RaNDomNESs and chAOs

Google

2009-11-05T19:56:00.000-08:00

I love todays Google!!!

Old fashioned lolly shops...

2009-11-03T20:57:00.000-08:00

Who doesn't like walking into an old fashioned lolly shop and surveying the gleaming jars filled with acid drops, chocolate frogs, and multi-coloured candies of every sort? As far as I am concerned, the more old-fashioned the candy shop, the better.

Due to circumstances beyond my control, I was unable to listen the audio book I had chosen for my latest trip back down the midlands after visiting my family and instead decided to listen to an old favourite by James Herriot. Those of you who do not know the joys of reading (or listen to someone else read) James Herriot have had very deprived upbringings and should rectify the situation immediately. Especially if you are interested in animals. Anyway, Dr Herriot, like myself, has a fondness for old-fashioned lolly shops, and as I was driving down the northern part of the midlands and into Campbell Town I was listening to him describe one such shop in Darrowby (and the cat that resided there). I couldnt resist taking a break from driving in Campbell Town to stop at the old-fashioned lolly shop and survey the gleaming lolly jars. Unfortunately they didnt have any Edinburgh rock (or a resident feline), so I got a small bag of 'fizzoes' and happily continued on my drive.

Pied Oystercatcher chick

2009-10-28T01:55:00.000-07:00

Today, I once again headed up to Orford to sit on a beach and watch birds. This time, though, my friend, Rob, decided to come with me and help me sit on a beach and watch birds. We spent all day watching the birds, but the last pair of Hooded Plovers we observed were particularly boring and spent the entire 30 minutes sitting amongst the twigs and debris covering the upper beach. When we packed up our stuff and headed out we closely examined the area the pair were inhabiting incase it was a nest, but were greatly surprised when we found this (well, I should say, when Rob found this) -

No, this isnt a plover chick. It is about 4 times too big for a plover chick. It is a baby Pied Oystercatcher. We had noticed that there was a Pied Oystercatcher sitting very close to the Hooded plovers, but we hadnt paid very much attention to it. Now we know why it was sitting there. We quickly grabbed a couple of photos and then carefully retreated and hid until the adult came back from wherever it had disappeared to when we approached.

Isnt it cute :)

less than optimal

2009-10-25T17:27:00.000-07:00

My mobile phone is dying a slow, painful death.

It all started a few weeks ago, when, for no apparent reason, the screen started 'blinking' when I was texting. I should tell those of you that don't already know that my phone looks like this:
except pink. Its a nokia 6085.

After a while the 'blinking' got so annoying that I googled something like "nokia flip phone screen blinking" fully expecting not to get any results, but just to make sure that someone hadn't written something somewhere to tell you how to fix it. They hadn't.

What I did find, however, was pages and pages of people whose phones had done exactly the same thing and then, shortly afterward, the screens had given up completely. The phone still functioned fine assuming you were blind and, therefore, didn't need a screen. For someone like me, though, whose phone is really just a device for texting (and occasionally calling my parents) a screenless phone would be, shall we say, less than optimal.

Field work...

2009-10-21T00:52:00.000-07:00

Today, I started my field work for my honours project. Basically, I spent the afternoon sitting on a beach in Orford, soaking up the sunshine and watching birds. Not a bad way to spend a day. Especially considering that a good proportion of my friends are madly studying for exams at the moment.

Lets play a game of spot the bird...

Here's a nice easy one to get you started.

A tad harder, but still quite easy (this is a Red-capped plover, by the way).

This is what I spent my whole day doing - "I know its around here somewhere. Where'd the birdy go?"- Yes, there is a bird in this photo (its a Hooded plover). Every time I put down the binoculars to fill in my data sheet I'd look back up and then have to find the birdy all over again.

As you can see, I would benefit greatly from a photographer and a camera with a nice big zoom, because these little guys are a little camera shy (must be related to Jeff - he is still happily swimming around, by the way).

Anyway, just wanted to show off that I got to spend all day on a beach and you didnt.

"Not to be infantile, but I believe the correct phrase is 'Na, na'" I have no idea where that quote is from, but its locked away in my memory storage and seemed appropriate.

Seriously.

2009-10-18T17:58:00.000-07:00

OK, so here is something that you are not going to believe. You are going to read it here and then go "No way!" and then google it and check it out on some sites that you actually trust to tell you the truth. Thats exactly what I did, too.

Pauley Perrette who plays the role of Abby on NCIS just turned 40!! Seriously. She was born in 1969!

The accused...

2009-10-15T03:28:00.000-07:00

As you all know, whenever the opportunity presents itself I like to pretend that I am cultured and sophisticated and attend the theatre. Usually, Tiani and I go to see PLoT productions at uni, but occasionally we are even more cultured and sophisticated and attend grown-up theatre. On Tuesday evening, we did just that.

The Hobart Repertory Theatre Society were doing a production of the Jeffrey Archer play The Accused. The play is set in the Old Bailey courthouse in London and is presented as a murder trial with the audience acting as the jury. The only characters are the judge, a couple of court officials, the defendant, a policeman, and a few witnesses. The audience is greeted as the jury and briefed on how the case will run by one of the court officials and then as the judge enters the court room everybody stands (God save the Queen) and then sits when signaled. The case runs for three days (3 acts) so this process is repeated at the beginning of each act. It was so much fun to be interactively involved right from the beginning of the play. At the end of the case the jury, of course, gets to decide if the defendant was guilty of murdering his wife and the audience holds up guilty/not guilty cards to determine the verdict. There are two endings to the play depending on the verdict given by the audience. We, of course, only got to see one of the endings and I would love to know what the alternative ending was like.

Here is my review:
Acting - good (not perfect, but good).
Sets - very good
Costumes - very good
Casting - very good (except that I dont like the actor that played the defendant, but it didnt matter because he killed his wife so you're not really meant to like him).
Overall - loved it! Well worth going to see.

**** four stars

Jeff

2009-10-11T23:50:00.000-07:00

So, you all know my goldfish, Jeff. Jeff is the huge and rather elderly goldfish that dominates my fish tank (and has a habit of going to sleep - hence his name). The above photograph was taken 3 years ago. I'm not sure exactly how long I have had Jeff, but it has been at least 5 years.

This morning I was saying hello to Jeff when I noticed something odd - a bump. These photos were taken today. See the bump on his side. Its located approximately halfway between his eye and dorsal fin. You can see it much better in the second photo.

Do you know how hard it is to get a good photo of my fish? Jeff is camera shy to say the least.

I don't like the look of his bump at all, I think its a tumour. I watched him for quite a while today and he is still moving easily, eating, and interested in life in general so I'm not going to do anything at the moment. Considering some of the things that Jeff has survived in the past, I wouldn't give up on him just yet.

2009-10-07T18:50:00.000-07:00

This is exactly how I felt when I saw a car parked like this at uni today. I take comfort in the thought that there are only a few weeks left until the undergrads disappear for the summer and parking will become less tortuous (and in the fact that after circling around I ended up with a much better parking space closer to the zoology building).

Thanks xkcd.com for this comic. And for the awesome caption "Police report three dozen cheerful bystanders yet no one claims to have seen who did it." No thanks to my so-called friends that like to get me hooked on webcomics and waste all my time reading them when I should be working.

Your vote can make a difference...

2009-10-06T00:19:00.000-07:00

Well, you might wonder what I've been doing lately as I havent been posting as much. The reason for this is that I have been sick so there hasnt been much to say. The only reason I'm saying anything now is that I'm bored. Being sick is prodigiously boring.

I have been well looked after by some of my friends while I've been unwell. The ladies who live in the flats adjoining mine (now affectionately referred to as the "Smoking Committee" due to their habit of spending most of their day sitting on the retaining wall and gossiping while they smoke) have all been very nice to me. I have been given food and lent DVDs to fill in time while I didnt have the energy to do anything more productive, and diligently checked up on everyday. I have also been daily checked up on by another of my friends and have been brought food by them, too. Its nice to know that there are people around me who are willing to look after me when my Mummy cant be around to do it. I think I'm starting to recover but my brain still feels like porridge and I'm completely exhausted after a big day at uni yesterday (the first time I went to my office in a week) so I still need a little looking after.

Anywho, enough of that boring stuff - onwards and upwards to the far more exciting topic of my birthday. It is now a month until my birthday (yes, I know a month is quite a long time, but you have to remember that I have been at home sick for a week so I have had plenty of time to sit around and think about my birthday) and I want to start planing a party. So, I need you all to comment and vote on what I should do - an awesome costume party OR a BBQ (where everyone is invited) followed by a murder mystery party (only 8 players). I know that a few of my friends will be doing exams over my birthday so my party will be postponed slightly to accommodate them (you should feel honoured because there are only a couple of you left at uni now and I'm still willing to arrange everything around you. You're welcome.).

I have added a poll so you can vote just under the picture of Jeff on the right of the screen. So vote. Now.

Go on, vote!

Prison Break

2009-10-01T20:55:00.000-07:00

Check out this news story from Yahoo!7 News. Full story can be found here.

"Forget the knotted bed sheets or tunnel. A New York prisoner has come up with a much easier way to bust out of jail: ask guards for the exit.

The inmate, who was wearing a suit and tie for a court appearance on charges of multiple store robberies, simply wandered out an open door and into a courtroom Wednesday, the New York Post reported.

There, a court officer mistook jailbird Ronald Tackman for a lawyer, asking: "Counsellor, what are you doing here?" the Daily News reported.

Tackman didn't miss a beat, the Post said, asking: "Which way is out?"

The hapless guard then showed the escapee the way to the lobby.

Next the daring jailbird went to his 81-year-old mother's Manhattan home to change clothes, and left, she told the Post.

"I thought he was discharged. He was all dressed up," she said.

Court officers' embarrassment only increased when it was revealed that Tackman, 55, was a known master of disguise, the tabloids said."

The cutest thing...

2009-09-17T22:57:00.000-07:00

Ok, so you all remember that shorebird conference I went to a couple of weeks ago? Well, what I didn't tell you at the time was that there were a couple of things mentioned in the talks that were bugging me because I didn't have enough background knowledge of shorebirds to understand them. One of them was why they always count shorebird populations as the number of breeding pairs when quite a decent percentage of the birds are non-breeders (and as a non-breeder myself I take offence at the suggestion that we are not as important as the breeders). I still don't have the answer to that one, but as to the other question that was bugging me so much, I stumbled over the answer to it quite by accident when I was reading a reference about something else.

It is a very important fact in shorebird biology that most beach nesting birds get very easily disturbed by people and dogs walking past them and will leave the nest whenever such disturbances come too close. When the birds are meant to be looking after the eggs, but spend most of their time running away from big scary things it results in problems (as in, the eggs never hatch). But, if you think about it logically, it doesn't make sense:

Shorebirds nest in summer
Summer is hot
Shorebirds nest directly on the sand
Sand in summer is very, very hot
A bird sitting on the eggs will only make them hotter
Hot eggs cook

So I kept wondering how the birds manage to keep their eggs in the right temperature zone so that they would be warm enough to develop, but not hot enough to cook. All I could come up with in answer is that they stand over the eggs and shade them, but I couldn't convince myself that shading by itself would be enough to cool the eggs.

Hooded Plover parentals standing over nest

Another Hooded Plover nest with 3 eggs

Turns out I was right. Birds do shade their eggs, but it isn't all they do- they do this amazingly cute thing called "belly-soaking"

"Belly-soaking" is when a parent bird notices that the eggs are too hot, runs from the nest into the water up to its belly, gets its tummy feathers all wet, runs back to the nest, and puts its now cold and wet tummy on the eggs. During hot days the birds do it almost constantly so its very time consuming and energetically expensive for them, but its also very effective. And cute. So very, very cute. I was rapt when I found that the answer to the question that had been bugging me was so simple and so cute. Now I love my birdies even more :)

Hooded plover chicks in nest

The highest room in the tallest tower...

2009-09-14T18:19:00.000-07:00

Here I sit alone at my desk, sequestered away from the rest of the world. Able to gaze out at the world through my window, but not free to roam through it. Able to see the wind dancing with the trees, but not to feel it.

Who will rescue me? Who is there in the land that is brave enough to climb the mountain, fight their way through the labyrinth-like hallways and laboratories filled with ghoulish undergrads to make it to the highest room in the tallest tower. Who, after completing these perilous deeds will have the fortitude to continue in their quest and pass the den of the feared supervisor guarding the doorway and keeping me captive with work?

Is there none among you who will take pity on the captive princess and rescue her?

The stolen weekend.

2009-09-09T18:57:00.000-07:00

Most of you have already patiently listened as I blabbed to you about my weekend, but for those of you who haven't yet (and those of you who are gluttons for punishment) here is a short summary.

I spent the weekend at the Australasian Shorebird Conference with all of the most important shorebird researchers in Australia and New Zealand (and a few from Asia). The point of going to the conference was to network within the bird community and to gain a broader understanding of the current shorebird research. The conference was run in the normal way of a scientific conference - a series of short (15 min) talks from various scientists with 5 min for questions in between.

Here are the key things that I learnt:

(1). It is really weird meeting people that you have referenced. A number of times I was quietly thinking to myself that a speakers name seemed familiar only to realise part-way through the talk that I had referenced them in my lit review - Finn (2006) suddenly stops being just an abstract idea in your head and suddenly turns into a real person standing in front of you.

(2). Bird people are all a little bit strange, but are quite nice despite this.

(3). People tend to focus in on one particular problem (eg shorebird conservation) and think that the entire population of the world should care about it as much as they do without taking into consideration the fact that it is not possible to care that much about everything that everyone thinks we should care about.

(4). I now know the Auslan signs for "bird", "chick", "migrate", "dog", and a few other things (we had interpreters at all the talks because one of the scientists is deaf). I really like the sign for "dog" - you slap your thigh twice as if you were calling your dog over to you.

(5). Honours supervisors can be useful. My supervisor was really great all weekend and made sure that I was introduced to all the right people and had an opportunity to network with them.

(6). Having to be at a conference 8:30-5:00 everyday of the weekend after a full week of being at uni (plus the conference dinner 6:00-10:00 on Sat) and then having to be at uni for the OH&S/first aid course 8:30-5:30 Monday and Tuesday can make you a little irritable on Wednesday.

(7). After seeing all the awesome photos of shorebirds I have found my inspiration to start painting again.

Anyway, that's it. See ya later.

Waiting....

2009-09-02T22:51:00.000-07:00

So, I handed in the first draft of my literature review to both my supervisors almost a week ago and I'm patiently waiting to hear back from them. One of my supervisors is notoriously unreliable and the other is frantically busy in organising the conference that I'm going to this weekend (more on that in a moment), so I'm not holding my breath that I will get feedback anytime soon. I'm not sure I want feedback - I'm a little concerned that it might be a bit too much like this:

Its not that I haven't tried to do a good job of it, its just that there was no real guidelines or structure to follow. I perform much better within a rigid structure than when its all so wishy-washy. Welcome, to the real world, I guess. If you can call Honours the real world (which you probably cant).

Lit reviews are a very strange thing - they usually relate to your thesis topic in some way, but are not quite the same (mine relates less than I would like it to, but it was my supervisor's choice) and while they are bound into the back of your thesis they aren't actually a part of it. Also, you have to hand in an acceptable lit review by the due date (a few weeks away) but you don't actually get marked on it - its just either acceptable and you go on with honours or it isn't and you don't.

On to the conference. Well, I have been pretty bored most of the week and haven't really done anything except feel guilty for not doing anything, but there isn't much I can do until I hear from my supervisors. I haven't been feeling quite as guilty, though, because I am devoting my entire weekend to a conference. It just so happens that the Australasian Wader Studies Group yearly conference is being held in Hobart this year and being hosted by one of my supervisors at Birds Tasmania so it has been strongly recommended that I attend. Tomorrow is an 'invitation only' coastal management workshop which I have been invited to and Sat and Sun are the actual conference. I am meant to be there at 8:30 on Sunday morning - I'm usually only just getting out of bed at that time on a Sunday morning. It should be quite an interesting conference, though, so I don't mind too much. At least it something to do.

Oh, and just a quick note about "Arctic Blast" - has anyone heard about a competition the Mercury is supposedly running to win an on-set visit, a spot as an extra, and a meeting with Michael Shanks? I havent been able to find out anything about it (yes, I have thought of looking on the Mercury website). I heard that the competition closes this weekend, though.

Arctic Blast update

2009-08-26T16:06:00.000-07:00

Hampton Road in the city is closed this morning for filming. If you dont have anything better to do this morning, head on down there and check it out (dont forget to take some photos for me).

I am now also able to confirm that, yes, they will be using the Goodwood studios for some of the filming.

The official government media release on the project has details of someone to call to arrange "on-set visits and interviews with key cast and crew" - does that mean that if I ask nicely I might get to go and hang out at the shoot? Check it out here.

Keep your eyes peeled for "random" sightings of Michael.

"Arctic Blast"

2009-08-24T00:22:00.000-07:00

Michael Shanks, an actor made famous by his role in Stargate SG1 as Daniel Jackson, is currently in Hobart!!! Yes, I mean Hobart, Tasmania! A real, live, famous person is in Hobart!!

He is currently here to film "Arctic Blast", a Sci Fi with a similar storyline to that of "The Day After Tomorrow." He is rumoured to be shooting a scene in Salamanca, but I cant find out exactly when he is going to be where (surprise, surprise he doesn't want to be mobbed by geeky SG1 fans. Yes, I do realise that I just called myself a geek.).

While this isn't as cool as if it were Jason Momoa (Ronan Dex) or Christopher Judge (Teal'c), its still pretty awesome. So, Hobartians, make sure you keep your eyes peeled while you are around the city for the next few weeks, and if you do happen to run into Michael make sure you grab a couple of autographs.

Ode to a fork...

2009-08-20T20:55:00.000-07:00

Forks are a very important invention when one is trying to obey the social norms of a civilised society. I expect that if I lived the life of a hermit I would find that, will forks are useful, they are not of critical importance. However, as I do not live the life of a hermit (most days) this is a rather irrelevant observation.

Today, I lost my fork. I'm sure I put a fork in my bag with my lunch, but when I got my lunch out of my bag the fork was no where to be seen. While this would be an intriguing mystery it would not have presented a problem if I had been eating a sandwich for lunch, but as it was pasta in a rather messy tomato sauce that was on the menu it was a slight issue.

Being forkless, I had to try to find a fork or a similarly efficient means of conveying food to my mouth, such as a spoon. I went downstairs to the staff tea room to heat my pasta in the microwave and hunt out a fork. The staff room is a very interesting place in the school of zoology. As the zoology building is built against the incline of a rather steep hill, some parts of the building have more floors than other parts. In fact, level 4 (the second highest level in the building) actually becomes ground level at the highest point of the hill. Technically, the floor where the tea room is located is level 1, but there is a second level 1 on the other side of the building and they don't meet up, and half of level 1 is actually underground. Even though the only truly important thing on level 1 is the tea room, it is technically the main entrance to the building. Most undergrads, however, live in complete ignorance that level 1 even exists, which, I think, is exactly the way the staff like it.

Approximately 95% percent of the time, the tea room exists in a lonely state of complete unoccupation. However, between the hours of 11:00am and 11:20am Monday-Friday it becomes a hive of activity crowded with recently re-caffeinated academics. On Wednesdays, affectionately termed "cake-days" by said academics, the room is packed to overflowing as everyone crowds around to get their slice of cake. If you want to take a popular piece of equipment or vehicle out into the field to do research, the best time to do it is a Wednesday morning as no-one else will be using it. They will all be at "cake-day".

Enough about the tearoom, back to the hunt for the fork. The first place I looked was in the cutlery drawer, which I deemed to be a sensible place for the storage of surplus forks. However, the cutlery drawer contained neither forks nor spoons, but merely a motley arrangement of knives. I surmise that this intriguing observation might arise from the propensity for staff here in the school of zoology to "borrow" a fork or a spoon with which to eat the lunch that they have heated up in the microwave, go up to their office so they can eat their lunch while watching clips on you-tube, and never return the fork or spoon to the tearoom because that would require walking back through the rabbit-warren of corridors and traversing at least one, but in most cases two or three, flights of stairs. Knives, on the other hand, are rarely needed and, therefore, do not get stolen (sorry, "borrowed") on a very regular basis.

After some more hunting, I eventually found a fork standing in a coffee mug and was able to eat my lunch while obeying the social rules of civilized society.

But I still don't know what happened to my fork.

Party!!!!!

2009-08-18T00:49:00.000-07:00

You know, I have just been putting a heap of important stuff into my diary (when things are due, when I have seminars, workshops and conferences - that kind of thing) and I just realised that its only 2 and a half months until my birthday.

I have decided that this year I am definately having a party. I didn't have a 21st party because I was in the middle of exams on my birthday (as I have been for the last three birthdays), but I promised my friends that I would have a party eventually - I was just postponing it. I wont be in the midst of exams this year because I dont have any (he he he, to all my friends that do) and I wont be far enough along in my honour's project to be too snowed under with work.

So, any suggestions what I should do for my party? I want a costume party. Maybe, 'dress up as your favourite tv character'? Or should I have a murder mystery party (downside with that is that you can only have 8 guests)? Or should I have both?

My office...

2009-08-14T00:17:00.000-07:00

This is the kitchenette sink in my office.

This is a view of the layout of my office.

This is my office.

2009-08-12T15:55:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note to say that I am intending to blog again soon - I am just waiting for my new poster to arrive in the mail so that I can take some photos of my new office and upload them as some of you actually seemed interested in seeing it.

smoking kills ...

2009-08-05T19:27:00.000-07:00

This is a mural on the ceiling of a smoker's lounge at a resturant in the US. Pretty cool, eh?

You can click on the photo to make it bigger so you can admire it better, if you like.

Watch out world, I'm back on campus!!

2009-08-03T21:54:00.000-07:00

Well, its official - I started honours yesterday. I didn't do any actual work or anything, just a heap of introductory stuff like getting our swipe cards and keys to the building, being assigned our offices and computers, getting our pin numbers to the photocopy machines, and meeting all the technical staff and important people.

My office is in one of the 'honours rooms'. There are several of these rooms, each one having 6-8 offices in it. The office itself consists of a large desk with a computer on it, with a shelf above you, a bookcase dividing your office from the one next to you on the left, and a pin board on the right. Although there are 6 offices in my honours room, I am only actually sharing it with one other person (I think he said his name was Tom). The rest of my cohort are in the room next door which is completely full. I was a little annoyed to be the only one separated from the rest of my cohort at first, but now I'm thinking it is probably a good thing because their room is going to get pretty noisy when everyone is around. There is also a little mini kitchenette in my room which they don't get.

My cohort consists of five girls, all of whom I went through my degree with. Its nice to be going through this with people you already know; it makes it ever so slightly less daunting. Even so, after the honours coordinator had finished with us yesterday we were all feeling pretty daunted.

I cant really do much work until my supervisor gets back from Japan in a few days time (yes, I finally managed to track him down and that's where he was). That doesn't seem to matter much, though, because the one most important thing an honours student does in the first few weeks of research is, apparently, decorate their desk area. I'm currently working on that :)

So ... undashing.

2009-07-25T05:12:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I thought I would share with you something that happened to me tonight to lighten up your day. For some reason it always cheers us up to hear about something slightly bad (but not actually terrible) happening to other people - I guess it makes us feel as though we aren't the only one whose life doesn't go according to plan. Well, anyway, I'd better get on with my little story.

I was just leaving my friend's house after having dinner with her and another one of my friends and I was wearing the shoes that I affectionately refer to as my 'clodhoppers' - they have very chunky heels and, so, they take a little concentration to maneuver on uneven surfaces. Apparently I wasn't concentrating enough as I walked down the steps from the front door. It was also dark and wet and there was one more step than I thought there was - I'm sure you can figure out what happened next... I fell down.

But I didn't fall down in any normal sort of way, I fell down in slow motion - you could even say it was almost (almost being the operative word here) graceful. I was carrying the plate I had brought with me in my arms, so I didn't want to drop that and, as I was falling in slow motion, I had enough time to figure out how to fall without putting the plate in jeopardy or falling flat on my noes. My solution (and might I say, considering the circumstance, I think it was quite a good one) was to land on my knees. I landed, fairly gently, kneeling on both knees in a puddle (which was already there from the rain and had nothing to do with me, in case that needed clarifying) at the bottom of the stairs. I was then able to stand up with only wet patches on the knees of my jeans to show for the whole adventure.

My friends, Myounghee and Tullia, who had been standing at the top of the stairs and watching me for the whole performance then, of course, immediately rushed towards me to see if I was OK. After managing to convince them I was fine (Tullia was sure I had injured myself), I continued on my way home, with my pride only slightly dented.

As I was driving home, this quote came to mind:

Black Books, Series 1, Episode 4: The Blackout

Bernard: (having explained how he broke his arm by falling down some steps) Hence...
Fran: So why were you embarrassed to tell me?
Bernard: Oh, well, I fell. You know, it was so... undashing.
Fran: And of course, going to the toilet through a wicker chair, well, we've all been there.

If you are familiar with Black Books, I'm sure that just made you giggle. :) Have a good day!

In which Emma rejoins the league of the unemployed.

2009-07-23T04:09:00.000-07:00

Most of you already know that I have resigned from work. Most of you seemed to be quite surprised by this and have expressed a desire to know why I would do such a thing. There are two main reasons why none of you were expecting me to resign - firstly, because I was not actually expecting myself to resign either, and, secondly, because I had quite deliberately not told anyone about the problems I was facing at work.

I didn't (and still don't) want to bad mouth the company, or portray any of the other employees in a negative light. These problems were not the real reason I resigned anyway - I had been facing them for the past few months and would have gone on facing them. I was expecting that once I went back to uni I would be quite happy at work, being able to just turn up at work, do my shift, and then leave rather than working full time as I have been for the last few weeks. I was actually really looking forward to this. The real reason I had to resign was because my boss couldn't accept that I have to put uni as my first priority and work around that rather than study around work. She couldn't (well, wouldn't) give me the shifts I needed to be able to continue working there while I was at uni. My choice came down to uni or work. I chose uni.

I found this out on Monday and I had a long talk to Mum and Dad on Monday night before I resigned on Tuesday. Tuesday morning, before I had a chance to resign, I was (finally!) given my work uniform trousers (I only had a shirt), my name tag, and a log-on name on the computer system. That made it even harder to actually resign, but I did it. For me, quitting wasn't the easy option. It would have been easier to stay at work, but my study would have suffered.

Anyway, today (Thursday - yes I know that's only a couple of days after I actually resigned) was my last shift at work. I have now finished and all I have to do is drop off my (brand new) uniform and name tag on Saturday. I have had to promise to visit the girls at work regularly and they have promised to give me free food when I do. Pity I don't eat any of the stuff from the bakery :)