Hi bloggers, hope you've had a good week. Mine's been ok, Easter was a bit of a wash out (literally) and to be honest I was quite glad to go back to work on Tuesday. The lady Australian was due to finish on Friday and me and P were rubbing our hands in glee till Friday afternoon the boss tells us that they've decided to keep her on for another month. WHAT! We couldn't believe it, she's the laziest worker I've ever known. I know she's a temp and she's said she's not bothered about the work but it took her 6 hours to do work which I could have done in 3. Thing is I'd asked for extra days and the bosses have decided to keep her on instead without even asking our team what we thought of her. Madness!

On a more important note me and Reb went to the hospital on Wednesday about the problems she's been experiencing with dizzyness and nausea. Thank goodness after being fobbed off by our GP for 18 months we finally got to see the person who could help us. Apparently she's got an inner ear problem which will get better in time but its going to be a pretty long process. At least now we know what she's up against and she's finally been given the correct medication. I feel so sorry for her having to put up with it but the only thing we can do is support her the best we can.

Today the lads went to Preston for the footie match and sadly our lads lost. I've been out with my ma, sister and two nieces. We went out to lunch and I found out I'd got a flat tyre, luckily I'm in the AA so I gave them a call and they came out and put the spare on whilst we were in the pub. After that we went bowling and had a great time, even though one of my nieces managed to beat us adults and win a game.

Called in Morrisons to do the weekly shop and am now vegging out cos I'm absolutely shattered.

On the abstaining from alcohol front I've not done too badly this week. Altogether so far I've had 5 glasses of wine since Sunday plus a g&T. Me and hubby are going to share another bottle of vino tonight but I think I'm doing okay, have certainly cut down from what I had been having.

I'm not sure what we're doing yet tomorrow but its supposed to be fine in the morning so we might go for a walk. Then it'll be ironing and cooking Sunday lunch. I've bought a duck for the first time and will be cooking that so I'm going to have a look for a good recipe in a minute. This week I've not cooked since Tuesday, apart from putting a pizza in the oven tonight, so I'm quite looking forward to being in the kitchen tomorrow.

On Monday I've said I'll go with one of my workmates to a hips, bums and tums class so I'll let you now how I go on. Anyway that's all for now. Have a good night.

Well I managed two whole days without alcohol. As predicted my pledge gave in last nightwhen we went out with N and G but to be honest I only had one glass of wine and a g&t in the pub after which we went and had a great Chinese where I shared a bottle of white wine with N so don't think its too bad really. We were home by about midnight, had a coffee and went to bed and didn't even touch the already opened bottle of white wine in the fridge which is quite good for me.

Think I have set myself too hard a target and have decided to change the remit of my alcohol abstinence. Me and hubby have decided that we're alcohol free on work nights and I'm going to radically address the amount I have to drink when out. After all we all deserve a good time and a couple of glasses won't do any harm and if sensible, as I have found today, you can get up the next morning and not feel bad. I was up and about by 9.00 am this morning, fetched the papers, had breakfast and the ironing board was out by 10.00 so I'm giving myself a pat on the back today.

For Easter dinner I've currently got a lamb shoulder roasting in the oven which is stuffed with herbs, ginger and lemon. With this we'll be having home grown cabbage, carrots, mash and roast potatoes with yorkie puds. For dessert hubby's just brought up some lovely rhubarb which I'm making into a crumble. Delish.

On the social calendar April is looking damned good. Going out for a drink with N&G in a fortnight, the week after D&R are coming to us for a meal and then we're going out with D&R and some of their friends who we've not seen for about 20 years so that'll be an interesting catch up night.

Two days after that its Gran Canaria, 4 weeks tomorrow!!!! Going to go shopping tomorrow to get some new T shirts and we just can't wait to get on that plane.

It'll be back to work for me on Tuesday. On Wednesday I'm going with R to the hospital for her balance tests, then its work Thurday and Friday. Next Saturday the lads are off to the away match at Preston and me, ma, my sis and E&C are going for lunch and then I've booked bowling so that should be fun.

Gavin and Stacey is on again tonight and if you've never seen it then tune in its fab. Have a lovely Easter weekend. Bye

Hope you've all had a brilliant Good Friday - ours has been great. Today me and hubby took my two 9 year old nieces to the Royal Armouries at Leeds. It's the first time we've taken them out anywhere with us, and E was a little bit upset on leaving her mum and dad but she soon cheered up.

We got to the Armouries and found that over the Easter break they're putting on some jousting events which you have to pay for so we got tickets for the 2.30 show. We went into the museum and there was a treasure hunt for kids which was a brilliant idea cos otherwise I think E&C would have quickly got bored. We had a lovely time looking round and the kids were really interested in the exhibits. We had some lunch and then went to see the jousting. Belive me it was very cold and the show lasted one hour but even though we were perished time flew by and we all really enjoyed it.

We dropped the kids off and came home popping into Asda on the way. Now temptation is all around me cos hubby bought a litre of Gordons gin, which I love and a bottle of Chardonnay of which he's just offered me a glass. However, I'm drinking Schloer and am sticking to this tonight, I had such a good day today that I don't want to spoil tomorrow by having a fuzzy head. Will I be able to carry this on tomorrow when we go out with N&G mmmmmm that could be trickly!

Brrr its cold outside but its only 4weeks and 4 days till Gran Canaria. I can't believe that its Easter already and its going to be a really cold one by all accounts.

Today I'm really cross with myself. Hubby has managed to get today off so that we could have a long weekend together. We had thought of going away today just for a night but having seen the weather forecast decided against it and thought we'd go to see a movie this afternoon.

Anyway, yesterday I bought a bottle of red vino for us to share last night but hubby decided he fancied some beer instead. So I polished off the bottle of red myself which has led to me feeling tired and hungover all day today which seems to me a bit of a waste of time off work. Thinking about it lately I've been wasting quite a few days due to the day after effects of inbibing a bit too much and I'm sick of this waste of my life. For instance last Saturday we went to D&R's and had a lovely meal, drank wine, had a great evening and on Sunday I felt tired all day due to drinking too much. I could easily have had just as good a time drinking non alcoholic stuff.

Hence I've decided to go teetotal. I know it might sound drastic but I'm one of those people who finds it hard to say no after having just one glass and I know that I don't need to drink alcohol just to enjoy myself so today is day one of abstinence.

The hardest thing I feel is having to say no when out with friends. I don't want to appear a party pooper but I also think that I shouldn't drink just because I don't want to appear a social leper with friends.

We're off out with N&G for a Chinese on Saturday and that'll be the first test for me. The positives of not drinking far outweight the positives of drinking eg more spare cash, help with losing weight,best use of leisure time.

I've been out shopping this morning and have bought a couple of bottles of Schloer to help me on the way and when I fancy a glass of something I'll be having some of that.

What a week its been. First hearing about the death of hubby's colleague. The funeral's taking place on Monday. She had some lovely notices put in the local paper last night - the sentiments were lovely and really made me cry.

Got a phone call at 1.30am today from ma in law's nursing home, she'd been packed off to hospital again. Hubby went across and apparently she's got another water infection so God knows how long she'll be in. Her health situation is really taking a toll on the family. How can it be that she's 85, ok having health problems but still managing to carry on but someone like T who was 52 can be taken away from her loved ones one week from being diagnosed. Life really sucks at times.

Work wise this week has been very telling. I'd got myself all keyed up last week I felt that finally the management were listening to us but then from talking to our office manager last night it seems that all that's going to happen now we've got down some of the backlog is that instead of putting in resources to ensure the same thing doesn't happen again they're simply going to use crisis management (my words not theirs) and are simply just going to react if the situation reverts back - which it definitely will. It can be very negative working in the public sector and I'm wondering whether my future could lie elsewhere but I think that decision is a long way down the line yet.

As you can guess I'm definitely ready for the weekend. I was supposed to be working an extra day today but due to the loss of a night's sleep I decided not to go in, plus I thought why bother dragging myself there feeling knackered when its not going to do any good in the long term anyway.

So this weekend hubby's off to the footie tomorrow and then tomorrow night we're off to D&R's for something to eat. Not sure what we are doing on Sunday, will see what the weather's like as it would be nice to go walking.

I'm working Monday and Tuesday next week and then am off till the following Tuesday. Hubby's off from Thursday onwards and we're thinking of having a night away on Thursday. I've been having a net surf to see what we could do and I think the favourite at the moment is a visit to Stratford. Will see what happens.

Anyway have a good weekend.

As usual on a Tuesday I went back to work this morning to a great start. We've got a clerk come to work in our team for a couple of weeks to do the mundane, time consuming admin jobs. She's an absolute God send. She's a medical student who's taken a year out and is doing temporary work to bring her some money in. Everything I've given her today has been done with no problems at all and I can't believe how much work she's done, never stopping even for a coffee break.

However, our temporary typist is another story completely. She's been working for us a couple of weeks and I had an idea that she was a lazy so and so which was backed up by one of my colleagues last week. Anyway she came to work this morning, took a 2 hour lunch which ok she isn't getting paid for, but to be honest we've only got this support for another couple of weeks so need as many manhours as we can get. However, she's going back to the land of Oz in a few weeks and basically doesn't seem to give a fig.

So to continue ... she came back into the office at about 2.00 and started typing. At 4.15 she finished the work she'd been given, turned round and said to me "is there a lot of point me doing some more typing now cos I'm not in after today till tomorrow" well "yes I said there is typing you can do and if you don't finish it put it to one side and you can finish it when you're next in" SHE WASN'T FINISHING WORK TILL 5.00!

I tell you I just couldn't believe what I'd heard - the new clerk/ my colleague and me had been working flat out all day with a short lunch break and she turns round and says this. GO BACK TO OZ ASAP YOU LAZY SOD!!!

Its amazing how life brings surprises that you don't want for yourself or someone else. About 11 days ago hubby came home from work and told me that one of his colleagues had been sent home because she'd become poorly. From what hubby said it sounded like she was suffering from stress due to personal reasons, she rang in the next day to say she'd been signed off work for 2 week and we thought she must be off with stress.

Then last Monday hubby came home and told me that this lady had been to the hospital and had been diagnosed as having a brain tumour. She was taken into hospital and on Friday as far as we knew the hospital had said she could go home and her partner was making arrangements to have time off to look after her.

Last night hubby came home with the news that this lovely lady had passed away. I can't believe it she was in her 50's, had got the kids off her hands. She and her partner were in a position to afford a nice lifestyle and apart from problems supporting family members life was great. Life is amazing, its like you're walking down a street and then every so often life/fate makes you turn a corner and things suddenly change. I only used to see her once a year at the works do but we always had a dance together. I can't believe that only a couple of months ago we were chatting about future plans not realising how wafer thin those plans can be if fate decides otherwise.

Hi all, I'm feeling lovely and relaxed and thank goodness today has been a great Sunday as opposed to last Sunday which as you may know was pretty dire as far as I was concerned.

I've cut down on the alcohol intake this weekend as I'm sick of waking up on my day off feeling sluggish and its worked. Woke yesterday morning to hubby bringing me a coffee before he went to work. Had a bit of a lie in before getting up to have my porridge whilst watching the lovely James Martin. I did a bit of housework before popping over to pick ma up after which we went to a local shopping centre and then went for a great pub lunch.

On my way home I did the food shopping and got back to find hubby was home. We had a lovely dinner which consisted of fresh tuna which I'd marinated for 20 minutes in olive oil, lime juice and a splash of white wine. With it we had new potatoes, french beans and sauteed carrots. Feeling repleted we sat down to watch Ant and Dec and then I spent the evening reading magazines before going to bed with my book leaving hubby to watch Match of the Day.

Today has been fab. We went to Lakeside at Doncaster and I bought a lovely Per Una dress from Marks and Sparks. Hubby also got some bargains, then we went to a local pub for a sandwich lunch topped off with a glass of the red stuff. We then came back home, had a coffee whilst reading the Sunday paper and we're just back from a lovely walk.

The pork's in the oven roasting away and with it we're having yorkie puds, mash, veg followed by jam roly poly and custard (mmmmmm)then tonight we're going to watch a movie.

Tomorrow's my day off so its going to be ironing in the morning whilst watching This Morning. Loose Women whilst I have my lunch. Then its operation bathroom clean up before popping to the local shops.

I know it might sound my life is pretty mundane but it feels FABBBBBulous!

Six weeks to go till Gran Canaria and only 6 more work days before Easter - I love this time of the year there's always something to look forward too. Hope I don't sound too smug and I'm sorry if you're having a crap time at the moment, if you are I'm sending you my happiness fairy to cheer your life up. XXXXXX

Bliss sat on the sofa having a look at blog with a glass of red at the side of me and a bar of chocolate to nibble on. Thank goodness its the weekend. I enjoyed work today As you may know I'm contracted to work 3 days but at the moment I'm doing some extra and I really enjoyed going into work today. Mind you it was a bit sad cos one of our temps left today, we've known her for quite a while and I felt a bit guilty as I was part of the decision making process which decided to let her go. She's a lovely lady but my God did we have to amend her letters.

Text my ma on the way home and we're going out for lunch tomorrow. Hubby will be working so I might as well get out of the house for a bit. We've decided we are going to stay in tomorrow it feels nice to actually have a weekend to ourselves for a change.

Not much more to say so have a good weekend.

Well its been a busy week. First though I'll give an update on the grumpy husband situation. Well after my outburst on Sunday and the fact that all we had for Sunday lunch was cheese sandwiches cos I was to brassed off with him too cook, he's turned a different leaf and is now a bit more like his usual self.

On Monday night hubby came home with a pressie to say sorry, a recipe book which I was wanting. Seems I hit all the right nerves when I had a go at him.

Went back to work on Tuesday. My colleague came back to work on Wednesday which is good although she's still negative about things. Mind you I was a bit brassed off myself today. We've been having meetings with our office manager about what resources our secretarial team needs to enable us to get on top of things. We decided on a plan which meant getting rid of a typist and bringing in a clerk to help with the paperwork. Everything seemed to be going ok until I got wind that management are wanting to INCREASE our typing output, still no extra resources, just cos it means bringing in more money to the Trust which I work for. Can't believe it but at the end of the day new targets are being set and if they don't give us extra help we won't achieve them and it won't be my neck that's on the chopping block but those higher up, ie management - decided I'm not going to get stressed out about it but am just going to go with the flow till the S*** hits the fan!

I'm working tomorrow and am looking forward to the weekend. Hubby might be working on Saturday which is ok cos I'll have the housework to catch up on. We're thinking about going for a meal on Sat night but we'll probably end up vegging out in front of the box.

If you're fancying watching a film but not sure what to get I can recommend The Holiday. We watched the DVD last night and its brill.

Am off to see what you lot have been up to. Bye

Hi ya, hope you mum's have been treated well today but mine's been a bit of a damp squib. It was nice this morning as my R&M came into our bedroom with cards and my pressies. R bought me a necklace and earrings which are lovely and M has bought me the DVD of Hairspray which I might look at later. Kids both went off to work and I was left with hubby.

Now hubby's been a right pain in the arse for about 10 days now. The reasons for this are he's a bit stressed out at work due to someone leaving and another staff member taking 4 weeks leave to go to visit Oz but that's hubby's fault for letting her take so much time off. Anyway I knew he'd be a bit of a pain for a few weeks but also its been compounded by his left shoulder which has been giving him a bit of pain since Christmas. I've told him to go to the Dr's but he won't, not sure why though.

Anyhow as I said for the past few days he's been a grumpy old man and this morning it just got to me. He woke up seeming really down in the dumps and when I asked him why he said it was cos he was going to see his ma in the home. So off he went and I was left at home watching TV. I didn't mind but after a bit I got thinking about it and thought what a selfish twat he'd been. He couldn't put on a cheery face even on mother's day and was simply feeling sorry for himself.

I became crosser and crosser and by the time hubby came home I just laid into him and burst into tears. I'm not sure if its done any good but at least its got it out of my system as is writing this into my blog now (sorry if I'm been a bit negative). He's gone down to the allotment now and I'm trying to cheer myself up but as for mother's day SOD IT I'm just going to get battered!

Oh did we party last night, we all had a great time. Went to see a local band play (an ex workmate is in the band) and they were simply fantastic. There was all kinds of music and they did an excellent version of Kraftwerk's She's a Model. They started off with lounge music which we saw the last bit of and then moved onto more funkier stuff. Absolutely fantastic. N&G had a great time.

After my trip to the salon yesterday I did indeed look like a new woman but the effect was lost a little as it was throwing it down with rain when we went out last night.

Good news N&G are going to join us in Manchester for a night out in June which will be great. I want to go to the Lowry Museum, any ideas for anywhere else we can visit would be appreciated.

Had a quiet day vegging out today. I dropped hubby and Mat off in town as they've got to the football, apparently their team have lost which is not good news. After dropping em off I went to Morrisons and did the food shop, came home and my sis rang so we had a good chat. I'm making a prawn curry for tea which we're going to have whilst watching Ant & Dec. I've bought a lovely bottle of red wine which we're going to have whilst watching a DVD and munching chocolate later on.

Its mother's day tomorrow and both my kids will be working. Am looking forward to getting my cards in the morning but I guess that's as far as mother's day will go for me.