Friday 23rd July 2021

Another week nearly done.

It my last day of the week, and Jools' first day of the weekend. She is going to do yoga, then shopping, then a haircut, then swimming. She's busier on her days off than I am at work. Though don't tell my boss!

I am still stumbling about, while Jools has packed her bag with the gear she needs, empty shopping bags, shopping list, swimming stuff. I have found the coffee she made.

And she is gone.

I review parts of the interwebs, nothing much has changed. So much stupid in my country.

So, I go to work. I slide from one chair to the other, log on and wait for another IT update. And talking of IT, the issue I have been struggling with is ongoing. Clear the cache and history IT says.

I do, doesn't work. So, I have to update the IT report "ticket". I get to the page, type in my comments, press save and the page refreshed and my comment is gone.

I do this three more times, and with the same result. As you can imagine this did wonders for my mood.

There was the weekly COVID meeting, where my colleagues in India are upbeat about the situation there as the vaccine is rolled out. When it came to me, I had to tell the truth about living here in Plague Island.

It is embarassing, and my boss can't understand what is going on. Its the leading news in Denmark what the latest mess this twat of a country is getting up too now.

Saying Boris Johnson is usually enough to explain the latest clusterfuck.

And then there is the meeting about audits. One of the meetings about audits. It is yet more frustration on my part. And where are the results from your audits, Ian? Well, no one has trained me on any of the new systems, boss I should have said.

I say yes, I will fill in the spreadsheet and another piece of me dies inside.

To call it a shambles would be kind.

At ten, Jools returns with a car full of shopping. So I help her put stuff away, toast some bagles and we have a late breakfast.

And she is off again, into town for a haircut or something, while I stare at the computer and work out how to update the IT ticket. I mean its only been six months, one shouldn't expect every sytem to be working in such a short period of time.

I rarely write about work, but this is so soul-destroying, taking so long to do the most basic of tasks, and that's when you can. I am to get a new laptop and mobile in the next week, and maybe things will get better.

Maybe.

I hear a noise and see a van stop outside of the house. It raises itself off the road on invisible legs, and by the time I get a camera and walk to the window, the guy is finishing having installed a new street light on the telegraph pole. No more sickly orange light for us, oh no.

And in less than 5 minutes he is gone, onto a different street to fix their long, dark nights.

I have to go to the chiropractor, as Ray was to interpret the results from the hospital and come up with treatment. Just down the hill, and wait in the car until called in.

He explained it in simple terms, I have a tear in my tendon leading to my forearm, and that must be protected, as if it tears all the way through that will be really painful.

He rubs, prods and rubs, then gives me some stuff to do from Monday. And I am free. It was the weekend.

We had hoped for thunderstorms. And I had spent most of the watching a huge storm drift from east of Brest, up along the coast of France. It took 12 hours to do a hundred or so miles, and no thunder here.

I cook a steak and ale pie for dinner, to use up the leftover vegetables and gravy from Sunday dinner. By the time I had taken part in the music quiz, and cooked dinner, it was seven.

Dinner was splendid, would hav been better with wine, but I made do with squash.

And that was it, really. It got dark, we went to bed to read a little then once it was dark, about nine fifteen, we turned the light out, and Cleo took up position between my feet.