A bed of roses

Where to begin?

Well, with the most recent cause of excitement - the discovery that the Sky Pirate's Den has been introduced to FF12:ZA.  It really was the only complaint I had about the game, so to have it restored to me is a Big Thing.

The second is older - the ongoing bubble of excitement every time I think about the FF8R.  I just want to know the release date!!!  I saw a couple of things this week about the game's rating being released, which suggested its release DATE would follow soon after (FF7R hasn't got a rating yet and we have the date for that) but, so far, nothing.  One of the things I'm excited about is my gamer colleague never finished FF8, so I want to see what he makes of it :D  We're talking about a parallel play with us and with another colleague who did play the whole of the original game (and talked about spending ages defeating that mechanical spider at the beginning when you only have to fight it once and can then run away from it).

Thirdly, I am making decisions about self-publishing.  At the moment, I think I'm going to use Lulu (they sell ON Amazon but they aren't ACTUALLY Amazon...).  I'm going to do an e-book and a POD physical one - and I'm going to do a limited print run on a 'special edition' that includes a bonus short story, which is going to be the one I give away to family and friends, and sell to raise some money for church.  And will be the one I hold in my hand and breathe in and cherish and...  Ahem...

Another exciting development has been my director mentioning a regrade without me saying it first.  I didn't get an interview for the new posts because the panel felt it was too big a step for me - which I suspect means they were going on their knowledge of me rather than my application - or their knowledge of me influenced how they read the application - or something!  Anyway, nothing I can take to HR as a Complaint.  But part of the purpose of the application was to wave a big red flag at people to remind them that I'm Still Here!!! - and it seems to have achieved that.  So, now I need something firmer than a guilt-induced conversation with the director, preferably in writing.

The guilt came from the way I found out I didn't have an interview.  I fully expected the director to come to me and have a conversation and then to get the auto-generated email from HR.  However, due to last week being graduation and he and I not being in the same location very much, I got the email first.  This instructed me to contact one of the panel (not the director), which I duly did - and they emailed back to say they thought the director was going to speak to me.  I then got a very rushed email from the director apologising profusely for the mix up and promising to speak to me in person ASAP - which, of course, they did.

And now that the Lord High Everything is going to be some version of Deputy Lord High Everything (because our new Vice Chancellor was officially announced this week and it wasn't him), he may have some time to actually consider people lower down the food chain who have given a great deal to the University in general and his career in particular.  But I do also have to say that the University has taken a giant leap forward in the last year while he's been leading it.

This year has reinforced all the things Tao says about patience and timing.  So many things that felt like blockages have either disappeared or moved or I've found a way around them.  And there's still nearly half a year to go!