Tag Archives: traffic jam

R Is For Reverse

Posted on by
21

Reverse is what we do when we change direction, and it’s not always something that we enjoy doing, but we have to do it anyway.

For some reason I was thinking of what to write for the Letter R, and the word Reverse came to me, and with it the memory of my Dad telling me many years ago about when he learned to drive, which was either just before the Second World War or during it.

It must have been when I was learning to drive in my teens that he told me this, although I seem to think it was earlier than that, so maybe when my Mum was learning to drive, but anyhow exactly when isn’t relevant to my story.

Apparently the old car he used to drive back then, which something inside is telling me was an Austin 7, used to be low powered like many old cars, and it was very hard to get up steep hills.  My Dad said that several times, because Reverse was actually lower than First gear, he had to reverse the car up a hill in order to reach the top.

It seems amazing in this day and age that people had to do that, but then only a few years before, we relied on horse power and to a lesser extent steam power.

I do remember when I was much younger, in single digits for sure, that when my Dad used to take us out for a drive in the country, and he used to love to drive and just see where the road took us, that we would quite often see Traction Engines, great lumbering steam powered Steam Rollers with huge wheels, that used to block the narrow country roads and cause traffic jams.

We also used to get a lot of hold ups in those days as well when driving in the country and the farmers had to move the cows or sheep from one field to the other, which invariably meant moving them into the road, down it and across the other side.

Those were the days, when it was fun just to sit in the car and wait while a hers of animals was shepherded down the road in front of you, a sight that you so rarely see in rural England these days.

Of course this all has little to do with reverse, and I have a feeling that my Dad (who passed away 5 years ago) was trying to tell me something.  Maybe it will all make sense to me later this evening.

As I wrote that I felt it might have something to do with reversals that I have made in my life, and I have made a few, notably getting divorced twice.

Who really knows the power of thought, and although the content of this post is now not really related to the word Reverse, one thing I am not going to do is to back up and change it.

Reverse Culture Shock

Posted on by
2

I have to admit that moving back to the UK after having lived in the USA for the last fifteen years is a bit of a reverse culture shock for me in many ways.   Fifteen years is long enough to get past most of the pangs of missing things from where you came and also to become well adjusted to where you moved to, however even after that length of time, there were still some words or customs I came across that were different in the USA that I wasn’t aware of before.

So having moved back to the UK and now having started back to work, albeit after almost three months of trying to find a job and spending much of my time at home, I am not back in the real world of living in England.

Working for a family owned company here is very different to working in Corporate America, where there are so many rules and regulations as to what you can and can’t do, and many of the traditions that might have been have long since gone.   Here for example, people in the department take it in turns to get tea/coffee for everyone, something that I haven’t seen in years.   The boss took us all down the pub for lunch on the first day, and it’s still acceptable to have a drink at lunchtime, whereas the mere mention of alcohol at work in the USA is a big “no no”.   Companies don’t necessarily have microwaves and water coolers here for the employees, in fact ours has neither, but there is a good supply of hot water to make a decent cup of tea as you would expect!

Driving to work is also very different to what it was in the USA, and for me it’s a step backwards.  No more driving 25 miles down the highway for me, or like in my last job 45 miles, which I could do in about 45 minutes.  Now it’s just over 8 miles to work, but it takes me between 40 minutes to an hour.   Only 1/4 mile of that is using a road that has 2 lanes each way, the rest is on just regular roads, and of course much of it is just one big traffic jam.

I guess this is just one of the downsides to living in the UK again, having to deal with the traffic, whereas in both Indiana and Florida where I was living in the USA, the traffic levels were much lighter.  Not only that, once I got out of the residential areas, the rest of the journey was on main highways with at least 2 lanes in each direction.  The traffic in the UK has always been terrible and it gets worse every year, but I am grateful at least that I am not working in London.  Most people working in London have to take public transport to get to work, and that just seems to get more unreliable every year too, so all in all I am pretty lucky to just have a 30 minute journey every day.

My next task, having moved house this weekend, is to sort out a food system for work.   In Florida I used to make myself oatmeal for breakfast in the office, and could bring in leftovers at any time to heat up in the microwave.  I also used to drink a lot of water, and kept bottles that I would fill up from the water cooler.  Now without either a water cooler or a microwave I am looking at alternative options, so will have to bring in my own water from home (since I object to paying an arm and a leg for bottled water), and will probably have cold cereal in the office, since there is a fridge that I can keep milk in.   We don’t have enough money for me to splash out on buying sandwiches etc more than once a week, and besides that, I prefer to know what I am eating, trying to eat healthy as much as I can.  Having lost more than 20lbs in weight over the last two years, I am determined to not put it all on again, as I feel so much better these days.

Well enough rambling for now… Please feel free to leave a comment…

New Job New House

Posted on by
4

I started my new job today, and all went very well.  I am hoping this is the right job to see me through until retirement.

The day started with my getting up before Debbie, which is unusual since we have been getting up based on when she needed to go to work.

As I didn’t have to go in until 9am today instead of the normal 8:30am, I left the house about 8:15, to give myself plenty of time.  Drove out of our road, around the roundabout, got 100 yards down the road and then sat in bumper to bumper traffic for the next 2 miles.  It took me close to 30 minutes to do that part of the 8 mile journey, the rest at least was a bit easier, and I got there on time.

The department was in a bit of a flap, since they installed a new computer over the weekend, and as always happens in IT, things go wrong.  I learned years ago to expect the unexpected, and this morning there were a few problems, but when you have good people who have been there a few years and know the systems, it doesn’t take too much to fix them.

The boss took us all out to the pub for lunch, which was a nice change, since in the USA drinking during working hours is frowned upon.  But this place is a lot more relaxed, and everyone works together very well in the team.  I managed to make a simple change to one program today and put that into production, learned some introductory things about the software I will be working with, and hopefully by the end of the week I will be well on my way.

Sunday Debbie and I went to see the house that we are going to move into.  Debbie had seen it a few years ago, but couldn’t really remember it.  I hadn’t seen it at all, and it’s really unusual to be moving into a house that you haven’t seen before isn’t it.   Well the house was ok, not perfect, they never are, but it sits close to the top of a hill and gets a lot of sunshine both in the morning and the afternoon.     Well it looked ok on Sunday, so we went back home, packed up the cars, moved a lot of smaller stuff in, and began cleaning up.

Tonight after work we went over again with a car full of things, and will continue until the end of the week.   Saturday we are renting a truck to take the bigger stuff over (chairs, bed, wardrobe etc), so by the end of the weekend we should be moved in.

It’s going to be awkward for a few days until the internet is connected, but then we should be close to being straight and comfy.   It’s amazing how just not having an internet connection can make a big difference to your life.  We rely on the internet so much these days, well at least WE do!  Still, by the end of October I hope we are both cozy in our new home.   Life is gradually beginning to take shape.