Last night went OK, I think. However, I thought one of the interviews here went OK and I didn't get the job so what do I know.

Life here is getting me down. My responsibilities are gradually being eroded away and my manager is a 'proper' manager IEEE the kind who generates work, but doesn't actually get their hands dirty doing any themselves. Her diary is full up with meetings so it's difficult for me to even get to see her. I have made contact with a couple of hiring managers here about other roles, but my confidence is at a quite low ebb.

At least Easter is coming up so I get a break from work - although I will be spending it up to my elbows in emulsion as I am finally going to finish decorating my flat.

A quick posting as I have to leave soon. I didn't get either of the internal jobs I applied for. As a result I have my first external interview in 5 years in just over 2 hours. So I'm heading to Knightsbridge to see if a certain department store wants me as a Business Analyst. I'm not sure if I really want the job, I'm mainly going for the interview experience but I'm surprised at how nervous I feel.

According to the AA and RAC websites there is queued traffic all the way from Hatfield to Stevenage so there is no point even trying to get home at the minute.

This week has been reasonable. I was off work on Wednesday and Thursday, although it was a nightmare coming back in today. Unfortunately, Wednesday was not spent having lots of fun as I had to attend my Great Uncle's funeral. He was a popular man as it was standing room only at the crematorium. It gave me something to aspire to as I can only hope that when I die there will be lots of people who will care enough to come and pay their last respects to me. I shall remember him fondly if for nothing else that he never ever got me and my sister confused and always called us by the right names. Which is more than can be said for our father and grandfather!

Yesterday it was my Mum's birthday so we went out for lunch and to the cinema. We saw Hitch which was perfectly enjoyable if you want nothing more to be entertained by a film with a happy ending. As my Mum didn't want to go for dinner, I cooked sausages and mash for her and my family. I may not be the best cook in the world, but what I can cook, I do well!

Today has been a nightmare. I deliberately didn't start looking at my e mails until after 8.30am as I knew that it would only upset me. After the first e mail I wanted to shout and tell the world to leave me alone. I have had 2 calls from my manger (who doesn't work on Thursdays and Fridays) giving me more work to do. Something has got to give and soon. I just hope it isn't my sanity.

It's been so long since I made a posting that the link to the blogger site had been removed from my list of recently viewed sites. Initially I was holding out hoping to be able to make a posting about the jobs I applied for. However, things have moved really slowly. I had an interview on 8 Feb and I found out last Wednesday (3 weeks later) that I had been unsuccessful. The other interview took place on 22 Feb and I am still waiting to hear. Based on the previous experience it looks like being another week still. I feel less confident about this job as I did really badly in the interview and more people have applied for the job. The only possible redeeming feature is that the recruiting manager is my old manager (the one with practically the same name as me) who knows better than most people in this organisation exactly what I am capable of. I'm not going to say much about the job I didn't get. They haven't really been able to give me a good reason as to why I didn't get the job. I suspect that 9 times out of 10 I would've got the job based on my application, interview and experience but unfortunately this time I came up against the wrong person. There wasn't much to choose between us and I think the fact that she's already in the team swung it in her favour.

Still on a work theme, I have a new manager for my current job. She's really nice and I think that for the short term I've been really lucky. The only drawback is she is part time. This is another incentive to get out. If I'm not good enough to do the job 5 days a week, why should I do it for 2? However, she is really supportive of me wanting to move on, although I can't help suspect that there may be some office politics going on in the background as it's in many people's best interests to keep me where I am for the time being.

Outside of work things have been quiet. I have had earache for the past week or so. I looked up possible treatments on the NHS Direct website only to find that apparently adults don't get ear infections as there was no information about it.

I've seen lots of my friends over the past few weeks - not only the usual suspects Bonnie Sin, Kinky Malibu and Mary Ellen Thong, but also Deedee Lustley. She and I met up for an afternoon in London where amongst other things, we signed up for a makeover day. It should be fun - we are going to save it for one of our birthdays and then go out afterwards.

I can't remember if I mentioned at all that I ordered an LCD television and DVD recorder in an attempt to join the technology age. I placed the order with Electrical World via their website. If you are considering doing something similar then my advice is - don't. After waiting for 8 weeks I cancelled the order. They might have been cheaper, but I eventually came to the conclusion that the technology would be out of date by the time I received it. I eventually got the TV from Currys and thanks to an offer on their website it only cost me £50 more and I got the TV in less than a week. As things worked out, I'd changed my mind about the DVD recorder so I just brought a standard DVD player in Tescos and am going to sign up to Sky+. With all of that I may never want to leave my sofa again!