1. I can't drink the water here. It makes me very, VERY poorly indeed, even when filtered. Poorly to the point of weeping, in actual fact. Immensely painful stomach cramps, huge bloating and, well...''lavatory issues'', over which we shall gloss. Lord and Lady Oakwood have therefore purchased epic quantities of Mr Lidl's finest spring water for me. It's being stored in the understairs cupboard, which now resembles nothing less than a ''prepper's'' hoard against the possibility of a major apocalyptic event, with or without zombies/solar flare/rogue biological agent. I'm trying to ignore the plastic waste involved.
2. Cities (even the outskirts) are HOT. I miss the sea breezes at home.
3. Offices are HOT, even with the windows open. The only breeze comes from the helicopters landing on the pad outside, at which times all paperwork and loose items must be firmly clamped to the desks, and people go a bit deaf from the blinds all clattering together.
4. Ladies of a certain age, when dragging a wheely suitcase (however small) from home, need a minimum of 15 minutes after arrival at destination (office) to cool down and stop sweating. This is true even on cool days.
5. The full-length mirrors in the office loos make even the most willowy of sylph-like creatures appear 5 stone heavier, 3 foot wider and 2 foot shorter than they actually are in real life. Think what it does for the chunkier among us. It's like being in the Hall of Mirrors at the fairground...
6. I hate wearing ''office'' clothes. My new, sensible grey trousers, whilst elegantly cut and suitably well-fitting, make me very unhappy. The brief was ''no jeans, relaxed office clothes, no strappy or low-cut tops or tee-shirts''. This week, I've bent the rules a bit and I'm wearing MY version of office clothes - dark brown fine needlecord drainpipe-cut trousers, black suede ankle boots, and, today, a tomato-red Ben de Lisi top. No-one commented or sent me home, so I can only assume that's acceptable. What can they do if not? Put me in detention for uniform infraction? I will not dress by George at Asda or the Tesco equivalent, which is what seems to be the default setting for ''office'' clothes here. Tomorrow, it's the same trousers, topped off with a rather nice Phase Eight black, bat-wing sleeve tunic. No surrender!
7. The office is large, but has too many staff for the space, too few chairs for the staff and too few scanners to cover the amount of work required. Everyone is permanently moving about, trying to find somewhere to sit. This also makes a mockery of Health and Safety training, as everyone spends inordinate lengths of time moving chairs and scanners round the office. Both are heavy, and very cumbersome to move.
8. Everyone spends the whole morning scarfing down sugary drinks and snacks, and then they wonder why they are all slumping by 2pm. So they scarf down some more, then ask each other for paracetamol to counteract the headaches they've given themselves. Seriously. Every section has a table full of mini-bites of this, and tubs of that, boxes of chocolates, bags of crisps and cans of pop. The two large fridges are full of Slimming World microwave meals. It's like working in a mini branch of Tesco. I've not seen anyone eat a piece of fruit, or drink the chilled water that's always available - except me.
9. On the plus side, though, the League of Fiends guys come through with a trolley on Friday afternoons - more sweeties, pop and, bizarrely, magazines. This is newsworthy because the two guys who push the trolley round have music playing, and did their whole stint with us to the strains of ''Sweet Child of Mine'' - which the older of the two sang along to at the top of his voice, in tune and with great skill. He was Awesome. They might just turn out to be the highlight of the working week...
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