Freedom

I have almost left the building. I mean, Plymouth. Well, I've almost left the building in Plymouth.

What am I waffling about? Well, I am about to be homeless. My job contract ended last week and now my rental contract is up, so I am about to take off into the wide world and explore. I have a rental car, I have too much stuff as always, and I have nowhere I have to be and no one I have to please, so I'm going to float. Zen traveling. Well, almost. I have a date with a hostel in Exeter and a desire to see Bath before I might have to leave this country, so some time in the next week, I'll see those places.

But other than that - life is wide open. Scary. Fun.

Flat as a pancake

Sorry I haven't blogged lately. I've been really antsy. I learned, just prior to Christmas, (and what a wonderful Christmas present it was) that I probably wouldn't have a job come March.

My employer (Govt) is having to rationalise to pay for the bank bail out and so all external recruitment has been stopped and all agency contract will not be renewed. Which means me. It's nothing personal, I know they'd keep me if they could, but they can't.

I tried not to let this affect Christmas at home but I think it did. I wasn't as social as I could have been and I missed spending some quality time with my brothers which is a real shame. I just hope I didn't affect their enjoyment of the holiday - I'm so sorry if I did guys!

But ever since I got back, I've not been able to rouse enthusiasm for writing at all. We even had snow for a few days as I reported and I couldn't keep my joy in it alive for long enough to build a snowman which I have wanted to do for years.

I am down.

I hate job hunting and when you feel bad about yourself it's even harder. I've had all this positive feedback from work too - they like me and I like it here so it's doubly damning.

The job market really sucks in the UK right now too. I can guarantee I won't get another job in Plymouth so I'll have to move again.

It all just sucks lemons, so I'm grumpy and writing up-beat blogs is beyond me. Sorry guys. Hoping it will get better soon. Send me cyber hugs in the mean time please!

Yours in a puddle,
Kat

Heart Re-Start

I have a job. Finally, I actually have income. One day soon it'll even be more than my expenses! I won't be paid for another month yet, but I will be paid. I can breath again.

I'm not going to give details of the job here - that's bad manners - but I'm happy and they're a lovely bunch of people and the work should be interesting so all good.

And get this - the building I'm working in was built in 1722, which is 50 years before Captain Cook 'discovered' Australia. How cool is that?!?

A job finally...

I've got a temp position in Melbourne as a contractor again. Still no word on the visa. But at least I'll be earning above subsistance now. I'd never realised just how little money someone on the doll gets. It's scary. I'm not sure I'd be able to survive on it for long. Glad I don't have to now.

I've got a job, I've got a job, I've got a job...

Well, two weeks work at least. It will take the pressure off.

Boy, when the Universe decides to be contrary, it doesn't mess around! And I say a heart-felt Thanks to the Gods and All the Fates for that.

*deep breath in ... and let it all out*

Let it go. Let it out.
Let it all unravel.
Let it free and it can be
a path on which to travel
Michael Leunig

Maybe now I will finally relax.

Here jobie job job job....

...where are you? You silly little employment thingy...

The fates are now primed: I have just stated my intention to claim Newstart Allowance. In old-world parlance, I've applied for the doll.

Let's see what you make of That, Universe!

...well, it's worth a try.

The Dispossessed...

I am, for the first time since I started working, officially without job or home. I am living out of a suitcase. Bits of my life are strewn across the UK and all over Australia. Very odd, very scary feeling. Not sure I like this place.

On the up side, I keep discovering stuff I’ve left at Ali’s which I had forgotten I owned. Ugg boots, three pairs of sunnies, books, a full set of working rig and a weeks supply of casual cloths… luxury!

Will be going up to Canberra on Monday for a flying visit to pick up my degree certificate so I can apply for the damn HSMP. Will probably not have time to say hello though, so sorry about that, but my brother deserves as much time as I can give him. It was his 30th this year and I weren’t around. Gotta make up for that at least.

Last Day of Work

I have finished out my contract and have handed over to my replacement who is a lovely girl whom I'm sure will do well. So my time at the ** is now officially over. So yeah...

It feels wierd. I'm at a bit of a lose end and not just because I don't have a job to go to. I don't feel as if I am as upset as I somehow should be. Being a contractor, it was a lot easier to leave this position than any of my previous jobs, so maybe that was it. Somewhere, my brain is telling me it should have been harder or more emotionally difficult to lose a job, so it's currently a little non pulsed that it wasn't. But if this is the way of contracting, then I'm not that unhappy. Easy gets my vote. But still... it just doesn't feel right yet.

Ah well. So, now it's packing and then... Home James.

A day full of misery

My backside is sore from the number of times that I kicked myself yesterday. I knew that this whole experience was going to be much more intense that my previous life had been, and that for every euphoric high that I’d experience, there’d probably be a corresponding low of epic proportions, but I had forgotten this fact in the general enjoyment I’ve been having lately. Well, yesterday I hit a rather large stumbling block and ended up drowning in my own misery.

First I stuffed up at work. Now I don’t usually get that upset with myself about an honest mistake. I just apologise and fix it and move on. But this was a rush job, and I didn’t pay as much attention to it as I probably should have. It wasn’t a huge error, looking back at it now, but at the time I decided it was Karmic Retribution for my over-confidence of late and that it was the Biggest Disaster to Ever Happen To Me! I kicked myself soundly for a least an hour until I fixed the problem, and was forgiven for it by my lovely boss, but I felt as rotten as I could possibly feel. And it lasted all day. Everything I did thereafter went wrong. My programming failed, my numbers didn’t add up and my computer kept falling over. Something was out to get me. It just wasn’t my day.

I was so miserable, that I decided to go to the one location that always makes me feel better – a bookshop. I always feel very safe and at peace in a bookstore. There’s something about the way that the noises of the world disappear as you wander into a maze of shelving and fascinating titles, the hush that books inspire and the aura of quite contemplation, and the smell… that musty smell of libraries and old things… it’s like walking into a lovely memory. This wasn’t just any bookstore either. No, the Waterstones at Piccadilly Circus is the biggest bookstore in Europe and, although Richard had once taken me there after my job interview, I hadn’t recognised the significance of the location and so had neglected to go back. So I purposefully walked in the opposite direction to home to find solace in the biggest bookshop in London.

And it didn’t help.

I bee-lined strait for my favourite section – sci-fi and fantasy – in the hope of finding a particular book – the name of which I still can’t remember because I was startled to find Helen standing not five paces away. And because I was so miserable, and so intent on this book, which I had promptly forgotten the name of, I didn’t really say much, and so she left. It took me about 10 seconds after she’d gone to come to my senses and run after her, but she’d vanished. I tried phoning her, but got no answer. I was doubly annoyed with myself, as I really could have used someone’s shoulder to cry on, so I went up to reference and sat amongst the books on how to write, and cried in a bookshop for the first time I can ever remember. My solace was lost. The one place I’d always found comfort in before, and I was just as miserable in the bookshop as I’d been everywhere else. I sat on a footstool and pretended to read something, facing a corner, feeling like an absolute idiot, and trying not to get the books wet, for about 15 minutes.

It took another two hours and two Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe mysteries, Francis Hodgeson Burnett’s ‘Little Princess’, one of Foster’s Hornblower compendiums and the Neil Gaiman / Terry Pratchett ‘Good Omen’s’ book before I felt even half-way normal, and then I got buyers guilt. But I needed a pick-me-up, and a Pratchett is always a good pick-me-up, but spending two and half hours browsing in a bookshop is an even better one.

By the time I got home, I was so emotionally drained that I couldn’t face anything, and so said a regretful no to a games night at Richard and Hilary’s, earning myself another kick in the butt for saying ‘no’ to something which I’ve promised myself not to do this year, and went to bed… there to lie and think and think because of course I couldn’t sleep. Eventually the sandman came and ended the misery by committing my litany of woe to dreamless oblivion, thank the gods.

Today, I’m fine. Apparently, it was just one of those days.

What a silly girl am I

Cessation of Hostilities

I was walking home last evening (as I’ve done every night this week – I’m quite proud of myself!) and I realised something. I lacked the grip of a certain constant companion what has been perched on my shoulder ever since I arrived in this ‘ere country.

It was the absence of fear.

I am now comfortable in this city. I feel like I’ve been getting involved in a new relationship with all the anxiety and heartache, worry and nerves that this entails. And let me tell you, London can be an absolute bitch at times. She’s moody and grumpy and miserable, and although she’s quite a buxom wench, who enjoys her beer and a wide variety of cultural expressions, she can be very short tempered, pushy and occasionally downright mean. But this week, she’s been in a good mood. I’ve only seen one shower and we’ve had sun every day. I believe we now have a working relationship. We are civil to one another, have the occasional contretemps but also share a few laughs and I think occasionally she even likes me!

I’m finally getting used to the claustrophobia this city incites and the dance routine you have to engage in any time you walk down Oxford Street or Tottenham Court Road. People live so close together here that personal space is a non-existent thing. I’ve found it quite confronting to have people walk so close to me, treading on my heals, standing within millimetres, squeezing by me leaving a trail of their perfume / aftershave on my skin… I’m continually looking over my shoulder and hanging onto my bag for dear life. But today, one of the endless stream of magazine hawkers, charity scalpers, stinking beggars, free newspaper pushes, religions spruikers and scientology converts offered to hug me if I’d stop and talk to him, and he even tried… and I didn’t’ even bat an eyelid. It didn’t bother me. I laughed!

The job is going well too. The people are friendly and approachable, the work is interesting and I have as yet not managed to be bored once.

I have also landed on my feet in terms of flat mates. Not only does she share my love of films and television, but she likes Jane Austen as much as I do! And when I embarrassingly managed to kill her fern when she was away last week (most of the time I have green thumbs but I’m obviously not used to this silly hot/cold/dry/humid climate) she didn’t mind! She did a visual autopsy, pronounced the corpse to be indeed dead, and that was that. Wow. Someone as easygoing as I could ever wish for!

But most of all – and I suspect that this is the deal clincher – I got paid this week. What a relief. The fact that I have money coming in (even if it was only the first 2 ½ weeks worth) has made the world of difference. It wasn’t a million bucks, it was barely a thousand, but it was in the plus column in my bank account, and so was black and not red. I feel grounded and suddenly solid. I’m not going to blow away at the first hint of bad weather.

I have a job, I have a home and I have a town to call my own. I’m no longer at war with myself. I can say its ok – I did the right thing.

Alls well.

My Head Hurts!

After 6 weeks off, it really ain't fun being back at work! I'm exhausted and the only reason is that I am having to concentrate all the time. I have to THINK! Oh No! She's using her brain!

It's a good job though - it's definitely challenging, there is plenty of work, and it isn't boring ...but I am SOOOOO Tired!

I don't much like being homeless though. Trying to find a house is just not something I can put a lot of energy into right now and it is something that requires a lot of energy here. One needs to be bright and bubbly when meeting potential housemates... which I just can't do! :s

Grr Argh ... *sigh*

The Beginning of the End...or the End of the Beginning?

Today and tomorrow are my last two days of Freedom. The end of my holidays and the beginning of a new career as a GIS Consultant - I have a job! But as I haven't received the contract yet, and I am supposed to start on Wednesday, I'm a little dubious as to the validity of the position it must be admitted! Anyway, I can hope - I have a starting time at least. Yay for me! I won't get paid until August though, so it won't seem quite real to me until then I don't think. Actual Pounds. Wow. Will be able to buy stuff... Mmmm... Stuff...

In the mean time I am looking for a place to live - which is proving more difficult than I had anticipated. This is more due to fact that I need to get my head around the amount of money I'll have to pay for accommodation (which is truly frightening!) and the difficulty of finding compatible housemates (people I can actually converse with in a language I speak) on the right tube line (so I can get into work in under an hour - honestly, it would be quicker to walk from some places!) and not within a neighbourhood which scares me silly (and there have been a couple I would just not feel safe living in) than actually finding a place because there seem to be loads...but then appearances are deceiving here. The process is interesting none the less.

I also visited some lovely places on the weekend. I went to the Borough Market with Richard on Saturday which was amazing - so many different vegetables! I hadn't seen a good majority of them in the flesh before, only on TV, so I was feeling very privileged to be able to touch and taste them -I wanted to buy samples of everything just so I could try them! I also got very wet for my first time in this country, as it absolutely poured with rain, so I feel like I've had a baptism of sorts and can feel myself truly introduced to England! I then visited Sarah and David (family friends) on Sunday and walked around Marylebone, visited the Farmers Market there and walked around Regents park (absolutely gorgeous!), and had tea in a lovely little cafe in the middle somewhere. So I'm now feeling more at home in this place. Have caught up with almost everyone I know here, but still have plenty of things I want to do, so it is all good.

So, all in all, I am quietly happy. I am scared of not finding a place and apprehensive about work and worried about money but I am also excited about visiting all the bookshops on Charring Cross Road, and amazed at being able to go to a different musical every week of the year and not repeat myself, and in awe that I can buy a ticket to go to Berlin next weekend if I so choose... I know for sure and certain that I am alive. And this is very, very good!

Stasis Leak

A report apropos of nothing.

I am still alive. I am job hunting. I am not doing much else. I am in stasis until I get a job.

Until I get the job, I can't get a house. Until I get a house, I can't acquire more clothing because I can't carry the stuff I have already. Due to my inability to carry more, I have to do laundry more frequently, as I don't have enough casual clothes to carry me through a week. So my impact on London's limited water supply, and hence the Environment, is much greater even though I have virtually nothing. And please don't mention to me the weight of books. I am desperate to expand my library - my comfort and my constant companions - but I can't carry OR afford any more. Although, truth to tell, I am not sick of living out of a suitcase yet. Probably because I have somewhere I can leave it in safety. Thank you Richard and Hillary.

But in the mean time, my lack of permanence is curiously disturbing and yet it isn't. I feel free and constrained at the same time. It is liberating to feel that I can decide to go to Bristol tomorrow if I wish, and have no responsibility to anyone or anything. But I am edgy because I have no stability.

My stasis is leaking... I want to be doing something, or being somewhere or acquiring anything rather than waiting around for someone to give me a job. Grr! Argh!

Things are looking up...

I'm having an strange sense of deja'vu but for the life of me I can't figure out where I may have been in a similar situation... hummm?

Anyway, as the title suggests, things are definitely looking up. I have an interview on Wednesday for a job here (if, that is, the ruddy recruiter comes through - have been having problems with that guy), and potentially another interview for a job in Soho London sometime next week. And I've had bites from other recruiters too, so I'm feeling happier about the whole job thing now. My hostel has become friendlier too - have met a couple of the inmates (one from Norway, another from Poland), and have established connections. My room is called Addictions and my bed is called Drugs... their way of identifying who is where. Rather amusing! I think I am also getting better, which always improves one's mode - was quite depressed the last two days. But everything is brighter when you're healthy.

I did manage to get on a couple of the Buses - and saw a goodly portion of the city. We drove past the Castle, The Palace of Holyroodhouse (a Royal Residence), the Royal botanical gardens (which I want to go back and visit when it's warmer - looked absolutely lovely!), the new Parliament building, Sir Walter Scott's Monument (which I climbed this afternoon - 287 spiralling steps up to a wonderful panoramic view of the city), The Royal Britannia Yacht, Arthur's Seat and the Salisbury Crags, as well as numerous churches and museums. And I discovered why this town is so steep - it's built on a ruddy extinct volcano! The main street, called the Royal Mile, is built on an old lava flow, and the castle is situated on the central plug - but then I've also heard it said that Arthur's Seat, which is the highest hill around here, is also a plug, so I'm not too sure of my facts there.

It is unfortunate that the bus goes so quickly that you really don't have time to take photos. If I want to capture what I've seen, I'll have to walk there. And at the moment, walking would be a recipe for pneumonia, as it is much too cold for my cold. I went and sat in the upstairs, outside part of one of the tour buses for about half and hour - and even my hair became cold, so I gave up and stayed inside. I have taken photos from the top of Scott's monument, which I won't be able to upload until I get my laptop back, but when I do, you'll at least be able to see some of the city through my eyes! But the rest will have to wait until I'm either better, or it gets warmer.

Yes, it is summer here, and yes, it is colder than even the locals were expecting. I went on the hunt for gloves and a hat yesterday, asking at almost every department store and woollens shop I could find, and I came across no less than three sales assistants unhappy because they didn't sell them - because they wanted them too! I finally discovered a hat in a warehouse, and some gloves at an upmarket boutique. So, I am now warm, but definitely marked as a tourist, as everyone else insists on being hardy and cold. Ah well.

I am now going to let the fates decide whether I stay here or go back to London. If I say either way, I think that Murphy might intervene, and I'd prefer him not to. Here's hoping it warms up over the weekend!

Sunny London... what?

Ok, so it was raining all last week pretty much, but I was rather ill and so couldn't go out, so rain was fine with me. Now that I'm all better, it's sunny again, and I really don't believe in karma, but I do believe someone out there is feeling friendly-like towards me... having said that of course, it will now start raining and be miserable. Murphy's law and reverse psychology can always be depended on to work just when you don't want them to. Although why I would want it to rain again has me puzzled - something to do with residual Australian water-hoarding tendencies perhaps?

Talking about reverse psychology, I'd like to bring you all up to date on my future activities, just because I can. My intention is to meet up with Sally and her sister by Tuesday of this week (CALL ME!!!), and go off to Poland for a week of Tourism. We're to go to a friend of Sally's wedding, and the Salt Mines there which are supposed to be spectacular as well as to Auschwitz. Why Auschwitz? Well, my reason for wanting to go to the camp stems back to my trip to Washington several years ago and my visit to the Holocaust museum there. Which I would highly recommend to anyone who is in Washington. It was incredible. But it is the only museum at which I have ever cried, and so moved me that I want to know more. I've always had a fascination with history - albeit a skewed one and generally more geared towards masonry, swords and armour than actual events - but the Holocaust has gripped me to such a degree that I want to go and witness where such an atrocity took place. So, an appalling and sobering trip that will be I'm sure.

However, and getting back to the point about reverse psych, I have then (from the 12th of June) lined up a trip to go to Edinburgh in Scotland. I want to see the castle and the town up there, so I've booked a train ticket and a Backpackers hostel. I've also been madly applying for jobs, so far unsuccessfully, but I'm hoping that since I've arranged to go to Scotland, a job will suddenly come up in London for which I am qualified and for which they want a lovely Australian holiday maker - ie me - to start as soon as possible. Hence forcing me to give up the Scotland trip (Murphy in action) but gaining me a job (the psych thing)... well, I'll live in hope at any rate!

But in the mean time, I still have a couple more days in Sunny London, so am going to have another crack at Portobello road, which I visited last Wednesday (in the rain), and found it empty - the market only functions on the weekend apparently - very disappointed. And hopefully, if Sally or Kirsten ever get in touch with me, I'll be going out and celebrating Sally's 30th with them. We were going to go and see Wicked the musical... so where are you Sally?

Anyhoo, will write again soon if I'm able. Must remember to give you all a list of where I've been so far too - have seen lots of famous sites around London so far! Very cool. But until then...

Hopeless Strikes Again

Well... I think I did warn you all that I was an absolutely hopeless correspondent - anyone who knows me knows this at any rate. So I've not been keeping up with this blog and I'm already 10 days or so into the trip.

But never mind - I am now in London - day three, or rather night three right now. I have spent today in Job-hunting mode as yesterday was all about tourist stuff (also because, due to yesterdays excessive walking, I now have blisters on my blisters!) and I may actually have a job opportunity. I missed out on one due to lack of Internet... and when did getting a job depend entirely on your access to the web??? But the very nice man at the recruitment agency emailed me after our conversation and let me know of another - in Cardiff. That's in Wales for the uninitiated. Could be quite fun. The plan was, that if I fail to get a job before going to Poland with Sally, I would make my way up to Edinburgh and try to get a job there. I would at least get to see some of the country that way. But maybe instead of Scotland, I will see Wales... nothing is happening quite as I expected it to on this trip.

My only activity for today was an orientation session with a company called 1st contact, who are hopefully going to help me set up a bank account - a process which has hairs on it here - and gave me all sorts of useful information and websites to look for jobs and housing on. I was quite happy to have been introduced to the service let me tell you.

But I have loads of stuff I haven't blogged about - so let me end this blog and go backwards and hopefully catch up on the first half of the trip....