weekend change

well this has been a confusing week for me apparently. I worked wednesday and thursday, then was off friday and saturday.

Oman has had a thursday-friday weekend for years, but UAE operate a friday-saturday weekend. this has advantages for businesses and banks, although our banks here in Oman have taken the friday-saturday weekend for a while.

a Royal decree came down saying that thursday 2nd may was a public holiday to ease the transition. we would then have friday-saturday as our weekend, and that would then become standard.

all fairly straightforward so far, no? since then, it's been a bit weird that everything has shifted a day. all our running club events have shifted, the social sea swim and swimfit has moved, and apparently it means I can't read the rota any more...

I turned up for work on saturday morning for 9am. I've got into the habit of checking the rota first thing to see who else is in, only to discover I wasn't supposed to be working. d'oh!

however, I turned it to my advantage and went straight home and baked a dairy free cake. result. also, I've sold my car :( but got a flat the other day coming back from the ROHM stores at ghala. my first flat. I'd never changed a tyre before then. got the manual out and followed the instructions. sorted. chris thoughtfully took a very flattering photo of me trying to find the jack point...

and this is my best side...

so my surprise day off also turned into a quest for new tyres. they were all a bit knackered and I'd never forgive myself if anything happened to the buyer because the tyres were shot... anyway, got them sorted that evening (saturday is the weekend now don't you know...)

anyway, this is all very interesting but it hardly expresses how bloody excited I am about crew allocation. this is now on SATURDAY. I fly out on thursday at midnight (woop 3 days!!!) and have a busy 72 hours in the UK ahead of me. 

meeting two great friends for breakfast shortly after I land, then down to visit another two and their babies (and a bump!), before finally heading to portsmouth where I have to get across to the clipper office and pick some post up. I'll probably get to the travelodge shortly before the ellen macarthur talk in the evening. catching up with folk from level 1 and other crew after the talk.

then.

the main event.

all day saturday.

I cannot wait to meet my skipper and my crew. this is the team I'll be sailing round the world with. that's massive!! me and heather (from level 1) have both been having the same thoughts that we could be left in the room and not be picked. this is both daft and normal I reckon.

bring on saturday :D

yes. it's may...

we have a start date!

clipper have released 1st september as the start date for our race! this is a bit later than I think we were all expecting (or hoping for) but now we know :)

we don't have a home port yet though. there is a lot of speculation in the fb group, with london (greenwich) and weymouth the two favourites. it'll be interesting to see how close the guessing is! personally my wish of somewhere in scotland or ireland has been dashed as the last newsletter said 'somewhere in the south of england'...dammit!

crew allocation is now only two weeks away!!!!! and in five weeks I'll be heading back to scotland!!!! it looks like I'll have to find some work for a bit as the race start is later than I thought, but it'll be nice to be working in the UK again. catch up with some mates and all that.

we have had really quite british weather here for the last week. we had a thunderstorm that woke me up (very unusual) and scared the life out of the wee feral cat we've been looking after - so she got to bunk in with me for the night. we've had rain that's caused flooding all over muscat as well. the wadis are really full at the moment.

work is getting busy, building up to the last bit of the season. we have ballet folklorico de mexico in this week and they have some fairly terrifying massive headpieces in the show...

claire realises this is the second friday in a row she's worked...

I think this one looks like the wee girl from the ring films. anyone else? ;)

nothing much else has been happening really, hence why there was no post last week...