A year ago and an interesting review

I looked back at my posts from a year ago. My - life was different then. I was having sleepless nights, wasn't particularly right physically and was wondering about 2007 and what I was going to do.

The year has been great really - soured by recent goings on but other than that to have the clear announcement really is the best thing that could have happened. Sure, getting the insurance money was a bonus too and that just allows us to consolidate everything. Heaven forbid that this comes back - but unfortunately it can - and we have to be ready for that, but at the moment, I've got the all clear. I know a lot of people who would rather have that than the position they are in now.

I think that after a year I have changed. I am not sure I like myself as much now as I feel that I am being more selfish than I ever was in the past. I've always gone out of my way to give my time and help people and I find myself holding back these days and not offering to help as much and taking more of a back seat. I don't like doing it but feel I must. Some of my relationships with friends are being strained - it could be me, work or just that this is the collateral damage I always thought would happen as I turn into a "cancer warrior"? A guy I know who survived cancer welcomed me to the "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen" the other day. The survivor's bond is a strange fellowship. Those who haven't had cancer probably wont "get it". A friend who almost died from DVT did get it... I don't suggest you try it unless forced to!!

I still can't quite come to terms with things at the moment. I do feel that now is a major turning point as the business (not mine) crashes down and self destructs around me. Someone suggested teaching - I am looking at becoming a lecturer and I am waiting to hear more about that. I fancy historical and family research to be the thing that I would like to do in the net 10 years. It isn't going to make me rich though but then again, the last venture was going to do that and never did.

You have to kiss a lot of Frogs until you find a Prince!

You don't know how lucky you are

A true statement I find. Someone know just had their daughter die - taken ill one day, dead the next Another person, got the news that their cancer has spread.

A healthy dose of reality is needed occasionally to re-focus my mind onto important things. We all make the mistake of thinking that sometimes trivial things are important when perhaps, it isn't those we should be concentrating on. I don't know many people who can live that way - I don't and yet I have enough reminders to make me do so.

Perhaps my mid life crisis or knowing what is right and resisting changing to follow what I should be doing?

The case of the missing "S"

I hope to soon have a new keyboard. This one has a sticky "S" and it doesn't always work properly meaning I have to go back and edit my posts (or pots). So if something has looked strange these past 4 weeks or so - now you will know what it is.

I have a new keyboard on order.

I have just had to invest in a new printer. This new printer has cost me less than the purchase of 2 of the 4 required cartridges for my old printer. It is cheaper to buy a completely new printer and run that than to use the old one - which at two years old has now had its day! I'm not sure how environmentally friendly that is but commercially it makes sense for me to replace this new printer after the second set of cartridges I put into it. I hasten to add that these are laser printers, ink jets cost far more to run. I also get cash back on the purchase of my new printer meaning that it cost less than £150 to get a really decent colour duplexing laser printer! Amazing!

Tidying up my mind

Needs to be done. I have so much stuff buzzing around that I need to get rid of all of the past stuff and give myself room for the new stuff.

The new ideas for next year are formulating in my head now and I need to spend time testing my assumptions and the market to make sure that they are indeed viable and that I am not kidding myself that a market exists for my services when it may not do.

On the health front I met up with some people that I hadn't seen for ages and everyone said how well I looked. I suppose that is true. I do feel remarkably well these days.

The stress of the past months is going away a bit but it remains to be seen quite what the business decides to do as whether or not I get paid will materially depend on whether or not they continue trading.

Leave it out and leave me alone

After giving me such a hard time and even publishing one of the worst personal attacks I have ever read, today I get a phone call in which they are trying to pave the way for me to come back to the table and start negotiating again????

Are these people insane? The biggest difficulty with these things is that you can never get a clear break from things. I am actually trying to get the hell away from it all before it explodes. I am also trying desperately to get that space you need between the disappointment of one thing and to give me the time to get enthusiastic about the next thing I want to do. Constantly having reminders about what should and should not have happened - it is all a bit too late for that.

Apparently the deadline has been extended to this Friday for a decision. Perhaps after that - the thing can die and everyone else can move on.

Two days and no posts

Stunning. I did get away from it this weekend and feel a bit better for that. I am trying to leave the last couple of months worth of trouble behind me and we were out on Friday and it was my wife's birthday yesterday so we did nothing - no work, no cooking or anything just had a lazy day.

It was tempered by news of a friend whose daughter died unexpectedly last week, taken ill on Wednesday, died on Thursday of bacterial meningitis. An awful tragedy as she was quite young. That put it all back into perspective for me on Saturday morning after not having the best of weeks.

Work can go to hell as far as I am concerned - and they probably will this week by the looks of it. The cold sweat of just how deeply in trouble they are is dawning on them. In an attempt to shoot the messenger and have a go at me, the management (although I doubt you would call it that if you met it) have managed to drive people that they need away from the negotiation table and send them scurrying off to the hills. I have to sit back now and watch it happen, I have written off getting any money back and I'm sure not going to get any of the time back!

Time - that is the thing that has been giving my mind such a work out. I wondered why I was so angry about everything and it is that - someone has wasted 7 months of my time when I could have been doing something more important, constructive, enjoyable etc.

Give it a rest

I certainly intend to do that this weekend. Tonight we are off to a Black Tie do locally and the menu looks great - well it isn't Christmas Fare!

Champagne reception and wine included I am looking forward to spending some quality time amongst friends. Apart from the Christmas festivities themselves - I am out next Monday and that is my lot.

Today I have been working out what I want to do next year and have started gathering detailed information to work out a business plan. I'm not going to say too much about it right now. It is something that I have always wanted to do. If I can make money doing it and, I might even be able to get an academic qualification on the back of it too, I shall be delighted. It would satisfy my want to follow a more controlled and academic career - one perhaps I should have followed from school days. That is a long story too. Anyway, let's see how the number crunching and business plan turn out.

So back to tonight - just about to go and get ready and then a relaxing evening, nothing to do tomorrow except write cards and start the winding down process.

So this new job

I think it needs to have nothing at all to do with medicine or anything (you know) downstairs :-)

I suppose I could go and work in a shop - but unsuspecting Joe Public and I would come to blows over some sort of trivia I have no doubt.

I think that I still have too much pent up anger to do anything in customer relations or help desk or anything like that.

Philanthropy probably wont pay the bills.

Journalism? Possibly - I don't like the way I write particularly but I could perhaps change that?

Go back to being an Electrician - my - I wonder if I could even remember how to do that after all these years? Good tradesmen are always difficult to find.

Oh well - I imagine that all of this will shake itself out in the next few weeks. I grow tired of corporate incompetence and all the self serving, self centred, ignorant and dangerous people. The good bit? I have met some really nice people with great ideas, strength and enthusiasm and we have had a good laugh along the way as well. A silver lining in that amongst all the greed and excesses of human behaviour these guys were beacons of humanity.

I have found it, if I cannot be chief test pilot for Mother Care then I could perhaps be head of Quality Control at a Brewery? Nice job....

Looking forward

I am trying to get away from all this nonsense but keep getting dragged back - I suppose that the reality is that I can walk away but the idiots who remain need to have a go or keep throwing rocks at me. The sooner they sort themselves out (next Monday I believe) the sooner they can move on and I can.

I intend to keep an eye open for the next few weeks and see what transpires and then to perhaps completely change my profession next year. I'm getting far too old for all this constant hassle and ego games that appear to take the place of business acumen and sense. It wears me down and I neither want or in fact deserve any of it.

So, what to do? It has to be something pretty neutral and that pays the bills. I fancy doing research or something totally different - I'm fed up of having to sort out problems (I've been troubleshooting for 30 years) and no matter what I do - people are stupid enough to get themselves into bother even when you tell them how to get out of it or tell them not to get into it in the first place.

So perhaps chief test pilot for Mother-care or something similar may be worth trying for?

Awake

It wasn't quite how I planned things. I decided that I ought to go to bed early and so get some sleep and just make a break of things. Overnight roadworks did it for me! Pneumatic hammer going off well into the early hours of the morning and next to no sleep for 4 hours.

At least I managed to rationalise yesterday's news and sort out a way forward from there.

I think I will give going up to London a miss this afternoon as it looks as if the roadworks will be back and also I am tired enough as it is this morning.

Now the truth comes out

The end game indeed - these guys are now not going to pay for any of the work I did.

At least I can get the hell out of it now and start to sort my life out. I think that they might have made a wrong choice deciding to not pay anything. We shall see how big their lawyers are I suppose.

Hardly worth holding my breath for

The much awaited "way forward" from the business arrived and addresses none of the major issues nor the short term cash flow problems and dresses up and spins its way around using words like "key to our success" but never quite explaining how that would be achieved.

It looks as if the business will continue but it will stagger towards its goals and never be fully comfortable with itself nor be able to function properly given the way it now presents itself. Most investors will, I am sure, move away and go and do something else. I'm not fussed either way now. I've gone past the caring bit and am almost past the worrying part too now.

Someone said that "I didn't need this given all the things that had happened to me" - maybe that is true but it has taken my mind off things. What I am happy about is that I have met a lot of interesting people whilst doing this and I am going to look forward to working with them in the future.

I think the next few days will see the levels of apathy increase (if that can actually happen of course!!) the investors are drifting away now and the end game is truly in sight as those with the money leave and those who have already invested and have sunk cost brace themselves for the storm coming. Cash is king in these situations and many people have to consider digging deeper into their pockets to maintain their investment - not nice.

Time to move on and 2008 looks to be an interesting year. I can look forward to building on a foundation of steadily improving health and can invest my time into projects and opportunities that I want to be involved in.

Fatigue and combating it

I was speaking to someone yesterday who reckoned that I was suffering from what some might call a sort of post traumatic stress syndrome. well I suppose that could be true. I think it is a combination of things and one of them is the utter relief of the outcome of the cancer clear prognosis. I hadn't considered how much you fight this thing mentally until I thought about what she said to me.

I have often said that you need to use your mind to help you and that it was always two battles. The mind is powerful and if you can imagine that there is a constant dialogue going on about whether or not you feel up or down, accept or deny what is happening, psyche yourself up or down to take good or bad news etc, you must be using up massive amounts of your reserves to fight your cancer with your mind. Additionally lets consider the physical side too.

I'm a relatively fit 50 year old and have been doing some exercise but - the impact on your body isn't one of wasted muscles and can't really be seen - they certainly stir up you insides around your bladder area. I'm sure that your whole balance is shot to pieces and with Immunotherapy actually making your body fight the cancer (or keep it away) the other areas of your body are totally out of balance with that.

Anyway, I am coming to the conclusion that at the end of this week I am switching off and I am going to take some more time for myself. I am sure that all I need is to turn off the computers, get my walking boots on and enjoy some of the local countryside, a few pints of real ale next to an open fire and also to get into the Christmas mood too.

It isn't easy to switch off but it is something I must do.

The 2nd Christmas Lunch

Out of the way - we had a lovely time and it really was a good meeting with over £1000 raised for charity as well.

My third in as many days awaits later today and it will take my mind off of the disappointment of the past few weeks with the job.

We might actually know later on today what they are going to do about things.

Tired and Weary

It is amazing just how tired I am feeling. I am absolutely certain that this is the the relief of the situation and the job and everything else all coming to roost.

I want to get on and do things and I am dragging myself around to do other things as well. I could sleep for a week but I am not sure it would sort this malaise out.

I am going to try and come to terms with this down the week.

A Good Day

Despite the rain which fell down as I was half way to the station. Despite that I did have a great time. The icing was to win the raffle - I won a gallon of Whisky - 4.5 Litres! I was pretty impressed with that - it should provide me with headaches for many years to come!

I managed to catch the second to last train home and there was hardly anyone on the train and the rain has stopped by the time I got home.

I am feeling a little tired now though - We are off out for Christmas meal number 2 in a few minutes. I have another one tomorrow! Three in three days - I will be sick of the sight of Turkey by Christmas.

However, I need to work on this fatigue - I am certain that it is the job and the worry of it all. Time off - that is what is needed.

Rain and Public Transport

Annoying is what it is. I live a fair way from the station and today, of all days, no one is around to drop me off to the station and the rain and wind are coming in. It is just typical!

So - that said - I hope to arrive not too much like a drowned rat to what is always a lovely Christmas meeting and just relax for the afternoon.

It doesn't matter how much I convince myself that work doesn't matter I still keep thinking about it so I do hope that I can lose myself this afternoon and not worry about it.

Lunch and onwards

My friend and I had lunch today and hardly talked about our health - which is great as we talked about work and futures and other things and at last I felt good again. I feel sick to my stomach over the business side of things as it look totally shady and dodgy to me now.

Not to worry too much about it I can get on and do something else now. I have almost decided that unless there is some compelling event to make me want to stay there that I shall move on and do something different. I have the diary from hell for the next week. I am actually out every day except Wednesday! A lot of that is at Christmas events. I start tomorrow with a Lodge meeting, then a family lunch on Sunday, another Lodge meeting on Monday, out with school chums Tuesday, Wednesday is a rest day - Thursday is with some old work colleagues and Friday is a black tie do locally. I also have a meeting on the 17th to go to as well. The trouble is I may not make something else I have planned that evening.

At least it will take my mind off of my present troubles.

Tired and Fed Up now

I'm getting mighty fed up with the uncertainty of the situation with work at the moment. Every time they attempt to "communicate" they make things worse. Divide and Rule and blatant self protection are key components of their strategy (if indeed they have one).

All this does is make everyone more anxious and it wears me down as I get no nearer to finding out if they will pay me or indeed whether they have the ability to pay me. They are a little perplexed why I don't appear to be wanting to do any work at the moment? Working with amateur and little people wasn't where I wanted to be but here I am and like many I am pretty annoyed that they can't deal with the situation they got themselves into.

I hardly need the pressure and I am now working out ways to get on and do something else as I don't see much of a future there.

I said I'd give this venture 6 months and funnily enough at 6 months all looked great. It is less than 3 weeks ago that the business shot itself in the foot and brought itself to its knees. So at 7 months - perhaps the ideal is to get on and out of this and move on to something that I might enjoy and something that I can get on and do myself and not have to deal with amateurs.

I need to still work on how tired I feel - it is in no short measure due to me having to keep working through strategies for a business that - at the end of the day - looked at them and decided to take the illogical route out. I think they have caused me to lose enough sleep and caused me enough worry. I just need to go and take some rest and build myself up for something new in the New Year.

Tired

I am so tired. I have been yawning all day and just wanting to get to sleep. Unfortunately I cannot for the moment as I am waiting for a phone call and a delivery. The last thing I need to do is miss either.

I'm guessing that this is the culmination of the past month's stresses and strains and - it wouldn't surprise me - if it was also something to do with the great relief that not having cancer means. Perhaps you build up a level of stress or you are "fighting" by that I mean you are standing up to things mentally and physically and this may be a wave of relief as well as the reaction to the stress of the business over the past few weeks.

I will try and get some more rest and also to get away from thinking about work for a while. The fatigue is marked though, I really feel drained and so I suppose it is lucky in a way that I am not spending time on the road and driving around the country.