The world’s gone white outside – first snow of the season, and the comment via email from Matt this morning was “In November! In Edinburgh! … What have you done to our weather!?”

Well, it’s not my fault. Which is not to say that I don’t like looking out the window at work, watching the snowflakes float down. *sigh*

This one deserves a post of it’s own – The Mark Saul Band will most likely be doing a gig on December 30th (not 31st!) at an as yet undisclosed venue in George Street, Edinburgh. More details to follow as they become available!

As you can see from the temperature guage on the blog, it’s getting CHILLY in Edinburgh! But the sky is blue, and the sun is shining bright, so cold is more than bearable. It’s the days which are cold AND grey which bother me…

Had a job interview yesterday for a job at an organisation which would absolutely thrill me to bits to work for – they run kinda empowerment programs for youths from difficult backgrounds, at an amazing looking facility on the Isle of Skye (see the photo at the header of my blog – it was taken at Skye, looking across the water to the mainland). Fingers crossed, and I’ll keep you all updated.

In other news, I’ve not caught the mouse yet, but given Fiona’s caution (see the comments on “There’s a Mouse! In My House!”), I think we’ll be investing in some humane mouse traps this weekend. Hmph.

Yours icily,
Charlotte

As a follow up to the squirrel comments, my aunt Karen kindly sent me a link to what must be the KEEYOOTEST set of photos I’ve seen in a long time. And Christine, squirrels may be rats with bushy tails, but I actually quite like rats! Had many as pets when I was a kid!

It’s quick. It’s cautious. It’s the sort of thing you only really see as a flash the corner of your eye. Matt first saw it, and since then I’ve been on the lookout for it.

I got a good look at it the other night while I was on the phone to Mark Saul (international phone calls, gotta love em!).

I was all like, “oh my god! Oh my god! A mouse!”

“You’re not scared of mice are you?!” Said he, with a note of smug surprise in his voice, to which I replied,

“God no! I’m chasing it!”

But it’s hard to chase mice when you’ve got a phone to the ear.

Last I saw the little darling, it had snuck out from under the couch in the next room while Matt and I were watching some doco about the headhunting tribes of Papua New Guinea. Matt moved his arm slightly, and the mouse froze for a second, then dashed back under the couch and hid.

I can’t bring myself to get one of those SNAP! You’re Dead mousetraps. The little squeak when they get caught is just too much for me. The RatSak is even worse – poison which thins the blood until the poor little things die from internal bleeding… Ack! It’s one thing to give it to people who are having problems with deep vein thrombosis, but to inflict that on another living creature to bring about death? Hmph. Will have to have a think about how best to deal with this mouse situation.

On the subject of rodents, I have to just say one thing about Edinburgh – they have Squirrels! I know I’m not supposed to like the American Grey squirrels which have systematically been pushing out the British Red, but the greys are all I see in Edinburgh, and Oh. My. GOD! They’re so cute! If you walk though one of Edinburgh’s many parks, gardens and cemeteries, and keep a sharp eye out, you’ll see a whole bevy of these adorable bright-eyed and bushy-tailed little creatures. They have this way of scrabbling along, then stopping as if the laws of physics don’t apply to them, and inertia was something fictional. Then they fix you with one of their shining eyes, as if they’re laughing at you, then scamper on, either across the ground, or up a tree – doesn’t seem to matter which, they’re as agile on either.

Just so you know, I (and perhaps many other Aussies) would be more excited about seeing a squirrel than, for instance, a kangaroo. Those big ungainly hoppy things are 10 Aussie Cents a dozen, and with the exchange rate being about 71 US cents to the Aussie dollar, that would make them .71 dimes a dozen, which makes it less than a penny per kangaroo… you get the picture. Suffice it to say that seeing a squirrel is a pretty cool thing for me.

Was meandering as one does this morning, all ready for another day at work (a Friday, my favorite!), walking through the historic streets of Edinburgh. Quite a normal morning – the weather couldn’t make up its mind, and I was popping my umbrella up and down, depending on the heaviness of the rain. I’d gone up the hill of Hanover street, and down the other side, and crossed the road past the Queens Street Gardens, which as usual were locked up tight, with spikey fences advertising the fact that if you try to get in without a key to the gates, you’re likely to be impaled multiple times – so inviting! You have to pay for a key, and I’m not even sure how much, and then once you have a key, you have to register your dog. Not sure if it involves DNA testing to identify illegally deposited faeces.

But I digress. This story has a point. I promise.

So anyway, I rounded the corner into the street where I work, and was faced with a little drama worthy of a low budget BBC TV show – a number of police motorbikes, and some flourescent yellow clad officers mounted on top, along with another flouro cop car filled to the brim with more flouro clad coppers. I try to look without making it look like I’m looking (if you know what I mean), and then see a number of burly men in smart dark suits around an open doorway across the street.

A cab pulls up and some lady with a suitcase gets out and lugs it past these men, trying to not look too intimidated, and then I see the burly men in dark suits make threatening “move along” gestures at the cabby. At this point, I try even harder to look like I’m not looking – yikes!

A moment later, who should come out of the doorway but… royalty! Princess Anne (or at least, I’m pretty sure it was!), all twee and proper, not a hair out of place.

Made my morning…

Have had to have a looong hard think about what I want to get out of my time here in Scotland. Do I want to just drudge though some admin job, and experience Scotland during the off time? Or do I want to hold out for a job which I’ll find really truly fulfilling, and really develop myself during my time here? The firm where I’ve been temping offered me a permanent position, and I was on the verge, the very VERGE of accepting, and would have done had it not been for my favorite recruitment consultant (not the one I’m temping through) calling me with a possible job at a large multinational firm.

Well, that was 3 weeks ago, and I’d still not heard anything about my chances for that alternative job. BUT. It really made me think – I don’t want to put a stop on career development just cause I’m overseas. I really DO want something which will challenge me, and make me feel like I’m doing something really worthwhile, not just filling a position.

Meaning no disrespect to the very reputable firm I’m working for now, but I’m gonna hold out for better. Something that seems a little more noble. Or at the very least, more varied.