August's Plans and June/July's Outcomes

If you're wondering what happened to July's plans well... I didn't have any.  Or at least nothing written down.  What with work farewells and drinks and more farewells, including my own, I decided not to do any planning for the month. 

Sometimes having no plans can be the best thing.  Especially when life has been particularly stressful like it has been for the past 8 months.

Surprisingly - or perhaps not - I achieved quite a lot in my month of non-plans.  I cleaned out 2 wardrobes, the bathroom cabinet, kitchen drawers and cupboards and totally tidied and reorganised my office so that I could actually find things for once.

The house feels fresh and new and I'm loving all the room I suddenly have.

Of course that's not all I did.... I also walked a lot and read a lot.   Which is pretty much standard for me.  But it was rather liberating knowing I could curl up on the couch with a good book and a pot of tea and totally indulge without thinking about work the next day.

This life of not working is actually rather nice... in fact it's really nice.  Of course not having any money to spend is another thing all together.  But we won't dwell on that.

Life at the moment is all about rest and relaxation and having some fun.

1.     Contagion by Teri Terry
        End of the world plagues sound like just my kind of thing.
2.     A Room Full Of Killers by Michael Wood
        As usual I have to have at least one thriller in my pile.  I enjoyed the first one in this 
        series so I'm hoping this is just as good.
3.     The Never King by James Abbott
         A little bit of fantasy for a change.  This sounds very much like something one of my 
         favourite authors, Joe Abercrombie, would write so I'm hoping it's got lots of bad ass 
         action in it.

4.     Her Backup Boyfriend by Ashlee Mallory
        Give me a good sappy happily every after romance and I'm a happy camper.
5.     Wedding Date For Hire by Jennifer Shirk
        An author who is a knew discovery for me and one that I am so far enjoying.
6.     A New Leash On Love by Debbie Burns
        More romance.  What can I say.

7.     All Over The Place by Geraldine DeRuiter
        A little bit of nonfiction and one that sounds really good.
8.     Hi, Anxiety : Life With A Bad Case Of Nerves by Kat Kinsman 
        As someone who suffers the occasional panic attack this book caught my eye.
9.     My Good Life In France by Janine Marsh
       A travel book... set in France.

10.    The Cazalets
          Having read the books years ago I am very keen to listen to this BBC audio book.  I 
          have high hopes for this one.
11.    The Camomile Lawn
          The Cazalets led me onto this TV drama - I'm starting to sense a theme here.
12.    The Durrells
          I missed this when it screened on TV so now is the perfect time to do a catch up. 

13.    Lose Weight and Get Fit
         This is going really well... or at least the get fit part is.  I've managed to do a 45 minute
         walk nearly every day, all up and down hill.  So I'm pretty pleased with this one.  As 
         for the weight lost I'm trying not to worry about it too much and will instead just 
         concentrate on eating a bit more healthier.
14.   Write More
         Would you believe I'm actually at the stage where I really feel like writing and have 
         even been working on some ideas so we'll see how this goes.

Life Lately

A little over two week's ago my life changed.

"Cue dramatic music"

21 years of working as a Librarian and I left my job.  Mostly by choice, partly by decisions that were out of my control.  And though being made redundant is never easy I feel happy to be gone.

The library I worked for is no longer the same,  Like many libraries around the world there have been cut-backs and cost saving measures and restructuring.  All of which have made working there no longer the great job it was.  Which is a little sad because I loved my job.  It was interesting and fun and something that I was passionate about.

That passion and fun though has faded a little over the last year, squashed down by corporate management who have no real understanding or love for what libraries are about and only think about the bottom dollar.   I'm being polite here.  I'd like to say they are idiotic morons who haven't got a clue and a whole lot of other things.  

But I can't.  So I won't.

So instead I will say that though making the decision to leave was hard in the end it was and is the right choice for me.

Bye bye libraries and Hello freedom 

Of course redundancy isn't exactly easy.  There's that little thing called money.  You know the stuff.  The one that buys all the pretties or the necessities... like food or a roof over your head.

Luckily for me I am more fortunate that most.  I have a roof over my head and some savings which are now a little bigger courtesy of my redundancy.  Of course it's not all a life of pink glitter and dancing - though there is some of that.  I have to be careful.  Very very careful which of course means some changes and some sacrifices.  

No more hair dye for me (sob) or chocolate (even more sobbing).  I'm not sure which is more traumatic, the fact that I've going to have to go back to my original hair colour (a scary thought in itself) or a life without chocolate.

Still as scary as it is facing life without a job it is also exciting.  My list of things I want and need to do is pretty long.  Like exercise and eat healthier and clean out cupboards and write more and knit more and learn Italian and do an online course...

In other words