Tales from the workplace

Well, I'm back from my second day of "work" - more on the quotation marks in a minute - so I thought I'd elaborate on what is going to be, frankly, the mainstay of the remainder of my time in England.

At the moment, it's an absolute doddle to get to work. A quick stroll down Earl's Court road, hop onto the Piccadilly Line tube, travel three stops (Gloucester Road, South Kensington, Knightsbridge) before hopping out at the latter. Knightsbridge, as no doubt some of you are aware, is the home of Harrods, the most plush, expensive and famous department store in the world. And I mean expensive. Holy shit. I've had a brief wander through there and some of the prices are astronomical. You can buy a cup of a coffee for, once you factor in the exchange rates, a price that wouldn't leave you much change at all from a 20 dollar bill. But of course that's for the peasants. I saw a sterling silver dinner setting for a touch over £14000. That's close to $40000. I'd love to buy something like that and then use the fork to eat 2 minute noodles. It'd be like James Packer driving to work in my shitty Corolla.

But yeah. Back on topic. My work is in Brompton Road, which is the same street as Harrods. Indeed, it's but a mere hundred metres from Harrods. Not a bad view all things considered. I won't go into any great detail about work, since you never know who reads this stuff, but since it's all favourable anyway I don't think it will be a problem. I mentioned "work" before. Well, on the morning I arrived they had a server crash and everything died. No-one could access Outlook or the database program that they use. So basically I've spent 2 days reading the insurance policy a few times, helping out with general filing and doing office dogsbody stuff. Since the whole business is basically conducted online, it's kind of brought things to a standstill. On the other hand, it has given me a chance to get to know everyone which is a good thing. It should be all systems go tomorrow, so I'm expecting a busy day - not the worst thing in the world, since it's kinda boring and makes you feel a bit guilty idling round the place with nothing to do.

I am looking forward to the job though. To a large extent it's self-regulated - you have work you're required to do, deadlines you need to meet and it's up to you how you go about them. Compared to the way things worked at AAMI, where everything was overseen and corporatised, it'll be brilliant. I really think I can make a decent fist of things here, so in that respect I've fallen on my feet.

Now I just need to find a decent sharehouse. Had a look at a few so far, still waiting to hear back from one which if I get, would be great. Saw one the other day but my Michelle/Alison senses started tingling when I met one of the girls who lived there - a right psycho if ever I saw one. Don't think I'll take that one. (Michelle & Alison, for those of you reading who are unaware, were 2 nutters that plagued my existence in various sharehouses back in Brisbane.) But, as in all things, I am quietly confident.

I'll take my camera along to work sometime this week and get some photos of the surrounding area so you can see what I've been rabbiting on about.