power failures are wonderful!

oh shit, i forgot so switch on the outside light before i left this morning…

 

oh. maybe the light bulb has blown. but these new bulbs are supposed to last a long time…

 

oh, is my electricity off?

 

that was my home-coming yesterday, when i was looking forward to enjoying the home-cmade gnocchi… but as the whole street was without power i had to… order pizza! (small price to pay…)

 

i was actually totally excited – i love power failures. must be linked to my love of going to the roughest places you can find – being completely out of your comfort zone, and not being able to rely on the creature comforts we take for granted.

 

so i had pizza by candle-light, reading about the genocide.

 

and i get to enjoy the gnocchi tonight with a garlic tomato sauce with beef strips… can you smell it simmering… mmmhh…

 

i had a crap day. don’t worry – the music and red wine are helping to rectify it.

 

with my staff member leaving yesterday, and 2 new people to train and a colleague away for a week, a lot is coming my way. and i find i stress and lose control when i have so many demands on me at the same time. of course, i need to work on passing things on to others (some call it delegation, i sometimes worry if it isn’t a boomerang) but i am also aware of how busy the others in my team are. and i don’t wanna overload them. anyway – i need to learn. again.

 

oh! and then there was the case of the no-response from the company i have paid a deposit to to automate my gate… i paid them yesterday – and you’d think that by now someone would have called to say – thanks we got your money, and we’ll contact you in a day or two to arrange installation.

 

but no – i had to call them – they gave me a number of their other branch to call (!!?!) – and i graciously flipped at them. maybe they’ll get the message. i’m just hoping they’ll give me my remotes after they install it this week ; – )

 

(is it really sooo hard to give decent service?)

 

what bugged me today: a feeling of not coping

 

what i learnt today: that remaining calm while crapping on someone can have a partially desired outcome

 

what i am grateful for: music – and remembering it’s positive effect when i listen to it!

mixed emotions

so i had a day that i can only explain as having mixed emotions… i was very unimpressed with the work ethic of some of my colleagues, yet i also had some very good times today.

i don’t know about you, but when you work together in a company, you need to help each other when there is something urgent that needs to happen. sometimes one needs to see the bigger picture and not be stickler for detail. sometimes one needs to not make excuses for others, instead of helping.

take the example of the client that needed an invoice urgently. normally this is only done when the file with all the correspondence in it has been double checked. fair enough. but when i can’t find the file, and the 4 staff that know where it is are either on lunch, on leave or (literally) AWOL, then surely you can invoice a very small file, a very uncomplicated file, without all the correspondence?

When i make it clear to the accounts person that this is super urgent because the client is shouting at me, i don’t need to get an e-mail from her boss stating “please give the file to her before she can invoice”. which part of the fact that we couldn’t find the file wasn’t understood.

when i pointed out that i had actually already asked the file to be invoiced 3 hours previously, which should have saved us a lot of time and anguish – i was merely told, “I’m sure she had a valid reason for not invoicing that earlier”.

no team-work, no mutual assistance, no making a plan for the benefit of the client, no finding out why it wasn’t done the first time.

this makes me want to not help them the next time. why should i give of myself, if i get nothing in return?

apart from that i had a lovely lunch with my dad – nice to get out and chat – we should do it more often.

and then i had a work function this evening. funny how i was expecting the worst, but it was actually very nice. i’m not the best at shmoozing with strangers – and the evening was spent with a group of agents from germany, and a couple of my colleague / clients from germany.

it always makes such a massive difference to meet, face-to-face, the people that you interact with on email on a daily basis. that was so awesome. so i ended up having a great evening, after all.

what bugged me today: the selfishness of some people

what i learnt today: that asking your friends about electricians might give you unexpected answers

what i am grateful for: pay-day!

are my standards too high?

last night i got a call from stef & johanna in vienna… was just what i needed… really made me smile… thank you.

 

so nice to catch up with them J

 

 

do you also find sometimes, that people will not listen to what you ask, or read it properly. merely glance at it and then tell you want they think you want to hear?

 

my day was full of people like that… from colleagues… insurance quoters, travel websites and hotels.

 

i began to think maybe it was me. i was happy to (ok, i would grudgingly) admit that it could be me, but not in cases like this.

 

hotel

“hello – who is your marketing manager please?”

“putting you through!”

 

garage door repairers

“hello, i need t speak to someone about the lock and system on my garage door”

“you can come in an buy a new lock, we have them in stock”

 

online travel website

“i cannot find my airline’s frequent flyer programme in the drop down list of choices on your site. can you see if it can be added?”

“you will find our drop down list of frequent flyer programmes under ‘my account’”

 

insurance people just ignore the questions they don’t want to answer

 

colleague doesn’t answer my e-mail, i get frustrated, she complains to me, using that dreaded cc function… so not necessary…

 

 

anyway – off to the theatre – gotta make snow 6 times this week. oh, and i recruited yet another colleague into the thespian world!

 

what bugged me today: colleagues (is this a recurring theme?)

 

what i learnt today: how to print a large photograph

 

what i am grateful for: Princess – or cleaning up after me so well, and folding my t-shirts in the cupboard!

angels & demons

what a wonderful afternoon! it’s always so nice to catch up with really close friends that one hasn’t seen in a while… and to just chill and relax…

 

did our parents’ generation also find that conversation turned to matters sex as often as it does in mine… or are we just lucky ; )

 

then of course i got 2 work phone calls that put me in a foul mood. i’ve had enough of that nonsense now. i’m so tired of cleaning up a mess after colleagues… it is exhausting…

 

 

what bugged me today: colleagues…

 

what i learnt today: a little bit about the life and work of dr kinsey

 

what i am grateful for: wonderful friends and sunny days

monday, monday…

i struggled to get out of bed, expecting the worst for some reason. but at around lunchtime i realised that i was having a great day. everything was running smoothly, i was getting work done that i had put aside, i was smiling

of course, these things don’t always last – and i was quickly edgy after lunch – from a colleague with whom i had a misunderstanding – she jumped to conclusions and we basically trubbed each other up the wrong way, each taking the other’s comments not-quite-correctly…

then everyone’s favourite agent, who’s clients arrived tonight called to say they didn’t like their hotel. well, you get what you pay for, and on that budget you don’t get the glitz and glamour you may want. them going out to dinner before we can resolve it didn’t help, but that just means we need to do it in the morning.

anyway – i get to spend an evening eating and wining with gordon & laura & the kids – that’s always fun – thank heavens for friends, ey?

what bugged me: when people jump to conclusions about something that is not meant in a certain way. i am guilty of that too

what i learnt today: that not all mondays are shit – at least not all the way through

what i am grateful for: the reaction that a huge avocado brings to people’s faces

smiling for the weekend

what has disappointed me today: my plans for saturday night have fallen through – i’m trying to make new plans, and need to deal with the fear that i might get nothing, or also have 2 things

what have i learnt today: to take the time double check the files of all ex-colleagues

what am i grateful for today: that i can still remember and celebrate losing my virginity – 10 years today

what a day… where to find the silver lining in it…?

this is my first blog – heard about wordpress last night, and thought i might give it a bash – and boy is this the right day for it.

i can’t begin to explain the shit day i’ve had – starting off with a hotel that had not been booked for a client. a honeymoon couple… i should mention at this point that i work for an inbound tour operator, so we organise holidays for people to all parts of our country… which you can imagine is a small disaster, not only for the clients, but also for me. And the arrogant tour guide doesn’t really help (do they always forget who pays their salary?) … anyway – we found them another place to stay, nicer, and are including dinner and wine etc – which doesn’t do good things for the budget.

after that, another booking where a hotel was booked and we underquoted because of a currency conversion problem… and the clients are travelling in 5 days time this is the type of mistake i really don’t enjoy!!! so a lot of sweet talking needs to happen, and a lot of begging the universe to please come and help…

one loses sight of the fact that my team made lots of bookings that are running very smoothly, but because that’s what’s supposed to happen, we don’t realise it.

anyway – the good news that i’m trying to focus on is dinner with some good friends in about an hour, and hopefully a quick stop at the mgym in between. i went to the men’s room earlier to go and scream – at about the time that my head couldn’t actually take any more information – but of course there was a guy at the urinal. so i couldn’t scream. imagine! he would have pissed all over the walls in fright!

and that concludes my first blog. may the next one be more up beat