Haven't we been here before?

I suddenly find myself in a position where I am hating, really hating, my job again. It largely stems from part of my role, which starting as a minor part, and has now almost engulfed the entire job. Basically its not a particularly enjoyable thing to do, and it doesn't make me popular with the students. Considering that the vast majority of my working life involves interaction with students, this is a Big Thing.

I've started drinking more again. A lot more, the bottle of red to myself every night kind of more.
I know it isn't helping matters, but I've got myself trapped in that place.

Naturally I have been applying for alternative employment, and I have my fingers crossed over a couple of possibilities, but many of them involve a quite serious pay cut. Paying for the habit is one thing, I can always kick that if necessary, but finding it tough to pay the mortgage is something else.

That said, I am tempted to simply hand in my notice on Monday, and deal with the consequences later. Maybe get a few temping jobs to pay the bills and see what happens after that, but I just don't know.

Wax and wane

You know how the moment you finish washing your car a bird is going to take a nice big poo over your windscreen?

Yesterday I had my car valeted, washed, waxed, top up the fluids that needed topping up and generally felt good about driving the monstrosity for the first time in years.

Today a numpty on a motorbike decided he no longer liked the idea of using brakes and used my rear end to stop instead.*

Bastard.

* Yes, he's OK (trust me, I checked him long before I started worrying about the car - He's still a bastard).

Hiyo God Damn Silver!

Again I appear to be the laziest blogger, so let me rectify that by sharing with a few things I've enjoyed while I've been away.

Firstly, a fan boys wet dream. A fan-made trailer for a movie about Dick Grayson. I love this for so many reasons, and I hope that if you've ever read a DC comic you'll enjoy it as much as I did.

Next on my path to true geekdom, I seem to have got myself involved in Dungeons and Dragons. Completely coincidental with the death of Gygax, I assure you, I am now playing weekly, and rather enjoying it. Anyone else of the blogroll a secret player? Any tips?

And finally, a little story from work. The other day I happened to pass by IT services and noticed they had a new plasma screen installed. The screen displayed a rotation of various statistics, such as the number of computers switched on, temperature and light levels in the server rooms, that kind of thing.

One such report seemed to show lights being turned on and off every half an hour in one room, over a 14-hour period. Obviously something was seriously amiss. Could it be that someone was truly going into and out of the locked room so often across the working day?

Eventually we figured it out. The report had been set for 14 days, not 14 hours. Light/dark was simply day/night. This was not solved before we had physically checked the location, stood guard over the room and spent a great deal of time scratching our heads.

We're professionals, us.