👋

[cbou]

This weekend’s been nice, and I have tomorrow off work too yay!

Yesterday mark had his second jab, then I drew all afternoon and we headed to a local festival at 4ish. The festival was so much fun! It was forecast rain but it stayed sunny, and all the bands were so good. The atmosphere was just really lovely.

Today I had my second jab and then met my friend E for lunch, I haven’t seen her for ages cos we were both friends with that “lesbian vibes” girl and when I fell out with her, we kinda all stopped talking. But me and E recently spoke a little and said it’d be nice to meet up again. So we did and it was so nice. We had lunch in the sun with a few drinks and then sat in a field and watched dogs running around, we just chatted non stop for hours.

I’m home now and me and mark started watching My Orthodox Life on Netflix and I love it. The woman is amazing. Such a strong inspiring woman!

[cbou]

Yes hun pls help me xoxo

[cbou]

We both had our second vaccines booked for next Saturday, but they’ve both been moved to this weekend. Annoyingly marks is this morning and mines tomorrow morning 😅 ah well, we’ll be glad to have them done. Just hope that we don’t end up feeling unwell cos we have plans this afternoon and I’m seeing my friend straight after my appointment tomorrow!

[cbou]

It’s one of my managers leaving dos tonight and my friend/ex colleague has gone and text me hehe, the people talking about me were him, my boss and a new researcher 🥺🥺🥺

[cbou]

On my way to work this morning as I was approaching the city centre, it just dawned on me that when I was younger I’d dream of driving to work in the city and it seemed like it really was such a dream. But now it’s reality?! I actually drive from a house I own to an awesome office in the city centre, for a great company, with lovely colleagues, to a job I really like and earn plenty of money? Mind blowing honestly.

[cbou]

Today’s been good! I went into the office with my delivery team, so that’s basically a group of developers. I haven’t met some of them in person before cos they’re new, but they’re super lovely. It was so nice to sit and chat cos usually all we do is talk about work on Zoom calls. I’m supposed to be leaving that team at some point and now I feel really sad about it cos we get along so well! I hope my new team will be just as nice!

We’re having Chinese for tea and I think I’ll try and finish my monster truck drawing because I just have a few tiny details to do.

Tomorrow Mark’s got his second jab in the morning, cos he somehow managed to book it a week before mine, even though I vividly remember him showing me the booking details to confirm it was same date/time as mine. But ah well, then we’re going to a local festival in the afternoon, it’s all cover bands but they’re really good! There’s cover bands Slipknot, Metallica, System of a Down, Linkin Park… etc. I just hope it doesn’t rain 😬

[cbou]

I can’t remember if I posted about this, but my friend recommended me for some freelance work at her work. I chatted to her manager and she asked to see some examples of work, I sent her stuff that’s live on the website I’ve been redesigning at work. She asked to see more examples so I sent her everything I used to have in my portfolio, although it’s like 2yrs old but I don’t have anything else.

Then we had another chat and she said she thinks I’ve been held back by brand guidelines and she’d like to set me a task that interviewees would usually do, although she knows this isn’t an interview for a job or anything. She put me on the spot and I agreed to it. But afterwards I was thinking about it and I don’t wanna do a task. She’s seen examples of my work, why’s that not good enough. She’s even expressed that my style looks like the style they’re looking for. So why do I need to do a task? What more do I need to prove?

You wouldn’t look at a freelancers portfolio and get a recommendation for that freelancer, and then ask them to do a task before you consider hiring them 😅

I just feel like it’s a lot of effort and free work for them before I even know whether they’re gonna give me this freelance work. It makes me worry what they’ll actually be like to work for. The extra money would be nice but is it worth the potential nightmare of working for them?

I’m also wanting to work on my Etsy anyway so that’ll take up my extra time.

Anyway she was supposed to email me that task 2 weeks ago and she didn’t, and I heard nothing from her so I just left it. But today she’s messaged saying she doesn’t think the task has sent and can she have my email address (that she already has?). So I need to tell them I’m no longer interested because this “task” thing is BS, but idk how 😅 it’s more awkward too because my friend works there. Eughhhhh.

[cbou]

😭 I wanna finish my drawing, but my neck is KILLING from sitting at my desk. It usually takes me about 2 weeks to get used to a new seat position 🙄

[cbou]

Oooof I kept talking a lot about accessibility on our website at work last year, and discovered a lot of other people share my interest of it and want to make improvements, learn about it etc. I’m absolutely no expert whatsoever but I put a group together so that we can have regular meetings about it and continue to learn and make improvements.

But, it’s really hard because all the pressure seems to be on me to make sure we have something to do/talk about in that meeting. I asked if people could do talks about things they’ve learned, but no one will volunteer. It’s like pulling teeth getting them to actually DO something. I can’t be the only person planning content for these meetings.

I came across a global network last year though, that’s just been started up by a few people at the BBC. So I joined it and we had our first meet up today, it sounds like it’s gonna be SO good. There’s experts from BBC, Microsoft, Google, Skyscanner, ASOS, NHS, government services…. So many huge companies. And they’re all willing to share their resources, run workshops, do talks etc. So this will be amazing for me cos I can then bring my learnings to my internal group! I’m v excited about it!

[cbou]

Lmaooo in contrast to my previous post… I’ve since told like 3 other people “no” today (nicely, with a clear explanation of why) and now I feel like they all think I’m a dick who doesn’t want to use anyone else’s ideas but my own.

I love imposter syndrome 😅🙃

[cbou]

Just ordered a few bras from the ASOS sale, and spotted this bargain so I’ve ordered it and I really hope it looks nice on. Usually oversized dresses look a bit daft on me, but I think this would look cute with a belt 🤞🏻

[cbou]

In my element 😊 watching the new The Hills and drawing monster trucks 😅

[cbou]

Found the arm for my monitor and spent 30mins tearing the house apart searching for the screws to attach the monitor to it.. turns out they were in the monitor all along 🙃

I’ve cleaned as much of this room as I can. I’ve hoovered the stairs (worst job ever) and I’m doing a big brain dump for my Etsy stuff so that I can get some sort of plan in place for myself!

[cbou]

Oh!!!! I found the dongle yay! Thank god cos I didn’t really wanna ask work to buy me a new one cos I’d lost it in a sea of boxes lol

[cbou]

Woohoooo I have a workspace again! There’s still a pile of boxes in one corner, but that’s Mark’s stuff that he didn’t get to yesterday. I can’t wait to eventually decorate in here, it’s just gonna be all neutral cos it’ll eventually be a kids room in future 😬! I also really wish I could find the stand for my monitor but I haven’t come across it yet, so I’m stuck with my tiny MacBook screen… I also wish I could find my dongle, but it’s disappeared so I can’t use my keyboard or mouse lol, cool thanks Apple.

[cbou]

Btw this is the eventual end-goal for the dining area, something like this. An inbuilt dining nook with under-seat storage cos you always need more storage. We were gonna try and get it built ASAP but it’ll cost a bit, and my parents were giving away their table, so it made sense to make do with that for now! We’re saving for a new bathroom instead!

Ok end of morning shit posting. Can you tell I’m off work today lol.

[cbou]

When I see those pics side-by-side, it’s mad how DARK the house used to feel. All the ceilings were artex and a creamy colour, and the ceiling in our bedroom was wooden panelling for some weird reason. The wallpaper in two of the bedrooms was ugly wooden-style stuff. The kitchen was so yellow and dark. And now everything feels so bright! We definitely need a light fitting above the dining area that has multiple bulbs though, cos that bit will probably feel dark in winter, cos it’s far away from the window! I really need some more chairs for that dining table too haha.