Holiday goals changed to doing nothing

Well, I made it to Halle and even managed to only miss one rehearsal. Although I have to admit that although I was at the Friday rehearsal my voice was not always quite as present. It was another great weekend and I really enjoyed the performance on Saturday night.

As always, it was fantastic to meet up with old friends as well as meeting new ones. This time round we even made the effort to participate in one of the non-singing activities, dragged ourselves out of bed early one morning and went off to see the State Museum of Prehistory. The few hours we spent there were not enough to do more than scratch the surface of what this amazing musuem has to offer. I'd highly recommend it if you are ever in Halle and will definitely be going back there.

Since the Happy Birthday Handel weekend coincided with Karneval this year, we even got to enjoy the parade on Monday before we had to leave. When I got back I was tired but happy, always the best way to come home from some time away, I think.

This year we also discovered the Irish pub in Halle, called Nante's (Nante is the nickname of the guy who owns it). We had a great night out there - they let us borrow one of their guitars and we started a really fun singalong session.

I now have the rest of the week off as I needed to use up some holiday time. I had planned to spend the time sorting out my balcony. The tiles badly need to be cleaned and then I wanted to buy some stones, soil and compost and get my pots filled and ready for planting a few things. If I got very adventurous I thought I might manage to finish painting my CD shelf. And maybe one or two other things as well. But instead of all that, I think I'm switching to just doing nothing at all. Well, that's about as much as I've done the last two days and it feels about the right speed so I'm just going with it. But even doing nothing I've still gotten one or two things done. Today, for example, I took out the documentation for the bank I opened up an investment account with and then never got around to actually setting up properly. I knew that had dragged on a bit and so when searching for tax-related stuff recently I had put anything I found dealing with that account into one place.

It took me several phone calls and resetting passwords etc. but today I finally got it set up. And I added in a current account as well as the investment account. This bank, ING-DIBA, does not have any charges associated with its current account. I've been happy with my current bank up to now but there are two reasons I've decided to bite the bullet and change. The first is that the selection of ATMs near me for my bank or any of its partner branches is really poor. The second is that I fell foul of their lodgement limit again this month. I thought it was 1,100 per month but it seems it's 1,200. I need to go back and check the last time this happened - I think they may have increased that amount and I didn't notice. At any rate, I was about 30 euro short of that last month, which means that I need to pay the 9.90 monthly charges. The current account, you see, is only free if you lodge at least 1,200 per month. This is the second or third time since I left my more-highly-paid job that this has happened. Since ING-DIBA doesn't attach those kind of conditions to their free current account, and offers free withdrawals from all ATMs, regardless of which bank, it just makes sense to switch. Even if I am kind of dreading having to trawl through everything to make sure I notify all of the places that I have direct debits set up with. In the meantime, I set up a savings plan to start investing in my first ETF fund. I'm excited. It's several years since reading something on Fiona's blog led me to Mr. Money Mustache and although my 50 euro a month savings might take quite a while to build up to anything substantial, it's a start. Or it will be, from the middle of April and then every month after that.

Tomorrow, I have to attend an organising meeting for the March for Science before running off to my choir rehearsal. And then all of a sudden it'll be Friday again and the weekend will be here. So, I'm not going to put myself under pressure to achieve anything else other than chilling out and trying to get rid of the rest of this cough. Yep, I'm still actually sick and totally fed up with coughing and sneezing. So a goal of doing nothing for the next few days is entirely appropriate!

Rejection

This post may be a bit disjointed - it's one o'clock in the morning, it was another very warm day and I am tired. And browned off. Had to audition for choir this evening and didn't get in. And this after rehearsing with them for four weeks. Normally, I think, you rehearse for two weeks and then do your audition. But I wasn't able to be there on the day the auditions were planned for and then it seems they kind of forgot about me. Until I asked a question about something last week and it was all a big drama that I wasn't actually already an accepted member, culminating in one fairly agressive woman coming up to me at the beginning of rehearsal this evening to insist to me that I would not be allowed to sign up for the rehearsal weekend in September until after I had done an audition and been accepted.

Now, I'm not a great singer. I can hold a tune but I don't have a particularly strong voice and there is just nothing special about my voice. But I do have a lot of years of choir experience under my belt and wasn't really particularly worried about not being accepted. That woman's attitude and a couple of other things that I've noticed and experienced over the last few weeks were working in my mind the whole time that we were rehearsing this evening and I had actually decided that I would graciously decline the option of singing with them after my audition and was coming up with ways to phrase it politely. But as it turned out, I didn't sing well in the audition at all. He also asked me to sing something from the score of what we had been rehearsing this evening but I am not good at sightsinging, never particularly good at singing on my own and the fact that this audition was in front of five or six other people (I was so nervous when I realised people other than the conductor would be there that I never even counted) really didn't help. The conductor said that they only need altos who can sing very loudly and powerfully and that's why they wouldn't be taking me but really, I had sung badly enough that I knew I wasn't going to be taken. Even though I know that choir wasn't a good fit for me though, it's still horrible to be the one rejected instead of the one rejecting. Oh well.

After the week I've had and the effects of my most unwelcome guest still being felt, I am more than ready for this week to be over. But I still have to work tomorrow because I took Tuesday off (because of unwelcome guest being here - even if I did end up sending her packing that day). And what was the annoyance she created for me today? She moved an old suitcase (the kind of square/boxy looking type from the 60s). I knew she had obviously looked in it because what was resting on top of it was put back the wrong way around but this morning, as I was walking round the corner near where it stands, I stubbed my toes really badly. Because she put it back the wrong way around, it was occupying a couple of millimetres more space than usual (lid was to the outside rather than against the wall) and that was enough to put me off my stride/get in the way. Look away now if you're not fond of feet, you may not want to catch a glimpse of the photo down below! Here are a couple of others as illustration of some of what was done on Monday to increase distance between here and pic of bruise.

The (re-created) before. Actually, I realised afterwards that that cable wasn't even there, it was on the window sill. So it was just the books and the adapter. I had left these piled here without putting them onto the shelf below as they are the books I read before and during my move and I haven't yet added them to the list I keep of books I've read.

And this is how it looked when I got home. I'd like to point out that this bookshelf is in my bedroom. The more I think about the fact that she was tidying up stuff in my bedroom the more it annoys me. Whatever about being in there when I was there the evening before...if you are visiting someone and they are not at home, you just do not go into their bedroom at all. You just don't.









Trying to look on the bright side, being rejected by that choir means my weekend is now free and not taken up with two performances, I don't have to spend the money on the summer party planned for after the performance on Sunday and will save a bunch by not having to attend the weekend away in September. I've already checked out the university website (which I should have just done in the first place) and there's a choir or two there that look like feasible options for me. As most choirs here seem to take a break in August it does mean that I'll have to wait until September now, which is a bit annoying. There are worse things to deal with though. And in the meantime, I still do have my local choir to sing with. It might not be very good, but they are definitely more friendly. And positively thrilled to have someone under 60 joining them. :-)

Yep, that's a bruise alright.

Time to move on

A new month and time to get my act together and just get on with things. I've spent a good part of the morning on the phone. With the social welfare office to check whether the money I received yesterday (unemployment money for February) already took into account the side-job earnings for January, information I sent them two weeks ago. Of course it doesn't. With the health insurance people who sent me the information on what they have submitted to the tax office on my behalf, as it didn't seem to add up. Turns out the amount I was refunded as part of the bonus program last year was almost exactly the same as the amount I was refunded just last month for the extra payment I made in December. Glad I phoned to clear it up though. And then with the agency which has given me most of the translation work I've done so far. There's another big project coming up and since there doesn't seem to be a rush on it, there's a possibility I might get the entire thing myself and not end up sharing it with two others. That would obviously be fantastic. It's a lot of work though so I really do need to get myself organised. I have another client who has sent me the first section of their masters thesis to proofread, too.

So far, my four months of not working have not been very structured. In November, I crashed out a bit, exhausted after finishing work (especially the nearly 150 hours I worked in my final two weeks) but with other commitments to still take care off. It was a double concert month for choir (two of our best concerts ever, I have to admit) so that was rehearsal plus weekend rehearsal plus the weekend of the concerts itself. I finished the translations for the memory/Alzheimers videos, which included meeting with a German friend a few times to double-check some of the German. And I had a couple of other, paid, translation jobs, as well. Not to mention the back and forth with the tax office to get my tax number sorted and the health insurance place.

In December, the first time I actually had a few days with nothing at all to do, I spent three and a half days in bed. And boy, did I need it. I didn't sleep overly much, mostly read or just lay there thinking but I desperately needed a time of as little sensory input as possible. Then followed my birthday weekend, with a lovely visit from one of my best friends. And all of a sudden, a big translation project, which took up a lot of time over the next few weeks, as well as trying to get a handle on the housework and prepare for christmas. My week in Ireland for that was a much-needed break, which felt very strange considering I had just spent the last two months unemployed.

In January, it finally seemed like I would be able start getting myself properly organised. I had another fairly big translation, as well as some smaller ones. Got stuff mostly sorted with the social welfare office. Ramped up my efforts to find a new job. Got back on track a bit with meal plans and cooking proper food.

And I'm not really sure what happened to February. I'm constantly astonished at how quickly the month goes by, even though it's only two or three days shorter than every other month. I did get some things done but it was by no means a powerhouse month.

February did end with a brilliant weekend though. My annual trip to Halle to sing the Happy Birthday Handel performance of Messiah. It was a bit quieter this year, with the most of the late nights ending at eleven or twelve rather than two or three. I was kind of glad the others were doing that, though, as it suited me very well to sleep well and then not be dragging through the next day's rehearsal. As always, I spent the weekend hanging around with my men - a group of retired guys from an Irish choir. I knew one of them in college and then we met again at this event in 2011. It wasn't until the second time I was there, in 2013, that I really got to know the others but now I love spending time with them and I think at this stage they expect me to be with them. It's really nice.

One of my cousins was there, too, and I brought her out for lunch on one of the days. We spent a couple of hours catching up, something we're always saying we'll do but that we never seem to get around to. She's ten years older than me and my mum lived with them when she first moved up to Dublin, so I have to admit to feeling a bit emotional at some of the things she talked about. But it's nice to hear things, too. Now I know, for example, that my mum was the only one of her family to go to secondary school (she was exceptionally bright, apparently. I think as a kid I just always assumed that everyone's parents were clever and then after she died, I didn't really think about it at all). And that when we were younger, she said to my cousin that the one thing she hoped was that when we were older, she and us would be friends, the way her older sisters were with their kids. And that apparently, I am named after a film star. My cousin wasn't certain if it was an actor or a character but it's interesting to know that.

But now it's March and I can't just drift any longer (much as I would love to. I even bought a lottery ticket last week so maybe when I check that later I'll have won a fortune and drifting will actually be a legitimate lifestyle choice for me). So, today, bad start really, I'm taking it easy. I took care of those phone calls earlier and have filled out the form for the social welfare place on my February income. That's that. I'm going to catch up now on some emails and blogs, perhaps watch a small amount of telly and then I'm going to a friend's house. She has been having an extraordinarily difficult time of things and asked me to come and see her. I assume that will end up being the afternoon and a part of the evening, too. Tomorrow morning I want to get up and go for a walk as soon as I do. No hanging around, no lazing (or at least, no lazing until later in the day). Really, I want to start doing that every morning, although I might alternate going for a walk with half-an-hour of stretching exercises for the first week or two. We'll see how it goes.

In the spirit of starting over and moving on, I've also updated my savings totals in the sidebar. I've been lax about keeping that up-to-date and I want and need to start being more meticulous about it. In addition to the accounts listed there, I'm going to use the end of my paper chain to start a small savings fund for something fun. I got to the end of my savings goal with that in one fell swoop at the end, so I never ended up tearing off the last few rings. There are 12 rings left. If I take each one to represent 20 euro, then I have 240 euro to do something with. Perhaps even a cheap weekend away to one of the places on my places to go list. Now that I've (at least partially) sorted my job situation, it's important to start actually living the life I want!