my sisters!

What else have I done this month? Decided that I'm going to buy a new car (I had a plan two months ago when I only renewed my Tax Disc for 6 months) and was speccing out and pricing up VW Polos but that's not what I've gone for in the end.

I'll post again when the car arrives...

Ow

Ok, get the sport out of the way first - no winners on the Grand National this weekend - my horse Seabass came third, so I ended up winning some but no profit.

An excellent FA Cup Semi Final between the Scousers, with the Reds triumphant in the end - even Andy Carroll scored! :-)

Out with the girls for the April girls' birthdays - met up in Kro Bar for a couple, watched the National then onto 101 Brasserie for some good food.

At some point, ended up in the Old Nag's Head to listen to people on the karaoke (didn't try ourselves).

Good night, lots of drink.

Woke up the next morning, having forgotten that I'd made myself noodles before I went to bed, had bruises on my legs and had some pain to the left of my chest, next to my lung.

Pain didn't go away, really struggled to get out of bed, so I went to the docs on Monday - I appear to have pulled a muscle next to my lung but how? Maybe from the gym and then worsened from sneezing, coughing or probably laughing on Saturday!

But ow...it really hurts, even when breathing!

Social Geeks

Following the ‘relative’ success of the last meet (I say relative because a couple of people fell out afterwards but that’s another story…), I drove up to Darlington the other weekend to meet up with some fellow World of Warcraft players. Ok, so to use our WoW character names, I met up with Lapi,(Cheryl) Uri (Bri) and Undead the guild leader (Adam)  whom I’d met previously and Antek (Ant), Gotwood (Curtis), Angrysheep (Paul) and Jonnydepths (Jordan) who I was meeting for the first time. We did look a motley crew hanging outside the B&B as I checked in – yes, I was last to arrive, despite being the closest; Gotwood and Angry drove up from Dorset the previous night, Undead from Leicester.


As always with meeting people for the first time and chatting face to face rather than online, it was a little bit awkward at first but things relaxed really quickly. We chatted about all things WoW, guild progression, basically ideas to get people motivated again about the game since many are just waiting for the next expansion set to come out. I still love playing but it’s a shame Boom has gone over to the ‘dark side’, ie playing the Star Wars game now when he has time. It was a lovely sunny day – seemed strange that I was sat outside in my vest top sipping beer as if I wasn’t in a northeast town in March!

I was the oldest of the group this time, the youngest only 19 but I didn’t feel out of sorts. I was careful not to drink too much though (didn’t want to be old and disgraceful) plus didn’t relish a bad hangover the next day. Lapi and Uri invited us to their home and introduced us to their dog Lister.

All in all, an enjoyable day and night out – after a nice meal in a local restaurant (my steak was a bit overdone but it was ok), we went to find somewhere for a drink and a chat – unfortunately, it was Darlington on a Saturday night so the only place we could find reminded me strongly of Peter Kay’s ‘Phoenix Nights’ - a little working man’s club, complete with glitter ball, 3 people inside, woman singing karaoke and playing tracks from the 70s! We only stayed for one drink as the 19 year old was ready for home after trying to keep up with the men all evening.

Nice B&B, with a mini military museum-cum-bar downstairs and my hangover wasn’t so bad that I couldn’t enjoy the full cooked English breakfast the next day!

The next meet will probably be sometime after Lapi has given birth (in real life, not in game!)

Slippery Slope

Thus far, I’ve been pulling any stray grey hair I’ve found but age has won out, and following comments from my sisters for ‘letting the side down’, I’ve had my few grey bits ‘blended’ into my normal colour hair. This does now mean I have to go to the hairdresser’s more regularly and I do find that a chore cos I hate all the waiting around, the inane chatter and crappy magazines. Plus it aint cheap.

Bugger, but hey, no more grey bits for a while!

We were going to go out into city centre to celebrate SW’s birthday but decided to give it a miss in light of recent events so went to the Trafford Centre instead. A nice meal, lots of cocktails but at some bar, we were sat next to a piece of sh*t who was bragging to his girlfriend that he had looted an Xbox 360. HW surreptitiously took a picture of him on her phone, which showed his side profile and tattooed arm – not sure where she can post that anonymously.

Felt like poo the next day, second hangover in a just over a couple of weeks, can’t cope these days!

With part of the award I got from work, I treated myself to a new vacuum cleaner – I think the one I’ve been using is nearly 20 years old. I’ve gotten myself a Dyson and it is one serious piece of kit – it was like a Transformer as I was putting it together! I must be getting old if I’m getting excited over a hoover, haha! Anyway, gave it a whirl and it sucked up a ton of stuff from my lounge which I had already hovered with the old machine!

Somehow this new toy might make one household chore a little more enjoyable!

Vuvuzelas

Regardless of England's progress in the 2010 World Cup, this tournament will, I think, be remembered for the noise of the vuvuzela trumpets/horns everyone seems to be blowing in the stadia. The question is....why???

Think of the buzzing of thousands of extremely large angry bees and you won't be far wrong! Bloody annoying to be honest!

Anyway, the usual frustrating England start; a magnificent opening goal from Stevie Gerrard but then, a terrible schoolboy error by our keeper Robert Green, gifting the USA a 1-1 draw. Not quite a disaster but that should have been victory.

I was hoping to celebrate both a win and my birthday but it wasn't to be. Had a most ungirlie football evening at the glamorous C's, with good food, lots of beer and all matters of footie on the tv!

I'm in a couple of the usual fantasy football leagues for the World Cup, even running a small one at work (with a small donation to charity so I don't get done by the rules-geeks for gambling...).

Anyway, come on England - you can do better!

Spaghetti Mishap

Cooking and drinking - they don't go together or maybe I've just too much on my mind to be multi-tasking right now!

Was cooking some pasta the other day.

Opened a bottle a beer.

Swig of beer.

Chopped up some veg.

Swig of beer.

Stirred pasta to stop from sticking together.

Swig of beer.

Continued until pasta ready and moved to sink to drain off water.

Knocked over bottle of beer with pan.

Caught bottle with left hand, almost like how Angelina Jolie does with the wine bottle in the film Mr & Mrs Smith….except I'm still holding the pan of pasta so...

Hot spaghetti and boiling water over right hand and wrist.

It didn't hurt at the time but later it did and now I have long thin spaghetti burn marks - looks like I've got some tropical worm disease. Skin still a little tender too.

What a muppet! :-(

They Get Worse with Age...

…hangovers that is and I swear I am still suffering from the prolonged after effects from the weekend!

My theory is that when I was younger, since I drank more and also more often, my body was coping with perpetual hangovers all the time so was used to it.

Now, drinking a lot doesn't happen as often so when I do over-indulge, my body is totally rebelling - not good!

So, I waved goodbye to my thirties with lots of wine, cocktails and gin, good food and laughs. Actually, too much wine, cocktails and gin.

On Friday, Boom took me out to Bem Brasil, a Brazilian steakhouse - it was fab. Everyone has these little discs on their tables, red on one side, green on the other. The waiters walk around with big skewers of all types of meat and if your disc is on the green side, they will give you a cut of the meat; if on red, then they know you don't want a slice. I ate a lot that night!

Saturday, met up with the girls at 3pm in Atlas Bar for some wine. The weather was sunny so we were sitting outside, it was very pleasant. We moved onto another bar (apparently…I don’t remember!) and then had a meal in Albert's Shed- I do remember having a lovely tuna salad and also that the glass of red wine that JH spilt did not end up thankfully on my white jeans but ended up over the couple sitting on the table next to us! Amazingly, they were ok about it, but JH was mortified and left them her telephone number in case they wanted to contact her with cleaning bills…

We ended up in Manchester 235 casino and by this point, I'd had so much to drink that I was totally oblivious to the fact that AM and HW had had an argument and were not speaking to each other… Hence I didn't understand why AM left early. But why was I drinking White Russians? Hardly brilliant for the waistline!

Anyway, stayed in the casino with HW, we didn't know what we were doing - at one point thinking we were playing Blackjack when it was actually poker - but we were winning and in the end, we broke even so that's a good night of gambling!

Got a taxi home, crashed out at around 1.30am, all lights left on in the house.

Sunday was a complete washout - I really couldn't get out of bed and all day, all I could stomach was one cup of tea, a bit of water and a couple of slices of toast! My head was banging, even when I was lying down! It's been tough at work this week as I don't think I've quite recovered but well, it was something that had to be done!

Jewellery featured high on the list for presents - I got a lovely bracelet from Boom (which I wore on Saturday and which I checked every 5 mins to make sure it was still on my wrist!), a necklace from the girls, plus some Euros for my hols, a necklace from my mate in Wales, BSG Season 4 boxed set from the boss (wooohoo!) , some flowers from an ex-colleague.

Have got a busy few days coming up - hope I get the time to update!

Lamb Dressed as Lamb

Well I've no idea how it's happened so quickly but this weekend, I shall be the grand old age of forty. FORTY!!!!

Yep, that's right - the big four-oh, no longer 30-something, an old bird, old fogie, past it, time to dress and act sensibly, listen to Radio 4, start knitting and all that…

As if!

Reaching this milestone (and it is a milestone since I'm still in one piece) has been plaguing my mind for a while now. I'd not been looking forward to it even though many of my friends (including the glamorous C) have already joined this club.

Why, when most people tell me I don't look my age, is it such a big issue for me? I really don't know, except that I knew that once my daft mind had gotten used to the idea, then I'd be ok.

I came into work on Friday to find my desk - horrors - festooned with banners and 40th birthday balloons - so much for skulking in and out discreetly without the whole company knowing! AM, when she turns 40 in two years time will suffer major payback!

Anyway, I think I'm ok about it now, especially as there were many shocked faces from colleagues who thought I was a lot younger (some thinking I was almost 10 years younger, yep they're deffo on my Christmas list, lol!) so it's been like a bit of an ego boost really.

Teetotal, clean living and early to bed - that's not me so it must be the late nights, alcohol and fast food that's been keeping me young, lol! Ok, the gym probably helps a bit and a younger man ;-)!

I was hoping to be away this weekend but that fell through, so I shall be out with Boom tonight and then out on the lash with the girls in Manchester and shall have a horrible hangover on Sunday and deffo not feeling young then.

Well, I shan't be changing my ways, will still be the same me, the same daft me, only a bit older.

Still, I don't look old, don't feel old so why should I be old? One step closer to retirement though- yay!

Fabulous and forty, that's me now (except first thing in the morning!)

Anyway, as I've done for the occasional previous birthday, for a short time only, here's a wee picture of me, which shall be taken down the next time I log in - blink and you shall miss it!

Edit - pic removed - phew!

2009 - will things be fine...?

2007 was rather turbulent for me; I looked forward to 2008, yet was also pretty apprehensive about starting a new year as a singleton. I needn't have worried really.

Things started off well - I'd set myself new goals, achieved some of the short-term ones and felt good about myself. But as the economy nose-dived and the credit crunch took hold, things went a bit pear-shaped at work (as they have done for many other people.) I didn't get the pay rise I asked for and the axe swung over my head, only for me to get a reprieve. Good or bad? I dunno yet.

Still, I had a fabulous holiday with my best friend, had the odd pleasant distraction and the year ended a little better than I thought it would.

So, how do I face 2009? I know for a fact that it will be a bad year on the whole (financially, workwise and also, personally...), therefore I face it without fear of the unknown - I shall make the most of the good things in my life and grasp at the few opportunities that swing by. Things will be bad but they can only get better.

Thought about new year resolutions, was going to set myself some really challenging ones but the year will be challenging enough methinks, so these are the ones I've decided on (some are the same ones as last year):

Short Term:
- No buying alcohol for personal consumption at home until April (I'm sure the 2.5 litres of gin, plus other bottles of stuff will keep me going until then...)

Long Term:
- Budget - in a major way, watch my spending

- No buying books aside from two books from a charity shop for holiday purposes - use library and read the books gathering dust on the shelves at home

- De-clutter at least once a month - get rid of stuff on ebay/charity shops

- Be more organised with paperwork at home

- Don't get distracted at work; by this I mean the internet

Again, I've set a couple of personal goals which I shan't divulge here - they won't be easy to achieve but hey, life is a challenge or it'd be boring, right?

Anyway, amidst the doom and gloom, all the best to all for 2009 - we shall survive as there is light at the end of the long dark tunnel.

All I Want For Christmas Is...

Well I dunno about anyone else but I had a most pleasant Christmas - stress-free, relaxing, lots of drink, too much food (maybe the other way round...).

I was given my own Christmas stocking (a blingy snow white one!) as the glamorous C's son still 'believes'. It was filled with goodies - I must have been a good girl!

So Christmas morning, after a heavy night of champagne and wine, we were woken up early to shouts of "IT'S CHRISSSSSTMAS!" to open presents. Although not technically a gift as it was an unwanted upgrade of the glamorous C, I still see my new Nokia mobile phone as such - it's so dinky and cool!

Long distance calls to speak to members of my family - it was good to hear what they did, albeit without me and when I heard my little niece on the phone say my name, I tried not to get too emotional. Shame I didn't catch my Gran though.

The glamorous C cooked a lovely Christmas dinner - I did my share of peeling vegetables, and slicing/serving the meat, and also kept the kids amused so she was able to cook with little distraction. We ate non-stop, drank gin and a load of Baileys and watched Top Of The Pops. The kids' dad came to pick them up so me and the glamorous C carried on into the night, catching a whole manner of festive tv, it was really relaxing.

We didn't get many chances to chat but the glamorous C is in a happy place right now - she mentioned that her new bloke had asked her to move in with him, that her next wedding would be a very small affair...wow! Maybe it's just me but things are like going way too fast for my mind to comprehend (they met on 1st Nov...) but if she's happy and comfortable with it, it's no business of mine to say anything, I mean what do I know?

Boxing Day, we stayed in our pyjamas until late afternoon, watched St Trinians on DVD (the recent adaptation), nursed a sore head.

Later, the glamorous C was off to see her sugar daddy and me...? Well, I went out too and after watching Pride & Glory, had a fab and fun (but very late) night.

The next couple of days are a blur of sleeping, eating (turkey sandwiches or cheese and crackers) and watching episode after excellent episode of Lost: Season 3.

Sportwise, the festive period hasn't been a good one for Ebbsfleet United, but has been excellent for Liverpool, who after beating Bolton 3-0 on Boxing Day, went on to thrash Newcastle 5-1, netting me a nice crisp tenner (my usual wager with the Geordie at work) and keeping the Reds on top of the league into the new year and on track to win their first ever Premier League title....

Today, I thought I'd brave the sales. Decided against going to the Trafford Centre so I went into a very chilly Manchester. When I saw the hoardes there, I developed a headache but after a coupla hours, I came away with a few bits and pieces, including some incredibly high heels (why? Because they were on sale...) and being organised for once, picked up Christmas cards for next year too!

Back to work tomorrow before another long weekend - I need to motivate myself for aerobics too, start as I mean to go on, etc.

So did Santa bring me what I wanted? Perhaps - only hope that it's not just for Christmas! ;-)