20 posts tagged “house”
...I'm being a sook I know. Great news first though. I've found a place to live! :) It's large inside, has a large courtyard area for Max, in a complex which will not only accept cats but a lot of the people who live there are cat lovers. The location is closer in to the city central (approx 10-15 min drive depending if its peak hour or not). it needs work but it can be done. I'm praying this is a new start. I've applied for a larger mortgage than what I need, so that I'll have extra to cover things I need to do to the place (new carpets, that kind of thing - there is currently nasty navy blue carpet in there which looks like it belongs on the floor of a recreational centre floor). It's in a lovely back street, quiet, front villa, quiet complex, close to cafe's and restaurants, close to a few pubs, a cheaper cab fare home if I go out in the city centre at all on a Friday night. The place has potential. And it has a brand new stove yay (I've been working with a dopey old stove for the past 2 years which is on its last legs).
Meantime Angel sightings have been infrequent. He's run cold the past week & a half or two. It hurt a bit. I put it down initially to him freaking out. After a week it was a little less usual. When I didn't get a response to an excited sms saying I'd found a place, I was stung.
By the end of the week though I'm getting an email asking when he can see me. Imagine a very unimpressed face. in the past he used to tell me how he'd miss me, and I'd believe him. NOW when he says he's missed me, I feel like a PART of him has missed me, but it's not enough. I need someone who can be there for me. Someone who really CARES. I think I've outgrown this quasi-relationship. Maybe I'm just saying this because I'm hurt and for a while needed someone who really cared. Someone who would be excited for me, who would want to know where it was, why I liked it and if I got a bargain. Someone who might want to go for a cruise past the place with me. To ask me when i'm moving in to the place, whether there were any conditions the sellers insisted on. Someone who'd ask me about my rollercoaster ride at work (figuratively speaking).
The weather is foul outside (wind howling, spatters of rain slamming against the window) and I'm inside, having read a letter from a family friend who is acting as settlement agent, informing me that I have to come up with a cheque for approx $12k for stamp duty, in the next week or so! EEK. I THINK I'll be able to get the bank that is doing my mortgage, to generate the cheque though but geez that was a nasty feeling reading that letter! That, and a girls night in on Sat night watching freaky movies where again it would've been nice to snuggle up to someone... meh I'm feeling a little needier than usual.
Just when I think there's at least a minimum of a connection there and that he'll at least be there as a close caring friend he acts like he doesn't give a crap. When I ask him about it he flippantly excuses it off as being busy, then tells me he's missed me and crassly asks me when we can rectify that. His barriers are back up and I've got no patience or tolerance for it right now. I need the guy who I thought was a close friend. Instead I see the worst side of him, the callous side that really is all about his own needs and wants.
Anyhoo there's my pout for the day. ;) no use crying about it. I'm just disappointed & disillusioned. As pathetic as it is, it'd be so much easier to find prince charming in someone I sometimes like sometimes THINK I might love, someone I have that physical connection with, rather than considering being out there dating again. It's just too damn hard.
So, my sister, nephews, brother in law and mother have gone away for a trip to a lovely tropical island off the coast of Queensland Australia.
I'm burying myself in house stuff, while knowing that my further studies at college pick up again soon this time online. I'm going to try to focus more on some of my friendships that I've lost contact with a little lately.
Woohoo I got a cash offer for $5k more than my minimum but subject to a 6 week settlement - aiee! The little funky place so close in that I had my heart set on has gone dammit. So now I'm out madly house hunting. If I don't find something I like though, I'll have to store my stuff in storage, and board max for a few weeks hopefully no more than 3 or 4 weeks. *WINCE*
I don't want to rush into a place for the sake of it however.
Meantime (sorry guys who don't get the restricted posts as work ones I've taken to hiding and some work ones are combined updates - only neighbours can view those), Angel and I had been catching up at least once a week, getting along so well - no dramas no arguments, if there are any worries by either of us we talk it out, it's been too easy to fall into a very old trap of thinking that I really like spending time with this guy. He's nice, comfortable to be with, damn sexy.. but a self confessed louse in the past. :S bugger. And sure enough after catching up to spend the whole night together 3 or 4 times in the past 2.5/3 weeks, he seems to be starting to cool and starting his old habit of suggesting only catching up late at night. If anything I'd want to progress towards catching up socially amongst friends but no chance at all of that. Meh. There is a lot that is good about him and we have a close friendship but I'm going to have to cool that connection if this is all that is on offer.
It's been nice though as a not-relationship, to stave off loneliness, to receive enthusiastic appreciative attention. But it's hardly a relationship and I know his signals well enough to know when his attention is waivering. Stuff chasing him like some lovelorn puppy. He's lucky to have me, I was lucky to have him too for a bit.
But seriously to be kept at arm's length like a big secret, it can be fun sometimes but eventually it gets really old and tired and irritating.
GF has been friendly lately but also had a schiz turn at me calling me at work getting savage wanting to know what I've said to a male friend of hers. I'm also always treated like a backup to another friend of hers which is nuts. A childish part of me feels like I'm back in school with the stupid friend politics of that era, another part of me cannot be bothered with it all - I didn't go out with her and her cronies on Friday night as I was tired and freaked out after being completely screamed at over 2 days by a psycho boss - GF turned it around and into a "so what are you REALLY doing tonight?". I didn't need the crap at the time.
.. it's no fun to read but it's been handy for me to spill my guts while I've been bummed.
SO, it's a long weekend over here, next weekend my house has a home open to possible buyers, (aieee so many people snooping through my things I hate it!) and the house still has a lot of painting for me to finish! I've been having a cursory look at other places too, so far not great.
I visited my sister & brother in law's latest place. There can be no confusion now, they're in a mansion as opposed to house, over looking a river and the lights of houses across the river. The only word I could find to describe this place with it's sensor lights for the wardrobes, marble bathroom counters, marble tiles, home theatre, etc was 'opulent'. The word fits this place. One of the lounge suites alone (all motorised foot things go up and down etc set up in a leather row in the home theatre) cost about $40k. I'm thrilled for them. They're happy and the nephews should be happy there too.
Meantime here's me, selling my house for around $300k. But I think provided I can find something decent which Max and I will be happy in... eh, the rest is just space to dust and clean! ;)
I get my white leather loungesuite on Monday afternoon, a drier and a top of the range bbq from my sister's old place (a street which was infamous for it's large houses enough to be inspiration for a Rolf Harris song) on Monday of the long weekend. It's a 2 & 3 seater set, softest white leather in need of a bit of a clean thanks to my cutie nephew who has been all over it with his sticky 3.5 year old hands and grubby feet, but I'm not complaining!
Well, I have a home open of a possible place to check out this afternoon and I'm thinking I need to go and start checking out others. That and finishing the painting means I'm going to be a busy BUSY girl!
Yup it's me, I've been skiving out of catching up with people. My normal week is nuts, I get home, do housework, study work, I'm stuffed and I'm asleep. My weekends, well even during the day when I'm not having lunchbreaks, I'm getting emails from friends asking when they can see me. I'm flattered and I care of course, but part of me gets frustrated that my weekends get booked up,so sometimes I commit the heinous friend-crime of piking out, just to get some me-time and CHILL. I need it. Is that selfish? Otherwise, i could be out all weekend every weekend and never have any down-time. I've got a week off in 2 weeks. I'm soo looking forward to it. I've hardly told a soul as I want some time to myself. No pressures, no personal deadlines other than getting some damn painting done!
On that, I had a real estate agent, requested by my brother in law to ring me and help me out, come around Saturday morning to size the place up and to give me an idea what the going rate of my place would be. I've been told again to finish my painting ... yuh huh. I wish I had time and weather allowing! it's been raining up a storm at times this weekend. Not exactly paint-drying or fume-airing weather. I've cooked up a chicken & vege soup, I defrosted my freezer, I've done 2 loads of wash, I helped a friend put together a piece of ikea furniture, and my brother came around to watch a dvd with me. This was my day. I was od'ing on socialising to the point of a sore head.
OH on that, (topic-ways I'm jumping all over the place for that I'm sorry!), Friday night after work I went out for a post-work drink with She-Bean and Marketing Woman from work. RogerRamjet (the guy with the chiselled jaw similar to RR so the nickname was a giggle) joined us. Last time I'd seen him socially he was blowing me off after helping me to pick up an aircon unit from my brother in law's inner city unit which he uses as an office. I've had a massive crush on him but it's passed. He's still HOTT, and a sincerely nice but naieve older guy. SheBean has a HUGE crush on him herself. So the conversation got around innocently enough by Marketing Woman about him being single and she offered to set him up with some friends of hers. I gut-reacted and chimed in "oh I'm sure he knows he has a fanclub already!" and he blushed scarlett. :) Me being evil and the crush having loosened its grip, I stirred (because my confidence doesn't keep me as tongue-tied when I'm not ga-ga over someone) and piped up and said "aww he's blushing how cute" and teased. I was more confident. My defense shield was back in place. I'm armoured, baby!
My list of excuses:
- I had to re-do a 15 page written report on an industrial relations scenario as my lovely lecturer decided to be harsher on me than everyone else in my class! I was procrastinating going near my computer putting off thinking about the huge task ahead of me.
- Work - I've been so fried and down about my boss taking her lousy moods out on me and the people around me and mood swinging from someone who I really like and admire, to mainly nasty negative critical demotivating crud lately... I've just been in a foul skulking mood. I've been miserable enough this past week to hate the thought of getting up the next morning to go to work and dreading Monday mornings wondering what new little scheme she'll think up to criticise me for. Oh and her goals for the upcoming year? MASSIVE. Given my current workload, they're just RIDICULOUS. It's really getting to me. I keep seeing the target of just getting through my current training and if nothing has changed in this area, I'm out of there.
- Lovelife, nil. Plenty of drooling drunken idiots .. (tales to follow in future posts) but nothing more genuine. Angel turned Hunter still hangs around.
- The neutral painting of the house continues... slowly around other priorities.
- I've tried to have a social life of late. That's been interesting but uneventful. I've had hmmm lemme count... 1, 2, 3, 4 indecent proposals, one invitation to dinner and serenaded from the door of a pub, and harboured a crush on a sweet but totally not interested coworker.
IN BREAKING NEWS...
- I've yet to strangle my manager, but at each few unhelpful spiteful digs each day I swear her goose is cooked.
- I passed the re-done industrial relations assignment and another one which was due at the same time. One last assignment to go then a new phase of study (harder) commences. Another 7-8 months though and I'll have the full qualification.
- I've worked a total of hmm (counting again)... approx 6 hours overtime this past week or so, and got told STILL despite this, that an afternoon taken off yesterday to have a free secondhand aircon unit installed in my home, had to be used to work from home on something from my laptop rather than the afternoon just being taken off.
- So on that note, I have had airconditioning installed. Just in time for the first real wintry weeks of the year... *snort* now I just have to figure out how to get the reverse cycle part of it working so I can HEAT the place. (oh, and forgive an Ozzie for laughing at this.. but one of our new starters who relocated from Canada, did not bring any kind of clothing other than short sleeved t shirts to live here for 4 years... she thought that we never get cold weather ...hee hee. Maybe not as cold as they get it but I'm sure the minus 2 or so degrees celcius nights during winter will still be a bit brisk for her in a tshirt!
A comment that will have feminiists out there gasping in horror. "Sometimes, when I've had a particularly crappy week, I don't WANT to be so independant. I hate having to be tough all the time".
There, I said it and I wasn't struck by lightning. I had such a lousy week last week. I had a fellow staff member from another office in another state call me screaming and vile down the phone spitefully having a go at me about getting something done. I'd only done what I'd been told to by my manager and I'd kept her in the loop the whole way along about where I was up to. Not my fault. Simple. Well this woman from interstate got VILE and spoke down at me like I was some junior reporting to her (but no junior deserves the tone and overall demeanour I was copping down the phone).
I handled it calmly and professionally with a bit of bit-back frustration, kept her to the issue and we kept on point and dealt with the problem, after about 15 minutes of abuse which had me shaking at the end of it. I was upset. I was proud of myself for handling it without biting back given she was getting so nasty, but it didn't take the bitter shock out of being spoken to like that. I got emailed TallFriend telling her "fark going home and checking for my lecturer's review of my draft assignment, we're heading to the pub!". I was upset, vulnerable and pathetically (very unprofessional career-womanlike I'm sure), and would've killed for a hug.
I emailed Angel from work saying simply, "I'm heading to the pub after work, or I'm gonna punch something!" (my little toughie way of admitting I was upset, rather than telling him my lower lip was trying ever so hard to stop from wobbling). I'll give him full credit, I got an instant response of "hey are you ok? what happened?" so I told him and got an instant tirade of concerned fury on my behalf back over email which was really sweet. Damn. He's a friend, but then shows concern to that kind of level and I just wish he cared that bit more than he really does (being realistic). He offered to sms me later to make sure I was ok, offering to pick me up after the pub (though I was still cynical about his motives for that).
It's times like at that afternoon last week, where I really sookily wished there was someone in my life I could go home to for a hug, who could assure me that everything would be ok as it'd been a lousy week with my boss having a ratty go at me despite me working through a splitting migraine to get her monthly management reports done earlier in the week.
I can be tough, but jeez I get sick of always having to BE tough. Angel comments about how self sufficient I am in terms of doing things like painting around inside the house and minor things like that around the house. I think he got a kick out of seeing my hot pink hammer. I mean, c'mon it had to be done really. :) for sheer giggle factor.
I worry that I keep that tough facade up too much from having to at work to make me less vulnerable, but also making me less human, less approachable and less fun to be around. But just when I start to relax and socialise, I get my head totally blasted off my shoulders like last week. By the end of last week, and another example of my boss switching messages on me to react to the latest manager-whine and I was feeling pretty damn disillusioned and fed up with my job, and on top of that to get the email ripping my DRAFT assigment to shreds, my motivation to continue study, to continue in the job were all out the window and I had a weekend of skulking, (by that stage nursing my black eye courtesy of Nephew!) procrastinating and generally asking myself if it was a job a) I was cut out for (doubting myself at the first study stumbling bock), b) that I WANTED if it was going to mean much more crap from my manager taking her moods out on me rather than defending me when I'm only following one set of her instructions. I find myself disillusioned and getting surly and I have to mentally pull on the reins because I've started to fight back with my manager, when, when she's in a mood, just won't get me anywhere and angers her further.
*sigh* after working on the assignment, doing stuff to the house, pressure on me to work unpaid over time (which I've done happily in the past when I thought it would clear a momentary overload but the workload is now constantly too much for one person and I'm getting sick of it not only being taken for granted, but when I'm not working the hours through trying to get my assignment, housework etc done, I'm copping abuse for not getting as much done which infuriates me) well it's been a tough few weeks, and on top of it emotional pressure from a few friends who have been pouting on me because I don't dance to their tune (mind you, not much sympathy from the people I'm thinking of either or understanding), ick at times I feel like I am copping it from several directions at once.
On good news, dad gave me some shares which apparently could shoot up to as much as $10k in the next 5 weeks! He's however trying to warn me to keep hold of them as he thinks they'll go much further. Aw c'mon... struggling homeowner doing it all by herself and ya want her to do WHAAA? Dat just MEAN! Sis and her hubbie are giving me their leather loungesuite soon (COOOLLL), and my brother in law is giving me a second hand aircon unit from his swanky danky inner city apartment which he's been using as an office, I've been sitting under the right apple tree for sure so life could be far worse in the scheme of things.
Angel plagued me all weekend perhaps sensing a chink in my armour, perhaps because we've been closer than ever this past week in sharing a few things bugging us, repeatedly attempting to get around me with the idea of a late night catch up. But it just hurt/insulted me that rather than making arrangements to spend time with me, he simply wants to pop around for a little late night relief. Excuse me if I don't find that flattering. :( especially given the sook mood I've been in this week (probably a good thing we didn't catch up as I've been too vulnerable anyway). I'm sick of having to be tough though. Fri night I got a sobby phone call from TallFriend who had had a friend abuse her. Again I was the strong one cheering her up. Noone has seen me cry, but damn it'd be nice just to even snuggle up into someone and feel the reassurance of a strong presence. It's times like this I miss being in a relationship as pathetic as that is.
As a friend of mine's been fond of quoting lately "take a good dose of 'toughen-up' and call me in the morning!" :)
Here are my results, have a squiz if you're curious. I found it quite interesting. Previously, I was less confident until I took up study and felt more like I've taken my career into my own hands by plucking up the guts to go. It was a huge step for me though, going outside my comfortzone. I found the link on Rogue's post.
It had me thinking about myself and where I am mentally and emotionally. Overall despite my fears about screwing up something at work at times, or not being able to complete this latest assignment coming up (oh by the way, I got "excellent work" for my first assignment - woohoo!), despite occasional bummed out moods I'm a happy person. I worry about the fact that my wish to take my work seriously makes me rather unpopular at times at work when I get too focussed on the tasks and forget to smile and have fun with my coworkers unless the moment needs me to be soft and understanding as part of my work. I have to remember to be a part of the work 'community' and sometimes I really lose that and get taken the wrong way.
Out of work, I'm the emotional sook to people close to me, but I'm closed off behind walls unless I trust someone enough to open up. I find the older I get, the less I open up to everyone and I get more selective. Maturity or distrust who knows. I've got to try to find that balance I guess.
Life in general, well I picked a bad time to do the test, given I'm going through a period of transition - taking on a more professional career as opposed to clerical work, (registered today to become a member of the professional body covering that type of work today ouchies at the fee, tax deductible), assignment to get done, work is BEEZY but I'm confident that for the most part I'm doing it well but worried about one aspect which I might've let slip, planning on what to do with the house now that I've investigated my options a little and been on a mission to get the house ready, I feel like I've been neglecting my friends a little but usually all I do is flit around trying to catch up with them all and never get myself organised so things have been a bit out of the norm for me lately. In a good way but I don't want to mess up my friendships either.
Angel - I told him I needed to back away from the friendship after last week's email exchange and explained why but he totally didn't get it and told me I 'got the wrong end of the stick' whatever that means. No apology for hurting me by pushing the conversation too far and rubbing my nose in it.. nothing. Just surliness that I'd not been responding to his sms and was not interested in playing by his rules. Mph. too bad.
I'm going to apply to have a day off just before the easter break - I need some downtime and the next assignment will be a biatch - 8 pages to be precise, written by me, a report. YEOWCH. And this weekend is JNL's wedding. Cool but I'll be away over night (mind you she hissyfitted when I told her I couldn't go initially despite the fact that the wedding will be 4 hours away and an overnight stay that at the time I couldn't afford). I know, I've made these decisions which have come up at this time but it's been just me continuing to live my life it's not been deliberate to focus on myself.
Well, to follow the instructions of the real estate agent lady, I've gone all out and purchased a heap of paint (with the idea that if I have any leftover I can use it when/if I move anyway). I spent about $500 on paint, lacquer for the slate tiles and all sorts,and other paint paraphernalia and I've gotten just about everything in the house painted. Well, I'm about 2/3 of the way through, with a little help from Eyore and her new man today.
It's all going to a neutral buttermilk colur that has a pale barely noticeable lemon tinge to it to brighten up the place. It looks clean and fresh which was the idea.
I went out and caught a movie last night called "The Method" - I'll give the link here. All I can say is that it was weird. A demonstration of just how much people will go through out of competitiveness and to win the job. I found it a bit bleak though and a scary demonstration of just to what lengths people will go to ethically to win a role.
SO, I got a call this morning from bub sis, ill and needing to rush over to the doctors and needing someone to mind Nephew1. She's going to be ok and I got a nephew fix, then charged off again to get some supplies. On the way home out of curiousity I checked out an outdoor furniture sale. BIG mistake or a good idea, I'm yet to decide. I walked away with a receipt and instructions about where to pick up the chairs and flatpack.
AIEEE. One 5 min quick stickybeak turned into the mission from hell which, if you were a fly on the windscreen, you'd be laughing your butts off.
I drove to this pick up point, to discover that I could only JUST manage to cram the outdoor tempered glass table into the car. I drove home side saddle in the front seat as I couldn't squeak my leg between the steering wheel and the seat it was so far forward and drove very awkwardly with nose practically pressed up against the windscreen of my little jelly bean hatch car. I got home ok,dropped the table off and went back for the chairs. Who'd have thunk it, but the outdoor chairs turned out to be an even huger mission! The trip home was easier, but getting them out by myself. Errr not so good. I struggled and swore and tugged and pushed and finally got them out much redder in the face and puffed, took them out the back and started putting everything together (new purchase, HAD to be done!). SO I did that, gapfilled around the front door (oh my aren't I becoming handy..next I'll grow chesthair!)
Eyore and her man came over and helped out then with painting (goofing off and being cute just as much as painting - it was barfably adorable). I realised later I had skanky undies on (laundry day) and the grungy pants I was painting in were doing nasty plumbers crack things and woo nelly her man must really love to her have tolerated me exposing the icky green last of the underwear grundies!
So the house is a mess, but the walls are starting to look fabulous. The garden is still a mess - I've not had a chance to look at it in far too long. Case in point for looking for another place.
Angel emailed me on Friday joking about how if he dared to come over, he'd pick up a paintbrush so long as he could have a wine glass in the other hand. I didn't respond. He sms'd me last night while I was in the movie asking how the house painting was going and reminded me to change my clocks back to remove daylight saving (ugh I hate it... I have enough trouble going to bed early/getting up early so this morning was supposed to be a fabulous sleep in ah well), then gushed on about how I should come over his place and help him with his plants (his usual excuse for trying to vie for help/company as it'd worked back when I didn't know him well, as a friend). I ignored the sms.
It's stupid I know - we have no hold on each other and I should know already where he's coming from, but it hurt, it was insensitive, and I've known for a while that the friendship wasn't working for me.
I find myself lately wondering what invisible leprechaun I've caught by its ankle and I keep expecting the other shoe to drop. My lovelife has never been more non-existent, but everything else has been falling into place. It's almost like God has shaken His head, clucked and said "oh dear, she's relationship-disabled, so here ya go hun, here's some good luck to cheer you up". (said with a laugh at myself and with no disrespect/offence meant to the religious).
I got a call from a friend yesterday, whose sister I'd spoken with about a year and a half to two years ago and impressed her that much about my work ethic, that she called her sister as soon as she had a vacancy for her Assistant, and asked my friend to ask me if I'm interested. It would've been a $15-$20k increase, but the instability of a contract role, and possibly a backward step in tasks.
It's come the same weekend as I wait to hear the response from the real estate agent who came around on Saturday morning to give me an estimate of what they think my house is currently worth. I plan to talk to a mortgage broker early this week to find out my lending power, put the two together and figure out what I could afford to move onto and whether this is worth doing. Max would adore it - I would try to make sure I found a place where he could go outside. My cat wouldn't know himself! I don't need a place with such a big yard. SO I guess what I'm saying is in a nutshell, before I get too much done to this place I was trying to suss out what I really wanted to do. It would decide what things I would do to my current home - for my comfort or for re-sale value.
Meantime my brother in law has found a second hand airconditioning unit for me to use for my house. What a good lad he is! This, and within the next few months I'll also be getting one of their leather loungesuites which they've decided they no longer want (6 months old still as new off white leather, soft). They're also moving into a place with a built in barbq. They have a top of the line barbq - I'm getting it.
SO, aside from the disastrous lovelife, things are good. Though I didn't make J's hens night last night. I was fighting a migraine and had an assignment half done due tomorrow which I wasn't making headway on and the last thing I wanted was to drink. Simple. The head was getting to me, there was so much swimming around in my head,and my friend J I love to bits and pieces but she's a little high maintenance at the best of times - her hens night I knew would be no exception and she's the same person who always says I'm no fun to be around unless I'm drunk. I hate drinking around her because I feel like a trained poodle barking on command and it peeves me. So I didn't go. I sms'd her (what a coward am I - I feel bad) told her I was fighting a migraine, which I was but it wasn't at the stage which I made it out to be, (it soon would've if I'd gone and I would've been a cranky wet blanket trying to smile and play nicey and not in the party mood in the slightest).
So guys - question - if offered a large wad of cash to do a job with less stability (and you're paying a mortgage in this hypothetical), and less job satisfaction - would you do it? Especially when it has an end date? Give me your thoughts. I've already more or less made up my mind. So much to think about and decide this weekend.. how self absorbed am I - a former close nearly best friend who I've grown apart from and she's stopped including me in her social arrangements (more out of us growing apart in interests and some of her critical nature was starting to rub me the wrong way) is getting married in two weeks and I'm tossing up major-ish decisions about my life. Anyway, give me your thoughts.
My manager called me in to her office on Thursday and told me that she and the MD had put me forward to overseas head office, for a $5k bonus. :) Could've knocked me over with a feather. She went on to say that my hard work, dedication, long hours and cheerful positive disposition hadn't gone unnoticed and that MD had not knocked her recommendation but supported it, from the moment she put it forward. I rather pathetically teared-up at that because it's been a rough year work ways and I'd thought the hard work had been assumed and unappreciated.
I've been with this company 6 years. I KNOW about this discretionary bonuses though I've never been awarded one before. The senior management only and maybe one or two line managers, receive them each year. If there's some poor soul who has been working their ASS off, they might get put forward but the figure gets bartered down and pared away to whatever small amount they can finally agree on or in a lot of cases the bonuses are disputed and knocked on the head after a bit of discussion. I love the job. Always have done despite the guys sometimes being notoriously thick when it comes to life skills. Engineers what can I say. ;)
This is above and beyond my pay increase, and a one off thing. I'm thrilled! I'll be able to afford airconditioning. The actual cash in hand figure though by the time the tax man takes his Jaws-like bite out of it, will probably be half of what I'm being given - it sucks totally. HOPEFULLY I won't fritter it away on frivolity but dammit it's so tempting to spoil myself sometimes. My wishlist of things I'd like to spend it on depending how far it'll go, includes first and foremost, airconditioning. I do NOT cope with the hot weather - I end up with migraines from the heat (oh and joy oh joy it's meant to hit 36 degrees this public holiday Monday, and the Tuesday, 39 degrees, after a week of rainy weather and Angel and I throughout the week joking about "Doonah Day" and how it'd be so nice to go home snuggle up under a doonah and watch dvd's (this being the final straw in the Nic's gonna panick and back out of flirting with Angel as she's gonna get hurt by him AGAIN fast packpeddal later in the week). Dammit. I'd just been crowing to myself that the cooler weather had arrived, and no more bunch of hot days one after the other turning my home into a furnace and dammit here it comes again, on the next long weekend. Someone upstairs hates me I swear it.
Anyhoo enough of the self pitying. Next on the wishlist, lighting. Approx $400 worth by the time I buy all the new fixtures and then the cost of having them installed. Worth it as the light fittings here totally suck. No other way to describe them. Ugly big black bugs of things perched up on the white ceiling. WHY would anyone want black light fittings on a white ceiling can I ask? They're big bulky and hideous.
SO if there is cash leftover, a new standalone cheapie stove so I won't singe my eyebrows the next time I try to grill something (thank God for George Foreman or I'd be the size of a house..grilling being one of the best low fat ways to cook after all).
And oh I'd so dearly love to splurge on myself and do all the things that through a lack of having spare cash, I've not spoiled myself with in ages. A haircut. Last one was July last year. I kid you not. I have VERY long hair. Just as well I use good product (one of my few self indulgences other than adding to my dvd collection). Otherwise that long hair would be trailer-trash straw in all probability. So, haircut, maybe a new bottle of perfume - faves being Red Door, Chanel #5 (my fave..the one Marilyn is famous for quoting herself as sleeping nude in), Moschino (the one with the little tricoloured ribbon around the lid), Anna Sui Dreams; but then here's my handbag and lingerie fetishes -neither fed for some time due to mortgage-dom. mmmm nope I have to sort out the house first. THAT way if I ever want to sell up and give Max a home that doesn't include psychopathic-towards-cats neighbours so he can roam freely outside, I'll be better equipped to. As I type this, he's spread out lying like he's human, full length (which is impressive) on my couch beside me quietly snoring with his belly exposed oh-so-innocently like a bear trap. You stick your hand in there to pat, you might get it back bloodied or gnawed on. Ironically, it's a rather tight budget this fortnight, and I've got to run now to grocery shop, while dreaming about how much the tax man might oh so kindly leave me to spend next fortnight, once the cash is paid to me.
