winter and sickness

Song of the day: If I were a boy by Beyoncé – that is the song you can hear everywhere!

I had a weird week. Monday and Tuesday, I was feeling so bad that I had to go back home early. I was feverish and coughing so much. I had wednesday off but I worked the other days plus Saturday at 7am!!! 😦 I am better now but you should here me. I sound like robocop! 😛

Yesterday I went in town after work to buy my last xmas present!!! We re almost there… few more days and that’s it. I will be travelling to France on the 24th and will come back on the 29th. I am so happy. I haven’t seen my family since July!

gr

Song of the day: Ghosts by Robbie Williams

Today, after spending 16 hours on an issue yesterday, my colleague came and sort it out in 1 hour!!! Believe it or not! You can’t imagine how pissed I was against him. But I should not hold any grudge againdt him. He is part of the development team that have been taken away from the support. Yesterday he was tied up by another production issue and he wants to make a point I think to our new boss that the separation was a bad move… But hey! that is work! C’est la vie! there is nothing to do now! 😛 But I ma still pissed though! 🙂

that’s long!

Today I worked 16 hours, can you believe it? I started at 7am, got an issue to manage at 8am and left the office at 11pm after having talked to half th world! And the sadest part is, I go back tomorrow and the issue isn’t solved! Maaaaaaaaamaaaaaannnnn, I want o go back home! 😛

banks and computers

And guess what? I am working. I am at my desk front of my 2 screens, it is 11am and I have been here since 7:15 and I will be here for a lot longer… We got too many works to do on our servers and we need to be extra careful these days because of what’s happening on the exchange. All our servers have been rebooted because Windows Updates have been applied so we have to restart 50 servers, put the passwords for the frive mappings, log on all the apps. We are going to carry few upgrades, password change, …

Some work are done because they’re moving our support offshore to Bengalore. We have people over from India here with us and we need to train them to do our job. Banks are trying to cut the prices because we are too expensive in London! 😦 And because of the credit crunch, they told all our contractors that their wages will be reduced by 10%: take it or leave it. No exception will be made… Thing is, we are already so streched that it is difficult for them to sack us, permanent employees but because it is harder now to get a job in banking, they still can hit the contractors! Bastards! But I am sure their bonuses won’t be that much affected, only ours…

good to be back

Song of the day: Shut up and Drive by Rihanna – one of the best seller here that you can hear in every clubs…

Now that I am back I get back in the old habit. Today, at lunch, I go downstairs with one other colleague to get some food at the canteen when he told me he needs cash first. So, we went to the bank, and while walking back to the office, my colleague says: ‘let’s have one!’… and here we are, in the O’neill’s with one pint of cider for him and a half for me! 😦

hard to work

Song of the day: Hell is around the corner by Tricky

Now that I am back, I just want to go back… The situation is not great at work. Everybody stresses but not on our side. The ITs are safe as they don’t want their systems to go down during a rush period as it happens sometimes during the day. So I hve no worries about my work.

On the other side, I think I am more worried about my money. Banks are not a safe place anymore and I wish I’d kept all under my mattress!! My colleague just told me today that he moved all his money to Northern Rock because it is owned by the english state now. They nationalized it. This bank had to annonce bankrupcy few month ago and the state had to back them up to save the savings of people. Because it is now state-owned, people are sure to get their money back! What a world my friend!

I am back

Song of the day: I can’t stop the feeling Ive got by Razorlight – nice song

Yes I am back and in one piece! The trip was really cool but exhausting. We traveled around the country, sometimes in bad conditions, sometimes in good ones. Now I enjoy simple things as hot water, good roads or food! 🙂 I now need to create a page to show my pictures. For my friends, I have already posted few of them on Facebook. It was different, good, funny, bad, interesting, sad, tiring, rich, talkative, gourmand, overwhelming and a lot more! Jenny and I had good holidays and it feels good to be away in the heat. People were extremely nice with us… partly because we hablais espanol! 🙂 I loved it and want more. I am already thinking about the next travel I should do! 😛 Who wants to come?

Today back to work, and it doesn’t look good in finance at the moment! 😦 More later about that!

I don’t like bank holiday week end

Song of the day: Start Wearing Purple by Gogol Bordello – TOO GOOD!!!

On Saturday, I worked which is pretty bad. And today as well! But today was a bank holiday in England. I started from home using my new blackberry 😦 and my remote connection at 7am… and then the worst case scenario happened. One of our main historical server doesn’t start up!!! It went off line during the night without anybody reacting.

I was the central point of contact. Users in London who were working today wanted to be done quickly and go home, users in Toronto wanted their day not to be shit, the support people who were on call couldn”t be bother and were pissed! We had to make the decision to go to our backup solution i.e. restore the backuped database, chang the DNS, bring up the server,… all done by several teams!!! Just the biggest shit ever when nobody was on line…. Then our PC support team told us that the RAID battery was fucked and they had to replace it and we made the call to cancle the switch to DR. The mess involved 20 or 40 IT and as much users. A total MESS. But I am now home and will soon eat as I only 2 buttered toasts at 6:30am!

Luckily, I had a GREAT Sunday! We begun with a good and filling english breakfast. Then we went to the Get Loaded in the Park festival in Clapham Commons. I saw Gossip, Gogol Bordello and others but these 2 were the best! I love them!! 🙂

foutue

Song of the day: Love’s Been Good to Me by Johnny Cash – Have you seen the movie Walk the Line? This is J C’s life. Really good!

Yesterday, on Friday, the last day of the week, I receive an email informing all the IT people of the bank that my department’s boss and his boss will be off the 2 next weeks…. but I already new that my colleague who is supposed to be higher than me and his boss were off as well the next 2 weeks. So to sum up, my boss, my boss’ boss, my boss’ boss’ boss and my boss’ boss’ boss’ boss or to put simply, my N+1, +2, +3 and +4 are off the next 2 weeks…. How SHIT is that?

What am I supposed to do? Run everything by myself without escalation point or anything???? Keep your blackberries on guys, because the shit will hit the fan and it won’t be nice! 😛

going to work

Song of the day: Out of the Ghetto from Isaac Hayes – he is dead but he was such a great singer!

I finished my book beginning of this week (Emporium by Robert Harris) and I have started Run by Jeff Abbott. I have just discovered that it is called collision in the US… Isn’t that weird??? Both countries speak the same language but the title of the book is different… :-\

Anyway, this book seems really good but I can only read on my way to work in the train these days. I am so busy at work and I am on the early shift this week that is 7 to 17 for me… 😦 but in less than 1 month I will be on holidays! YAY!!! 😛