26 October 2019 (Saturday) - Late Shift


I suppose it would have been a good night had I been getting up at five o’clock. But chucking Treacle out of the bed because she was scratching my bum just made space for Pogo to come and scratch my bum. And then Fudge made himself comfortable by curling the duvet round himself and off of me. When I did finally nod off my brother then sent a flurry of text messages about the family Christmas party. It’s been planned for a day when I’m working. Again.

I got up and over brekkie had a look at the Internet. A friend was posting on the local Facebook geocaching page suggesting he might organise weekly walks.
I used to do that for a few years. I gave up partly because my work pattern changed, and partly because of the negativity I got. Leaving aside the rather rude way the walks were dismissed by many, what got me was how a surprising number of people would send me messages saying that they would only come if such-and-such wasn’t invited. And because I was trying to be inclusive and open to all, those who didn’t like such-and-such would take against me.
​Toward the end I found that trying to organise a walk was a good way to fall out with people…

I also had an email saying about how people have added “favourite points” to some of my geocaches. (I think I’ve had that every day for the last week). For every ten film pots you find stashed under a rock you get a “favourite point” which you can allocate to a cache that you think is in some way outstanding. Over the few months I’ve hidden quite a few geocaches and seem to have accrued quite a few of these “favourite points”. I don’t think it is because what I’ve hidden is particularly good; it is just that very few other people are hiding anything.
But better a “favourite point” than being told where I’ve gone wrong by those who think they know better.

We took the dogs out for a little walk round the co-op field. We had a rather good walk without meeting (let alone upsetting) any other dog owners. To be honest the walk would have gone better had a cat not made a point of sitting on a fence and deliberately provoking the dogs, but such is life.
As we walked, so the vet phoned. There was a problem with the insurance claim I'd submitted over two weeks ago and it had been sent back to the vet. Could I pop in and sign the new claim form? 
It was a shame that the insurance people couldn't have mentioned this some time ago.. Working as I do in an acute hospital environment I'm used to things being dealt with right away. I have trouble understanding why a problem would take two weeks to come to light. Am I being cynical in thinking that if these insurance people find enough petty reasons to send back the paperwork, then people give up bothering to claim? It's not as though the claim is for a *lot* of money on its own, but in a month which featured a car service, a car breakdown, a broken boiler timer, far too much spent on Lego,  and new specs, as well as Fudge being ill, I rather want that bit of cash.
So with our walk over I popped to the vets to sign another bit of paper. I did chuckle when I got there. Our vet is in the back of "Pets at Home". The nice people at "Pets at Home" were having a "Meet the Retired Greyhounds Day". There were six retired greyhounds sitting in the front of "Pets at Home" with which every dog going to and from the vet tried to pick a fight.
You would have thought that someone might have thought this one through, wouldn't you?

From the vets I drove on to Tunbridge Wells and the late shift. As I drove the pundits on the radio were interviewing some MPs about what a hard life they have.  I don't think any of the MPs persuaded anyone that their life is anywhere near as arduous as they would have us believe. Everyone thinks they are hard done by at work, and MPs live in a glass house and should know better than to throw stones.
This was followed up with an interview with an Icelandic journalist who says that the Icelandic Prime Minister's phone number is in the telephone directory, and if you want to talk to her, you can just phone her up (and apparently people do).
There was then an article about the collapse of the payday lender QuikQuid. Payday loans are coming under pressure from the government as they just encourage people to get into debt. The entire concept of a payday loan is a bit dodgy, isn't it? Because you don't earn enough, should you borrow money? I can't help but think that the fact of the matter is that if you don't earn enough money you should spend less and be more frugal with that which you do have. Harsh? Perhaps.  But that was the line I took when my finances collapsed a few years ago.  A business model which is based on persuading people to live beyond their means is no way forward, is it? If you need to borrow money for a one-off expense, go to the bank. If you need to borrow money every month, then this needs to be sorted. It ain't rocket science, is it?

I got to work and went to the canteen. There was a rather good steak and dumplings thingy on offer today. It was not too shabby at all. I then got on with the late shift. As I'd parked my car so there had been a few spots of rain. As I worked I looked out at the rain (which was rather heavy by then). I don't mind working at the weekends *that* much if I'm not missing anything. And I think it fair to say that I would not have missed much today.

But today was dull… 

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