Oz!

I thought I had better inform you all that the shark of all sharks is off on a little adventure to the land of Oz. Ever since my failed arson attempt in my office I've realised I'm a lot safer in the other side of the world.It has taken a lot of organisation and planning, which as many of you will know, is most definitely not my strong point. But I can finally announce that I am flight tested, insured, packed - with what appears to be the entire contents of a small pharmacy, and in possession of a valid passport.

I met my friend today for a coffee and a natter, we were chatting about how well I had done in getting everything sorted. She was both surprised and impressed. That was until it came to her second question...have you got your dollars. I totally forgot the money. It was all going so well. Question one...have you packed? Answer Yes. Question two...have you got your money? Answer SHIT...NO! I had a few dollars that people had given me but that was it. It just hadn't occurred to me that I might need money. Coffee was followed by a rather frantic trip to the Holiday Hypermarket where I purchased my dollars. I try and avoid the Holiday Hypermarket at all costs, me and my friend once thought it would be funny to ask for a plane ticket to Iraq. It turns out that the staff there didn't share our sense of humour.That is all for now, I will be back to inform you all of my REAL shark, jellyfish and kangaroo experiences so stay tuned its about to get fun!

My arson attempt

I left the heater on at work last week. It was a very old heater, but I liked it. I liked it so much I decided it was too good to only be on during office hours, so I gave it an all nighter treat. Unfortunately not everyone agreed with my secret treat for the heater. I think leaving it next to a wooley cardigen may have been a bit of a over sight. But sadly the heaters illegal party was caught, and the poor thing was thrown out in the skip like an old shitty wardrobe. Aparently leaving a heater on over night is a fire risk. I miss the heater, it had so much to live for, but alas, it's gone. Gone but not forgotten. It will always have a special place in my heart.

I will leave you with a very special letter I wrote on the day I had to say bye to the heater...

"Dearest heater,
Thank you so much for keeping me warm, because of you I never got goosepimples.
Love your beloved Sharky pants"

The Belfast adventure

I somehow managed to survive Belfast! It was a very nice few days break. A few disasters including almost missing our plane due to getting carried away in Frankie an Bennies, but alas we made it.

The plane was a bit bumpy but that's what you get when you travel cheap. I love Ryanair they even play a cute little personal song when you take off and land ''lets fly, lets fly, fly, fly, ryanaire'' I'm thinking of using it as my X -Factor audition song, I'd like to stand out and I think this might well be the perfect way.

Once we arrived at Belfast and we managed to find our B & B we were given the choice of two bedrooms. One upstairs or one downstairs. My friend Catrinder McWinderwiffendorinian announced to the lady showing us around that we would like a room as far away from people as possible because ''we are quite noisy''. I'm not exactly sure what the lady thought she meant, and she did look somewhat bemused, and continued to show us a room with a big double bed and a single bed. Just in case there was any confusion regarding our relationship I decided to make a big point about me sleeping on the single bed letting Catrinder McWinderwiffendorinian take the double bed. At which point Catrinder clearly not noticing that this lady thinks were a couple says ''Oh its ok Clare you can just get in with me''. The look on the Lady's face was a classic.

The next day after breakfast we went out shopping for the day, and when we returned only the double bed had been made...

We also got to see the lights being turned on in Belfast, and I had the luxury of watching Same Difference Sing. Is it just me or does everyone seem to think about dancing burgers and hot dogs when watching Same Difference perform?

Belfast here I come

I'm off to Belfast on Saturday with my friend Catrinder McWinder Wiffendorinian; for all my long standing fans, this is the same Catrinder McWinder Wiffendorinian that I went to Madrid with earlier in the year.

And, as per usual, the organisation is shockingly poor. I was on the phone to Catrinder earlier and I had a few questions regarding the trip. Just some simple questions like... What time are the flights? What airport are we flying into? Where are we going to stay in Belfast? What time do we get back on Wednesday? It turns out, between the both of us, the only thing we know is that we have booked into a B and B somewhere in Belfast and we fly out there some time on Saturday. Tomorrow's lunch break will be spent ringing various B and B's in Belfast asking if we have booked with them, whilst Catrinder Mcwinder Wiffendorinian will try and sift through the emails to try and find our flight times.

Work has been a lot nicer this week, with no more important news that involves a mail merge of over 3,000 letters. I've also managed avoid guiding people which means that no one has been sat on the wrong chair, no one has been told were taking a right when were actually taking a left, and no one has had to ensure the most scariest guiding experience of their lives. They say practise makes perfect but in my case I'm not convinced.

I will leave you all with a picture of what happens to me after a bottle or two of wine....

A Career change is upon me

Apologies to all my avid fans for the lack of posts, I'd like to say its because I'm a dancer in strictly come dancing, or because I'm a singer in x-factor, but in reality it's because I got completely bloody lost out at sea and couldn't for the life of me fine my way back home. I think leaving a trail of plankton was probably my first big mistake. My second mistake was not laminating my map before I set off to tackle my fear of those pesky dolphins. But alas. I survived so no real damage done.

I was at work last Friday, and due to some important information needing to be sent out asap, I had to fold and stuff over 3,000 letters into envelopes. It took ALL day, and to be perfectly honest, it almost broke my spirit. There's only so much fun which one can gain from paper folding all day long. So I then decided to imagine that I was sending out children's Christmas wish list to Santa, and it worked, because it suddenly made the task feel so much more worthwhile. Sadly the rest of my office didn't find my new thinking as helpful.

Well after my Friday of happy thoughts of Santa, I decided to head to my local shopping center and pick up an application to be a Santa's little helper in our grotto! I filled out the form and just before I went to hand it in, I spilt Ribena all over it. So then I had to go back for a second form, but at least I look enthusiastic.

Badminton

A few weeks back, I started playing badminton after work. My work hires out courts and people play for a discount. I had a moment of madness, and agreed to go. I really could do with getting a little bit of exercise.

It has been a few years since I did any form of sport, because to be quite frank I’m terrible at all sports. Sport takes coordination; coordination is one thing that I simply do not have. I even managed to fall off my office chair last week, and my bum landed on the wheel part, I pretended it didn’t hurt but it did.

During my first week, I walked in, went to pay then asked if I could hire a ‘bat’. I also failed to get any of the shuttle things over the net, and every game I played I lost. The next day I bumped into a guy from badminton and he suggested I might want to wear something other than jeans.

So here I am, five weeks later and you know what, the only thing that’s improved is my terminology, I now ask for a racket, and I no longer wear jeans but today, for the fifth week running, I got hit in the head with a shuttlecock.

One final point, am I the only person that though Milan was in Spain?!

Calamity Clare

On Friday, I participated in some training at work called ‘Understanding Sight Loss Training’. It started off well. I learnt all about different sorts of sight loss and how it can affect the eye. I tried on some glasses which are a guide on what it’s like to have certain conditions.

Sadly though, it all went wrong in the afternoon ‘guiding’ session. There were three people in the training who were registered blind, and then the rest of us were people from all over the UK who had recently joined the charity.

Anyway they placed me with a nice chap, who I’m sure the person leading the training said was completely blind. Anyway I started chatting, began the guiding session, and as I began I thought it would be nice to have a natter. So I politely asked (since I was curious) how he’d lost his sight, and was slightly embarrassed when he said he was partially sighted and doesn’t actually ever use a guide as he can get around ok, you would have thought the fact that he was wearing the blackout eye mask thingy would give it away.

Then we approached the stairs. I went full pelt down the stairs forgetting to say about a handrail or where the first step is, nice chappy very nearly fell down the stairs.

Lesson learnt...stick with the office work or even better, the Atlantic.

Another lesson I learnt this weekend was that if you have a flat tyre the best thing to do is to change the tyre, not continue to drive home on it. Apparently that is very dangerous.

Over and out!