Caution! Children At Play!

Well, it appears some of my fears about the pay increase were unfounded. I did get one. I got around 1.5%, which it would appear is around half the rate of inflation. Nice. Better than nothing though, I'll admit, and a number of people did get nothing, so I'm avoiding sounding too ungrateful. At the same time, I'm buggered if I'm going to feel guilty for getting a slightly less shit rise than them. I'm continuing to review my options (read 'cogitate in a mixture of CBA and indecision') concerning my working life, and I would imagine that at some point I'll decide to do something.

I think the fact that this is the third week in a row I've posted an update means I get to say that I've reverted to weekly updates. If I lapse again, I'm sure someone will kick my ass. That's if any of you care enough.

This weekend we went to visit SR and co. Little Miss is now about 21 months old, and has a brother or sister due to arrive a week after her 2nd birthday. And she's changed a lot (understandably, given it's 5 months or so since we saw her).

There's a lot more talking going on, for a start.

We went for a wander around Beverley, which included a trip to a discount book shop. Little Miss got a telephone book - a little book shaped like a telephone with a button on it that made a ringing noise. Every time you tried to have a look at it she'd snatch it and say "My book".

"No daddy" is also one of her favourite phrases. Anything he does that doesn't meet with her approval is met with that reprimand.

She was also very unsure about me. Yes, I know you all think this makes her very sensible. She was quite happy to play with me and drag me around showing me things, but whenever I tried to talk to her I got strange looks.

She liked Alison though. Possible because Alison bought a load of books, and Little Miss very much likes reading books.

On the way up we called in at Toys'R'Us to find something to take for Little Miss. We got her a musical dog that played various tunes as you pulled it along the floor. While we were in there though, I also found that the Transformers Energon basic blister packs were on '3 for 2', so I thought it rude not to get three of them (after all, it was a bargain). So I got Strongarm and Battle Ravage and the three minicons that combine to form the Energon Saber (sic).

I also helped SR to fit lights in two of the bathrooms. He wasn't confident of matters electrical, so needed a bit of a hand in getting past that. We fitted the first one as a joint effort, then he did the second more or less on his own.

It took us three hours to make the journey back, partly because we made a dog's dinner of navigating to the M62 (it took us an hour to get from Beverley to the M62, if that means anything to anyone), and partly because we stopped for a tea break because Alison (who was driving) was getting sleepy and I was on the verge of nodding off which meant we couldn't just swap over.

And Alison got sucked into watching Average Joe last night. Oh, the shame!

I'm browsing Jobserve at the moment. It's a start.