Had a fantastic (...) night last night at John Barrowman's concert through in Glasgow - I'd go to the show just for John's patter in between songs! I didn't have quite as good seats as I did last year, however meant the usher couldn't get to me...

I wasn't using a flash so most of my pictures came out as vague coloured blurs. And proportionally more of the Daniel Boys ones came out - possibly because he doesn't move around as much as John.

Anyway, these are the best of the lot (and that's pushing it, particularly if you click through to the full res versions) - couple of good ones I think, the rest are still on the fuzzy side I'm afraid! Left in a couple of 'smeary' ones too, which I just liked for some reason. Includes him splitting his trousers due to overly enthusiastic dancing!

My favourite:



( And the rest in chronological order (image heavy): )

ETA: On the trouser ripping - The pic before is just after he's shown us the first time (I was too slow to get the pic). Then he showed us again, and wiggled, so the audience could get the giggling out of our systems - which didn't work which was why he decided he had to change. And he also yanked these black strings out the rip telling us it wasn't a g-string, it was attached to his shirt to keep it tucked in!

It’s quite hard to think about what you’ve done over the last 12 months. Pretty much the stuff I always do really!

Brief 'highlights' of the last year may include such things as:

Seeing roughly 77 musical/theatre type shows. Mostly crammed into an exhausting, (and expensive) 3 week period during the Edinburgh Festival.

Changing department back to customer facing (and about to change department once more to get away from it again).

Not becoming obsessed with a single new show, just moving focus around the existing ones a bit (currently - Torchwood, Jack/Ianto).

Being mocked for being too old to love Zac Efron and High School Musical as much as I do.

Being mocked for falling asleep in a bar, leaving all my possessions behind and ending up on a friends doorstep in the middle of the night as I was unable to get into my flat. And then having to go into work the next day. Where we had a surprise audit.

Going to 2 weddings (1 involving a road trip with 5 people squashed into a very small car. The journey home, after the free bar the entire day before, was memorable for all the wrong reasons), bringing my total number of weddings attended in my life to… 2.

Having a fun, completely fangirl weekend in Cardiff, with about 500 pictures of us giggling madly on the invisible lift and outside Ianto’s Tourist Information Centre to show for it!

Wow, when I start taking breaks, I really start taking breaks!

So, how is everyone? I need to get back into hobbies, having a proper grown up job uses up way too much energy.

Hello!

So, yesterday was the first day in my new position (same company, different role). All fine, no mishaps or anything...

I was getting ready for bed last night when I noticed my chest was oddly... greasy. And oh look! I was wearing a bra with gel inserts, one of which was now slightly deflated. I think, oh well, this is what I get for buying Primark underwear, but nevermind.

5 minutes later, I pick up the shirt I'd been wearing earlier at work and notice one bit looks darker than the other. Confused, I lay it out properly and realise the whole of one side looks like it's wet - yep, on the leaking bra side. So I was walking around in front of my new colleagues all day, with what have must been a steadily growing damp patch on my chest.

That's how to make an impression!

What better story to start me off after a 4 month hiatus!

Had a flat inspection today, to make sure I hadn't destroyed the place, and practically the first thing the guy said was "Well, you like Christmas." And I haven't even finished decorating yet.

I know I've left this late, so it will quite possibly be post-Christmas cards (especially internationally), but anyone who wants a card from me, fill this in!*

Poll #1102328 Christmas Cards
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: None

Give me your name and address...

And link me to your post if you have one, 'cause my endeavours to catch up on lj just mean that I'm still reading posts from back in early November somewhere.

*Probably homemade, but, uh, haven't sorted that out yet either. A proper job leaves so little time for fun stuff.

It looks like Christmas exploded over my living room. I took everything out of the boxes, and then got distracted, so it's all over the floor. Plus, I'm used to someone being here to help me with the difficult bits, like not tangling myself up in the lights! Also went to see Fred Claus last night which got me very in the Christmas spirit, and am listening to Transiberian Orchestra while I don't decorate.

We went to see John Barrowman filming his new quiz show this week. The man is just *awesome*. He would just randomly start singing or dancing around the stage. Plus he shops at M&S and is addicted to TK Maxx, apparently. I tried to ask who was the best kisser out of the Doctor Who and Torchwood casts, but he sadly misheard since his answer was along the lines of "It's a secret. Well, I've only kissed one of them so I couldn't say".

Can't wait until I see him on tour in April!

Despite intending to do more christmas shopping today, I instead gorged on The O.C season 4. And now I want Ryan/Taylor fic but can't find any.

I pulled out a middle-aged guy I don't know in the work secret santa. Any suggestions? Alcohol or food are my only ideas at the moment.

I just went to make dinner - actually *make* which is rare because I can't cook (I've even burnt pasta in the past), and noticed the flour was nearly two years out of date.

While debating whether to still use it (okay, I was phoning my mum to ask her), I noticed teeny little bugs crawling in it. So glad I noticed that before deciding to just use it!

Now I feel all itchy.

So I moved to Edinburgh over a month ago now. Living by myself, which I've discovered I actually quite like, and a minute from work which I *love*. Edinburgh, however, is rubbish for shopping compared to Glasgow.

I like my job so far. Not that I have a clue what I'm doing most of the time! There's a whole lot of us on the graduate programme, spread out over the entire UK, so we're forming geographical cliques. We're the Scottish group, based around Glasgow and Edinburgh, and it's great having people to email to say "Uh, are you as clueless about thing x as I am?", and then to meet up and go for drinks and mock ourselves in person!

The people I'm actually working with on a day to day basis are also fab - I've never worked anywhere where the people are so nice (and so helpful, which is slowly helping with the cluelessness). Plus, I totally have a crush on one guy. Cute, funny, smells good, *awesome* car, heh. That makes the work day a little more fun!

A month and a half of no internet is just wrong. But now it's finally working, whee!

So, what have you all been up to?

And still no internet. I do now have a phone line, because I gave up on Virgin, however now AOL has decided to step up do its level best to absolutely make me insane. They tell me they 'absolutely guarantee' it will be working by day X, then laugh when I say I guess I'll be phoning again on day X. And lo and behold there I am phoning again on day X, and I am not finding it funny.

And omg I only have 6 icons! I need pay day to hurry up!

I have no phone and no internet. And don't foresee having either anytime in the near future if Virgin keep up this *excellent* level of customer service. And being put on hold until the money runs out in my mobile is just so much fun, I've now done it twice!

I'm cut off from the world! I'm so bored, and I don't know where anything is in Edinburgh. I'm in Glasgow right now, purely to use the internet at the library... okay not quite. But close! I also came to get my hair cut and buy a coat. I needed the retail therapy to cheer me up, and the small talk with the hairdresser since I'm starved of human contact. And the coat just because it was pretty.

I start work on Tuesday. Yay? We're booked into a hotel for the next two weeks (a different hotel for each week in fact) - despite the fact that I live in Edinburgh and am closer to work from my flat. And I hate staying in hotels because I never like the food. Don't know if I'm allowed to not stay in the hotel - I don't care if it's unsociable!

Apparently the problem with selling the flat is their interpretation of the title deeds. The deeds say we own the "second floor flat on the east side". But because the flat has two floors inside it, they're saying we don't actually own the top floor and the two bedrooms are therefore common property for the whole building!

It's not like there's any other access to them, and they're not an addition that we put in - it was built like that more than 70 years ago. It's all part of the one flat! Nobody else who's lived there has had a problem with it.

Seriously, WTF.

Our solicitor called and said he thinks the sale of our flat is going to fall through. Almost *3 months* we've been waiting for these people, and now 2 weeks before we're supposed to hand over keys, they're still questioning things and haven't signed to finalise the sale.

My parents are seriously stretched financially waiting for this to go through, since they had to get my sisters place before uni started again. They could lose their house if this doesn't happen.

Jesus Christ, if this falls through, I hope this couple gets a serious punch in the face from Karma.

So this is what 6 years of stuff looks like packed into one not very large room.

I can hardly move aroud all the boxes, and I don't have anywhere to put it anyway! Plus, my room here at home is still bigger than any of the rooms in flats I've looked at in Edinburgh. My giant room in Glasgow has spoiled me. And I have too much stuff.

Yesterday was my last day at the crappy job, and I don't start the new one until the beginning of October. Hello laziness!

I'm still looking for a flat in Edinburgh, which is stressful because I have to keep phoning people and I have phone fear. Plus, I now don't know if I'm looking for a 1 or 2 bedroom place, since a former flatmate is also moving there and we're talking about sharing. Plus - cheaper. Minus - less privacy; compromising. She has a lower budget and I want somewhere nice in a very specific area, which could make things interesting...

Oh, and I finally got my Prison Break dvds! Movietyme, I sort of forgive you for sending me an empty box.

My sisters new flat may have fleas. She has about 15 bites all over her (and the old owners had cats). Any suggestions for getting rid of them?

OMG I could not hate voice automated systems any more than I do right now. They *never* understand me. Then I end up shouting at a recording which doesn't make me feel better like shouting at a real person might - but then I wouldn't need to shout at a real person, who would presumably be able to understand 'D' is not 'E' or 'B' or 'P'. *seethes*

I have 4 more days left at work. 4 more days! I am clinging on to this desperately to keep hold of my sanity.

The fact that it's pouring (and that I'm lazy) makes me less inclined to have my usual cinema trip today. The only thing out this week that I want to see is The Hoax anyway. Plus, I'll be that annoying person coughing and blowing their nose every 5 minutes. I've had more colds in the last 3 months, since I started this job, than in the last 5 years.

I'd rather lie in bed and watch dvds, but there's a problem with this too, since I still have no Prison Break dvds (the blame for that is mostly on Movietyme, though the Royal Mail and its strikes can take some now too) and my SGA season 2 dvds haven't arrived yet either (which means I won't get them until next weekend, since I'm not in when the post comes during the week). And those are the things I want to watch.

I have no sympathy for Royal Mail staff and their strikes for more money. If they actually managed to do their job and, you know, get mail to people, then I might. I've lost count of the number of times we've had cards through the door saying they've tried to deliver something - at a time when there were people in. Anything bigger than a single dvd, there's an 80-90% chance we'll get that bloody card and have to trek to the delivery office. And then there's the things that never get here at all. Grr.

Oh, Monday.

I somehow buggered my knee carrying boxes and stuff yesterday so now it's all... loose and wrong feeling. Hasn't done the whole 'buckling underneath me' thing for years. How I did not miss it.

Mail came in from the solicitors about selling the flat, which my parents need to read - and I can't scan it and send it since my scanner's already packed and gone, and I told my mum I have no stamps so can't post it tonight, to which she replied "Well, what do you expect me to do, drive down to Glasgow and get it". To appreciate the attitude - that's a 5 hour drive each way.. Tried to go buy stamps at the garage but they had none left. My knee was too weird for further exploring.

*And* I got an email back about my missing dvds, which basically says, "Well, not sure what we can do about that." I replied: "How about send me the dvds I paid for?".

That's 5 hours worth of work in my hell hole of a job, to get sent an empty boxset!

I ordered Prison Break a few weeks ago, and when it arrived the cellophane wrapper (inside the envelope) was hanging off the box set, but I didn't think anything of it.

I went to start watching it tonight and *all of the discs are missing*. I seriously hope the company will sort this out, since it looks to me like one of their employees stole it!