Merry Xmas

Well its the last day of term, time for the jelly, ice cream and playing board games.

People are in aren't really in a work focus way. It's a case of donuts, quizzes and because its my company, trying to get one last emergency fix to live before everyone heads off down the pub and 2pm.

Merry Christmas

D

Loads of insurance

Its a big chunk of change 460 pounds but its an expensive trip and the insurance also covers a Heli-skiing trip, so I had to pay it. I've left it this late waiting for a pay check to cover it as my cash flow is a bit nuts at the moment.

I also plan on getting a helmet as well just to be doubly safe

Busy Day

As well as getting my new job offer a load of other stuff happened yesterday

1) we had the big office move around
I walked into the office and it was complete bedlam. in order to work in a more agile way (agile is a style of project management) we are moving so that the different project teams are closer together and not spread out all over the office.

This meant that I've had to give up my very nice seat in the corner with the great view across london. I'm now at a desk right in the middle of the office with no view and no space. But I don't really care as I'm not here for very many days and its quite likely they will have moved offices by the time they come back.

I do however have a little more simpathly with the guys who were complaining all summer about how rubbish and hot this part of the office is.

2) I got my new ski jacket
Had to go the post depot and sign for it. Its a very nice Helly Hansen Precon Jacket (about £150) specially done for the ski academy with the
logo on the back and front right breast. Should keep me warm on the slopes. So now I'm wearing around the place, basically showing off that I'm off skiing!

3) I got my flight tickets and Itinerary
Funnily enough went I got home this letter about my flight was waiting for me. Now I didn't have to sign for it or anything unlike the jacket!

4) went to check out the storage units
A couple of doors down from my flat in the Vanguard storage unit and so I decided that getting a small unit there would sort out most of my storage issues.

Also I have to work out what to do with the bedding on the Friday morning before I go as I can't really leave it in the flat. This way I can put the last of
my stuff in a bag and drop it off at the depot on my way to the airport.

Its an expensive business, I got quoted 40quid a month for a one metre cubed box. which is the smallest they do. I was already to hire one but they haven't actually built them yet which is a bit of a problem but they said they should be done over Xmas. So hopefully they will have one ready in time. so now that I don't have to ship out my cooking stuff or furniture (leaving it all for the tenants to use) it should just be a half a dozen boxes of book to store.

I have it in Writing!!!!

Yes its true
I've got the fabled bit of paper.
Richard gave it to me yesterday and I've just signed it and returned it to HR
It says I will come back on the 2 April as a Senior Dev on a 23% pay rise. Also
if I'm back promptly I get this years 2 grand bonus which I would have lost out on.
So now quite the sabbatical that I wanted but close enough. Also I don't have to do
a probation period and so it won't hurt my pension too much.

So they were as good as their word and I will look forward to getting back in April.

Bond, Lego men and getting it all in writing

Friday was a busy day

1) It was the company Christmas party
2) I had my final 1-2-1 meeting with Rob

Panic was starting to set in, during the day, I was waiting for a box of 25 assorted Lego keyrings to arrive which I had ordered the day we knew the Redesign drinks where cancelled so they would come in time for the new Redesign drinks night which was on Tuesday. However by Friday I was starting to wonder if they would come at all and I badly wanted to give them out at the Christmas dinner. The day before Gordon and I had worked out which of the different types of Lego man should go to who.

The selection included...

Darth Vader (for Richard), Police Officer, Chewbacca (for Gordon), Viking, Boba Fett, Imperial Royal Guard, Brazil Footballer, Pilot, Doctor, Batman (I took that one), Robin, Joker (for one of the testing guys), Wizard (for Rob),
6 STORMTROOPERS and 6 UK Footballers (for the developers) plus 25 Cowboys from the original order.

So I got them all together each with a little note to say thank you for the hard work on the project and took them with me to the meal.

The meal itself was James Bond themed (so I was in a Black Tie) at London Zoo. It started with drinks in the reptile house. and then onto the main house for the meal. I had a mad dash at the start trying to get all the correct keyrings on the right place settings before the others arrived. I just about made it with just a few cowboys to place as everyone started to enter.

It was great, people would discover the gift on their napkins and everyone said it was cool and thanked me. I got some kind comments about doing it without anyone knowing and the good choices on who got what keyring.

the rest of the evening was good and we went to a casino afterward for some more beers. The evening ended with a few of us hanging around waiting for the tube to open so we could go home. I got in about 6:45am and was asleep by 6:47am.

The 1-2-1 was OK I told Rob about the business not putting anything in writing and said it's just like giving out a job offer so what's the problem. He agreed and said he would get some thing sorted before he left for his holiday. And yes I think he did as Richard said something along those lines while we were out the back of the Xmas party in a big group having a whiskey and a cigar.

Just had a quick Scum

Just had a quick Scum meeting for Richard to say a quick thank you for peoples effort during the redesign project and to give out a few jokey gifts. I got a mirror and a lip balm. The balm because I'm off skiing and the mirror so I can look at my own aspect. An aspect is one of the underlying object in the Customisation system and apparently I keep talking about them.
Other gifts included a guide to being a manager for the test manager Tush, A swear calendar for Owen the lego developer, nice soap for Matt because he goes to the gym alot, a Movie book for Gordon the PM, he's big on Movies and did the Perfect day video for the Quarterly meeting, and Rob got some cigars and a light cos he smokes.

and now we all off down the pub on Richard's Credit Card

Nice...

Fast Delivery

My new laptop arrived Monday in time for me arriving at work. I didn't of course get that much done.

Resignation Letter

Well I'm just about to print it out...

Dear Susie,

Subject: Sabbatical request/Resignation

As required by my contract of employment, I hereby give you notice of my intention to leave my position as Programmer.

I have decided to take up a 3 month Ski Instructor training course in Canada and my only reason for resigning is that uS****h is unable to handle unpaid sabbatical leave.

I wish both you and uS****h every good fortune and I would like to thank you for having me as part of your team. I also look forward to work with you all again in the future should that become possible when I return in April.

Sincerely yours,

David Dunhill
Programmer
uS****h

Credit OK

I got back in contact with the building society as they haven't called me. They said the credit check was fine, they didn't give a reason as to what happened or why there was a problem. So I popped in at lunch time and signed the agreement and it should all be sorted now. I also dropped off my request to them, as mortagage lender, to be allowed to let out my property.

No I'm going to have to sort out all the stuff in my flat and call up a few letting agents.

Computers

I bought a new laptop last night. I was in the office doing my Xmas shopping on line and had a little moment and bought a laptop.

TOSHIBA A100-147 Laptop - TOSHIBA A100-147 INTEL CORE DUO T2050 PROCESSOR 1.6GHz LAPTOP - Intel Core Duo T2050 Processor 1.6GHz

533 MHz FSB
2 MB Cache
1024 MB RAM
60 GB Hard Drive
DVD ReWriter SuperMulti
15.4" Widescreen TruBrite Display
Microsoft Windows Media Center
128mb Intel UMA 945 integrated Graphics
1 year FREE warranty

normal cost £599 at PCWorld
I managed to get a deal for £404

hopefully they won't cancel it and it will be delievered to the office sometime next week.

A frustrating day

A frustrating day. I didn't really notice because I was busy all day but I'm still waiting for things to get resolved.

Firstly I didn't get a call from Nationwide to tell me what the outcome of the loans application is. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing. Nationwide head office is still working out whether me getting two new credit cards and a current account means that I can't have a loan. I did at least get my credit cards, today the Natwest one and last night the Nationwide one. The activation process where you ring up, is to give them some details and then listen to them trying to sell me payment protection insurance, were almost identical, right down to them asking me to justify why I don't want the insurance.

The second thing I was waiting for was my flat's management company to ring up about a problem with one of the payments I made for my service charge. Basically they lost the payment back in July 2005 and I've been trying to sort it out ever since. But they aren't the most easy company to deal with, what with not answering phones and letters and I only got some response when I mentioned taking them to small claims court. They said the person that would deal with the issue was on holiday and would ring me on Wednesday (when I rang on Monday) but they never did.

Thirdly the merry-go-around that is my job carried on a bit further. I had a meeting with Susie the HR lady, I thought to sort out all the details about coming back. However the meeting was only to sort out my holiday and what date I will be resigning. It works out that if I have 15 days to carry over (19 minus the four I've booked this month) then I can resign on the 26Th Dec and take the days holiday at the end of my time. I asked about the offer from last week about coming back and getting my bonus but she said that it's all on a promise and I would have to start afresh (lose all my benefits) when I got back. She said they won't even put anything in writing. So looks like I'm back at square one again and there's no reason to come back. Rob is away so I can't really talk to him but I'll talk to Richard tomorrow.

Oh and it just so happens to be the two year anniversary of my starting at uS****h. So Nils, Jamie, James and myself went down to bar HA HA for a couple of beers after work to celebrate.

A word about the Music

I made a effort last night to get to the choir practice early last night and got there at just past 7. It normally starts at 7:30 but I wanted to let Joel, the teacher, know how several people in the group feel about this terrible Britten music and I wanted to tell him by himself and not in front of the whole group.
I made the points that its not fun and I don't feel I'm learning much because we are so focused on getting ready for the performance. We spend quite a lot of money on these lessons and expect to get something out of them. Also that the way things are carrying on he is driving people away from the choir.
Joel said he appreciated the feedback and would pass it on to the principal. He said next term he would definitely focus more on the lighter jazzier music and reintroduce some fun into the lessons. Not that I will benefit of course but it seems unfair on Joel not to let him know how things are. We did see some benefit during the lesson as we finished going through the piece early and he went and got some Christmas carol music to finish off this week. I great improvement, I didn't know Good King Wenceslas
had so many verses.

Choir / Detention

I've bunked off two rehearsals for this weekends performance, mainly because that music is so dreadful. Britten's St.Nicholas quiet hard for a tenor (my part) and too high only really using the high notes of the range. I told everyone not to come to the performance, partly because the cost is a whopping nine pound, but mainly because it won't be a very enjoyable experience.

I believe that Joel and the Blackheath Conservatoire have pretty much managed to drive everyone way and won't be back next term. well I won't be back for other reasons anyway. The course is meant to be 'singing with pleasure', I might still ask for my money back.

Getting a loan

Ok so I may have screwed up

I booked an appointment last week at the Nationwide and got talked into getting a new credit card and current account. So today I went to see them with all my documents and bits of paper.

the problem with this is that I applied for a Natwest Credit Card and with the extra credit check. When I tried to get the loan I got refered on my credit check so I've got to wait for the head office to OK the loan.

The Nationwide account and credit card as quite good for travelling as you only pay for the conversion to the new currency and not an extra charge for handling which most others do.

I'm getting a 8 grand loan based on the standard bank rate

my caculation breaks down as:

5 months at £740 = £3700
12 wks at £200 = £2400
and my current account -£2300
which is about £8400

so I'm asking for 8 grand with the three months pay should get me thru.

I figure I have also about one thousand pounds of one off costs
and about £400 to pay for the loan.

on a more positive note the snow reports for Banff are very good...
D

My non promotion

I got promoted today...

well no I didn't but I did have a meeting this morning about what sort of deal I can have to come back after my trip and it included coming in as a senior developer one level above where I am now.

With finally the introduction of the skills matrix in the department, a list of all the permanent member of staff and a rating of how good they are at different skill (both technical and business related), it means that certain people in the department needed promoting. Because they link the relative level of the skills which a new set of pay scales (not something we had before) several people are good enough to be rated in the next level up from the one that they are currently in. So we had three, well deserved, promotions in the department two developers to senior developers and one from junior developer to developer.

For my own position Rob said that I would have been promoted today but as I was leaving the company soon it wouldn't look good for me to get promoted and then to leave straight away. So my promotion will come into effect when I come back. So it meeting next week to iron out the details and get it all in writing.

I believe Rob and Richard did make a special effort to get me a good deal with Andrew the MD. The offer improved from the start of the week in that I will get paid by bonus that I would have lost when I get back in April.

Also I explained in more detail about what it is that I'm actually doing and detailed the benefits the training will have to the company. I said the course also has components of leadership and teacher training both of which I can use at the Company.


So I'm not sure if how much damage financially this will cause me more information next week.

The Deal

We I've just had the meeting and it looks like it will pretty much boil down to what would have happened if I had just resigned.
The offer was to take less time off and keep my job or resign and they 'promise' to take me back afterwards.
So as it's a fix length course the first option is not really an option as they were pretty much only offering to let me take what a have in holiday off and not allow any unpaid time.
So that means I resign can go on my trip but lose my bonuses, a couple of grand, and start again with the company when I come back.

So much for Rob saying on Friday not to worry about it and we can work something out.

The worst kept secret

I've been trying to keep quiet about my trip since I spoke to Rob last but I think I've told about half the work people I've been down the pub with this last week. I keep taking people to one side and spilling the beans. Then making them promise to keep it a secret and act surprised when they find out. Fortunatly I don't have to keep it quite much longer.

Well that's him told

Yeap he had heard that I was wanting to take a sabbatical.

The HR lady (Susie) told my CTO (Richard) and my CTO told my Team Leader (Rob).

He was quite surprised at what I wanted to do and how long I wanted three months so he didn't know any details. He agreed that I wasn't asking for all that much unpaid leave as this years and next years holiday entitlement covers 2 thirds of it.
It was more a chance for me to put my point of view and mention a few thing I wanted them to know

1)I really had nothing from this company in the two years that I have worked here and I want to do something for me. and I feel angry and that the company is just taking advantage of me.
2)I was mainly holding out from telling them, waiting for the company to finally do something about promoting me, paying me a reasonable amount of money and sorting out all the holiday we have left.
3) Don't want to leave the company I want to ask for a sabbatical as I need a break from the less healthy madness that goes on in this company (some grown adults can really act like children when they don't get what they want)

I felt that as we where near the end of one project and before we started the new one this was probably the most suitable time to tell them.

I Rob said fair enough and that I should keep it quiet until he and Richard can sit down and come to a decision about it. He apologise for the promotions thing not being sorted out months ago and said it should be sorted out in the next couple of days. He said the sabbatical issue won't effect it (my major worry in case you hadn't guessed) and that it would be tied to a new skills matrix for the department which has been signed off and will be out soon.

So so far its going quite well, these are decent people and I wasn't expecting to be screwed by them. The problem may come when they have to OK whatever gets sorted with other parts of the company and they limit what we may be able to do.

1-2-1

Well just had a meeting about our holiday and the company are being really helpful and letting us carry over all our holiday as long as we book the three days off over Xmas (which I have already done).

So now I'm just about to going into a 1-2-1 with Rob my team leader and letting the whole secret out of the bag.

my hands are actually shaking...

Lunch

Just been down the Noodle bar for lunch with a couple of the guys I normally go to lunch with. Nice place I had fried pork (char-siu) and noodles with some pineapple juice, lovely. Anyway that's not why I mention this, the reason is that I told them about my plans to go off skiing and then sworn them to secrecy.

Meet the Gang

As part of the intro to the whole holiday thing. Crystal has sent out a email (only those that wanted to) of people's emails that are going on the trip. I've had a couple of mails to the group and so far they seem like at ok bunch of people. A lot seem to have myspace sites set up perhaps I should finally get around to setting up one for myself.

is the cat out of the bag?

had a word with Susie the HR lady about trying to carry over all my remaining holiday into next year (I have 19 days left to take) and use it for my big trip.

We were talking about how they don't normal allow anyone to carry over holiday but then neither do they allow people to take sabbaticals. So she said she would have a few 'off the record' conversations and find out the best step forward from here.
This of course means I'm now looking at the managers I talk to at work think 'are they thinking I'm the one who wants to go on sabbatical.

besides that its very busy at work this week as my Team leader is away and I seem to been nominated to sort out everyones problems. still it's made the week go quickly...

D

Company Halloween Party

We had a top company do last night. the company Halloween party at the crypt in St Martins in the Fields, very spooky. loads of people with some great costumes. I had a good evening and won the award for the scariest costume (see picture below. I'm the one on the left). I won 30 pounds worth of gift vouchers for House of Frazier (I guess to pretty myself up a bit) mainly I think for the wicked contact lenses I had on.

A fair few members of the company where rather late in this morning, the winner being Owen that got in about 11:30am.

Spreading the word of Blog

My friends Colin and Clare and currently away for three weeks travelling around Oz, making life here in London quite quiet (well part from work). I convinced them to make a little blog while they are out there and here's what they have managed so far

http://mort-on-the-move.blogspot.com/

D

Ah a little Flickr

As part of the plan to get mobile and ready for the big trip. I've got myself a two subscription to Flickr so now I should have no troubles taking loads of pics while I'm away, so long as I can find a way to up load them. Here's an example of me from the back catalogue

MCR

I finally got around to checking out the new My Chemical Romance album and video on their website last night, Welcome to the Black Parade. And I've been listening to it for most of the day at work. Not sure about it yet (I figure it's a grower like the last one). Looks from the video for the first single that they have picked up a touch of the Freddie Mercurys. Listen to it Loud!!!

Oh and Russ is going nuts at the moment on my email as NIN have just announced a tour for next year (most of which I'm in Canada for). A very excitable chap indeed.

I checked and MCR also have dates soon but all the ones I can go to have already sold out. I guess I'll just be happy I'm going to the Muse gig in November

Hurrah!

19 Days

That's how much holiday I have left now that additional days for the over time has been added.
Current company rules state that all holiday must be used by the end of the calendar year.
So unless they change it and give me the money or left me carry it over (that would be handy with what I'm planning) I'm not going to be in the office much for the rest of the year!

Project Review

Had a nice little innovation yesterday. A meeting about what we did right and what we did wrong on the project. so we (about a third of the developers) where able to say what went right with the project (scums, working together as a team, the introduction of a wiki) and what went wrong (getting information from the business, had to cut corners due to the deadline, having the sales team keep changing their minds). It's part of the agile developer method and I think it should help in the long run.

Also had a one to one with Richard (the CTO) today and we talked about changes to team structure and he said that there is some of the training budget that he thinks I should have.

Also he hinted at they are planning on introducing more structure into career levels and that it should to my benefit. However he said that the change had to be agreed by the business and so it will be a couple of weeks yet before we have some news.

All positive stuff but I'm running out of time and I am not sure I can wait too much longer.

Live!

It's nearly 3am (ah the KLF) and the site is live...

www.uS****h.com

all the colours are good and the whole thing (mostly) works!

not a bad day; quiet morning, an afternoon picking up leaflets at the Ski show
and a 11pm-3am shift at work.

D

History Blog Entry

http://www.historymatters.org.uk/output/page96.asp

Hi my name is David Dunhill

I'm a white English male, 33 years 5 months 25 days, 5 foot 11 inches, 13 stone and a bit, fitish (go running a couple of times a month) with short blond hair (about 1cm) shaven number 2 at back.

Today I'm wearing blue/grey Salomon trainers, cream Craghopper double layered walking pants, Calvin Klein black boxers, grey socks, blue Abercrombie and Fitch t shirt, blue v neck thin baggy jumper, old denim jacket from Next, Timex Expedition digital watch with compass, bright red Berghaus extrem powder rucksack; containing psp (Wipeout pure racing game), money, book (blood fever by charlie higson), Nike wolly hat, black baseball cap no logo, handkerchief, Bloc sunglasses, umbrella, diary and pen, usb/charger cables for phone, lip balm, keys for home and work, driving glasses, mobile phone with headphones (includes camera and mp3 music player),copy of today's Metro newspaper and my oyster travel card.

and this is how my day went...

Woke at 8:15am with Radio 4 on the radio hearing about the historymatters campaign switched it off when they started talking about stupid politicians again.
Travelled to work across London via a bus and two tube trains. thought about history, stuff I need to do at work, sorting out the details for my weekend away, what I'm going to get people for Xmas and why have purple bins started appearing near home, annoyed by people smoking in the bus queue and slow tourists in Victoria station,
Got to work 9:30 am so late for work (they didn't mind as we've been doing lots of late nights because we have a project deadline on Wednesday night) at a web site company in IT.
First cup of tea 9:40.
Morning was busy sorting out data issues with the project.
Second cup of tea 11:10.
Third cup of tea 12:22.
Lunch 13:30 chicken and Noodle soup, steak and kidney pie both from EAT sandwich shop costing £6.85 eaten at desk.
Fourth cup of tea 14:37.
Afternoon mostly spent talking to business users and developers sorting out last minute problems.
Fifth cupof tea 16:44.
Sixth cup of tea 17:35.
Finished up remaining tasks for the day and left work at 19:20.
Don't think I thought about much on the way home just avoided the free newspapers and read my book.
Home at 20:50 after popping into supermarket to get supper.
Tea was chicken and rice with a bottle of campa viejo rioja 2000.
Played Star Wars Lego on my Xbox for a bit.
Watched stuff recorded on my digital tv recorder; american crime dramas and uk programs about gadgets and cars.
Last cup of tea 22:50 (as you can see I drink alot of tea, so much so, my nickname at work is Tetley).
Packed for friends wedding in Sunderland that I'm going to at the weekend.
Bed at 00:10am.

The Long Day

Well I'm off work the next two days, except for the period 11pm-3am tomorrow night when we go live with the new web site.

So I'm trying to get everything sorted before I leave tonight. We are now in the code freeze (although bits of it have been thawing out all day) and so there's not much to do for the developers. This doesn't apply to me however as lots of little issues seem to be coming from the business which only require small db changes to I've been changing images and switching bit on and off all day.

I was really tired this morning and I'm seriously spaced out now after last nights hard choir lessons trying to get thru the Britten. I'm really starting to hate that man now. That and working the weekend again.

Today is 'One Day in History' blog day were the national archive ask people to describe their day and add it to the archive at British Library's Web Archive in Modern British Collections.
This idea to capture normal life on one day from lots of different view points. A really cool idea, I'll stick my entry up here when I've done it.

D

Crystal's good news / bad news

To go with my good news about the free ticket to the ski show , I got the bad news yesterday.

In the small print for the Holiday I missed the fact that the season ski pass is only for Lake Louise not for all three resorts at Banff. I have the option to 'upgrade' for 260 pounds to the full ticket ski big 3 season pass. B**tards!!

Also since they left it so long to tell me I can't get the early bird deal on the pass and it will cost me 300 dollars extra. OK I can live with the upgrading to the cheaper prices but I don't see why I should pay for their tardiness.

So its pay up or lose two thirds of my holiday.

I believe they call that blackmail

Letter of complaint fired off.

D

1:12:21

Ran the Nike10K at the weekend. OK time 72 minutes. I got a bit bored around 5.5Km and walked between 6K and 7K. Pretty standard for me. Of course I'm a bit stiff now.

I now have a green t-shirt to go with the blue, red and dayglo yellow shirts from previous years.

D

Part two nearly complete

Part two - getting my pension contribution is nearly complete. I just been given the check and will be posting it off to the pension company this weekend. So that should be safe from any consequences.

BTW part one was to book the holiday.

A ski freebie...hurrah!

I got something great in the post last night. A free ticket to the Ski and Snow board show at Olympia.

Problem is its a busy week

Work have asked (or are about too) me to work a night shift on the 18th/19th 4hours 11pm-3am. which may mean I get wed and Thurs off except for the over night bit.

The snowboard show is 18-22nd

I'm off to my friend Julie's wedding in Sunderland on Friday 20th back on the Sunday 22nd (staying with Nick in Leeds)

One problem is that the ski people wanted to meet on the Sat at the show but I won't make it which is a shame because I would like to see what the other people on the course are like.

so I may be able to go on the Wednesday during the day.

Which will be good

Rumours and Hints

Well
It sounds like they have started planning on what will be happening in the department after the big redesign project finishes.

Richard the CTO mention the he knows that I should be official Senior Dev (promoted) and better paid as everyone (who?) agrees that I'm already filling that role in the company.
He had a quick chat with me about the shape of the new teams.

Rob say in the pub the other night about how I'm important to the team and in a Senior position

I was thinking three different things as both these conversations were going on
1) this is all 6 months late
2) I wonder what will happen when I tell them about the skiing
3) I'm still angry about what they did.
4) with this company I'll believe it when I have it in writing.

So things may be happening soon. Fingers crossed
Hopefully before I have to give them the big news.

The factors that are governing that are
1) I don't want them to know until after the (postponed now by about 3 months) review so it won't effect what they say
2) I want my pension check for this half year in the bank so they can't pull a fast one.
3) I have to give them 1 months notice so my absolute deadline is the start of December.

still they are very busy at the minute so I'm not expecting any real news soon...

My dream email

I got the following post

We need your help! Please tell us which new LEGO product ideas you like best. Your feedback will help us to decide which products to offer in the future! Go to the link below and give us your opinions by 8:00 PM Monday, October 2nd Thank you for your help!

I suggested some more Lego game tie-ins like StarWars Lego and try and make Lego that can play mp3s. It's the sort of email you wait your whole life for ;-)

Deadline day

It Fat lady sings time at work for the project

The whole redesign project, all our business channels, about 20 developers and 10 odd tester have been madly busy to get to this point. They where in at the weekend (I decided to take it easy and not come in mainly cos I got a bad cold and had big nights out on Friday and Saturday, rather than an attempt at rebelling) and until late the last couple of evenings (pizza on Monday and Nandos on Tuesday from the bosses).

The last two days went amazingly quick with lots of different issues and people wanting information. We were aiming to get all the functional bug sorted for today and then concentrate on the content and styling issues while the testers start regression testing.

So we are in the eye of the storm, so to speak.

Just tidying up

The guys have been working really hard and Gordon (the PM) says he will be organising a wrap party. hopefully I will be able to surprise everyone with the gifts I got for them (may have to get a few more as I only got 25)

Center Parcs

It was a lovely weekend

As I mention before I was my Mum's 60Th Birthday and to celebrate we had a family weekend away to Center Parc at Elvendon Forest near Norwich.We stayed from Friday to Monday, we had a great time, the apartment was away from the main complex and nice and quiet. Well that is apart from the odd bits of noise generated by Ivy and Freddie. This is the most time that I've spent with them and I felt that I got to know them a bit more. Certainly some of their sleeping habit like waking up at 6 am! Freddie has just managed to hold largish plastic balls (a little larger than his hand) and its very funny because he hasn't learned to let go and as he waves hand around he looks someone has super glued the ball to his hand! Ivy is a real dynamo and I don't know how her mum, Emma has the energy to keep up with her.

We hired bikes to get us around and a buggy bike thing for the kids to sit in. Having bike was Ideal as the place is a bit large to walk to every thing but not big enough that you can't easily reach stuff by bike.
The down side to the bikes was that they aren't the best in the world as I found out on Sunday morning. I had gone out to pick up the morning copy of the Telegraph, using a free voucher we got and I decided to have a bit of a tour around the side and some of the back lanes. I had covered most of the park and was doing the loop closest to the flat when the chain popped right off. Bang!
I went straight over the handle bars and landing part on the concrete road and part in the bushes by the side. first to hit was my right elbow and it was this arm that took all the damage. It felt for a minute or so like I'd dislocated it as it hurt and didn't respond to my trying to move it. fortunately I had only badly bruised it and apart from it being sore, the main injury was to take the skin off the elbow. Its amazing how much blood comes from such a little wound, only about the size of a 50p. It bled for hours.

So I gathered myself up and wheeled my bike back along the path. Almost straight away Ed, my brother in law cycled up and was able to guide me straight back to the flat via a short cut. Everyone help me get tidied up and clean the wound.

The paper was fine.

Apart from that, the weekend was great just being together as a family. We didn't manage to do too many things while we where there, partly because everything cost and we didn't fancy anything enough to pay for it, but mainly because it was a holiday for relaxing. Not that we didn't make good use of the pool with its different types of slides and rides. We (well I did) went each evening after most of the kid had gone home for there tea, so we got on all the rides when it wasn't too crowded. Also the salt water pool was good for my elbow!

I hope we do a holiday like this again sometime soon.

My mum loved her present we had all clubbed together to buy her a stained glass round window to go in her hallway. Emma designed it based a bit on art deco and Charles Rennie Macintosh and Sunrises, and Claire organised it from a place near where she lives in Horsham. The window when it's in place will look amazing with the sun pouring through the different colours, gold, red, blue, green and purple.

A little time off

For the first time since Feb I going to be away for the next few days. Work and all it's crazy deadlines and missing bits of development can wait until next Tuesday when I come back. I can decide whether it would be better if people find they need me and want answers to things while I'm away or that I'm not needed because I've done a good job in educating people about my Customisation system and left it running in a very stable state.
Customisation hasn't had an real bug raised against it during the whole of the testing process so far. A couple of issues raise for bits of extra functionality but a 'clean sheet' for the stuff we created before testing started.

Anyway I digress, I'm off to Centre Parks on holiday with the whole family. Mum and Dad, Emma, Olly and Ivy, Claire, Ed and Freddy. That's Seven Adults and Two kids so I hope its a big chalet. We sorted out a great gift for my mum and should have a top celebration. I'm planning on mostly running, swimming and sitting around.

Should be great!

It's all gone to seed

Had a bit of a weird day yesterday

1) Last night in the supermarket I decided to get some more seeds and dried fruit. I take them to work as a healthy snack. So I selected a couple of different things including sour cherries, lovely, and then carried on shopping. A couple of minutes later down the other end of the shop I spotted a bag of mixed seeds which looked quite tasty but when I picked them up it was a bag of bird seed. D'oh! as the saying goes all this healthy food stuff is just a load of bird seed.

2) A cool tag line for an advert I saw in tube this morning. It was for Burger King and it said
'Eat like a King and not like a Clown'. Whether or not you like Murder King you have to agree they definitely scored one against Maccy Ds with this one.

Al Bean

Last night after going into work (Sunday) because our project deadline is today, I got the opportunity to hear speak, Al Bean, one of the Moon Walkers.

He was the fourth person to walk on the Moon as pilot of Apollo 12 and since leaving NASA he has devoted his time to being a painter. So I had two reasons why I wanted to hear him speak my interest in all things Space, since a little boy and including getting a degree in Physics, and my hobbies in Art, including evening classes for the last couple of years.

It was a really uplifting experience as he is a delightful speaker with warmth and a great sense of humour and he gave some insight to how human, and down to Earth (sorry!) the other Moon walkers are. Like talking to Neil Armstrong about which hand he used to steady himself before the first big step (micro gravity is very difficult to stand in until your body learns not to overreact when you start to lose balance) and Harrison Schmitt wishing he had drawn his daughter's name on the side of a boulder while he was up there.

He spoke about the feeling of travelling with out moving in space where as there are no mile markers the journey is very still and feels motionless with just the Earth moving away quickly at the start and the Moon rushing to meet you at the end. And he spoke of the desire to try and look over the top of the Moon to see if he could see the far side.

The talk gave some insight into the fear and excitement he felt through the experience and brought the whole subject down to a very human level, where you could image yourself trying to balance in the Lunar gravity or being in awe at the size and beauty of the Earth.
He describes the Earth as paradise and is very thankful to have made it back and at the sheer wonder of the everyday things, like simple ordinary people, that he sees around him.

The main message he had to give was make the best of your opportunities as your won't believe what you can do if you try and everyone has a 'song' or a story to tell and if you don't try and make it happen then it will never be heard in all eternity.

Very positive and I for one am very glad I had this once in a lifetime change to hear him.

Deadlines and Spacemen

It the Friday before the Monday project deadline and it's all getting fraught around here. Most people will be in at the weekend. I'm doing Sunday cos you get 1.5 Holiday rather than Sat where you only get 1 day and is no reward at all.

Still Sunday should be a brilliant day because in the evening I'm going to a talk by Al Bean the fourth person to walk on the Moon. I saw one by Buzz Aldrin a couple of years ago and it was very interesting. A once in a lifetime experience and no mistake. Also full marks for my Mum for telling me about it otherwise I would have missed it.

Right its Friday and time for the Pub. Bizarrely there's a big carnival music event happening in the shops by the office right now so I'm going to look at that too. Free finger food! and it makes a change to be typing away with a musical (sort of) accompaniment.

D

Got my hair cut yesterday, not really news but you'd think people had never seen short hair at work.
OK it may have got a little long (collar length) and I did get my head shaved but everyone made a joke. of course it could just mean I populate and what I do gets noticed. nah!

Messages thru the mists of time

so I managed to mail my friend jis back and some up my life at the minute ...

I suppose the first thing to say is sorry! As you know part of the human male condition is our tardiness when it comes to replying to letters, etc. but half a year is pretty bad.
As to why I haven't replied I guess it was mainly because I wanted the email to be interesting and was waiting until something interesting to happened so I could mention it. Pretty silly really as that's a recipe for never getting around to it.
So although nothing Earth shattering to report, Hello!
(...ooh I've just noticed how simular to the start of your email that was freaky)
So what's been happening to me the last few years. Well I'm still living in London, I've now been in my flat and owner since 1999. It's located in the Docklands part of the city and I now own it up to about shoulder height of it. It's a good area with lots of stuff that has opened in the past few years so there's plenty of things to do.Its also pretty handy to get anywhere in London which is one of the main reasons why after all this time I still like being there.
My current work is in Victoria which is the other side of London and it only takes about an hour. Of course if you ask an Londoner how long it takes to get to somewhere in London they will tell you about an hour no matter where it is, but its a fact it takes about an hour. The company I now work of and have been for nearly two years, is called uS****h.com. They are a web site were you can pick out better deals on your gas supplier, broadband connection, current accounts, etc. Not a bad place to work as I have a very good view of Buckingham place and the park from the office window (still!). Actually you may of heard of our parent company as they are American. They are called S***pps, I believe that they own Dilbert, Snoopy and most of the local newspaper in America. They bought us about 4 months ago for a silly amount of money around about 180 million pounds.
On the social side of things I'm currently single and don't have any kids. however I do know a bit about what you where talking about of how kids can effect your like as I'm now an uncle twice over, a boy and a girl. Ivy who is a bossy one and a half and little Freddy who is a very jolly seven months.
My big plans for the future, well near future at least, revolves around skiing. This January for three months I'm planning on taking a break from work (they don't know yet) and spending the time learning to become a ski instructor. I've chosen a course based in Banff which should polish up my skiing to a high level and get me through half the Canadian Instructor grades in three months. So I'm already getting a bit excited about it and I've been doing training running around London in preparation, well trying to. This means I'm trying to work out the best thing to do with my flat while I'm away. If I'm lucky I should have no problem renting it out to someone who works up at Canary Wharf and, hopefully, cover my mortgage and most of my trip expenses.
The other unusual event I have coming up is to do with a choir I've been singing for, for a couple of years now.This Christmas we will be doing Benjamin Britten's St Nicholas with about two hundred other people. Its a full Cantata with professional tenor and amateur choir (us) and a mixed orchestra. Not really my taste in music but should be an experience to be in the middle of the choir and orchestra.
Well that's some of the thing happening to me at the moment. I do also have some items of news about people from Uni. that you may remember
I see a fair bit of Big Phil and the other guys from my house in Leeds and some of them where only down a coupleof weekends ago to go to the CAMRA British Beer Festival at Earl's Court. Of course we are all a little wider than we used to be (must be the beer) except Phil who cut quite a slimish figure these days.
Also Colin Mortimer and his wife Clare are good friends and are living close to me in London just across the river from me in Rotherhide. So I see them very often.
Next week Paul Ryan and his wife Rachel are having the baptism of their second kid, Sam, and I going up to Darlington for it. I should meet up with a couple of the lads from Leeds and hear what they have been up to.
Also if you can remember Julie Thomson, well she's having wedding do next month. Not the actual Wedding that was last January in Algeria (Husband's Country) it's more of a wedding blessing but still a good excuse for a right old knees up.
...um it sounds quite exiting now that I look at it all on paper!
Anyway hope life is well with you and your growing clan. It does sound your have an exciting time of it and arestill the dynamic go getter I remember from that TV program.
Cheers
D
P.S. Nearly forgot my contact details!

...

New Blog

Well this thing has just been converted over to use the new beta blogger that connects straight to my gmail account. This means that I should all be private now so I can add a couple of blog entries that I wanted to do at the start. These are about me and what I'm planning over the next year or so. I want it private for the time being because I haven't told work yet what is going to happen and I don't want them to know until I've had my next review and pension check. Just in case it all goes Pair shaped you understand. ;-)

Weekend Working

Gordon the project manager is still asking people to come and work at the weekend. I'm not doing so and we're dealling with the situation by not talking about it. A pretty standard approach in this company.

Skis

Went to Ellis bingham in Covent Garden at lunch today as they are having an old of season sale. I wanted to see if they had any skis, They didn't. That's it the chance of finding a bargin in London is offically dead. I'm just going to have to wait until next season stuff comes out and pay full wack

My Past

I got an email on Friday from a good mate from Uni who's now work and kids in the States.
he sent me a mail in January as a news catch up and I basically forgot until he mail last week to say 'hey no reply!' Ouch!
So I'm here after work trying to summise my life at this point.

So is it a positive or negative process .. well it was a real chore to start and its a chore to do, but it is quite uplifting to see that i'm getting on with most parts of my life and I sound like quiet an interesting chap.

I could however be because we are getting a pretty good sunset up here on the 10 th floor and all the light is topping up my Lux count for the day and helping me avoid SAD (a risk event in summer in the UK).

Maybe if a actually manage to write something half decent I'll edit it for some other people I've not heard from in years and see what they are up to. A couple of people spring to mind my old flat mate from Fulham (now working in US I think) and a mate from my days at Logica who went back to the land of the Hobbits.

Beer and the Weekend

I've given up drinking, again

Had a good weekend with my friends Phil and Nick visiting. but it involved a lot of alcohol. This isn't really surprising as the main reason for the visit was to go to the camra beer festival. we went on Friday with the beer running out a bit but it was good. a fine selection of stouts and porters.

One truly amazing thing that happen while I was there, was running into Steve Clark who I was at Primary School with and haven't seen for 20 odd years. I was talking to Phil and this person walks up to us and says 'Are you Dave?'. I did a sort of double take and peered at him and then went 'Steve!'. Apparently I haven't changes much and he had said to his wife 'There's some over there I think I know. I'm going over to find out if it is them'. He said he was living south of london and had just got married. Things seem to be going well for him and its nice to bump into someone now and again.

The rest of the weekend was pretty laid back with Phil and Nick playing Timesplitters on the Xbox and Phil heading back on saturday after meeting up with Colin and Clare for a coffee (Clare was shoe buying apparently). We met up with the Mortimers on the Sat night at Brewery Wharf by Bough Market and Nick headed off home as usual on the Monday morning.

I got a phone message while we were out and on Monday a call from Julie. She is having the other half of her wedding this October. Its going to be quite a big affair, a blessing, and we have to dress up. She got married at new year in Algeria as that's were her other half is from and this is just a blessing and the rest of the wedding bits and bobs. It's in Sunderland so I've been on the web trying to work out the cheapest way to get up there.





Right that's me off to the pub.

Wooden Spoon

Just had the Prizes for the Sports day. I got a wooden spoon for being last overall and twenty quid nike voucher for winning the tug of wars

Hurrah

D

Skis

BTW I take back some of what I said about buying Skiis as I got rung up on weds to say they didn't have any stock so that buggered up the whole thing. I spent some time trying to find some more but everyone is pretty tapped out. I am going to have to wait for the new season stuff (due the end of Sept) and get a proper fitting at a store (and of course pay full price!!)

Still I had a nice long chat with my Mum when I call to tell her that the skis wont be coming. It was mostly about a trip to center parcs the whole family are doing for my Mums birthday and a party for it we are having combined along with my cousin Sandra's party we're going to up in York (partly so we can all see the cofin coffee table that she meant to have), rubbish web sites and how luck the Moon landings were not to have any accidents (there was a program on the telly the night before).

Friday afternoon

Just been to Nandos for peri chicken and now I've got the caption competition to do.

We had the company evening out last night as a school sports day and the pic for the caption compo is of one of the rounds of tug of war. I was in the winning team for that (hurrah) but we did real bad at all the other events. beening well built for tug of war means you're not the best for the speed events. I also was part of the sack race and the three legged. we were so far behind on the sack race that I (being the last man) took my time and just enjoyed the view.

So it's mean to be the project deadline today but its been moved to next week. people are in at the weekend and most are getting nice new machines (I got one the other week) dual core dual processor 2.0 GHz 3gb memory and two hard drives, nice. the plan is to get virtual machines on the PCs to run a database server and a web server locally. anyway people should be working the weekend and I'm still refusing, besides I got my friends Nick and Phil visiting for the Great British Beer Festival at Earl's Court this weekend and so am not really free. The fest is a great do and I've already went on wednesday with Col.

so the little people in my desk drawer are staying there for a little while yet. Gordon the project manager said He'll organise a little party at the end and we can give them out to the developers then.

Sunday

Had quite a day on Sunday.

First I spent alot of money on the Snow+Rock website. I brought one pair of Atomic SX:B5 Skiercross Ski + Atomic Neox 412 Bindings which was 579.00 pounds for 347.40 pounds. These are quite a serious ski but if every thing goes to plan I should be skiing for 3 months next season and a very good pair of skis is a must. They are very similar to the CrossMaxs that I've used before and are abargainbargin at 231.60 pounds off. I went up to the Snow+Rock store at Covent Garden on Saturday after I had been for an eye test (Every thing the same), but they really didn't have anything at all. Most other places I tried over the past few week didn't have anything in at all (skiing is of course a bit seasonal). But I noticed the offer on the web last week as I was searching for a good deal on laptops (a bit random I know but I'm also looking for a laptops so I can keep up with email and store photos on my travels) and decided to go for it.
The one draw back is it will be delivered by ParcelForce who are bobbins. So I'm having it delivered to my Parents (I have warned them someone will be trying to give them skis in the next few days) and won't see them until I can get back up to Watton (were my parents live).

The other thing that happened to me on Sunday was that i went to the Ben & Jerry's Sundae Festival on Clapham Common. There was lots of free ice cream on offer with was nice but I was only there for one thing.

The Wonder Stuff were playing as the second to the headline act (the guy who sings that ad with the balls going down the road, Jose Gonarsomethingorother) so for a fiver I got to see them on a big stage for an hour going through most of their greatest hits.

It was such a thrill as they started with the opening chords of 'On the Ropes' with the Sun shining and a pint of the black stuff in my hand. I would definitely say it was one of the better gigs I've seen them do (fourth time I've seen them I think). The lineup has changed again and they now have a Girl playing the fiddle!

One thought that I had was it is a strange feeling to have more hair than your heroes.

Also it was strange to look around at the people in the crowd and see what 10 years has done to the fans. Lots of fathers with kids on shoulder all singing along knowing all the words Brilliant! and some fans who must have been at junior school when the Stuffies were number one bouncing around to 'Don't let me down, Gently' like it was brand new.


All in all a great day.

Deadlines

Busy week this week as the project deadline is upon us. we got a little side tracked last thursday when British Gas put there prices up and caused a huge influx to our site. This caused a complete crash and quite a few people having late nights. some like our Network Admin, Craig were up in the wee small hours at the server site fixing cables and stuff.

The project about to go into testing and I'm tasked with trying to coordinate everyone finishing at the same time and getting all the developer database combined into one big release database.

Still be nice to finish and I'm looking forward to giving the suprise gifts on friday.

Heat

It's bloody hot here and we've run out of water again...

Fireworks at Work

Not yet
It was the first weekend of the overtime this weekend and so some people were in at the weekend to help with the deadlines, including one guy that couldn't get in until he was vouched for by someone already in the office!
The project manager has been very grown up about the whole thing (unlike the way I'm behaving) and said the coming in is voluntary and me refusing was fine. I'm pretty vital to some bits of the release but not madly busy as yet. so I'm not doing too much damage and hopefully getting a little message higher up the managment structure.

I deciding to do this it made me think about the way going on strike (which is pretty much what I'm doing) or working to rule effects other people. In my case the message gets out that I'm not happy but the people it most effects are the ones I work with who, mostly, are not to blame. This is simular to the train and tube strikes we always seem to be having. we were going to have a train strike that weekend but it was called off at the last minute. Anyway a train strike, in my company at least, only hurts the staff as they are told they have to be in on time and if not they have to make up the time.

ah well

Little Lego Men

As the project at work is coming to an end I thought it would be nice to do something to celebrate the fact. The project is a rebranding of all our current websites and intgration of .NET 2.0 changes.

As part of this there are two sub systems called customisation and lego. Customisation is a data store of image and other types of content and lego is a set of custom controls which the pages are made from. So Lego is pretty much the building blocks of the website.

After a bit of thinking we decided LEGO would stand for Localised Extensible Generic Objects.

This means that I could get some little jokey presents to celebrate the project deadline (which is friday next (and the week of the London Beer Festival (bad/good timing or what!!)). So I've bought 25 lego cowboy keyrings (hopefully one for each of the developers that have had to work with the new code) . And if I'm really luck maybe I can get the project to pay for them (they were only 40 quid so I don't really mind if they don't)

Fireworks at work

Well soon maybe
we've just been asked to do some overtime as we getting close to our deadline. and this is my reply

Hello XXX

I don't want you to think it's anyway personal to you and it's no fault of anything you've being involved with
but I'm refusing to do any overtime for this company, under my current conditions.

Sorry if this causes any problems.

D



so this might just make them take a bit of notice and I should have an interesting time tomorrow. right time for the Pub....

New Mortgage

When and sorted out a remortgage yesterday with Nationwide. basically another 2 year track at +0.27 base rate. As it with the same company I get to keep my overpayment benefits and loyality this, that and the other.
However this is the crazy thing I asked them about letting out my flat for the three months I plan to be away (Jan to Mar) and they said fine no probs, I can let out on my new mortgage by just telling them I want to (in writing). Great I said also I would like to take some of my overpayment back to pay for my trip. My overpayment is about 7 grand and so would cover most of the expense. No problems they said. Then I said can't I get a payment holiday rather than take all the money out and they said ... Er no you either either have a payment holiday or let the flat!!! So I say, I can let the flat and take my overpayment out to pay the mortgage? Er yes you can do that ...! also sir you can get a temperary loan at our base rate to cover holiday and the mortgage payments and pay it back when you like!! well slightly crazy so I take out the quick loan to cover all my expenses and payments and keep my overpayment benefits and only have to pay for what it take out. Cool crazy but I'll do that then.

So I'm on the new mortgage and will sort out enough loan to cover what I don't save up for in the meantime just before I leave. This will leave me letting the flat going away and covering my mortgage just calling it all a 'flexible loans'.

full steam ahead then.

Strategy Day - After

Well it wasn't too bad. definately a long day and a real lot of talking.
I managed to say everything I want to say and we will now have to wait and see if anything comes from it.

I just want the company to invest in the staff a little more so that they won't just keep leaving. I've been here two years and its hard to even get them to do the odd team get together.

The irony is that I'm planning my exit (if hopefully only temporary) so most changes aren't likely to effect me.

Another interesting development is that now the project deadline is getting a little tight, Gordon the project manager has been asking people if the will come and work at the weekends. I've avoided the question so far but will refuse to do it.

My reason for this is that I'm not giving any more to this company until it gives something back to me. For the same reason I plan to refuse the personal review process so they can't use it to justify not improving my conditions (which is what happened in Feb) and I'm still waiting on them to get back to me about the pay review from then, which was less than inflation and so in real terms a pay cut.

A nasty suprise when you thought you were working hard all year and get stuff done.

Strategy away day.

Tomorrow we'll be out of the office (I work in IT at in a department of 50 or so people) at a Strategy away day. This will mean sitting around talking about how the department should be run and what we should be doing to. Sounds like fun doesn't it. Actually I'm glad I'm going because the people who are invited are the managers, team leads (we call them dev managers) and the senior developers. Now I'm not actually in any of those groups. but since I've been doing this IT stuff for 10 years I carry on like a senior developer (they are very much like a junior team lead) and managed to get an invite.
The senior developers position is quite a resent thing here. The positions were created back in feb and several of the current developers at the time were invited to apply. I was one of those who applied and like most people at the time, we thought I was a cert to get one of the positions. As you've probably guessed I didn't the post it went to someone more junior than me (4 years experience ) but who is a lot better at the old office politics.
So I'm still both bitter and angry at the whole thing (not least the 5 grand or so pay it cost me) and have been known to mention it now and again.
Fortunately for me (and part of the reason I get to go to the away day) is that we have just got a new CTO for the company and he doesn't yet suffer from effects of the office politics. The away day is his idea and I should get a bit of a forum to get some good ideas across ( we I think they are good ideas). Here's the list of things I plan to say so far:

Strategy away day.

1. IT future direction; big picture;

Views on Structure, teams,

Move to a more open structured system

Currently too few people doing to many things

Don’t need people to have an input into every decision all the time.

Process, methods

REVIEWS we should be doing some!

Fix the method of booking meeting so you can actually tell where people are when you need to speak to them.

Environment, tools

Separate DBA team

Build Server

Views on Lifecycle

How we interact with the business

Development of internal computer systems to support the Business

Automatic of review publish process

Better tools for fininail reporting rather than just using Excel

Better system of storage update, versioning of HR forms and processes

General store for company wide information – extend the wiki

2. Company strategy (from an IT perspective - what should it be)

Driving the company with newest technology

upmystreet on mobiles?

3. What new technologies/ technology approaches should we pursue that could transform the business

i.e., Ajax; search engine keyword optimisation (like Shopzilla); etc etc

Microsoft Partner program/ solution provider.

Gold Partner system.

Use of the new Frameword v3 code

Make the cross application communication more stabile with a technology such as MSMQ

CCTV system so I can see if people are at their desk without having to go around and see!

4. Global strategy USA; EUROPE - what should we be thinking about now?

Localization

Scalability

5. Personal Development - creating a culture of learning - how do we achieve this?

IT Training – Some please

- Languages c#

- Techologies web, nant, nunit, nhibernate,

- Methologies – UML, Agile development

Project planning and estimation

Risk anaylsis

Business Training

- to better understand them and what they need

- and where they want to go

- so the way they do things /think doesn’t come as a supprise to us.

- possibly also mirror to the business system training idea (from the quartely meeting – Susie (HR) presentation)

Soft Skills Training –

Time management,

Writing (IMPORTANT!) and communication,

Team working

Interviews (we do?)

Leadership (we do)

Resources

Electronic

Books, DVDs (microsoft web casts (from gold partner system)

Learning environment PCs prototype boxes

Conferences

Flexible Working

Time for other things

Other Projects

Charity Work (group work team building)

So its up to me to give a good impression and hopefully help put the worst of politics behind me!

D

The Flat

One of the things I'm trying to sort out is what should I do with my flat while I'm away. There are several options on this; nothing, take a payment holiday from my Mortgage, try and let it out or sell it.
The best option would be to let it out and get loads of money for it but of course I'll have to square things with the Mortgage company Nationwide. So I'm off at lunch time to set up a meeting and take some advice.

Ideal would be yes you can take out 7 grand to cover the ski course (remind me to explain about that!) and take a 3 month payment holiday and let me let out the flat while I'm away.

I've been overpaying the Mortgage for the last couple of years by 400 a month so that should give me some lea way to deal.

Currently I've just finished a two year +0.09 base rate tracker so I need to sort something out as I'm paying 20quid extra a month just for being on the banks base rate.

D

A Start

Well here it is another attempt at blogging to join the million others out there. I have high hopes for this blog, that I may even post to it more than once. It could end up like those diaries you start on holiday in a brand new exercise book which you find ten years later with a single entry in it, but hopefully it won't!!

Anyway the real reason I'm doing this is to record what is happening to me at the moment and what will happen to me over the next couple of months. You see the thing is I'm planing to make some major changes in my life and I will have a lot of things to sort out and decide