The (very) cold light of day

And so back to earth with something of a thud. The flight back wasn't too bad, all things considered, but it was still 24 hours in the air and two in Hong Kong getting continual electric shocks from the luggage trolley and marvelling at their rather groovy new airport. Monday, returning at 1400ish, was a bit of a challenge, and Tuesday was just plain weird. I'm almost back to normal, I think.

So, work. Although Kathryn's earlier and highly perceptive comment about my apparent work/life balance does strike something of a chord with me, I'm going to give you all a quick work update nonetheless, as I'm sure you're all simply dying to know what the latest is in the ongoing saga.

The plan, as I think I might have mentioned, was for me to roll off the Irish thing upon going on hols, and to be onto something new on my return. This spectacularly hasn't happened, and as such I'm stuck in this role until the start of next month, whilst the project manager goes on holiday himself. I'm feeling pretty sanguine about it though, it's another month of billable work which means the whole of this quarter will be, and so hello bonus. Which is nice.

To be honest, the past three weeks have reoriented the Kiwi and myself a fair bit. With the prospect of moving to NZ now a firm reality, priorities have shifted towards making plans, saving cash and (in my case) working out what to do with the mountain of debt left over from my misspent youth that I'm still shovelling through. We're also keeping an eye on the Auckland housing market (slowly slipping... fingers crossed for a monumental crash) and the exchange rate (currently in my favour, not that great for sending pounds over though).

So, work-wise the remainder of this year will be centred around reading worthy work-related books (have just hit Amazon up for a load of very dull but probably useful books), not spending any money at all and getting some relevant training out of work before I leave. Oh, and trying to get a new job in a city 20,000km+ away without actually being there.

I've also promised myself that if at any point I don't use the gym at least twice a week, I'm cancelling my membership, as it's currently costing me around NZ$160 a month, which would pay for a sofa or something within a year, I'm sure. Although reading that, the irony of trading a gym membership in for a sofa isn't lost on me.

This could get interesting...