Chatterings after messing up at communion

I am trying to remember back to the week before last, not that much exciting has happened but there are a number of plates spinning in the air that need my attention to keep them spinning and so I need to stay largely in the present.

There was a Starter Pack make up the week before last. This had not happened for a while due to the wholesaler we were using stopping delivery to groups like us. I am not sure whether this was stopping delivering for everyone or just for occasional users. Judith ended up going into Wilkinsons for things and spotted that there was a major overlap between their stock and our requirements list. However they would not deliver, but the manager changed and suddenly not only would they deliver but would not charge for delivering. We also ended up with the extra stuff being supplied being left for the next makeup. I think that at one stage when it looked as if we were short of one or two items, Jean D went to the cupboard and pulled out extras must have surprised them, but these were the left over bits from others. If they are going to deliver as they did this time, we need to talk to them in future about the order in which they deliver because they used a managers 4X4 and had to do several runs. If they are doing that, they need to split the packing so we can pack whole packs at this end.

Over the weekend I went down with a cold. Not sure where from, though someone  must have brought it into the computer centre as when I got into work again on Tuesday both the receptionists in the building were off sick with a cold. It just happened that I had a four day weekend due to my department wanting me on Friday this week. However I remained well enough to write although not well enough to cope with going out and by staying in a dealing with it I find the cold symptoms remain mild and clear more easily. Admittedly I treat with echinacea, tree tea oil and eucalyptus with drinks of whisky, lime and honey to put me to sleep.

On that Tuesday and the following one I was giving a course on SPSS again, well different ones each day. There clearly is a demand, but  the training room closed last Friday and the new one will not be available to sometime in January. We are not sure when in January but I suspect early rather than late January as the pressure for courses is mounting. I am realising that there is quite a lot of learnt helplessness in the department and I find it frustrating that quite a lot of the time I do not know who to talk to. When I deal with the people who think like me, things happen and happen very very quickly but most of the time it is like being in a fog in a maze with a number of rooms I need to get to and quite often when I get to the right room the person feels so disempowered that what they do is pass the job onto someone else. A very different department to the small one I joined almost twenty years ago. Most of the time this does not matter as I am a one person team, but that also means people do not really heed me when I speak from knowledge that I am employed to have. I am supposed to know for the packages I support, how they are used in the University. Most of them are research packages and that is easy to deal with. One is purely taught and people understand  that but two are part research and part taught. One of them is moving from pure research to research and teaching. When I said this was a taught package, the department seemed to think that I was pretending perhaps to promote it. When I actually said to a department this will not be available on managed machines because we cannot get it to work and the department got in touch with work, suddenly things were different.

The weekend was not just cold but also thesis writing, I needed to get papers to my supervisor for a supervision tomorrow. I had around 3,500 words still to write and had been making slow progress. I am pretty sure that a lot of that was nerves as the section I was writing was pulling the whole thesis together and drawing in a lot of the tangents that I had let run. The thing was that my way of doing that was to apparently take another tangent and then use it to draw in the whole thing. Actually by the time I finished it on the Sunday the writing had been exhilarating. I had a feeling somewhat like that you have when you come off a big dipper ride at a funfair. This despite the cold. Of course I find out on Monday whether I have actually done it! However I am hopeful. Unfortunately my hands started becoming sore again (I suspect a repetitive strain but not a standard one)  so it is back to the mouse pads but this time I am more familiar with them and therefore I am happier using them. The pain has largely cleared during the week.<

Thursday my parents rang as they usually do. However the phone played up as they were dialling although they got through. The phone seemed to get confused over extensions. The next day Dad was having to use an extension to get out but I managed to get that sorted but as soon as he started trying to connect the other lounge phone it cut out. The thing was he could not get control back to his handset and therefore he could not put the phone down. I could not phone in and as I could imagine Dad getting worked up I did not know what to do and was due in work. In the end contacted Age UK and they carried on checking until the line was clear. They also rang BT to check the line. It eventually sorted itself but if it had not they would have gone around. However Dad had a migraine on the afternoon. He is now using his central phone and going to extensions so as to not set that off again but I will have to try and get it sorted.

Friday evening I had a meal with the Dicksons and as it was St Andrew’s day we had Haggis for dinner with neeps and tatties. Yes it was good, Jean is a good cook and I would not expect anything else from her. Talking of haggis the Haggis Hunt is on again. The Haggis population in Scotland seems to be having a resurgence and this year all but one of the cameras (the exception being Oxford St) are in Scotland. Well there seem to be plenty of haggis around at present, normally are around the start of the season. However the main advantage is that you get to watch webcams situated in places such as Loch Ness and Inverurie. I leave you to find out where the other seven are situated but there isn’t one from the Mull of Galloway. In the run up they did have one at St Andrew’s so that might appear again later on in the season. Haggis’ have strange powers, given their size on the photographs it is amazing how rarely they are seen in life, but watch out for their ability to turn night into day as well!

Today was communion at St Andrew’s, well we did it. It started off not great when I left my keys in my flat door and exited the block of flats without them. The entrance to the block of flats locks automatically after you so when I was halfway up the drive I realised I did not have them. Came back but there was no sign that any of my neightbours were awake so I went on to church. Actually the setting up was straight forward and we for the first time managed to do it without staining the tables. Everything went well until we were halfway through serving the bread and I suddenly noticed we did not have the children back in. Too late then to do anything about it! However it upset me and I automatically reverted to Congregational praxis, NOT GOOD. I kept forgetting to serve the elders and Sarah got caught up in this too! Elizabeth kept saying “elders” during the wine stage and Sarah and I initially thought she meant to use the chalice not to serve the elders. Mea Culpa. I just got the giggles. We were very short on numbers as well, due to people away and sickness. I wonder if we are not soon going to have to stop processing in with the elements as it is becoming more and more difficult to find elders who do.When I got home I pressed the Tradesman’s entrance as I believe that rings all bells when it does not open and it buzzed so I realised it was open.