Okay I exaggerate, but it was nonetheless not the prettiest of weeks that I've been through.

The placement started off okay, despite the fact that people under the age of 30 (35?) are abit of a minority at the company. I'm put into the Service division where we're essentially engineering consultancy for a wide range of applications. Steel and paper industry and wind turbines, to name a few. Awesome stuff... this. Definitely fulfilled my resolution not to be so narrow-minded, being all gung-ho in motorsports all the time.

My cubicle-mate is an avid motorcyclist. His boss is a superbly nice and friendly person with loads of CAD experience under his belt. My boss is great too. No complaints at work really, with the exception of no makan places at all in the surrounding area. Thus I'll have to make do with the site's cafe for the year. Thy shalt not komplen.

I digress. My 14-day suckfest began on the 23rd, when I started my placement. Because the tenancy agreement for the new accommodations in Luton won't be ready till the 30th, I stayed in London. Many thanks to Cheebai Jeng and Auntie Connie for the keys to their flat. Commuting daily from London to Luton costs a princely sum of 16 pounds return. That's 80 quid a week. Sniffles. My new accommodations required an admin fee of 120 pounds, a deposit and first month's rent amounting to 500 pounds. I am now broke.

Then there's the accommodation. It is a bedsit. It has no shower and washing machine. It's electricity supply is coin-operated. I can't wait to get out of that place. During the viewing, the good man conveniently forgot to mention the coin operated bath hidden behind the bathroom door where if you wanted to wash yourself, you put a 1 pound coin in, wait an hour and a half and voila, you have hot water. I've decided to shower at the company. This fuck up was my fault, because I cannot find anyone else to blame. Luckily the contract is only for 6 months.

I had also gotten a mobile broadband contract from Three. Nifty things. Plug it in the USB of your lappie and you're online. No cables, no phone lines and no mess. It didn't work though, because my lappie sucked monkey balls as I discovered later. That caused me plenty of grief. Emphasis on 'plenty'. Boredom set it.

Big big hugs and many many muaxxes to Tre-sama for being awesome. She ferries and stores my worldly possesions, helps me move, sorts out my lappie, washes and irons my clothes and cooks for me. Of late she's also been feeding me Piriton, Ibuprofen and Clarinase because I had the bad luck of falling ill as icing on this cake of misfortune. I love you babe~!

The good thing about working is the sick leave, I guess. I just ring the boss and tell him that I'm not coming in for two days. Convenient. One only has to self-certify when they get back. But really... these two days have been a much needed break. I'd probably end up chucking my chair in to the monitor amidst a heavy-headed feeling and the inability to breathe thanks to the stuffed airways.

Now that I'm still snivelling while writing this, I shall run off to get more tissues to stuff my nose with.