goodbye '08

so i just got told my contract was being extended. hopefully i will only be here for a few more weeks and i get something a little less boring in the new year. my agent asked me to come into to work as normal on friday, but i told him i had made plans and would come to work on monday instead. i really want a nice long 4 day weekend and apart from the couple of days i had off last week for christmas, i have worked every single day since i started. thats wouldn't really be a big deal under normal circimstances but turning up to work in the land of nonsense everyday is hard, believe me!.

and thats about it for 2008. i know i whine about work but when it comes down to it, it is my choice to work in these banks and take their money and so i have take all the shit that goes along with it. i did it to myself so i can accept it and if i am really honest, its not THAT bad, in that i don't work very hard and i have hardly any stress and my boss isn't looking over my shoulder at everything i do. the only problem for me is that it is soooo boring and silly the things we have to do. its not hard. just boring and silly.

anyways, as is the case with me at this time of year, i look forward to the new year with lots of hope and many dreams. some might even come true.

take care V. you are on my mind as always. look after yourself and best of luck for the 09.

today i have mostly been listening to screaming lights - GMN. have a listen.

may or may not

my contract ends on wednesday. haven't been told if it will be renewed or not. i don't want to stay but at the same time i would prefer to be in a job earning some money than sitting at home doing nothing. in the perfect world i will get a renewal and will spend january here and then quit and start that other job, which i haven't been offered yet, in february. that will be perfect. we shall see how it goes i guess as its out of my hands at this stage.

ended up working till 8 yesterday evening as the work i needed to get done by the engineer at the datacentre took longer than i thought. no bother though.

trains have been empty on my way to and from work this week and last week. its been really nice not being pressed up against strangers and breathing peoples exhaled air and farts for 40 minutes every morning. how very civilised. if public transport was like this all the time we would never need cars. unfortunately its not like this and thats why people have cars, so they can have the privelege of breathing in their own exhaled air and farts and not anyone elses. some people are so lucky!.

right well i could write about more silliness at work but i have done enough of that recently and so i will shut my cakehole on that subject for today.

tomorrow may or may not be my last day here in the land of no logic and redundant brains.

today i have mostly been listening to the bravery - unconditional.



keep smiling cali girl.

don't leave me like this

a quiet uneventful christmas but it was a long weekend and i didn't have to go into work for 4 whole days. thats the best christmas present ever.

unfortunately i am back at work today and back in the land of nonesense. ozzy is sitting opposite me today and for some bizarre reason is breathing really heavily in a slightly perverted manner. i don't know whats up with that, maybe he is practicing for a few phone calls he is going to make later today. its really quite loud and quite annoying, so i have put my headphones on and am listening to my music. people can't even breath properly in this place!!. i told you investment banks were full of weirdos and idiots.

office is pretty dead again today like it was last week, but i have a bit of work to be getting on with so i will try and get something done. last week i mentioned i had to raise a change request to get someone to LOOK at the back of a server. this weeks idiotic task is that i have to raise a change request to restart a few servers. you can not imagine how many people have been involved in getting a few servers shutdown and restarted. i kid you not, when i say around 8 people and its probably taken around 12-14 man-days to arrange for the restart of a few servers. its absolutely astonshing. honestly, if i hadn't seen it for myself and been involved in the whole mess i would never have believed it if someone had told me. utter madness.

i saw that virgin atlantic have some cheap fares to LA and san fracisco for next year. am very tempted to book a ticket. will see how things pan out over the next few weeks.
i have my meeting next week about that other job as well, and i really am hoping it comes through. it would be fucking awesome and especially so, as it gets me out of this place.

watched the film HEAT with robert de niro and al pacino recently and there is a scene where one of the gang of robbers gets beaten up badly for information at his his house. robert de niro goes looking for him and finds him laying on the floor in a pool of blood. de niro says he is going to call an ambulance for him but the guys who can barely talk, whispers "i am not going to make it, i can't feel anything", "don't leave me like this". and so de niro shoots him to spare him suffering.

thats a bit like me at this bank but in a slightly less violent way and without the blood loss and beatings that preceded it. i might whisper it to the guy in my interview next week "i can't feel my brain","don't leave me like this". ha ha ha!!!.

speaking of things you should never say in an interview i had an interview with microsoft around a year ago. it was my second interview there and i was talking to a couple of the people that were hiring in their MSN/web and search division. one of the guys asked me what i did when i couldn't find a solution to a problem, to which i replied i tended just to "google it" and see what came back.

after being quite relaxed through the interview the guys expression visibly turned to a frown when i mentioned google. he replied "er, or you LIVE search it!". i actually don't use live search which is microsofts search engine because its lame, but after seeing his frown i replied "oh yes, live seach as well".
jesus, get over yourself dude. stop being so petty. google are bigger and better than you at web search. its a fact and there is no need to be hating on them. live search is shit at the moment and thats a fact as well, that microsoft acknowledges because they tried to buy yahoo a few months after my interviews there.

anyways, no surprises when i tell you i didn't get the job. they said it was because i hadn't worked anywhere big. yeah whatever!. some people have no sense of humour. anyways, thats a top tip for interviewing - don't mention their bitterest and more successful rival in an interview. another example would be going for an interview at boeing and saying how wonderful the new airbus super-jumbos are or maybe having an interview at chrysler and saying you like ford mustangs. anyway i don't care. thats just the way i am i guess. i wanted to see if they had a sense of humour and they clearly didn't. would have been a good job but you know what, i think i might have got bored of it after a while.

today i have mostly been listening to blind melon - no rain.



take care flower.

wish upon a dogstar

i got a call just now from that media/games company that interviewed me a few weeks ago. it looks like they will need someone to come in around february as one of their guys is leaving. they asked me to go to their offices at the beginning of january to meet their team and if all goes well he made it sound like they would make me an offer to join them and start in february.

i have applied to this place 4 times in the last year or so, and through a combination of bad luck and bad timing it has not come off. i know there are people out there better than me but i know there aren't that many better than me, for me to keep missing out.

things are looking good although i shall not be counting my chickens before they hatch. its just nice to know there is a more than reasonable chance of escape from this bank, come the new year. the moral of the story is to be persistent and its not a question of how many times you succeed but more a question of how many times you can fail.

in the meantime i shall see what comes up in the new year. until i get a piece of paper saying they have offered me a contract i will carry on looking and see what i can see. have been close to a lot of jobs only to have missed out at the last second.

in other news work is same as always. frustrating, idiotic, non-sensical and dull.
have to stay late tonight which is a bit shit, but i am getting paid so i shouldn't really grumble. i remember the days i worked crazy hours for no extra money so it shows we have not totally regressed proffessionally although it does feel like it sometimes.

i ordered a couple of books to read as it had been a while since i have read anything new. the first book is all about hyper-v (techy geeky shit) and the second book is all about the band motley crue. i remember when i was at school one of my friends was really into them and he came to school the day after he saw them play and was proudly showing off a stain on his white jacket which was caused by nikki sixx spitting oh him. we were all very impressed and he was very proud of his stain. ahh, those were the days.

have a lovely day flower. don't work too hard.

xx

today i have mostly been listening to satellite party - wish upon a dogstar.



perrfy farrell. you got to love him. rumours are that there might be a full janes addiction reunion. that would be awesome.

ridiculous

START OF RANT:

back at work in the land of no common sense. i built a server last week and all was well but on friday it just dissapeared from the network. as i am not in the datacentre that the server is in, i asked if there was anyone that could check the server to see if there was a cable in the back of it and where this cable might lead.

i was told that i would need to raise a change request for someone to take a look at the back of the server. eh?. change request?. i don't want them to change anything yet. i just want them to take a look. was told that it constitutes a change and the form needs to be filled out. its a huge form asking for tonnes of information and justifications and business impact of the change and what you will do to roll back the change in the event it breaks something. how is anything going to break by looking at it?. you idiots.

i also have to arrange for the guy in the datacentre to be allowed into the datacenter. you see, the hardware engineers are not actually allowed to enter the server rooms with out justification and that is a seperate set of forms and is not covered by the change request forms i am filling in (even though its not a change!!!).

its absolute madness. these requests then need to be authorised by managers in the department, so basically to sum it all up, its taken 4 different people, 5 hours of phone calls and form filling and administration and we still haven't got to the stage where the guy can go in and look at the back of the server. i wonder if they know how ridiculous this is?.

END OF RANT:

added a few more photos from my trip across the states to my posts that i had written about it. i access my blog at work and i look at the photos and it reminds me of good times. its kind of sad to go through your own blog but hey, it makes me feel better seeing southern california. it also reminded me how annoying my friend was on the trip. my goodness he was annoying. i think i deserve a medal for having put up with him, though working in an investment bank does make you tolerant of unreasonable bahaviour and process and i have had quite a bit of practice this past 18 months.

it was the shortest day of the year yesterday. the days are slowly going to get longer. we are going from the darkness into the light. lets hope it metaphorically as well as literally.

have got a second telephone interview with a place that did a telephone interview with me a couple of weeks ago. i asked the recruiter if they would prefer to see me in person and he said no, they just want to have a chat with you about some projects they have coming up. i nearly replied, but i already chatted with them on the phone!, but i didn't say that because i really want the job. it will get me out of this bank and back in the world of the living so i am willing to go through their rather odd interview process.

anyways, thats all for now.

today i have mostly been listening to common - drive me wild

take care flower. have a good christmas.

paracetemol plus

was feeling really rough yesterday but feel much better today. 3 paracetemol plus seemed to do the trick yesterday evening after i got home. was tempted to take more but didn't want to risk doing a 'heath ledger'.

feel much better today anyhow. its bad enough working where i work but its even worse when you feel like shit all day. my tolerance for mindless process and bullshit has returned and i am ready for another day in the mental abyss.

am certain that i have got stupider since i have been here. working in an investment bank will make anyone stupider but the rate of decline is definitely greater where i am now. is it any suprise that we are in a credit crunch and these people have almost bankrupted their firms?. i shit you not when i say that common sense and logical thinking is actively discouraged at these firms. culturaly they are very starnge environments to work in.

i don't know, maybe its me. maybe i am the crazy one, the one that is not normal. everyone else seems to me to be content to not use common sense or logical thinking. maybe i should just resign myself to the fact that this is how it is. that they don't want you to use your brain or think about anything.

nah!, fuck it, that ain't me. i shall persist in being not normal.

had a call from a recruiter yesterday about a job that might be coming up in the new year. also had a couple of other mails from other recruiters as well. something will turn up......soon i hope.

today i have mostly been listening to ida maria - oh my god.

dodging shoes

forgot to set my alarm this morning and so got into work about 20 minutes late today. don't matter. its not like i am able to do anything productive or interesting. had a strange dream last night where i dreamed i was driving across america with a bunch of people and we were in virginia and we were all in the car and i was driving and no one knew where we were supposed to go next. it was all a bit odd. even stranger was the fact that one of the girls from the mtv show the hills, audrina, was there as was one of my friends from football on a thursday night. very bizarre.

also have got a bit of a sore throat this morning and i am not the only one. quite a few people on my floor coughing and spluttering today. am hoping for the next few weeks till the end of the year to be quiet. god, i hope so. i was at a japanese bank this time last year and that place was dead the last couple of weeks i was there in december. thinking about it, it feels like i was at that bank years ago though it was only 12 months ago. feels like a lot has happened and yet at the same time not very much.
what the fuck am i talking about?. i haven't got a clue. these dark winter days are making me lose my mind i think.

today i have mostly been watching george bush - dodging shoes. man, that was fucking funny seeing him cowering behind the podium. he threw a shoe at you!. they were all saying how a grave insult it is in middle eastern culture to take a shoe to someone. hey!, its pretty bad if someone does that to you in western culture as well. i think its pretty bad wherever you go. ha ha ha!!!.




that dude throwing the shoes looks he had very good fastball. i bet there are some major league scouts watching that thinking of maybe signing him. he should join the yankees as they need some pitching after missing the playoffs this year and a bit like bush, they too like spending lots of money to achieve nothing.

go redsox and padres!!.

football finished for the year

sweet jesus, its friday!. the week started slow but the last couple of days have gone in the blink of an eye and now its just minutes till the end of my working week. one more week that i have survived in the god awful place, one more week closer to the end of the year and one more week closer to leaving this place and finding a brighter day.

work is frustrating as usual. issues with cabling in remote data centres, issues with people not getting approval for the amount of SAN storage that i tried to order for a server. its all just a mess and somedays i just really can't be bothered with it. i want to do a job working with computers again. we shall see what happens over the next few weeks. hopefully something will come up.

had football last night and it was bloody freezing. thankfully it didn't rain but i was freezing my nuts off as it is. it looks like that was almost certainly the last football we will play this year, as next week we are struggling for people and then a couple of the guys are going to ireland over chrismas and new years so numbers will be low. our season shall hopefully resume again sometime in january 2009.

plans for my weekend?. laundry, gym and cleaning. excting shit eh!?.

have a lovely weekend V.

xx

today i have mostly been listening to nine inch nails - 1,000,000. it was one of the first songs they played in knoxville when i saw them in the summer. i know i always reminisce about my trip last summer but its what get me through these dull cold days.

everyday feels like wednesday.

we are in the midst of the winter blues. over the last few weeks the increasing darkness and cold has gone from an annoyance to a real pain the ass. thankfully its about 12 days till we have the shortest day of the year after which the days will slowly start getting longer and we can start emerging from this seemingly infinite winter.
if you compare it to a normal work week we are on the equivalent of wendnesday, which is usually a shitty day where you have lost your weekend high, and its another 2 whole days before the next weekend. everyday feels like wednesday these days and thats not good.

anyways gym and football are the highlights of my week these days which is kind of sad. i was in the gym last night and its usually pretty quiet when i am there which is around 9pm, and i am usually the only one in the weights room, but yesterday for about 20 minutes i was the only person in the whole gym.

just had a department meeting and they were talking about how much work was being backed up and how things were not moving as well as they should. they gave a big speech about all the workflow and processes they had updated and then asked if anyone had any ideas or suggestions.
there was a stony silence although one of the senior managers had taken my advice about putting her make up on with the light on, because she didn't look like the joker from the batman films or robert smith from the cure, today. maybe she read my suggestion on this blog....or maybe having spent years in this bank, in a technological bubble in a parrallel universe she doesn't know what the internet is, which is not beyond the realms of possibility.

today i have been wishing i was sitting in the sunshine at a restaurant on melrose enjoying a delicous burger and watching the human traffic.
right well i am off to the sandwich shop to buy an overpriced tuna melt and coke which i will then consume at my desk.

today i have mostly been listening to nine inch nails - head like a hole.

look after yourself V.

X

fight!

the other 2 contractors i work with are really struggling to work together in any capacity. ozzy is in a mood all the time and just sits silently at his desk zoned out to the rest of the world. the other contractor, i think i will refer to him as harry, is still his same hyper active, short tempered impatient person as before. they are just very incompatible personalities and tension was inevitable. they had another little argument this morning over email. both of them were wrong though in this case, ozzy was a little bit more wrong than harry.

me, i am just sitting here not getting involved and doing what every contractor should do, which is try and get on with everyone and at the same time not make any waves. i think there will be more fireworks between ozzy and harry in the not too distant future. i hope i have front row seats for when it all blows up as i have never seen a fight take place at work before. :-).

ozzy mentioned to me that he felt like punching harry in the face, because he was so rude and pushy. i did the mature thing and said he should take a deep breath and just walk away next time he feels like that. i should have said, dude don't hold all of that anger inside, punch his lights out......just make sure i am there to see it.

3 weeks till the end of the year. all things taken into account its been a good year but i just want to get 2009 started now. this time last year i was at a bank i hated and a year later ........i am at another bank and i hate it even more....., but in a strange way i am able to cope with it better. i do find my discomfort and frustration at work quite amusing in a strange kind of way. shit!, you have to laugh about it, even if it is happening to me.

on the postive side of things it does mean i have worked for 3 of the largest investment banks in the world in the last year, and banks that all survived the credit crunch and didn't go under like bear or lehmans. my resume is the shit!. i also did my trip across america which is easily one the best things i ever did in my life uptill now. i think about it everyday and things i saw and the people i met and it really does help me get through the day.

had a couple of calls from recruiters about jobs but nothing solid. one of the recruiters said i had a really impressive cv which was a nice boost for my ego and it shows its not completely a constant stream of rejections for me. just most of the time its rejections. :-). anyways, it looks like they are just getting things lined up for the new year and hopefully some roles come up. thats fine by me. i can wait another 3 weeks.

watched the film tropic thunder last night and it was hilarious. tom cruise is in it and plays one of the funniest parts i have ever seen anyone do. i was literally laughing out loud and had tears streaming down my face.

thats it really. got football on friday as long as no one drops out. forecast is for the temperature to be 3C during the day on thursday. at 10pm when we start playing it will be at, or below, freezing. ouch!.
am thinking of taking another exam soon. its just that i am so bored and i am looking at maybe doing the hyper-v exam or sql. will see how i feel. there are usually lots of good films on tv around christmas so i might not do the actual exam before the new year and just do some study till then. lame excuse but its true.

today i have mostly been listening to ladyhawke - delerium.

great expectations

i went to see the gaslight anthem play tonight at the astoria 2 tonight. they were very very good indeed and they played with a lot of energy and sounded great. have said it before but its really nice to see new bands really giving it everything as opposed to seeing bands when they have had tonnes of success at which point they seem to just go through the motions when you see them live. U2 being a classic case of a band doing just that.

there are exceptions to that rule of bands with success just not trying hard, namely nine inch nails and janes addiction who give it 110% whenever i have seen them play live. saying that, they aren't quite on that stadium scale of shows like U2 are, and i am glad as it seems as if its kept the fire in their bellies when they play. highlights were when they played great expectations, old white lincoln and the backseat.

anyways, after tonights show i think the gaslight anthem might be at the start of something. am glad i saw them in a venue as small as the one tonight because i reckon they might need bigger venues next time they play. hope they have great success like some other american bands have had in the UK recently most notably kings of leon and the killers.

i forgot my camera and my mobile phone is lame but below is a pic of the show.

things you wish you could say

one of my favourite films is the breakfast club and there is a bit in it where the teacher lays down the rules to the kids in detention and then ask if anyone has any questions, to which one of the guys asks "does barry manilow know you raided his wardrobe". ha ha ha, its hilarious.

we just had a full department and management meeting where they were going through er....something or other to justify their jobs. it was things i have heard before a thousand times. manage expectations, communication, streamline the process, blah blah blah. anyways the meeting was conducted by one the senior managers here who was wearing a tonne of make-up. i mean it looked really ridiculous.
at the end of her talk she asked if anyone had an questions. i wish i had put my hand up and said
"its not so much a question but more of a tip really....next time you put your make-up on i suggest you turn the light on".

if only.......

today i have mostly been listening to the airbourne toxic event - sometime around midnight.

conversation with ozzy

this is an accurate transcript of a conversation i had with the spaced out guy i work with, whom i refer to as ozzy. i asked him to install windows server on 4 servers last week.

ozzy: what are you doing there?
me: i am building some servers.
ozzy: hey, they look like the ones i did last week!. why are re-installing them!?
me: there is no operating system (windows server) on them, and i need to get them done.
ozzy: but i already did them last week, i sent you a mail.
me: but there is no operating system installed on them.
ozzy: check your mail, i am sure i did them.
me: mate, there is no operating system installed on them, here take a look. (i show him the screen of one of the servers and nothing is installed and its rebooting itself)
ozzy: so, why are you reinstalling them, you should have told me.
me: but you were sick yesterday and the day before, and i needed the servers so i installed them. its no big deal.
ozzy: you should have still told me.
me: ok, but there was no operating system installed on them and i needed them in a rush yesterday.
ozzy: check your mail, they were done. i mailed you on friday.
me: ok, so you installed them last week, but there is no operating system on them NOW, so i am installing them.
ozzy: well which ones did you install.
me: server1 and server2.
ozzy: but i did them already.
me: there was no operating system installed on them.
ozzy slopes back over to his desk.

how many times can you say to someone there was no operating system installed on the server before they understand?. do you get an idea of what i have to put up with. a lesser man would have broken by now, but not me. i still have my eyes on the prize and the prize is getting out of here from these people.
hope you are having a better day than me. ha ha ha!!!

escape

had a department meeting this morning. it was mainly just an update about all the new wonderful changes they are making that will make life easier and more efficient. it was mostly bullshit. do they think what they are saying is profound or new. its not fella. i have heard it all before with the same phrases and lame jokes every where i have worked. do senior managers all go on the same soft skills and management courses and get a standard script of phrases to use?. it seems like it to me. i just stood there thinking of the beaches in southern california and of driving through the desert on my way to las vegas from phoenix. those were good days....

had a telephone interview yesterday for a job that i really didn't want to do. anyways i don't need to worry about that because they don't want to call me in anyways. agents are always a little timid and worried about giving news of getting turned down. need not worry with me. i have been rejected more times .......than er......someone who has been rejected a lot of times. michael jackson has had fewer rejections to be a registered childminder than i have for computing jobs.

also turned down another job that might have been an option but it was a permanent role and i want to stick with contracting a little while longer. its coming up to the new year and i want to see what i can get in january. just need to make myself endure my current job for a while longer.

football got cancelled for tomorrow night. its december and we are struggling to get numbers. i think we will for the rest the year. am not too dossapointed because it bloody freezing this week and the forecast was for rain tomorrow as well. cold and rain. arrghhh!!!. this is just the worse time of year.

seeing gaslight anthem play on friday night and thats about it really.

anyways, hope you are well cali girl.

today i have mostly been listening to editors - escape the nest. it was on their last album but was not a single. wicked tune.

the little shithead

a few weeks ago i had an exam at a test centre that i have done around 10 exams at before. you are supposed to bring your passport but on this occasion i forgot it.
the guy behind the counter asked me for id and i showed him a couple of credit cards, my travelcard which has my name and photo on it, my microsoft certification ID and my ID card for the bank i work in.
he said he wouldn't let me take the exam unless i showed him a passport. i asked him to check all his records and it would show that i had done lots of exams there and that i could show him how i made the booking and also my online exam transcripts. he said that didn't prove anything and that i could easily be using someone elses usernames and passwords.
what!!!!???? and all my credit cards are fakes as well and my bank ID is a fake as well. you idiot!!.

the guy was clearly an asshole, so i decided to call the testing company that books my exams and after talking to them and giving them my password and address and testing id to prove who i was, they said they were fine with me taking the exam and asked me to hand the phone to the guy at the test centre.
my mobile is pretty loud and i could hear what the lady was telling him on the phone about letting me do the exam. he then started saying to her he was not satisified that i had provided proof of identity and that the testing company (lady on the phone) should have more stringent regulations.

getting annoyed i said to him,
"excuse me mate, if the lady at the test centre who runs the exams for microsoft it fine with it, then why are you arguing with her?. she is fine with me taking the exam, why aren't you?.
he then told the lady on the phone that he was refusing me entry to take the exam no matter what id i showed because i was being rude and aggressive and then he hung up on her.
i told him i had already paid for the exam and that i would like my money back to which he said he it too late to cancel it and that unless i went home and got my passport i would lose my money. "you what!!??" i replied in incredulity at his obstinance.

he then called building security and told them to escort me off the premises and not let me back in. what the fuck!!!!.
i told him, i hadn't shouted or used bad language (i didn't say "what the fuck" when i was there) and why he was being so obtuse and unco-operative to which he had no answer and just walked off. around this time a guy in a suit which may have been his boss walked passed and asked what was going on. i told him i was being refused entry to my exam despite showing half a dozen other id's and that the guy had called security to kick me out of the building. just to set the scene i was dressed in a suit as it was during my lunch hour at work.

the boss guy went back in and talked to the idiot i had been dealing with and 2 minutes later he said i was ok to take my exam. i went back in, sat at the terninal to do my exam, kicked its ass in 25 minutes with a score of 91% all the while seething at the nonsense that had taken place earlier.

i then went to reception and picked up my transcript from the idiot who was still sitting there. i nearly said to him "what was all that shit about earlier pal?". "you want to use your common sense a little bit and learn how to deal with people and situations a bit better and not call building security any time someone asks a question you can't or don't want to answer". " you might also want to stop throwing your weight around and remember your job is to process candidates for exams and not act like a bouncer at the door of a night club". i nearly said it but i didn't. i hadn't been rude or aggresive before when he accused me of being so, but i might have then. i just picked up my stuff and walked out and ignored the little shithead.

just for the record i haven't been in a fight since i was 8 and that was at school when victor, another little shithead, started cussing and saying things about my friends mum. i asked him to back off at which point he said shit about my mum. at that point i told him he better stop otherwise he would be in big trouble at playtime.
he didn't stop and carried on. maybe he was feeling strong that day, i don't know.

anyways, i waited for him in the playground and when he came out through the doors i bundled him into a corner and gave him a few good kicks and punches till i heard him start whimpering and crying. that was the last time i had a fight. shithead at the test centre was like victor. he could have ended up crying as well but we left that kind of behaviour in junior school.

99 problems

one of the purposes of this blog is to record what goes on at work so that i don't forget how it really was. sometimes with hindsight your memories of what it was really like is clouded and not as truthful as it actually was.

just last week i had lunch with a few of my friends that still work at the intenet company i used to work for and it was lovely to see them all and it felt just like old times. the truth of the matter is that i had lots of good friends that i had some good times with, but the work and the way is was treated was pretty shitty and thats why i left, but for a couple minutes i almost kidded myself into thinking it was all good times and laughs there.

today i have been working with laidback guy again. my god its hard working with him. he answers questions with questions and talks in broken sentences so its really hard to make any sense of what he is saying. its all a big jumble of nonsense. i reckon its a bit similar to talking to ozzy osbourne. he just rambles and can't remember anything because his brain is so fried, much in the same way as laid back guy. i think i will refer to him as ozzy from now on. :-)

anyways, its been a busy week at work only because the amount of administration and process is just totally out of control here. on tuesday night a 2 minute job turned into a 3 hour job because we had to get so many authorisations from so many poeple. its madness. i can't understand how people can stand to work in this way. i must be not normal i guess, because they all seem to be pretty content, but it drives me insane.

anyways, if in the weeks and months from now, i remember this experience fondly i will have these posts to remind me that i need not to do so, and i will have a record of what it was really like.

look after yourself and have a lovely weekend flower.

today i have mostly been listening to Jay-Z - 99 problems.

turn the page

i asked the laid back guy i work with if he could build a few blade servers for me. i gave him all the details like names and addresses and which blade to build each one on. he logged into the blade chassis and just picked the first server in slot 1 to start the build. i asked him to build on the server in slot 4 as that was the hardware that had been allocated to me. he replied that it was not important which actual blade it went on as long as it was in the right chassis. what!!!!. no dude, thats not right, you MUST build on the allocated blade otherwise it screws everything up.

anyways i insisted they get built on the particular blades assigned but i fear for what he has been doing the last couple of months. you know what?, i just don't want to know. if that is how he has done things then everything he has done is going to be screwed and need to be re-installed. oh man......i just don't want to know about the mess out there.

aside from that things are ok. been working quite long hours because i have a ton of stuff to do, most of it not requiring the use of my brain. just chasing up other people to get their stuff done so i can get on with my stuff.

had a call from the games company and the guy there said that one of their staff was maybe emigrating in the new year and that they would call me in if that happened and look to get me in. i told him that was fine for me. in the meantime i am applying for other stuff and we shall see what comes through. nothing has yet and i know its a shit time of year and i know the economy is screwed but just like it seems that the good times don't last forever.....neither do the bad times last forever.

take care my friend. miss you.

today i have mostly been listening to metallica - turn the page. orginally a song by bob seger and both versions are wicked. sad video to go along with the metallica version done in a documentary style.

chinese democracy

yikes, i have been busy today. had to get some servers ready for someone who needs them badly and because it was holding up their project. the day has just flown by, but it was nice to just concentrate on one thing and getting it done. now thats finished with i am back to doing scraps of work and finishing off shit that no one else wants to do. thats just life i guess.

had a quiet weekend. cycled to the gym on saturday and it was absolutley freezing outside. the cold was just going straight through me and i was so relieved to get back home and indoors. it was a tough ride and my legs just had nothing in them. when its cold like that your muscles just seize up like an engine without oil. was thinking about southern california all the way home.

look after yourself V. miss you.

today i have mostly been listening to guns'n'roses - chinese democracy. it fucking rocks.

starving

after yesterdays disagreement that the 2 guys i work with had, one of them has not come into work today. probably best that they cool off, but its a shame that they are both behaving like this. am trying to be the peacemaker in between them but am not going to go out of my way to help them too much. if they want to bicker like children there is nothing i can really do about it. you really would think they would know better.

2 new unix contractors started on monday and have spent the last 4 days sitting in the canteen because they have no pcs, desk, logins. what a shambles, but you got to laugh fellas.

was supposed to have a call this afternoon from that games company that might be looking to hire someone but i have no confirmation so i don't know if it will happen. have heard that might have some projects coming up in the new year. will do a bit of preperation in the meantime as it better to be safe than sorry.

something come through for me in the new year, please please please. i want to do a job in IT and computers again. sorry to break it to the people that work here in the tech department but what we are doing is not a serious or proper computing job. its just not fellas. its all just proceduralised (if thats a word???) bullshit.

that feeling i had when i got my first job in computers, of wanting to learn about things i didn't know, has not dissipated in the slightest over the years. that fire is still burning for me. have been downloading lots of whitepapers about new products and guides to intalling and configuring various SANs and servers and lots of other shit i have no clue about.

i am not clever or brilliant at what i do. i am not going to make any new discoveries or come up with anything that hasn't been seen or done before. its just that i haven't seen it or done it and so for me its a new discovery, and thats good enough for me.

found myself nearly buying a chemistry book a couple of days ago, after reading in the paper about BASF, the chemicals company putting out a profits warning because there was less demand for products like polyethelyne. found myself thinking about organic chemistry and the make up of a polyethelyne molecule. shit i need to get a more interesting job. my brain is starving.

look after yourself cali girl.

funny

.....now that was fucking funny. like i mentioned before the 2 other guys i work with don't really like working with each other. one of the guys is a bit spaced out and in his own world, whilst the other guy is quite hyper and wants to get everything done quickly and has no patience for anything and gets pissed off at everything.

anyways, just now they had a face to face disagreement on the floor i sit on.they weren't shouting or anything but voices were slightly raised and there was a sharp tone in what they were saying. as is usual for me when i am in a tense situation, i was trying to contain my laughter and had to bite my lip as it was fucking funny seeing them argue like that.

we are contractors fellas. lets just do whatever work we get and keep our heads down and get on with it. i keep telling the one of the guys not to get so stressed and pissed off about stuff but he just can't seem to let it slide and not make it bother him. to break up their argument i called one of the guys over and asked him a question about something i was working on, otherwise they would both still be standing there going over the same shit.

i think my experience a couple of contracts ago, when i had to sit next to an asshole for a couple of months was beneficial for me. it was an exercise in restraint and containing frustration and that particular guy was such a big asshole that i have not come across anyone even remotely as annoying as him, since i left. its all been a walk in the park...relatively. everybody needs to calm the fuck down and chill out. i told you this was going to be good entertainment.

we contractors rarely get involved in disputes or politics. i miss that a little bit, but we have it here. hopefully there is more to come. :-)

keep smiling my friend.

entertainment

there are 3 people in my team that i have to work with. we all started in the last couple of months or so, one guy a couple weeks before me and one guy a couple of weeks after me. i get on with everyone fine, but the other 2 guys have a real problem working with each other.

you see one of the guys here is a bit spaced out and seems to just jumble everything up. he is a nice guy but its kind of frustrating working with him because he just waffles on and on when he talks and most of the time you can't understand what he is trying to say to you. he is really disorganised and just messes up a lot of stuff.

an example of him being spaced out was a few minutes ago i asked him a question. he said pardon and so i repeated it and he said pardon again, and so i repeated it again at the same volume in the same tone, and then he answered it. its like this all day if you have to deal with him. dude, are you high?, have you been smoking some herbs?. you find yourself constantly repeating yourself when you talk to him. its like he is not listening even when he appears to be looking at you and appears to be attentive.

it doesn't really bother me too much but it drives the other guy i work with crazy, and he gets very stressed about it and today i think he is close to breaking point. its a good thing they sit on different floors in this building otherwise they might have exchanged some harsh words now. most of their communication is done via messenger and he is just the same where you have to type the same question to him 3 times for him to respond.

its all very amusing to me. i don't let it get to me. i keep telling the other guy to now worry about it and just get into that contractor mindset of doing your own work and not get involved in anything else going on. its leads to a much less stressful existence in places like this. he is new to contracting and i think he just finds it hard to not give a shit about stuff. i find it quite easy these days.

anyways they just had a small argument on messenger and they are both sitting at their desks with smoke coming out of their ears. ha ha ha!!!. nice to have some entertainment at work for a change.

today i have mostly been listening to keane - spiralling. i don't really like a lot of their stuff but this is a wicked tune. credit where credit is due.




take care my friend

close my eyes

its like pulling teeth getting anything done at work. you can't take a shit without raising a ticket to half a dozen different departments, and to make things worse, no one actually gives you a definitive version of what the process for anything is. to make things worse you end up receiving jobs to do through their ticketing system that are riddled with errors. its incredibly frustrating. servers named incorrectly, servers in the wrong datacentre, incorrect amount of storage specified, wrong version of windows, etc etc....

this is an experience unlike any i have had before and hopefully unlike any i will ever have again. the other banks i worked at had huge amounts of process as well, and i complained they had too much, but this current bank is at a whole new level of bearocracy.

i am so glad i have worked in other places and have experiences to compare this place to. this is not how the rest of the world, or even other investment banks function. this is not the real world and a lot of the people here could really learn a lot from seeing how they get work done in other firms and use the best parts of the way they work.

i wouldn't know better if this was the first place i had ever worked at and if i got used to this, i would be in for a huge shock if i ever moved on, but i do know better and i have moved jobs and thats what makes me endure the frustration for the time being. its not like i have a choice at this moment in time, but hopefully a choice will come up soon and i will choose to move on, when it does.

.....sorry had to vent....... will close my eyes for a few seconds and imagine i am in san diego, sitting on pacific beach in the bright sunshine and listening to the ocean.....or maybe imagine i am in LA, sitting outside in the sunshine sipping on a cool drink watching the human traffic walk by on melrose. i feel better already. all is well again.



today i have mostly been listening to the gaslight anthem - old white lincoln.



If I could write, I'd tell you how much I miss these nights

take care flower.
Xx

the gaslight anthem

been listening to the gaslight anthem the last couple of days. it reminds me of being somewhere else and not here, and i really want to be somewhere else these days. they play very american music heavily influenced by early springsteen but thats no surprise as they are from new jersey. lots of songs about cars and girls.

anyways decided to check out their website and saw they are playing in london at the astoria2 in about 3 weeks, so i bought tickets to go see them. its a great little venue to see a band play in.

work is the same as always though saying that i have actually done a little bit of work today, which makes a change. it was trivial by the way and appears as it will be from here on. oh well. have noticed a couple of other things whilst sat at my desk about people in the office. there is one guy here thats sits at his desk with his suit jacket on all the time. who sits with their jacket on all day?. at the end of the day its all creased up and looks like he has slept in it. its weird but there was someone who did the exact same thing at my last bank.

there are also a few people here that have put listed their qualifications or degrees on their email signatures. i can't stand that shit. its just petty point scoring and wanting to make yourself look clever or some shit. do they think we are going to be impressed or think they are really clever?. can you stop it please because actually i think it makes you look like a bigheaded egotistical asshole. idiot tech boss in my previous job used to do the exact same thing of listing his titles and qualifications and we all know that having worked with him, he was the biggest dumbass i have ever come across despite his doctorate, which i still can't believe he had.

anyways thats all i have to say about that.

keep smiling cali girl

Nxx

BEng(Hons)Electronic Enginnering, MCP, MCP+I, MCSA+messaging, MCSE, MCITP-Enterprise administrator, Citrix CCA, VMWare VCP.... captain of football team in high school.... 2nd placed finish in the sprint in my class aged 8 (photo finish).... lap record holder around the nurburgring in gran turismo on the playstaion.... 4th place finish in cross country running aged 13.... grade D in french aged 16.... drawing of car made in crayon posted on fridge aged 4 (coloured in, mostly inside the lines).

how'd you like them apples mutha fuckas!. i think i might use that signature on my work emails from now on. i bet people will be really impressed.

week 7

got a couple of calls about possible other contracts. i doubt anything will happen and i think its more a case of recruiters getting things lined up for any work that might come in, in the new year. anyways we shall see how it goes.

work is the same as always. i still don't have all the access to the sysyems i need. i just email the support teams and they try something and it doesn't work and then i mail them again and wait. it would be really frustrating and annoying if i cared but i don't care. i gave up caring a long tome ago. take as long as you want fellas doing whatever it is you do. this is my 7th week and i still can't be productive and its not my fault. as usual things are being 'chased up' with regards to all this shit.

need to remind myself to be a bit more careful when talking to recruiters. there aren't any quiet rooms that i can go to when they do call so i end up standing in the stairwell by the lifts because thats the closest place away from my desk to talk. i try and keep my voice down but its a public staircase and on more than a few occasions today i have said phrases like "yeah, i am available immediately" and "i will get those references to you", just as someone from my floor has walked past. oh well.

have football this week. am really in need of getting some football action. i had to miss last week because i went out with some friends and i am suffering withdrawal symptoms now. oh lord why didn't you give me immense footballing talent and let me play for arsenal and barcelona earning a hundred grand a week, instead of leaving me here working in the bank that time forgot. still you got to laugh. :-)

take care cali girl.

today i have mostly been listening to the gaslight anthem - '59 sound. its a wicked tune. they are from new brunswick, new jersey and when i am in new york and i am taking the train back to my uncles house in new jersey, the train i get also goes to new brunswick. i get off the train a few stops before but maybe one day i will forget to get off at my stop and end up in new brunswick. anyways, have a listen.

death by email

it was hard to get out of bed this morning. motivation is low on a monday when you know you are going to be bored all day and all week. to top it off its horrid weather outside. its dark and its raining in that way when you know its going to carry on like that all day. the weather today is the type i just hate the most. if you are going to rain, then do it properly and come down like cats and dogs and enough already with this persistant slow falling rain that just seems never ending.

also feel a little cut off from the world today as i forgot my phone at home. its weird how reliant you become on it. it means i can't take calls from recruiters and i can't text and call my friends either. its just me on my own cut off from the rest of the world stuck here in this soulless bank for the rest of the day.

speaking of the bank, i have got a little bit more access but still not everything i need. i have made people aware of it and all they say is "chase it up". i would have thought telling someone once would be enough. have never heard the phrase "chase it up" so many times in a place in my life. i was sitting at the desk of one of the team leaders and he had 3,500 unread messages in his inbox. wow!!. no wonder nobody responds to email if they are all like him. any message must just get lost with all the other crap and its all frighteningly inefficient. i get bombarded with all kindfs of crap sent to me. they really shouldn't email so much crap to everyone. its like death by email. anyways i just have to remind myself that its 7 weeks till the end of the year after which we will find a brighter day somewhere else.

saw a special offer on plane tickets to LA for travel in june '09. was nearly tempted to buy one because it was such a good deal, but i have no idea where or what i will be doing then, so i didn't in the end. it was nice to think about it for a while. i miss california even more on days like these.

had another quiet weekend. was supposed to go to a friends house on saturaday night but the trains were screwed and i would have had to have taken a bus and then a train and then a 15 minute walk at the other end. it was raining on saturday night and it was too much hassle to get there and back home so i gave it a miss. spent most of yesterday tidying up. threw out a ton of crap that i didn't need but had just accumalated over the past few months and years.

today i have mostly been listening to MGMT - time to pretend. awesome song.

strange universe

thank god its thursday. its my favourite day of the week and it means that there is only one more to go before we get to the weekend. i have never looked forward to the end of the working week like i have in this contract at the bank. thankfully the weeks are passing by quote quickly now and not dragging on like they were when i first got here.

got talking to one of the unix admins in the lift and he said it was a mission getting all his system access set up when he started as well. he said he got to wondering why they hired and paid him if they were not going to get things set up for him so he could work. my feelings exactly. its a most strange environment and experience at this place and unlike anything i have experience before or hopefully will ever again. this is the end of my 6th week and i have done absolutely nothing. companies usually like to get contractors working and doing something productive as soon as they can, but thats not the case here.

the people here will be screwed if they ever leave this place. the rest of the world does not function like this at all. i would hate to be trapped in a place like this for all my career. its like living some kind of strange parallel universe not connected to reality.

am out in shoreditch tonight to meet up with some friends i used to actually work with, and i mean proper work, in a normal job and company. my goodness those were the days.

6 weeks

this is being written from a PC that has an internet connection at work. it only took 6 weeks to get this sorted out for me. bravo!, champagne for everyone. i still don't actually have an administartive account so i still can't do any work, but at least i am connected to the outside world. i asked one the guys here who has been here for years as far as i can tell, how i get an admin account and he tried to show me but then struggled to come up with any information and said he would get back to me. yeah, whatever fella!.

to be honest i really just don't care. this is by far the worst job i have ever had but you know what, you just have to laugh about it. its so ridiculous and i have so many stories of incompentence that i am looking forward to leaving this place and recalling the tales of ineptitude to future colleagues.

US election tomorrow. come on USA elect obama. our european presidents and prime ministers will look even older, blander and more boring than they already are standing next to obama, and believe me they will all want to be seen standing next to him hoping some of his charisma rubs off on them. it will also make a marked change of not wanting to be seen anywhere near your current president. he couldn't less popular if he had herpes.

had a busy but boring weekend. gym, laundry, grocery shopping, ironing, haircut, blah blah.

take care V.

week 5

this is the beginning of the 5th week of my 3 month contract at a large investment bank and i still don't have a pc. they also screwed up my wages so it means i haven't been paid since i started working there though i have been assured it will come through next time pay roll is processed. this is all going wonderfully well and initially i was really annoyed and pretty down about it but now in a strange way i actually find the whole situation quite funny now. shit!, you have to laugh about this stuff even if its happening to you.

aside from that nothing else is really going on and hence a bit quiet on the blog because life has been very quiet recently. job applications and gym and sitting at work studying. that is my life these days. nothing else.

still haven't spoken to my friend i went to the states with, and its been almost exactly 2 months since i got back. just can't be bothered to get in contact and i really don't want to if i am honest. he really did do a few things that were out of order and that doesn't include changing the route on day 2 of the trip and taking the car and wasting a nine inch nails ticket i paid for, and then me having to take an 8 hour bus trip from knoxville to memphis.

another example of something he did on a few occasions was when we went to get something to eat. there were a few occasions like the time we went to new york hotel and casino in las vegas. we went to the restaurant and ordered some food. i ordered fish and chips which was $15 and he ordered a kobe beef steak which was $30. the bill came to around $50 and he put a $20 note down and then said he didn't have any change and then looked at me. i put down the other $30.

i am not one of those assholes who calculates the bill to the last cent but i also don't like it when people take the piss and i end up paying for his $30 japenese beef steak. he did this on quite a few occasions over the course of the trip and i just thought it was a little bit of a shitty thing to do. you don't go out to eat and then order the most expensive thing on the menu and then not pay your fair share.its not like he even split the bill in half. he always tried to get away with paying less than that.
friends like that we don't need.

anyways, if i can't think of anything else to write about i will write about more random and trivial incidents on my trip across america in my forthcoming posts.

today i have mostly been listening to the smiths - how soon is now.
there was a survey recently to find the best song lyrics ever and a few lines from this song was voted as the best ever.

theres a club that you'd like to go...you could meet somebody who really loves you...
so you go and you stand on your own....and you leave on your own...
...and you go home...and you cry and you want to die...



jesus, what does that say about england and the people here if that is the best lyric ever. cheer up everyone. :-)

take care V

a long couple of months ahead

monday will be the beginning of my 4th week at the new bank and i still don't have a pc or a login. its a complete shambles at that place. i have asked a bunch of people there what is going on and they all say they are going to sort it out and then they just don't do anything. this is one of the largest financial instututions in the world and they can't sort out a login and a pc. i am not surprised this bunch of muppets has lost billions of dollars recently. they make the trivial seem complicated.

its things like this that just make me feel really disillusioned with working in these large banks. this is my 3rd bank and each one has been mind numbingly boring and not challenging in the slightest, and yet as my job has become more and more boring and trivial my salary has gone up each time. it just simply makes no sense at all. this is not at all like how i had expected it to be at all and this current bank i am at is by far the worst one i have been at.

i didn't end up getting called up for that other job i really liked and i heard they already filled the role. i am applying for other jobs but its coming to the end of the year and things are pretty slow out there. its looking like i will be at this bank till the end of the year. its going to be a llong couple of months coming up, but shit, we done it before and we will just have to do it again. will have to just keep day dreaming about southern california to get me through the days.

take care V.

today i have mostly been listening to audioslave - cochise.

a second shot

Guess what?........i still don't have a login, computer or desk at my new job and its been 2 weeks now. i have done absolutely no work at all but have billed them the equivalent of a few thousand dollars. i don't know who my manager is and i don't know hardly anyone i am supposed to be working with because i sit at a spare desk with the UNIX team and not near the windows server guys. its been ok though because i have been studying like a beast and i took another exam this week on top of the one i took last week. but looking at it on a proffessional level, its a very poor way to treat a new starter even if they are a contractor like me.

......and then in a twist of fate one evening i was just randomly browsing to see if any jobs were out there and i saw a job spec of something that looked similar to something i went for about 8 months ago. i sent my resume off to it and the next day i got a call back from the recruiter asking when i might be available, to which i replied that i was available immediately (didn't tell them i just started somewhere new). i then asked the recruiter about the company that was looking to hire and it turns out its exactly the same job at the company i saw 8 months ago. i almost landed it then but they ended up going with someone who worked there before, though i know that the guy that interviewed me at the time was pretty impressed with me. it seems that the other guy they hired instead of me must have left because they need to fill the position again.

fingers crossed i can go one better and land this job. i know it would be just perfect. if not i will have to carry on that bank. it won't be the end of the world but it would be really really nice to get this other job.

today i have been mostly listeing to air traffic - shooting star. have a listen, V, if you get a chance. its the kind of thing you would like.

new job

new job diary.

monday : did no work - no permanent desk, no login, no pc/laptop. don't know why they asked me to come in.

tuesday : did no work - still no permanent desk, no login, no pc/laptop. did take my own laptop to the office and studied for exam.

wednesday : did no work - still nothing sorted out for me. carried on revising.

thursday : did no work - still no access to anything. carried on revising. went to the tate modern art gallery in the afternoon.

how do you think friday will turn out?. i suspect i will do nothing again. i will however bill them for 5 days work which almost covers the cost of the holiday i took in the states lat month. proffessionally a waste of time, but not financially.

oh jesus!, here we go again. what is going on in these banks?. i thought because they were paying me so much they would give me work to do. i was wrong. its just like the last 2 banks i have been at. paid to do nothing at all.

am still applying for jobs but will bleed them for cash in the meantime and if nothing comes up over the next few weeks i will just have to stay till the end of the year. the beginning of a new year is always a good time to get something new.

i just want to go somewhere and do some work. is that too much to ask for?. i get so bored sitting there doing nothing. some people would love it but i know it will drive me nuts soon, hence i have started studying again. i have 2 exams (exchange and ISA server) booked in the next couple of weeks and after that there are 2 more exams i want to do( sql and hyper-v), but after that i will have pretty much run out of exams to do.

i must be getting close to some kind of record for the most microsft exams done. i will be on 25 or 26 exams passed by then. shit!, what will i do with myself when there are no more exams to do?.

last day of summer

this weekend the weather has been beautiful. i get the feeling it was one last final taste of summer and blue skies before the heavens are shrouded in slate grey skies for the next 6 months. we shall have to do what the animals do and hibernate from what is about to come and awake again in the spring.

its ok i guess. it will mean i will have nothing to distract me at work and i will do all the overtime i can get, that is if i last in the job and it all turns out to be ok tomorrow, which will be my first day. its not like i will be able to go out anywhere nice on the weekends anyway when its cold and horrible and i will just have to keep reminding myself that i will be saving money to go to california again next year.

i have had a couple of months away from work and even before that when i was working i didn't do very much actual work and it wasn't tiring, so i have the capacity to work really hard and really long hours if need be. besides, its not like this job is it for me. ideally i will do it for at least 6 months and anything beyond that....well we will just have to see how it goes and what the market is like.

today i have really been missing los angeles and san diego and V.

i have mostly been listening to MGMT - kids

final rush

got called about a couple more jobs that sound like they might be better than the one i accepted already, and i don't mean just financially either. the agents asked my availability and i said i was ready to rock'n'roll anytime. they seemed pretty confident that i would get called in for interview next week sometime but agents can be full of shit so we shall see how it goes. am supposed to start my new job next week so will have to try and sort something out if i need to take an hour out for an interview. the 'i have an exam booked' is always a good excuse to use.

a couple of years ago i turned down a job out of a sense of loyalty to the company i worked for at the time and i ended up regretting it about a month later. i promised myself that i would not make the same mistake again and if need be i will do whatever needs to be done and i really won't feel too bad walking out of a job for something better.

these 2 new jobs are both vmware roles and i know that i would not be getting put forward for these roles had i not spent over 2 grand of my own money on doing the course and exam. it pays to invest in yourself.

at least i have the job at the german bank in the bag and i can do it till the end of the year at least, and you never know, maybe i might get something better in the meantime.

new contract

its been 4 weeks to the day since i got back from the states and i got offered a contract today at a large german bank. ofcourse i accepted it, even though i have my reservations but everyone is worried how a new job may turn out, and thats no reason for me to turn it down. besides what with investment banks disappearing on a daily basis the last week or so, i think i did pretty well to get something so quickly considering just how bad things are in the financial industry these days. i even managed to get a nice pay rise out of them and so thats even better. i think my first day will be next monday but there is a chance that they might want me to start this thursday or friday. no bother, i told them i can start whenever but it does mean i will have to reschedule my exam which is next week.

was a little apprehensive about it because in the interviews i had, no one asked me a single technical question. not one. they just looked at the other banks i had worked in and asked me what kind of stuff i had done, but they didn't test me on any of it. thats cool, we shall see how it goes. as always i am hopeful, and even if it does to turn out to be crappy, i will be paid very well and am sure i can stick it out for a few months and at least till the end of the year and it will make my bank account look a lot better and it will pay for another trip to california next year. it will also make a nice mix of banks on my resume having previously worked in a large japanese bank and then a large american bank. another good thing about it is that i will be working in the city of london again and i will not be in horrible, bland, boring, soulless docklands. it will be nice to be back in town again.

its still not quite my ideal job though. that is yet to come in the future.

i got an email from my friend who i went on the road trip across the states, you know the one...the guy that didn't want to go out for a drink in memphis, san diego, LA, santa fe, flagstaff, las vegas, washington ... . anyways he sent a mail around inviting a bunch of people out for drinks at a bar in central london. needless to say, i shall not be attending. i don't want to go for a drink in london. i have done that a million times before. i wanted to go out for a drink on sunset boulevard in LA or in las vegas. that would have been miles better.

today i have mostly been listening to , kings of leon - sex on fire. what a great song. this is what i was watching on tv last friday when you, V, were texting me.

take care flower

UPDATE: as is always the case with these things i have just been put up for a better job, paying much more at another bank. i told the agent i would take it if offered. didn't tell him i had already landed a contract. we shall see how it goes, but you just need to play all the angles sometimes.

mundane

and now i am back to the mundane life in london. it rained almost everyday for 2 weeks when i got back from cali. it was such a downer.

i started looking for a new contract about a week ago but the job market is pretty slow out there in the kind of places i am looking for, like banks and other financial institutions. still, i am sure something will come up seeing as i did all those exams and i know more than most people who work in banks, having seen first hand over the last year in the 2 banks i worked at.

thats it really, nothing else really to report. i haven't spoken to my friend who i went on the trip with and its been 3 weeks since i got back. i might give it a few more weeks before even considering contacting him, but i really think i have had more than enough of him for this lifetime, besides he'll probably be eating if i do call. :-)

have been training after taking a month off from the gym whilst being away. its been 3 weeks and i have just got back to the condition i was in before i went away. have got the time these days to do an extra session or two in the week so i am determined to push on further and take it up a few levels over the next few weeks.

and that really is it. i have a couple of exams booked but i just can't motivate myself to study for them. i don't need to do them and i am not that interested in them. i only booked them because i was bored and i thought it might be something to do.

hopefully something comes through with regards to a job soon in the next few weeks. would be nice to know where i will be till the end of the year and what i will be doing but at the moment its all up in the air. not worried though. just keen to find out what will happen as i am getting a little bored at home. daydreaming a lot about california and stuff. that will keep me going for a while.

take care cali girl.

last day

we had one final day in LA and the next day i was sheduled to fly back to crappy london town. we didn't really have a plan for the final day and just went with the flow. i did a final bit of shopping and picked up a couple of things i needed to. we headed down to melrose and had lunch at the village idiot, which had a very london feel to it and could have been in shoreditch or clerkenwell instead of hollywood.

we then headed up towards the hollywood bowl as radiohead were playing and thought we would see if we could buy a ticket from a tout. when we got there the going rate was $600 for 2 tickets and to be honest, i don't like radiohead THAT much to drop 300 notes for a ticket. my friend did consider it as he likes them, after only becoming aware of them 18 months ago. i had seen nine inch nails on this trip already and so had seen a good concert already. i told my friend that he should get a ticket and see radiohead and that i would find a bar on sunset boulevard or melorose and wait for him there and meet him after the show. he thought about it for 2 seconds and as with the tijuana trip he decided not to do it. what a surprise.

around 9pm walked back through hollywood and on our way to the car i suggested we could go for a drink anyway somewhere on sunset or melrose, but my friend said he didn't feel like it and i figured i had spent 2 weeks with this no fun, unenthusiastic person and i decided to not try and convince him or press the point. besides i would have died of embaressment walking into the viper room with a guy in tight baby blue shorts and silly brown trainer/shoes. there are some weird freaky poeple in LA but he just looked ridiculous.

.......and that was it for my trip across america. it was wicked and i feel really lucky to have had the possibility to do it and i enjoyed it immensely even though i was travelling with a miserable git who showed no interest in anything apart from graceland. it was still good that he came along because i got to split the cost of the trip and i also made him do most of the driving, so it wasn't all bad that he came along.

its just that you go on trips with your friends in the hope that not only will you have a great time seeing all these new and wonderful places but also you will have a good laugh on the way in the times when you are driving 4 hours across olklahoma and there isn't that much to see. you hope that your trip will be even better than just seeing cities and that they will add something to the journey. he didn't. i am pretty sure i annoyed him with my complete disregard for mealtimes and staying up late in the evenings watching the olympics and my childlike fascination with everything and wanting to explore and walking everywhere, but thats what i went for.

it was an awesome trip and i have memories that i will carry with me forever and i met a few really nice people as well and i also saw my best friend in phoenix who i hadn't seen for what felt like forever. who knows how the future turns out, but i have a suspicion that i will return to southern california next year. i just have a feeling in my bones.

i didn't hear this next song whilst i was in the states but i heard it on the radio or on a tv programme here in london a couple of days after i got back. it just sounds like america to me.

jesse malin & bruce springsteen - broken radio

city of angels

reluctantly i bid farewell to the white sandy beaches and bikini clad girls of san diego and we headed up the freeway a couple of hours to LA. as we entered the greater LA area it was just a maza of freeways and we found ourselves hopping from one to another. we would have been completely lost with out GPS navigation. it really is a life saver and is absolutely essential to have on a trip like this.

we checked into our hotel which was near LAX and then drove into town to see if there was anything good to see. as per usual my friend had done no research and was absolutely clueless as to where we might go. i thought at first it was just laziness on his part, not doing any reading or research about the cities we were visting, but actually it was just that he was simply not interested.

had i not known about pacific beach in san diego, he would have spent all his time staying in a hotel on a freeway. had i not known about beale street in memphis he would have just gone to graceland and thought there was nothing else in memphis. the same could be said for the old town in santa fe, williamsburg new york, georgetown washington, flagstaff arizona, and now we were in LA, i suspect he would have just stayed by the airport and thought that the city was lame.

anyways i told him to head towards melrose and we could see if there was anything interesting there and actually it turned out to be really good. lots of cool shops and restaurants and we got something to eat at a place called johnny rockets on melrose. the obesity epidemic you hear about in america is something not afflicting the cool cats in hollywood and it might be because the portions are normal sized and not the gargantuan portions we were served in texas and tenessee and which i had always failed to finish. i thought they served great food but my friend was distinctly unimpressed by the smaller portions and i also think that because we were on melrose surrounded by the beautiful young people of LA, he felt self conscious about ordering 2 meals like he had done in previous places and so i get the feeling he left the place hungry. i loved it and i also liked the outdoor seating where you can sit in the shade out of the sun and just watch the world go by. it was a lovely afternoon and it will be a memory of LA for me forever.







we then headed back to the car and did some touristy things like take pics of the hollywood sign and go to the hollywood walk of fame and we headed up to sunset boulevard past the viper room and a few other places. having been sunburnt to with in an inch of my life on the beach in san diego the previous day, i was quite glad when we headed back to the hotel in the evening and was looking forward to a soothing cold shower and an early night.

tomorrow was to be the last day of the trip for me.