Getting meditative

A couple of years ago (and again last year) the work had a "Health and Wellbeing" day for staff, to try and encourage the wine sozzled, refectory food guzzling slobs who work here, to get off they're arses and well, not drop dead basically.
As part of this event, there was an introduction to meditation.  I went along, really liked it, and wanted to keep going, but as is typical where I'm concerned, no group started up, and the chance to keep going in a group never materialised.

Until yesterday.

The woman who had arranged for someone to come in and run the meditation taster, managed to find someone from the Glasgow Buddhist Centre, to come in and take a group.

So yesterday afternoon, was my first group session of mindfullness meditation.  I have to say, that afterwards, I felt really calm and happier than I had been when I went in.
Unfortunately, due to timetable issues, I'll only be able to make it along once a fortnight, but hey, it's better than nothing.  And, once I know what I'm doing, I'll be able to do it on my own, when I want/need to.

We have ways of making you enjoy yourself

So, with just over two weeks to go to THE BIG DAY(tm), the shops are in full SPEND SPEND SPEND mode, and the pubs are emphasising FUN and PARTY, and I'm thoroughly sick of it already.
Seriously, I'm looking forward to Boxing Day and some semblance of normality (sales excepted).

I've got two do's to go to, the main departmental one (which as per usual, I'll go to for the meal, then sneak off and meet a few colleagues who will also escape (or just not attend) in a pub of choice for a drink, where we don't have to be witness to people we work with pretending they actually like each other, and "dancing" like loons as they slowly (or rapidly in some cases) get wasted.

The other do is the one I prefer.  There's a few of us in a lottery syndicate, and we always go for a Christmas lunch and drink, just the five of us.  This year, it's been hi-jacked, as someone who can't make the main do has been invited - which is fine - and has then asked others along - which is NOT fine.  I've even been asked "Are you going to Bobby's do?"  WTF!!  It's not his, it's ours, and it's been hi-jacked.  I'm seriously considering not going, as it's going to be a pain having to smile, joke and laugh with people I don't want to be in the company of.

Like I said, roll on Boxing day.

Karate and getting to a calm place

The last couple of months I've been struggling to get to karate practice.  Thursdays are out as I've had no option but to change my guitar lesson to a Thursday night, as the teacher had a change in circumstances, Saturday mornings are out, as there's an issue that I would rather avoid, as there's a junior who is..... disruptive, won't listen and thinks they know it all, despite having only been going a few months.
There's a Tuesday club starting up next week, so that's all to the good.  In the meantime, there's the Wednesday club, that due to work I've been only attending sporadically.  The overall result is that I've been near to throwing in the towel, but I thought that I'd give it another go today in preparation for the new Tuesday club, and do you know, it's been a real tonic.

Before lunch I was a bit strung out.  I'd been really busy, and one of the systems we use to place orders was playing up, so stress levels were high by lunchtime.  Cue the karate class.  Great session today.  I'm now in a very calm serene place mentally, and nothing is going to be allowed to change that for the rest of the day.

meh

In a bit of a downer at the moment.  Not depressed, just basically can't be arsed.
I think work is to blame.  There's samplers that I need to make for a project, and they need to be ready for May/June.  Now I've ordered in the parts I need, but there's stuff that we can't buy from approved suppliers, and that has to be bought using the project credit card, which I don't hold.
This has been dragging on since Christmas.  I need one part to build a prototype, and I've just been told, if it doesn't work, then we'll have to think about some other way of sampling.

Fine.

Except.  I'm on holiday for two weeks in May.  This was booked before I was asked to make the samplers. They know I'm going away.  So, basically, if they don't get their fingers out, they aren't going to get their samplers.

End of.

Why is this making me meh?  Well, I really enjoy working on this, and it's just frustrating that it's other people holding things up.

I'd scream, but I can't muster the energy.

Life, the Universe and Rock n Roll

Things are looking up.  Work-wise it's getting more varied, and more interesting.
The other day I was doing some electronics for the first time in about 20 years.  OK it was a very basic digital circuit, but do you know, I really enjoyed it.

Yesterday I started working through a tutorial for a bit of software that simulates instruments, that you can then connect to circuits/devices, and either get inputs from the devices or output to the devices, as it acts as an instrument simulation.  Today I've spent most of the day installing it on my desktop, so I don't have to be in the lab to work through the tutorials. (Yes, it took a couple of hours to instal!!)

Apparently there's also going to be the chance to do some C++ programming, so I'll get to learn that.  This is pretty cool.  I did some programming during my degree (TurboPascal, BASIC and C) and really enjoyed it, so this should be pretty good.  Challenging, but good.

In non-work news, I've booked a block of 4 beginners guitar lessons.  This will apparently lead on to a block of 10, once they get organised better.  It starts a week on Saturday (9th).  The only problem with that is that there's an all day karate course on that day, so it means I'll only be able to attend in the morning.  I was kind of hoping there was a chance to get graded, but I guess that won't happen if I'm only there for half the day.  Swings and roundabouts.

Crimbo do - the aftermath

And there I was thinking that not much had happened.  There was a couple of things I saw, but nothing major, but here's the breakdown from the corridor gossip the morning after the night before.

1 - lecturer in psycho mode.  After looking stressed/freaked out, a lecturer hides in a corner with a drink and starts looking angry.  After announcing he's leaving as "this is not my sort of place, I don't feel comfortable here" he's spotted at the bar with not one but two drinks.  Proceeds to get pished and have a good time.

2 - admin lassie absolutely blootered, staggering about with a drink in each hand telling anyone who will listen, about the "sleazy b*stards who keep groping her arse on the dancefloor.  She then proceeds to name them before falling over twice.  Once in the venue and once in the street.  Horribly hungover the next day, and eventually threw up.

3 - married academic caught snogging single admin girl who (rumour has it) is involved with another (married) academic

4 - lots of really bad dancing, which, due to the amount of booze sunk, the perp think is the best dancing ever done.  The highlight being one academic (do you see a thread here) dancing like a condemmed man who hasn't been strapped into the chain before they've turned the current on.

5 - possibly the weirdest one of the night. Male academic walking round in one of the admin girls' high heels.  This is not the first time he's pulled this particular party trick.  Is there something he's trying to tell us?

Anyway, that's it for another year.  Thank God.

it's the weekend, yay!!!

That's it, work's over for another week.  Tomorrow we're off to pick up Tracy, and head out to Whitelees Windfarm for a wander round the visitor centre and the forest.  Hope it stays dry, but if today's anything to go by it should be fine.

Work is getting interesting.  There's a project I'm involved in, and it involves fieldwork to collect samples.  At the moment it's from to Glasgow sites, but soon, there'll be a couple of sites in Melrose that we'll be collecting from as well.  I say it's getting interesting, as there's been problems getting the samplers to work, and it's not the same problem each time.  Today at one site we got fantastic samples, but none at the other.  There appears to be a problem with the sampling unit, so we might have to get someone from the compay that installed them to come out and take a look.

In other non-work work related news, I'm organising a hillwalk up Ben Ledi, to raise money for SAMH, at the end of August.  Some of the girls in the office have gone *squeeeee* as they've found somewhere to buy pink walking boots.  Yes, that's right, PINK walking boots.  

On the music front, I'm currently loving the soundtrack to Into the Wild.  Awesome songs from an amazing movie.