my old blog

ahh - how i love my old blog. i'm very confused by all this. i appear to have a whole new blog that uses my most recent choice of username. i chose the username just a couple months ago but this other blog seems to have been open since feb 09. no idea how, and no idea how i got in here again. would be nice if i could merge them into one username as they appear to be sitting as seperate entities even though i have to sign in with the same gmail account.

very strange... *scratches head*

ah well - life goes on.

Life in NZ

wow! just saw how out of date i am with my blogging. september last year...oh boy. well - the engagement party we had in Edinburgh was great and then we went on some travels round Europe for three weeks before coming back to NZ.
Got Married in November, went to Fiji for honeymoon, managed to work two weeks at my last school to earn some money, also got a couple weeks work out of a contact from the next employer (telecom). this was great cos otherwise we'd have run completely out of money!!!!
started work in January on 3 month contract and hopefully it's going permanent in the next week or two... they keep piling more responsibility on me so it'd be a bit daft to be doing that if they not going to be keeping me :)

ok - there's your real quick overview... life in NZ is great - i love it! i work as an intergration Analyst (data analyst) which makes a change from teaching...and a bit of a relief too. my line manager asked me yesterday how much he can increase my workload before i get too stressed - i said bring it on... thinking of teaching when you don't have a choice how much stress, i figured i've got a long way to go before this work is going to be causing me any problem.

right...enough for now.
i've finally got a very fancy digital camera (with a massive zoom :-) ) so might be able to put pictures in easier...but we don't have broadband or wireless and i don't like sitting at the desk to play with photos and surf the net so when the circumstances are right and i have everything the way i like it (lazy me!) then we'll have some more fun posts with some pics too!!!

well ... back to work.

It's SUNNY Outside!!

woke up this morning and the sun is shining. Real strong. looks like it'll be a great day. Have looked at the weather report and discovered that it's gonna be even brighter tomorrow. GREAT!

Doesn't mean summer's here yet though. There seems to be a lot of rain in the country over the last few weeks with a huge amount of flooding in many parts of England. I guess we're lucky here in Scotland. definately glad that i chose to come to Scotland rather than some other ambiguous place in the UK.

we're having an 'engagement' party in Edinburgh at the end of September and looking forward to that. Invites are going out now...as soon as i get addresses for everyone.

We went up arthur's seat to get photos for the wedding invitations - that was a bit of a walk, but fun! Got some great views... and besides, you can't go to edinburgh and not climb arther's seat!

Time passes, and i still got lots to do - just remembered the marzipan for the cake. will get that to you soon H.

Working in Scotland

welcome to the space of the wonderful blog!

i'm sitting at work, it's 9.20 and i'm already bored. i've been hired to answer phones and be the welcoming face that people see when they come in, covering until a new receptionist is hired. Unfortunately life here is a tad boring. ah - the post has arrived. that'll keep me a little bit busy for the next 5 minutes.

Here's a time that i never thought i'd see: yes - if they ask me to wrk next week, i might have to say no. when there's a chance of free money, i should really take it and enjoy it but this free money is doing my head in! ah the joys.

had a few interviews but nothing much. i'm gonna go round next week and bug some of these people, maybe call up a few companies and sell myself...maybe. I can't believe how difficult it is to get a job here now - my brother was out of work for a month and not exactly sitting back. he spent every day applying, following up, reading job sections in newspapers. he applied for everything!! he eventually got a saturday job and ended up taking a job in the company he's worked with for the last however many years. it came just in time 'cos he had no money left...literally. £7 left in his overdraft limit and that was it. The job was a lucky break too 'cos they didn't know he was looking for work, just called to see what he was up to and if he could help them out. well, he decided to go back since they pay lots and he'll be on proper salary. I couldn't believe how long he was looking for. and now i've been here for a month and no luck. I heard a girl in the bus telling her friend that she'd applied for up to 200 jobs and got one interview and managed to get the job - didn't matter what it was, she was gonna take that job cos she wasn't gonna get anything else very easily. I'm really shocked at the state of the job market here.

Anyways, i'm here...not just a couple weeks - i'll be here for the next 6 months pretty much. i'm looking forward to phoning the places i had job interviews at last week and finding out what feedback they have for me in terms of interview technique.

ah - the post...got to put it away still. i do jobs in little bits so that it lasts a long time. i did the post ages ago and put half of it away to the appropraite people so now i've got to get the rest into the correct pigeon holes. not so easy when you don't know people's names nor their role in the company.

Right - off to have a great day. it's now 10.30 and i'm almost done with all the stuff that's landed on my desk...not much more on the horizon.

Saturday 28th April

me and the boyfriend were going out saturday night. he'd told me to keep it free, so i did - said he'd pick me up from dad's place. so there's me got to dad's place but noone in. the sensor light was still on so figured dad'd just gone out. ten minutes later the flat buzzer goes and i let the person in thinking it must be for some other flat. my brothers girlfriend walks in a minute later so i was wrong about that. we chat for a bit and then i ask how come she's at dad's since it's way over the other side of town from hers and my bro. she tells me she came to see dad about borrowing the van. very convincing!!
dad walks in 10mins later to my surprise and so i think that's ideal for her to ask him about the van. funnily enough, she doesn't say anything about that - just chats. my B'friend arrives a few minutes later. here's me still thinking just me and him are going out. then a party fire engine - a big pink thing - pulls up outside and he makes some comment about our transport arriving.

yeah right!!, i'm thinking. probably some crazy people going out in that thing. dad and co had already gone out somewhere so me and T went downstairs, seen dad and folk standing on the kerb and then we all climbed into the pink fire engine. (i'm still thinking 'are you sure this is for us?')
drove around edinburgh and seen all the great sites. the photo shows edinburgh castle on the hill behind the fire engine. There was posh bubbly with the fire engine too – dad and A stole the second bottle since it came with the package anyways.
Pulled up to a nice Chinese buffet restaurant. I think it’s really good food. Yummy!!!! Soup, then starters, then main course, then another course just ‘cos you can, then icecream, jelly, fritters. The best icecream in town from a little known local icecream shop that’s now expanded very successfully cos their icecream is so different.
We were waiting for my bro to arrive so had some starter while we were waiting. T was just getting into a magic trick when he showed up. T impressed the company with his magic skills and we went for some real food. It was the funnest meal ever!! After every plate, we would relax and T got out his cards or showed off with some disappearing money. Very clever, eh!!!

Pudding time – most of us had icecream and stuff. I had to go back for 2nds to try the different flavours and was the last one finished – hate to think of the time T was waiting for me to finish…ooops!

So, as it was, T had to do another magic trick. It was nothing unusual since he’d been doing tricks all the way through the meal. The girl behind the bar was looking intently at the magic trick and appeared very interested, which I thought was cool. So the coin disappeared and he told me to go and see if the coin was behind his neck like he’d said it would be. I had a quick feel and found something…but it wasn’t the coin. I didn’t know what to do! Everyone else noticed that my face had changed and it went a wee bit quiet – wondering what the matter was.
I kept the ring in my hand and found the coin that was there and put that back on the table. And promptly sat down. Funnily enough, attention wasn’t on the coin or the trick any more – they were more interested in what was in my hand ‘cos they had no idea what it was. T took my hand and then the ring. There was a bit of a gasp when they saw it was a ring I was holding. T got down and asked me then to marry him…eek!!

‘course, we all know the answer would be yes, but it was soooo weird to be asked and have to reply. I was a wee bit quiet so the girl behind the bar prompted me and I said yes.

She started up some music that I immediately recognized as a song that T is always singing a couple of lines out of. Can you believe he sang the whole song right there infront of the whole restaurant. There was a rugby team out celebrating their loss to a local team too. Excellent night!!! The rings absolutely beautiful and it fits too, which is always a bonus !!!

NEW POST

Due to popular demand (ahem), i've decided to add some extra posts up here. unfortunately, i still don't have a digital camera so you're gonna have to make do with writing and the odd stolen pic.
I made it all the way back to Scotland just over a week ago. i'm really glad to be in Edinburgh for longer than a week or two but a bit bummed that once again my life has been disrupted. my CV consists of loads of temporary jobs, different areas in Scotland, England and Wales, even got New Zealand on there now. There's only two jobs that have begin and end dates of a year or more. that's not such a good record - i had hoped to change that, but i think it's not going to happen anytime soon. so here in Scotland i'll hopefully find a job soon that i can keep for maybe 6 months. i've also suggested to my boyfriend that we could stay for longer if we both do well in our jobs...it's all about saving money and being rich when we get back to NZ.
so i'm here in a temp job for a week doing reception. not much happening though so i've plenty time to work on my computer course and update any blogs. if you have any questions feel free to post a comment - i'll have plenty time to get back to you. got an interview on Wednesday for a telemarketing role with possibility of progression to a business development manager if i'm successful. have researched the company and it looks great. have even checked out the job profile for business development manager and it's paid a hefty amount of money for hanging out with clients. sounds perfect for me :)

we'll see how it goes. i'm off to do my computer course just now in all my spare time while waiting for the phone to ring in this extremely busy office.

Leaving the country already?

And for anyone that's reading this and interested, i'm off to the UK again in April. I'm actually looking forward to it. Mainly 'cos i know i'll be coming back to NZ to live. Residency is currently being processed. i'm waiting for my passport to come back, but i think i'm gonna be able to say that i got residency in less than two months. That's not bad considering it normally takes 3 - 6 months.
i sent in my application on 1 Dec 2006. i then recieved a letter asking me to sort out a problem in my medical, get a letter from my employer, get a contract sent, etc. sent it all back within two days. Then just before finishing up for christmas i called to find out if they'd got everything and my immigration officer told me that she'd already authorised it and i should get a letter in early January.
6 January - got letter asking me to pay a migrant fee and put in my passport and stating that i should recieve it back with residency permit within 30 days. That takes it to a total of 2 months for a whole load of paper work and the all-important stamp on my passport.

So, in March my man travels to the UK. 5 weeks later i'll be joining him, working there for a wee while. Earn some money, pay off some of my student loan and then see what we decide to do. At this stage there's no time limit been put in place except for the return ticket that needs to be used within the year. guess we'll see what happens.

I did consider finishing up at school early and going over, but it'd be really nice to be able to do a full year at one school without bailing out... not that i have done before hand, but i did 7 months in my first school and now i'm here. although they offered me a permanent job, i'll not be taking it, but i'll be leaving having fulfilled my contract and no leaving them in the lurch. good for me, eh!!

AND ON, AND ON, AND ON...

Teachers have the best life, don't they? high stress, holidays dotted throughout the year, all public holidays, massive summer holidays.
They just keep on going :)

i've got loads to keep me busy though. today was the first day i sat down and actually went through what i'm going to teach a certain class. Dance & Drama. it'll be the first time i've ever taught that subject but i'm excited about it. I'll have to be ahead of the game though, and well organised. got some great ideas this morning, just got to write out my lesson plans and focus now.
Ah, but if you think that's all, think again. that's just two classes a week. I've also got my ICT class to think about. and i realised that unless i get a fresh year 7 class, i'll be having to have a new focus with new tasks and new assessments. yeah - people think we can just regurgitate the same things. nah!!! the kids know when you're being lazy and repeating work in a new context. they're always the first ones to say 'we've done this before, why do we have to do it again?'
so ICT classes to do.
Then there's my music - first a plan for the Tamaki lot (they're special you see...behaviour management is always an issue when creating lessons) Then there's the outside schools who get more lessons in a block and who learn faster. i don't need to create a lesson around behaviour when i plan for them. i'm always amazed at the difference between morning (outside schools) and afternoons (tamaki students). at times i wonder if i'm really cut out to be a teacher (usually in the afternoons) and then other times i realise that i'm actually not too bad (normally in the morning after a successful lesson).

and apart from the lessons, i've also got to decide on some stunningly wonderful songs to sing for assembly. think i'll get a couple from the kiwi songs - should be some good ones there.