Every now and again I do the audit challenge.  You have to audit something, being completely honest, whether it is the contents of your handbag, what is on your desk, your bedside table, etc.  Here is my desk audit…

Corner 1: Mayhem corner

1.  The Pink Panther – a large pink paperweight
2.  Momiji Jesus figure, missing a finger
3.  Mickey mouse collectable figurine from EuroDisney – a gift from Mark and Indi
4.  A pirate stolen from Vinegar Hill
5.  A perspex container full of Pantone pens
6.  Desk tidy full of fancy pens and pencils
7.  NEXT lipbalm
8.  Scanner

Cidersville

1,2,3: Spanish cider brand that we are currently working on
4: Coke – the drink that keeps me awake

5: Orange layout pad – for doodling ideas
6:  I am really fussy about pens.  The pen featured here is the Pilot V Sign pen
7: My ideas book.  I have a whole series of these – they are all the same shape and size. I stick things in like cool clothes tags, fabric samples, photos, leaflets etc, make notes in them, scribble ideas, doodle, etc.  It is sort of like my journal I suppose.

1.  Birthdays and addresses book – temporary residence for new web hosting clients and their renewal dates before they go into our system.
2.  2010 diary
3.  Paperwork (hidden so that it can be avoided)

Bankers’ bonuses are a real soap box issue for me. I find the whole notion absolutely infuriating. Look at this excerpt from a Times article back in January:

RBS’s boss, Stephen Hester, said last week that he had to pay bonuses, which will cost the bank an estimated £1.5 billion, to stop bankers leaving for higher rewards at rival institutions — an argument that prompted the former Times editor Simon Jenkins to complain that bank bonuses were “the most outrageous contempt of democratic authority in modern times”, and inspired the singer-songwriter Billy Bragg to announce that he was going to stop paying taxes. When asked by MPs how he was going to face the public backlash, Hester remarked “I thought I might go on holiday for a long time”. But does he have a point? Isn’t it true that RBS would bleed staff if it didn’t dish out millions?

Frankly, I am sick and tired of being patronised by banks and financial institutions (although I acknowledge that not all are the seame). We are told “Oh but you have to be exceptionally clever to work in a financial institution.”  Clever at what exactly?  Let me explain…

A couple of years ago, a financial institution offered me a 110% mortgage to buy a tiny flat in a not very nice area. They advised me that it was a really good idea. Common sense told me that it was an utterly ridiculous idea. Immediate negative equity.

A financial institution persuaded my Granny to let them invest her money in an almost ‘no risk’ (as they put it) fashion. They lost 10K for her in the process.

Bank charges. Need I say more? A letter is generated automatically by a computer and costs you £28 in admin, along with a £35 charge. There is no admin involved here, it is a computerised process. It is not in their interest to put in a system to have your card stopped when there is not enough money on it (I believe electron did though?), nor is it in their interest to have an online system that is up to date. Consequently you can end up being charged when your bank says you put in money before the chargeable amount left your account. Fair? I think not. They simply say “But you should know how much is in your account”.  Oh yes, so I should. Remind me why an online system exists then? I will stick to pen and paper shall I?

So, I am told that the bonuses system is thus… If you have a banker who makes millions for the bank, why would you not pay him a bonus of half a million? He deserves it. This sounds logical (although I hope he is taxed mercilessly for it) but the real question is, HOW has he made millions for the bank? Has he taken pensioners like my Granny and ripped them off at every hurdle? Has he been ungracious with bank charges? Or is it all about greed?

Imagine my attitude of “colour me surprised” when RBS announced today yet another batch of job losses (now 20,000 since the bail out). The government bailed them out to the tune of an extortionate amount of money rendering them 84% owned by the tax payer. The tax payer sponsored bonuses of 1.5 billion and will now be sponsoring those left on the dole as a result.

Who deserves a bonus?  I think of nurses, who are on their feet for long night shifts caring for critically ill patients. Nurses are not paid enough for what they do. “But it takes a special sort of person to be a city banker”. Forgive me if I present you with a disdainful expression.

I have come into work with JT today to hang out and mess around on my computer.  I have just sampled the best hand cream I have EVER stolen.  It is The White Company London “Flowers” with jasmine, rose, neroli (I am just not posh enough to know what that is?!), lavender and geranium.  Sue Seymour, if you ever read this I am really sorry!!  Anyone else, if you ever want to buy me a present………?  *pokes out tongue*

I used to work for this man:

(I wanted to put a photo in here but for some reason I can’t so I will do it later!)

Recently he has become something of a television star!  Introducing: Monty English.

It never fails to amuse me when it comes to election time, quite how archaic the voting system is.  Every party must have spent hundreds of thousands this year with their voting campaigns and, in particular, in encouraging young people to vote.  Fantastic.  It seems to have worked.  If you look at Facebook at the moment, the news feed is absolutely bombarded with political opinion and Facebook’s own little ‘I voted’ app.

So why is it, that when you actually come to put the critical cross in the box, that you still, in 2010, have to walk half a mile to a metal cabin, give a number from a piece of paper to a lady outside with a clipboard, give your name and address to someone else inside who finds you on a piece of paper and crosses you out with a biro and a ruler and then are handed two pieces of photocopied paper (one in lilac and one in white, just so that you can tell the difference) upon which you have to place your biro crosses (in a little booth) and then post them into hand-cut slots in a couple of storage boxes with sellotaped notices on (‘local candidate’ and ‘government candidate’)?  Wow that as a long sentence.

These votes are then counted by lots and lots of people, who then submit them to the ‘grand total’ (or the rather sketchy BBC swingometer that kept cutting out!  Haha).

There must be such a monumental margin for error with such a system.  You’d think that by now you would be able to vote online.  Or at the very least, that the poor assistant in the metal cabin might have a computer with a database of names on rather than having to sift through 20 sheets of paper and cross you out with a biro.  Perhaps a touch screen system?  They even have those in doctors’ surgeries.

It is one of those things that is both lightly amusing and frustrating every time there is an election.  I am not sure therefore if I would like it to change or not?  Thoughts?

It started with a slightly surreal chicken in my ideas book…

It turned into something VERY strange!

This is the third time I have sat down at my blog this week and wondered what on earth to write.  Bad times.  I have been so busy at work trying to meet a crazy deadline and am so tired that my creative stream has a bit of a dam blocking it and the water behind is going stagnant.  This is not a place that I should care to be in for too long.

This was my expression on Friday as I looked at my screen in dismay…

I have so many fun creative things that I would like to do out of personal interest, but work is getting in the way.  I need to have some fun!

In other news, my brother-in-law and his wife have just had a beautiful baby girl called Amelia Jo.  Many congratulations to them!

For my Mum…  To make her proud!