First signs of spring

The bulbs in our sitting room have burst into flower over the last couple of days and the first snowdrop is in bud in the garden. It's even almost light as we leave for work - looks like spring is on its way.

It's good to see these good omens as both Tim and I are a bit down at the moment. Tim is back into his studying for CFA part 2, which is in June. He's got lots to learn in a relatively short time and at the same time his work has got very busy. The contract he's been working on intensively for the past few months has just hit some difficulties with the client which, although not Tim's fault at all, made him understandably a bit down and a bit stressed over the last few days. To top it all off he twisted his ankle again at badminton last night so couldn't play!

Meanwhile we have come to the decision that I should seriously look for a new job. As most of you will know I've not been happy at work for a while, mainly due to the lack of pay rises but also because I've not ended up doing the job I wanted to do when I started three years ago. Over the last year I've ended up working full time on a specific contract which has required learning lots of new software packages. Unfortunately, none of these packages are of use in the wider world. The contract is expected to continue for another year, at the end of which time the whole system will probably be mothballed - leaving me with a load of skills in defunct software! Meanwhile, because I'll be working on it full time I won't build up any skills in the new, longer-term projects which are coming on board.

To top it all off, our Chief executive (not the greatest people manager in the world) has just decided that our entire department must work an average of 15% overtime - with no mention of when this will end. Over the last 6 months we've all been working 10-15% overtime and people are getting tired. We're happy to work overtime as the individual projects we're working on require it, but we're not keen on working even more just to jump through some hoop for our Chief exec and prevent the expense of him recruiting some more people. There has been a lot of muttering in the ranks over the last couple of days and the morale of the department has dropped significantly. I may not be the only one looking at the jobs pages...

The main problem is I have no idea what to look for. I've moved away from meteorology into aerodynamics, but there are no other jobs available in that field. I've got lots of strong transferrable skills, especially in presentations, training, problem solving and customer interaction, but very little project management experience. Where can I put those skills to good use - close to Bedford??!

Sorry for the general 'down' tone of this entry. We'll try to be sunnier soon. Any suggestions for me and general ecouragement for Tim and I would be good - February could be a tough month for both of us!