Just smile and nod...

It's lunch time over here on this side of the world and I'm using the strong winds as an excuse not to go for my lunch time run! The hour that we get for lunch is fabulous!! At first I didn't even know what to do with myself---it seemed like forever! I thought about cutting it down to 30min and getting payed for the extra half hour but I have since decided that it makes the day fly by when you go for a run (or blog, read the newspaper, or trashy magazines that seem to rule this place, or meet with mol in the park!) for an hour in the middle of the day! Anyhoo! Work is going well--my boss asked me a few days ago if I would feel comfrontable answering the phones when things got busy. I'm pretty sure my voice was shaking the first few times but I'm starting to get used to it and am kind of loving it! One thing I learned really quickly is that you can't just smile and nod when you talk on the phone. The whole 'just smile and nod' has gotten me by many a time when I don't understand a damn word that someone says (esp. sarah who might forget to breath when she speaks---between me and mol, we are usually able to piece together what she says. Although, it may make for some delayed reactions!) but that doesn't seem to work too well on the phone! Which is kind of great I guess--I'm sure I'll be able to understand these Kiwi's perfectly someday soon but so far I've been quilty of passing on a few calls simply b/c I can't understand them! And I'm perfectly aware that if I screw up or tell someone something completely wrong, they'll be able to track me down with "that girl with the accent told me so". The girls have been sure to point out that there is no hiding for me!

Enough about work! Our immature flatmate that I have told some of you about (ya know ash, the guy with the chip on his shoulder!) has now taken his TV out of the living room. Hilarious. To make what could be a really long story short, Mr. Brenden (or, 'the b' as he referes to himself) is extremly immature and has gone through periods of outright ignoring everone who has come through the house. It's happened to me and mol for about a week until I said something and Brenden just pussed out and told me nothing was wrong. He has now started ignoring Phil for the 2nd time. Sooo, we all got to the point where we have had enough. We were all meant to go to his 21st birthday but decided that he treats us like crap and being there would just damper our moods. SO, we decided to stay home and have a party of our own! Mol had a brillant idea of picking names out of a hat to see who would be the birthday person---sarah won! HAPPY BIRTHDAY SARAH became the theme of the night---complete with balloons, a few games of 'circle of death' (in which sarah made a rule that you had to say 'happy birthday sarah' before you picked up a card) and some great flat drunken moments! We managed to stay awake for the All Blacks rugby game--we kicked butt!! And finally made it to bed soon after the birds started chirping and the sun came up! The B hasn't been around much since the weekend but this morning when we woke up, we noticed that he took his big TV out of the living room and left the smaller one that belongs to connor on the floor. We can't help but laugh! We hope it means he is moving out but it's more likely him just being spiteful.

Off to get some reading in before I head back to work! Hope all is well at home! Miss you all! Also a big congrats to my Rice girls who pulled out a big Conference USA win--that's HUGE for a program that is only 5 years old! Mol should be updating her online picture account soon so we'll be sure to put a -few- pics from our big birthday night up there!! :) (the website is written on one of these last few blogs)

oh--one more thing! I now have MUFTY friday's at work!!! The ANZ Bank has decided to join the rest of NZ and we are now allowed to wear jeans on friday! I think I'm more excited about the word mufty then I am about wearing jeans!