January 10

As there had been so much snow in December it stopped me visiting the Lavers to meet Isaac when he was born, despite my attempt to get there after 3 hours driving in the snow I decided the more sensible option was to turn back home. So I re-planned my visit for 2nd January and again the snow tried to thwart me! This time after a quick call from Charlie before setting off we changed plans and I went to get the train instead which was definitely a better idea than driving. It was a lovely day seeing Isaac, building snowmen and throwing snowballs up at the house.

Most of January was tied up with working, from December we had recruited someone temporarily to cover my day job for me so that I could work on the planning for the restructure, ready for announcing the first part at the end of January. It made it much easier for me to be able to pass everything else over and just work on the restructure.

At the end of the month I managed to get a day off to get down to Sal & Rob's for the weekend. I'd booked to fly down as it seemed probably the same cost as driving but a lot less hassle. By the time I was on the plane on the Thursday after a day at work I was again pleased not to be driving so much. It was a lovely relaxing weekend, we had some house things to do, wait for deliveries, view all the plans for the decorating and watch films in the cinema room downstairs.

In January I also had my injections in preparation for my trip to Brazil. For all the travelling that I've done I've never had to have vaccinnations for anywhere that I've been, which meant that I had to have all the booster shots as well. So I went for most of them on one day Tetanus, Diptheria and Polio in one shot in one arm, Typhoid and Hepititus A in the other. Then a few days later Yellow Fever (for a price) that was the only one I was worried about but of course the actual injection was no worse than the others and I didn't feel too ill after it. Now just to get to March for the holiday!

Tribunal

One experience I hope to never have to go through is giving evidence in an employment tribunal. Given the fact that I'm a HR Adviser I think this wish will be a little unrealistic. One of my colleagues, Emma had to go through the experience in December and we spent three days watching the conclusion of the case this week.

I always knew that it was similar to a court room situation but I was nervous just watching and listening to the barrister's firing questions, being very arrogant and condescending (theirs not ours) and starting sentences with 'I put it to you...' And I've decided I never want that sentence to end 'I put it to you Miss Greenwood'.

So I'm going to have to work even harder to make sure that all of my cases are dealt with so well that they never get that far, or work really hard on making sure that any that do turn into a claim are settled well before it gets to a hearing. For anyone that's wondering the outcome of this case will be decided on 14th April - and it's not looking good for us.

First Week

I managed to make it to the end of my first week in my new job at Yorkshire Housing, but I'm so tired.  I thought first weeks were always fairly quiet just getting used to things, find out who people are and get into doing a little bit of work.  That lasted about 1 day, then it's just been busy ever since.  I did think I was sitting in a disciplinary in Sheffield on Tuesday which then changed to a grievance meeting in Huddersfield which then got cancelled so at least I've had a few more days before I need to start providing any real advice!  The travelling has started already though with a day out in Bradford on Wednesday to meet the other 2 HR Advisers, and I'm out in Sheffield for two days next week which should help with getting to know a few more people.  The useful thing is that we all have name badges so at least I'm not having to remember who is everyone is just yet, I just have to have a sneaky look down at their badge if I've forgotten who they are already!

New Job!

I had half a day in my new job this morning having a handover with the girl that is leaving. Bit of a shame to put annual leave in from one job just to go in and work at another but at least we finished by lunch time so I still had the afternoon to myself.

Thankfully the morning hasn't put me off working there! I was a bit worried that it might scare me so much that I would go back to my current job and beg to stay. That hasn't happened though so I can carry on my winding down of work and look forward to Christmas. My last day in work will be Christmas Eve and then I have holiday until I start with Yorkshire Housing on 5th January. It's going to be quite a strange start in January as the 2 permanent people that work in the HR Department now both leave before Christmas so I'll arrive in January with a new HR Manager, another new HR Adviser in Bradford and a vacant position to fill. Should be a challenge!

Change of Route

I made it to Glasgow this week for work but not without a minor diversion. As there was industrial action by the Scottish Signallers last week my journey to Glasgow took a slightly different route. I should have gone direct from York to Motherwell but checking the rail timetable on Tuesday night I found that train had been cancelled so I had three alternatives written down for me to pick from.

It was a very early start and after the alarm went off at 5.30am, I had a taxi come to pick me up at 6am - being the over cautious person that I am I was then at the train station half an hour early! In the end I decided to go for the journey with the most changes but the shortest travelling time, even though this was still an hour and a half longer than my original journey. So at 6.37am I got on the train and an hour later got off in Newcastle, I had half an hour to wait so I had breakfast at the station (discount with a Network Rail card comes in useful!). The next train was the longest of the journey - 90 mins from Newcastle to Carlisle. Unfortunately it was also the most uncomfortable train. It was one carriage and even for my short legs there was not enough leg room, somehow I did manage to fall asleep though, only to be woken up by a very loud Newcastle pensioner telling stories of her family.

From Carlisle I ran from one side of the station to the other in time to get straight on the next train to Motherwell. Unfortunately from there I felt the full effects of the strikes when I got to Motherwell asked when the next train was to Blantyre and they looked at me quite blankly and just said 'None'. Not particularly helpful for an information desk, then they offered 'Bus?'. Thankfully I had already warned my colleagues of the problems and they were already prepared to come and collect me if needed.

The journey home was much more straight forward, although no train from Blantyre to Motherwell still, I did go to Glasgow and from there direct to York. For someone who doesn't like trains, I think I'm getting the hang of this now!

Travelling

Mum complained that I hadn't blogged about anything for two weeks so I'm going to do a quick recap of the things I've done in that time.

I've driven 382 miles
- From York to Preston for work.
- From York to Manchester for Charlie's birthday - a lovely 2 days of mooching, shopping, walking, eating, drinking tea and admiring the new piano.
- From York to Kirklevington for another lovely weekend with Mum & Dad of eating (for Dad's birthday), shopping, reading and sleeping.

I've travelled approx 680 miles by train
- From York to Swindon via London Kings Cross for work.
- From York to Doncaster (twice) for work.

I've walked 34 miles
- From 7 days of walking to and from work.

In the next two weeks I should travel -
34 miles walking to and from work
400 miles on the train to Glasgow for work
600 miles driving to Mum & Dad's next weekend and Sal's the weekend after.

And during that time I will
- Be learning how to play the Cello again in time for next Saturday's Amazing Praise concert, having not played at all since December.
- Trying to find a place to hide the lovely chocolates that are tempting me to eat them so that when I get to Sal's in two weeks I fit into the lovely bridesmaid dresses.
- Get myself to Tesco because I've not had decent food in the house for two weeks.
- Clean the house, which desperately needs it and finally
- Throwing away the perfurme that felt like it had burned my neck this morning and has left it red and swollen.

Sick Day

I've been off work for two days because I've got this stupid cold and rather than spread my germs around the office I've stayed at home. Yesterday I had a real sick day and just checked my emails a bit and ignored my phone, today I've failed at being 'off' sick and have decided to reclassify it as working from home day.

In the time that I have been at home I've watched 5 films so far Hairspray, Run Fatboy Run, The Bank Job, Ladies in Lavender and Michael Clayton. I've eaten much less than I would have done if I'd been in the office (and been fully well) and probably done more work than I would have in the office ;)

I also found out that I've got a pay rise this week - woo hoo! Now rather than putting some extra money towards nice lovely things for me, I can pay the ever increasing fuel bills :(

Sunday evening blues

I've got that Sunday evening feeling. Even though work hasn't been too bad (in the last week or so at least), I still have that feeling that I really don't want to go to work tomorrow. I've had two weeks of being incredibly busy as we try to put a case together to convince the UK Border Agency that even though we haven't been entirely compliant with our work permits, they'd really like to let us keep the 6 guys that they are threating to send back to the Phillippines. I think as the deadline to that draws nearer (Tuesday), I'd rather delay it coming around by it never becoming Monday.

I've also got a sore throat that started this afternoon and I can feel already is going to annoy me for the next few days and become quite painful probably by Monday morning, another reason for not wanting it to become Monday too quickly. Saying that I think it's time for an early night and another dose of paracetamol and will just have to give in to the inevitable and wait for Monday to arrive.

Swindon

I had to go to Swindon with work this week so I set off on Tuesday morning to get to the train station for 8.15am. The first thing that should have told me it was going to be a bad day was that as I was half way to the bus stop I could see a bus drive past the end of the road so I knew I'd missed that one, although the next one was a couple of minutes late I knew I still had enough time to get to the station before the train was due to leave at 8.27, or so I thought.... We managed half of the journey fine but then as we reached the stops at the racecourse the engine cut out everytime the bus pulled up at the stops from there and every stop all the way into town. I still would have had enough time if it hadn't also happened each time the bus stopped at the traffic lights so by the time the engine had started again the lights had turned red so we had to wait twice as long.

I got to the station thinking I had a minute or two to spare so I rang Susie as I got there to see where she was, to which she replies that she was on the train just as I saw it pulling away from the platform. That wouldn't have been too much of a problem, I could just get the next train and meet her in Swindon - except that she had my train tickets as well! So we decided I would get at ticket to Doncaster and meet her there. Sounds simple enough.....

As the train was pulling into Doncaster I rang Susie and she'd checked the tickets and decided we could use them to go via London which is the faster route. I was on a Kings Cross train anyway so I just needed to stay on it and she would get on at Doncaster. By this point the train had stopped outside of Doncaster station to wait for a platform to become free so I was then slightly panicked when Susie rang to say that she was on the train! She quickly pushed her way back off that train and ran to the other platform where my train finally pulled in and we managed to find each other at last!

The rest of the trip was quite uneventful, the disciplinary meeting I was in Swindon for wasn't that exciting but did last a bit longer than expected, when my notes run to 12 pages I know it's been a very long meeting and my writing hand begins to ache. I went to the gym at the hotel which I was quite impressed with myself for doing as in all the times I've stayed in hotels with work over the past 4 years I've never once used a gym in a hotel. We had a quick dinner because we wanted to watch The Apprentice and I was so pleased that Michael finally got fired, it had been too long in coming!!

Working from home

I always think that working from home sounds like a good idea, but it's not. It's actually very boring. Although I have the same access to all the IT systems at home and I have the same mobile number, for some reason I find it much harder to fill my day with work unless people are emailing me things to do, which begs the question - What do I do when I'm in the office?

My reason for being at home today was to wait in for a delivery from B&Q of my new kitchen worktops. The delivery estimate was between 12:00 and 18:00 and at 14:10 they arrived, not bad going. The main concern with B&Q delivery seems to be not whether they arrive when they say they will but more whether they actually deliver what you ordered. All being well I think that part has gone ok. I have the right number of boxes of the right shapes, they're just so heavy that I can't actually get anywhere near opening them to see if it's the right one without danger of serious injury so I think I'm just going to trust B&Q that on this occasion they've got it right. Once I know my neighbours are at home I'll have a look in the box so that should I end up buried beneath one of them I can hammer on the wall and hope that someone comes to rescue me.