Raising Azaria

As everyone knows by now, Kate Moss has given in to pressure and publicly apologised for the 'behaviour' that had gone 'unnoticed' by all the people who work for her, or for companies that she worked for. I imagine they didn't 'notice' her 'behaviour' because they were too busy in the work toilets, cutting up a line.

What I want to know this week is how I have managed to not know until now that a young 25 year old Australian woman came forward in August claiming to be Azaria Chamberlain? How could this sensational and salacious story escape the news-gathering reach of NNN, Nick's News Network? I am obsessed with the Azaria case, being one of those sentimental memories of my childhood like yo-yo tricks, Lego, and those elusive VHS video recorders that could skip the ads. Here's the story about the confused young lass. How exciting if it were true? Apparently she wants Lindy to provide DNA samples to settle the matter.

Today is the second week anniversary of having started work. I'm not liking it anymore than last time I wrote. I spend most of my day managing to be busy at pretending to work, and it's an arrangement that seems to sit comfortably with my co-workers and management. But still I've become concerned about my outrageous internet usage. What started as a necessary distraction through extreme lack of work, has now expanded to occupy my time when not distracted by work. I was called into my manager's office today, causing my paranoid brain switch into overdrive as I catalogued every site I'd visited in the last week. Rather than castigating me, my manager said he's happy with my work, and would like to extend my contract beyond the three months originally negotiated. I've often heard complaints about the English work ethic, but this is ridiculous.

I think the extension has little to do with me being the right guy for the job, and more about being the right now guy. The Afrikaan resigned on Friday in a brazen, hissy tantrum, all because he was asked to move to a desk three metres away. And if the worker droids are allowed to diminish to unacceptable numbers, then there is nothing for the management droids to do. So this probably has a lot to do with manager preserving his job.

Continuing a lifetime of shunning gift horses, I made a mess of things when offered the extension. Some people might argue that the only suitable answer to an extension offer is "yes", especially when there is a 28 day quit clause, but that is far too simple for Nick. Basically I told TeamLeader that I'd like a week or two to "think if I really want to work here". You can stop for a moment and question my sanity, as who wouldn't want to get paid to look busy and read about Kate. But this is I.T. contract code. I explained to TeamLeader that I'm used to Australian I.T. contracts, which are fixed-term and lack a quit clause. So I am naturally cautious to extend until I am totally sure about the job at The Firm, and the work I will be doing. What all that means is that I want to be doing interesting work, similar to the job description I applied for. TeamLeader seemed okay with that, and dangled a carrot of .NET development, which is exactly what I want. If I'd stopped there, I'd be laughing, but I then (foolishly) went on to (stupidly) say, "then again, I could renew and if I don't like the work I could always give 28 days notice". TeamLeader visibly flinched, convincing me finally to stop digging and shut up. I later smoothed things over with my recruitment agent, so I think everything will work out swell.

I MSN chatted with Kerby today and mentioned the potential for a contract extension. I also said that even if I hate winter here, which is quite likely, it would make sense to stay in London until this time next year to enjoy the beautiful summer. Kerby seemed okay with that. It is a possibility that we originally discussed, provided everything worked out well here, and it has. Hopefully Kerby will be able to get vacation time in the middle of next year and so we'll end up seeing each other every three or four months from now on.

Today the temperature was minimum 10 and maximum 18. The bad news is that January's record maximum is 14. Just repeating, the RECORD MAXIMUM is 14. The average is 2 to 6, meaning that the average maximum is almost half of today's minimum. I'm going to try and take advantage of the 'warm' weather before winter gloom arrives. I'm thinking of a little road trip in a few weeks time, perhaps to Dover, Devon, or Cornwall, followed up by short trips to Paris and Belgium.

My friend Doug arrives today. He's my (first) house guest for the next two nights, and on Friday we fly to to Madrid together for the weekend. I'm flying back to London around Sunday lunchtime, just in time for the 7th Birthday Salvation party. Yay!