The Lard Arms

Red Alert

I said that humour was the way forward so I must be true to my word.

Apparently, according to my mother, in Italy, if you wear red underwear tonight ie New Year's Eve, good luck will be coming your way!

Aha!

So, since I am not the owner of racy red knickers, I must don my Dans-Ez Minimal Bounce Bra  if 2009 is to be my year! LOL!

So, you know what to do!

I'd like to wish everyone a VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR!!  May it bring you everything you wish for... and more!

Office Politics II

Of all the things I berate myself about the most, my naivety ranks pretty highly.

Today has not been good for all sorts of reasons. First, I woke up exhausted. The bizarre thing is that even though this is the end of week 6 of my new job, I don't seem to have been taking an early train into London very often. Today was really hard and it felt very unfamiliar and then I was the first person in the office, which was locked! So I couldn't get in.

Second, I woke up feeling fat. Really fat. For once, I did not spend the day saying to myself, oh well, it's too late now, what the hell? I might as well chow for England. No, I exercised restraint - not even a latte en route to work but believe me, temptation lay EVERYWHERE.

Third, I really saw office politics come into play today and it was not pretty. In fact, it was a sharp reminder about why I suffered in an office environment. I am not good with people who say one thing and do another, who behave in one way and then pretend they don't. I am not a game player but I realise the world of work is FULL of such people. Fortunately, I didn't seek solace in food (very good) but when I got home, I did have a few drinks with my husband and I am not happy with the amount I have been drinking since I started the job.

Tonight I lay in bed and sobbed. I seem to have been given a ridiculous deadline, which is hard to gauge when I'm the new girl. No one else seems to be putting in the insane hours that I am. And I am getting really snippy at home and obsessed by work. Last week I thought I really was enjoying the job and this week, I had a major reality check and thought, I have got unrealistic expectations of this job. I am looking at it, hoping it will fill the massive hole left by my miscarriage. It's a great distraction and when things were new and exciting, it was a perfect antidote. Now with the reality goggles firmly in place and the impact of tiredness and commuting (as well as my work perfectionism), I see it for what it is and it seems a very high price to pay. It was compounded further by a group email that was sent to my team (from anonther member of the same team) but my name was not on the list. There are five of us. I know it's ridiculous but it really bothered me. Pathetic, isn't it?

In the meantime, as I cried my eyes out tonight, my husband told me his view of the situation; "you haven't got anyone to b*tch with at work". Is that the answer? All we need is a trusted colleague with whom we can moan in safety? I don't know.

What I do know is that already I have created some problems for myself (lack of boundary setting) and some have been served to me on a plate.

I feel very miserable about my weight, too. Having been fairly neutral about it, I now feel really unhappy. I think I already know what the answer is; the question is, do I have the guts to say to my employer this is how it must be from now on? It's not totally tied up with work but it is linked; if I can get my work-life balance sussed, I feel I could get a bigger grip on the food. This week I did no cycling and no running.

Hmmmmmm.

Oh, and my final whinge of the day; email etiquette. What's THAT about? People don't acknowledge them; not even with large volumes of work attached. When I mentioned this to my husband, he more or less told me to get over myself because that's what everyone does now (or DOESN'T do); have email, will not respond (unless I feel like it). That seems to be the motto of the day. Maybe I have been out of the loop too long?!

PS I do realise given my last but one post that this may seem hypocritical; in one way it is and in another (the workload way), it isn't.

Salad Days

The sheer relentless-ness of the past five weeks have finally caught up with me and I am a zombie. The weekend was a hard slog and I am beginning to realise that unless I get some sort of rest at the weekend, I cannot function at the required levels during the week.

I managed to get to bed just before 2am on Monday and then up, supposedly at 5am but it was 5.30am by the time I could move and open my eyes. It's insane, isn't it? We were out of the house by 6.20am (I benefit from my husband's taxi), which enables me to be at my desk for just after 8am. It's earlier than the official start time but it makes all the difference.

As I had had such a chaotic weekend with food, I tried to make sensible choices; I did have a latte at the station (not so sensible but understandable given the lack of sleep). En route to the office I fantasised about something hot and I as walked by various emporia, my cravings adapted accordingly. So golden arches made me think pancakes would be JUST what I needed, then a skinny blueberry muffin came into mind as I saw Starbucks. Anyway, I had none of it but bought a big pot of yoghurt with wholegrains.

That got me through the morning. With coffee. The whole time I was fantasising about food - it was trigger-tastic. Salt and vinegar crisps, biscuits, fruit, toast - you name it, I thought about it. But I knew it would not make me feel any better. Lunch was a salad (brought from home) with lots of extras to make it interesting. This was a first and I must say I was really proud of myself for managing to a) make it b) take it to work c) eat it at lunchtime (not 10am, which is when I used to eat any homemade sandwiches) and then d) not go bonkers afterwards.

The journey home in the evening was severely testing to say the least - the damage potential from a station (for me) cannot be underestimated. I did have a whole dialogue in my head about which food I could buy before getting on the train. In the end, I just removed myself from the main concourse and sat on the train and waited for it to leave.

It doesn't sound much but these were big steps forward. My challenge is make these decisions the default setting in my brain. Ah yes.