Articles by Bee Orchid

I used to love my job. Not so long ago I was sat in my own little office, with a window that opened. The view was cr*p but it was mine. I worked for just one ‘department.’ I was having a quiet moment, the students were all busy, and I was catching up on some research and having a quiet coffee, and thinking to myself: I love my job. The building I had my own office in has now been demolished. I share an office now and get no peace and quiet. I can’t open a window because I work with a foreign…

First of all, let me stress that I didn’t actually burn down the house, but I gave it a bloody good try. My home is small. It’s very small. Many years ago I had a friend on Yahoo 360 and she lived in a trailer. She posted some photos of her kitchen and her trailer, and also posted the size of her trailer. It was bigger than my house! We all posted photos of our kitchen and the clutter, or not, therein. I had to stand outside my kitchen to get it into the frame. People thought I was joking when I…

For those new to my page, I don’t live on a ship; it’s just a bit of fun. As regular readers will know, the Cabin Boy and computers don’t seem to get on. He’s very clever – well I would say that – and knows quite a bit about IT and computers; however they don’t seem to like him. He used to have a lovely laptop, but that died the death last year. Since then he bought a PC off an online company, well that died and we can’t get hold of them. On further inspection a number of customers have had s…

This morning I wore my ‘favourite’ coat to walk the dog. It’s a parka. I never had one as a teenager, they were too expensive. I bought this one in a sale in Matalan – cheapish clothes shop – a few years ago and honestly I’ve had good wear out of it. It was a little chilly, so I did up the zip, only for it to get stuck more than two thirds of the way up. It wouldn’t go down, or up, and I was stuck! I had a good grip on the zipper, and tried in vain to budge it. Nothing was stuck in the zipper, a…

Well, as expected, my son was punished for not adequately looking for work over the Christmas period. There were 2 weeks where he couldn’t find enough jobs to apply for, and the punishment is loss of JSA for 4 weeks. So, no money from him for me for 4 weeks, which when you get right down to it, means less money for groceries because I can’t skimp on the rent. Nice one. Meanwhile, my neighbour who has never worked a day in her life has the gall to complain to me that she’s bored! I have 2 more…

Apparently next week is Random Acts of Kindness Week. In work, we’re being encouraged to step out of our normal routine or comfort zone, and be extra nice to people and then go online to share our experiences. Call me a cynic, but isn’t this something we should do every day anyway? I’m always nice to people, always smile at people, and I do my best to be polite. As for sharing, isn’t this a little like doing something nice and then ‘bragging’ about it? How about just doing something nice in our…

"A vote of no confidence has been adopted by a lecturers' union in a college governing body after it approved a 46% pay for its principal. Judith Evans's salary at Coleg y Cymoedd soared from £98,916 in 2013 to £145,000 last year. The vote was unanimously passed by 138 University and College Union (UCU) members, following a 0% pay rise offer in 2014/15 for lecturers. A college spokesman said it was surprised by the vote." Now whilst the above is not my place of work, this is exactly the…

On Friday I had my wages which included the overtime that I’d worked recently. By the time the tax ‘man’ had taken his cut and the NI increased, and my pension of course, and my student loan, I was left with just over half of what I’d earned. I was gutted! I’m not in the higher tax bracket, not even close! I’m doing more overtime this month and I’m seriously considering taking the time off instead. I often think I’m on a good salary, and wonder why I find it hard to manage. Recently I had an…

This week has been a farce with missing keys and lifts not working: Some men turned up to take away our confidential waste bin and I showed them to the lift. I then ran upstairs to the floor I stated. No sign of the lift moving from the top floor, so I went down again, and showed them to the old lift, then ran back up to meet them. They had two to collect, and I went up to the next floor to try and locate the bin but to no avail. Then of course it was back down 2 floors. So, this place has paid…

It was minus 2 here this morning which is pretty cold considering the ‘urban heat island’ that we have, and it took me ages to defrost the car. I briefly considered leaving it, and just walking, but it’s the walk home that puts me off; it will be dark, and cold, and it’s all uphill on the way home. Work has been cold, so much so that on Thursday I went home for a fleece, and then left early as I couldn’t get warm. Students keep leaving the front door open, and even if I bolt one door, they un…

I worked on Saturday, the second of 3 lots of overtime. My colleague didn’t really want to do it, and said he didn’t need the money, so I did the whole day myself. The money will go towards replacing my cooker. The day went well; it was well attended, and they didn’t run out of coffee. The on-site café was also open, and the heating had been turned on. So, a good day lol. I was lucky with buses, and after only literally seconds at the bus stop, my bus came along. We had 4 sessions of exams, and…

My sister has been quite poorly. Mostly it’s self-inflicted in that she smokes despite having had asthma all her life. I phoned her a few times last week to ask her bf how she was - too breathless to talk, and over the weekend she was well enough to call me back. She’s now feeling much better and we talked for almost an hour. She briefly asked after my son, very briefly asked after me, then spent the rest of the hour talking about herself. I have something on my mind, and would have liked to tal…

My home is becoming a PC graveyard. I have a laptop that charges when it feels like it. My son’s PC is broken and apparently can’t be fixed cheaply. My old PC is being used by my son but the wireless capability works intermittently so it has to be plugged directly into the modem now. His monitor is broken. I feel a trip to the city dump coming on. My son has ordered a new PC so I'll soon have my old one back, though how much use it will be remains to be seen. Due to the dog ‘eating’ the phone ex…

I’m beginning to suspect that there’s a ghost in my house. The dog is often skittish and hides in his bed; this happens just after there are inexplicable loud noises from upstairs. My son denies ever hearing these noises but the dog and I obviously do. He also denies causes these noises, however I find it strange that they manifest mostly after his Dad has phoned. Strange that... His Dad phoned on Christmas Day and they had a chat on the extension upstairs, then he called down that I was wanted…

Today is the shortest day of the year; the Winter Solstice. I know winter has barely begun and so far it’s been pretty mild, locally at least, but for me, this marks a turning point in the year and it’s all full steam ahead to spring which is my favourite season of all. My little fruit trees already have buds on them, and spring bulbs have started to pop their heads above ground; that’s how mild it’s been. Blackout – I recently heard on the news how the government is going to pay the power co…

I had an email recently, from my ex, stating that his house sale is going through and they’d be ‘completing’ this week. I have a key, so it was off to his house for a quick pillage. Now, before any of you are hovering over the phone to dial the police and ‘shop’ me, I had permission to take what I wanted except for furniture. I’m so glad the new owners want the furniture as I wasn’t looking forward to maybe disposing of it for them. Is it pillaging if you have permission? LOL. I left with a…

As you know, I’m counting down to my Christmas break; 1 more week of work. I had a busy week, and Friday I slept for 8 hours which is a record for me lately; 2 good night’s sleep in a week :) In work, students have a week off mid-term which coincides with the school’s half term week. This week allows everyone to decompress, it’s a good time for staff to have a day or two off, and also to get things done without the distraction of students. More importantly, it also means if you have young chi…

Or more precisely; night. I don’t sleep well, haven’t done so since late May, however last night I slept solidly for 7 and a half hours; fantastic! I think there were a number of factors: my son’s PC has broken so he actually went to sleep at what I call a decent hour rather than disturb me by typing, or laughing, or logging off at an unseemly hour and then using the bathroom. I was shattered from working all day on Saturday – a rare occurrence. I had to cram all the shopping and housework into…