Also, the mood felt different, because of me going somewhere on holiday around summertime in the past few years - this was the first summer since 2008 that I didn't go anywhere (a day trip to Tynemouth doesn't count), and I missed doing so. Really hope next summer will be a different story.
On that note, it's about time I spilled some beans - when Nicole was over here with me back in May, she told me that there was an opportunity for a temp job in her neck of the woods, a chance for me to live and work in the US for a few months. I was all for it until I read about getting a visa in order to go do that - far too much hassle, far too much expense. And would they really give me a visa once they saw that I was unemployed? It just wouldn't be worth it sadly.
I mentioned previously about possibly ending up on a brain-dead training programme, courtesy of the jobcentre - I have been referred to what's called the "Work Programme", which means a sort of agency called Avanta are going to work with me for the next 2 years to try and "help" me get a job. By "help", I mean they're probably just gonna shove me on every training course and work placement under the sun for the next 2 years just to keep me out the road and make the jobcentre's unemployment figures look better than what they actually are. Same old story, just repackaged.
On a better note, this month I also took the plunge and bought a new laptop - it was a last minute thing, the laptop in question is a Lenovo IBM ThinkPad, with Windows XP and dual core, selling for only £145. Bargain, and it was a much-needed replacement for my Sony Vaio, which has started to slow down and switch itself off when overheated. So far the new laptop is blowing the old one out of the water performance-wise.
Last but not least, here's some artwork, and instead of a clichéd beach scene, here's some heavy metal spiders:
"Araknid: Heavy Metal Spiders" - what you get when you mix two things I like, music and cartoon characters.
See you in September.
