Blog back in working order

Many thanks to the blogger help forums for without them I would not have been able to gain access to my blog.  A blog that, much to my surprise, has been running for nearly 11 years.

Now I apologise for the haphazard way in which I run my blog, with moments of intense blogging followed by silences as life gets in the way.

So what has happened in my world lately?

Well a job that I had been working in for almost 20 years (initially working locally, then London, then remotely from Spain and again remotely from UK) finally lost the contract that was originally only going to be temporary until the client took it in-house.  Now for 18 of those years I had worked on that contract and whilst the original company had TUPE us across to another company I had helped to build upon this role and build the team until the clients were ready to work on it themselves.  Consequently it left me without a job unless I wished to either re-train and commute to London again or to accept voluntary redundancy. 

I accepted redundancy.  My redundancy started on my birthday 1st December and upon this birthday I reached the age of 65 and now fell into the bracket of "retired on state pension only".

But I am not ready to retire.  I am not ready to rely totally on my £164.35 pension!  I am definitely not ready to slow down or quieten my brain.

So, what next?

So far I have been brushing up my CV and applying for jobs.  Only 2 interviews so far.... Now I am pretty sure that I have the experience and qualifications but something seems to be preventing me from obtaining new employment.  Age is not really allowed to be a factor but in all honesty I guess any position would involve other colleagues and I would need to fit in with their age group.

As I continue my search I have taken on the joy, expense, and training of a young puppy to keep my other dog company.  I had forgotten how exhausting that can be.  But it is keeping me busy!