As of last night my internet connection is non-functional. I reported the issue to Virgin Media, who told me that it might not get fixed until Saturday.

I’m hoping that it might get fixed earlier if it happens to be a regional issue. Otherwise, the Urban Recluse might have to start blogging from a cafe, use dialup again (the horror!!) or refrain from blogging altogether.

And I’ve so much to tell you, but I must get back to work before I get in trouble…

Right now I should probably be at my workplace’s Summer Party, but instead I’m staying in. I live about an hour away from there, and as it’s in London zone 1, I have to spend several quid to get there (which is okay when I’m actually being paid to be there).

That’s not the main reason that I’m not going, of course. I have not named this blog The Urban Recluse for no reason. I’m not going because I don’t want to suffer through tedious small talk with people who just see me as the Admin Monkey (no offence to administrators or monkeys).

I can imagine myself standing around on the outskirts of the gathering, nursing a glass of orange juice, my gaze constantly returning to the clock on the wall. Is it okay to leave after half an hour or an hour? I ask myself.

When the 59th minute finally approaches, I collect my jacket and head towards the exit.
“You’re not leaving now, are you? The fun is just beginning!” says some inebriated partygoer.

I mumble something about feeling unwell or having to meet someone, and slip away.

Why bother going in the first place?

I know I’ve had worse days than today, but I can’t remember any right now.

At work I felt slightly menaced by a client who was in aggressive battle mode; I felt a bit vulnerable when I was left alone with him, but he calmed down eventually.

After that I couldn’t focus on my work, and felt overwhelmed by everything I had to do. It didn’t help that my colleague, Kay, jars me with her patronising matronly demeanour. I used to manage a team of staff in the dark days of the academic hell-hole; she can’t manage her way out of a fridge yet she seems to think that I’m a moron.

London’s flooded. Even some parts of Croydon have been affected. It took me 2 and a half hours to get home from work (it usually takes an hour) because the railway lines were flooded. I was stuck at Clapham Junction for more than a hour. Station staff directed loads of us onto the wrong train, and the driver informed us that the train was actually going somewhere else… Eventually I got a train to Streatham then took a bus. I was exhausted by the time I got home. My feet are still aching from all the standing, but at least they are dry.

Yesterday was a peculiar day.

In the morning I received an envelope in the post with a postmark from my former employer (the university of sloth). Asking myself what the hell it could be I opened it and found that some imbecile there had decided to send me a request from their photocopier company for a meter reading. My name was on it as the department contact, but surely 7 months after leaving that dungeon of torture my former colleagues might have realised that I don’t work there anymore…

I was peeved as hell at work. I whinged all day to my colleague about how much pressure I felt there. She was very sympathetic, but I feel that I need to be more careful about what I say to her. My workload is very heavy, and I do feel like I’m doing a full-time job in part-time hours. Kay told me that she has worked in Administration job for the last 30 years. There’s nothing wrong with that, but I couldn’t do it. If I felt that I was going to work in Admin for another 30 years I might just give up. I just don’t find it interesting. I also sometimes get the feeling that people look down on me for being an Administrator, and I hate that feeling.

I don’t feel nice enough to work at my current workplace. All the niceness that I may have possessed a few years ago was sucked out of me at the university of hell. So now I’m just a jaded shell of a person. I can’t believe I thought I could be a counsellor, or a volunteer with the Samaritans. I still wouldn’t mind being an Agony Aunt though…

Dirty Dirk came to see me again at work in the afternoon. It was the same old story; he still wants me, do I still want him? I said no – I just like him as a mate, but I offered to give up going to the cafe if it bothered him. Maybe I should anyway, all that junk food isn’t good for me.

Still haven’t written anything since Sunday, but I’m hoping that Wednesday will be a better day. I need a pick-me-up, like a back massage or a facial. I got my blood test results back and I’m all-clear for malaria, etc. I must have just been extremely run-down the other day. I’m taking extra vitamin-C to boost my immunity