|
|
|
21/6/10 Canberra was cold and overcast today.
I got to drive myself to Wollongong (about an hr from Sydney) for a
regional meeting. Was following two
other cars with other co-workers in them – darn they drive fast!
I chose to drive alone – one for the experience (heck Rodney drives me
everywhere) & two just to think. Boy
does Gabe drive like a bat out of its cave & I was trying to follow her!
She “claims” that she was only doing 113K’s but I had to drive
120K’s just to keep up!!!! She
took us the “gentle” route. Hmmmm!!!!
The meeting was for work – primarily to let us know about the
restructuring that is going on. My
job is the only one that is safe right now – so guess if we go under, I’ll
be the one to turn the lights out and say goodnight.
Driving home was fun – NOT! I
didn’t follow anyone but let the GPS take me – so it took me the “tough”
route through Macquarie Pass which is a long curving road (some places are so
curvy that you can only go around at 15K’s.
At one spot there was a big truck coming towards me, so I moved over just
as close to the cliff as I could get to give him room to turn.
Was glad to get back on the highway again. Rodney’s day wasn’t really good either.
Remember Bob & Jen – Rodney’s boss?
We have known for a while that his position was going to become
redundant! Okay so this morning at
0900 – they called him to HR, gave him his package, escorted him back to his
desk, he packed his stuff and was escorted out!
No good-byes or anything. The
guys were pretty upset. They are
having an afternoon tea (meaning food & drinks) for him on Wed, so I may
have to go and pick him up. You know
how well he handles alcohol! It is
hard for all of them as they have worked for this man for 12 years. 22/6/10 Work was hectic today as I am trying to train one of our Youth Workers to do my job so I can go on vacation in two weeks (she has done Admin before) but it’s hard to put everything in an SOP as this job has so many distractions. Our new Acting Mgr came down late this afternoon, so it will be interesting to see how things pan out. Got the new washer – Yeah lots of different buttons to push instead of just 4 as on the old one. We’re moving on up! 24/6/10 Australia made history today by electing a woman as
Prime Minister. It’s all over the
news, etc. She has carrot red hair
(dyed) and speaks in a monologue, but is extremely smart.
I don’t understand all the politics here, but Kevin Rudd (former PM)
was ousted (kinda like impeached) and this Julia G stepped in.
The real election won’t be until later this year by the “people”.
So we’ll just wait and see what she can accomplish.
Weather is getting colder with possible snow. 26/6/10
Well this has been an interesting weekend so far.
Worked late last night as here it is the end of the fiscal year – Jun–Jul. Luv being finance – NOT!
We were supposed to go to Possum’s Nook for the horseback riding
weekend, but they had to cancel due to a death in the family.
I got the msg Friday morning at work – after all the luggage,
‘puters, etc. were in the car! That’s
okay as Rodney has another computer he can work with!
We had a team meeting today with the new Area Mgr (I do like her) and the
new Acting Mgr (Hase Elmasri) – different kind of person, fast talking, easy
going, young!, etc. Anyhoo – at
the team mtng we found out that LWB has been extended for 12 months and if we
can continue to show them that we can “take care of business” then we are
good to go. It was such a hectic
day. We, (Gabe, Liz, Chris, Esther,
Hase & I) went out for dinner and drinks.
It was okay. Chris (both in
mid-20’s) is getting married on Jan 1st and he and his fiancé are
virgins – Catholics. Nothing wrong
with that. BUT their counselling
pastor gave them a book to read from the ‘70’s.
Chris was driving as Jenny was going thru the book.
You know how Sydney driver’s are = he was looking to make sure he could
pass and she started laughing and reading some interesting stuff about after the
wedding – he looked at her and went “what?” then barrelled into the car in
front of him! I hope this statement
makes the censors as I’m really trying! Yes
I know – Rodney tells me how trying I am all the time. We have decided to celebrate my birthday on Wed cuz
we can go to the Weston Club, 1 free schnitzel w/a purchase, 1 free drink and
maybe win a meat raffle. Yeah!!!!
Vacation has been cancelled for about a month.
With the changes at both our works (Bob being redundant & new mgrs at
mine) we have decided it would just be easier.
My goodness I’m telling you more about my life then I’ve ever had!
The blunder bus is only half ready anyway.
The new washer is working well thou we discovered that if you put it on
full load it will take an hour to run so we have decided to use “quick wash”
which is 30 min. Boy putting clothes
on the lines is a pain in the arse. Australia
is a wonderful place to live but sooooooooo behind the times. 27/6/10 Can you believe that I turned 30 today again?
:>) Weather is still
beautiful, blue & cold. Still
doing laundry and putting out on the line. Rodney
just told me that by Wednesday the weather will be a max of 8c.
We decided to get out of the house for a while so went to the new
SupaBarn Warehouse by the airport (suppose to be like a Costco).
Ummm is lacking but new novelty for Canberra. 28/6/10 Well it seems that the darling little gray mouse that
we saw in the house (yes pun intended) has moved inside for good.
We don’t know if we have 1 or more mice.
I hope the one we found dead several months ago in the master bathroom
was the female! I don’t know if
you remember the old heater (never used) that was by the kitchen table – but
it seems that he/she/they have decided to use that as a ladder to the roof.
As my hearing is going bad, I can’t hear them running but Rodney says
he can at night and yes I’ve found mouse poo in some drawers & cupboards.
I guess it doesn’t help that white “dumb & stupid” has to be
fed inside so “big brown dog” doesn’t hog it all!
So I guess we are feeding them too? I’m
trying to convince Rodney to wait until we go on vacation in 3 weeks (we are
taking the dogs) to put out the rat poison so D&S plus BBD don’t eat it
too. But he swears we’ll be
invaded before then – hmmm will keep you posted.
Very cold here.
-2c tonight. Am going to be
working late this week cuz of the financial year end and other crap that is
going on. 29/6/10 Remember in the previous letter I mentioned that we
are going thru a restructuring and that Liz and Chris’s jobs were on the line
cuz National had decided that we only need one Care Coordinator?
Well the stress got to both of them.
Liz got sick and Chris started looking for other work – both had only
been in the company for about 18 months. Chris
started applying for jobs; found one, put in his resignation & received his
redundancy payment a couple of days ago. Gee
– National came down after that and said that they had made a mistake and they
need both positions as the Out of Home Care Mgr (Gabe) can’t handle it all!
Chris was soooo mad and I don’t blame him.
He was suppose to be in training this week in Sydney, but after he turned
in his resignation they pulled him back home.
So now we have no Chris as of next Friday, need to find a replacement (I
think National has decided to send a “temp” from another state) for him.
Megan, our previous Ops Mgr (whom we really respected) quit cuz after 2
years of fighting NSW that the ACT was different and had a different Gov’t to
work with – they are waking up cuz we lost the ACT contract!
Lots of negotiations, lots of big wigs coming to the office to talk to
this Gov’t, etc. What a mess!
Hey – again my job is the only safe one – Hmph!
So tomorrow we will have a team meeting (Gabe is picking up a cheese cake
for my birthday – morning tea – happy hip time) and hear the rest of the
poop (also got a box of small cinnamon dunots from Liz which didn’t last long
– not that I like them you know? Well not much more happening.
Dogs (are they? Okay BBD is) have been very disappointed so far this week
– ‘tis only Tuesday cuz we ran out of the most wonderful smelling marrow
treats – um NOT – okay for them, that we give them in the morning.
Kellie is really good about sitting and receiving his – um Angel, well
she is working on it. She is now a
yr old and people who haven’t met her reassure us that she’ll get smarter as
she gets older? Nope. Oh one more thing happened today – hey feel I gotta tell
you all – in one of our resident house (Kambah) the 4 kids have really been
having a heyday – drugs, alcohol, etc. Lot
of damage to the house – kicked in doors, stashes, etc – remember these are
kids that have no family to go too. Any
hoo there was a house meeting at work today (no more destructiveness pls) when I
came in with pocket money, movie tickets, etc.
TC – the leader of the crowd (sorry won’t mention names as is not
ethical) said to JK – “don’t mess with Julie as she lets me hold her blue
bear and she is nice (blue bear lights up with different colors and sits on a
chair in the reception area (Paul gave it too Rodney when I went to South Korea
for the Army several years ago so he had something to squeeze at night!).
JK said “I want to be mean!”. TC
said “Julie gives you your pocket money and she is nice so back off!”
Not sure if that was good advice but I handled JK okay and he did say
thank you when I gave the Youth Worker his money.
|