Live to work, or work to live?

Much as I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with my job, I think I certainly fall into the latter category.

One of the nice things about my shift pattern is that I work six days on, four days off. That may sound like a lot, but consider that the first day begins as soon as I knock-off at 07:00hrs and is mostly slept away in bed.

Four days off however does afford plenty of time to spend with the girlfriend. Although she’s happy to see me, the first day doesn’t exactly have much in-depth conversation short of me mumbling and complaining about sleep, or lack thereof.

Four days also affords plenty of time to plan stuff.

On this set of rest days we’ve managed to fit in a fair few things, despite her having to work 3 out of the 4 days.

Thursday in particular was excellent. Girlfriend maintains good communication and friendship with her ex-husband, who having met him a few times, I must concede is a very sound bloke. Indeed, one part of my brain is always thinking “Y’know, this is awkward;” every time we meet “He used to be married to my girlfriend.” But all the same I can’t fault him. I especially can’t fault a bloke who maintains good steady contact with girlfriend’s, his, son either.

So girlfriend’s ex-husband, who works as an engineer at a local RAF base, kindly extended the invitation to me to accompany them when the base’s annual friends & family day came around this year.

An excellent day was had by girlfriend, her lad, ex and I – perusing the stalls and watching an excellent flying display. Me being the quite the aircraft enthusiast reverted to a mental age younger than her son’s when the Typhoon slammed on its afterburners and the Vulcan cruised gracefully overhead. And as for The Red Arrows, they never fail to disappoint.

We managed to do some catching up at the cinema also and saw ‘The Dark Night’ and ‘WALL-E’. Two excellent films that show filmmakers at the top of their game in two very different ways. I could hark on about how truly brilliant both flicks are, but you should simply abandon any preconceptions you may have about either and go see. You won’t regret it.

An ice-cream here, a coffee there, but we did also go out for dinner here. Yum.

For the first time in a while I actually feel refreshed, mentally and physically, and ready to go back to work.

Let’s see how long that lasts.

"If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs..."

ITV News in their typically scaremongering Daily Mail type-fashion declared this evening that before this recession is out "up to a million people are predicted to loose their jobs".

Two thoughts popped into my head:

1. Where the hell did they pluck that figure from?
2. As a colleague of mine mentioned earlier today “It’s quite a good time to be working for the government when you think about it.”

It’s a good time to be working in a politically sensitive job where, although there’s always someone who’s going to disagree with what you do, suggest that that they get rid of you altogether, or slim down your numbers, and they recoil in horror at the thought.

See I hate to gloat here, but as long as I get signed-off okay (still some 3-5 months away, paperwork permitting); my job security will be second-to-none. Once I get signed-off then I become harder to fire, which is useful also in a job where every second choice can result in criticism or disciplining if it all goes south. Once I get signed off, I shed my ‘probationer’ status and get an annual pay-rise of some £2500. Bloody useful indeed in this climate.

I think I must be one of a select band of ‘professionals’ living alone in rented accommodation – for which the housing market went way out of his reach several years ago. Sure I could have saddled myself with stratospheric mortgage a few years back, but without the financial security of a live-in partner, I would have been terribly vulnerable to interest rates and the like right about now.

“HOUSE PRICE SHOCK! - Rates plummeting at their fastest rates since... Last Tuesday!” scream the headlines...

That’s brilliant news if you ask me!

Houses should be about living in, not making profit on.

So with some fiscal prudence then, I’m actually poised to ride out any recession in a pretty damn good position.

It’s nice when things go your way for a change.

Apparently thousands of market traders are set to lose their jobs as the recession hits. My sympathy there is minimal; after all they helped get us into this mess in the first place.

Blue lines

Work remains the reason why I seem to blog a lot less these days, and why I have significantly less material to work with.

Damn, I wish I could spill what it’s really like for a modern police officer these days – how the praise from anything you do immediately gravitates upwards, and how if there’s any shit to be flung, you can generally tell it’s going to fall squarely on yourself.

How the thin blue line is worrying thin indeed at times.

How you’re often one decision from losing your job, but how much pressure you’re under to make that decision. And fast.

I’m approaching the end of my training, and as it tuned out I should have been looking to be signed off in August as a fully-fledged-and-significantly-harder-to-fire officer. As it turns out I’ve been extended for a few months into the autumn to give me a little longer to get my learning portfolio and get some operational issues in order.

Consider it like doing a university assignment and asking your tutor to give you an extension because of extraneous circumstances.

Some of these issues were under my control, or perhaps I could have changed if I really tried, others have been way out of my control.

Still, I do enjoy what I do and strive to be the best I can, however lady luck appears to have been significantly absent for me during the first part of the year. At least at work anyway.

I’m a few keystrokes away from telling you what it’s really like behind the uniform, but I’ve had my fingers burnt once before.

If you’re ever in my part of the world – come have a drink with me.

I’ll tell you what it’s really like.