Guitars and Life

Have you ever worked somewhere where the culture is long hours and "presenteeism"?  If so you may well have heard the oft said jibe, "Part-timer", at a colleague leaving either early or more likely just simply after they have worked their hours for the day. Well for me now this is actually the true case and not a jibe.  As of today I'm 0.4FTE - to use the official term at my employer.  I only work for them now for two days a week.  This is all in planning for the course I'm starting in September.  I'm firstly going to do some jobs about the house i.e. paint the back of it, put a new roof on the old kids wendy house etc.  In Sept I start the course and I also therefore want to look potentially for some voluntary work where I may be able to exploit the skills I hope to be gaining, accepting of course that I can't do proper 1 on 1 clinical work or anything like that for a long time.  So from now on I'll only be in the office Tuesday and Wednesdays ...

Last week has been variable ... sounds like I'm giving the shipping forecast here doesn't it! Monday.  I attended the funeral of an AA friend.  A lovely, bubbly, funny, fun person sadly cut down too early in life through cancer.  The chapel was packed, with a large number of AA friends there showing just how much she was loved and how much she meant to so many of us.  The service was a non religious one, which was very nice.  At one point the lady leading it mentioned a prayer that meant a lot to Lynn and started to recite the Serenity Prayer - the adopted prayer of AA.  Without prompting the AA members present all joined in.  I had to stop before the end as I was so choked up. I don't drink.  I go to AA meetings and am involved in AA service to hopefully spread the word to those suffering alcoholism and to keep me sober.  It has just become a way of life.  Every now and then I'm really really shown how lucky and important this all is...

There has been more than one occasion when I have considered renaming this blog None The Bloody Wiser"!  The older I get the less I know I really know - both in terms of life the universe and everything and also in terms of my own ability to operate within said reality. The last few weeks have been a bit of a struggle - sorry folks this is all about work again, regular readers may detect more than one long-running theme here.  I've just felt overwhelmed by it, worried and stressed by it, lost about it etc. etc.  But of course this all comes down to a couple of major factors. Firstly impostor syndrome . This is something that I only recently became aware of in terms of it having a name and being well recognised.  I've suffered with this all my life.  The continual fear that today will be the the day that "they" realise that I am a fraud at this job, task, activity, whatever and that they will call time on me and expose me as the failure I undoubtedl...

So Son-of-Furtheron is back in the land of male voice choirs etc. - i.e. back in Wales ready for new year at uni - his last!  Yes this time next year I've every confidence he will have a flying first in his undergraduate master in Physics and Space Science...  Yes he does make his old man look like a thick old numpty...  I'm so proud.   Daughter-of-Furtheron is settling into A level studies and is looking at universities that we'll be traipsing around this time next year in preparation for her to apply to.  One finishes and another joins the fray.  Mrs F is settling in with a new year group, new teacher she is working with and two guinea pigs her class has adopted! The trip back to Wales was, almost predictably, met with weather that even Noah would have said "You expect me to go out in that!".  When I fetched S-o-F back at the end of the year we just escaped as floods hit that area - this time it was worse in land and I had to slowly edge throu...

Another blogger sparked off something in me that has really got me thinking... So here I am in the "new" job...  I've put the quotes there as actually I've been here over 10 months now and rapidly it'll be a year so is it still "new"?  It feels it to me.  And there in lies a crux of issues that have been assailing me of late. Let me throw a bunch of things at you... culture, complexity, change, commitment, belonging... A little history lesson.  I worked at the same place from 1991 - 2010 until I was made redundant, something I was happy about at the time, that old place was on a downward spiral and my mojo had decidedly left me and I found myself regularly the harbinger of bad tidings "We tried that three times before and it failed due to a, b, c etc.".   I needed to get out and get a change.  After 7 months not working I got a job with a small consultancy firm - I didn't mind the work and the fact that as a consultant you go into somewh...

... with the one you love, love the one you're with. eh?  Okay following on from yesterdays outpouring of self-pity and looking at the comments (thanks everyone) and Mrs F saying repeated yesterday evening - "You'll never be happy in any job!" I've had the great Stephen Stills song in my head all morning.   Basically along with the old Abraham Lincoln quote “Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be."  (Adopted by AA on the Just For Today card).  The point being that I need to be (more) in love with my current situation given ideally I'd like to be noodling on a guitar all day, but let us face facts that won't be my bills.   So that is the new mission - change me to be more accepting etc.  You know just trying to smile a bit more is a start I think.   I'll be back here no doubt to let you know how it is but that is the new mission - essentially break the cycle in the last posts diagram at the point where I realise how good...

I feel like I need to do that with myself - delete all previous settings, especially delete browsing history and start afresh with a clean install of Human 1.1a (Never buy 1.0!). I saw an opening via someone on a social networking site - get me down with the web 2.0 gurus!  Anyway late last week I put together a CV and winged it over to them via the marvelous internet - how did we exist 20 years ago?   I had a really nice "chat" with the Chief Exec today on the phone.  Problem is this is a bit of a speculative venture, an alliance of people, companies, institutions who kick around ideas until there is enough substance to turn that into a project normally for an initial proof of concept.  At that point they need someone to corral the various interested parties to get a reasonable project brief and that is then hawked around to get funding from one of the members to kick it off.  They need people to do that donkey work getting some consensus on the project ...

... and I'm annoyed with myself over it. Another post by a brave soul out there has prompted me to post this.  I snapped yesterday getting heated in an argument with a person at my place of work I find infuriating.  That is no excuse frankly is it.  Well I don't think so, I only have to work with the person, they really in my grand scheme of life have a tiny tiny corner of space just at this moment and that will pass and they will move on or I will and that will be that gone, not important. This person though is a black belt in obfuscation.  Ever issue grows and grows around him, he has a knack for over complication never simplification.  Yesterday I told him something that I'd understood pretty much from day one of the eight months I've been here - the next financial year is a zero based budget.  i.e. even if you have a project that is continuing you have to rebid for the money, any money not spent this year goes back into the pot to be redistributed....

Just like a cork shooting out of a champagne bottle my post the other day has released a lot of bottled up tension.  Firstly thank you to all who commented etc. your kind words meant a lot to me. Here is the thing - see I often get to the point of taking it all inward that it is only me who gets like this etc. etc.  I internalise, I don't see the wider picture, I get on a downward spiral of negativity and find it difficult to break out.  But I know the things like "first things first", "don't try to fix all your problems in one day", etc. etc.  I tell this stuff to others enough in the rooms of AA or on their blogs!  But can I easily do it myself - er... in a word NO!  But as I say the release of finally getting it out there has been a real help to me. So a new attitude etc.  Almost instantly there has been a meeting about funding and projects and at least one of the big ones has biten the dust.  On the other ongoing work I had two meetings th...

... disappear.  Honesty time folks.  Boy...   Here I am again, hugely troubled by work.  It really bugs me this, it pervades the majority of my thinking, it makes me sick inside, I get snappy with people close to me, go distant and isolate etc.  So what the hell is up?  Me - I'm "struggling" at work.  I seem to be using that word too much "struggling" - what do I mean by it?  See above this doubt, this taking over my conscious state too much.  I started here back in September last year.  There was/is a big reorganisation underway in my department.  Therefore when I started I was a little bit out on a limb, shunted to the left a little for want of an analogy.  I said to people then, I should relish this time to get to know stuff.  I've learnt some undoubtedly but I don't feel it is enough.  I picked up that there is loads and loads to do, actually more than realistically we can achieve with any real sense of c...

Spent Saturday in Rochester at the Medieval Merriment day at the castle. It wasn't too bad, a set of craft stalls with some vague medieval link and a bunch of recreationalists (is that was you call them) re-enacting life in medieval England.  The focus being on the famous siege of Rochester in 1215 when the revolting barons took control of the castle from King John in the long dispute that lead to the Magna Carta and all that.  Actually that siege has been recently portrayed in the very bloody film Ironclad, questionable historically etc. but based on the truth of the siege  Anyway a good day out in the sun. Sunday I went to Ikea for the first time in my life.  Another debate in the house due to my claiming my kids were dragging me into the middle classes - I will always consider myself working class as to me it about attitude and what you are for or against in the world they think it to do with job, wealth, salary etc.  ...

I am incensed. Really I am. I'm livid. I'm so angry it is making me feel ill. A friend of my wife's husband has not been well - last year his daugther and son had a double wedding. A lovely day etc. He was sadly taken ill during the day and it transpired he'd had a heart attack. He has had more in the intervening time. In the end they had to fit an internal defibrillator. However he has continued to be unwell - as you'd expect. He has been frankly a martyr trying to get to work when he could. Hs is a "driver" but obviously at times he can't drive with this illness. Anyway - he had another bad day Monday and had to leave work. He saw his GP yesterday and was signed off for a month. He called to tell his boss and... was sacked on the spot!!! Their rationale being that his contract says he is a driver and can't do that therefore he is no longer capable to work. Goodbye! I was sure this was illegal. However some searching through the web...

So I've had my first week in paid employment for a long time... I'm shattered! Actually it has been ok, most of the week spent at HQ with HR, Finance etc. learning about the company and the processes etc. I did have a quick outing to a client for them looking at me for a possible assignment and I got that - which is good so soon I'll be earning for the company which is always a good place to get to quickly. I'm out and about next week for the first couple of days to meet others who work for the company and meet them and learn about their experience and current work them I'm off to the client for a 3 day meeting that will kick off my assignment. So sadly I think I will be very very busy so unfortunately I might be less on here and not able to visit all of you so frequently.

So nearly 7 months ago I waved farewell to my old job and company smiled sweetly at the generous redundancy settlement and wandered off into the sunset. In the intervening time I've pondered on what I would like to do, what I can do and what people are likely to actually pay me to do? Firstly I thought about a complete career change but frankly some of the options I looked at there had issues, I wasn't completely sure of my commitment to them, saw difficulties possibly with starting on the lowest salary etc. In the end I struggled to with it and realised without that 100% commitment I was going into something that I'd end up with regrets about, it wasn't worth that. Who knows I might still come back to it at another career junction in the future having had a look at it. I've tried being a professional singer/songwriter... well that has been my only source of income for a while!! However unless we have some unbelievable spell of mammoth deflation what I earn isn...

So I sat down to work today and was faced with a bunch of the usual nonsense... the confused and bewildered going round in corporate ever decreasing circles. It riled me. I had to stop and ask why I'm angry about it - to be honest it is just the normality of work these days, everybody means well and are all trying to do their best I just seem to see it all as a set of circles that either benignly never intersect, very rarely to combine successfully or sometimes just smash into each other with various degrees of force and damage to those in those circles. So given that gratitude was a strong theme at an AA meeting I attended last night I'm working on my gratitude to placate the rising anger. Yesterday I spoke with a couple of people I've not caught up with for a while. One is having a really stressful time, her Mum is in her 80s and had a hip replacement but then got some viral issue, lost loads of weight and has been very ill. Also in her family a lady was stung by a wasp ...

Today I had to say goodbye to the best boss I have ever worked for - he is leaving our company unfortunately. He had moved on to pastures new and greater some years back and I rarely see him these days as he is based at another site in the UK and spends a lot of time in USA. However still sad to be saying good bye and at the same lunch two other people who'll be leaving in the next few weeks as part of the ever onward drive for efficiency savings, one of those management euphamisms that you know means someone somewhere loses their job. It was a fun time reminising about the good old days of the old teams we were part of over the years. But is was also quiet a depressing time, it's said to see these people leave. Also shows how we're all getting older - as time goes by I'm almost one of the oldest in the departmement now and one of the longest served within the company. Still wheels continue to turn and it's all just the turning of time and tide isn't it. I ...

I go back to work tomorrow after my enforced break through this illness, coupling with the holiday I've actually not been in the office for a month! I have tried to have a look through my work emails today; what a mess!!! Things move quickly at work and looks like there is much I've missed. Honesty time... I've not been enjoying work much at all lately and I do wonder if the illness is stress related. I have been seriously thinking about leaving work, but as ever I'm pretty useless on answering the fundamental questions regarding what I want to do etc. I've been in the same type of job since I left school, i.e. IT related although I long ago moved away from the "coalface of technology" and became a manager in many guises. I probably have a load of skills I could translate somewhere else but I'm terrible at recognising that, I see myself as an IT Manager and that is about it. So I could take the plunge and leave where I am, but then I fear that if...

A lot! Firstly I’m now off to Sonicsphere at the weekend unexpectedly with my son. He has ended up without the person he expected to attend and immediately he wanted me to go… given Mrs F and I bought the tickets as his birthday present in the first place that seems fair! Looking forward to the music, Metallica, Heaven & Hell, Linkin Park, Coheed & Cambria top the list. Add to that Thunders last ever gig – I’ve never seen them but had an album I liked a long time back (Back Street Symphony) and I’ll try to make it to that. Hundred Reasons are another band I like and they are there on the Sunday as well as Feeder who I quiet like. My son is into Mastadon and Lamb of God, so all good on the music front. However… Camping!? Yes camping – I’ve not camped since I was about 18 on a holiday to Switzerland. And the weather looks just rubbish for Saturday. Great! Work – very stressed out not help by the holiday coming up and being away at the weekend now. I’m just completing...

I’m angry at myself at the moment. I’m letting work stuff in particular dominate my life and I’m also not dealing with it very graciously. The context is that I’m in this new role, I’m not moved companies I’m still working where I’ve worked for the last 18 years but my old role was eliminated back in Feb and after some weeks of insecurity and also me going back and forth about whether I wanted to stay I apply for one job that was available and I got it. I blogged about some of this stuff already – particularly in “I should be happy” . So the new role is complicated, there is a load to do, many colleagues have said things like “I don’t envy you that job”, “Why anyone would take that on is beyond me”, “Jesus you have a hell of a task there” etc. So it’s a recognised challenge, it’s new, I’m 3000 miles from my boss and the rest of the team of people also trying to take on this role. I’m just over 6 weeks officially in the role, the boss of the team only started in his role at the beg...

Wasn’t that in the lyrics of that annoying Startreking novelty record years ago? Whatever it’s where my head is at at the moment. I had a really really crap day Tuesday. I was completely overwhelmed by the demands of the new job culminating in a meeting where someone was laying down the law about what she expected my new team to be doing and I was thinking… hang on this is one bullet point on the role description and if this is the level they are expecting that is an 80 hour a week thing just for that alone. I went into a spiral of can’t do this, can’t do that, too difficult, I’m useless, exposed as a fraud, lose my job, wish I’d just taken the redundancy, blah blah blah… I ended up with huge chest pains, headache, dizzy feeling, nose bleed… etc. I couldn’t get to sleep for ages either. Yesterday I tried to tackle the issue but doing an action the team had asked me to marshal our thoughts on the issues and we met briefly to discuss that and agree some next steps – which I’ve furt...