String and sealing wax...

[annwfyn]

1. My username is annwfyn for assorted complicated reasons. I wanted a name in Old Welsh, as I was trying to write a thesis about Romanitas in Dark Ages northern Wales at the time, and was quite focussed on it. 'Annwfyn' is the Old Welsh spelling and word for 'otherworld', which summed up something I was trying to create at the time - an otherworld, a journal space away from my then-main journal of winterthing. And most of the good words were already taken.
2. My journal is titled My Own Private Otherworld for the reasons explained above. It is mostly an elaboration on the name of my LJ.
3. My subtitle is nothing - I've never put that much up there.
4. My friends page is also nothing. Maybe Annwfyn's Friends. It's too eclectic to have a name.
5. My default userpic is a pic of me when I was about eighteen. It was my mother's favourite pic of me, it's a rather pretty sepia pic, my sister took it and it's nicely neutral which I feel a default pic should be. I use a lot of other pics tho.

In other news, I am currently meant to be in work. I am not in work, however, but am instead in Weybridge, which is why I am able to write in my LJ. Bless Surrey County Libraries and their liberal internet usage policy.

Why am I in Weybridge?

I am having a mental health day off work, which is to say I have called in sick for the sake of my sanity, and followed jez out to the small town he is working in today where I can wander around, read some books, and curl up in a library and try and get some university work done.

Why do I need a day off work for the sake of my sanity?

Well, that's a bit of a complicated story.

First of all, I'm beginning to get worried about my Masters. When I say 'worried', I mean 'getting a bit of a sick and panicked feeling inside my chest'. The reason for this is that I think I may have badly misjudged how much time I had, and how much time I was really available to work. That, and I think my work and myself may have communicated badly when I took this job.

You see, when I took this job I was told it would be two days per week, and occasionally covering for other people's holidays. What appears to have happened is that everyone has taken holidays over the last couple of months, which means I've been working full time a lot. In fact, for the length of my Hilary Term at Oxford this year, I've been working full time for most of it. Oxford terms are only eight weeks long. I think five weeks of that I've been working full time, and right now I'm being asked to work full time again for the last couple of weeks, and I am beginning to feel like it is leaving me behind with my work, and behind with my admin re: university paperwork. I've not made it to a single lecture this term (admittedly, I didn't have any compulsory lectures, and there were only four I was at all interested in and found relevent, but I would have liked to make them) and I'm just...

Argh.

Yes.

Stress.

The other reason I decided to take a mental health day is the rather pathetic reason that yesterday turned into a bit of a mental black spot for me, and I wanted to take some space for myself instead of staggering onward. I've also found this last week quite tough due to pierot working in Portsmouth and getting in tired and grumpy, and increasingly poorly, which has been worrying me. It seemed like a good idea to go somewhere where I'd have someone to wibble at if I did feel crappy, and also where (if my brain continues to work) I could actually spend some time with my boyfriend, have some lunch, get on, and hopefully just generally unwind.

So, I'm here. Jez is working at the moment, and I am purging myself of miserable thoughts via LJ.

Oh, in other news, I'm not on LJ really at the moment. I'm mostly either in work, where I have no LJ access, or I'm at home where we currently have no internet access. The internet is theoretically arriving on Wednesday, but until then I'm offline, and so may not be reading LJ. If there is anything I should know about, e mail me (annwfyn@hotmail.com) or call me.

Any news?

Comments

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

Masters > Work

Tell them that you aren't avaiolable to work full time. At the worst you'll lose the job, but don't throw away your Masters.

Oh, and as someone who has recently been through two theses, start writing early. Write up little bits of chapters so actually starting the document doesn't become something scary that you avoid.

And hang in there, sounds like some weybridge detressing is good idea. It's Christmas soon, and Christmas is a time of miracles, so be of good cheer.

[castorlion.livejournal.com]

I like good cheer!
(That's made with vodka, right?)

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

No, that's bad cheer, good cheer is made with Amaretti.

[inquis.livejournal.com]

Bless Surrey County Libraries and their liberal internet usage policy.

Surrey Libraries are obviously wonderful :D

You know, they do books too! (We get judged more on how many books are borrowed that almost anything else...)

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

I like their books too!

The other great thing they offer is a nice quiet corner, with a table and chair and no one to nag me if I sit there and make notes, or write up bits of thesis. So far the vast majority of my uni work has been happening thanks to Surrey Libraries.

[inquis.livejournal.com]

Yay! :D

And if you're ever a little further out of town, on one of the rare occasions we're open, New Haw is a nice little library, and we have a table too :)

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

You're in Surrey? You're only five miles away from us then!

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

*nods*

Jez works out your way a lot. Oh - in even more random news, my little sister is looking at buying somewhere in your neighbourhood - she's looking at Dorking and Leatherhead which I seem to recollect is pretty near Epsom, so I'm liable to be down your way even more often.

[twicedead.livejournal.com]

Leatherhead is where I work, and there's very little there, I'd suggest either Epsom or Dorking which both have better facilities and transport links. But Leatherhead is still rather nice, it has a good supermarket and a reasonable video store. Epsom is best place to live in Britain... leatherhead only comes in at number 9 :)

Dorking has a silly name, though. I would be embarrassed to live there.

[inquis.livejournal.com]

Ah, but Dorking has the benefit of being one of the nicest places in Surrey. But yeah, Epsom is very well regarded. I can also recommend Staines, but people tend to look at me funny for saying that ;o)

[headinclouds.livejournal.com]

I basically want to say what twicedead said - your job is a temp job, right? It's not something you want to do on a long-term basis/is not important for your career, and if you've been working so much more than expected, presumably you're not in desperate need of extra cash right now? So yeah, tell them you're sorry, but you accepted the job on the basis that it would be a couple of days a week, and that you're still happy to do that (assuming you are) but that you cannot be available full time. Your masters is more important, so don't let them bugger it up for you.

As some of us having been trying to tell you for years, you need to try this 'saying no' thing a bit more often. ;)

*hugs*

[cairmen.livejournal.com]

Er, yeah. What they said.

You will probably find they'll take your saying "Sorry, but I can't do these extra hours as I took this job specifically so I had time to work on my Masters'" much better than you expect.

But no matter what they say, I think you'll seriously regret it in the long run if you don't lay down the law on this. And I say that as someone whose client (for one of our contracts) is trying a very similar thing with us.

[castorpollux23.livejournal.com]

At the end of the day, you have to look at what is important: your own well-being.

Purging thoughts in LJ is very useful, it can be quite therapeutic.

Anyway, I'd say that you want to get your masters done, and if you can get away with not working, or taking a leave, you should. It's not worth killing yourself over. Your health should come first.

If there's any help you need, or anything I can do to help out and make things less stressful, let me know. Seriously. :)