A better day!

I woke up at 5:00am and was thinking about work, which was silly. I left early to get Sheila some flowers, chocolates and a card, as today was my last official day working with her.

Thankfully, I had a much better day, made even nicer by the scones, cream and jam that Sheila had made. There was a steady stream of people wishing her good luck in her retirement (even though she's working one day a week on a Wednesday) and tucking into the cakes!

We submitted the payroll sheets, and I tackled some of my emails and input a few contracts. I am going to have to get tough with the staff who continually make mistakes, as I won't have time to keep correcting them. They will soon learn! It was lovely to drive home and look forward to another three-day weekend. I am lucky, although I don't realise it at times!

We sat in the kitchen this evening, chatted, and enjoyed a very simple supper of pizza/quiche and roasted vegetables. The cats have been very good this week, as the weather has been changeable and there's been a lot more rain, so it's been easy to get them in! This makes Sophie's life so much better, and she loves getting them in early and taking them upstairs for a furry love-in!

Feeling overwhelmed!

Today has been another crazy day, and our regional manager came in to talk to us about the prospect of accepting cash payments at our sites in a couple of weeks. I'm not sure that today was the best day to talk about it, as both Sheila and I felt a little overwhelmed. One of the things that our manager hinted to me when Sheila was out of the office was that my colleague tends to overcomplicate things, and I agreed. Some of the processes can be more streamlined, and I was reminded that we were there to record the data, not investigate!

Keith came to pick me up, and I said that I wasn't sure if I'd made the right decision, as there was so much to do and Dan, our manager, had asked Sheila to do a last-minute job at 4:00pm. I don't mind staying later, but I will need to have notice, as I can't have Keith sitting and waiting for me for half an hour.

Keith was out tonight watching Sileby play, so Sophie and I had planned jerk chicken pasta for dinner. The chicken had been marinating since yesterday, and I prepared the rest of the ingredients when I got home from work.

We enjoyed a bottle of Chardonnay with the meal, which was a lovely balance of heat and creaminess. It was delicious! We watched two episodes of A Place in the Sun, followed by a deeply moving and saddening documentary about babies that were forcibly given away for adoption in the 60s and 70s.

Keith came home from the match, all bundled up in a coat and a scarf. Is summer finally over?

Back to reality!

After a lovely three-day Bank Holiday weekend, it was back down to earth with a bump today and payroll week! Sheila let me do everything by myself today, and I managed to get two lots of timesheets onto the system before we finished at 4:00pm. It had been very busy indeed, and the time had whizzed past!

It was lovely to go home and relax, but unusually, I'm back in tomorrow and having Friday off instead. 

As is the tradition, here are the 2026 storm names:

Austen

Boelo

Chloe

Dano

Evelyn

Finn

Gwendolyn

Heather

Ivy

Jade

Kilian

Laoise

Miriam

Nicola

Olaf

Phelim

Ruban

Shaun

Theo

Vesna

Wende

Apparently, according to the news, we're in for a stormy winter because of the Super El Niño. We shall see!