2008: Sighting 'Hind

2008. What a year! What fun we had! We laughed, we cried, we snorted, we defecated. We experienced the following things, in a nutshell:

January: Coming back to Canberra from New Zealand.
That was pretty crap. Part of it was the fact that it was the end of a holiday, but the whole business of having an awesome overseas experience, and then having to come back to a town and job that I was thoroughly sick and tired of - blech. Unhappy Jan. Prior to this unfortunate return, it was determined that one would move to another city in Australia for the next leg of life's lil' journey. But was it to be Melbourne, Perth or Brisbane (all very sexy cities). In the meantime, it was back to work, and saving money to move.

February - May: Same crappy job, different Fascist supervisor. **Warning Explicit Language**
Aww. Mah. Gough. The bossy, presumptuous, control-freak, head up-her-ass, esteemed colleague who I'd been trying to train through the almost insurmountable barrier of both her and my arrogance, got promoted in a rather untimely fashion. I won't go into intimate details of her fucked-up life view, wildly inappropriate behaviour and our delightful encounters due to the ever-shrinking quality of the world. Suffice it to say that our relationship did not improve as result of the change, and the goal of sticking it out until the end of financial year and bonus time became significantly more challenging.

June - July: Death is better than my job.
Hating job. Hating town. Having some success at saving money but it is slow going. Still debating the goodness of one Australian city over another. In possession of a great ball of inertia and distinct air of irritability. A lot of restructuring (Nazi-ising) happening at the company. Spat the dummy when supervisor chose to instruct me to perform jobs that were the specific and clearly understood domain of a more junior employee, being the twig that broke the camel's back. Left not a moment too soon for my sanity (unfortunately, only a few scattered remains were salvaged), got jipped out of my bonus by the bastards I'd been employed with for 4 and 1/2 years, despite having worked up to and including June 30. In other words, the whole business of gritting my teeth and sticking it out in Pseudo-Hippie Hell for more $$ - completely and utterly pointless. Nonetheless, singing hallelujah to be the fuck out of that place and away from the soul-sucking management. Yep, still singing. If I'd stayed there any longer, I probably would have started bashing my head against the desk until it was bloody.

Late July - August: Perseverence in adversity.
I was at this point that I experienced something that I hadn't since I was nineteen and had just returned from a working holiday in the US - unemployment. I hadn't planned it to happen at that time. Should have, but didn't, and I didn't really know what to do with it. I could do anything that I wanted. Unfortunately, I still had one demon on my back: study. Fucking study. Earlier in the year, I enrolled in a post-grad property investment analysis course. My motivations for doing so were somewhat cloudy, however, I got into it, and fucked if I wasn't going to finish it. I had the exam in exactly two weeks from the day that I walked away from the fuckwits that I used to work for. Strategic action was required. I took a few days to absorb, booked myself return flights to Melbourne and booked accommodation with my sister and her boyfriend there. Called the institute that I was studying with and asked them to change my exam location from Canberra to Melbourne. Done. Had a very nice two weeks, studied some, hung with my sister and the boi and ate healthy food, enjoyed Melbourne, saw some friends down there, aced the exam. Suck on that, former employer asswipes. As to what to do when I got back to Canberra....

August - October: Unemployment, not as sexy as it sounds.
Slack, slack, slack. That is the best way that I can describe these months. I did stuff and saw people and made jewellery, bring my DIY earring count up to ~45 pairs, but, overall, this period was something of a wash. A whole lot of TV watching and sleeping and noncing about. I know that I needed a break, but what I did wasn't very restful. I shoulded myself a lot, and agonised about how I was going to get to Melbourne. Yes, we decided, as we suspected we would, that Melbourne was the next destination for the long-term voyage. We also, after some long conversations with the sister were considering entrepeneurship as a valid state of being, and spent time considering and planning items for this arena. But, to sum up, got some ideas, but going nowhere fast. Started applying for jobs wholesale after observing slow but steady depletion of carefully saved funds.

November: Love that nepotism.
A couple of friends of my parents who have their own contracting business for IT contractors found me a job. It wasn't a proper IT job, otherwise I wouldn't have been in the hunt, but they wanted to pay someone what I was earning in my previous job to help organise and keep track of a bunch of techs doing a system upgrade for a government department. I'd registered with a handful of agencies, applied for dozens of jobs, got nothing to date. Bob & Betty call me to see if I still wanted work, and I was employed the day after next. I am still employed there, albeit on a short-term contract. It's a crappy job but enough variety to not make me want to kill myself, and a really awesome team. A real breath of fresh air. And money!!!!

December: Fucking Christmas. Is it the holidays yet?
Had a bit of a spending blow-out around Christmas. For the first time in my perfessional life, I work in the 'city' centre, with handfuls of retails stores, restaurants and coffee places. Not good for saving. I now have nice clothes, but my budget from late last year is in shreds. Nonetheless, between self-spending, I got the Chrissy presents sorted, and braced myself for the festive season. My mother experienced (and inflicted) her seasonal psychosis in time for her Mega-Annual Boxing Day party. We had a respite from this last year, due to going to New Zealand. However, this year, we had the madness, with a bit of a twist. My grandad has come down to Australia for his once-a-decade visit. (Originally from West Viginia, but it's OK, he escaped to Louisianna. He's actually a bit of a dude) We had the usual Christmas at the family friends and we had the party at our place. Some nice pressies, some nice company, overall, not too much of a hassle. So far so good. But it doesn't end there. Oh no-no-no-no. Mum then has to invite people that she didn't invite or that couldn't make it to The Boxing Day Party, that she neglects to tell the rest of us about until a couple of hours before the event. The next three days filled with eating and sitting at tables with people I just don't give a crap about. Had enough of the FFF (Forced Family Fun). Not to be selfish, but I only had 8 days of respite from work, and I didn't want to spend all of it sitting at a table stuffing my face and making nice with my parents friends. I counted the pennies, and made the command decision to fuck off to beach and the city of Wollongong for the NY's. I'd never been, and wanted to visit there before going south. Got a good deal on a last-minute cancellation for accommodation. I'll do a separate post for the 'Gong, but overall; nice and just what the doctor ordered.

And that was 2008. Auf wiedersehen, year gone past. You will not be greatly missed, but you will be noted.

(24 to go.)