Hello world.
As promised here is a special 2 for the price of 1 blog. You buy one , you get one free, I say you buy one, you get one free. Sorry, couldn't resist it :-).
Well I will start with yesterday. Another very quiet day at work, probably the quietest Saturday ever since I have been there, which is almost 10 years now. Took an appallingly low total for the day. Was rainy and cold for the most part too, so all in all a low sort of a day. Thank goodness for books, as I get the very minimal of conversation (and believe me ANY conversation is better than none sometimes) I would go mad if I had nothing to read all that time. I do get to have some glorious wonderful silence too, just not always when I wish I could.
That's the big problem for me I think. When It has been quiet , and devoid of customers for any length of time (say half an hour or more), I am usually really getting to enjoy the quiet, or become engrossed in a book. If someone then comes in, I can end up feeling annoyed by the interruption. Which I really shouldn't. But don't worry, I am usually glad to see them (really I am).
There is an old man who comes in in his little car, whose car we fill up for him. I was doing just that and chatting away, but failed to notice that the pump hadn't cut out properly, and ended up with diesel all down my leg and over my one shoe. Ooh that stuff stinks.
Watched the Eurovision last night, and for the first time in years it felt like a proper contest, with much less backslapping going on between countries with their voting. All of the various countries acts seemed of a much higher standard, I really enjoyed watching it for once. Usually I end up cringing behind the sofa at the awfulness of it. But this year was spot on. Have to agree that Norway were pretty cool, and I loved Iceland's effort too. Oh yea mustn't forget our entry, Jade, must I. Fifth, I think we deserved a better placing than Turkey, but it was a fairly close run thing, so no real complaints.
Eurovision was partly to blame for me not blogging last night you see.
On to today now. Got to work this morning to a rather ominous variety of beepings. Not great. On closer inspection the machinery that controls all the fuel pump electronics and felling had gone and tripped, and tried to reset but failed. A few button presses later and a restart and all was OK on that front, but, the credit card terminal was literally terminal. Kaput. Rang up the help desk to try to rectify with a software reset over the the phone line. We are sorry, but our operating hours are from 10am till 5pm on Sundays. What use is that. I need help now, at 9am. Only had to turn one customer away who didn't have cash on him though, for which I was thankful.
10am I rang again, and got through to a wonderful call center in India (sarcastic hat on). Whenever we have to call them, they seem eternally confused with our English and pronunciations, and likewise us with theirs. So things tend to be a bit drawn out and take longer to explain than they should.
The first thing they suggested I should do was to turn it off and on again (I thought that was the IT departments little thing). That was the first thing I had tried when I got there. Much messing around later, and he comes to the conclusion that the machine doesn't work, which was funny, because that's what I told him to begin with, the very reason I rang up n the first place. "We will send a new one out to you. It should arrive Tuesday". Lovely. A whole day of not being able to accept cards, and having to turn lovely customers away. Most demoralizing it is. The other girl is on tomorrow, so she will have some fun there.
As was hardly surprising, we didn't take an awful lot.
Got home just after quarter past 1.
Last night I made a lovely beef and carrot stew, and left it overnight to improve. I put that on and we were eating just over half an hour later. Convenience food at its best.
Went and had a shower ready for church than and got myself ready. Got there just after 10 to 6, so had a bit of time to get comfy. We had forgotten, it was the evening prayer service rather than Communion service. So all packed like sardines into the Lady chapel. I really love these services, everyone in together instead of being spread all over the church. Much more fun altogether.
The sermon was very good, and extremely enjoyable, even entertaining today. The vicar started off talking about his masters degree, then consumerism, he then came out with a few fascinating facts on the shopping habits and behaviour of the average person, selling tactics of supermarkets, and how we always speed up when we walk past banks. Then a complete change of direction he began to talk about the reading we had had. I think the point he was trying to make was that we are very subtly manipulated by the supermarkets etc into buying things, that we may not have originally set out to buy, even though we assume we have a free will in what we buy, we are not as free to chose as we maybe would imagine.
But when it come to Gods love for us, we do not chose to receive it, but it is freely given to us, He chooses us. Where have the choice though, is whether to chose to love Him, and to chose to live as Jesus did. To love one another, to live peaceful, joyful helpful lives. Jesus said we are his friends, he wanted us to be his friend, as He is our friend. A friendship that is open to everyone and anyone who chooses it. Plus that we should be Christians 7 days a week, not just we sing His praises each Sunday in church. He calls us to be disciples to continue what was started 200 years ago. St least that how I understand it, I may be totally wrong.