Well let's see, what did June have to offer? Well to begin with it was really bloody cold and rainy. Which was definitely reflected by our power bill. It seems like ages ago that I went down to Invers but I guess it's really just over a couple of weeks ago. Things have just been busy enough to fill in about twice that much time. Mostly it's work that's keeping me busy. I applied for another job too, also at MBIE. Waiting to hear. My current job has been focussed on coordinating the science panel meetings, where they will assess all the proposals that have been submitted for research funding. Everything is very much under control thanks to my super-spreadsheet, and I'm sure the next few weeks will run smoothly and everything will go fine. I'm looking forward to meeting all of the people that I have been emailing over the last two months, and trying out all the delicious food I've ordered for them.
At work we had a couple of dramas to keep us busy last week. And that's aside from all the bad press we're getting about spending too much money on signs and screens and other building-related things. Plus there were a couple of meetings last week (pre-meeting meetings, where we discuss how we're going to run the meetings (and before that we had pre-pre-meeting meetings, that's government for you)), where I inadvertently became the messenger that got shot - repeatedly. I ran the meeting because I am one of the coordinators, so it is up to us to make sure all the managers understand how everything has been coordinated, so that all their meetings run in the exact same way. Only my colleague wasn't there to back me up because she was on damage-control for one of the dramas I mentioned, and our manager was needed in another meeting, and our overall manager doesn't really keep up with the day-to-day running of things, and dashed off to somewhere else halfway through. Now on the second day that would have been fine, because the managers were nice ones. But on the first day there were about 10 people, one of them that could aptly be described as a bit of a snarling dragon, and they were all questioning and demanding and saying 'but we always do it like...' which is all well and good, but thanks to high staff turnover there is no set processes and none of us coordinators have done this before. So the dragon-like manager is not one to be argued with, so I nodded and smiled and apologised and made notes and said 'I'll see what we can do'. Then I let my colleague know, and our manager, and left them to go back to her and say no, we aren't doing that. She also pretty much called my team admin staff, which we actually are not. We do much more than admin.
So you see how work leaves me pretty much completely worn out. I leave at 4 though, which is nice. It's still daylight when I get home so I can walk the dog down to the dogpark. After work I sometimes have more work to do, because I have to prepare my tutoring lessons. Which is hard without my laptop, using a tablet just isn't the same. But these last few weeks we've been doing chemistry and the periodic table, and making our own poster sized version, so that's been fun. It's school holidays next week too so I should try think of something fun for us to do. If I can arrange it we might go to the observatory, I've never been to one. That would be a very nerdy Saturday night! This weekend might also be a nerdy Saturday night, I don't think I can handle being in town at all with the huge amount of people that will be around because of the rugby, I might just stay home and be boring. But speaking of the rugby, you might have seen some of the people waiting in line all night here in Welly for tickets? Well have a look at this new clip and you'll see a familiar face (and wearing a hat I knitted no less, shame it wasn't blue and yellow though): http://bcove.me/icgh1y7s. I feel he still owes me one after I gave up my lesson prep time to drive him to town, then had to go all the way back again because he forgot his sleeping bag!
So did anything else happen in June? Well, the oven broke and I've been without for two whole weeks! It's been hard, especially with some pretty cold weather about a week or so ago (it's nice now though). What's worse is that I had been planning in doing a big roast dinner the weekend that it broke! Luckily I have a big stockpot so I braised my lamb shoulder instead and it turned out really well! It didn't warm the house up like the oven would have though. The new one arrives tomorrow. So that's probably all my news. Oh, and on the crochet front - my bus time has been taken up with Pride and Prejudice this last while but I will get bootie-making after that. I might not make it back to Invercargill again as soon as I hoped, I am at work when the grabaseat offers pop up so I always miss them. I'll be there eventually though. Here's a picture of Cher to finish with (she turned three in June):
At work we had a couple of dramas to keep us busy last week. And that's aside from all the bad press we're getting about spending too much money on signs and screens and other building-related things. Plus there were a couple of meetings last week (pre-meeting meetings, where we discuss how we're going to run the meetings (and before that we had pre-pre-meeting meetings, that's government for you)), where I inadvertently became the messenger that got shot - repeatedly. I ran the meeting because I am one of the coordinators, so it is up to us to make sure all the managers understand how everything has been coordinated, so that all their meetings run in the exact same way. Only my colleague wasn't there to back me up because she was on damage-control for one of the dramas I mentioned, and our manager was needed in another meeting, and our overall manager doesn't really keep up with the day-to-day running of things, and dashed off to somewhere else halfway through. Now on the second day that would have been fine, because the managers were nice ones. But on the first day there were about 10 people, one of them that could aptly be described as a bit of a snarling dragon, and they were all questioning and demanding and saying 'but we always do it like...' which is all well and good, but thanks to high staff turnover there is no set processes and none of us coordinators have done this before. So the dragon-like manager is not one to be argued with, so I nodded and smiled and apologised and made notes and said 'I'll see what we can do'. Then I let my colleague know, and our manager, and left them to go back to her and say no, we aren't doing that. She also pretty much called my team admin staff, which we actually are not. We do much more than admin.
So you see how work leaves me pretty much completely worn out. I leave at 4 though, which is nice. It's still daylight when I get home so I can walk the dog down to the dogpark. After work I sometimes have more work to do, because I have to prepare my tutoring lessons. Which is hard without my laptop, using a tablet just isn't the same. But these last few weeks we've been doing chemistry and the periodic table, and making our own poster sized version, so that's been fun. It's school holidays next week too so I should try think of something fun for us to do. If I can arrange it we might go to the observatory, I've never been to one. That would be a very nerdy Saturday night! This weekend might also be a nerdy Saturday night, I don't think I can handle being in town at all with the huge amount of people that will be around because of the rugby, I might just stay home and be boring. But speaking of the rugby, you might have seen some of the people waiting in line all night here in Welly for tickets? Well have a look at this new clip and you'll see a familiar face (and wearing a hat I knitted no less, shame it wasn't blue and yellow though): http://bcove.me/icgh1y7s. I feel he still owes me one after I gave up my lesson prep time to drive him to town, then had to go all the way back again because he forgot his sleeping bag!
So did anything else happen in June? Well, the oven broke and I've been without for two whole weeks! It's been hard, especially with some pretty cold weather about a week or so ago (it's nice now though). What's worse is that I had been planning in doing a big roast dinner the weekend that it broke! Luckily I have a big stockpot so I braised my lamb shoulder instead and it turned out really well! It didn't warm the house up like the oven would have though. The new one arrives tomorrow. So that's probably all my news. Oh, and on the crochet front - my bus time has been taken up with Pride and Prejudice this last while but I will get bootie-making after that. I might not make it back to Invercargill again as soon as I hoped, I am at work when the grabaseat offers pop up so I always miss them. I'll be there eventually though. Here's a picture of Cher to finish with (she turned three in June):
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