Protecting the Stormtroopers

Last week was the 8Th London Sci-Fi festival, which we are regular visitors too. Well regular visitors to the Sci-Fi pub quiz which is held on the last day and is a slightly alcoholic but fun way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

This year I decided to give a little back and volunteered to help out. Most of my duties were things like tidying up and manning the front desk, but there were a couple of stand out tasks.

One was helping out in the projector room, the festival which is mostly movies is held in a cinema in central London, seeing all the bits of equipment and reels of film.

The other top task was to be bodyguard to some Star wars Stormtroopers, who were helping to promote the festival. They may have ruled the empire and fought their way across the galaxy but they needed guarding from the general public so their armour didn't get damaged!

Decision in principle

Went to see the Mortgage advisor yesterday to give me a firm figure of how much they are will to give me.

They couldn't quote me much in the way of valid rates as it was the last day of the month and apparently they all change on the start of the month (they could have told me before hand) still I'm still 3 months until my old mortgage switches to the expensive standard variable rate so should be able to sort something out nearer the time.

I checked their rates this morning and the 3yr tracker has dropped 0.5% from yesterday.

So in theory the money is sorted, the next step is to get a HIP (home information pack).

Birthday treat and advice

We (Russ, Nick and Myself) had a great little birthday trip to Thorpe park adventure park.

We raced around with priority tickets, tried out most of the rides and got a bit sun burnt (it rained all week and was sunny, just long enough for our trip, which was nice!).

The best ride was Nemesis, with lots of lovely looping and a real feeling or whooshing back and forwards.

A word of warning, we did a ride called the Samurai which rotates on three axis and really screwed up our balance for several hours. fortunately we did that ride after all the other, as the park was closing, and so we could wimp out of doing any more because they wouldn't let us.

I still get the odd 'body memory' of flipping over backwards now after 5 days.

And now a word from our sponsors

Well I survived the talk
It took about 10 minutes in front of about 100 people. People laughed and asked questions, and nicely for me said afterwards that they enjoyed it. I drank three beers straight down afterwards and I'm quite glad I don't have to do anything like that again for a while.

First Thursday

Oh my one of the drawbacks of working for a funky media agency is that once in a while you have to do some funky media agency stuff.

I've been picked to give a presentation about myself in the big company wide meeting in a section called Knowing me Knowing you.

I have to give a quick talk about myself with slides.

Two people get picked per month and I was unlucky enough to be picked last month while I was away skiing.

30minutes to go wish me luck...

The Knives were out

Well I missed it the big board cull at my old company has happened. I found out last night that the Americans did what we were all predicted and got rid of most of the board, only Alan, Richard(who most still blame), Susie and Nick and the lawyer bloke are left.

The board after selling the company to the Americans presided over the downturn in the companies fortune, making a load of us redundant and the watching as most of the rest of the company resigned, due to them having ripped the heart out of the company.The morale has been really bad and they must have been having leaving dos every week.

The people who were forced out and nearly all in much better positions (except for Rob who's still at leisure) and now most of rest of the company (or at least IT) are in better positions as well.

Valuation Weekend

As part of my plan for selling my flat and moving to some thing bigger (2 bedrooms) I needed to get the flat valued.So on Saturday I had a day sitting around waiting for estate agents to call and value the flat.

I picked three agents partly because they were local and partly because the were on the bigger property websites (primelocation.com, propertyfinder.com) and in the case of the last one because they have just sold a flat in my block and the sold board is nailed to the front.

First up at 10am (and me with a hangover from a pretty good works night out) was a lady from Rubicon. They are the nearest agent, at about 10 doors down the road. She had a good look around, made notes and quoted a price of 215K.

Next Up at 1pm was a chap from Alex Neil, the company I used as a managing agent while I was letting the flat out, they quoted 220-225K partly based on a load on flats nearby on for 230K which were a bit smaller but had water views (a big thing in docklands where I live if you can see the river Thames or a bit of one of the dock the price goes up) and partly on other units they had sold in my block.

Finally at 2:30pm just as a huge rain storm started was the posh lady from Franklin James. She completely turned me around by say I shouldn't try and market the property above 250K (I hadn't planned on it after the first two estimates) but the flat was a good size and she quoted 245K.

They all said the market is still quite good and that a flat like mine would sell in 4-6 weeks. They also all explained about getting a HIPS pack and about sole agent agreements.

It was all very interested and quite fun once the hangover had gone. I'll now have to sit down and think my options through.

Clocks go forward

It's so nice to go home from work while the sun is still out.

It makes you all positive and thinking all is right with the world even when you have to travel home using London public transport.

Back from Skiing and still walking

I did take it easy. In the end I did 5ish days of skiing and only fell over the once.

I found it quite tricky to turn right as my left leg would drag slightly behind me. However I do think some of the technique I learnt last year help so I didn't just try and turn using my knee joint.

I stuck to Green and Blue runs and was going fine not staying out until I got tired until, on Wednesday I fell over while almost stationary. Just one of those over balances that happen on skis some times. I fell on my right side and just ever so slightly twisted my left knee (basically just the weight of the ski and the boot). At first it felt quite sore and I couldn't get enough
power through it (tried to push but nothing happened until I push down with my hand) to clip back into the binding. So I quit for the day.

Oddly enough walking around on it didn't hurt so I guess it's a slight pull on a muscle that you don't normally use for walking! I figure the general weakness of the knee made the twist worse than normal.

So I took it easy for the rest of the week, just a three hours on the Thursday on some green runs (actually bloody scared due to all the out of control beginners rocketing around) and took the Friday off to be a tourist and do some site seeing.

It was a good holiday and I glad to say that being able to ski properly again looks good.

Just have to wait until next year to give it another try...

Personal Trainer

Yeah I'm trying out a personal trainer at the gym. he says I need to do lot of work on my core muscles.

He had me doing planks (which I'm quite good at) things with the gym ball (for stability as the things go all over the place when you try to do sit ups on them) and press ups (again using the gym ball to make it harder which I'm really rubbish at). I'm not sure how long I want to do this as its a bit on the expensive side but from the grumpy signals coming from my stomach muscles today it should do some good.

It's all getting a bit Yuppie isn't it! Next thing you know I'll have a flat in Docklands and a pair of red braces...Oh hang on a minute...

Back in the flat

Sort of moved back in this week, well just for a couple of days, before I go off skiing for a week.

The place is in pretty good nick and clean. Except for a few bits of wear and tear (as the management company called it) and something tells me I didn't stipulate that he had to be a non-smoker (the sofa got a good Febrezing).

It's very empty and tidy at the moment I have to see how I can keep it that way.

Off to the snow

Yes I'll be careful

A gentle week in Les Deux Alpes. Just trying to get my nerve back.Actually I'm more worried about moving around the town when not on skis, watch the ice!I've been packed really to go from over a week and I've been to the shops and brought the Bourne identity books to have something to read on the trip


I can't wait

Ivy's party and a Sleeping Dougie

At the weekend Ivy had her birthday party all based around a teddy bears picnic. there was small people and teddy bears everywhere.

I now understand that a childrens birthday party is a compleate bedlam!

Fortunately a very large pot of Tea was available for the adults and it was fun to see my sister in teacher mode controlling the chaos.

Dougie slept straight through most of the noise and attention.

Brecon Beacons

So we had a good time in the Brecon Beacons and my leg more or less managed to get through it.

We stayed at a lovely little cottage in Talybont-on-Usk (SO119216)

http://www.breconcottages.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=CM.cottage&Propref=BANK&startmonth=0

which looks like the owner had been watching grand design et al.

We did two days of walking including a huge 9 hours and 12 miles walk around the Pen-Y-Fan horseshoe and on to Fan Y Big and a Wellington bomber crash site. We ended in the dark with our head touches by the time we got to the bomber and a couple of more hours afterwards back down to road.

Techincally it was still a bit beyond me and using polls to help your balance is very tiring when you have to pull them out of mud and long grass. So by the time we got back I was dead on my feet and could hardily move, but to be fair Colin and Mark wheren't in much of a better state.

As a result we made sure saturday was an easier day with a just couple of small sunny hills to a pub lunch and very long flat walk back in the rain to cottage. The saturday walk was a full outing with the girls and baby Abi, as well.

Sunday was an easy day, as we were all a bit tired. A lessurely breakfast and then a slow train home.

Discharged

It was a very quick 10 minute meeting. Nipun, the Physio had me stand-up, sit-down and jog up and down the room.

Then he said 'is ok?' and I said 'yes'.
He said 'are you jogging?' ('yes' I said), I mentioned that I did some walking at the weekend just said I went for a bit of a walk.
'and cycling?' ('yes' I said)
'and have you joined a gym?' ('yes').

'Good' he said and that he'll discharge me.

I told him its pretty good now mostly just klicking when I bend it. to which his reply was don't klick it!

He told me to keep focus on the straight leg lift (sitting straight up on a high backed chair and lifting your leg locked straight out in front of you) and to keep good posture

I asked him about skiing and he said don't ski for a least 6 months, and to get a second opion from Mr Parmar, my surgeon (not likely at 145 quid a go)

So I didn't tell him about the trip in march and said 'thank you' and 'good bye'.

A firm hand shake and I was out the door.

Douglas Daniel and a long walk around Pen-Y-Fan

some more good news...

I'm an uncle again.

Douglas Daniel Waring (7lb 15oz) arrived very early on friday morning and is doing very well. As is very nearly a family tradition I was away doing something vaguely adventurous, this time walking in the Brecons.

He managed to arrive in time for his sisters birthday on the Monday.

Friday a conversation in the Pub

'Your beard has got really long the last couple of days.'

'Er I've had my hair cut....'

Interviews

It's really bizzare but I've been asked to do a couple of interviews. That's interview people for a position here rather than the other way around. It's a fairly odd experience as I start by explaining a bit about the company and the position, both of switch I'd don't really know about yet...

Feb 18th

It's sorted my tenant will be moving out on the 18th Feb. Not quite sure what notice he actually got in the end as the management company got a bit confused (not good in a management company!) but it was meant to be two months.

Oh well, its sorted now, and I'll move in just after, its a Monday so slightly odd.

And I can have a sit down and decide if anything needs fixing up before I move a load of stuff back in. Most of it is just twenty metres down the road at the storage unit, so that's not a problem.

The flat still has the same kitchen and bathroom (more or less) since it was built (around 1993) so may be its a good time for some new stuff.

Anyway the Lads will be happy with hotel Dunhill will be open again for London visits, or at the very least, the sofa...

An 'Oh my god she's dropped the bottle' moment

Yesterday, at work, I managed to earn my salary before 9am and earn a few brownie points.

I was looking through the code on one of our live sites trying to find some performance improvements and I noticed there was some code to get the entire user table, which includes username, email and password for the site and write it out to a web page.

Er I wonder if you can access that page on the development server, ah yes you can. How about the stage server, oh yes you can see all the users printed out in a nice list. But how about the Live site....oh Shit! every single username and password. A very rapid flurry of emails then occurred as I got them (the clients tech team) to make the site safe and delete the offending pages.

A little later when our CTO found out (I had to tell him) a general email went around the department giving everyone a rocket (it wasn't the fault of anyone who currently works here) and reminding them to check they don't release test pages like this in future.

A trip into the loft

skis - got them out for the first time since last year from where they got dump when I got back. They're a bit more bashed up that I would have figured I guess I used them quite hard last year. A couple of deep holes that I should p-tex and perhaps give them a good waxing. But they should serve me well in March.

Staples sorted

the bill for getting my staples out - another 25:50 but they did pay in the end. I think that's it and I'm now in a position to work out how much the crash actually cost me.

Sunlight

sunlight - it's just starting to get light in the mornings the sunrise happens while I'm on the train on the way in. It was so much nicer even on Monday morning for it not to be dark.

New year at the gym

Its a new year and its very very busy at the gym near work and it's smelling quite bad too. An entire sea of new years resolutioners are jamming up the works and making the place busy (read sweaty urgh!).

I notice it on the way home as well, lots of red faced people on the homeward train. I guess it will all die down again in a couple of weeks. I do think though it is starting to have a benefit.

I'm going a couple of times a week or more and hopefully I'll be in a half fit state for my walking trip at the end of the month, the Brecon Beacons, let alone my upcoming ski trip

Doing the crane

At the physio again

This time he had me jogging around, running up fake steps and standing on the most tricky balance board to date.

The jogging was a little faster than he wanted and he told me to slow down, I figured at that point I then won't tell him about running on the machines at the gym. The fake steps just go up three steps and then back down again, in the corner of the room, and apart from me failing around a bit, need to practice my balance, I was okay with that. On the other hand/foot the balance board was really hard, a 30cm round wooden disc with a wooden cone fixed to the bottom, I couldn't get it to stay horizontal at all.

The rest of the exercises where all around me standing on one foot a trying to go into a crouch, sort of a geriatric karate kid. he's happy with my progress and said that next time, in four weeks time, may well be the last time I need to see him. I'm still deciding if I'm going to tell him I'm off skiing!

Review of the Year

Spent 28 days in Foreign countries

Worked only 135 days out of the UK normal of 252 days
but managed to increased my salary by 47%

Managed to resign one job, then get hired back with a promotion. Then get made redundant and finally get another job for much better terms.

Spent 7 1/2 months with crutches or walking sticks and 2 nights in hospital

I know lot more about knees and ligaments

Became an Uncle again for the third time.

Got a new bike and a pair of skis

Rented out my flat without any problems to just one tenant.
Lived at my parents for 11 months

Did interviews for 6 different jobs

My 2007 carbon footprint includes
Total for flights = 2.303 tonnes of CO2
Total for bus & rail = 0.726 tonnes of CO2
and I should offset by planting 6 trees (about 4.380 tonnes)

Didn't change my weight at all and still weight about 13 1/2 stone.

Joined a gym (LA Fitness) but haven't tried any of the classes yet. I go about twice a week and I'm back to being able to jog.

Only brought myself 4 CDs

Joined Facebook in April

Had a beard at three times over the year.

Went to one music festival (Leeds) and one gig (Beatallica). Already have tickets for this years festival.

So this is Christmas

I had a good time at my Parents for Christmas and we had a Boxing day visit down to West Sussex to visit my sister and her family.

Ivy got a dolls house nearly bigger than she is, which she made sure everything was placed exactly were she wanted it. Freddie got loads of 'Cars' stuff and watched his 'Cars' DVD again and again, and Edie just watched everything that was happening around her.

The other bit of news was that I wrote back to the flat management agents to ask for my flat back. I have to give to two months notice so it may be back in London in March.

A bill for Staples

I just got a note from the insurance company saying they are sorry but they won't pay the invoice for 25.50GBP as I'm now longer covered.

What! er what 25.50, what procedure was that for!

So I rang them and apparently the surgeon only just got around to billing for removing the staples from the surgery all those months ago.They said they would sort it out.

So the whole thing is still not settled

I shan't be using Lastminute.com again

or don't believe what Lastminute.com put on there website.

The upshot of the whole experience seems to be, Lastminute won't guarantee any of the information on its site. It's star rating system is factually wrong as you can't compare quality from one country to another. And they will blame anyone but themselves.

So my advice stay away from them

Here's some of the details of the letters I got including on the 17Th Dec received a final response to my complaint letter way back in October

Lastminute said back in 7 Nov 07

1) We're sorry.
2) Your feedback is important.
3) We are passing the buck to our supplier, Fleetway Travel.
4) So we're not going to do anything else about it.

and last week in the post from Fleetway Travel. The main points being.

1) We're sorry
2) The description of the hotel is not our fault we blame our supplier
3) We checked the hotel met Greece Health and Safety at the start of the season.
4) The classification is can only be compare to other local hotels.
5) That is what passes for 5 star accommodation in Rhodes.
6) We will pass on your comment to the hotel
7) The quality of the accommodation is your personal option
8) We'll take the comments into account when using this hotel in future.
9) You should of contacted the local agent or the UK office
10) We could have move you to another hotel if you had asked.
11) We're sorry about the flight but you can't blame us.
12) Please travel with us again in future.

Both of which do a very good job of avoiding most of the issues I was trying to make. So I guess I'll try again but this time make it real simple and get across that I was mainly upset at the miss-selling of the holiday.

1) If something is advertised it should be in the holiday. i.e. Sauna, Sat TV, Scuba Diving.
2) When selling to a UK audience, a dreamlike Deluxe 5 star hotel should be described as a decent 3 star hotel if that's what it is.
3) You should not be using a rating system to compare holidays from different countries if in fact they are not comparable.
4) I was not complaining about the flights I was complaining that the advert did not say we would not be getting any food.
5) I did report my complains to the Holiday rep and email again once I got home but its a little difficult to work out who to complain to as you both just pass the buck.
6) If you can't guarantee any of the information about a holiday then you should say so in the advert.

Closed for Christmas

The office closed for Xmas and opens on the 2nd. So I effect I get another 4 days holiday!

However a load of stuff was promised to clients in time for Xmas and so the last couple of days was really mental. Partly this was due to the amount of stuff to do but mainly this was due to most of the people that knew stuff had left for the holidays.
I was in the odd position of being the only 'expert' at a couple of systems despite not actually having seen any of the code.
With you talking to someone about an issue one day only to find out later that that was their last day! In the .NET team we went from 4 people to 2 people as the contractors finished and we got all their stuff to support and release.
So it was busy but I didn't think it was too bad as no-one was actually screaming and I've had the odd mad deadlines before.

Hopefully nothing goes wrong over Xmas and things should be running smoothly when I get back!

Nipun and the wobble board

This weeks trip to the physio, or jolly psycho as I've started to think of him, was a bit different.

The session was mostly with me standing on a balance board (basically a round board with half a football under it) trying to keep up right while Nipun threw balls at me a different angles for me to catch.

The idea was to make me bend and weave from my knees. It was a bit scary to start with due to a complete lack of trust in my knee but once we got started it was OK and much less of a problem than I was expecting. I guess that was the point!

When he wasn't playing ball, but still on a wobble board (this time a square one with a fixed bar under it) getting me to stand on one foot (my good one), we were mostly talking about letting flats in London! yeah odd, but he ask me about mine and he was of the opinion Ilford was the place to buy in so there!

The other important exercise for me to concentrate on this time was the hamstring stretch. Its not too bad for normal motion but anything more the hamstring is tight. last time I was told to sit in a chair and raise the leg up until I felt the hamstring stretch and hold it for 20. this should take about 6 weeks of doing it every day to get the hamstring back to a good length. However I didn't seem to be having much success. The Physio corrected my posture and told me to sit up straight and not slouch and right away I could feel the pull. bit obvious really but you try remembering all the stuff they say!

To top it all the wobble board fun last major thing he told me, after watching me walk up and down for a bit, was that I should start jogging again. Eek! its a year since I done anything more than a fast walk so this a major step. The feeling at the moment is that if I put to much weight on the leg too fast it will give way and I will crash to the floor. So I'm going to take it real easy.

I went to the gym that evening a did 1K on the running machine, very slowly 6.0KM/h and boy did my leg hurt the day after.

On Sunday I did 1.5K at 7.0 KM/h and so far it feels OK.

Week two and the Xmas do

So my timing was pretty good the company is happy because they just win a couple of major awards and I also join in time for the Christmas party.

They had a little celebration at the awards news and we had champagne in the morning. Which was nice.

The party was good, if a little more tame than I was expecting. It was at a swish Sony place called the colour rooms (basically some neon lights a big TVs) with just lots of free drink and light conversation. Although judging by the rumours and the lack of people making it into work on Friday morning some more stuff happened after I left. Actually I was the first person into the office that morning and had to get it unlocked and the lights on.

My new niece

A week later than planned I finally made it down to my sisters place to see my new niece Edith May.

We tried got down last weekend but an exploding spark plug meant we saw rather too much of the hard should of the M25 (between Jn17 - Jn16) and had a very long trip home in the recovery truck.

This weekend Dad and me in a fixed car, went down (Mum took the train down last Monday) and despite the weather we got to see Edie.

What can I say 'It's a baby!' and she's lovely!

First Week - New kid at school feeling

Well its a very different place to work.
It started with bacon sandwiches at a meeting for the whole company on Monday morning at which the new members of staff are introduced...

Er... Hi.. I'm David...

and the week ended with beers being handed around the office at 5 on Friday. before I headed off for a major leaving do at my old company (partly so I could tell them all about my new job!!)

It's going to be an interesting place to work, very media agency, laid back, casual clothes, music playing type place. They have a few nice perks in the office as well, from free stuff to make breakfast with in the morning (bagels, toast, crumpets) to fresh fruit deliveries a couple of times a week. Of course they have tea and coffee and handily they've placed me near the kitchen to I so don't have to run dry of Tea... (and No its not the new boy makes the Tea, any more than anyone else)

The work hasn't really started yet but beyond the initial front-end designs and the deadlines, how things are done and what technologies I use will be up to me.

The company is mostly designers, producers and front end Flash (its a name of a technology rather than a personality trait) developers. There are a couple of other .NET developers and nothing at all by way of DBAs. So I should have some opportunity to apply some of the things I've learned at my last company about process and the best way to organise things.

The hardest part at the moment is getting up while its still dark. that and learning everyone's names!

Thursday and my trip up to Town.

...or two interviews, one meeting with the agent, a job offer and a little light shopping.

An early start, smartly dressed this time, to meet the CTO of the digital agency. This is the first time I've gone to an interview and had to apologise for being too smart!

It was quite a tricky meeting with him asking lots of questions about Agile and Scrum and how I think things should be done in an IT department. So we talked and I've done this so many times in the last couple of weeks I'm trying to make all the answered sound like I've just made them up rather than said the same thing before. Also I'm trying to watch my body language so I send all the right signals with mirroring and stuff like that.

We ended with him saying good luck in the interview that afternoon and then he changes it to good luck making the right decision. I wasn't sure how it went and so I headed off to do some shopping while I killed 2 hours until the next interview.

The Seventh interview was with a small company with an amazing TV studio setup. They film and then broadcast company TV across satellites and the web. It was a good interview except for the interviewer asking me the same question several different way. I guess it was to see if the answers where all the same. I had a tour around the offices and got to see the huge TV mixing desk and the studio they do some green screen stuff.

OK by this stage its about 3pm and I'm trashed. but it's off the Agent for a debrief on the day's interviews. It's right across town and I'm wandering around Bank and Monument for a while trying to find the office, despite having been there before with a desperate need to go to the loo.

When I finally get there the Agent is as chipper as ever and was just getting down to grilling me on how the interviews went when he was called away to the phone.

He comes back in with a slightly bemused, stunned look on his face. 'That was [the digital media agency] on the phone, they really like you and want to offer you a job...for [the same amount as the other offer], which is er... 3 grand more than they were willing to pay!'

Hurrah ! I'll take it! I said and my job searching is over. They print me all the package details and send me on my way. I travelled home in a slight daze (well until I got my PSP out to play WipeOut) and broke the news to my Dad when I got home.

So I'm starting on Monday and I'm slightly scared at trying to match up to the person I come across as when I'm being interviewed. But at least I won't have to wear my suit again for a while.

Sixth Interview and a Decision

Otherwise known as what I did on Wednesday

So I've had overnight to think about the offer and still don't know. Anyway the sixth interview is at 11 am and I said I would make a decision after that.

The interview is at a digital media agency based north of oxford street. basically they make online adverts and viral marketing like the Sony and Lynx themed game sites. It's a very different prospect from the other interviews so much so I've been told to go in casual clothes. It seems to be a lively place and according to Mel (who runs the IT department) who interviewed me its got a lively social. Also she said that they get all sorts of perks like drinks evening and yoga classes! So I'm pretty impressed and I think that it went well as the technical guy I met was saying some pretty positive stuff as I left.

Well I got about 200 metres outside the office and into a nearby shop before the Agent rang to say they wanted me back for a second interview. Blimey that was quick it could have only taken 20 minutes. So I'm due back on Thursday (11am) to see the CTO. although next time I will be dressed smart as I'm off to interview number seven in the afternoon.

So the rest of the day is mine to do a little Xmas shopping and wonder what I going to do about the job offer. Actually by this stage I had decided, I didn't fancy it and the work place didn't compare at all well with the place I had just visited. So I found a nice quiet place to ring the agent and give him the bad news, it was in the stairwell in Liberty's.

Two phone interviews and a job offer

At this rate I'm going to need a job just so my life quietens down a bit.

Today started with me heading off to the first meeting with my new Physio in the NHS, Nipun. Interesting differences with my last physio. Apparently I'm still favouring my left leg and limping a bit so we are going to work on that. Its a case to stretching out the hamstrings and learning to use both legs the same.

In the afternoon it was phone time first the second part of yesterdays interview and then a HR interview with a streaming media company based in St Martin's lane.

The results of which were from the latter an invite to a second interview on Thursday and a Job offer from the first phone call. Well from the agent late after he'd spoken to the company.

It's a standard package health care, pension, 10% bonus and 22% increase in pay from my old job. pretty good

I've got over night to think about it and with it being a scary job I don't know if I'm going to say yes or not!!!

Fifth Interview and the Arrival of Edith May

Friday evening and I'm sorting myself out for a weekend away and all of a sudden the agents go crazy and all start ringing at the same time. One of the agents who contacted me thought LinkedIn had a position with a financial opinion news service. They must be a bit desperate to fill their position because from first phone call to me it took about 40 minutes to get my CV to them and fix up an interview.

So Monday morning I went down to Liverpool St (not to Guildhall where Google maps had located them) to a small company hidden down a side street. The interview was fine but the job sounds a little scary, basically I would be the only developer/architect in the company surrounded by business users. A huge opportunity to shape a whole department but only I would be needed to IT support an entire company! According to the agent it went OK and I had the second part a fairly simple technical phone call with their current third party IT supplier on the phone on Tuesday afternoon. One of the questions he asked was 'What upcoming technology in the near future really excites you' to which I guess I was supposed to say something related to IT but I said the new Virgin One spaceship!

Also on the Monday as well as going to see one of the agents and doing a very odd multiple choice technical screening test, we had some good news...

I'm an uncle again.

Edith May Golding (7lb 7oz) arrived early in the morning and is doing very well.

Fourth Interview part deux

Well it went well enough for them to ask me back for a second interview. So yesterday I went back to see them. This time it was in Angel.

This time is was a full technical test, which was alot like a written exam. Fortunately we were late as the person who was seeing me was double booked in another meeting across town. So I didn't have to do it all just have a good go at it for half an hour. There were questions on asp.net controls c# sql queries and creating tables, state management and requirements capture.

It was quite hard as these things test more your ability to remember stuff than whether you are any good at coding. But I got a chance at the end to talk around some of the topics to show I a little of what I know.

The last question they asked was 'How would you work out how many hairdressers were there in London'. It's quite common in my experience that interviewers ask something a little left field in an interview just to see how a person would react. I normally, when interviewing someone would ask 'tell me something interesting about yourself', a question I picked up from my old boss, Julian. Well this time I answered it a couple of different ways including using a phone book and making a worm hole out of a couple of stars to freeze time and going around counting by hand! At least I will be remembered!

So still fingers crossed.

Fourth interview

I thought this one went OK too, er like I did the last three.

This time is it was at the end of the day so I went in a little early and went for a wander around the British Museum. I visited the money section, since I was going to an interview at an investment bank, and the Painting and Drawing section. Most people don't even know the Drawings are there, hidden away at the back of the building, but you can see some wonderful things in there, like sketches by Michelangelo.

So the interview, that was a little different again from the others as I was interviewed by two people this time, for a bit and then asked some technical questions by one of them in a different room. Also I got chaperoned to the interview by the Agent, which was a little strange.

The reason for the slightly odd way of doing things was that they were holding a sort of 'open evening' and meeting a couple of candidates, so we will see what becomes of that.

One draw-back of my amazing cheap suit is that is quite thin and as the temperature dropped today (6C with wind) it got a bit chilly on the way home.

Third Interview

From two guys at an investment bank by phone.

Didn't go too well as they asked me loads of how web pages work type of stuff which you never need to know when you are actually writing them.

Also doing it by phone is never as good as face to face.

So I'm not expecting anything more...

Second Interview

Well the suit has now paid for itself.

This one too seems to go OK and nice place in Angel.
but I've had no reply back from the agent so I figure that one has gone to someone else too.

Still early days yet. It's only the end of the second week of looking.

(the agent rang on the Sunday evening (the interview was Friday morning) to say the guy that got the job was someone who had worked with them before and so knew their systems, you can't really compete with that!)

First Interview

Today was my first interview had a long trip down the district line all the way to Hammersmith.
It seemed to go ok


but they gave the job to someone else

the agent thinks it might be some one cheaper

English Sporting Weekend

Saturday, the English rugby team, got through to the final, amazing. It was a bit of a long shot but we dared to hope. A painful match to watch (watching England nearly always is) and a bit sad in the end.

Still there was Lewis on Sunday to win the Grand Prix and cheers us all up.

Oh dear perhaps next time.

I think I'll stop watching sport for a bit, not that I watch much before.
Still in both cases an amazing achievement to get as far as they did.

CV go live!

Finally managed to get my life on to two sides of A4 and ask my Mum to read through it to check it made some sense.

Posted it up on to Jobserve.com on Thursday and got about 20 email straight away
and the phone has been really busy for the first couple of hours.

One agent said said it had been download 10 times already and then was in a couple of hours. I looking for a contract in Central London around the 300 a day mark, to start with. I figure that about right for 12 years experience in IT.

So fingers crossed and I had better start revising for any technical tests I may be asked to do.

Complaint Letter

Dear Lastminute.com

I wish to complaint about my recent holiday to Rhodes as booked through your web site (I reported my complaints to the local rep on 8.10.7). I wanted a quiet, warm, stress free holiday to recover from an operation I’ve just had. I wasn’t after much, a nice room, some nice food, a swimming pool and a gym to help regain my fitness.

I paid 600 pounds for this holiday and I don’t feel I got my moneys worth by a long stretch, In fact I feel I have been miss-sold too. The holiday was advertised as a ‘dreamlike Deluxe 5 star hotel’ however the room was very basic needed and multiple maintenance work was needed to be done on it, in the first case just to make the room safe.

The holiday was rated as 5 stars and this definitely wasn’t. You do point out on some of your other holidays that standards are a bit different in some countries, but that is clearly stated in the advert and was not in this case. I don’t expect any 5 star accommodation include two single beds, of slightly different heights, push together to make a double when the room is clearly designed for a double bed (the double bed head board was nailed to the wall). Supplied in the room was a single hand towel and a single medium sized towel (not even bath towel size), 2 rolls of toilet paper and nothing else. Nothing to make it a 5 star experience at all not even a bar of soap. When advertising a 5 star experience you think of such things as mini bar, a kettle for tea making, a range of TV and radio channels, furniture that isn’t worn and shabby, a room which doesn’t need things fixing and perhaps even some toiletries.

Where I would agree the all-inclusive part of the package was good, the main lobby and the swimming pools were fine; but practically nothing else was of even a moderate standard. The Fitness Centre and Sauna was a shabby little basement room with a nearly unusable multi-gym and no sign of the sauna at all. The advertised Scuba diving lessons and hire were non-existent.

The room was in such bad repair, ignoring the minor faults, I had to call out maintenance 4 times. First time was to fix the high cupboard door that was dangerously hanging off making entering the room unsafe. Then it was twice to try and make the hot water work. Finally once more to repair the patio door which fell off its hinges.

Room facilities were not as advertised or perhaps only the barest minimum to cover the legal definition. The ‘Satellite TV with international channels/ music radio’ was 1 English TV channel only, BBC World, and that was only after I had retuned the TV to get it. No radio channels that I could find.

You advert specifically lists what is not included in the holiday and you didn’t mention that the In-flight meals were not included as you do on some of your other holidays – on the way out as I wasn’t warned and so I was pretty hungry after 14 hour journey there. And on the way home, 9 hours stuck with Thomas Cook only a single drink and sandwich at the airport and nothing on the plane during the appalling journey home.

All these problems left me much more stressed and tired than before I left and I now feel I would not want to wish your organisation on my worst enemy.

Last Physio

Now the insurance money has just about run out (the day after this visit), I went to see my physio for the last time and get a list of stuff to work on in the future.

He said my goal should be to do 20 one leg 'squats' with weights either in the hand or perhaps a rucksack. He also said I could join a gym and use my bike again.

At the gym I want to focus on the leg press and leg curl and he said my skiing trip in March is a good target to work towards.

The leg is still shaking and I need to keep up with the stretches the goal of the 20 repeats is a still quite a long way off. I can start kneeling down and siting back on to my heals (that's really painful at the moment!).

In the future I should always include the stretches the balancing and one leg squats in an gym routine from now on to try and keep the level of use up.

Basically his message was build up the muscles and good luck.

Off on Holiday

its raining here
is not raining in Rhodes
so I'm packed and I'm off for a week in the warm tonight.

Iliotibial tract

"Rhodes... where we're going we don't need Rhodes"

Had my last meeting with Mr Parmar, well the last one should be in six months but the money runs out. Everything is fine and it was all quite jolly! Apparently the main issue I still have, a clicking, sore bit on the outside of the knee, is cause by my Iliotibial tract rubbing on the drill site and should lessen with time. the rod is sticking out a bit and rubbing on this tract thing but should smooth off and get absorbed into the bone.

Also we've sorted the lawyer stuff to quite a tight deadline, set by the Company. Funny really because it was mainly them causing the delays. But once they had sorted all the typos and got the amount right we had an agreement to sign and that should be that.


On the trip front I went for the third option in the end and just book something quick. So I'm going to Greece. I've booked a week on Rhodes. It looks like a nice place with a gym and several swimming pools. This will be the first time I've been on a beach holiday as normally its all activity
for me so the difference should be interesting.


Now I just have to get some beachwear and some reading materials and then I away from this England of constant rain!

Skiing March 2008

Yeap

I've just booked to go on a ski trip next March. It's six months away so I should be fit enough by then. It's important to get straight back on the horse as the saying goes.
The trip is with my friends from Ware it should be a nice gentle re-introduction to Skiing as its a group with a full range of abilities.

To aid the recovery, and because I have a little time on my hand, I've been going to for walks around the village each day. the government say you should do 30 minutes of moderate exercise 5 times a week. so I'm got a nice little route worked out which has some ups and downs to get me slightly out of breath for an hour.

The route runs up behind my Parents house, through the woods, across a couple of fields until I get to Mill Lane. Then its up Mill Lane, the steep climb stretches out the knee) and then across the huge rolling field above the Lamas until I get to the point Walkern road bridge goes over the bypass. Then its reverse course and return home.

I great walk with good views of the village, as it runs along the ridge, but not to good when its raining.

Suits you sir

I'm impressively unprepared for looking for a new job. Not only do I have to fix up a 3 year old CV, I find that all my smart clothes are in storage.

So I had to go out and buy a new suit today. This is probably a good thing as I haven't used them much in three years they are probably too small. That goes for shoes that aren't trainers as well. The fit is now up to a 40" Regular although the trouser are still 34". I guess if I put on the old jackets I would now look a bit like a bouncer.

Still writing my CV. it's like pulling teeth. I'm doing a full permie CV has I will probably need it at some point and then cutting it down into one suitable for contracting. With a full CV you give lots of detail about yourself, as well as your skills, so a company can work out if you are a good fit. However for a Contractor CV it should be much short, not more that 2 pages, and only concentrate on the skills the company is looking for.

And no word from the lawyers, I guess my old company are still messing them around.

Lawyers and leg bending

The beard has now gone and I've had a hair cut so I'm looking professional again, partly for the future interview but mainly because I needed a passport photo that didn't make me look like a nutter.


Thursday was a trip to the Physio

He said that there had been no progress in the last three weeks despite me walking in this time without the crutches. I was thinking that he could go and get knotted. OK the progress isn't amazing but I definitely moving around better.

I told him about the redundancy and about the end of my medical cover. We sorted out that we could have a couple more sessions until it runs out on the 17th Oct (one month from me signing the letter on Monday). That got him off my case a bit but he still wanted me to do the exercises 'every hour'

Friday night in the pub

A company tradition even if most of us now don't work for the company anymore. It was Christians leaving do and most of us had already planned on going before events happened.

I did get a call in the middle of it, after I had had a few pints from the lawyer to say that the company wanted the contracts signed by the by the close of business on the Friday, but as they hadn't actually sent mine yet and the ones that they had, needed some correction, then it wasn't likely to happen. I said it was no bother to me and repeated to them that they didn't need to tell me what the company is like as I had worked for them for three years!


The other event that evening was that Matt turned up, so he had recovered from the shock on Monday and seemed ready to get on with job hunting.

CV Writing

Mostly this week I've being doing a bit of revision, watching season three of LOST and trying to update my CV.

Man its hard I haven't touched my CV in three years and to try and sum up your time at a company and then sell yourself on paper is really difficult. So its slow going. Fortunately the management at my old company had a bad attack of buzz words towards the end so I can just put them all straight in; Agile, TDD, Scrum, WCF, SOA, Continuous Integration, Product backlogs, etc.

LOST is fine. I had put off watching it as I got fed up with it during the second season but I find I have free time on my hands and so I decided to get caught up.

and the revising, well starting interviewing again means technical tests which meant reading around the subject to be able to answer questions about .net development which you never really need to know when you are actually developing.

Passports and Postoffices

Its a case of bad timing but my passport is about to expire so I've been rushing around trying to get it renewed.

So I had a trip out to Hertford to the big post office to use their check and send service. I got there a bit early and it was deserted so I went for a wander until 9am. Quite how there managed to be a 10 person queue outside in the 5 minutes I went to the cash machine I don't know. The trip home was fun as well, I got the bus back with all the OAPs.

Anyway the reason for the sorting my passport is that I was thinking of doing something like the last time I was made redundant. I decided it would be a good time to take a long break and went on a trekking trip around some of the national parks in America. I did a big loop from San Francisco via Monument, Yosemite, Dead Valley, Las Vegas, Bryce Canyon and Moab, down to Los Angeles.

So my options are

1. get another permanent job.
2. going contracting - setting up a company and finding a job for a couple of months and then do a big trip.
3. going sailing perhaps a tall ship cruise.
4. going trekking although my knee is not really up to it.
5. or go on a smaller holiday and sort my life out when I get back.

So now I'm waiting for my passport to return in the post.

Facebook and the voided pass

Poor Matt

Monday didn't go too well for my mate Matt. He was on holiday while all the redundancy thing was happening so officially didn't know anything about it. Fortunately some of us rang him at the weekend (although we didn't know if he was included as well) and told him all about it.

Otherwise the first he knew about it would have been on Monday morning when his door pass didn't work.

Which is exactly what happened.

Matt was always early into the office, usually getting in at 8:20ish. so he was half expecting it to happen and that he would have to wait around until someone else got into work. So I had a very odd phone conversation with him at about 8:40ish after he had tried to get it, with me sitting at home and him sitting in the park near the office waiting for 9 am so he could go in and get fired.

For him that's how 5 years of service ended to the company.

I did go in to work later on but Matt didn't stick around and went home. I was there to signed away my right to fight the redundancy and take the money. Also I was there to collect all my personal stuff.

So I cleaned my desk and my locker under the watchful eye of Charlotte from HR. Met with Susie to sign the agreement letter. I wasn't able to sign the no contest contract as I was told I needed to get legal advice first. Fortunately the company would put some money towards that and an independent lawyer was in the offices seeing some of the others so I got a bit of time with him. He took me through the contract and explained the process and sorted out some of the vague details with Susie. He said he would get the company to complete all the details and then he would mail me the contract to sign. Seemed like a nice chap for a lawyer!

Generally the day was a slow process as I stopped to talk to everyone coming backwards and forward. I was in the main lobby for quite a long time neither getting closer to the office or towards the door as a steady stream of people still employed and those collecting their stuff turned up.

It ended in the pub again as we discussed the events of the day over a few pints of beer.

When I got back I set up an ex-company group on facebook so we could all stay in touch.

Redundant

Well I guess I don't have to worry about the office politics anymore

Friday morning started normally with the Traffic project scrum meeting at 9:30 where we talked through what we are doing on the project and what the next lot of work is we will be starting. You meant to stand in a scrum meeting the idea being that if you are standing you will be quicker. However I've been sitting at these meetings because of the knee. The aim of a scrum meeting to for each person to cover three things and three things only 'What I did yesterday, what I'm doing today, and what problems am I facing that are stopping me getting things done'. So we successfully sorted out what the team was doing and went back to our desks.

Waiting for me when I got back was an invite to a strategy meeting. The list of people on it was a bit unusual rather than just being the normal people the go to planning meetings it included a range of people from junior developers to Fabio our technical architect and some developers from the our teams. Raza was one of the developers from another team and he came across to ask what the meeting was about. I didn't know but joked that looking at the selection of people if they fired us all then the company would be in a bit of trouble and alot of the systems knowledge would be lost. Funny how accurate you can be when you are making a joke. So we all trooped off upstairs to Breakout (the meeting rooms are all name after computer games).

The Strategy meeting was as awkward as you would imagine a meeting to tell people that they are being fired, can be. all the guys from IT arrived at the same time to find, Richard (CTO), Susie (Head of HR), Liam (Recruitment), Ruth (Recruitment) and Barry (Tech Support) already in the room. Richard started to read from a script and it was at that point that my heart rate went through the roof and my hands started to shake (they shook for most of that weekend). He read from a script that basically said that they were reorganising the company and as such they didn't need as much staff as they had. They would meet with each of us individually and go into details of our redundancy packages.

Up to this stage I was thinking that it was pretty much like the last time I got made redundant the developers in the room where the ones getting the chop the rest where there to make it official. I was sitting next to Ketan and we could see across to Robo. But Robo's shocked reaction didn't sink in with me until Richard said the time of his meeting with Robo. they also read out the meeting times for Fabio, Ruth and Barry so it was at that point we realised it was them as well. Richard also said that the rest of the company was being told right now and that the was another group being given the bad news in a different meeting (these were people from the business side). He then said we could stay in this room if we wanted and then our computers had been locked. He finish off by saying something about being sorry but by that time I wasn't really listening anymore and was just thinking things through.

So normally at times of crisis this British make a cup of tea. So I suggested that but then realised that Raza was sitting next to me. He's just started his month of fasting so for him the whole shock to the system couldn't be softened with even a glass of water.

We sat in the room for a bit and talked. I explained what happened to me the last time and Gareth made lot of jokes! I guess we all react to shock in different ways most of us by joking about it. We decided to go down to the coffee bar outside the canteen, also so the smokers and the ones who have given up smoking could go out a have a cigarette.

I walked back into the office to get my wallet and ran straight into the IT meeting explaining what's happening. I listen at the back for a bit and then went out a round the other way to get to my desk.

First order of business was to find a quiet corner to ring my Mum and tell her what has happened. Then it was down to the coffee bar with the others. We passed the news around and found out about the others who got the chop and some of the people not given the chop came down and commiserated with us.

Talked to Christian and some of the others about setting up as a contractor. Christian quit a couple of weeks ago and was still working out his notice. Basically a set up a company, get an accountant and then find a job through some recruitment company like GCS. GCS is a company that during my time in the industry a lot of the good contractor guys that I have worked with
have come from. So once I get home that's what I'll be looking into.

So everyone that was in the scrum meeting was out of the door and looking back that forms an odd moment in my mind. The most ironic thing of the whole experience was the mail Rob had sent out a few days ago spoofing the I'm resigning letters. Because we had had so many people resigning recently giving their contract details and saying goodbye, Rob wrote a joke version saying he was not leaving and that he could be contacted on his work address. Little did he know!

I had to go back up for my 1-2-1 meeting with Richard and Susie, this time it was in JetPac. Richard read through another script, this time saying much the same thing but adding if I didn't want to fight the decision then they would give me a pay off to 'soften' the blow. But I had to make my mind up fast as the money would start decreasing. I had until the end of business on the Monday to agree to get the full amount which roughly speak was about a month and half of pay. If I didn't agree until the end of the Friday after it would drop down to the statutory minimum payment, which for me is 310 pounds for each full year that I've worked with the company.

That done I went back down to the office with my little pack of documents and collected my stuff. By this stage most people had got to the pub but I hung around for a bit talking to people and keeping Raza and Lutfur company as they don't drink as so weren't going down the pub. Checking my computer I found that they hadn't locked me out and so I was able to collect some of my personal files; CV, pictures and some music files.

We left the office and Raza did come down the pub to say goodbye. That's where I stayed for the rest of the day drinking, mostly at first with Ketan and Fabio. Later everyone else turned up including lots of old members of staff, it was planned as a big night already because my mate John was leaving anyway and Gareth had invited lots of people. It got very messing towards the end and I heard reports afterwards that a couple of people needed help getting home.

Fitting I suppose, that it all ended in a pub which always has been the heart of the social spirit of the company.

sans crutches

First day going to work without crutches

Seems to be going OK apart from trying to get across Victoria station. People sort of assume you're going to get out of the way for them but while I can do a reasonable straight line I can't yet dodge, but then again most people just bounced off me and for one bloke in particular, I can push back too.

I've noticed that the reason I walk very slowly at the minute is due to only using one leg to push me forward. I've been favoring the left leg for so long now, when I try and force the left leg to push as well the increase in speed is quite noticeable. So as I get back to normal walking I should speed up in no time.

Jokes about crutches stopping me shaving (I've had a beard for about a month now) must have reached the fifty mark by now. The beard is doing fine!

Tickets, Lockers and a Telling off

Visited the Physio again on Tuesday and this time I've been bad and got told off for practically everything, still using two crutches and not doing enough of the exercises. I think he may have told me off no matter how much work I had done. So its more exercises including balancing on one foot and stepping down stairs. I'm to give up the crutches but I think I'll still carry on with one for a bit as it easier to get a seat on the tube with one.

The Raffle for the 22 available lockers (staff is about a hundred so this isn't the most well planned feature of the new office) in the office happened today and I managed to get one. I'm planning lots of lunchtimes at the gym in order to build my leg up so in a couple of weeks it will be handy to have some extra storage.

Further fallout from the festival happened today, after yesterday's revelation that the Kaiser Chiefs played a secret gig at the festival which we missed and reading all the people on the forums laying into how rubbish the Red Hot Chili Peppers were, Russ found out that they are selling tickets to next years festival at this years prices so he got some, we're going and I owe Russ some money.

Leeds Festival with crutches

Well thanks to lots of help from Nick, Russ and Vicky. I successfully managed to go to this years Carling Leeds Festival. I took my crutches and the guys carried a camp chair for me so the whole thing wasn't too uncomfortable. A great weekend away even although the parking was managed by the numpty squad. So I'm a bit tired now...
The Band were a mix of the good to the down right rubbish with Lost Prophets, Fall Out Boy and Kings of Leon in the first group and the Red Hot Chili Pepper leading the second group.

Appraisal Twice

once with the physio

once at work

physio was fine said everything that I expected him to say about stopping using the crutches and brace and trying to walk normally again. roll the foot from heal to toe he gave me three new exercises sitting on the floor with a towel under my heel try and get my leg as straight as possible (a bit achy)lying on my back bring my knee up to my chest and try to make my heel touch my backside (v. painful) called the roman chair I think leaning back to a wall go down into a sitting position and then hold it for a bit.

it's appraisal time at work again, well actual they had it while i was off but I'm having mine now. so Rob and me go off to talk about what I've been doing, what I want to do and what's going on with the company. Generally I'm doing well if not particularly senior work mostly straight forward development. I've mostly been working on our most critical project (I generates most of the money) and that's been going well (good for this years personal bonus).
However I'm not so happy about the way things have been going and this was a good opportunity for a good venting. I'm a senior developer and as such should really be doing some project and team leading. Now I've been promised an opportunity to do this sort of thing three times now only to have it taken away again before I started. So I'm getting a bit frustrated with them and took the opportunity to remind them. Rob (who's also been having quite a rough time of it with his big international project getting cancelled) said that He would make sure that working in the new traffic project I would get the opportunity lead some development. Sounded a bit woolly to me and I said it sounds like b****cks as they have promised before and not delivered.
So the meeting had its lively moments, at one point he tried to say that me being off having surgery was part of the problem until I pointed out the several members of the department have had more time off on holidays since I got back and managed to hold down senior positions.

So I've given him some stuff to think about and write up.

Maybe it will help...

Back to Work

Wednesday was back to work its a bit of a hassle going into London. It takes a bit of time to walk anywhere but with crutches and a brace I do get a seat on the tube.Work isn't too bad although I have to get kind people to carry my cups of Tea etc back from the kitchen.The increase in exercise should be good for me in the long run but by the time I got home my knee had had enough and was quite swollen.

It was no surprise to me that the department organisation at work had changed again while I was away. I'm now in the marketing IT team which looks after different project which have been requested by the sales and marketing teams. At the minute I'm just one of the developers in the team and someone else is doing the team leader work. Rob said that the team leader position will be rotated over time so all the seniors in the team get to do it (there are three of us) but I'm not really buying it. Very frustrating.

Still I've got my Appraisal on Monday so I'll be making my views clear then.

Destapled

Had my two week checkup with Mr Parmar on Tuesday and he gave me the OK to go back to work He also, much to my relief, he removed the staples with a device which looked like a miniature version of the staple removers you get in offices.

He had some video of the operation to show, as well, but only once we managed to get one of the computers to work enough to show it. He had about 20 minutes of tape from the camera that goes into the knee. So I saw the scraping, the cutting and the drilling. I now know the whole process in quite alot of detail and I know that the screws are made from polymers which will blend into the bone over time and that the threading process is similar to how a knitting machine works.

Power cut

Friday morning was a bit different I awoke to a power cut, it lasted about 2 hours.

I'm still on my crutches and my parents are currently away for the weekend, so not being able to go anywhere I had no TV, no Internet, no radio and no way to make a cup of tea!

Basically no more civilisation!

So I got a book (a Rebus novel) and went and sat at the bottom of the garden next to the river and waited, in the morning sun, for civilisation to return.

Bruises

One week on I'm still on the crutches but much more mobile. Its not so painful now which is fortunate as my supply of pills is getting short. The knee looks fairly normal, except of course for the holes in it with the bits of metal sticking out. the rest of the leg is developing some lovely bruises mostly across the shin and around the back of the knee.

10 Staples

Took the main dressing off today and found I had 10 staples in my leg. Looks very Frankenstein! Three small wounds around the knee cap and one inch long one lower down and on the inside of the leg.



Oh and I finished Harry Potter, a very satisfying ending.

Hospital Trip 2

Well it was early start but with a little help from Dad and TomTom I was there for seven a.m.

It was still a long wait until the operation as I went in about 11:30. The dress code was similar this time with an anti DVT socking on my good leg. They didn't make me wear the scary string net pants like last time but keep my boxers on.
It was much more of a major operation than last time and the anaesthetist warning me he would be using much strong drugs (on me) than last time. however despite it being more major I was still out after about an hour.

The drugs definitely were much stronger with me being blotto for most of the rest of the day. the other effect of the drugs (morphine I think) was me being sick all day long and not being able to keep anything down. I didn't help that when ever anyone asked me a question I either nodded or shook my head which set me off again.

The rest of the day was me sleeping or the nurses taking my temp and blood pressure which was up and down due to the drugs.

In the evening my Parents visited but since I was still drugged up they didn't get much out of me and I was nodding off again.

Day two sort of started when they gave me an anti-biotic shot at around 2 am and some pain killers.

The day started for real around 6 am (I remember it starting really early last time as well). it consisted of lots of tea and waiting (reading Harry Potter).

The physio came by and we talked about exercises and gave me some new crutches (elbow style much better to use than the Canadian ones). I said I would reused my brace I already had, once she had ok'd it, otherwise a new one would have cost me a hundred quid (not covered by the AXA).

Finally around 6ish Mr Parmar turned up and asked me if I wanted to go home. I said 'you bet I do' and he said 'Ok, off you go. I'll see you in two weeks'

My Parents came and took me home.

Operation round two

Well I'm packed and ready for a very early start tomorrow. I have to be there at 7 am and with any luck the operation should be early tomorrow. I've been saving the new Harry Potter to read so I probably won't care if there is a bit of a wait.

Time for a good nights sleep...

Mens Fashion

Met up with Colin last night for a beer and a chat.

He's grown himself a set of side burns!

Very 1970's

A little reunion

We had a little IA skiing reunion on Saturday

Jason organised a drink at a Cuban bar near where I used to work in Holborn. It was quite a good little get together with nine of us. Everyone else has pretty much recovered from all the skiing with just a couple of people having some physio for sore knees. It's good to hear no one else had to cut their trip short.

Walking back from the station I had the following three thoughts.

1) Watton has a bit of a wet dog smell to it when its late and after its been raining. (Well the station at least.)

2) Can't remember quite what the second point was, but I'm sure it was quite profound.

3) I really want to go back and finish the instructor course

New team

Well last week they sort of sorted out what'll be doing at work and what team I'll be looking after.

I'm being given the Business As Usual team, which looks after the many small changes and pieces of work that have to be done in order to keep the site running.

They messed up sorting this all out as the Management had give me and others the impression I was starting on the new Credit Scoring project but they changed their minds again as they decided not to give it to someone who might be a bit rusty at running a team (I last officially ran a team back at the end of 1999).

Also they managed to cock things up even more by telling nearly everyone in the department about the changes (the whole department is being shook up) so I first find out whats going on from the company grapevine.

It's not the change in teams that annoys me, I'm not bothered what the team does I just want to be running one. It's that I keep finding out stuff from other people that I should be hearing from my managers first.

New moves

Went to the new Physio last night, called Ian, and he gave me some new exercises to work on to build up the muscles before the op.

1) Kneel down and then sit back so that your backside is touching your heals.
2) Standing on one foot, the bad leg, and practice balancing. When that's simple, do it with your eyes closed.
3) Standing on one foot again bend the knee so that you go down. Keeping your back straight and other leg off the ground. This one is done near something to steady yourself in case you start to fall over.

The first one is a bit painful as I get most of the way there, short about an inch, but the pain is in both legs.

The second is fine no trouble at all.

However the third one... boy does it hurt. I can only go down a little way before it hurts and the whole leg starts to go wobbly. so I must be doing me some good. Compared to the other leg I've got about 12 inches to go not that I expect to be anyway near that for a long long time.

I'll be doing them at work, waiting for the train and probably down the Pub!

Anniversary

Today it's six months since the accident. A long time, I'm mobile now and can walk around fairly normally, not fast, but I can turn and twist a bit without pain. I'm not completely stable until I have the final surgery next month.

I was remembering back to just after it happened when I couldn't put any weight on my leg without it giving way. It was hard just to cross the room make a cup of tea and get back to the bed.

Now-a-days it gets a bit tricky getting through security doors at work (You need three arms with the stick, the pass and the door handle) and moving around on moving trains.

It will be nice to pick up a bit of speed when I, say, need to cross a road quick.

Trains

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAArrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrggggggggghhhh

Haven't actually managed to get to the physio yet, mainly last night due to our wonderful local rail service. I'll be trying to go again tonight. Need to build up the muscles and tendons a bit so the recovery from the sugery is a bit quicker.

Excess Charge

I've got the final bit of surgery sorted for 1st Aug. It's an early start I've got to be there at 7am this time with a morning operation. But at least this time I won't have to fast as long as I will have been asleep.

The official name(s) of the operation are

W7420 Autograft anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction

W8230 Arthroscopic meniscal repair

W9012 Therapeutic local anaesthetic/aspiration - large joint - single

the insurance company is happy to pay for the hospital, the anaesthetist and the physio but the because the consultant is capped by they will only pay the first £1136 of his bill. Fortunately the estimate is £1200 so I will only have to pay £64. I was thinking it was going to be a lot more so this is very good.

Found my box

Well of course it was the nearest one possible. Just across the aisle in the section next to us. I got a little bored at lunchtime and decided to dig through some of their boxes. In the first box under some bits and piece I spotted a familar cup shape lump and digging down found my stuff.

During the big pack up it looks like the guys found some bits and pieces from other people, at the end and just put them in the box. So when they came to look for the box it they didn't recognise it. Of course the box still isn't labeled correctly

So the whole team is happy except for Jamie who's on holiday and will get a surprise when he gets back.

Company Cloak and Dagger

Ah I was begining to think since I've come back that I've been working for a different company

It was a case of loads of people I don't recognise and loads of stuff happening that I've no idea whats going on. It all looked quite business like.

Well the old Company reappeared this morning. Gordon said that Richard was planning on switching me to a different project next Monday, today being Thursday. This is the first I've heard about it, Gordon wasn't allow to tell me, although its clear he has been dropping hints for most of the week now.
On the other hand noone told my current manager or team leader who had rather assummed I'd be working for them and had planned accordingly.

I figure I'll carry on working for my current project and ignore this until I get more conformation.

The new project would be my first official team lead at the Company, which being at the planning stage means I'm wouldn't actually be in charge of any developers straight away.

Stress

Ok so there it was all going a bit too smoothly

The new consultant is what's call capped by AXAPPP with basically means the insurance thinks he charges too much and will only pay what they think is right.

Also the hospital seems to have got mixed up and booked me another appointment with Kitson when they were meant to book one with Mr Parmar.

Looks like the appointment is ok for next thursday. I guess the hospital where just having problems with there computer.

A waiting for the train

This morning while I was standing on the platform at Watton station waiting for my train into London, something quite unusual happened.

It was a lovely sunny morning, one where the heat from the sun, nicely balances the cooling of the wind. The bird were singing all around and now and then there was the sound of a car going down station road. The sky was the sort of blue and cloudy like you see at the start of the Simpsons and in the middle of it was a red and white plane doing acrobatics!

It did some loops and barrel rows, a couple stall climbs and some quarter turns before flying off to the north.

A pretty cool thing to watch for five minutes before the train arrived

Goodbye Mr Kitson

I had my meet with the consulant to check my progress and talk about the next lot of surgery. It didn't quite work as planned and I we didn't fix a date for the next surgery.

He filled me in on what happened in the surgery and said I would need my ACL replaced. I got some nice(?) pictures of the inside of my knee. However he doesn't do the type of acl replacement that I need, because I'm sporty (I told him about the ski instructor course) I should have the ACL replaced with a section of my hamstring.

So I'm being refered on to Mr Parmar who is the man for this sort of thing.

Back to work - It's got that new smell

It was a bit like the first day at a new school. Now my company has moved into its new offices, I return to work at the new location. I had no idea where anything or anyone was in the office, when I walked in. I didn't even know where my desk would be.

Fortunately it turns out its in quite a good location. the office is shaped like a giant L and I'm situated at the bend so I'm in a good position to know what's going on. Of course its not so good for surfing the web and not working, as my screens can be seen quite easily.

my coworkers have mostly been in the office a week now and the large part of the problems have been sorted out. A few servers are still not on line and a couple of the rooms are not quite ready yet but I'm sure it won't be long.

However, and I should have seen this coming, there is one thing that has gone wrong and they haven't been able yet to sort out what's happened. The storage box which I packed all my stuff (and most of the rest of the energy team did too) has gone missing!

It's big, orange and has got my mug in it. So if you see it, tell me as I fancy a cup of tea!

Scars

Took off all the bits of bandages and steri strips yesterday (Thursday) and well they're a bit small.

With the way the knee feels, like I've badly twisted it, I was expecting something a little more impressive.



Oh well, should be fine to go back to work next week, after two weeks off. I must remember to take my doctors note with me.

The Operation, so how did it go?

Monday, my dad told me it would have been my Grandma Dunhill's 100th birthday

It was a lunchtime check in, they asked me what newspaper i wanted in the morning. A little odd I thought as I wasn't planning on staying that long.

A porter collected me and took me to my room (307), slightly cruelly for someone who has been told to fast, we had to walk past the dinning room.
It was a nice single room right at the quiet end of the hospital. A nurse checked me in asked me loads of questions and left me to change into a gown and a set string net knickers, nasty.

Someone popped in and asked me what food i would like later. I figured chicken soup as I was in hospital and some ham sandwiches.

At about 2pm the consultant (Mr Kitson) and the anesthetist (can't remember the name) visited. Kitson marked me on the leg with the same marker pens which we used to use to mark the frozen chickens when i was working at Salisburys. so I was happy that they would operation on the right one!



I was then left to sit waiting watching daytime TV and reading some seriously boring stuff from work about doing testing. I was starting to go a little nuts when I was finally called at about 4:30 and started my long walk to the theatre. It was slow going and the doctors were wondering where I was so much so the anesthetist came looking for us!

I was told to lie down on a trolley and they put a needle in the hand without (I think) any pain (I was expecting this to be the most painful part of the whole experience) we talked about skiing and scuba dives for a bit while they injected some stuff in my hand until I passed out.

I woke up at 6:10 from having such a lovely dream

An hour and 40 minutes, this is a very long time for the op which I had been told would be about 30 minutes. Kitson came in and explained what happened to but of course catching me a bit away with the fairies so I didn't take much in. He said he didn't do anything to the cartilage, there was no damage and in the end he just cut away the ACL stump. So ACL was causing the pain and clicking.

So, although it took me while to realise, it this was great news. No cartilage damage which means less long term problems and I should get a good knee back once a new ACL is put in.

They wheeled we back to the room.

OK, the next parts are a bit confused (I was on drugs!!)

They brought me some food.

Said that i should stay in over night as it was getting a bit late and I should see the physio who had already gone home.

I rang home a couple of times to tell them how it went.

Got a bit sick eating chicken soup. So I asked for a shot of anti nausea stuff which went in my backside and was the thing that hurt the most of the whole visit.

Keep failing asleep eating my ham sandwiches.

Watching TV with the nurse coming in to take my blood pressure and rate on a regular basis.

Kept drinking the water and refusing the painkillers.

Remembered at some point that I had brought my pyaminas so didn't need to still be wearing the frankly quite scary gown and pants combo.

Phoned home to fix up being picked up the next morning (someone must have told me about checking out by 10am at that point).

Took some pics with my mobile



Watched the Terminator and then when to sleep.

I woke up at 3:20 and 5:40 and then just before 7. That would have been my body clock thinking it was time for work. The nurse turned up shortly after to take my readings and give me some pills (painkiller). This was quickly followed by another nurse with an more pills (anti inflamatory), a lady with my breakfast (a vague memory of filling in a form about
what I wanted when I got my ham sandwiches) and a porter with my free newspaper.

So by 7:30 i was sitting up in bed with breakfast and a newspaper watching breakfast TV.
I did the sudoku and word puzzle to make sure my brain was more or less back working.

9:30ish the physio turned up and took me thru a similar set of exercises to ones I was given in Canada. The three exercises where;

with the leg flat try and push the back of the knee to touch the floor
with a towel rolled under the knee tense the thigh muscle, curl the foot up and then slowly lift the lower leg off the ground
with the leg flat and straight gently lift the heel 10cm off the ground

The result of these should be to get my leg straighter and build up the muscles a bit.
The physio also checked out how I was walking and told me off for using the walking stick in the wrong hand (it should be the opposite hand to the problem leg) and was kind enough to get a new rubber foot for the walking stick (called a ferrel) as I've worn the current one down
quite a bit.

So it was just left to the duty nurse to get me some drugs and leaflets to take home and to check me out. My dad had kindly taken some time off work to come a drive me back. he had a bit of fun trying to find my room and we hung out in the room until a porter with a wheelchair arrived to take me to the car.

The sun was shining unlike the cloudy day when I went in and all in all I think it was a very peasant way to get operated on.

Back to the House, Ivy was visiting and I think she was a bit impressed with my bandage.

bye bye office

A last chance to look at the fantastic view from the office and reflective how slightly dogeared the whole place looks. I've pack all my stuff in a crate with the number of my new desk on it.

No wait I don't have a new desk number because looking at the new seating plan the entire Energy development team is missing!

D'oh!

Sounds like an early echo of the bedlam to come next week.

Destroy the Office

Jamie, who sits next to me in the office has started the process of moving out of the office early by destroying (accidentally) the binds on our window. he managed to rip it off the ceiling so that I won't go back up. I figure when they finally move out we won't care much about the stuff left behind but he's a little early.

So its hot in here as the sun is right on us for most of the afternoon. fortunate then that I'm off next week.

Admin

The Knee's too bad at the moment trying not to do anything to dramatic in case I bugger it up.

The preparation for the op is begining at the moment the whole thing seems to be mostly filling in forms I imagine the op will be quicker than the admin!

a huge pack arrived in the post including a lot of detail about how things happen and what can go wrong. I guess that you have to be fully informed before you go in , but its a bit EEK!

New Office

its a bit purple

apparently its a neutral colour in our company. Something about not clashing with the company colours!

It all very nice if a little unfinished at the moment. It's based above Victoria station and we share the building with the Met and the Daily Telegraph.
I was there for a meeting about new changes to our Customisation system and we had it in one of the new brand new rooms in the new building. the room was call Pong and like every other room at the new office it is named after retro computer games. I spotted the following rooms, Pong, Defender, JetPac, Elite, Glaxians, Centipede, Tetris and Asteroids.

A bit Geeky I know, but it is a very nice office. It should be nice to move in after I've had my op (everyone else will be moving in while I'm away on the 9th)

Nice Sofas and carpet

Well private is a bit different!

The Friday appointment with the consultant went smoothly and quickly. The place was very nice and we didn't have the hour wait like the NHS version. I even think the weather was nicer.

So he gave me the full physical again, basically bending my knee at funny angles until either it went click or started hurting. He said that its definitely a big tear to the cartilage and maybe some damage to the ligament. That means the cartilage is worst than we thought and the ACL is probably better.

The result of all this is two operations; one to cut out the cartilage and then much later one to fix the ligament.

So we fixed up a date for the first op. I will be going to the BUPA Hospital in Harpenden on the 4Th June.

It will be a day case, so no stay over night, but I will get a general anaesthetic while they do the op, which will be keyhole. This should reduce the pain and make the knee move more freely, rather than it locking up and not straightening completely, as it currently does.

I will be out of action for a couple of weeks, afterwards, while the bruising heals. This means that I'm probably going to miss uSwitch's move to the new offices. Hopefully the problems and the chaos will have died down by the time I get back (yeah right).

Ring-a-Round and the NHS side step

I've gone private

Took a bit of phoning around to different secretaries in different hospitals, but I've got an appointment to see Mr Kitson, the consultant, this Friday at 4pm.

It at the same hospital, just a different wing. It had to be the same hospital because though a little slight of hand the records from the scan are available only if you stay at the hospital. It seems that the NHS don't allow you to transfer your records to a private hospital and make you go through the whole process again. Fortunately we may be able to get around this as I'm not moving hospital, just moving within the hospital.

It's call the Elizabeth House wing and according to the official NHS map its just around the back.

So hopefully things will start moving very fast and I will be sort real soon

Meniscus Tear, er that will be bad news then.

Bad news


This whole being injured thing is a very frustrating business I've been putting up with a wobbly knee for about five months now and I just want to be able to walk a bit faster.
The visit was quite frustrating as well with a long wait of over an hour and then about a three minute talk before it was all over again. Many thanks to my Mum for driving me there and waiting with me.


The doctor said that the MRI was inconclusive about the ACL, but showed that there is a meniscus tear Apparently this is the pad between the bones that acts like a shock absorber
He said that I should have a bit of keyhole surgery to cut out the bad bit of the cartilage and so they can put in a camera to have a look at the rest of the knee and work out what state the ACL is in

so I will have to have two lots of surgery and so two lots of recovery.

Checking on the web once I got home, about a meniscus tear, a site said they normally cut out the torn bit as there is no blood flow to that area so no chance of it healing.

So the doctor says we should get me in for an operation. I told him I've sort out some private cover when he started talking about getting me in for the surgery. he gave me the business card of the lead consultant for the clinic a Mr Kitson and said I should ring the number on the card and book an appointment to see him. At which point that ended the NHS' involvement in the process and with it the meeting, he wished me good luck.

back home and I call the number on the card and unsurprisingly I get the answerphone.
so its stop start again as I said very frustrating...

Uncle duties

Great news !

I got a phone call, while at work, from my sister, Claire.
She rang to say I will be wanted for my Uncle duties around about the 25Th Nov as she expecting again

Congratulations to Claire and Ed.
Brilliant News...

Finally!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So I got a text this morning from my Mum saying that a letter had arrived from the hospital. Hurrah! so rather than wait until the evening, I rang home and Mum read it out.

I'm off to hospital next monday morning, hopefully to finally find out the damage and some idea of what it will take to get my leg fixed.