This will be a quick post I hope. My weekend was a complete write-off. At about 3pm on Friday my nose started dripping like a tap. I got through those last two hours of work but I've had sinus headaches pretty much all the time since then. This is a recurrence of what I had last month (and never fully recovered from). I took today off work and didn't go to tonight's autism group. I'll try and get a good night's sleep and maybe go in tomorrow, although I'll have to leave work early (and presumably make up time later in the week) because I'm seeing the shrink at 3pm. My sinus problems and the other problem have certainly made life difficult for me since I moved into this place. I've hardly thought about buying or moving furniture, which would be like rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.
Sadly I had to pull out of Saturday's tramp - would have been a lovely day for it too. The furthest I've been since Friday is the market on the corner of Willis and Vivian Streets; even that felt like an expedition.
This morning at around ten I realised I hadn't taken my pills for the day, then as I was about to pop open the packet I noticed I'd missed yesterday's pills entirely. It's been years since I've knowingly missed a dose, but everything is out of whack at the moment.
The good news is that mentally I'm feeling better since my change of role. My anxiety levels at work - once I'd got Monday out of the way - were several notches lower than in my other job. Long may that continue. I had an enjoyable evening with Rose on Thursday - she and I have more in common than I realised.
My parents were very supportive of me when I told them of my trials and tribulations at work. They were away at the weekend - a very pleasant one at Moeraki and Hampden in their caravan - but Mum was worried when I didn't answer her texts.
Dad is coming up here on Wednesday for six days. That's given me some motivation to rearrange those deckchairs. I'll see how the shrink goes. I'm a little wary of psychiatrists but at least this one won't cost me hundreds.
Monday, March 19, 2012
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
What's the difference between a buffalo and a bison?
Answer: you can't play cricket at the Buffalo. The joke works better in a Brummie accent (see the end of this post).
Last weekend I saw an hour or so of a four-day provincial cricket match at the Basin. It cost me nothing to get in. It's a great little ground (it is quite little) and should provide an excellent atmosphere for NZ's test match against South Africa later this month. The best part, perhaps, is the scoreboard:
Daniel Flynn brought up his hundred off the last ball (for Northern Districts against Wellington) before a short rain delay. At the top of the board is a dysfunctional digital bit which needs an overhaul. The manual bit, by contrast, works like clockwork. It comprises numerous rotating panels - the men inside change the magnetic numbers and letters every over or thereabouts. There's more to change than you think. The passage of play after the rain break was worth seeing, Flynn and Arnel hitting out and putting on 60-something for the ninth wicket.
Today was day two in my new role which I've got until 23rd April. It was much better than yesterday; it must have been my most productive day for some time in any job. I can do this job! My role mostly involves printing and sending out letters to clients: "we need you to get a blood test" or "this is your last chance if you want to proceed with this application". Some of the letters are automated and are badly presented. Mental health issues crop up regularly in the correspondence.
I'm hoping that this job will lift my mood for a sustained period. It's still nowhere near as good for me as the earthquake job where there were only a handful of people in the office, most of whom I couldn't see from my desk. My latest role still has all that performance review guff to deal with. "The bottom 10% will be managed out," I remember reading last April, almost knowing that I'd be a victim of the company's decimation policy. The last two days have given me a window on the call centre. The way people are graded on their calls reminds me of school. In fact so much of how big companies (and the people within them) operate reminds me of school. The way the three women from Accounts tried to outdo each other in their experiences of the Big Four - just like kids at school with their marks - was nauseating to me.
I really envy my dad who would have hated office politics and point-scoring just as much as I do. He's cleverly circumvented the whole system, never needing to know what HR stands for, let alone deal with anyone from that department.
I sit next to a Brummie at work. She's bin in New Zerlund four yers but gows back to Bloity in ten dies.
Last weekend I saw an hour or so of a four-day provincial cricket match at the Basin. It cost me nothing to get in. It's a great little ground (it is quite little) and should provide an excellent atmosphere for NZ's test match against South Africa later this month. The best part, perhaps, is the scoreboard:
Daniel Flynn brought up his hundred off the last ball (for Northern Districts against Wellington) before a short rain delay. At the top of the board is a dysfunctional digital bit which needs an overhaul. The manual bit, by contrast, works like clockwork. It comprises numerous rotating panels - the men inside change the magnetic numbers and letters every over or thereabouts. There's more to change than you think. The passage of play after the rain break was worth seeing, Flynn and Arnel hitting out and putting on 60-something for the ninth wicket.
Today was day two in my new role which I've got until 23rd April. It was much better than yesterday; it must have been my most productive day for some time in any job. I can do this job! My role mostly involves printing and sending out letters to clients: "we need you to get a blood test" or "this is your last chance if you want to proceed with this application". Some of the letters are automated and are badly presented. Mental health issues crop up regularly in the correspondence.
I'm hoping that this job will lift my mood for a sustained period. It's still nowhere near as good for me as the earthquake job where there were only a handful of people in the office, most of whom I couldn't see from my desk. My latest role still has all that performance review guff to deal with. "The bottom 10% will be managed out," I remember reading last April, almost knowing that I'd be a victim of the company's decimation policy. The last two days have given me a window on the call centre. The way people are graded on their calls reminds me of school. In fact so much of how big companies (and the people within them) operate reminds me of school. The way the three women from Accounts tried to outdo each other in their experiences of the Big Four - just like kids at school with their marks - was nauseating to me.
I really envy my dad who would have hated office politics and point-scoring just as much as I do. He's cleverly circumvented the whole system, never needing to know what HR stands for, let alone deal with anyone from that department.
I sit next to a Brummie at work. She's bin in New Zerlund four yers but gows back to Bloity in ten dies.
Monday, March 12, 2012
Work woes
Friday was my last day in my old role. Not many people there even knew. That didn't bother me. I don't have fond memories of my time on Level 25. In fact I don't have many memories at all. I do remember my last attempt at bluffing - nearly a month ago - before everything caved in on me: my big boss was talking about some make-or-break audit-whatsit called the FMR. I must have said MFR at least ten times before realising I'd got the letters in the wrong order. Perhaps that was the last straw for me. I might as well have said MFI (which is a chain store in the UK famous for selling dodgy furniture) or even MI5.
In all seriousness I managed reasonably well in the role until mid-November when my new boss arrived on the scene, creating an extra layer in the hierarchy. He was young, hungry, eager, energetic, basically all the things I wasn't (I'm not even young any more). Suddenly everything I did at work came under close scrutiny by an upstart who could quite easily do both our jobs. I was surplus to requirements. Depression set in, I became even slower and even less accurate, tasks got taken away from me, and before long I was just a body.
It was going to happen eventually, as it always has for me in a team environment. If it's just the three or four or five people in my immediate team then I can just about manage. But then people move in and out, you're expected to build relationships with people outside your team, alliances are formed, and before long I don't even know what I'm doing there any more and I end up on the sidelines. I know of no other possible outcome.
It wasn't a wonderful weekend. For some reason I could never relax. All that sunshine on Saturday did little to lift my mood. I did however watch some provincial cricket at the Basin - more about that in my next post. I saw Julie yesterday; she has her own battles with depression as well as physical pain. She takes twenty pills a day.
Today was my first day in the new role. New start. New opportunity. It would all be blissfully stress-free. If only. It was fairly menial, as jobs go, but I still had my fair share of new information to take in. I made multicoloured hand-written notes with bullet points and asterisks to help me remember. I started out OK but slowed up badly from about two o'clock when the sensory overload set in. I was wide-eyed, the ceiling lights seemingly turned up to 500 watts. It was a hugely frustrating afternoon for me - work got done, but very slowly. I'm quite concerned that I won't even be able to hold down this job for very long.
Buying this property (which, had I left it three months, would have been impossible) meant a new bank and more pieces of plastic in my wallet. I now have thirteen flexible friends, including those that fit into an ATM but have nothing to do with banks, and I can't keep track of them all. Most of the time I dodge the issue by paying in cash. As well as being easier for me (I find handling change much simpler than remembering which card is where), it helps to control my spending and reduce the size of my digital footprint. Regarding the flat itself, it's got a lot going for it and would be great if I was feeling better and could be confident of maintaining an income, but right now it feels like a burden. I structured my mortgage in such a way as to handle this scenario at work, not expecting it to eventuate quite this soon.
On Thursday I'm meeting Rose. Could be interesting.
My appointment with the shrink has been postponed till next Tuesday.
Tomorrow's job (apart from my actual job) is to tell Mum and Dad about all the work stuff. I know they'll be worried sick about me once I tell them, which is why I haven't as yet. Odds-on at least one of them will fly up here before the end of the month.
In all seriousness I managed reasonably well in the role until mid-November when my new boss arrived on the scene, creating an extra layer in the hierarchy. He was young, hungry, eager, energetic, basically all the things I wasn't (I'm not even young any more). Suddenly everything I did at work came under close scrutiny by an upstart who could quite easily do both our jobs. I was surplus to requirements. Depression set in, I became even slower and even less accurate, tasks got taken away from me, and before long I was just a body.
It was going to happen eventually, as it always has for me in a team environment. If it's just the three or four or five people in my immediate team then I can just about manage. But then people move in and out, you're expected to build relationships with people outside your team, alliances are formed, and before long I don't even know what I'm doing there any more and I end up on the sidelines. I know of no other possible outcome.
It wasn't a wonderful weekend. For some reason I could never relax. All that sunshine on Saturday did little to lift my mood. I did however watch some provincial cricket at the Basin - more about that in my next post. I saw Julie yesterday; she has her own battles with depression as well as physical pain. She takes twenty pills a day.
Today was my first day in the new role. New start. New opportunity. It would all be blissfully stress-free. If only. It was fairly menial, as jobs go, but I still had my fair share of new information to take in. I made multicoloured hand-written notes with bullet points and asterisks to help me remember. I started out OK but slowed up badly from about two o'clock when the sensory overload set in. I was wide-eyed, the ceiling lights seemingly turned up to 500 watts. It was a hugely frustrating afternoon for me - work got done, but very slowly. I'm quite concerned that I won't even be able to hold down this job for very long.
Buying this property (which, had I left it three months, would have been impossible) meant a new bank and more pieces of plastic in my wallet. I now have thirteen flexible friends, including those that fit into an ATM but have nothing to do with banks, and I can't keep track of them all. Most of the time I dodge the issue by paying in cash. As well as being easier for me (I find handling change much simpler than remembering which card is where), it helps to control my spending and reduce the size of my digital footprint. Regarding the flat itself, it's got a lot going for it and would be great if I was feeling better and could be confident of maintaining an income, but right now it feels like a burden. I structured my mortgage in such a way as to handle this scenario at work, not expecting it to eventuate quite this soon.
On Thursday I'm meeting Rose. Could be interesting.
My appointment with the shrink has been postponed till next Tuesday.
Tomorrow's job (apart from my actual job) is to tell Mum and Dad about all the work stuff. I know they'll be worried sick about me once I tell them, which is why I haven't as yet. Odds-on at least one of them will fly up here before the end of the month.
Monday, March 5, 2012
Onwards and downwards
I've got two more days in my current role at work. On Thursday I'll be moving downstairs - 24 floors downstairs to be precise - to start a role in New Business. I'll have that job for a month, perhaps more, but after that (if there is an after) my salary will be slashed - in half I imagine. To be honest I'm relieved.
Julie decided to come to the Asperger's group. I was a little peeved by that and I'm not sure why. Perhaps it was because I didn't feel I could quite be myself.
Would you believe it, Mandy (one of my old colleagues from Auckland) recently won another ten grand on Bullseye, to go with the forty grand she won last August. I've since been asking her for the Bullseye number in advance: "you don't have to be spot on, just kind of close would be fine."
The big news story in Wellington today was that eight-year-old boy who drove an SUV through the middle of town early this morning. Clever little chap isn't he?
Julie decided to come to the Asperger's group. I was a little peeved by that and I'm not sure why. Perhaps it was because I didn't feel I could quite be myself.
Would you believe it, Mandy (one of my old colleagues from Auckland) recently won another ten grand on Bullseye, to go with the forty grand she won last August. I've since been asking her for the Bullseye number in advance: "you don't have to be spot on, just kind of close would be fine."
The big news story in Wellington today was that eight-year-old boy who drove an SUV through the middle of town early this morning. Clever little chap isn't he?
Saturday, March 3, 2012
Exercising my demons
I did Round the Bays on Sunday. Well I didn't run it all (that just be silly); I jogged the bit at the start, ran the last 500 metres or so, and walked the rest. Supposedly it was 7 km but I think the bloke who measured it must have done so using the dodgy clock in his car: I'm pretty sure it was less. Being part of a work team wasn't pleasant; as soon as I'd crossed the finish line (in about 57 minutes) I wanted to go home. The queue for the buses seemed to go on for ever - it was obvious that walking home would be the quicker option. I walked home with one of my colleagues and felt better after the exercise. All that tennis I used to play in Auckland would sometimes drive me nuts but I certainly benefited from the release of all those endorphins.
I've just been to the gym in my apartment complex. A lot of the equipment is looking a bit tired but that doesn't matter. Some weights that I could actually lift would have been nice though. They even have a squash court - I've got two rackets but I haven't played in ages. I was never any good.
On the same subject, Dad has just bought himself a rowing machine for $250 from the Warehouse.
I was glad to get February out of the way - all 29 days of it - but March so far hasn't been any more fun. I took yesterday afternoon off work (as annual leave, not sick leave) to meet up with one of my cousin's contacts about the business proposition. He was reasonably enthusiastic and would put me in touch with one or two people, but annoyingly he wasn't interested in any of the PowerPoint slides I'd spent many hours preparing! Today I checked my email just in case he'd sent me one, and there were seven of the buggers sitting there including one from a Christchurch businessman who wanted to arrange a meeting. He said Skype was OK but despite setting up two accounts I've yet to Skype anybody. Presumably all these people expected me to reply immediately on my non-existent Blackberry. Dad said that if they ever try and give me a Blackberry at work, I should give them a raspberry. Not much chance of that now of course.
After the meeting I saw the doctor. Like me, she's a pom who's lived in NZ for eight years. Now that I've maxed out my Efexor and it's not helping, she's putting a lot of emphasis on getting a psychiatric assessment.
Work was a little better last week. I've had a lot of (contradictory) advice on how best to handle my situation.
I really wish I could shift this cold. It's been two weeks and counting. But compared to some of the neverending colds I had as a kid, this is nothing.
The weather has been ghastly today (howling winds and torrential rain). The forecast isn't always trustworthy but this time it was deadly accurate.
I had fish and chips last night with my cousin and her family. She then introduced me to a very good Scrabble-based game called Take Two. I'll be seeing her again tonight for some advice on what to do with all these damn emails. It could be very positive but only if I don't make a complete mess of everything.
I've just been to the gym in my apartment complex. A lot of the equipment is looking a bit tired but that doesn't matter. Some weights that I could actually lift would have been nice though. They even have a squash court - I've got two rackets but I haven't played in ages. I was never any good.
On the same subject, Dad has just bought himself a rowing machine for $250 from the Warehouse.
I was glad to get February out of the way - all 29 days of it - but March so far hasn't been any more fun. I took yesterday afternoon off work (as annual leave, not sick leave) to meet up with one of my cousin's contacts about the business proposition. He was reasonably enthusiastic and would put me in touch with one or two people, but annoyingly he wasn't interested in any of the PowerPoint slides I'd spent many hours preparing! Today I checked my email just in case he'd sent me one, and there were seven of the buggers sitting there including one from a Christchurch businessman who wanted to arrange a meeting. He said Skype was OK but despite setting up two accounts I've yet to Skype anybody. Presumably all these people expected me to reply immediately on my non-existent Blackberry. Dad said that if they ever try and give me a Blackberry at work, I should give them a raspberry. Not much chance of that now of course.
After the meeting I saw the doctor. Like me, she's a pom who's lived in NZ for eight years. Now that I've maxed out my Efexor and it's not helping, she's putting a lot of emphasis on getting a psychiatric assessment.
Work was a little better last week. I've had a lot of (contradictory) advice on how best to handle my situation.
I really wish I could shift this cold. It's been two weeks and counting. But compared to some of the neverending colds I had as a kid, this is nothing.
The weather has been ghastly today (howling winds and torrential rain). The forecast isn't always trustworthy but this time it was deadly accurate.
I had fish and chips last night with my cousin and her family. She then introduced me to a very good Scrabble-based game called Take Two. I'll be seeing her again tonight for some advice on what to do with all these damn emails. It could be very positive but only if I don't make a complete mess of everything.
Saturday, February 25, 2012
What's HR?
On Thursday (one of my sick days) I popped over to see Julie in Hataitai. I told her that everything had kicked off at work and that I'd soon be having an HR meeting on Monday. She asked me what HR was. I wished I didn't know what HR was either. In her day it would have been called Personnel I suppose. I wasn't particularly chatty; all I wanted to do was fall asleep.
I went to work yesterday; the meeting (HR manager, head of department and myself) was brought forward to then, so I didn't get much chance to prepare or make a case for myself. I did mention the chronic depression but their reaction was more "so why did you apply for this job?" than "so that must be hard for you." I'll be moved out of my role pretty soon, maybe into something else, maybe into nothing else. They put out an advert for a replacement a fortnight ago. This feels like 2009 all over again but it's actually quite a bit worse.
I had dinner last night at my cousin's place. Friday is their takeaway night so it was Big Macs all round. It was ten years since my previous McDonald's (although I've had a fair few Burger Kings and Wendy's in that time) and now I know why I avoided it. Soggy bread and just not enough food - I'd feel hungrier after a McDonalds than before.
Tomorrow morning Wellington has its Round the Bays run. I put my name down as part of the work team - I thought I should participate in something at work - and I'll still do it tomorrow, even though I'm feeling like crap, but I'll probably just walk it.
I still haven't got over my cold. I've still got a sore throat and I'm coughing up thick chesty gunk in a variety of greens, yellows and browns. My skin complaint isn't going away in a hurry either. It feels like I'm falling apart.
I played my last complimentary games of Countdown today. I had an interesting chat during my game with an Irishman whose show(s) had just been filmed and who would be appearing on TV next month. My last game was against another previous TV contestant. In a mad scramble I got the final numbers game to take the lead for the only time but she then untangled PEAVERING in a very swift three seconds to beat me. Overall I had 15 wins and 10 losses. Two of my wins needed two tie-break rounds, although I did have my fair share of close losses.
Will see how the run/walk/ramble goes tomorrow.
I went to work yesterday; the meeting (HR manager, head of department and myself) was brought forward to then, so I didn't get much chance to prepare or make a case for myself. I did mention the chronic depression but their reaction was more "so why did you apply for this job?" than "so that must be hard for you." I'll be moved out of my role pretty soon, maybe into something else, maybe into nothing else. They put out an advert for a replacement a fortnight ago. This feels like 2009 all over again but it's actually quite a bit worse.
I had dinner last night at my cousin's place. Friday is their takeaway night so it was Big Macs all round. It was ten years since my previous McDonald's (although I've had a fair few Burger Kings and Wendy's in that time) and now I know why I avoided it. Soggy bread and just not enough food - I'd feel hungrier after a McDonalds than before.
Tomorrow morning Wellington has its Round the Bays run. I put my name down as part of the work team - I thought I should participate in something at work - and I'll still do it tomorrow, even though I'm feeling like crap, but I'll probably just walk it.
I still haven't got over my cold. I've still got a sore throat and I'm coughing up thick chesty gunk in a variety of greens, yellows and browns. My skin complaint isn't going away in a hurry either. It feels like I'm falling apart.
I played my last complimentary games of Countdown today. I had an interesting chat during my game with an Irishman whose show(s) had just been filmed and who would be appearing on TV next month. My last game was against another previous TV contestant. In a mad scramble I got the final numbers game to take the lead for the only time but she then untangled PEAVERING in a very swift three seconds to beat me. Overall I had 15 wins and 10 losses. Two of my wins needed two tie-break rounds, although I did have my fair share of close losses.
Will see how the run/walk/ramble goes tomorrow.
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
It's all too much
Things have gone from bad to worse I'm afraid. The last few days have been pretty trying all round, and especially at work. My attempt to meet that work deadline last Thursday by putting in some extra hours was all in vain. I'd got work done alright, but it was all wrong. I'd based everything on the eighth version of a previous spreadsheet - the supercharged V8 - when there was a V9 I should have used that I hadn't even noticed. Then I'd updated the figures using a file with dodgy data in it. My boss asked me how confident I was of having everything correct by 3pm the next day; when I said fifty-fifty he promptly took the task off me.
On Thursday I picked up a cold which got worse during the night. I'm not sure if it was flu or just a bad cold, although I did have a slight fever. I hadn't slept much and the next morning I wasn't in any state to go to work. I listened to the eight o'clock news on the radio in bed. About the tenth news item was the horrific prison fire in Honduras that killed 359 people. Because they were prisoners that nobody cared about in a country that nobody cares about, the NZ media weren't going to care either. The Guardian however did that horrific event justice. I needed to call in sick but I didn't know any of my colleagues' desk phone numbers, couldn't get through on the big boss's mobile, and couldn't email (I had no internet). I found the reception number in the White Pages and got through to my boss (it is a bit crazy that I don't know any of those numbers but I never thought to write them down or commit them to memory).
I had a doctor's appointment booked (for my other problem) and somehow made my way over to Brooklyn. It felt swelteringly hot outside that day but it was probably only 20-odd degrees. I saw a woman doctor this time; from experience (small sample size) female doctors are more understanding of mental health issues. It perhaps helped that on Friday I also looked sick. After I rambled for a bit (I can't remember what I said), she increased my dose of Efexor from 300 mg to the maximum 375. I said I could probably take the whole packet and it wouldn't make any difference. She then wanted me to see a psychiatrist next month; she thought my bipolar diagnosis in 2009 was a load of tripe (I happen to agree). She also mentioned Asperger's without any prompting from me, although I must have given her a few clues.
I picked up my extra pills from the pharmacy near the surgery; they had a set of scales which still measured stone and took two-cent coins which haven't been in circulation since the late eighties. I didn't happen to have any obsolete coinage handy but the scales weighed me anyway. I was twelve stone two; the scales agreed exactly with my digital ones at home. That's a perfectly fine weight for my height (nearly six foot) but it's where the weight is that I need to watch. I've now got a spare tyre which I didn't have before I came to Wellington. My new place has a gym and I need to start using it. Realising my food stocks - and petrol - were low, I went to Pak 'n' Save. After buying a few groceries I tried using their totally unmanned petrol station. It was bad as trying to figure out some of the spreadsheets at work. I felt completely washed out by the time I got home. That day I really just needed to rest. Then one of the new tenants at my old flat - she's Indian and eight months pregnant - came round to look at my fridge. I ended up with two fridges and she wanted to buy the older one off me.
I was able to recharge my batteries over the weekend. I worked on the PowerPoint presentation for the business idea my cousin has for me, read large chunks of Tony Attwood's book on Asperger's, but best of all didn't see or get phone calls from anybody. Not having the internet had its advantages too. The most strenuous thing I did all weekend was pick up some fruit and vege from the market. I still have a whole load of boxes that I've yet to unpack.
I felt far from 100% on Monday but went into work because after what had happened the previous week, and the whole Friday/Monday thing, I didn't want them to think I was skiving. I still didn't have a phone in my flat then - Dad rang me at work having returned from his not-exactly-a-holiday. I went to the Asperger's group that night. Nine of us were there. We decided to make a list of all the subjects covered in the meeting. I started off writing on the blackboard but I couldn't keep track of all the topics, such is my memory (or forgettory) at the moment. Tracy, who has an almost photographic memory, took over and put me out of my misery.
Tuesday was a bad day. I slept through my alarm and got up just before eight. I still got to work at an acceptable time but felt quite disoriented. I was functioning on 10% of capacity, knowing that I'd need to be at 200% to keep up with my boss. He got me to do what I thought was just a copy-and-paste job but ended up being a lot more. I was doing my absolute best to get it done but I couldn't remember where things were and it was like I was running uphill backwards through treacle. There seemed to be a lot more noise than usual and of course so much Mandarin. The incessant talk from the three women in Finance about the Big Four accountancy firms was becoming repulsive. I feel more and more isolated with each passing day in that place. I also feel exceptionally stupid the whole time I'm there. I had to come home at lunchtime to get my phone connected. In the afternoon I asked my boss something about the job I was trying to do. He asked me when I'd have it finished. I told him I really didn't know. "But you've already spent four hours on it!" "Look. Just coming to work is a success for me at the moment." "WHAT!" I spent the next few minutes in the toilet, then calmly said to him that I really wasn't that well and that I was going home. He just laughed at me. "What about work?" "I could be here all night. I won't make any difference. As I said, I'm not very well." Again he laughed. "If you don't understand that, you're obviously very ignorant." Then I went home. He gave me a sarcastic wave.
As soon as I got home my bloody mobile rang. It was an 09 number. Phew. It happened to be Vodafone, not my boss or anybody ghastly like that. Five minutes later it rang again. This time it was my boss, or rather the big boss. I ignored it. Then he rang again. I picked it up. He was a bit more sympathetic than my other boss. He told me to take two days off work and even asked if I had anyone in my apartment block I could talk to. I wish I did. After dinner my other phone rang and it was Julie, hoping that my number hadn't changed. She said she was in a bad way. I tried to listen and agreed to meet her on Thursday. I managed to end the conversation, then my mobile rang again. Who can this be? I'd totally forgotten about the people coming to pick up the fridge. Three blokes came round, gave me $170 (I think they got a good deal), and would somehow lug the fridge the 500-odd metres back to my old flat. They had only just hauled the fridge into the lift when Mum and Dad rang me. I didn't mention work.
Many organisations offer an external counselling service; I was advised to make an appointment which I had at 12:30 today. My cousin rang me at about 11:15 to talk about the business idea but I couldn't take in half of what she said. It was quite a long phone call which meant I was running late for my meeting. I did make it on time but must have looked quite dishevelled. It was a useful meeting if only to get one or two things off my chest. He did say I need to learn to say a particular two-letter word. This afternoon was a bit of a write-off although I did send a useful email to my cousin saying that we need to back off from the business thing because I'm clinically depressed and struggling to cope. Tonight I went to the tramping club. I met Danielle and signed up to a day trip next month but there were hordes of people there and it was good to get home.
On Thursday I picked up a cold which got worse during the night. I'm not sure if it was flu or just a bad cold, although I did have a slight fever. I hadn't slept much and the next morning I wasn't in any state to go to work. I listened to the eight o'clock news on the radio in bed. About the tenth news item was the horrific prison fire in Honduras that killed 359 people. Because they were prisoners that nobody cared about in a country that nobody cares about, the NZ media weren't going to care either. The Guardian however did that horrific event justice. I needed to call in sick but I didn't know any of my colleagues' desk phone numbers, couldn't get through on the big boss's mobile, and couldn't email (I had no internet). I found the reception number in the White Pages and got through to my boss (it is a bit crazy that I don't know any of those numbers but I never thought to write them down or commit them to memory).
I had a doctor's appointment booked (for my other problem) and somehow made my way over to Brooklyn. It felt swelteringly hot outside that day but it was probably only 20-odd degrees. I saw a woman doctor this time; from experience (small sample size) female doctors are more understanding of mental health issues. It perhaps helped that on Friday I also looked sick. After I rambled for a bit (I can't remember what I said), she increased my dose of Efexor from 300 mg to the maximum 375. I said I could probably take the whole packet and it wouldn't make any difference. She then wanted me to see a psychiatrist next month; she thought my bipolar diagnosis in 2009 was a load of tripe (I happen to agree). She also mentioned Asperger's without any prompting from me, although I must have given her a few clues.
I picked up my extra pills from the pharmacy near the surgery; they had a set of scales which still measured stone and took two-cent coins which haven't been in circulation since the late eighties. I didn't happen to have any obsolete coinage handy but the scales weighed me anyway. I was twelve stone two; the scales agreed exactly with my digital ones at home. That's a perfectly fine weight for my height (nearly six foot) but it's where the weight is that I need to watch. I've now got a spare tyre which I didn't have before I came to Wellington. My new place has a gym and I need to start using it. Realising my food stocks - and petrol - were low, I went to Pak 'n' Save. After buying a few groceries I tried using their totally unmanned petrol station. It was bad as trying to figure out some of the spreadsheets at work. I felt completely washed out by the time I got home. That day I really just needed to rest. Then one of the new tenants at my old flat - she's Indian and eight months pregnant - came round to look at my fridge. I ended up with two fridges and she wanted to buy the older one off me.
I was able to recharge my batteries over the weekend. I worked on the PowerPoint presentation for the business idea my cousin has for me, read large chunks of Tony Attwood's book on Asperger's, but best of all didn't see or get phone calls from anybody. Not having the internet had its advantages too. The most strenuous thing I did all weekend was pick up some fruit and vege from the market. I still have a whole load of boxes that I've yet to unpack.
I felt far from 100% on Monday but went into work because after what had happened the previous week, and the whole Friday/Monday thing, I didn't want them to think I was skiving. I still didn't have a phone in my flat then - Dad rang me at work having returned from his not-exactly-a-holiday. I went to the Asperger's group that night. Nine of us were there. We decided to make a list of all the subjects covered in the meeting. I started off writing on the blackboard but I couldn't keep track of all the topics, such is my memory (or forgettory) at the moment. Tracy, who has an almost photographic memory, took over and put me out of my misery.
Tuesday was a bad day. I slept through my alarm and got up just before eight. I still got to work at an acceptable time but felt quite disoriented. I was functioning on 10% of capacity, knowing that I'd need to be at 200% to keep up with my boss. He got me to do what I thought was just a copy-and-paste job but ended up being a lot more. I was doing my absolute best to get it done but I couldn't remember where things were and it was like I was running uphill backwards through treacle. There seemed to be a lot more noise than usual and of course so much Mandarin. The incessant talk from the three women in Finance about the Big Four accountancy firms was becoming repulsive. I feel more and more isolated with each passing day in that place. I also feel exceptionally stupid the whole time I'm there. I had to come home at lunchtime to get my phone connected. In the afternoon I asked my boss something about the job I was trying to do. He asked me when I'd have it finished. I told him I really didn't know. "But you've already spent four hours on it!" "Look. Just coming to work is a success for me at the moment." "WHAT!" I spent the next few minutes in the toilet, then calmly said to him that I really wasn't that well and that I was going home. He just laughed at me. "What about work?" "I could be here all night. I won't make any difference. As I said, I'm not very well." Again he laughed. "If you don't understand that, you're obviously very ignorant." Then I went home. He gave me a sarcastic wave.
As soon as I got home my bloody mobile rang. It was an 09 number. Phew. It happened to be Vodafone, not my boss or anybody ghastly like that. Five minutes later it rang again. This time it was my boss, or rather the big boss. I ignored it. Then he rang again. I picked it up. He was a bit more sympathetic than my other boss. He told me to take two days off work and even asked if I had anyone in my apartment block I could talk to. I wish I did. After dinner my other phone rang and it was Julie, hoping that my number hadn't changed. She said she was in a bad way. I tried to listen and agreed to meet her on Thursday. I managed to end the conversation, then my mobile rang again. Who can this be? I'd totally forgotten about the people coming to pick up the fridge. Three blokes came round, gave me $170 (I think they got a good deal), and would somehow lug the fridge the 500-odd metres back to my old flat. They had only just hauled the fridge into the lift when Mum and Dad rang me. I didn't mention work.
Many organisations offer an external counselling service; I was advised to make an appointment which I had at 12:30 today. My cousin rang me at about 11:15 to talk about the business idea but I couldn't take in half of what she said. It was quite a long phone call which meant I was running late for my meeting. I did make it on time but must have looked quite dishevelled. It was a useful meeting if only to get one or two things off my chest. He did say I need to learn to say a particular two-letter word. This afternoon was a bit of a write-off although I did send a useful email to my cousin saying that we need to back off from the business thing because I'm clinically depressed and struggling to cope. Tonight I went to the tramping club. I met Danielle and signed up to a day trip next month but there were hordes of people there and it was good to get home.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
The clock is ticking
I haven't written much about my job lately. It's been a real struggle since November - when my new boss arrived on the scene - and like most unpleasant things I chose to deal with it by blocking it out of my mind, let alone writing about it. In the last three months my presence at work has added no value, has perhaps even subtracted some, and yesterday the house of cards finally came down when both the head of department and the Aitch Arr manager had a word with me. I could see it coming a mile off to be honest. I stayed until after seven last night and started an hour early this morning to meet a deadline but the work I produced was total crap. Two days after moving into my flat, the timing isn't great. There were no written warnings or anything like that yesterday, but the clock is definitely ticking and I'm now trying to buy some time.
I did tell both managers that I was unwell but I didn't elaborate. I've got a doctor's appointment at 1pm tomorrow - my medication needs to be seriously looked at. To add insult to injury I've picked up a cold, probably from one of my work colleagues.
I saw this interesting piece in today's Dom Post about talented people (like Amy Winehouse and Whitney Houston) who throw it all away, including eventually their lives. The last two paragraphs about the author's grandmother were particularly good to read.
I did tell both managers that I was unwell but I didn't elaborate. I've got a doctor's appointment at 1pm tomorrow - my medication needs to be seriously looked at. To add insult to injury I've picked up a cold, probably from one of my work colleagues.
I saw this interesting piece in today's Dom Post about talented people (like Amy Winehouse and Whitney Houston) who throw it all away, including eventually their lives. The last two paragraphs about the author's grandmother were particularly good to read.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
A new start?
I'm in the new place (well I'm not physically in the new place as I write this because I haven't got phone or internet there yet, but you know what I mean). Mum orchestrated the move while I was at work yesterday. It was inexpensive and (according to Mum) fairly painless. Mum was a great help; I just hope that her help stops there, and that she doesn't decide to fly into Wellington every other week and gradually convert my flat into hers.
I got an email from Dad this morning. It's bitterly cold there; the bad weather hasn't helped his mood. He'd just met up with some old friends in a pub; if I was him I'd want to spend all day there. Dad touches down in Christchurch on Saturday.
I really do need to see the doctor and get my pills looked at.
I got an email from Dad this morning. It's bitterly cold there; the bad weather hasn't helped his mood. He'd just met up with some old friends in a pub; if I was him I'd want to spend all day there. Dad touches down in Christchurch on Saturday.
I really do need to see the doctor and get my pills looked at.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
One sleep to go
Things have been pretty busy the last few days but I've now got an hour or so to myself on this sunny Sunday morning. Mum and my aunt have just been to the Catholic church opposite my flat. They said there was a large (in more ways than one) Tongan presence in the congregation of 400. The Pacific Island community does add a lot of vibrance to the southern part of Wellington. Mum and her big sister have now gone to Te Papa to see an exhibition of wedding dresses on loan from the Victoria & Albert Museum in London. If instead it was an exhibition of beer bottle tops I might have been more interested in going. A four-day domestic cricket match has started at the Basin; the crowd is very sparse. I can't see much of the ground from here but the scoreboard man regularly pokes his head through a hole in the board to change it.
I wasn't in the best of mental states when Mum arrived on Wednesday. When I got home from work I rang Vodafone to get my phone and internet sorted for my new place. All the options were expensive; I said I would think about it. At 7:30 I met Danielle at the tramping club. Hordes of people unexpectedly filed in to see a presentation. Danielle, who didn't stay for the talk, said she'd never seen so many people there - I half-jokingly said that someone had probably been to the Himalayas. Which they had. A woman of about Mum's age - and without a full set of fingers - proceeded to give a talk about her intrepid Himalayan adventures in the seventies and eighties. She lost her boyfriend on one trek in the mid-eighties and she was badly frostbitten. Later she married a like-minded chap and they started up a school in Kangchenjunga region of Nepal (which includes the world's third-highest peak), bringing education, medicine and contraception to the area. Unfortunately they now face the task of rebuilding the school after a major earthquake last September.
Late on Wednesday evening I rang Vodafone again. I spoke to somebody (probably based in India) who was very knowledgeable about the phone network but who talked too quickly and didn't speak up. He was just doing his job, but he bombarded me with seemingly dozens of options that would all set me back hundreds. "Slow down a bit man, you're giving me too many options." The big mistake I made was phoning at almost 11pm; I was too tired (and depressed) to take anything in. Eventually I lost the plot and threw the cordless phone across the room. I felt terrible that I completely lost it like that in front of Mum. The front of the handset had come off but I snapped it back into place. He was still on the end of the phone! "Sorry but I'll have to ring off." The next two days I visited a Vodafone store in town. Those shops aren't much use because they really just want to sell you stuff. The one on Lambton Quay has a bank of five funky-looking world clocks which work but are surely just for show - the hour and minute hands are identical. I couldn't tell whether it was supposed to be 3:25 or 5:15 in London although I knew that in reality it was neither. I don't know when I'll get my phone connected.
Talking of phones, yesterday Mum's mobile rang while we were in the flat but she couldn't find it. I then rang her phone to locate it, but as I moved around the flat the ring never really got any louder. We did find her phone in the end. It was in the fridge.
The wedding. The main event. I didn't go to the wedding, just to the reception, but that was more than enough for me. The food was good and while the speeches dragged they did have a couple of moments of real poignancy. I ate too much and drank more than I normally do (which still wasn't that much). The tables weren't numbered but were given "meaningful" names - ours was called Castle Island after the town in Ireland from where Mum's great-grandfather emigrated in the 1870s (our family visited the town when I was ten). Despite Mum's efforts she couldn't persuade me to dance. It was good for the family to get together, even though the whole idea of travelling hundreds of miles and taking time off work to attend a wedding of someone who you share a few strands of DNA with but hardly know seems a bit ridiculous to me. I saw my aunt and uncle from Auckland for the first time in years (I worked in the same company as him from 2004 to '06). At around half-nine all that hip-hop crap started blaring out and I wished I could have changed the station.
Yesterday lunchtime they put on another wedding party at some friend's million-dollar-plus waterfront bach (bach!) but Mum and I didn't go. We were able to use all the packing (for my move) as an excuse. The two things I wanted to avoid, above all, were drinking and talking. Last night though we did have a much smaller non-wedding-related dinner at my cousin's place.
Tonight will be the last time I sleep in this flat. The block looks a bit grotty from the outside but I get a lot of sun here. The extra vitamin D has given me a boost I'm sure. The next place won't quite have that. Tomorrow at 9:30am, three men are coming to shift my big items the quarter-mile or so into the new flat. Mum has been very helpful with a mixture of organising all my bits and pieces and motivating me to organise myself. This weekend only three people have used the word "exciting" to describe my move. Mum flies back tomorrow afternoon.
Yesterday morning I found the time to play three games of Countdown when Mum was here, winning two of them. I won the first game - at the time I didn't seem to play very well but looking back I did better than I thought with some tricky selections of letters. In the second I finished strongly but was still fortunate to win. With four rounds to play I was 14 points down but I found SAINTLY to halve the arrears. We both then got ATTEMPTS for eight and a difficult numbers game ensued. I got three away and expected to be beaten but my opponent blanked so we were tied going into the conundrum. PRROTESTS seemed to leave us both stumped but only having two vowels and knowing that conundrums are never plurals ending in S, at least I had something to go on. I saw SPORT and then buzzed in with SPORTSTER (which I wasn't sure was even a word) with under three seconds to go. Apparently it is a word, so I won the game and avoided a tie-breaker. In the third game I faced a better player; my first-ever nine-letter word (SHARPENED) gave me 18 points and a slightly flattering (for me) 11-point loss.
I wasn't in the best of mental states when Mum arrived on Wednesday. When I got home from work I rang Vodafone to get my phone and internet sorted for my new place. All the options were expensive; I said I would think about it. At 7:30 I met Danielle at the tramping club. Hordes of people unexpectedly filed in to see a presentation. Danielle, who didn't stay for the talk, said she'd never seen so many people there - I half-jokingly said that someone had probably been to the Himalayas. Which they had. A woman of about Mum's age - and without a full set of fingers - proceeded to give a talk about her intrepid Himalayan adventures in the seventies and eighties. She lost her boyfriend on one trek in the mid-eighties and she was badly frostbitten. Later she married a like-minded chap and they started up a school in Kangchenjunga region of Nepal (which includes the world's third-highest peak), bringing education, medicine and contraception to the area. Unfortunately they now face the task of rebuilding the school after a major earthquake last September.
Late on Wednesday evening I rang Vodafone again. I spoke to somebody (probably based in India) who was very knowledgeable about the phone network but who talked too quickly and didn't speak up. He was just doing his job, but he bombarded me with seemingly dozens of options that would all set me back hundreds. "Slow down a bit man, you're giving me too many options." The big mistake I made was phoning at almost 11pm; I was too tired (and depressed) to take anything in. Eventually I lost the plot and threw the cordless phone across the room. I felt terrible that I completely lost it like that in front of Mum. The front of the handset had come off but I snapped it back into place. He was still on the end of the phone! "Sorry but I'll have to ring off." The next two days I visited a Vodafone store in town. Those shops aren't much use because they really just want to sell you stuff. The one on Lambton Quay has a bank of five funky-looking world clocks which work but are surely just for show - the hour and minute hands are identical. I couldn't tell whether it was supposed to be 3:25 or 5:15 in London although I knew that in reality it was neither. I don't know when I'll get my phone connected.
Talking of phones, yesterday Mum's mobile rang while we were in the flat but she couldn't find it. I then rang her phone to locate it, but as I moved around the flat the ring never really got any louder. We did find her phone in the end. It was in the fridge.
The wedding. The main event. I didn't go to the wedding, just to the reception, but that was more than enough for me. The food was good and while the speeches dragged they did have a couple of moments of real poignancy. I ate too much and drank more than I normally do (which still wasn't that much). The tables weren't numbered but were given "meaningful" names - ours was called Castle Island after the town in Ireland from where Mum's great-grandfather emigrated in the 1870s (our family visited the town when I was ten). Despite Mum's efforts she couldn't persuade me to dance. It was good for the family to get together, even though the whole idea of travelling hundreds of miles and taking time off work to attend a wedding of someone who you share a few strands of DNA with but hardly know seems a bit ridiculous to me. I saw my aunt and uncle from Auckland for the first time in years (I worked in the same company as him from 2004 to '06). At around half-nine all that hip-hop crap started blaring out and I wished I could have changed the station.
Yesterday lunchtime they put on another wedding party at some friend's million-dollar-plus waterfront bach (bach!) but Mum and I didn't go. We were able to use all the packing (for my move) as an excuse. The two things I wanted to avoid, above all, were drinking and talking. Last night though we did have a much smaller non-wedding-related dinner at my cousin's place.
Tonight will be the last time I sleep in this flat. The block looks a bit grotty from the outside but I get a lot of sun here. The extra vitamin D has given me a boost I'm sure. The next place won't quite have that. Tomorrow at 9:30am, three men are coming to shift my big items the quarter-mile or so into the new flat. Mum has been very helpful with a mixture of organising all my bits and pieces and motivating me to organise myself. This weekend only three people have used the word "exciting" to describe my move. Mum flies back tomorrow afternoon.
Yesterday morning I found the time to play three games of Countdown when Mum was here, winning two of them. I won the first game - at the time I didn't seem to play very well but looking back I did better than I thought with some tricky selections of letters. In the second I finished strongly but was still fortunate to win. With four rounds to play I was 14 points down but I found SAINTLY to halve the arrears. We both then got ATTEMPTS for eight and a difficult numbers game ensued. I got three away and expected to be beaten but my opponent blanked so we were tied going into the conundrum. PRROTESTS seemed to leave us both stumped but only having two vowels and knowing that conundrums are never plurals ending in S, at least I had something to go on. I saw SPORT and then buzzed in with SPORTSTER (which I wasn't sure was even a word) with under three seconds to go. Apparently it is a word, so I won the game and avoided a tie-breaker. In the third game I faced a better player; my first-ever nine-letter word (SHARPENED) gave me 18 points and a slightly flattering (for me) 11-point loss.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Feeling flat
I'm now officially the owner of my... what do you actually call it? It's not a house, I know that much. One word I see far too much of is unit, which sounds so cold, industrial, lifeless, certainly not somewhere I'd want to live. Everything these days seems to be called a unit, as if people are too lazy to think of the proper word. Apartment might be the proper term for what I've bought, but even that sounds a bit American - why use one syllable when three will do? - so from now on I'll stick to flat.
If I had a dollar for every time someone used the word "exciting" to describe the purchase of my flat, I could buy... a damn good bottle of wine. I stopped getting excited some time in 2008 I think. I mentioned this to my dad over Christmas; he said "you're not an old man you know." I know, and my inability to get excited any more is a problem. Not only that, but there never seems to be anything on the horizon to look forward to, even when there logically should be. The only thing I really enjoy these days is food. My medication needs to be seriously looked at.
Mum is coming to visit tomorrow. She'll be helping with my moving and packing (and getting my A into G, instead of E flat or wherever it's been of late) although that wasn't why she came up. My cousin is getting married on Friday; Mum and Dad were invited but of course Dad is still in the UK. This isn't my female cousin who lives in Wadestown (she's been married since 1998 I think) but a male cousin who lives in Hataitai. He and I have a lot in common. For a start, two of his grandparents were exactly the same people as two of mine. We also both have a chubby face. And we were born less than a month apart - I was born on 20th April '80, which is an interesting birthday because 20 × 4 = 80; his birthday is 16th May '80 (16 × 5 = 80).
My cousin and I are quite different. He exudes confidence and enthusiasm; I don't exude much at all. Because my dad couldn't make it I got a last-minute invite. I'd have been more than happy to miss it. I said as much to Mum. "But there will lots of family there and everyone will be dancing..." Exactly. "And the food..." Well there is that I suppose. I won't be going to the wedding itself, just the reception.
The autism group, which took quite a long break while a new facilitator was recruited - went well last night. We've got a new host - she's from Holland but (unsurprisingly) speaks very good English.
I had a few more games of Countdown over the long weekend. I've now had ten wins and eight losses, avoiding the walking dictionaries and calculators who have appeared on TV (you can tell who they are) but all bar one of my opponents seemed decent enough. In one game I was pretty happy to find ADROIT for six but I my opponent found ROOIKAT (huh?) for seven. Funnily enough I didn't win that game.
If I had a dollar for every time someone used the word "exciting" to describe the purchase of my flat, I could buy... a damn good bottle of wine. I stopped getting excited some time in 2008 I think. I mentioned this to my dad over Christmas; he said "you're not an old man you know." I know, and my inability to get excited any more is a problem. Not only that, but there never seems to be anything on the horizon to look forward to, even when there logically should be. The only thing I really enjoy these days is food. My medication needs to be seriously looked at.
Mum is coming to visit tomorrow. She'll be helping with my moving and packing (and getting my A into G, instead of E flat or wherever it's been of late) although that wasn't why she came up. My cousin is getting married on Friday; Mum and Dad were invited but of course Dad is still in the UK. This isn't my female cousin who lives in Wadestown (she's been married since 1998 I think) but a male cousin who lives in Hataitai. He and I have a lot in common. For a start, two of his grandparents were exactly the same people as two of mine. We also both have a chubby face. And we were born less than a month apart - I was born on 20th April '80, which is an interesting birthday because 20 × 4 = 80; his birthday is 16th May '80 (16 × 5 = 80).
My cousin and I are quite different. He exudes confidence and enthusiasm; I don't exude much at all. Because my dad couldn't make it I got a last-minute invite. I'd have been more than happy to miss it. I said as much to Mum. "But there will lots of family there and everyone will be dancing..." Exactly. "And the food..." Well there is that I suppose. I won't be going to the wedding itself, just the reception.
The autism group, which took quite a long break while a new facilitator was recruited - went well last night. We've got a new host - she's from Holland but (unsurprisingly) speaks very good English.
I had a few more games of Countdown over the long weekend. I've now had ten wins and eight losses, avoiding the walking dictionaries and calculators who have appeared on TV (you can tell who they are) but all bar one of my opponents seemed decent enough. In one game I was pretty happy to find ADROIT for six but I my opponent found ROOIKAT (huh?) for seven. Funnily enough I didn't win that game.
Friday, February 3, 2012
Countdown
In the UK Countdown is a TV game show where contestants display their lexical and numerical skills. It has run for almost thirty years, racking up more than 5000 episodes. I enjoyed it when I lived in the UK, not that I got to watch it that often due to its daytime slot (and we didn't have a video recorder when I was growing up). In each episode, two contestants battle it out over a series of letters games (where the goal is to make the longest word from nine randomly-selected letters), numbers games (where you have the reach a three-digit target using six smaller numbers) and finally a conundrum (a nine-letter anagram which you have to unscramble as quickly as possible). Click here to see an impressively swift conundrum solve from a contestant who has Asperger's syndrome. Unsurprisingly perhaps, a number of Aspies have appeared on Countdown over the years - here is some interesting opinion on the subject from 2008 and '09 (unlike most of the stuff on that forum, the thread I linked to is actually worth reading).
At its most popular (the nineties?), viewing figures reached an incredible (for the time of day) four million. The low-tech nature of the programme and the lack of valuable prizes only served to add to the show's appeal. The avuncular Richard Whiteley presented the show, along with maths whiz Carol Vorderman. Celebrities such as Stephen Fry and Tim Rice made regular appearances. In 2001 the show was extended from 30 minutes to 45 (I wasn't a big fan of that) and for some reason it no longer seemed quite as friendly. Then in 2005 (when my dad was having major heart surgery in the UK), Whiteley died suddenly. Due to his huge part in the programme's success I imagined Countdown would die with him, but it has survived to this day and is now on its fifth presenter.
Despite (or maybe because of) the lack of financial rewards, there has always been a certain cachet to doing well on the show. The winner of an episode comes back next time (up to a maximum of eight appearances), with the best eight performers of the series competing in a knockout competition to decide the series champion.
Countdown is (or at least was) more inclusive than most game shows - being short or fat or ugly was no barrier. Neither was age - plenty of kids have appeared, some of them making the finals. I gather health and safety requirements have unfortunately made child prodigies a thing of the past. There is a rule preventing people who lose in the first round from reappearing even decades later, except in rare circumstances. This I find rather unfair - whether you win on your first appearance is hugely dependent on who your opponent happens to be; many a contestant would have gone a long way if they hadn't bumped into a walking dictionary on day one. Plus you'd probably be less nervous, and perform better as a result, the second time.
I'm on the wrong side of the planet to ever go on myself (although Australia now have their own version) and I'd don't know if I'd be good enough anyway. Frankly my two-second TV appearance in November was plenty. But, I wondered, can you play Countdown online? The answer is yes, on a site called Apterous. You can play 30 games for free, after which they charge you £15. Most of the players on the site are pretty good, as you'd expect when they've paid to play. A fair few have appeared on screen or are using the site to prepare for their 45 minutes of fame.
I plan to play my 30 free games and quit. It could become addictive, and paying to feed an addiction isn't really that sensible. I've so far played five games, winning just one. My first game ended in a draw after the scheduled 15 rounds. I'd have been happy with that, but an extra conundrum was used to break the tie. Only it didn't because neither of us got it. On to a third conundrum then, and I got SUCCESSOR in five seconds to win the game. That was my only win, although a couple of my losses were very close. I realised one thing: I'm terrible at the numbers! Or maybe my opponents were just really good from hours of practice. My main problem was that I didn't quite figure out how to type in the numbers solutions, but even taking that into account I still wasn't that flash. My mental arithmetic is good - I don't have any problems working out 6 × 78 = 468, but with the Countdown numbers games you start with 468 and have to recognise that it's 6 × 78. That's a slightly different skill I think.
It would be nice to show one of my games here (the one I lost by two points was interesting I thought) but doing so seems to be in the too-hard basket for me.
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