keep your head up

it was the last day of summer yesterday, not that we have had much of a summer even by the lowly standards of london. i read a story in the news where they said this had been the coolest summer in 20 years. i fucking new it!. sometimes you think you are just remembering your childhood through rose tinted glasses and the long summer days playing football in the park and sunshine and hot days were just your imagination, and that in actual fact it may not have been like that. turns out it actually was like that though. this has been the shittest summer i can remember in a long time. it rained most of the afternoon and i couldnt cycle to the gym today for my usual sunday session. i didnt want to leave the house and get the bus and then walk. i could not face it, so i just stayed home and had a good clear out and clean.

work is ok but its getting quite busy indeed. my team leader said we should take it as a compliment that whenever the management want an important piece of work done for the project, they send it our way, but it does mean we have lots of work and we are on it pretty much all the time. was given a bunch of trading application servers that needed to be ready for this week and was on that on that the last few days. we also have our own work for our part of the project as well, so its really is piling work on work. the days are flying by.

the other team of 3 techies are back from tomorrow, as 2 of them were on holiday last week. jesus!, holiday!, 2 of you at the same time?. have you not got any work to deliver?. i would usually be going on holiday to NY and LA this friday but i have postponed it, because this project is too important and we need all hands on deck. i heard that the other 3 techies came with in a whisker of all being fired 2 weeks ago, when it was discovered how many fuck ups they had done. the PM that talks too much looks to be on his way out as well. they have stripped him of most of his responsibilities because he was not able to deliver and there were too many mistakes being made.

i will be very surprised if he makes it past the end of this month, when his contract expires. he had been with the firm over a year but word around the water cooler is that he will not be offered another 3 month deal. i had my doubts about him from the first time i met him. he talked way too much, made far too much noise and didn't appear to put in as much effort into DOING work as he did TALKING about work.

both he and one of the chancer techies both seem to be living in denial. the PM has just bought a very expensive and large house and the chancer techie wears a £6,000 watch and spent thousands of pounds on his stereo. makes you wonder how they will survive when they get let go, and given the level of work they produce, it makes you wonder if they could get anything really good that pays as well. one of the other techies in another department has a really flashy watch and goes on expensive holidays, but he can because he is very good and really knows his shit. he could get laid off tomorrow and he could easily walk into something else paying as much.

i always remind myself not to get to extravagant and keep my feet on the ground, and not get caught up in the whole investment banking/hedge fund lifestyle. i am good at what i do, but i am not that good and there are lots of people that i am better than, but i have also met lots of people that are miles better than me. you need to maintain some perspective and am lucky in that my friends and parents would probably think less, not more of me if i spent 6 grand on a watch, although i did treat myself to a new phone last week, which is very nice indeed, and my old phone was starting to die.

anyways, if this was a normal year, i would almost certainly be flying off to new york or LA this friday, but i am not. its going to be a tough few months for the remainder of the year, and its just my luck that it would have been sweeter than normal given our shit london summer. will be there soon, cruising to the beach in a dodge challenger.

today i have mostly been listening to ben howard - keep your head up.