Final Wednesday

So I'm down to four days and counting now. Life at the office is still rushing along with a lot of work to be done. The major difference is that the 'normal' bread and butter calls that we all love have tailed off to almost nothing and the seriously daft calls are taking precedence. All the weird requests and complaints come out of the woodwork at this time of year and they take much longer to log and solve. The team are coping well however. We are all gorging ourselves on mince pies and fancy biscuits and sneering at the idiots who keep us busy.

Nearly down to single figures

As I write, we are at eleven and a half days and counting. Indeed, I have threatened to begin counting hours once I get to less than ten days. I was really pi....annoyed over the weekend. I had a sore throat on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and on Saturday, the whole cold hit me with a thump and I felt rotten all day. Sunday was better but I didn't feel worthwhile until this morning, just in time to return to work.

Time is ticking away.............

Whilst the countdown above is correct, I have moved my internal clock to "working days" and they are going down nicely. I have reached 18 days and the anticipation is building substantially now. I always look forward to Christmas because the family are all together but this year will be very special as, when I leave work on Christmas eve, I will have finished forever.................woohoo!

And then there were five...........................................

Weeks to go, of course. I had a very brief taste of retirement on Friday last as I had a cold, or flu depending on whom you believe. By lunchtime, I was feeling ok again and managed to do several jobs that I had wanted to do all week but didn't feel well enough to do at the time. Anyway, I am now down to just  35days (and a bit) before I walk away from organised labour forever. A few bits and pieces arrived during the week and the railway track and racing car track are now complete so plenty of work there then. My week was made less boring than usual by Sally as she was also off work with a similar problem.

The other side of the coin was that Lulu finally went into hospital for her much awaited operation and actually got it this time! She is now recovering well and looking at an early homecoming, possibly today. Just knowing that the job has been done successfully has brightened her up immensely and it has even rubbed off on Corey so that he is less fretful that his mum is away for a few days. 

Slow and steady wins the race?

I've always been a bit dubious about that one, I'm fairly slow and steady and I can't remember the last time I won a race. However, I currently find myself in a vaguely similar position at work. I have spent the past four years specializing in problems with Microsoft SharePoint. I now find myself working on almost all of the SharePoint problems coming into the support desk at the university. As can be seen above, I have less than fifty days left in my job. oops! I have tried to impress upon my colleagues and masters that I will be gone soon. "Yes", they say, "We must do something about that". Not so far guys. Part of their problem is that I actually like SharePoint, it suits my methodical 'Slow and Steady' way of working. Does this mean that, finally, I will win the race?

More water under the bridge...............

The decision has pretty much made itself, I will ask to go at Christmas. My shoulder has improved due to copious amounts of Ibuprofen gel being rubbed in twice a day. Trouble is, to compensate, my arthritis is now becoming somewhat intense when I type..................... like now. My back has improved slightly, I think it was more bruising than anything else. I have been putting in derisory bids on Ebay over the weekend and won every one. So I am now the proud owner of a baseball cap and a clockwork train set for almost peanuts.

Getting older sucks!

I am so close to retirement now and all I wanted to do was leave gracefully. Chance would be a fine thing. My body is fighting me and trying to make me stop sooner now. My back is a dull roar most of the time and my shoulder is constantly hurting at present. With the onset of the colder and damper weather, my joints are beginning to complain and, as I cannot use anti-inflammatories, I have to simply suffer. Early starts are murder now and once 10.00 pm arrives I just need to fall into bed. That's as well as napping all evening and nodding off in my lunch break yesterday.

Hazel is suggesting I ask to leave at Christmas and not go on until the end of February. This idea appeals to me. She also thinks I should drop my hours to four days a week from now until I leave. This idea also appeals. Hazel would like to see me do both but I am more inclined to one or the other. We need the money for one thing as we are in the throes of trying to move out our current tenants and take in new ones who will actually pay their rent.