The story really starts when a good friend of mine, a Miss Rowan Elizabeth Sant, who I hadn't seen in over a year, travelled up to my adopted home of Leeds as one of her former work colleagues was leaving for continents new. This visit however coincided with the reappearance of my girlfriend Catharine who I hadn't seen in, actually I can't remember the precise time but it was at least a couple of days. So, of course, without wanting to deprive either of these lovely ladies of my precious company, I dragged a clearly exhausted Catharine out to Mojo's bar so as to catch up with Rowan. The result, I end up feeling guilty as (a) Catharine's a zombie, and (b) I have to leave after just an hour to put her back in her crypt. Bit of a poor show even by my low standards.
Then in a flash of inspiration at work, I agreed to travel to Swindon for some expenses training thereby providing me with the opportunity of going down to visit Rowan and celebrate her birthday in Royal Leamington Spa (ten minutes on the train from Coventry shudder) and attend the training at Swindon on the Monday. It wasn't just me mind, there was a good clan of Rowan-ites down there. Bizarrely, everyone had the same name. Two Chris', two Row's, two Ciara's. Okay not everyone, six of us. Well I thought it was weird.
All Rowan's housemates were all very friendly and welcoming, and it was good to see two more of my uni friends Rowena and Ciara again as ever, and overall a thoroughly rollicking weekend was had by all. We went out drinking on the Saturday and the next day we went rowing in the local river. Which I think everyone was agreed on that Rowan was clearly the worst by a stretch. Perhaps aided by the fact that it was the best weekend weather-wise in the year thus far, Leamington is a really beautiful place. It may not be thriving with nightlife and perhaps has one too many charity shops but it's a picture-postcard part of England.
Later in the day, most of the other Rowan-ites had to go home, and obviously I was staying another night so I could go to Swindon the next day. So Rowan had the daunting task of keeping me entertained (which isn't very hard, I found writing the html code on this website entertaining) so we promptly hot-footed it into the tourist-haven that is Stratford Upon Avon, so we could catch her new man, with a name granted to only the most gifted in society (i.e. also called Chris), finishing a half marathon. Something I'll be doing in September. Although it was nice having everyone around the night before, it was equally good to catch up properly with Row and get to know Chris better, who is a top bloke incidentally. But it all had to end eventually and finally the day came. Swindon.
Half an hour. That was how long the training took. The total cost of the train tickets was £150-ish, I didn't pay for them
obviously, the company did, but pretty much a waste of time. Still it gave me about an hour to explore Swindon before my train back to Leeds.
I've got to go down again to Swindon for my 'corporate induction' at the company's HQ for two days soon. I've managed to get
out of it for this month but I doubt I'll be able to again. At least one night spent in Swindon. Which by the looks of things
will not be a pleasant one. Half the bars I saw were boarded up. It was like going from extremes, somewhere which matches the rose-tinted nostalgic view of Britain you remember when you're in
different climes, to its concrete arsehole of an offspring. Not just that, but the people all looked a bit, well, like genetic experiments
gone wrong. At least it only took me 6 hours to get back.
I thought this would make a really amusing anecdote but it really isn't that funny in the light of day. I'm going to tell it in any case. For the ignorant among you, Catharine (my girlfriend), Simon and I all used to work at Yates' in Leeds together, and it was there that it first became apparent that she becomes a little bit violent when she's drunk. Indeed, I have witnessed at first hand her deliberately twisting someone's ankle so badly that they were out of action for a whole football season. At the same rate that Catharine gets violent, Simon's brain capacity decreases until he becomes the evolutionary equivalent of a turnip, with a propensity for falling asleep in a variety of different places. Although, since he's moved in with some new housemates this habit has apparently decreased in frequency. We all believe you Simon.
Anyway, a while ago I taught Catharine this very basic judo move, which she has since attempted to use against Simon at every drunken opportunity she gets. And with some success I might add. She has even considered joining a martial arts class with the sole intention of being able to floor Simon more effectively (that and to be like Uma Thurman in Kill Bill). Well after several hours in the pub, the inevitable occurred and Catharine asked to hold Simon's hand, which he offered without hesitation. She then proceeded to grip it and slap Simon round the face with it, thereby making Simon hit himself.
Within the next quarter of an hour, she had managed to repeat this five times without Simon twigging on to the fact that if
he gives her his hand, he would get slapped. So we can conclude two things from the evening, firstly that it is Simon that needs to sign up to some martial arts classes.
And secondly that whilst you can negatively condition animals such as hamsters to associate actions with pain,
you apparently cannot negatively condition a drunken Simon to do the same.
Hamster 1, Simon 0.
And that really sums up the day to be honest, as all my forward planning of finding things for us all to do
surprisingly fell away after the first few beers and we were all pretty content to sit by the Rhine and drink. I'd certainly recommend Basel as a place to
visit for the weekend (£30 return from Liverpool), loads of art galleries, museums and other touristy things as well as quite a few bars and restaurants. I had planned to go swimming in the Rhine, well I think it's more of a
"get swept along by the current" than a swim. You pay a fiver for a plastic rucksack to put your things in and get out when you reach the other side of the city. Definitely one for the summer that, it really
doesn't look appealing on a grey May afternoon.
Anyhow, I digress, as my real purpose is to impart to you all the experience of the Olympic Games.
Yes that's right, I went to the Olympics. Did you go on holiday? I did, I went to the Olympics, where did you go? Turkey? Spain? - phnurgh, pish posh, that's where all the scroats go on holiday isn't it? Whatever, your holiday wasn't as good as mine. Did you see the 100m final, I don't think so. Oh you saw it television did you, oh very good, I was there. Sitting above the finish line.
Where were you? At home were you? Was that fun?
At this point Catharine decided it was time to leave the room.
Sorry. It was every bit what we had hoped for, though there were a few moments which caused a little anxiety. Probably the first of these was actually trying to find the campsite. As the place we were staying at was at the most northern part of Athens, it didn't show up on any of the tourist maps that we had armed ourselves with, so we just headed in the right direction and got off at the last stop of the tube.
We managed to find a Greek girl who spoke a bit of English and told us which bus to take, telling us that it stopped right outside the campsite. The problem was however that it didn't, it stopped close but not next to, so Nick and I ended up staying on the bus as it did a full circuit of the route and ended up back at the tube station. Thankfully, a couple of Aussies caught us trying to talk to a Greek bus driver and said they were staying at the same place so we just followed them.
In terms of the actual games themselves, we saw pretty much everything we went out there to, i.e. most of the athletics in the first week, as well as getting to see the USA v Australia in the basketball. We ended up sitting next to the Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, though we wouldn't have known if we hadn't asked the photographer why they were taking photos of us. Yup we felt pretty stupid. Still, we got a photo of him which you can see below (he's the old bloke in the background).
We didn't get to do much "touristy" stuff to be honest as in between events we'd usually go back to the campsite and get pissed off by Germans divebombing in the pool. They really don't do themselves any favours stereotype-wise, always down to the pool first with their towels on the sun loungers. And when you do get one they'd start divebombing. Needless to say they weren't very popular amongst the Brits, "selfish twats" as one old bloke from Rochdale said. Then there was the transexual who liked sunbathing naked, that was interesting.
The one night we actually ventured into Monastiraki Square, which were advised by two lads from Bradford was the place to go. And it was busy, quite a few bars and not far from the Acropolis. We got a couple of Mystos beers from the local off-licence and sat down to consume said beverages. I was getting some funny looks it has to be said as I was still in my Team GB gear, wearing a flag and sporting some Union Jack tatoos. Then some guy called Nicos came over and started chatting to us. He seemed nice enough, telling us that he was in some rock band and had an English music manager. So we chatted to him for a while. And a while longer.
Until it became blatantly obvious to both Nick and I that he was gay and was interested in making a different form of international relations. Now I'm not homophobic but I was fairly keen to make a sharp exit and when we both said we were going to find somewhere to have a piss, it was a little unnerving when he followed us down a dark alley and watched us. The real icing on the cake however, was when we informed Nicos that we were heading home, some huge bloke that looked like a Village People extra, with a handlebar moustache and leather waistcoat, approached us going "Where you from?". Time for a swift exit.
We decided that would be our first and last visit to Monastiraki Square, and spent most of the other nights in the bar local to the campsite called Genesis. It soon came time to leave, and Nick still didn't have a flight back. So we went to the airport together, and he was informed that the going rate was about 800 euros. I had already booked my return flight so I had to leave him in his predicament and then had the pleasure of sitting next to a couple of teenage scousers. Strangely enough, the inflight entertainment was all about where Nick and I had previously gone to on holiday together as it was a documentary about Stingray City, a place you can feed stingray in Grand Cayman (which has since been ripped apart by Hurricane Ivan).
In all honesty, it's getting the new job which has really got me buzzing at the moment. The final piece to the jigsaw if you like. For a while now I've felt like there's only been one thing missing, namely a career that matched my ambition. Working for Zurich has been great for me, getting some experience at a reputable company, but I always knew it wasn't where I wanted to be in the long term. I'd fallen into the job as opposed to anything else. For a long time I thought a career in law was the route I should go down but I've just come against too many barriers to consider it a realistic option. If you're one of the lucky few to get a training contract whilst at uni then that's great but if not, then it's probably a case of shelling out another eight grand trying to do your professional qualifications. There are just too many 20-something law graduates who are still looking for a training contract and I just couldn't afford to be another one of them. So I've decided to go down a different route, and to apply for tax consultant jobs at financial services firms. Now the word tax immediately conjures up in people the idea that I'm going to be a taxman. In reality what I'm going to be doing is helping people make 'tax-efficient' solutions in respect of their life and business decisions. It's actually going to make the best use of my degree in that I did Law and Accounting, as it all use both skill sets as opposed to just one.
So I decided that's really what I wanted to do, and I'd thought about this sort of career before and two years ago actually applied to all the major firms and secured an interview at Deloitte and Touche, but being so fresh out of uni I was just completely inept of producing numerous answers to the typical structured questions you get, like 'provide four examples of when you've shown leadership qualities'. Clearly having worked with a large financial company for a while now I was a lot more, how should I put this, self-assured in my corporate perspective on things. I am now skilled in the art of cheesy corporate schpiel. I applied for my first choice firm, Price Waterhouse Coopers, first choice not simply because they're the biggest and most respected, but they're also the number one graduate employer at the moment. Within a week and a half of applying, I'd gone through the whole 4 stage process and landed the job which starts mid-july. Woohoo! I only had to make one application to my first choice and I got it, jammy git eh? It's such a morale booster in comparison to the whole process of applying to law firms. You apply to one hundred firms and you might get one offer to interview. Then you meet people who have already secured training contracts, and they're complete divs. I only ever had one law interview with Cripps Harries Hall in Tunbridge Wells, again straight out of uni but was such a bag of nerves that it went disastrously. Anyhoo, that's all water under the bridge now, it's back to college for me then soon as I have to take tax exams but I'm quite looking forward to it. In April I decided to stick my toe back into the exam water when I did one which was part of the Certicate in Financial Planning (the qualification you need to become a financial advisor). It was just to put something else on the CV and to show employers I can manage study and work full time. Turned out to be quite a useful thing to cite in the interview process in the end. So soon when I'm qualified I can soon help you all to be 'tax-efficient'.
Well what else, oh yes, my finest ever purchase. This was almost just to celebrate the fact that I'd got the job. I'd been saving up you see to do the Legal Practice Course, and had about a grand which of course I no longer needed to save up for as PWC will pay for all my exams. So what did I spend my money on, well you can't have a yuppy city pad without the obligatory black leather recliner with three-speed masssage function can you? Oh yes. Big tele, big chair. Catharine is of course barred from sitting on it, and if we do have guests round be warned that I will 'giving you evils' if you
presume to park your behind on it.
I wasn't there in London today, I very nearly was but this week I decided I wasn't going to travel down on the Thursday but rather on Friday. Perhaps that's why I feel so affected by the images I've seen on the news. The fact that the two areas that were hardest hit were those that I go to on a regular basis and have done for many years. I've tried taking my mind off it, gone for a few drinks with Simon, but in the end we both sat there trying to rationalise what's happened and it can't be done. At least not by those with any sense.
This entry was a bit of a drunken rant to be honest with you so on reflection I've deleted the rest of it as it wasn't a particularly insightful piece of writing. Needless to say I was pretty emotional and still struggle to understand how somebody can justify those acts to themselves. As it turns out all the bombers were right on my doorstep.
Quite literally. The bomb HQ was at the end of the road of the house my brother and I lived last year in Hyde Park in Leeds. Where I live now is only a ten minute walk from where the bombers actually lived. Pretty shocking stuff.
It was basically two days in the grounds of this conference centre in the countryside near Chalfont and Latimer. Lots of corporate stuff stressing the importance of teamwork and what was expected of us. Some of which clearly was a bit wasted on me as I'd already been working for a month. Nevertheless the real bonus was just meeting the other graduates. Everybody else bar myself and another new starter in Leeds called Matt were doing their professional tax exams in London together, so if it wasn't for this event then we wouldn't have met anyone.
So the networking was good, especially with the free bar. But that's where the trouble started you see as any of you that really know me probably also know that in the company of a free bar then I tend to indulge. Being probably the oldest graduate starter there I ought to have set an example but to be honest, I ended up hoarding a stack of booze with the lads from Scotland (the bar closed at 11 you see) and was a bit of a wreck. I staggered back to the hotel part of the complex with a pint in hand and that's the end of my memory. Well not quite I remember trying to iron my shirt vaguely but that's a bit of a blur. I collapsed in a heap on the bed at around 2am.
The next thing I know I'm in the hotel corridor. I come to my senses and realise I've been sleepwalking. Now this isn't something I've done for some time. Clearly the alcohol and the fact I'm in unfamiliar surroundings were a factor, but if you take anything from this tale then learn this - wear boxershorts if you stay in a hotel. As if you don't you may find yourself in the predicament I did, namely standing butt naked in a hotel corridor on a corporate event for a firm you've just started at. Not only that but we'd had a lecture from a senior partner about integrity and behaviour. So good, so blind panic.
I'm in a corridor butt naked, I look around and it's not my corridor. Where the hell am I, where am I, I'm upstairs, how the hell did I get upstairs. I look at my watch, it's 4am. Now what to do, I pray I've only been wandering around for a few minutes which is probable as I'm standing near the fire stairwell. I go downstairs and try and get into my room. Is there any way of getting into my room, is there buggery! I can't believe it, resigned to the fact that I can't get into my room I wander down the hallway to reception.
There are no plants, no towels, nothing to cover my pride but my bare hands. I wander into reception to be greeted by a young foreign man of spanish or portuguese origin watching WWE wrestling.
"Would you like a key sir?"
"Please"
"What room sir?"
The hotel staff member passes me the key and I scarper back down the corridor as quickly as possible for fear of bumping into somebody. Thank god I didn't bump into anybody. I put some trousers on, went back to reception and gave the spare key back. Needless to say that I couldn't keep this incident under wraps for very long and I think I've made a lasting impression. Thankfully there are no photos accompanying this diary entry. So He-man style moral of the story is: Wear boxershorts. Or don't drink so much, one of the two.
Of no connection at all to this story, if anybody wants to buy or commission some art work then please check out the website of the supremely talented Mags Gaisford aka 'Neladgam'.