This weekend was one of the bests ever. So much joy it will be difficult to put to words.

It was My Love’s birthday last week, and to surprise him I booked a weekend in a little chalet up north. He knew there was something coming up, but with no details. He was only allowed one instruction from the navigation system at a time to get us to our getaway destination.

We arrived to the chalet during a gorgeous sunset, to find a lovely little place surrounded by green mountains. The room was decorated for My Love’s birthday and romance was in the air.

We spent our first night there relaxing, and only went out for dinner in a nearby pub. On Friday we went out travelling to see the sceneries around, visit a little winery and have and wonder around, and ended our day with the most amazing vegetarian dinner. Unfortunately it rained cats and dogs on Saturday, so there was nothing to do other than spend the whole day in bed, which was not such a bad thing at all.

Coming back home was not easy and going back to work was even more difficult, but I’m sure this will not be the last of our wonderful weekends together.

Happy Birthday, My Love!

P.S. Photos coming soon.

Happy Christmas everyone!

Holiday cheers and Christmas bestseller compilations are filling the air and music shops once again, and no decent new album can be found.

Like everyone else, I once again compiled my “Best Albums of 2003″ list. However, my list is completely biased. I only included as candidates albums that were published this year and that I have purchased or listened to many times. This means that there are some albums that may have missed the list because I didn’t have the chance to listen to them or because I only purchased them recently and haven’t yet made up my mind about them (such as The Strokes’ Room On Fire and Muse’s Absolution).

Here goes:

5. Placebo, Sleeping With Ghosts – I didn’t like it when I first listened to it, but a few months later I picked it up again, and just couldn’t take it out of my CD player.

4. Belle & Sebastian, Dear Catastrophe Waitress – I know I wrote a rather bad review about it, but this album is a grower. I still stand by my initial words that this is not the best B&S album ever, but this does not exclude it from the best albums list this year.

3. Blur, Think Tank – What else can I say? The gig was amazing, the album got hold on me immediately on a first listen and never let go.

2. Radiohead, Hail to the Thief – Another masterpiece from Radiohead’s studio. They can’t do anything bad. However, it is a bit of a regression from the turn they took with Kid A and Amnesiac which I liked a lot.

1. The White Stripes, Elephant – A deserving album for the top spot. An album which made me go WOW on a first listen and makes the long traffic jam to the office in the morning much more enjoyable (and that’s both for myself and for the drivers around me that probably find my air-guitar techniques at least amusing if not entertaining).

What’s your top five?

Sometimes there are moments when I wish I could just pull out my camera and take a picture.

This morning I was driving on the highway on the way to work when I arrived to a section where a load of tissue paper was spilled just moments earlier. The papers were twirling around in the wind, creating a white curtain that threatened the cars going through at high speed. It was surreal; a moment torn out of its day and time, as if none of the cars suddenly slowing to avoid the white sheets of paper is actually in any hurry to get anywhere.

I quickly passed the paper tornado and continued on my way to work. Nothing reminding of that short moment of beauty, except for a few white tissues stuck to the fronts of cars around me.

An addict’s nightmare is to come home after a hard day at work, turn on the computer, and find out that the mouse doesn’t work. Everything seems to be OK, accept for a little cursor in the middle of the screen that doesn’t move anywhere.

Don’t get me wrong, I get along well with keyboard shortcuts, but unfortunately browsing requires clicking. All I wanted was to check the weather forecast for tomorrow and make a clothing decision.

Luckily I could get my fix at My Love’s place. How good it is to have a geek boyfriend.

I feel like shit, and there’s no nice way of putting it. Just like there’s no nice way of telling someone he’s fired.

For the first time ever I was involved in a firing talk today. Luckily my boss was assigned with doing most of the talking, but being the relevant team leader I had to be present and contribute. I never even had the chance of a practice at my own firing, since the only time in which I was fired was as part of a whole company closing down and the atmosphere was completely different.

There is no one to blame, just a hiring process that failed, resulting in bad recruitment and lack of suitability on both sides. It had to be done. However, knowing that doesn’t make me feel any better. Today I contributed to a good person losing his job during a difficult time in the marketplace, knowing that it will not be easy for him to find another one.

I learnt a very important managerial lesson from the ordeal, which is the importance of a more careful hiring process. Preventing a mismatch of ambitions and requirements at the initial phases of recruitment will prevent future need for such uncomfortable situation for both sides. I will do my best to remember and follow this advice.

I thought I got away with it. I thought that if I’ll be a good girl and take all my vitamins it will not catch me.

But No! No one can escape THE FLU!

Today the kittens finally flew out of the nest to a whole new life. I wish I could keep them and take care of them forever but unfortunately that would have been a bit too much.

First thing in the morning I took Sylvester and Tigris out to a secluded corner of the courtyard, along with bowls of food and water, and just opened the carrier box and let them out. Diana heard the familiar sounds of her babies and came running to see what was going on. They seemed to like their new surroundings, and Sylvester was enjoying wondering around the vegetation and chasing the leaves. Tigris was a bit intimidated. I checked up on them in the afternoon, and they seemed to have found a little cosy corner in which to cuddle and sleep.

The initial plan was for William to stay behind and become Sebastian’s new buddy. They were together the whole day and seemed to get along. This evening, however, William decided to sneak out to be with his mum and siblings and didn’t want to come along when I tried to take him back home. I guess he’ll be enjoying his courtyard life too, but if he decides to come home some time in the next few days I won’t stop him.

It was sad for me to say goodbye to such cute kittens, and it is a shame that they are becoming strays. I really wish I could find good homes for all of them. I’m sure they will survive, with the guidance of their mother, and I will keep feeding them outside and watch them grow. My only fear is that they will encounter some bad humans who will hurt them in some way, but since there are quite a lot of cats in the area, it is likely that cats have a good environment around here after all.

Now, my life can go back to normal, and Sebastian can continue to rule my life.

I really don’t like long nights at work.

Most often they are the result of some urgent problem that needs to be solved and on the client’s site ASAP, which means I have to wait around for the people who can solve the problem to figure out what it is they have to do, and then test it when they’re done and ensure the problem was indeed solved and ready for clients.

Usually, like now, I am too tired at those hours to use the time properly to deal with other tasks in my long To Do list, and I end up just surfing around the Net for a bit. It feels like wasting time. If I were at home now I would have had Sebastian with me and I would be wearing my comfy sleepers, sipping some hot herbal tea, or maybe a glass of wine. I have some leftovers of a nice Spanish wine from a recent dinner. My Love is away anyway and I miss him to bits, but at least I’m not wasting any quality time with him. Maybe if I were at home I would have been able to chat with him freely now.

I hope tonight won’t drag for too long and I’ll be back at home soon enough, though I have a feeling there is only a slim chance I will be able to be up on time for a gym workout in the morning.

I had a strange dream about blogging last night.

Am I going mad?

Once again the Bad Sex in Fiction Award is upon us, but this time, it is well received.

This year, the award was won by Indian writer Aniruddha Bahal who was delighted to win the award as a statement against Indian censorship, saying to the BBC that the award is a “rebellious gesture”.

Unlike last year’s winner, this time the inspiration is clear, with a quote describing sexual intercourse as driving a car. It reminded me of the Peugeot 206 advert in which and Indian guy is violently re-shaping his car in order to make it look like Peugeot 206. Does it relate in any way to sexual inspiration?

Also, should I start worrying about the inspirations of my boyfriend who really likes fast cars?