I had an early night last night for once. I went to bed and lay
awake for an hour or so. I finally nodded off and then “er indoors TM” and the
dogs came up. The dogs stomped about until I was wide awake, then they all
settled. I then dozed on and off for the rest of the night; not sleeping for
more than twenty minutes at a time. Some nights I’m out cold; others not so.
I gave up trying to sleep, got up and made toast. I tried
watching another episode of “The Decameron” but gave
up after ten minutes. There are eight episodes of the show; I gave up after two
and a bit. It wasn’t the best.
I
had my usual look at the Internet. It would seem I’d missed quite a bit this
weekend. Portsmouth Kite Festival, Piratemania, Maidstone’s River Festival,
Folkestone Pride parade, Folkestone Kate Bush Day…
Had
I known about what was happening in Folkestone yesterday I would have been
there. Not so sure about the other events but it would have been nice to have
known about them. Given notice I could have swapped work shifts about. Oh well…I’m
sure it wasn’t all a conspiracy of secrecy; I just really do need to pay
attention.
Over
the weekend some people had walked my series of geocaches in Kings Wood and
reported two missing. The furthest two from the car park. That’s not
necessarily a bad thing – it will make for a dog walk in the next week or so.
I
sent out birthday wishes, got Wordle on the fifth attempt, and had a little
Munz session from the sofa. The requirements for next month’s Munzee Clan War
have been published. Next month we need to get “Garden Scatter Points”
and “Storyland Bouncer Points”. It’s not just scanning bar codes stuck
to lamp posts, you know. However I’m finding that as time goes on this game is
getting too complicated for me…
I set off to work. As I drove the pundits on the radio were
talking about how the latest Chancellor of the Exchequer has announced that the
country's financial situation was far worse than the
outgoing Conservative government had claimed it was.
The general consensus was that this announcement and the
subsequent cancellation of all sorts of public projects including scaling back
on new hospitals and road tunnels under Stonehenge is a prelude to major tax
hikes that she promised she wasn't going to do.
Amazingly she's also announced above inflation pay rises
for teachers and NHS workers. Not that I don't want a pay rise, but the timing
leaves a lot to be desired. I suppose what she's doing is to try to get some
parity between the private and public sectors. It needs doing. Yesterday I
heard about a distant acquaintance whose manual labouring brings home fifty per
cent more money than what I get. Not that I'm jealous (I am!), but if I
make a mistake I'm up before the professional regulator and out on my arse. On
the other hand how can you balls up digging a hole in the road?
I'd left home early this morning expecting traffic chaos at
the Coldharbour roundabout. I never got that far; the motorway was closed at
the previous junction, and I had a little diversion through Aylesford.
I got to work and cracked on with the early shift. Work was much the same as ever, but today I
had the added bonus of having my annual appraisal. Not that I am cynical about
that sort of thing, but I'm too old for that sort of nonsense. I've done career
advancement in the past and (in all honesty) didn't like it very much.
Where do I see myself in five years time? Either pushing up daisies or eighteen
months away from full retirement. Do I want to take on any extra roles or
responsibilities? Not really. Been there, done that, wasn't keen.
I intimated (said outright) that I'd like to stop
the night work, but I can't see that happening. Back in the day when I started
this game (in 1981) the night work was paid rather better than it is
these days. People did the night work for the money, and stopped on their
thirtieth birthday as the youngsters were keen for the money. Nowadays the
money is nowhere near as attractive, no one wants to do it, and people don't
even start in this line of work until they are over thirty anyway.
And as well as an appraisal there was cake as well.
Personally I was far more interested in the cake.
As always an early start made for an early finish. I came
home and got that little hand-held pressure washer out and had a little blast
round the patio.
“er indoors TM” boiled up fish and
chips then went bowling. I made myself comfortable on the sofa with the dogs
and watched a film on Netflix. “Queenpins”
was rather good. Fun, entertaining… and then I woke up and realized I’d slept
through half of it.
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