Holiday and New Job
Well, the holiday was great. Ali's licence validation was hampered more by the weather than bureaucracy, which was surreal for Africa! As a result, we got less flying in than we would have liked, but the flights we did do were great - Cape Town from the air, anyone? We also saw some whales from the air, which was amazing, unfortunately the really big, obvious one was on a flight when I didn't take the camera. Doh!
We also went to Grahamstown, and had a chance to meet up with old friends, which is always good. It was odd being back there, almost as though nothing has changed, though of course some things have, the atmosphere is the same as always. We also had enough time around Hermanus to potter, shop and look at the sea (too chilly to swim most days though) which was wonderfully relaxing.
We had a weekend when we got back to recover from the journey, which I was glad of. It is amazing quite how tiring travelling is! I would have really struggled to do a full week's work without that weekend to recover.
The new job seems to be going well. It has been a varied week, starting on Monday with simply moving stuff into storage or out of the way. When you have kids with behaviour problems starting the next day, it is a really bad idea to have planks with nails sticking out, long steel pipes, sharp-edged fencing and similar junk lying around. On Tuesday and Wednesday we had kids in for at least half the day (though not all of the students turned up for their first day!), and spent the rest of the time sorting paperwork. On Thursday I helped to sort out and clean the computer room - which had been used as the office during the building of the new workshop. Once we got all the paperwork out we needed to get rid of all the building dust that covered everything. I learned that a damp rag is the mug's way to do it - compressed air is quicker and infinitely more fun. It can also set off the fire alarm if you raise too much of a cloud of dust!
The rest of Thursday and Friday were spent sorting out paperwork. Unfortunately much of it simply had to be piled up, as Mike has to go through it and make piles of 'keep, archive and chuck'. I don't know enough about what is important to know what to keep. All we were able to do was throw away obvious rubbish, like 2003 parts catalogues or expired vouchers. I felt a bit dithery at times, not quite knowing what needed doing, but there was plenty to help out with! I was glad to be able to volunteer for something, which was re-typing a very boring and difficult to read worksheet. I made it look better as well as making it easier for the kids to deal with - 18 point Comic Sans in a basic table, along with a 'cheat' sheet in the same format with info about where to find the answers. (I bet some of them still struggle!) It felt good being able to just get on with it, not having to rely on someone else to tell me what needed doing.
All in all a very tiring week, with lots of physical work such as moving stuff around, but satisfying. I found myself smiling on the way to work this week for the first time in years. I think that is a good sign, but we will have to see. I have already seen some of the frustrating red tape that the Project has to deal with. Hopefully there won't be too much of it that I will have to personally deal with!
The kids are back in on Monday, so we should start getting into some sort of routine. Looking forward to it!
We also went to Grahamstown, and had a chance to meet up with old friends, which is always good. It was odd being back there, almost as though nothing has changed, though of course some things have, the atmosphere is the same as always. We also had enough time around Hermanus to potter, shop and look at the sea (too chilly to swim most days though) which was wonderfully relaxing.
We had a weekend when we got back to recover from the journey, which I was glad of. It is amazing quite how tiring travelling is! I would have really struggled to do a full week's work without that weekend to recover.
The new job seems to be going well. It has been a varied week, starting on Monday with simply moving stuff into storage or out of the way. When you have kids with behaviour problems starting the next day, it is a really bad idea to have planks with nails sticking out, long steel pipes, sharp-edged fencing and similar junk lying around. On Tuesday and Wednesday we had kids in for at least half the day (though not all of the students turned up for their first day!), and spent the rest of the time sorting paperwork. On Thursday I helped to sort out and clean the computer room - which had been used as the office during the building of the new workshop. Once we got all the paperwork out we needed to get rid of all the building dust that covered everything. I learned that a damp rag is the mug's way to do it - compressed air is quicker and infinitely more fun. It can also set off the fire alarm if you raise too much of a cloud of dust!
The rest of Thursday and Friday were spent sorting out paperwork. Unfortunately much of it simply had to be piled up, as Mike has to go through it and make piles of 'keep, archive and chuck'. I don't know enough about what is important to know what to keep. All we were able to do was throw away obvious rubbish, like 2003 parts catalogues or expired vouchers. I felt a bit dithery at times, not quite knowing what needed doing, but there was plenty to help out with! I was glad to be able to volunteer for something, which was re-typing a very boring and difficult to read worksheet. I made it look better as well as making it easier for the kids to deal with - 18 point Comic Sans in a basic table, along with a 'cheat' sheet in the same format with info about where to find the answers. (I bet some of them still struggle!) It felt good being able to just get on with it, not having to rely on someone else to tell me what needed doing.
All in all a very tiring week, with lots of physical work such as moving stuff around, but satisfying. I found myself smiling on the way to work this week for the first time in years. I think that is a good sign, but we will have to see. I have already seen some of the frustrating red tape that the Project has to deal with. Hopefully there won't be too much of it that I will have to personally deal with!
The kids are back in on Monday, so we should start getting into some sort of routine. Looking forward to it!
posted by Kristy at 12:22 pm
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