Getting Rusty

It has been almost a year since I last had regular work. I should be starting my new job shortly but there have been a few more setbacks in opening the new office so for the meantime I am still at home, enjoying time with Max and the beautiful weather. 

Last night I was laying in bed worrying if my year long absence from the workforce has made my skills a bit rusty. I lay there awake trying to walk through the steps of creating a pivot table in MS Excel and some of the other more advanced functions of the MS Office applications that I used to be a whiz with. I also have noticed my spelling and grammar has become a bit lazy. I am cutting corners and not paying as much attention to these things as I used to. Its a really good thing that I have been blogging over the past year, otherwise I think my writing skills may have become truly appalling. 

Big news this week was GM filing for bankruptcy and announcing the closure of several plants, including the Orion Plant in my hometown of Lake Orion, MI which is being put on standby indefinitely. I had a very surreal moment the other night when I was watching Sky News. Every night they air CBS news coverage, and in their story about the GM plant closures they were actually interviewing a plant worker in Lake Orion. Its always exciting to see your little hometown on national news, but to think that British viewers were watching footage of my town was a completely different feeling. 

The GM crisis hits home just as much in Britain as in the US. The British division of GM, Vauxhall is also being effected by GM's financial problems. Vauxhall is being sold off to Magna Corporation as part of the liquidation which will start a new chapter in the history of one of Britain's most popular vehicle brands which has been part of GM since 1925. In fact, we currently own a Vauxhall Astra and Jason's first car was a Cavalier, a Vauxhall Cavalier of course!

Only time will tell how this crushing blow to the auto industry will affect both my hometown of Lake Orion and my new home country of Great Britain. 

This Week's British TV Review:

Creature Comforts

Creature Comforts is funny claymation show created by the same team behind Wallace and Gromit. The show features little vignettes of claymation animals giving their views on a certain topic in a kind of mock "man on the street" format. The characters are always funny and watching the show really puts a smile on my face. 

There is a US version of the show as well, but what I like about the British version is the range of accents. It makes it so entertaining because they have recurring animals some with very posh accents and others with strong Cockney or Geordie accents which just adds a whole new layer of humor. 

There isn't much else to be said, you really have to see it! My internet connection is a bit slow at the moment so I haven't been able to get up a YouTube clip for you, but will post one when my connection gets better!