Monday

The weather has turned dull and dank, which is a tad disheartening.

I spent the morning in the office, and found out I'll be moved to a new desk when I get back on 3 July. I was also given a slice of the most wonderful Banana Cake ever, it was served still warm, moist and soft, with such a sweet aroma I just wanted to dive down on it all lips and nose, absolutely bloody gorgeous.

Day was pretty much passable after that, and I left at lunch.

Tuesday

Spent the day between two offices in Bristol. The morning was with the main team in the centre of Bristol, the afternoon was doing data entry in the office in Bedminster.

The data entry was pretty damn easy. It's all down to barcodes; peel off a label, enter the number on system, add details, click 'Ok'. Dull and repetitive, but strangely not too bad a chore - maybe it's that the alternative is doing worse monkey tasks.

I saw a squirrel in Bedminster, it was kewt and amusingly out-of-place. Such a small little park area, not even big enough to kick a football, and this frolicking little tree-rat was enjoying itself.

There was an email sent around about the Weston office closing party, where they are inviting people who have worked in that building over the years. Somewhere along the line they decided to run a raffle, then it became a little twisted. A request came out for all attending the party bring a raffle prize along with them on the night, and winners will be able to choose which prize they win.

I wasn't sure if somewhere I'd misread the idea, but I tried to work out the logic.

I buy a prize of value X (for arguement £5).
I then pay money (Y) to enter raffle (for arguement £1).

One ticket has the potential to regain a prize of similar value to X (or indeed X itself, as I have the choice), but lose the value of Y. (£5-£1: +£4)

If ticket is not lucky, I pay X and Y, to lose the value of X and Y. (-£5+-£1=-£6)

Also, I may have to pay multiple of Y to still have a chance of regaining X.

So, either attending gives me negative value of X and Y, or negative value of Y, negative Y multiplied, or negative X and Y multiple.

However, there are people who are attending without paying for a prize, so any win counts as profitable. Why not just raise the money by having to pay to get in, isn't that fairer and more transparent? Obviously opting out brings along the guilt trips, but honestly, the concept is fairly moronic.

Wednesday

Started off early again to head to Bedminster, though not obscenely early this time as I did last week. I was on the 07:40 out of town and it was fairly packed in.

Andy was already in the office and he'd grabbed another barcode reader to help me shave a few seconds off the inputting. Truth be told, it didn't really help much seeing as by the time I'd grabbed the reader, got it hovering over the code and waited for it to pick just the right angle, I could have actually typed it in. In addition, I still had to type in all the rest of the information anyway.

On the plus side, it give me an appreciation for how easy barcodes are that the readers can be used with no specialist software needed - simple hardware 'plug and play'. I also like how the system cascades in a 'one to many' for boxes to files.

I really like the card folders we use - A4 size, with a half width flap on the rear/right side. Yes, I am that geeky about stationery appreciation. I was actually trying to think of instances where I could have an excuse to get some at home.

I had to head back to Weston to clear my desk, seeing as when I get back to work, I'll be in the other Weston office. I feel slightly let down that all my possesions actually fit inside two courier polylopes.

Still, I'm free until 3 July now.