One word? When seven would do…

I *think* I like this and I *think* I’m going to leave it alone now. I got bored of the white and purple and I had in mind something sort of gingery but actually I like this. I especially like the archives bit and I’m quite proud of myself for managing to change the little bits I have managed so that’s where I’m going to leave it. 🙂

Anyway, enough talk about what it looks like a bit more talk about what’s going to be written on it. 🙂

I worked yesterday afternoon, I walked into work and then Ady came and picked me up afterwards. I’ve been keeping my phone on me at work as it has a built in pedometer. On a full day I am easily managing those 10000 steps there and on a half day I get at least 6000, the walk into work really helps and come the summer I’ll see if it is feasible to walk in all the time. Does explain why my feet are killing me 🙂 I can’t believe I not only used to spend all day every day on my feet I also used to do it in very high heeled shoes. Standing still is even worse than walking around and wearing shoes to walk on carpet is a real killer – far harder somehow than walking outdoors.

I’m starting to feel more like I work there and less like I am observing now as I get more used to things. Everyone seems very friendly and although my shift pattern means I often see some of my colleagues just once a fortnight even that is quite nice in terms of lots of variety when I do work. I also told them yesterday that I might be able to do the odd evening (they shut at 7pm so hardly an evening in retail terms :lol:) on days when I have not worked during the day. There are aspects of it that I am struggling with, the pace of the place generally is so very, very different to anywhere else I have ever worked. There is simply no sense of urgency to get anything done. The working environment I was used to was the culture of always chasing your tail and there never being ‘nothing’ to do, I had a never ending job list which I was lucky to maintain the length of by ticking off one item before the next two got added. Here they pace themselves with jobs to ensure they don’t run out of things to do before lunchtime! There is at least one person there who has a dreadful attitude towards the public and doesn’t attempt to hide it, I am struggling with that too. I consider the job to still be within the service industry albeit a mostly free public service and I have real issues with anyone who works in the service industry and cannot provide excellent service. I hate shoddy service in shops, restuarants, pubs etc. I know that working as a checkout operator or waiter can be a shitty job, FFS I’ve done those jobs. But jobs they are, you are being paid to do them and if you don’t like them then don’t do them, don’t inflict your disdain for your profession on the people who are paying your wages. I’m struggling on a personal level with being so junior but they warned me I might feel like that and it is a totally personal thing rather than a reflection on the job or my colleagues. It does make me question my cunning plan to stay there part time until the children are more independant and then go full time with a view to a career – I couldn’t spend all day every day doing something with so little responsibility, I’m already biting my tongue during a four hour shift about things I can see need doing but the people way senior to me don’t seem to notice (an example being the way four staff stood around for two of my shifts while a big display of Christmas books was still up on a wall for nearly 2 weeks after Christmas. Clearly no one borrowed any of those books once the big day itself was over and they were already moving onto their health and fitness new year resolutions so I would have had that display whipped off and a load of books on diet, cooking and exercise out there ready.). I appreciate stuff that I don’t know a thing about is going on behind the scenes but I can’t help but be offended by people standing round earning £45 per hour collectively. But as I learn more I will either decide that I am talking bollocks and know nothing, get used to it and wonder why I ever ran around like a headless chicken in previous jobs or find things that occupy me and allow me to work at a pace I am comfortable with within the job or totally revolutionise the culture of libraries for the future 😉 !

There are plenty of aspects that I am really enjoying though and this week it has been much busier and I am being shown additional bits and pieces which show me that as I learn more I will be able to go and find things to do when I get bored which is good. I have been given a sheet with loads of training dates all through this year which appear to be very comprehensive so I’m looking forward to that. I am really enjoying talking to people – it is mostly old people or people with children coming in when I’m working and I’m enjoying that lots. I really enjoy talking to old people generally, lots of them seem to get through massive thick hardbacks daily and want to come in and tell you all about them, it is very possible that you are the only person they have a conversation with all day. I’m enjoying the banter with the regular old men who come in every morning to read the papers together and debate the news of the day with each other. I love talking to the little old women who want to tell me the plot line of the Catherine Cookson they’re bringing back and the gentleman who has been coming to the library every week for the last 49 years. I’m also rather surprising myself by being quite good with the children who come in. I stood for ages talking to a little boy the other day who was borrowing Balamory and Wallace and Gromit dvds. During a quiet afternoon a young girl with obvious learning difficulties came in with her mother and wanted to know all about how everything on the counter worked so I let her check her own books out and stamp them, explaining a bit about how it all worked. There are several of my colleagues who are really interesting people I am enjoying getting to know better.

So yesterday it was overall busier, I like the Saturday staff and there is a slightly different feel to the place on a Saturday – we also get to wear jeans to work :). I was given a few different jobs to do which made time go quicker and when a tall, ageing rocker type of bloke came in and made my colleague go all simpering and giddy, talked in a loud voice about how he lives in California and has calmed down a lot since his younger days even I was quite excited to learn after he’d gone that he was Keith Emerson once of course I knew who Keith Emerson was :lol:.

Ady and the children came in at the end to pick me up and the children chose a book each which I let them scan out themselves (I offered Ady a go but he declined 😉 ). They’d been watching Nemo, making the cast of Willy Wonka from bits of paper and playing board games all afternoon while I was at work.

Davies has been quite challenging this week, he is from time to time. It is usually classic attention seeking type behaviour and while I am aware of all the ‘not rewarding negative behaviour’ advice I am firmly of the opinion that it is always for a reason rather than him being an arse on purpose so I’m trying to balance giving him the attention he clearly wants with trying to get across that he is not the only person in the family and some behaviour is simply not acceptable.

Part of the reason for this I am sure is that Scarlett has had a few leaps and bounds moments this week. She has decided not to drink her milk from her bottle any more. Don’t know if I’ve mentioned this on blog before but both the children still drink milk from bottles in the morning and before bed. It’s one of those things which was briefly an issue when Davies was about 3 but has long since stopped being one for us. Having gone past ‘normal’ age for stopping using them we decided they would stop when they were ready rather than some predetermined age we dictated. She has also started to wipe her own bottom (yay!) and is now quicker than Davies and doing up and undoing her own seatbelt in the car. She is revelling in being a ‘big girl’ and I think that sort of throws Davies’ position into some doubt for him so he is acting out accordingly. Unfortunately a lot of the negative stuff is a mirroring of some of my less pleasant behaviour – impatience, aggression in tone when talking to others and a general intolerance for anyone else. Scarlett seems to bear the brunt of this and is fairly confused as to why the person she adores more than anyone else is being mean to her. All easily remedied by me exhibiting rather more of the traits I’d like to see him copying and giving them both a bit more time and attention I’m sure.

A quiet Sunday here today with roast dinner at lunchtime. The children are playing on the pc and with a box of toys they call the ‘muddle box’ because it contains a variety of odds and ends of things rather than any specific toys. This included several packs of cards, some dominos, various Happy Meal toys and so on. Davies has been setting up domino runs and telling stories around them this morning. We’ve got tidying up of the childrens’ bedrooms scheduled in for this afternoon. Might be back later.