I love it when you go into the ladies’ changing rooms in a department store when they’re busy. You can hear lots of hilarious conversations going on between disembodied voices, but you can also have extra fun with the lady who checks you in and out.

Like I did yesterday.

I went in, whilst the place was in chaos. There was no check-in lady to be seen, so I went in, tried my items on, and on my way out, there was the check-in lady.

“Any good?” She asks in that despairing way that only changing room check-in ladies can.

“No thank you” I said, handed her the items and strode away.

“Errr. ” She said. “Where’s your disc?”

“What?”

“Where’s your disc?” she motions to the items in her hand “Fer these?”

“I didn’t get one” I said.

This is interesting, I think to myself. What kind of powers does a changing room check-in lady have? What’s she going to do about this situation, then? Will I be arrested?

She’s looking at me with a face that seems to say “Could she have stolen something? Does she look dodgy?” She eyes me up and down. I am wearing my work suit, I have a hand-bag and little else about me. Her face brightens.

“Okay then!” she says, and turns away to her racks.

Amazing.

The front line of store security.

Well, here we are again.

Another year has gone by and here I am delivering yet more bad news to a group of people who should have seen it coming, but are still shocked and crushed nonetheless.  All but one of them has been here before. Last year and in some cases, the year before, too. It can’t be good.

No-one likes the news that they may not have a job in 6 weeks time. But as I sit with Manager Frank as he delivers the rationale for why half the staff have to go, I can’t help but be amazed at how they take it. Frank has never been in a position to deliver this kind of news, and I can feel him waiver and shake from within. But he pulls it off. None of the audience will ever know how much time I sat with him and made sure he was saying the right things in the right way, explaining what to do when, and how this long and horrible process has to work. They see him, their leader, strong and decisive. I know better.  

How do they take it? Lets go round the room.

Cyril, a big, miserable-looking lump of a man is good at his job, despite the appearances. He takes the information in and grunts occasionally as though someone is badly telling a funny story he’s heard before, even though its not funny, and yes, he has heard it before. He asked pertinent questions about how he’ll be affected by the pending redundancies, but theres a sense of sadness about him, despite his gruffness.

Next to him is Carl. A skinny man who looks permanently like he’s been caught doing something he shouldn’t be.  Not an idiot, but he’s certainly not very good at his job, and before the redundancy threat came along, he may have been looking dismissal in the eye in any event. He seemed fairly pragmatic about the news, and even put forward some useful suggestions.

Brenda, a hard-working, conscientious and dilligent member of staff who we’d be sorry to lose looked close to tears and barely spoke. Secretly I know that as long as she applies for her own job, she’s safe. I cannot tell her that. No-one can. I feel her pain, but there is nothing I can do. Absolutely nothing.

Violet, who reminds me of Thelma from the Scooby Doo cartoons, makes a fuss and moans and complains and was utterly selfish. She has no awareness of how the others feel, unlike me. She drew attention to herself, tried to make others feel sorry for her and succeeded in doing exactly the opposite. She too is not meeting her targets, and is performing at a much lower level than Cyril and Brenda, and they know it. Violet made no friends today.

Christine stoically took in the information, and worried about her poor sickness record. Her achievement level is similar to Violet’s, but she didn’t upset the applecart, and quietly wrote her own notes to ask sensible questions later. Christine is generally easily led by others – but not today.

Bob is off sick, unwell and poorly performing. If redundancies hadn’t come knocking, Bob would be facing dismissal earlier even than Carl. He was grateful for the information we gave him, and even thanked me. Unbelievable.  

Muriel squeaked and sqawked and generally tried to be teacher’s pet by making out she knew all along that things were bad and that something like this was bound to happen. Muriel is a high achiever, but she talks too much, is very emotional and manages to upset everyone very easily. She stamps her feet and cries when she doesn’t get her own way. So today, she just did her thing. Out of all the others, Muriel is the only one who hasn’t been through redundancies before. She is fairly new to the team, and had no appreciation that these others are all survivors.

As a team, this is a most dysfunctional team. Their line manager, Kate, is inexperienced and finds it hard managing this group of people who are, at best, like a sack of cats.

None of the team mentioned Kate. Partly because they hate her anyway, and partly because, with the exception perhaps of Brenda and Cyril, everyone else is way too selfish to consider anyone other than themselves. 

No-one thanked me as we left. No-one except Frank, that is.

I’ve never stopped to think about it like this before, but I am the messenger. I say what needs to be said in a sensible, reliable way. I am the voice of the corporation, a face for the faceless entity that is an organisation. The person to shout at, to complain to, to hate. On another level, the complainers know that I am there for them. Administering the will of the company, yes – but they know it isn’t my will. It isn’t me they hate. They just need a messenger to shoot. Its nothing personal.

And that’s me.

Badger and Spaniel Cutting the cake!

Hopefully you can see a quick pic of our wedding.

It was fabulous!

Odd things have happened lately which have got me thinking.

As a good psychologist I know that people change depending on the company they’re in, which makes it difficult for anyone to truly know another person. The more time you spend with someone in a variety of different situations, the more you get to know them.

Sometimes you think you know someone, but you end up being shocked by something they do.

• Badger’s cousin T suddenly hanged himself aged 35, ending his battle with clinical depression and debt that none of his family knew anything about. He had always been the most level-headed ‘together’ guy we knew.
• My friend L, a quiet family man who was sacked ffrom his job for fraudulent expenses claims, sky-high mobile bills for sex-chatlines and hardcore pornography on his laptop.

Sometimes you think you know someone, but you end up being shocked by something that other people think they’ve done.  

• D, a quiet and studious man, accused and arrested on suspicion of rape by an 18 year old girl who got drunk, followed him home and fell asleep on his lounge floor.   
• W, a lovely, kind, caring man with children of his own who spent his life caring for others accused by a man with mental health issues of touching him when he was a boy.

Sometimes you don’t think you know someone very well – but you end up being shocked by how much you do know about them, and how much they have confided in you.

My friend A, a genuine, funny, sensible, insightful and caring leader of people. I have spent very little time with him, and yet, when bad things happened in his life and he cut off all communication with his friends and colleagues, for some strange reason he continued to speak only to me. I only very recently realised I knew him better than anyone.

People are amazing.

I have never heard of anything so ridiculous.

The lady from the UK Passport office rang me today to tell me that there was a problem with my application to change my name.

Really? What’s wrong?

She told me, in the condescending tones of a a civil servant who knows just how idiotic the general public are that I had signed my new application in my old name. She implied a silliness in this action, that was completely absent, and therefore got my back up straight away.

Me: “No, said I – I’ve signed my signature. “

Her: “But its the same as the old one. “

Me: “That is correct. “

Her: “But it isn’t allowed. It doesn’t match your new name. “

Me: “So? If my signature was a meaningless scribble it could say anything and you’d be none the wiser.”

Her: “But it isn’t. We know it says your old name, and that’s not good enough.”

Me: “So, you’re telling me I have to make up a signature just for my passport?”

Her: “Oh no – you have to change your signature for everything. “

Me: “Why? Where does it say that?”

Her: “I can’t really be getting into discussion about this – I’m just telling you the rules”. 

Funny that…. “OK,” says I, “Where do we go from here?”

Her: “We’ll send you a new form which you’ll have to sign properly. “

Me: “And I’m going to have to pay for this again am I?”

Her :”Oh no, you won’t need to pay again, you’ll just need to sign it again. “

Me: “I see. Well I’ll wait for you to write to me then. “

Her “OK, I’ll let Mrs suchandsuch know and she’ll send you a new form. “

Me: “Fine. Goodbye.”  

This, my friends, is the thin end of the wedge.

I’m not giving up without a good fight. When did readable signatures become law? This is preposterous!

I shall wait until I get my new form and letter and complain to someone higher. What utter rubbish.

Yes – we had a perfect day!

Back soon to update you all. xx

Frantic, busy, not much time to check wordpress.

Covered in eczema patches, probably stress.

Work is busy – many many nutters – too many to tell you about.

Wedding in 15 days time.

Aggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Will be back soon.

After Mauritius, Edinburgh and calmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

DS

I’m not a fan of Tom Cruise, but on the whole I really enjoyed this film.

Maybe the fact that early on in the story he ends up losing an eye, a hand and a lot of fingers helped endear him to me, because unlike in every other film I’ve seen him in, he wasn’t perfect for once. 

Also, I think that because I knew from the start that it was a true story, and that they were unsuccessful in their objectives to overthrow Hitler made it very emotional to watch. I was very sad at the end when they realise they have come so close to success, but have ultimately failed.

Having the actors speak in their own accents rather than trying to do something ‘Allo ‘Allo -style was a lovely touch, too.

Worth watching.

I ventured into Lakeside today, the large shopping mall in South Essex which seems to be staffed entirely from unhelpful girls with appalling gutteral accents who would rather chat to their friends than serve customers. But that’s another story I’ll not bore you with right now.

 As I walked along the busy mall, passing fairly close to the front windows of brightly-lit shops advertising their hugely-discounted sale items, other shoppers whizzed past me, overtook me, jostled and hussled for space and momentum, and were gone; off beyond my field of vision, going about their business, but quickly replaced by a hundred others all doing the same sort of thing.

As I walked along, something caught my eye. A tall brunette-come-redhead, heading towards me, eyes low, hugging the shop-fronts as she made her way along. She was clutching her bag with one arm, and I noticed that her outdoor jacket was dark and largely shapeless, part-covering a knee-length brown skirt and 4-inch plain black heels. 

There was something about the hair. I looked back at its odd colour, and realised how thick and lank it looked, catching the bright halogen lights but reflecting rather flatly.  There was no natural shine to that hair, and not a lot of shape to it at all. The words ‘badly cut’ sprang to mind, but that wasn’t it. Why was I fascinated by it? What was wrong?

As we got nearer to one another, she came into focus, and I tried to make out her features. Her face was turned down, the gaze of the self-conscious, the unsure. I couldn’t see her face properly, but it was made-up, pale under a heavy fringe with striking eyes, and a hint of blue-grey around the mouth. Odd.

After a few seconds, I had regarded her gait and stride sufficiently to realise what had been so wrong. This was not the leggy, meander of a woman enjoying her feminine heels, nor was it the tottering, unstable stagger of the inexperienced lady trying to walk in heels a little bit too high for her.

No. Her steps were wide apart; long and heavy, but perfectly balanced despite the high heels. I watched her lope past me, then stopped and turned around to see her enter a shoe-shop. Her hair didn’t move at all as the breeze from the shop’s door-heater blasted as she went in. No, the hair didn’t move as it should, and neither did she.  

It was definitely a man in a wig.

Its two and a half months until Badger and I get married. I cannot believe how quickly the whole thing has snuck up on me!

Most of the organising is done, and in my normal laid-back way, I’m not letting the final preparations stress me out….. but it is very exciting!!

Regular readers may already have picked up that this is my second marriage, and it contrasts with the first one in so many ways.

But I’m running behind in two quite important areas:

I have no wedding shoes yet. Why do shoe designers think you want to be tottering about on 4-inch heels and nasty pointy shoes on your wedding day? 

I’m too fat. My wedding dress is never going to fit me.

Meh.