Sunday

A hair cut and then down to catching up with some more work I am behind on. It is a bit of a nightmare as I need to get a lot done and have taken my eye off the ball. I need to get some printing sorted out and a load of forms etc.

I should have done these a few weeks ago but starting the job and the Tribunal sort of pushed all this lot to one side. Plus not being around for last weekend much didn't help.

I'd better get on.

Brain Meltdown

Today - I have read about 120 pages of documentation, speed read 5 books and started putting together the plan for communications for when the boss gets back. I am absolutely spent. I have just been sitting in the library and here reading my way through and the poor old brain is in meltdown at the moment.

Anyway, that is no bad thing and at least I am getting up to speed with a bit more on marketing and PR. I understand the basics and have done a fair amount in that area but wanted to make sure that I had considered all the angles prior to publishing my ideas.

I managed to complete a regulatory project this week as well and so I am very satisfied with the week's work.

I feel very well and I am glad that I didn't go up to town today as it meant I could spend a lot of time just reading and not being in an office getting disturbed.

The weekend is catch up time as I have to get a load of personal and Masonic stuff sorted out.

Confirmation

That is good - confirmed appointments at the Hospital so at least I can get that sorted out. I can plan what I am doing now and get myself planned out and set up for it.

Another good day today and quite a lot more achieved. Research tomorrow is the name of the game. I've done a lot of sales type activities in my time but not a great deals of customer retention work which I need to swot up on tomorrow.

Right, I ought to go and get changed as I am due out in about an hour.

Catching up on my workload

It is amazing how quickly I have gotten behind on my internal workload. I will need to sort that out this weekend.

I actually have a part day tomorrow and plan to do some research on Friday meaning I won't be in the office so that will be good.

Today I sat in on one of the decision making committees which was very interesting. I am working on some interesting policy stuff too and thoroughly enjoying it still.

I'm a bit concerned that I haven't heard back from the Hospital to confirm my appointment and assessment. That is only a few weeks away! I have dropped them a note and hope that I get something back soon.

I'd like to thank

The criminal mastermind who drove into my car today. Luckily no one was hurt but a car being pursued by the police glanced off the side of our car at speed. I wasn't in it C was driving and I was on my way home from work. Well, at least no one was hurt.

Work was good again today - I nearly worked way past the end of the day! Luckily someone packed up across the way and I looked at my watch I was well away on this job I am doing

Still enjoying that and really getting to grips with it all now. I may even get to remember some more names soon.

The Difference in just a week

I am amazed how much better I feel this week. I hadn't realized quite how wound up I was about the case and the way that the other lot behaved. Mind you, I have had a chance to rationalise that now and so it is in the past. Win or Lose they haven't got the money to pay either way. I really hope that one of the other guys steps up to the plate and winds them up - that way all hell can break lose.

I've learnt a lot about greed and selfishness these past 6 months. It amazes me that it was less than a year ago I set out with high hopes only to have those dashed as they stumbled at the starting gate. The trouble was they though they were on the last lap and yet they hadn't got their track suits off by then. Blinded by the end result without any plan to get there - it is the sort of stuff that makes you squirm on Dragon's Den and yet they shot the messenger rather than face up to the reality of the situation. At least they told the Judge that the business was going to make millions and be wonderful even though this was the third time they had tried :-)

How I get the smile from my face I don't know!

3 am

Is when I finally got home. We ferried the Scottish lads back to their Hotel. It was a great afternoon and it looks as if it was a first for English masonry. We had Roast Beef and Haggis for the meal and then went on to a club to have a Harmony - which was a series of songs and jokes with ample beers and Whisky being drunk in between.

All very nice and they were a lovely bunch of guys. I certainly needed the rest of the day "off" and I am off to bed now as I need to start early in the morning. I will start my first full week tomorrow and I am looking forward to getting going on that.

Big Difference

In me. Much happier and feeling good about myself. Work agrees with me and the jobs I have to do are great and varied and interesting.

The people are really friendly and aren't greedy and there is no "corporate silliness" going on.

I am glad the other nonsense is over too. I need to decide what to do about the debts the company is owed - I need to talk to my accountants about that too. Hopefully I can draw a line in the sand with that one and move on. I really hope that the business gets liquidated as that will finally get them reported and let the scale of the debts come out. At the moment they are not reporting the money they owe to me as creditor. That is false accounting in my book.

So apart from that everything else is cool./ I am off this afternoon to go and see a Scottish Rite Masonic meeting which I am looking forward to immensely as it will be the first time I would have witnessed that.

Tomorrow I shall just collapse and relax. It really does take it out of you having to work for a living :-) However, I have to say that I am now starting to feel really good about the job and some if the initial worries are over.

Enjoying my Job

Big Time!

Picked up an important review today - and they liked my first report. I really hope that they like my style - it is SO different to theirs and challenges accepted thinking. How nice to meet people who apologise that they found a typo in your work! The last lot would have had you hung drawn and quartered :-)

I can't even begin to tell you how pleased I am. I do have a problem in that I should be at my friends Dad's funeral tomorrow but cannot attend. It is my boss's last day and I need to pick up the reigns from him. They know it is important - very important as I just realised I haven't actually earned any money this year at all! Well I've earned it but not got paid it. a nil Tax return will be a first for me. C is taking my place and representing us both.

I'm really grateful to my friends for Tuesday night having to listen to me unleash my emotions for an hour or two. I find that I am not able to tell everyone of my problems unless they actually understand the issues I am talking about. At least I have some social interaction at work now!

Busy old day

I finally got my pass to get in and out of the building which is much better. I will be able to work a bit more flexibly then from now on. The routine is interesting and the same train there and back is also a bit alien to me.

I've run out of suits and ties - well I have hardly worn them for years.

Spoke to some friends today about "things" thought it was quite funny that the ex employers (alleged) are now going to be asking for a load of money up front, no return etc but they don't have any real documentation to back that up - most companies will run away when being asked for that level of investment. That is Dragon's Den stuff and if you took the worst person you ever saw on it and took their brain out and certified them dead - they'd probably still be rocket scientists compared to my lot.

Second Tuesday

We head off to the pub and meet with the old school chums! Old we are indeed now :-) In our early 50s well we are 50! Anyway - you now what I mean.

Had a nice call from a friend and he cheered me up as he said he hadn't seen me looking or sounding so well in years. Well - that lifted me even more. Today was good, I was really pleased with the reception I got at committee and my project is on the roll. I am really making an effort to get this right. It is very important to them (and me of course) that this goes off well.

As for my past, I am learning to put that behind me now and to get on with this opportunity.

The Dust Has Settled Now

I had to go out tonight and I feel surprisingly relieved of the weight of all of this. The evidence is given and they must have expended a fortune on briefs, copies of documents and everything else. I suppose they feel it was worth it. Not sure what all the other creditors are doing. I can't imagine they are waiting for me to give them a lead. One of them or all of them collectively needs to shut them down.

Anyhow, hopefully this is now gone away and win or lose it can be firmly put in a drawer or burnt.

It made me feel quite ill but I can see that go away now and can get on with something far more important - that of making a difference to underprivileged and distressed children. I have a committee meeting tomorrow which will "rubber stamp" my first project. I will be working on some major initiatives in the next 6 months and I am really looking forward to showing them what I can do and bring to the role.

What a day

What a headache just starting too. Got to the Station - arrived in time - got a ticket - the cancelled the Train due to the Snow. Had to get back out of the Station call C, half walked half ran home, got picked up and shot off. Managed to find a car park walked up the stairs - there was the Tribunal Offices - had made it before I would have by train and walking!

Large breakfast, they were delayed, then they wanted time and then, we started - not pleasant and all a bit confusing but think it went as well as expected but not know certain of the outcome as their brief was very good I thought. We sparred a bit but some stuff was way beyond my comprehension. There was some obvious left field stuff coming in and the old boss was there to taunt me but kept quiet and only sat in the corner and glared and glowered at me. Old trick meant to unsettle but actually did the opposite.

Anyway, we have to wait and see - perhaps for up to 4 weeks for a ruling. It was made very complicated due to the other relationships that were around at the time.

So, I can close the door on this apart from it took all day to do this. Anyway, home now, one major worry off my chest, had my day in court and let the Judge decide. I probably wouldn't have got much satisfaction anyway. Mind you it must have cost them a fortune in documents, files, fares and a brief for all day. So there is a cost I doubt they can afford unless funded by other means.

Back to real and meaningful work tomorrow. A real job and my first committee meeting too. Looking forward to that immensely.

Wound UP all day

We awoke to Snow - we hadn't gotten finished from the party to 2:30 or so in the morning. I was shattered and have spent a lot of the day refining and revising my Tribunal stuff. I feel really rough - nerves are a terrible thing even if I feel that I am right, I don't fancy sitting there and listening to the two Witness statements they have provided they are pretty disgusting but I hope the Tribunal will pick up on the facts of the case.

I have no doubt that I will feel a lot better this time tomorrow.

The snow has melted - I hope it keeps away tomorrow I don't want to have any excuses to have to go through all of this lot again.

At last

After 15 months or more trying to sort out these accounts I found where I had made a mess of them last time, altered that which nicely rippled through and meant this year's accounts balance too. Thank goodness for that - I have those ready for audit now.

The Tribunal is on for Monday - more paperwork arrived this morning that they issued yesterday - I have no idea what they think they are doing issuing it this late? Absolutely crazy and not relevant either. It will be interesting but a little annoying too that this has to proceed but I suppose that is the way of things. We shall see what the Tribunal make of all of this irrelevant stuff. The case is quite straight forward and buying something you cannot afford and saying after you have it that you aren't going to pay is hardly a defence. Oh well, at least I don't have to say that to the Judge!

Mind you it is all pretty bizarre behaviour as they must have spent as much on the solicitor as they would have spent to settle in the first place.

Seriously this is doing my head in

Accounts. Now I have been doing what I call contract accounting for years and I can do project accounting budgeting and just about everything else, IRR, NPV and all that good stuff but can I work out a balance sheet? Not on your life! I ave just been through my accounts and they look fine as I can account for every penny in and out but can I get the balance sheet to balance? No way!

I think I am going to have to admit defeat and let an accountant look at the figures so that they can show me where I have gone wrong. I wonder if I made a mistake on the accounts a year back and I have pulled it through with these accounts?

It is too late now - I am going to bed retiring hurt :-)

Oh well

Home - early day on Friday which is nice. Gets me home ahead of the traffic and rush hour. No word about the Tribunal so looks as if I will have to attend that on Monday - I could have done without that but I am making the right impression at work and so far they can see some results coming through and are beginning to get a flavour of the sort of things I can do. It isn't great timing of course. I hope that they have a good argument for having put the first hearing back as it will be (I think) a straight forward case no matter what they say.

Tomorrow is As 18th Birthday party and we are hoping that we will have a lovely evening. A bit worried about the number of 18 year olds there and not many places will take them for obvious reasons.

She appeared to have a good day yesterday - now she can vote and go to the pub! Amazing - she hasn't taken me to the pub yet though!!

The Dreams

How strange it is - noticing that I fall asleep easier, have pleasant dreams and feel a lot better in myself. It feels good so far but I am pretty tired. I need to get some work done tonight as I have been tied up these past few days and unable to get onto these figures.

I can't work out how I have managed to increase the balance at the Bank and yet cannot make the balance sheet show that? It is one of those things that I really never did understand and I've already said to these guys that they need to relieve me of the job as soon as they can as I find it difficult to do. I'm normally quite good at most things and I'm quite OK with figures but I am afraid that balance sheets leave me cold.

Shaken to my core

I really have been shaken by the revelations of the way people treat each other but more especially their children.

As a children's charity you expect to have cases of hardship and tragedy. I hadn't realised that people would treat their children so badly. It has come as a shock to me what people find acceptable. It puts my own horror at my previous employer's behaviour into context. My goodness, they are amateurs in the scheme of things I have read in the past few days.

Don't get me wrong - I am more convinced now than ever that I am going to make a difference here.

I was out tonight at a Jazz night - it has been 20 years since it started and I have been going almost all f that time. A lady walked in with headscarf, no eyebrows and the obvious signs of Radio/Chemo - we chatted and she had just completed her course. I said "This is what living looks like" - then sort of said "well kind of - you wouldn't want to look like this!. I think she understood what I meant. She came out and wore her headscarf with pride. We agreed that we were fighters. I like the Esprit de Corps you get with cancer. If you haven't had it you probably wont get it.

As a further aside, my dreams are back in full flow and they are generally hopeful and pleasant. I haven't had that sort of dream for perhaps 18 months or more. I can't even begin to tell you what a relief it is to have dreams that settle me down and don't upset me!

I think I am beginning to enjoy my job and the responsibility to perform its duties.

How was it for you?

Well - pretty harrowing really. I spent most of the day running through a series of case studies that can only be called pretty distressing at the least. It is a lovely place to work - great people as you would expect.

I did a number of early bits of work on the cases studies which certainly made me consider what we were all really there for. I ended up getting home late as a friend called me on the way out and we had a few beers on the way home. I got home gone 9 which considering I left the office at about 5:20 was some one or two drinks!

Anyway - a different day to the one I was expecting but nonetheless, I did enjoy it and the day rattled past pretty quickly.