why the long face?

C'mon, gissa smile!

I met up with an old colleague (E) on the spur of the moment last night.  she is someone that I worked pretty closely with for many years, and someone who is very well known, liked and respected at my old workplace.

Her daughter (L) also used to work in the same department as me, and we too forged a pretty good friendship.

So, me and E were having a lovely catch-up in Camden – drinking, gossiping and she was giving me the lowdown on what was going on there.  and LOWdown seemed to be the right word for this, as everything seems such ‘bad news’ at the moment, and noone seems to be particularly motivated about anything.

Anyway, we’d had a few drinks, and this sleazy guy came over and started to try to chat me up.  Which I found cringey and E found hilarious.  she then wanted to go to the loo and I wouldn’t let her, as i was worried that the guy would come over and corner me while she went.  luckily, at this point, L called her and said she was in a bar in Charlotte Street and that we should go over and meet her.

So we did (E still busting for a wee).  When we got there, I was surprised as there were a few people from my old work there, and I hadn’t realised they would be.

And they all looked miserable.  All of them (apart from L who was a bit drunk by then, and is a very happy person anyway…and works from home a lot, which probably helps).

It made me feel so grateful that I left.  It was a hard decision at the time (after 17 years there), but whenever I speak to people still there, I love the fact that my life is so busy but stress-free at work.  the fact that I am appreciated, listened to and the fact that things get done without reams of red-tape, working parties, procedures for everything and the fact that my directors are inspirational, motivational and innovative.

Best move I ever made.

a cluster of bloggers

I certainly was a big brave girl last night!

Last night, I swallowed all my usual ‘stranger danger’ fears and went along to the London Bloggers Meetup.  You may remember that I went along to this in January, but I missed the February one as I couldn’t walk at that time (damned calf muscle!!).  There doesn’t seem to have been one in March.

Anyway, I’d put my name down to go last week, and was having my usual worries about going out and meeting new people, and then yesterday I found out that the only three people I’ve really been in contact with since then weren’t going!  Argh!!

But no, I did not back out!  I was a big brave girl and went along anyway.  And I’m glad that i did, as not only did I get to chat to the lovely Tom again, but I also met some other interesting people, including Asgeir.  this was really good for me, as although a lot of people I know think of me as a total geek, I was well and truly out-geeked by the people there!!  Although I did find myself getting into a dodgy uber-geeky area when I was appalled that not everyone had considered their plan-of-action if they were survivors of the Peak Oil Crisis or a zombie virus.  I had to tell myself to shut up as I’d obviously put FAR too much thought into it!

i also had to find a friend of a friend there, which was really embarrassing – especially as I didn’t know his actual name and couldn’t go up to just anyone and ask if they were his Twitter name (it DOES have ‘Adonis’ in it, so there was good reason!).  I think that situation is just an embarrassment of modern times!

Anyway, we heard a talk about making money from your blog (not something I would ever do) and also about mflow, which is a new product that is kind of like the bastard child of iTunes and Twitter.  It goes live tomorrow, and we had a code last week to download and play with it early, but I must admit, I haven’t had a chance to yet.  It looks like a great idea though.  you can see what your friends are listening to, and share with them what you are listening to, and then if they buy it, you get 20% of the price that they paid!  result!!  I think it will be great to see in action, but hope there’s a decent library.  You will obviously need to have a lot of friends with the same tastes in music to get the most out of it!

So, it was a good night, and I was really glad that I went along   I’m looking forward to the next one.

the night that was

Choose being an alcoholic

What with everything going on this week, I haven’t mentioned what an absolutely bloody fantastic night I had on Saturday to celebrate my birthday!

I’m one of these people who is a ‘nervous organiser’, and every time I arrange something, it seems to go well, and then I wonder why I was ever worried…but I’ll feel the same the next time.

People DO tend to come along on my birthday, and for the past 6 years or so, I’ve arranged to meet on the Saturday nearest to it and met up at a Wetherspoons bar in Angel as there are a few people that come from outside London and come into Euston, so it’s easy – and Wetherspoons are cheap!!  Which is great for alcoholics!

I actually had my hand forced as to when I was celebrating my birthday as I would’ve had it the weekend before, as it was closer, but loads of my mates informed me that my birthday was always ‘the first weekend in February’ and that they’d saved the date.  Which through me!

Over 25 people turned up, which was fab as a few (as always) had dropped out on the day, and I was having jitters as usual that noone was really going to turn up.  It was also great as a lot of my friends hadn’t seen each other for ages, and were happy to see each other again, and also that I had a couple of ‘new people’ that I introduced into my fold and who seemed to fit in really well!

It always amuses people though that a lot of my closest friends, I met 7 1/2 years ago on a dating site.  And my oldest close friend (longest-standing, not literally the oldest!) I met on the CB radio when I was 17!  I got a text from one of the ‘new into the fold’ friends (who I met on an application in Facebook of all places!) that said “I really liked CB woman and CB woman’s bf” which amused me

I had a fantastic time, I met a couple of new people, and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.  And as this is my year of getting back to my social self, I am considering just having a random meet at the end of April or something to bring everyone together again