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Prehistoric Buick
Originally uploaded by The original SimonB

There is something about number/registration/licence plates that has always seemed to catch my attention. We used to make up words or sentences from them on long family journeys and eagerly looked for the first new car whenever the year letters changed. I can remember my Dad's old cars (CBM130T and FTM252Y spring immediately to mind), ones that made me laugh when we were out as a family (BOO36T had us in hysterics for no real reason) or other prominent vehicles (ADX1 is the first Ipswich motor bus, now in the Ipswich transport museum).

Maybe it was Lady Penelope's FAB1 in Thunderbirds that grabbed me early on, but I seem to spend half my life scanning plates as I pass them or they overtake me (usually the latter as I have this annoying habit of keeping within the speed limit). I used to judge whether I was early or late for work by where on the road into Ipswich I would see L15ETT coming the other way - never considering that she might have been the one not running to time - and could pick out other members of staff in the car park from their plates rather than the type of car (well, there were always duplicates of model and colour).

So when I stumbled across Richard Herring's Consecutive Number Plate Spotting (where you look for 1-999 in order) I had no choice but to give it a go.

After over a year of looking, last week I finally passed the 100 milestone (which was becoming something of a Millstone). I'd been dedicated enough not to count the new style 02, 03, 04... and 53, 53, 54... seeking instead older plates with those digits, but that didn't really slow me down. In fact both runs that could have been got through "cheating" actually fell to me each within a single day when I reached them numerically. No, I don't believe it either, but it is the truth. No point playing this game if you can't be honest about it.

The scrappage scheme which is taking older cars off the road has made me wonder if I will ever get to 999 (there are at least three 999 cars in Felixstowe that I know of, but they can't be counted until their time) but I am aware of myself enough to know that I will never give up.

Oh, the picture was one I saw in Canada two years ago, and one day I might post my American States plates collection...

Oh bloody hell. Idiocy strikes back and I end up suffering again for a stupid, stupid mistake. Or in other words, on Wednesday afternoon I declined going up to Martlesham P&R for a photo shoot as Joan's meeting in Ipswich was due to finish before the shoot did. Turned out it didn't and those who went were back in the office before I left. Plus to make matters worse stupid Simon did a bit of web surfage that was spotted by Mitchell. He said nothing to me about it but did tell Sonic.

And of course on Thursday morning when I couldn't stay asleep any longer because of the heat and ended up at work early what was I doing again when Sonic arrived. Yup, browsing the Llamasoft forums. So of course he had a word. Nothing too drastic (hell, he even said I could keep browsing at lunchtimes and all that like before just not to get too carried away again) but I ended up feeling like shit. All day.

It didn't help that he wanted a meeting which didn't happen until nearly lunch time and I had planned to be out of the office all day delivering books. I spent most of the morning shaking with self-recrimination and feeling as sick as a dog before having the meeting (lots of which went over my head) not eating much of my lunch and heading out to try and catch up on the deliveries. I did manage to get some done in the afternoon but not as many as I'd hoped for, no new locations found to help with my targets and stuff like that. So when I got home I was not in much of a good and happy state. And of course neither was Joan after she'd had another counselling session which confirmed she needs to take more time for herself and didn't really need me phoning her in a panic of "what the fuck have I done this time" proportions. So we spent a good chunk of the evening looking for jobs on the internet and hopefully there will be some application forms with me soon (in fact one is here already but looks a right evil sod, with some of the old "how would you cope with X", "tell us how you have prioritised Y" and "give an example of dealing with Z" type of questions which are going to require a lot of thought.

Friday I was planning to go to work in the morning before heading off to Colchester for stitches out in the afternon (with deliveries on the way). Instead I woke up in a totally depressed state, tears and all and ended up taking Joan for her doctor's appointment (pre-booked but handily times as she ended up being signed off for two weeks so hopefully she can start sorting through the counselling stuff and get back to an even-keel without all the crap from work she is having to cope with) and then having one myself.

Not exactly back on the anti-depressants yet, but have got some nice other pills to calm me down (which are kind of working as I seem to have spent most of the time since then asleep!). I stil feel shaky as hell and nauseous when I think about what I'm going to have to face tomorrow but hopefully I will get through. I think it will be better after this week's one-to one as I have got the first draft of an action plan to meet my targets sorted out and we can use that to hopefully determine if they are realistic or not. I think Sonic will be understanding of the situation (he certainly was with the teeth issue) and I'm sure he doesn't want us all to fail as that would then look bad on him but if the worst comes I will just go straight to personnel for further guidance and help. Hell, I'll even go back for more counselling myself if that's what it takes - it helped before and I have no qualms in asking for more help again. And if I can get through this week there are then two weeks where Gary and Charles will be away and not spreading their own negativity which I really don't find helpful either. One way or another I plan to be either back on track with the current job or at the very least planning for an interview for something else by the time they get back to work.

After a lie in, shopping trip to town and sleeping most of the afternoon yesterday we had H, B & A along for a nice Chinese meal. Sat in the garden all evening and it went well - I even managed to stay calm for most of it, just needing a quick break to sort my racing heart out again at one point. Today has been more relaxing (I slept most of the morning after getting up for breakfast then going back to bed with another outpouring of tears for no valid reason) with a fair deal of sitting in the garden reading. Finished ...Nutmeg on Friday after the stitches did come out (no fuss there at all, again a quick in and out which cured a bit of the worry but glad Ma was free to drive me as I'm not sure if I'd have been up for that - even managed to stay awake on the A12 this time (Although I had just had 1½ hours before lunch of snoozing)). Overall a very interesting read, and almost impossible to imagine the hardships and deprevations the people suffered trying to import spices. Went on to Exile 2 - The Golden Torc which I finished this morning and indeed am now straight in to number 3 The Non-Born King. Both as good as I remembered them and indeed so gripped by getting re-acquainted with the story that I couldn't make myself take a non-fiction pause. So the next one of those will be after the Exile section of the whole saga I reckon.

So, I shall see how it goes tomorrow. One thing is for certain, I'm going to cut back on work webbing totally (other than for actual work stuff!) so entries here will be more sporadic, but probably longer when they do come along. Fingers crossed for a good outcome.

What a waste of a day that was. And worse, the train from Ispwich to London had not been given it's seat reservations so I had to find my own and on the way back from Bedford to London we sat outside King's Cross for nearly an hour as someone on the train ahead of us had died. So I didn't get back to Ipswich until 5pm after leaving at 0730 for a 1½ hour meeting!

Still, it did give me time to finish all current magazines and I'm now on to the first Harry Potter book. Enjoyed the film loads and am now enjoying picking up on the bits they left out.

Very nearly didn't make it in to work today. Got about half way here when I came over all peculiar - light headed and nauseous etc. Did actually turn the car around but after sitting for a minute at the side of the road, taking my coat off and opening the roof I began to feel a bit more human again. So here I am. Fool!

OK, time to do some work-related tidying up!

Hurdie Ho!

Weekend seemed to go in a flash. I did get online for a while, but not long enough to add anything here so...

Doctor did the trick, and I've now cut the meds in half again. So hopefully a couple more months and I can come off them completely. OK, so I seem to be brewing a bit of a cold at the moment, but otherwise feeling pretty darn good. And the sun is shining too so with any luck I'll get to go out for a wander in it shortly.

Finally got round to starting a new book - The Martians by Kim Stanley Robinson. Having recently finished the main mars trilogy I was looking forward to this as I didn't want to reach the end of that. They were quite deep in some places (a bit too much science and not enough story perhaps) but I still wanted every page to be a few words longer. So the chance to fill in some of the gaps in the narrative is quite nice. I wonder what the overall result would have been if these "leftover" bits had simply been inserted into the main trilogy and that extended. Anyway, let it just be said for now that I am enjoying catching up on bits of the "past" that were only hinted at before.

Didn't actually listen to any coherent whole albums over the weekend. Music mainly came from the assorted appropriate channels on tv, although many of the tracks encountered that way were archived to mini-disc so will get listened to again soon. I used to be a real addict for new bands, but then had a period of no spare cash and no spare time and no decent radio stations to find them and just enjoyed what I had. But getting the sky dish has really fired my imagination again. Everywhere I turn there are bands I've vaguely heard of but not experienced before and I'm finding I like them all. Which is good in the short term but could damage the wallet eventually!

Right, now for a walk in the sun.

Mood has lifted a fraction, but nothing to write home about!

Joan's Boss is coming to dinner tonight, so I hope I can at least contribute to the conversation. Will probably make a bid for "freedom" and lurk upsatirs if they get on to work too much or something else I don't want to know about.

Time to go home I think.

Feeling pretty down today. I'd like to be able to say it was caused by the "sorry, thanks for your interest but we don't want to give you an interview this time" letter from the East of England Tourist Board that came this morning, but I wasn't in the best of spirits before the post arrived. Just one of those woke up with it days. If they happen on a weekend I don't mind cos I can just ride out the gloom listening to suitably down music and not having to worry about interacting with people. Unfortunately today means work meaning people to try and get through. Oh well, the morning's done now in one long meeting/listening to other people while trying to stay awake session so only a few more hours to go.

We are involved in a huge database transfer project at the moment which has been ongoing for well over a year now and still sees no sign of ever coming to an end. There are stacks of other smaller projects and even jobs hanging on the outcome and I just want to get on with them rather than the continual hanging about while they try to fix another problem. I seem to be in a perpetual state of oscillation between manic panic-stricken deadlines to meet using outmoded software and late information and hanging about trying to find things to do. It would be nice for stuff to come in a steady stream, but I don't reckon much on the prospect of that in the near future. And we are always fighting against the opposing realities of having to get information out to the public in time for them to make proper use of new bus services or changed routes but not getting hold of it ourselves until a few days before services start. The upcoming change in notice period from 42 to 56 days will help, but how much is still in the realms of guesswork.

Anyway, seeing the doctor on Friday. Was hoping to say I was feeling great and can I start coming off the meds yet, but after today I don't think that would be such a good idea after all.

Hmm, this is making for gloomy reading, so I'll stop and maybe come back later if I get anything more uplifiting to say.