Barbie gets speccy

I hate how I look in glasses. I also hate the fact that everything I look at has slightly fuzzy edges to it...hmmmm theres a problem there then eh? I have been supposed to wear glasses for the last 6 years but as my eyesights not really that bad I've just never bothered. I did recently get my eyes tested though and its no longer safe for me to drive a car without some sort of eye adjustment so its been time to take the plunge. Today has been the last of what seems like millions of appointments at the opticians and I have finally come away with contacts and a pair of glasses. I don't need to wear them all the time, but it is nice for everything not to look furry. I have to build up my contact wearing ability over the next few days but at least I have managed to get them in and out of my eyes without blinding myself.

The glasses are *Surprise* purple...but I still think I look like a secretary in them and I can manage the proper schoolmarm look too...

30 club

Ok, so I admit this is a little sad, but meh, I'm getting old so most things I do probably are really. At work we have realised that between this June and Next June there are at least 5 of us turning 30 so I have established THE 30 CLUB! We have decided to organise extra nights out around each of the birthdays and have an extra little collection between the others for that particular birthday girl in order to get her a special little pampering treat (like a mini facial or a trip to the nail bar etc) Its certainly entertained us all for a while and it means that we are all going to be getting a lot more social for a bit too which is nice. (maybe next year we will have to have the over 30 club?)

Sardine cans, oh no sorry Buses..

Why do the bus drivers here in Edinburgh seem to think that their buses are like the tardis? I've never seen so many people herded into small metal boxes before and only once in three years have I seen a driver turn anyone away from the bus because it was full. never mind the outrage against factory farming of chickens...maybe we should be outraged at how we are squeezed on public transport ...grr

Nerves and semi naked people..

I've been helping run exams at work this week. I secretly enjoy them, I would possibly take the opportunity to work in that department if a good enough job came up (It won't because I'm just too damn expensive for them and they'd have to deal with me reorganising their whole schedule) The only down side is the travelling (fancy a month in India followed by two weeks in Singapore and a week in Hong Kong?) and the early starts (even as a helper this week I've had to be in an hour earlier than normal)

Anyway, I had been "Volunteered" by my boss to do two days this week. Tuesday was the best as I got to order the candidates around which I great fun as they all have god complexes. I walked in to find my co worker for the day with the biggest grin. I found out what the big deal was when I went through to the main room to find a young man (student age) laying on a bed wearing nothing but a pair of skimpy boxers at one end of the room and a young lady at the other end of the room in a vest and shorts. These were our actors for the day. I being my usual self totally ignored their virtual nakedness and chatted away quite happily to them both, telling them what was for lunch, how many more candidates they still had left the prod at them, and checking if they needed blankets - it was very cold in there because they were in the same room as other medical specimens.

Today I was registering the candidates so I had lots of fun confiscating mobile phones (and promising to sell them on eBay) and generally winding the candidates up (In the nicest way, I was trying to take their minds off the nerve wrecking 2 hours they had ahead of them and making them relax a little) Some of them seemed to appreciate it anyway :) and I had fun. My Colleagues were certainly amused by the rapport I had with the previously mentioned male model...As he walked in the door and said Hi, I very loudly greeted him with "What time do you call this?? Get down those stairs and get those clothes off!" He came back up for a chat at Lunchtime (Fully clothed I must add) and commented on how nice it was to be spoken to like a human rather than just a limb to be prodded at by trainee doctors.

So maybe I do have a way with people... dressed or not!

Tiny toys

B-Man bought himself an iPhone back in April. A short time later the price of them dropped by £100, so this week he got a nice credit note from Carphone Warehouse for £100. I didn't know this but they price check and if you bought something at a higher price the month before they will send you back the difference... sweet :) I accompanied him to the store to spend his cash (it expires in June) Needless to say theres not that much you can buy in carphone warehouse past phones and accessories. So B Man piled himself up with extras for his phone and still had some money left. My Mp3 player had given up the ghost when I joined the gym so he treated me to a new one... an Ipod shuffle. I was a little gutted that they didn't have any purple ones in stock...but its rather funky silver instead and soooo tiny... (see below, although its worth noting that I don't have giant hands either!)
Now all I have to do is put some tunes on it!

Damn cars

Gurn talked me into downloading a free game - Trackmania Nations Forever. Mainly because its free and I'm a cheapskate. As he has proudly shown his car creation
I figured that only fairly I should show off mine... Especially as they HAD to be purple... The first two minute attempt....And the second... (now I know what I'm actually supposed to be doing...)

I'm still undecided as to which I like best...

Life without net

Ohh I don't know how I survived!!! We have had ongoing problems with our Internet pretty much since we moved in. It had a fun game of randomly loosing connection for a minute or two at a time. We tried going to Sky to fix it, (thinking it was in ISP problem) and after poor B-Man repeatedly going through the troubleshooting with someone reading from a script until getting through to a minorly knowledgeable human they sent us a new router (it only took 6 months!) to our dismay the problem kept on going. During this time we got a new phone too after the other one decided that it didn't want to work anymore. Suddenly it was like someone switched a light bulb on over our heads....The new phone had periods of not working too.....and they coincided with the net downtime...ahhhhhhhhhhh. Now I get it.

I managed to get through to BT faults and found the only people who work for BT who are actually helpful!! I reported the problem and after they realised that a block had been incorrectly left on the line, they got their engineers on the job. Two days later I hadn't heard anything so called back. "Oh its fixed." Ummm no. That would be why I still don't have a phone line or a net connection then? The faults lady agreed that maybe it wasn't fixed then and sent the problem back to the engineers.

Friday whilst tiling Gurns bathroom and covered in adhesive, I missed a call from a random unknown number. B-Man rang them for a status report on Saturday only to find out that an engineer was booked to come out top the house on Tuesday Morning. (No problem, but as Monday was a bank holiday I had to text my boss and beg for an extra morning off! Luckily my boss is a particularly understanding lady - obviously as she puts up with me!)

Ahhh so today, after 5 solid days of no net connection the BT engineer came round. After about 2-3 hours the phone is back on and we have connection!!! I'm not sure what I've been doing to cope with no Internet but I must admit I barely noticed. There was only a few times I wanted to check something until I remembered that couldn't.

I never used to be able to cope without a net connection for more than a day but it was actually quite a welcome break - not spending every waking moment staring at a PC screen!

Barbie and the Secret Garden

B-Man and I moved to our flat in November. At the time the landlord (who's a lovely chap but as proactive as a rock) mentioned about the garden, He promised to replace the old rusty washing poles and fix it up. We've known it was there but due to the wonderful Scottish weather being as it is haven't really had a chance to get out there and even look at it, never mind do anything. I ventured out in February and discovered the shed, which mysteriously has a mattress and some mirrors in it but not much else.

I am desperate to be able to put washing out and have a BBQ area so, seeing as I have a few days off work and not much else to do (Gurns bathroom tiling aside) I went out and got stuck in today. I think I was pretty good, and although It doesn't look much yet I have actually achieved quite a bit :)

I found that we do have a garden path...not really where I thought it was, but its there (and now uncovered) I raked away as much of the old cut grass as I could (which has left some unsightly bald patches but it'll get there) and generally tidied up. This all took about 4 hours! There seems to be borders and flowers (lots of bluebells) but in the oddest places - mainly in one area that I thought was a path!

I think I'm going to have to call it quits on the washing poles though... after speaking to our neighbour i think cutting them down at the base and putting the grass back over the top is a far better idea than trying to dig up the mass of concrete they're embedded in!

I might have it finished by the end of summer....maybe