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Still no photos, no post for over a week and no comments on other blogs (actually scrub that…I’ve not even made it to other blogs!).

The stress of Mr H’s work (and the indecision regarding his team’s future) is making life a little difficult here at the moment. We were plodding along, coping, until last Sunday (29th) when Mr H pulled out of a parking bay and dragged the side of the car on a metal pole. A combination of the pole being hidden by the wing mirror and upright between the drivers door and windscreen and us being in a rush due to being late for church (again) leaving meant he just forgot the pole was there and swung across it (there was no car in the space next to us). The car is being collected by the insurer’s prefered bodyshop on Thursday (the earliest they could take it). We are fairly sure that both driver’s side doors will need to be replaced, though the main frame of the car is also damaged which may mean the whole car could be written off!

The accident was a bit fo a wake up call for Mr H. We’ve always avoided parking the car by these poles as Mr H has seen how many scratches are on them and hasn’t wanted to risk damaging the car by forgetting them or not seeing them, however we had no choice this time, there were no other spaces. It has made Mr H acknowledge (sorry, can’t seem to spell that today) how much the stress at work is starting to affect him. He’s been getting increasingly tired and easily frustrated but hasn’t admitted it before now.

Thankfully he’s been able to work from home most days since the accident as he’s not happy to drive the car (though it’s driveable and appears safe). When he has needed to go to work he’s ridden his bike. Part of his frustration is coming from the fact the team has very little work to do, until the decision is made there is going to be very little around for them. Mr H and his colleagues believe that the decision may wait until the rest of the company restructuring is done, however we don’t know how long that is going to be. They strongly feel that there is work for them if the big bosses think about it.

In the meantime, Mr H is keeing his eyes open for something new. If he resigns before November (or before the decision is made, if earlier) he will recieve a redundancy payout (due to the redundancy possibilities at the end of last year). That money would help cover moving costs if we needed to move, though with the housing market as it is we really don’t want to (prices here are starting to slide). However, a couple of other members of his team have already done that and if anyone else goes the team may be too small to be viable at all.

The munchkin and I return to Yorkshire tomorrow (until Tuesday) for my school reunion type thing. I’m not 100% happy at leaving Mr H alone for so long, he’s relying on me a lot at the moment, though he says he’ll be fine. I suspect we’ll talk on the phone a lot more than we do when I’m usually away. It will be good to be back at my school however, the concert we’re singing in on Thursday night should be great. We’re also going to fit in a girls night out while I’m up. It’ll be lovely to see the girls again, especially my best friend R, who’s back from the US briefly before flying off to start her new teaching job in Moscow! It may be a little difficult at times though as my sister L will also be up until Saturday (she’s at Mum and Dad’s already), I’ve written before about our relationship, I do hope that we can stay civil to each other, we usually start to struggle after 48 hours together. We’re just too different, as Mum says if we weren’t sisters we wouldn’t be friends. I’m going to try as hard as I can to make it nice for Mum to have us both (and the grandchildren) there together, it doesn’t happen very often.

I’ll hopefully be back at some point next week, but I may just have a bit of a break and come back in a couple of weeks, who knows! Bye!