I really didn't think...

...that men like him existed any more, but they do.

Now don't get me wrong, this colleague of mine is a nice guy, he works hard.

But that fact that he is CONSTANTLY patronising me because I'm female, that is driving me bonkers.

The way he constantly offers to carry/move things for me could be seen as a polite act, if it wasn't for the condescending smile and the "I'll get that love, it's too heavy for you". The fact is I'm actually fitter than he is, the man who is on a constant diet and has to use the lift to go up to the second floor or he's to out of breath to talk.

I also don't know anything about sport because I'm female. My interest in Formula One puzzled him until he discovered that Anthony is also a fan. I'm now a fan because Anthony is, not because I liked it myself beforehand.
The last time he watched a race was when Damon Hill won the championship, yup, back in 1996. Despite this, he is an expert on the sport.

Today he spent a good 20 minutes telling me which drivers and teams he rates this year, told me exactly why the Bahrain GP was so boring "not that I watched it mind, but they mentioned it on the news" and attempted to explain to me how a double diffuser works. Then he said "and I have to tell you, though *whispers* I'm not a queer like, that Schumacher has come back fit for his age. It's like that Lewis lad, he's a fit one too, not that I'm a queer like, I'm just saying"

Oh, Dear. God.

I swear the only reason I didn't call him out for being a homophobic know-it-all was because I was too busy trying not to laugh in his face.

Mind you, if he calls me Katie once more, I swear I'll do to him what I threatened at the Christmas works do - "If you call me Katie one more f**king time, your balls will be dangling from the top of Nelson's f**king Column"

I have always loved...

...mucking about with spreadsheets. That is until recently.

The changes at work resulted in two redundancies, we lost a full-time position and a part-time one. Another colleague had her hours reduced. She opted to leave and so Don has stayed, although he now only does 16 hours a week rather than full time. The three part timers that we used to have were all working overtime to do full time hours anyway since we are a full time member of management short. These changes mean that we have gone from having 4 full timers to 2 part timers and since we still have that vacancy...it's all a bit of a nightmare.

In order to free up some of Richie's valuable time I volunteered to take over doing the rotas.

I now loathe spreadsheets!

Here are some lovely photographs of what I have gotten myself into.




(sorry about the quality, had to use my phone camera - and they're not worth looking at in detail anyway as THEY MAKE NO SENSE!)

Once we have filled that vacancy the rotas will work well, in fact I have already worked out the base daily rotas. The problem at the moment is that because of the vacancy we can't use the base rotas as it would result in there being nobody there to open the shop...hence all the crossings-out and bizarre extra shifts.

Apart from me now being not so keen on spreadsheets it is also making me want to stay as far away from any type of typing as possible (and putting me behind with my OU work, but that's another (eventual) post).

So many apologies (yet again) for being a crap CRAP blogger.

I will be back with you at some point, probably once I have started sleeping properly rather than lying awake worrying about only having 4 staff on a Saturday.

(and I also spent most of this afternoon being convinced it was Wednesday...)

I have been utterly...

...neglectful in not blogging about the Chinese Grand Prix sooner. This is partly due to the fact that Anthony has been here every evening (and distracting me) and partly due to the fact that I'm having a bitch of a time at work at the moment (and unable to vent/blog about why).

Anyhoo.

So on Saturday morning I got to watch Sebastian Vettel sticking his Red Bull on pole and being rather happy about it. Then I went to work and had a rather better day than usual due to the God that is RichieFingers and the comic talents of Donal, our resident Irishman.

Sunday morning I got myself up to watch all the pre-race chatter and saw something come up on the screen that I wasn't sure if I'd seen correctly. Nothing about it popped up on Twitter, and although Martin Brundle mentioned it in his grid interview of Vettel, Sebastian didn't expand that much on it and they didn't repeat the shot.

Then after the race I found this on the red bullog.



I did see it. I wasn't imagining it.

Sebastian Vettel has a sticker reading "Kate's Dirty Sister" stuck inside his cockpit, just above the steering wheel.

But who, or what, was Kate? And why exactly was his car named after her sister? Her dirty sister...

The man himself explained later:

"Like a ship, a car should be named after a girl as it’s sexy.

My original car was called Kate. But then it got smashed at the opening race in Australia. So we called this one Kate’s Dirty Sister because it is more aggressive and faster"

So there we have it. I got smashed in Australia...and Emily has won a Grand Prix. I'm so proud of her.

Kate's Dirty Sister Google Search.

Call me nosy...

...but I always like looking at what the person in front of me is buying.

In the corner shop just now the man in front of me bought 8 cans of Strongbow, 4 bottles of Blossom Hill red wine (couldn't see the type) and a pack of Bernard Matthews Turkey burgers. "Oh and 10 Benson's, actually mate, make it 20".

Intriguing.

Mind you, the guy behind me must have been slightly puzzled at my purchases.

One large tub of Johnson's cotton buds and a packet of Viscount biscuits (14 for the price of 7).

Plus the £10 of gas and £20 of electric that I'd actually gone in there for.

We do actually need the cotton buds, but the Viscounts were an impulse buy.