Tuesday, September 28, 2004

I'm not arse-licking, but...

While my boss seems in some ways too much like my mother, I've come to appreciate just how good she is at people stuff. When you need to tell the recreation officer of a rest home that they're a little too demanding, she's the best person for the job. When negative feedback has to be passed on, she can do this without making it sound personal and put things into perspective as well. And I realise now that this is an ability which most of the people I work with, including myself, could improve on.

Enough navel-gazing.

This afternoon I had to deal with four teenages who were bored (it's the school holidays) and didn't want to read (...so what the hell were they doing in a library, you ask? I'm just about to tell you...). They'd been sitting at the non-Internet enabled computers all afternoon, using Painter to create silly pictures (including a remarkably good one of me wearing a frown) and then setting those pictures as wallpaper for the computers. They also found ways to make annoying beeping sounds come out of the computers. These guys are computer-literate to really make a nuisance of themselves; eventually I had to send the library manager out for a walk around the library so scare them off (he's not a scary guy, but then I'm only five feet tall and a conflict-avoider).

It's no fun being the killjoy.

I used to be a regular swimmer, but gave up for two reasons:
1. I used to colour my hair (blue-black was my favourite) and the chlorine would've killed it.
2. I get terrible goggle marks; they used to disappear soon after I got out of the pool, but my skin is no longer as elastic.

I went to the pool tonight, for a spot of aqua jogging, and re-discovered an ugly truth - at certain times of the month, when you're feeling a little bloated, avoid any activities which involve wearing something skin-tight (like a swimsuit) - unless you're okay with looking a little pregnant.

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