Theraputic walking

Can I begin by saying thanks to those of you who have been leaving 1st comments on my blog (with ongoing thanks to my regular commenters).

I hadn't realised it was de-lurking week recently and that many people who usually only read were coming out of the woodwork and saying 'hi'. It's a huge treat for me to know that there are more than 4 people reading regularly, though I still am amazed by that fact.

What fun this blogging is, especially when you can visit the site of commenters and get a feel for the different kinds of people dipping in, such diversity of geography, age, culture, gender. I think it's wonderful. I'd like to encourage more of you to de-lurk, I'd love to know who's reading. No need to say anything deep, just 'hi' would be fab.

Now please feel free to enjoy the pictures above and ingnore the rant that follows, it's just me letting off steam, and probably not worth you actually reading. Instead have some fun linking to some of the upbeat people on my links section on the right, Anna has some very tempting pictures of the cake fest that was her housewarming plus lots of shots of her new house which she has done up in absolute record time!

Camilla has a new-ish place too and each time I see pictures I just want to move straight in, it is so calming and quite similar to the look mine will have when it is eventually done, except mine will have a lot of colourful textiles in amongst the white.

I like to change my fabrics with the seasons, blues in summer, reds in winter, greens in spring etc. A bit predictable but I like feeling seasonal. And I shake it up when I have themed fancy dress dinners, like my divali night or my under-the-sea party. I had to look at that post to get it's link, and realised that it was my house with walls and a ceiling! Oh I miss walls and a ceiling.



Ok, here's my rant for those that can bear it... The dog walking is really keeping me sane just now after a big and fairly public confrontation with my manager. Why is it that so many incompetent people end up in charge? I've tended to just keep my mouth shut since my last attempt to deal with bad management ruined my health forever (which is why I can only work part time now). But this woman just pushed me too far and I had to speak out.

Bah, so frustrating. I hate people who just out an out lie about things at work. Little did she know I learned from my last bad experience and had witnesses to conversations and had kept her original extremely nasty note which she sent last autumn, the one she'd was trying to claim was friendly. Ha, she soon shut up when I offered to pop home and get it to refresh her memory about it's contents. SO glad I kept it.

She's one of those people that changes her argument every 5 mins yet swears that each one is the utter truth, until I have evidence to prove she is lying. Lucky I have such a litigous nature, no way I'm having someone accuse me of doing my job badly just so that others can cover up their mistakes.

Grrr, sorry to be growling here but, you know, better out than in. She even had the cheek to tell me that I was causing problems for the supervisors because I never turn up to work when I should! When I challenged her on this she said it was all on the computer and that she just checked it (so clearly she was planning a fight before we even met). Turns out she was referring to Friday, when Marley had his Op and I'd phoned in to ask if I could start an hour late, fully approved by the supervisor. Other than that I'm always there on time, and I usually stay on late to make sure I get the work done to the best of my ability, even though they don't pay me extra. No incentive to do that now that I know it's for someone nasty.

It's a shame though, because even though it's just a mindless part time job, I still like to feel the satisfaction of having done it well, otherwise it becomes drudgery.

Oh how I long to have my house built so I can just do my creative work from home. I'll still need a 'normal' job for cash flow etc. but I will feel like it's supporting my creativity so I can handle that. I feel so lucky though, to have all of you out there. It really cheers me up to sit down and look though your blogs and take my focus away from negative multinationals and into positive individuals. I really value what you all put out there. Thank you, here is one last picture to lift the tone. This was on a great car we passed, it was so curvy in all the right places. Not that I would have the bird myself, but it was very cheering.