january

Well hello there!  If you're reading this it means I've actually managed to swap the home pages successfully and haven't lost the entire Brummie Blogs site (phew! - is it sad that renaming a file should cause such a huge swelling and dropping of all internal organs?).  If any links don’t work, let me know and I’ll dig out my ‘Websites for Idiots’ book.

So here we are in 2006 and Brummie Blogs' third year!  And what will this year have in store for me, I wonder (nervously)?   Birmingham bus drivers have, so far, failed to completely kill me off (and they certainly tried hard), but maybe this will be the year when the nerves finally crack and I go mad on the top deck during Yet Another Gridlock. 

Traffic, lunchtime crowds and computer networks haven’t driven me to hand in my notice and storm from the city with a final two-fingered wave yet, but who knows what's in store this year.  Am I bovvered?  I’m not bovvered.  Bring it on!

Yeah, bring it on.

Sunday 1

My Partner and I had the usual New Year's Eve discussion last night … shall we go out or stay in?   We couldn’t decide (as ever) so we just sort of ended up drinking loads, yakking lots and watching the fireworks go off all over Birmingham at midnight (very impressive, like World War III in glorious Technicolor).

My dad and his wife live across the road and we’d planned to wave to each other from our bedroom windows as the New Year arrived.  We raced upstairs and there they were, two silhouettes in their window, us bouncing up and down in ours. 

Dad waved a tiny torch at us.  A strange look came over my partner's face and he raced to get our zillion watt floodlight, pointing it out the window and lighting up our entire grove.  The silhouettes recoiled from the glare as their bedroom blazed with a brilliant light – we actually saw their shadows reflected on the back wall! 

It’ll probably take days for them to recover.  But at least, being retired, they don’t have to face the terrifying, depressing, utterly soul-destroying prospect of …

GOING BACK TO WORK.

No! Wail! I can’t do it! Scream!  I don’t want to! Argh! 

Suggestions for an alternative lifestyle that doesn't involve excruciating poverty gratefully received.  Alternatively, please feel free to (a) drop my boss a line demanding I receive a massive pay increase with drastically reduced hours (2-3 working days a week would be thooper), or (b) offer me an obscene amount of money so I can clamber off the corporate hamster wheel.

I await an onslaught of either with baited breath ....

Monday 2

Still waiting J

Ah well, I guess its back to work then sigh.

Tuesday 3

Right, work.  Think positive, its just work, nothing to get ‘worked’ up about phnar phnar.

On the bus nice and early – don’t want to be late on my first day.  New and nervous bus driver, swear to God I could have gambolled down the road faster than he drove, but who’s in a rush anyway.  New Year’s revolution is to not get worked up about the dreaded commute, so I just sit back and watch the scenery inch by.

Get off bus with a veritable spring in my step.  So springy, in fact, that coming down from the top deck I whacked my head at the bottom of the stairs and literally saw stars.  Pretended I wasn’t in incredible pain with a suspected fractured skull as I staggered off.

Arrive at work to find the security system has malfunctioned.  Nobody can get through the doors!  A sign, perhaps, that we should all turn round and go home?  Resisted the urge to turn round and go home, primarily because Head Secretary had spotted me outside the doors and came rushing over to haul me in.

Tsk.

Despite the fact that I don’t drink coffee, I discovered cappuccino in packets over Christmas and built up a nice little addiction (to go with all my other addictions!).  Dashed to Coffee Republic at lunchtime for a hefty fix (CR do the biggest cappaccinos in town).  I was so intent on pouring caffeine into my body that, when I got up to fetch a serviette (posh, eh?) I forgot there was a step in the middle of the cafe. 

It all happened in slow motion.  As I sailed through the air my brain screamed: Oh my God where’s the ground gone? I appear to be flying.  I think this is gonna hurt.  A lot.   And it did.  As I went down like an ungainly rag doll, my flailing hand walloped a woman on a tall stool right across her bum.  She peered down at me sprawled across the floor as if I’d done it on purpose!

Nobody came to my aid – not the staff (who probably see it happen several times a day – get the bloody step removed then!), not the customers, not even the friend I was having coffee with (who just glared at me as if to say, What the hell are you doing, woman?).  I jumped to my feet like a gymnast’s finale and pretended nothing had happened.  Collected my serviette and limped back to my table as everyone basked in the heat from my face.

“At least tell me I went down elegantly,” I asked my friend.

“Yes,” she said.

“Really?”

“No.”

New Year’s revolution No.2: attend stunt classes to learn how to fall with dignity.

Wednesday 4

New Year’s revolution No.3: give up watching Eastenders, life’s too short and the storylines are just ridiculous. 

New Year’s revolution No. 4: walk off the excesses of the Christmas food fest. 

I now have a new commuting regime - 10 minute march to an alternative bus stop in the morning, get off before Five Ways Island and walk all the way down Broad Street, across Centenary Square, passed the Main Library and through Victoria Square.  Then climb several sets of stairs to my floor.  Fall into chair absolutely bloody exhausted. 

So, Day 2 and I have a lump the size of an egg on my head, two bruised knees and a body so shocked by unaccustomed exercise every single muscle turns to stone and I can barely move.  On top of this, the Barbi-sized tights I hauled on this morning keep shrinking back to midget size and I spend all day either pulling the gusset up from my knees or walking like a constipated penguin.

Thursday 5

My mother and sister meet me for lunch.  After much indecision they finally decide they want to eat at the Pavillions Shopping Arcade, only the furthest place from my office.  So off I rush off to the other side of town, with mom and sis dawdling along behind me.

It’s difficult for non-office people to understand the concept of the one hour lunch break: the race from the building, the dodging of crowds, the constant glancing at the watch, the blinkered vision, the sheer agility of getting from A to B in 60 minutes or under.

So while I’m up front, urging them to hurry up, mom and sis saunter along with all the time in the world, pointing at things in shop windows and stopping at several stalls to look at gloves, and socks, and scarves.

We eventually reach the Pavillions and make it to the top floor by 1.20pm (time remaining: 40 minutes).  Mom and sis go to the toilet, I stand outside, clock watching and wondering how anyone can spend an entire 10 minutes in the loo – is there a Mom And Sister Convention in there or something?  Time remaining: 30 minutes, and we haven’t even eaten yet

There are several cafes at the top of the Pavillions: Druckers, Healthy Eating, some Mexican place and a few others. 

“Which one do you fancy?” I asked, foolishly. 

They couldn’t decide. 

Oh God.

We eventually queued up at the healthy eating place and I spent a healthy amount of my not-considerable funds on a not-considerable cheese and potatoe pie.

Time remaining: 20 minutes.  Except … mom eats slow, really slow.  And then she starts talking to someone at the next table who, by amazing coincidence, attends the same church. 

And then my sister decided the small dollup of cheese and potatoe pie just wasn’t enough and wandered off to raid Druckers.

At 1.55pm I had to admit defeat and legged it back to the office, arriving - red, sweating and late - with acid indigestion.

Next time I might suggest they bring sandwiches, only they probably won’t be able to decide where to sit and eat them.

Friday 6

I’ve only been back at work for four days and already I’m coming down with something dreadful.  Woke up this morning with the lump on my head, blackened knees, stiff muscles, and now a bunged up nose and aching joints.  But I can’t take any more time off work – not when I’ve already had a whole week off after the ‘leg’ incident – so I buy mega-strength Lemsip capsules and stagger snottily into the office.

There I’m met by a cacophony of coughing and sneezing – a little intervention and I’m sure a hacking rendition of the 1812 Overture could be produced.  A flu epidemic has arrived.  What fun.

I struggle to do dictations that are punctuated by my boss’s ear-shattering coughs and sneezes, whilst in the background all I can hear is people loudly shifting phlegm.  I’m surrounded by colleagues sniffing and groaning and passing tablets around like sick drug dealers.  Secretaries lethargically stir flu remedies in their mugs, bosses snatch at industrial sized tissue boxes.

But, in the midst of all this misery, a bright point.  Quite by accident I discover certain keystrokes turn the computer screen upsidedown!  It’s worrying how excited I become as I rush around the office turning everyone’s screens around – some people aren’t best pleased about this, especially when I forget to tell them how to turn it back again. 

I do it to a colleague’s screen while she’s in a meeting.  When she comes back, she’s told she has an urgent email that urgently needs responding to, urgently.  Except … her screensaver has kicked in and I can’t turn the screen the right way again because its password protected, and she can’t put her password in because its upsidedown. 

There follows a tense few minutes of her not finding it very funny, and then I slink back to my desk and take more tablets.

As does the rest of the office.

Saturday 7

Middle Son completely took over our study during the Crimbo hols.  Our computer and monitor was discarded in favour of his own NASA-type machine.  Furniture was moved and supermassive black holes literature was scattered around like large confetti.  He was in there studying so much that – because he likes a tropical temperature not often found in Birmingham in mid-winter – he had the heating turned way up and the plants in there thought spring had come early. 

One plant – a fig that feebly sheds all its leaves when I put it in the garden in summer, and drops them again when I bring it indoors in winter – grew twelve inches in three weeks! 

I doubt they’ll survive normal temperatures now that Middle Son has gone back to university (wah!).  I think the plants are going to miss him as much as I will.

Saturday 7 - Update

Okay, here it is, the germ has arrived, uninvited, definitely unwanted, and a bloody nasty little bugger to boot.

Slept.  All day.  On the floor.  Over an armchair.  Across the sofa.  Sweating.  Buckets.  Then the chills, like I was standing naked in the middle of the Arctic.  Wearing two dressing gowns, covered by blankets and duvets swiped off the beds – my Partner had a job finding me a couple of times.

Feeling dreadful.  Really, utterly, completely dreadful.

Brummie Blogs was getting a little ‘hefty’ (aren’t we all!) and needed to be pruned a little before it blew up, hence the reason it was taken offline for a few days.  Hopefully it’s now a bit tidier and streamlined.  (Half a day’s job, I thought.  S’taken me two weeks of hard slog – didn’t realise the site was so flipping BIG.) 

If any links don’t work or your download time is still being measured using a calendar rather than a stopwatch, let me know.  Also, for those who know me, could you please not use my real name in comments (or make any references to LS … nudge nudge wink wink).  I thank you.

Now, where were we …

Sunday 8

Slept.

Shivered.

Sweated.

Consider suing my company for sick office syndrome.

Monday 9

Must go to work. Had a week off before Christmas with a dodgy leg, any more sick time and my name will be highlighted in the HR system as a Persistent Malingerer.

Got up.  Stood, dripping and shivering, in the middle of the living room, barely able to move.

Went back to bed again.

Tuesday 10

MUST GO TO WORK!  No choice.  Have to go.

Got up on auto pilot.  Got on bus before fully conscious.  Sweated like a power spray all the way into town.  Staggered into office.  People said I looked ill, people said I shouldn’t be there, people totally avoided me like the plague and I can’t say I blame them.

Haven’t eaten since Friday (everything tastes of iron filings, what’s that all about!) so felt alarmingly spaced out. 

I only said one thing all day, to any question, any remark, any request for work: “I just feel so ill.”  And there was only ever one response: “Yeah, you look it.” 

Was talking to one secretary (telling her how ill I felt) when she suddenly threw a hand out towards me.  In my foggy state I thought she was trying to hit me, so I screamed and ducked. 

“A fly,” she said, horrified, as I cringed on the floor, “I was trying to catch that fly.”

How I survived a whole day I’ve absolutely no idea. 

Got home.  Slept.  Shivered.  Sweated.  Took super-mega-strength tablets.

Wednesday 11

Boots the Chemist has devoured most of my Emergency January Money (such as it was) in my quest to feel anywhere near normal again.  Staggered, sniffing and coughing, to the Great Western Arcade again this morning for my daily list of drugs-to-get-me-through-the-day.  Capsules, packets, ointments, anything that had ‘mega’or ‘extra-strong’ on the packaging I bought it.  £16!  

I have the energy levels of a sloth and the concentration of a three year old.

But I’ve lost a few pounds, so that’s good.

Thursday 12

Hospital.  For a scan.  “Have you had any major operations?” the scan-person asked, as I lay on the table trying to peek at the screen (well, I've never seen my internal organs before).  “No,” I said.  Long minutes passed.  “Oh,” I suddenly thought to mention, “I’ve had an ovary removed.”

The scan person looked at me.  “I’m glad you said that,” she said, dead-pan, “I’ve just spent the last 10 minutes looking for it.”

You have to drink about 175 litres of water before having a scan, so most of the conversation consisted of me saying, “Can I go to the loo yet?” and the scan-person saying, “In a minute.” (a bit like kids asking, Are we nearly there yet? and the parents lying through their teeth and saying, yes, in a minute).  Days seemed to pass.  I didn’t so much sprint to the loo afterwards as squelch along with my knees held together very tightly.

Next, consultant.  Only the ‘proper’ consultant (lovely man) was busy.  So I saw his assistant, who clearly hadn’t been doing this kind of thing for long and looked Absolutely Terrified.  “You appear to have lots of fibroids,” he spluttered.  “Oh, how many?” I asked.  His eyes widened.  “Er,” he said, “I’ll have to count.”  I waited while he counted.  “Two,” he eventually said.

Another frog impersonation on a table.  He explained nothing.  The nurse stood at my side saying, “Think happy thoughts, nice happy thoughts, you don’t look as if you’re thinking happy thoughts.”  Actually, I was thinking of what I wanted to do to the assistant and was in so much unexpected pain I nearly kicked his teeth in.

He told me to have some blood taken before the next appointment, and gave me a prescription.

I left in a state of bewilderment.

Friday 13 (Friday 13^th!)

Rang the hospital about the opening hours of their blood department.  9.30am until 3.00pm.  Really convenient.  More time off work or a do-it-yourself procedure using a safety pin and a straw?  Decisions.

Took prescription to chemists.  “I can’t fill this,” the pharmacist told me.  “Why not?” I asked, wondering if I’d been prescribed some illegal or controversial drug (how exciting).  “There’s no quantities on it,” she said, “I don’t know how many tablets to give you.”

Great.

Rang consultant at hospital and got put through to his secretary.  “There’s no quantities on this prescription I was given,” I told her.  “Let me get your file,” she said, and the line went quiet.  Not sure what she did then, but she certainly had enough time to go to the loo, fix her makeup, nip to the canteen for some lunch and have a few in-depth conversations with colleagues before she came back to the phone.

“There are quantities on the prescription,” she said.

“There aren’t,” I told her, staring at the prescription in my hand which was utterly bereft of quantities.

“There are,” she insisted.

“Where?”

“80mgs and 1mgs,” she said.

Pause.

“But that’s the strength of the tablets, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” she said.

“They’re not quantities, are they?”

“Yes,” she said.

“It doesn’t actually state how many tablets I should be given,” I persisted.

“It does,” she sighed, clearly bored of this conversation, “80mgs and 1mgs.”

I felt myself slip into a Twilight Zone moment and asked, “If I brought this prescription to the hospital pharmacy would they fill it for me?”

“Yes,” said the secretary.

“They’d know how many tablets to give me?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“Oh, they’d probably give you a week’s worth.”

“But my next appointment isn’t for 8 weeks.”

“Ask for eight weeks worth then,” she said.

“What, just say Gimme a load of tablets?”

“Yes.”

I gave up.  I'm tablet-less and considering drawing my own blood ... by comparison, Friday 13th holds no fear for me (she says, nervously).

Saturday 14

The virus/flu type thing lingers.  I’ve hardly eaten anything for a week except eggs and milk which, strangely, don’t taste like rusty metal (unlike everything else).  My clothes are hanging off me, so that’s one good thing (I’m skinny! well, very nearly), but I’ve spent so much on ‘cures’ it would have been cheaper to buy shares in Boots the Chemist.

Slept.

Sunday 15

Slept.

  <<< "I found your blog entry "Slept" really most inspiring and insightful." phnar phnar.

Monday 16

The virus/flu type thing lands on my chest and I cannot stop coughing.  My work colleagues shout, “Can you please stop coughing!” but I can’t.  Someone tells me I look grey … I feel like death.

Another trip to the chemist at lunchtime to buy cough linctus.  “Which is the strongest?” I asked the pharmacist (actually, what I said was, “Which cough is cough cough the cough cough hack strongest?” cough).  She held out a bottle and roared, “Cavonia!”  So I bought a bottle of that.  Took a swig outside the chemist.  Stripped the lining from my mouth and burnt a fiery trail down to my (empty) stomach.  Finished the bottle five hours later.  Then read the instructions: Take 2 tsps every four hours.

Overdosed, then.  But it did nothing for my hacking, gut-wrenching cough.

Coughed all night.  My sleep-deprived Partner managed to resist throttling me at 3am, when I eventually got up to hack somewhere else.

Tuesday 17

With bloodshot eyes, tried to ring work to tell them I wouldn’t be coming in because it doesn’t look good for employees to die at their desks.  Couldn’t stop coughing long enough to speak, so resorted to emails instead.

Rang my GP’s surgery and managed to crack through the receptionists stringent security system to procure an appointment – absolute miracle.  Couldn’t actually explain to doctor what was wrong with me because I couldn’t stop bloody coughing, but she managed to guess and gave me antibiotics.

Tried not to think how many drugs are in my knackered, spasm-ridden body right now, probably enough to mix together and cause spontaneous combustion.

Wednesday 18

Back at work.  Starving.  Coughing.  Exhausted.  My work colleagues are very patient and don’t lob heavy objects at me, though suspect they want to.  I get the evils from bosses who can’t hear themselves think.

I just wanna stop coughing!

Thursday 19

Okay, enough about the sickness, onto other things.  Big Brother, for instance.  Absolute rubbish, never watch it, caught the end of it the other night and got totally hooked.

Pete Burns is fab!  Everyone I speak to thinks he’s vile, but I think he’s great: intelligent, articulate, candid, funny, ‘original’ (and has the guts to be that way) and pretty much guaranteed to win because, let’s face it, he’s good entertainment.

So that’s what I’m doing, watching Big Brother.

And coughing.  A lot.

Friday 20

Wait.  What’s this?  I think … yes, I actually think the antibiotics have ‘kicked in’ and I’m starting to feel a little better, for the first time in two whole weeks.

It's a miracle!

Still coughing like a rusty steam engine, but at least I’m managing to draw breath occasionally now, which is a relief.

There’s been a series on the television recently called the Big Red Bus (can’t find a link).  It’s about people learning to be London bus drivers.  The programme showed you several taking their tests and the examiner telling the camera why some didn’t pass. 

“He kept slamming on the brakes,” the examiner said.  “If he’d had passengers, they’d have all been flung forward in their seats.”  I was aghast with astonishment.  I’m like a metronome on the buses some days.

“My foot kept wanting to break,” the instructor said.  How many times have I sat on the bus, left foot bouncing up and down like a piston, thinking, “Oh my God we’re not going to stop before hitting that car/truck/pedestrian!”

“His driving didn’t inspire confidence,” the instructor said.  We’re supposed to have confidence whilst travelling on a bus?  Half the time I’m just grateful to have survived the journey.

“He didn’t stop within the regulation distance from the bus stop.”  I thought that was part of the fun of public transport, having to chase after the bus that’s pulled up halfway down the road.

“He was a danger to himself and other road users.”  So, that’s not a good thing then?

“He’ll never make a good bus driver.”  He’s probably making his way to the West Midlands Travel depot right this minute, they’ll hire him [sharp intake of breath, but hey, I commute daily, I’m allowed to rant about my near-death experiences].

I must admit, they’re not all bad.  There’s one I know who greets all passengers with a smile and actually appears happy and competent in his job.  I get on his bus and I know that today isn't going to be The Day It Finally Happens.

One.  Out of the 3,753 drivers I’ve had the dubious pleasure of travelling with.

Rant over.  [Ooooh, I feel so much better now … cough cough].

Saturday 21

My website appears to be growing at a vast rate of knots and has almost taken on a life of its own.  So, because of the redundant links, the slow download time (and because a reporter from the Birmingham Evening Mail, no less, is considering doing an article on Brummie Blogs), I decide to tidy it up a bit.

Half a day, tops.

Got up at 7am to make an enthusiastic start.

7pm I was thinking, ‘Just how big is this bloody site?’

Dreamed about web links.

Sunday 22

Our ‘anniversary’.  My Partner and I have, today, been together for six years (yay!).  No money to go out and celebrate (its all been spent at Boots the Chemist!) so my Partner cooks a meal.

While I beat Brummie Blogs into reluctant submission (down, you beast, down!).

Sloppy message to my Partner:  You’re the best, the absolute bees knees, and its been a truly BRILLIANT six years (helped by the fact that you're 100% barking mad). x

Monday 23

According to ‘experts’, Monday 23 January is the most depressing day of the year.  People receive their credit card bills, have failed their New Years Resolutions, January weather is crap and, of course, it’s Monday.

I, on the other hand, don’t agree with debt, Christmas or not (my motto being, if you ain’t got the cash you can’t have it), I didn’t make any New Years Resolutions and the weather wasn’t actually that bad. 

So I walked into work this morning in glorious sunshine, passed magnificent city centre buildings and smart people in suits, thinking, ‘Most depressing day, pah!  I feel fine, absolutely fine.’

More fool me for being so blasé.

Today, an incident occurred at work.  Whereas I’m hard pushed to get worked up about anything, this was not a subtle 'incident' and it totally floored me.

The 'incident' continued all day.  I was very upset .

Really one of the worst working days I’ve ever had.

Tuesday 24

Okay, a new day, ‘things can only get better’ and all that.  Yesterday was a one off.  A bad day.  Today will be different.

Except, it wasn’t.  The 'incident' continued.  I left the office in tears mid-morning.

I was deeply, deeply hurt.

Wednesday 25

The atmosphere at work is now diabolical.  There are only two words to describe it: excruciating purgatory.

Thursday 26

Unable to physically tolerate my working conditions any longer, I left the office at 11am.

I went home.

And cried my bloody eyes out.

Friday 27

When this all started on Monday I booked today off as holiday.  Cried all day - so unlike me to get upset over anything that doesn't involve blood or loved ones.  I actually feel traumatised, like I've been involved in a nasty accident.

Today, at home, I got phonecalls, text messages and emails from people at work who know me.  They said the nicest things, which soothed my shattered confidence a little. 

I've hardly slept or eaten for a week.

I've edited the above entries.  To be honest, I don't want to be reminded of one of the worst working weeks of my life and I don't particularly want to put 'misery' in Brummie Blogs, that's not what its all about and its not what I'm about either - misery is miserable, and life's too short.  But I want to thank everyone who read the original entries and left comments/sent emails - I was really touched by your concern and for some seriously good advice ... so, thanks for that, thanks a lot.

people have been here (spooky!)

DISCLAIMER: This is a personal weblog.  The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer(s), work colleagues or family.  My experiences are written purely from my point of view and are intended to be a humorous depiction of my somewhat chaotic life.  No malice is intended in any way, it's not in my nature. The names of real people and companies have not been used.
 

This page and all of its contents are copyrighted (c) Brummie Blogs 2006.  All rights reserved - that's all of 'em.