The (attempted) cat stealing, god-awful loud music playing, unable to shut the door without shaking my house neighbours are gone.

Well, I am not sure if they have totally gone yet. But the house is up for sale. And there has been no car outside since Friday.

However, the little black and white cat which lives there is still hanging around, and they have left the window open out the back, so I am assuming they are maybe leaving some food out for him? And quite possibly that is where Mister is hanging out when he’s not here.

But hoo-bloody-ray. I shall be glad to see the back of them.

And Mosh, have had lots of cuddles off the cats recently. Obviously this is down to my wonderful care and attention, and them repaying it with love. Nothing at all to do with the sudden drop in temperature, and the fuckwits who keep setting off fireworks every night!

Watched the special ‘Royle Family’ last night. How brilliant was it? I can’t even remember the scene now, but about 15 minutes in I was practically rolling on the floor, howling with laughter.

Of course, 30 minutes later I was balling my eyes out. Yet still managing to smile through it.

So well written. So well acted.

Still just like my family.

Was off work for most of the week. Went back to the opticians on Tuesday, having not worn my contact lenses since Sunday. Well, I did wear my lenses, just to drive to the opticians, and I could feel it irritating my eye.

So. Now I have new lenses in my glasses (and wasn’t that a fun two days without them - resorted to wearing one contact lens, and spending the whole day feeling incredibly lopsided), not that it makes a whole lot of difference. I went back to work on Friday, but it was so hard. I have, however, been in contact with the RNIB (apparently I can describe myself as ‘part-time partially sighted’), who put me onto the Job centre, who have sent me a form to fill in. Then someone will come out (probably from the RNIB) and do a workstation assessment, and hopefully recommend things I can do and use to at least make the work day a little more bearable.

The thing which is particularly getting me down is the disbelief I get. Thankfully my new boss is great, but I know in my old job it would have been awful, because the old boss just didn’t believe I couldn’t see through my glasses. Mainly her own fault, for refusing to read the internet links I sent her because she is ‘too busy’. But a lot of people just assume I am making it up, since most people have never heard of anything which you *have* to wear contact lenses to be able to see, and glasses aren’t an option. They assum contact lenses are for vanity only.

Have been extremely bored. Have ‘watched’ some of my dvd’s, getting annoyed with the ones who have a ‘letter’, or other written thing which is crucial to the plot, since I can’t read it. On my way back from the opticians one time I popped into Hobbycraft. £30 later, I was home, and have been making some cards, although I am dreading when I can actually see them just how imprecise the placement of some things will be. Still, it’s kept me failry sane. And the radio has been a great help - particularly BBC radio 7, with it’s thriller hour, and comedy shows.

One thing I found particularly scary was when I asked the optician about whether I should inform the DVLA. I had asked my old optician, and he had told me I didn’t have to, but I have since found a discussion group website which is suggesting I have to tell the DVLA and my insurance company. Apparently I don’t have to. And not just when I am wearing my lenses, apparently I can see well enough with my glasses to drive. Not ‘just’ able to see either, but over and above the limit set by the DVLA - by two lines!

Excuse me? No way can I see clearly enough to be out on the open roads. I must admit I have driven with just my glasses, but no further than to the local shop (or Indian takeaway).

What is scary is that there are going to be people with worse eyesight than mine out there driving, because legally they can see.

One other thing which isn’t helping my mood is LELI. He’s gone back home today for a week’s holiday. I am missing him already. When we went out on Sunday night he was making noises about not moving back home, maybe just moving to London. Even better was the rarely alluded to staying here, and if he does then he would make an effort to ’settle’ and buy a flat and car, and properly ’stay’. I didn’t realise just how much this had got my hopes up when, as I usually do when he goes back I sent him a text saying to have a good time and “remember to come back”. He replied “this time I will come back, but not so sure next time”. Urk! He is going home for Christmas, even when he is talking of going home he has been talking about March/April. Bugger.

I went to the opticians yesterday - after putting my lenses in for the first time in over a week. It felt mighty fine to be able to see - and they didn’t feel uncomfortable.

But. Apparently it’s not totally healed. I told him I had had to take time off work because trying to do work not being able to see was causing me major headaches. He suggested I wear my lenses, but not full time.

However, have put them in today, and I can feel it already. He did suggest it might be that the lens doesn’t fit any more, and he might have to refit it, but he will check in 2 weeks when it’s healed. However, if the lens is rubbing it, then I think it’s not going to heal.

I am bored. I haven’t been able to do much, even when I have been at home. I can’t read. I can only watch telly for a short time before I get a headache. I can’t sit at the pc for very long either. I have spent a lot of time sleeping, and listening to the radio - and BBC radio 7 has been a godsend.

I have been looking at websites today - most notably the RNIB. I probably should have looked at this site a long time ago, but I didn’t really want to, it’s sort of like admitting defeat.

What has scared me is that I probably should be declaring myself as disabled at work.

But when I wear my lenses, I have almost perfect vision? But then the website does say that most people don’t consider themselves disabled, because for most of the time it isn’t an issue. I suppose if I do that, it will make them understand more why I have not been in to work.

This website has made a pretty good stab at what having my eye condition is like. I suffer from the ghosting big time. The night vision is very like what I see too. The other symptoms I don’t get.

On the plus side, because I am wearing my lenses now I am going out to dinner with LELI tonight.

It’s only been 4 days, but me eyes are driving me mad. How did people manage before contact lenses? I have spent most of the weekend pondering eyesight - and how much I take it for granted. Last night I was chopping an onion, and it was hard. Because of the way my eyes work, it was difficult to see where I had chopped, and what needed chopping. That is not a good state to be in with a very sharp knife in your hands.

Then I got to thinking. What the hell would I do should I ever totally lose my sight?

I read such a lot. I usually have three books on the go at any one time - one in my bag, one in the kitchen, and one in the bedroom.

I live a fair way from the centre of town - how would I cope if I couldn’t drive? And couldn’t see to catch a bus?

I like to make things with my hands. I like to do crafty things. I couldn’t do that without my contact lenses.

I love to cook. How do blind people cook?

I spend a lot of time on the pc. I would really miss that.

How would I do my work?

It scares me. A lot. And I am also feeling very sorry for myself at the moment.

It feels like my sight is getting worse as the days go by, but it’s not, it’s just my brain getting lazy. Friday wasn’t too bad at all - but then every so often I take a day off from wearing my lenses, so it is something I am used to. Saturday was also not too bad. Yesterday morning was okay (I even drove to the local post box to post my sister’s birthday card, not sure why I bothered since it’s not arrived today), but by the afternoon I was starting to struggle.

This morning wasn’t so good. Work has been a struggle all day. I will go in tomorrow, but if it’s bad, I might end up having to take the rest of the week off sick.

My left contact lens has been irritating a bit the last few days.

Today it was a lot worse, so I got an emergency appointment with the optician.

Ouch.

Ulcerated cornea.

Can’t wear my contact lenses for at least a week. I can’t see well enough out of my glasses to drive. Getting to and from work shouldn’t be too much of a problem, as I can get a lift with someone I am sure.

However, I was supposed to be visiting friends this weekend. It’s her birthday, and she’s having a small birthday-come-house-warming party. It’s 120 miles away. It wouldn’t be so bad if I hadn’t dropped out of her 30th birthday party bash last year, when I got shingles. She will think I am avoiding her.

It will also mean no exercise classes next week. This is the bit I have been dreading. When I haven’t been for a few days, it’s going to be oh so easy to not go again when I am tired/not feeling up to it/just can’t be bothered. Still, the woman who runs the pilates class I went to on Tuesday night also runs one round the corner from here on a Monday night. I can go to that.

Work is going to be bad for the next week. Not wearing my lenses, and staring at a screen all day is going to cause me big headaches. Mind you, the pain in my eye has been giving me a headache today, so it’s not that a big a difference I suppose.

I like my new job even more now.

There is one thing that really get’s my goat, and it’s people who waste time and resource refusing to code their programs correctly.

We have had problems with our systems the last few months, after an ‘upgrade’ to improve efficiency. It didn’t work. The techie guys can’t figure it out. But I know they are spending hours trying to figure it out (hell, that’s what they like to do, prove some other techie wrong somehow, prove that they could do a better job with their eyes closed!)

But the last few days the system has pretty much ground to a halt.

So, I now have access to check who is running what code. And how many sessions they have open.

I don’t quite have total power - the techie guys won’t give me access to kill any jobs I think are taking too much space/inefficiently written/someone has too many sessions open - but I do have the power to ring up said abusers and ask them to choose which sessions they want to kill, else I will pass their names to the techie guys who will kill all their jobs.

I am so enjoying it.

However, I would much rather people wrote efficient code. It’s not that hard to do. And I am responsible for signing off access to the data. I am seriously considering taking it away from some people until they have had some training. The form asks if they have experience, and access is only supposed to be given to ‘intermediate’ users. However it is completely clear that some of these people have never coded in their life, and are just copying and amending bad code to start with.

Exercise is good for you.

Exercise raises your metabolic rate - not just while you are exercising, but for a few hours afterwards too.

A raised metabolic rate means you process your food faster.

Processing your food faster means you poo more.

Yesterday, about 12 o’clock I went to the loo. Was only planning on having a wee but got a bit ‘caught out’, as it were.

Only I was more caught out than I expected.

Now, about 6 weeks ago they changed the cleaning company. The new company are crap. I have complained several times - at one point I threatened to call in the Health and Safetey, because they just weren’t cleaning the toilets. They were wiping down the seats, and throwing bleach down it, but with so many people using so few toilets they need a damn good scrub every night. The bowls were getting browner and browner by the day.

They now clean the toilet sproperly.

However, they seem to be cost cutting elsewhere.

Like cutting back on toilet paper.

I didn’t think to check - I mean, these cubicles have those huge toilet paper dispensers with two enormous rolls on them, where when one is finished you slide the thing underneath and the second roll cna be used. With the old company it was very rare to have to use the second roll, as soon as the first one was approaching being used up, it would get replaced.

Imagine my horror when I reached for some toilet paper, and there was none there.

And I usually carries tissues, but I was wearing trousers with no pockets. So no tissues.

And it’s approaching lunchtime, when lots of people would be coming into the loo.

What a dilemma. Do I sit there, and wait for someone to come in and ask them to pass me some toilet paper, thereby making it clear it is me that has stunk the place out?

In the end, I waited until the coast was clear, and half pulled up my knickers and trousers, and dashed out of the cubicle. However, because my trousers were down, they caught under my shoes. And the floor was a little wet from drops of water when people have been drying their hands.

I went flying.

Luckily I didn’t fall over completely, and managed to dive headfirst into the next cubicle (which had TWO rolls of toilet paper in it, goddammit) and ’save the day’.

What a pallaver!

There have been issues recently with parking at work. The car park where we have parking passes suddenly cordoned off a whole section of the car park, and have reserved it for ‘parking permits’. The first day it happened I pointed to the pass in my windscreen. Oh no. That’s the wrong type. Apparently that is charged to the company per day, in arrears at the end of the month. The special part of the car park is for those who pay in advance for a years parking.

Now, excuse me, but why do they get a guaranteed space? I have never had a parking permit yet which guarantees me a space, even when I paid British Rail through the nose for an annual parking pass. It is always a strictly first come, first served basis.

This morning I went to the doctors. I got to the region of work around 20 past 10.

I got into the office just gone 11 o’clock, after driving round for half an hour. I ended up having to pay £3 (and risked a fine because you can only park there for 3 hours at a time, so had to go back to pay for another 3 hours, and I was half an hour late).

I wouldn’t mind, but there were loads of spaces in the usual car park, but they were all in the cordoned off place.

On a better note, I spoke briefly with one of the people who work ‘upstairs’. They are sort of the technical part to my role - we do similar jobs, but I am responsible for the actual data, while they are responsible for all the techy stuff behind it. There are 6 of them up there.

She said to me, “Me and J (one of the other guys who works up there) were talking after the meeting on Friday. You have achieved more in the last 3 weeks in that job than has been done in the last I don’t know how long. I was pleased when I heard you had got the job, I am even more pleased now you are in it.”

I was so chuffed. It was really only the end of last week that things were starting to come together, after 3 weeks of sponge-like activity, where I was just absorbing a whole lots of facts, but not knowing where they all fitted, I am starting to piece things together to get the whole picture.

Of course, most of the credit has to go to the two guys who work for me - I have divvied up my list of task given my by my boss for the team between the three of us, and they are both just beavering away at them all. Ihave had meetings with both of them the last 2 days, and I am astonished at how much they have done already. And they are both so enthusiastic. And helpful.

I am really, really loving the job.

Two kilogrammes.

That’s four point four pounds.

Bringing total lost to six kilogrammes.

That’s thirteen point 2 pounds.

That’s almost a stone.

Her first words to me when I walked in were, “Wow, you look really well.” Apparently it’s starting to show. I felt it was, but I also realise that proportionally that’s not that much, I still have such a lot to lose. It’s nice to have it validated (especially after, when I asked my mom if she could tell any difference her responce was, “No, you’re as fat as ever.”)

And that’s even after a big bag of chips on the way home from exercise last night.

Again, part of me thinks if I hadn’t stopped for the chips (and had my corned beef sandwich and a bowl of chips when I was fed up for lunch one day last week, and so on and so on) it might have been more. But the reality is, if I didn’t allow myself to have the chips when I want them, then I probably wouldn’t have stuck to either the healthier eating plan, or the exercise regime.

As the nurse said, “It’s working for you, so just keep on doing what you are doing.”