Well, crikey. Things were pottering along quite nicely and then all sorts of ups and downs appear from nowhere. I went out to meet the other Andrew Jackson for coffee yesterday (which was good), after which we walked over to a cafe called Lido (which was also good). On the way there, however, some idiot threw an almost-full can of Speights out of a fourth floor window and it hit me on the head (which was not good - but at least it was a glancing blow. If it had hit me straight on I think it would have knocked me out).
I wandered home after Lido, still slightly stunned, only to find when I got there that I’d lost all my keys somewhere along the way (definately very not good indeed). So, wandered back in to town and met up with work folks for a beer before going to see some improvised comedy at the Bats theatre (which was pretty good) and managed to completely forget about my loss of keys. Couldn’t get in touch with my flatmates, so ended up crashing at a friends place. As well as all of this, due to overspending on my holiday the other week I’ve got very little cash and have more or less run out - a week before I get paid again!
Back on the plus side, my boss here has just told me how pleased he is with my work, and offered me a further short-term (6mth) contract back out here again (inc. flights!). So, I could come home for a bit, catch up with folks, maybe work for a couple of months, and then come back out here and miss another pair of winters. So, a rather eventful few days appears to have culminated in a very flattering and tempting offer. In short: Blimey. I’ll have to give this some serious thought, but the advantage is that I don’t have to give an absolutely final answer until after I’ve been home again.