glasgow and lanark (2005-02-17 - 9:12 a.m.)

I have lost all respect for Dr. James Dobson ever since he said that SpongeBob SquarePants is gay. What IS it with Christian leaders trying to sexualize children's icons? You really have to wonder.

Things have gone all to crap at work. Literally, every day I've said, "Well, I'll stick it out, surely it will get better soon" and every day it gets worse. Last week, Wed: Alex comes in on his day off to train me, meaning he's worked a week and a half straight. Friday: training new girl in reception. Louise from accounts gets stuck in reception the rest of the day because no one else can do it. She's now working 7 days a week as well. Saturday: new girl says she can't come in because her dog is sick (on her second day of work!). Alex tells her not to bother coming back as she can't be relied upon. Monday: It is discovered that the ONE receptionist we have left has been emailing her CV out right, left and centre from the company email account. Tuesday: The toad of a general manager yells at Louise for being in reception instead of in accounts (despite the fact that she is there as a favour and would much rather be doing her actual job! And also has been working 7 days to cover reception as well as accounts.) Then he yells at Alex for turfing the new girl - "at least she would have been an extra pair of hands". Louise tenders her resignation on the spot. Alex gets very upset and storms out.

I just duck and try not to get hit by the fallout.

Alex seems to be back, so I guess he hasn't actually quit. Louise is still trying to decide. As for me, I promised myself I'd give this place a month and see how we go... but at this rate, the next resignation tendered will be mine. At least I only have to give a week's notice.

I've never worked in such a badly managed place EVER.

Anyway, had a good weekend at least. I'm actually starting to feel a little guilty for getting weekends off when everyone else is working so many hours... but none of this has anything to do with me, and for the moment I'm just going to work to rule. No point in putting in extra time till I know I'll be keeping the job.

Didn't get to see any castles, sadly, but did have a nice wee trip with Shannon and Jen. We caught the bus to Glasgow Saturday morning and fetched up in the Glasgow Tourist Info, trying to decide what to do. After reading every pamphlet in the place we saw a poster for New Lanark and decided to head there. We found a hostel and caught the train down, in what I thought was a pretty efficient manner, considering. Although Shannon did confound the poor ticket guy by asking what time the train left three times in a row!

Lanark turned out to be a nice little town. I really liked the place - kept seeing houses that I'd love to live in. They backed on to a sort of valley - green, rolling hills. Very, very nice. New Lanark is an old mill that's been made into a tourist site, though we didn't actually go in. (I think it would be worth doing, but we only would have had an hour and we didn't think it was worth the admission for that amount of time).

Instead, we went for a walk to the Falls of Clyde, which is much as it sounds (a waterfall on the River Clyde!) The waterfall was pretty, but it was the hike that I liked. We wandered along a boardwalk and up a hill overlooking the falls. Everything was green and moist (in February!) and it was SO nice to get out of the city for a while. The waterfall is used as an energy source, so there was a power plant and a lot of piping etc beside it - but it didn't really wreck the view, and it's a nice renewable source of energy so I couldn't complain.

We went and had a scone at the cafe, poked around the gift shop and had a long conversation with the lady working there who had been to Edmonton (but always wanted to go to Green Gables, which provoked a lot of eye-rolling on the part of the PEIslanders!)

Lanark is also home to a gorgeous little sweet shop, as we discovered on the way back to the train. Rows and rows of glass jars full of brightly-coloured sweets, and a nice old dog lying on the floor! Shannon, a self-confessed candy addict, was in heaven. Myself, I felt like I'd stepped into a Roald Dahl story.

I managed to lose the return portion of my ticket at some point before reaching the train, which set the tone for the next bit of the day. Luckily, the ticket guy didn't check too closely so I didn't end up paying twice, but I was still annoyed. Then we got back to Glasgow and walked the wrong direction for a few blocks before finding the hostel. We were all starving, but we had totally forgotten that it was Valentines weekend. Every restaurant we stopped at was packed to the brim! We got turned away from about four of them before we finally stopped at the Filling Station - and still had to wait for about half an hour before getting seated! I was starving by this point and dizzy and very unhappy. Then of COURSE it took ages to get our food, and they had to substitute some things, and then they overcharged Jen for her jacket potato and refused to change it. By this point we were not too pleased, so we paid the list price for the potato and walked out.

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Okay, was going to post this last night, but ran out of time and got distracted by going for a pint with Keri and Shannon at the Tron. Work was better yesterday, and then one of our FEW REMAINING STAFF (one of the porters, I think) got knifed last night in an attempted robbery. As for today, so far so good.

Anyway, as for the rest of Glasgow: we wanted to go out, but had no idea where to go. Bee told me some good places but unfortunately we didn't have a map with us and didn't really want to wander around the streets. So we went to the Walkabout. Sigh. It's bigger than Edinburgh's, and that's about it. We got hit on by rugby players all night and danced a lot and had ice cream from a cool vending machine when we got back to the hostel. (It had a sort of vacuum tube that sucked up the ice cream and deposited it in the tray - very suspenseful since it had to make a couple of attempts for each ice cream bar.)

On Sunday everyone was pretty tired (stupid early risers who stay in hostels!) so we just went shopping. We went to the Barralands, which is the dodgiest market I've ever seen. It was absolutely crazy - the place to go, I suppose, if you would like the DVD of a movie that hasn't been released on DVD yet! If you know what I mean. Lots of other things on offer too - cigarettes, CDs, alcohol, even a booth selling raw meat with a guy with a microphone doing the meat patter. Interesting place, but keep a close eye on your bag! "Ned central", as the above link tells us. (A "ned" being either a non-educated delinquent or a non-employed delinquent, depending on who you ask).

Then we went to Primark, which to be honest was one of my main reasons for heading to Glasgow. I wish Edinburgh would get a Primark. Dirt-cheap clothes, and no worse quality than anywhere else. I stocked up on enough underwear to last me for a year and came home with a giant Primark bag.

Happy belated Valentines Day, by the way. I had a very nice one, as I got a candle-light dinner (cooked by Keri) and loads of chocolate. And a massage! Could not ask for much more.

So it's already Thursday and I feel like I haven't had two minutes to just chill out since last Thursday. Hopefully I can have a bit of a quiet weekend this time around, because Steph and Remkes are coming the next week and I'll need my energy!



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moved! - 2008-05-12
Sunday = time to ramble on - 2008-05-11
apparently I'm doing monthly updates these days. Sorry. - 2008-05-04
watershed - 2008-04-06
end of trip - 2008-03-31

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