![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
My week is full of meals
Sep. 15th, 2010 08:05 amToday takes the biscuit, though.
First, working breakfast at 9.30 for the EU Heads of Mission. Please, please, please, whichever higher power deals with working breakfasts, please let it not be like the last one. It was torture. We had to sit at our tables, inhaling the scent of ham, cheese, sausage and scrambled eggs (not to mention the lovely aroma of the sesame sprinkled on the bread rolls), for more than an hour until the booooring (and totally pointless) speeches were finished. Everybody was drooling and desperately sipping orange juice.
Then lunch at 1 with the new Austrian education expert -- she sounds nice on the phone, and her predecessor, who is a good friend, told me she was sure I'd like her.
At 7.30 dinner with the police guys. Five of them. Looking forward to it, because I've always had a soft spot for policemen -- these are rather high-ranking, but that only means the stories they tell are a lot more interesting. I had to assure Stefan three times that, yes, it was going to be a totally informal dinner, i.e. jeans, no ties. I might be slightly late for work tomorrow, if the dinner goes as dinners with policemen usually go. Meaning lots of fun, but also lots of alcohol, and maybe adjourning to some club afterwards. Fortunately bars, clubs etc. have to close at midnight during the week (1 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays), and the rule is strictly enforced, so I'll at least get home at a half-decent hour.
Tomorrow just lunch (with a guy from the OSCE mission) and dinner (farewell dinner for a very nice colleague from the Swedish Embassy, who was sent here for only half a year).
Gym between work and dinner is pretty much a given.
Irene and I went yesterday, but they didn't have electricity. Bummer, really. But I did 1,5 hrs of home sports, which I hadn't done in a while -- it's not as high-impact as gym or tennis, but one hour of step with 0,75 kg weights isn't bad either, especially as it targets different muscles than what I usually do.
Since I'm going to be more out of than at my office today, I'll get started tomorrow with the quarterly report. I'd like to have it finished when boss is back, i.e. on Monday, so he just has to read it through and we can send it off.
The last thing I saw, looking out of the taxi window and at my balcony when I went to work this morning, was Cornelius stretched out on the deck chair, enjoying the morning sun. There was a hint of "unfair!!!" tingeing the overall feeling of "awwww isn't he sweet!"
ETA after working breakfast: much better today than last time, much less boring. For some unfathomable reason, there are chickens in the yard of the restaurant where the breakfast was being held, and the cock crowed just at the right moment, i.e. when the Deputy Prime Minister was extolling Macedonia's fantastic performance on its way towards EU integration. Absolutely priceless.
Also, you wouldn't believe how difficult it is to say the word "cock" to the British Ambassador, even if it's in a merely fowl-related context. Should the occasion ever repeat itself, I swear I'm going to say rooster. Bonus points for Brit Ambassador: he's a smoker. I could hardly believe my eyes.
First, working breakfast at 9.30 for the EU Heads of Mission. Please, please, please, whichever higher power deals with working breakfasts, please let it not be like the last one. It was torture. We had to sit at our tables, inhaling the scent of ham, cheese, sausage and scrambled eggs (not to mention the lovely aroma of the sesame sprinkled on the bread rolls), for more than an hour until the booooring (and totally pointless) speeches were finished. Everybody was drooling and desperately sipping orange juice.
Then lunch at 1 with the new Austrian education expert -- she sounds nice on the phone, and her predecessor, who is a good friend, told me she was sure I'd like her.
At 7.30 dinner with the police guys. Five of them. Looking forward to it, because I've always had a soft spot for policemen -- these are rather high-ranking, but that only means the stories they tell are a lot more interesting. I had to assure Stefan three times that, yes, it was going to be a totally informal dinner, i.e. jeans, no ties. I might be slightly late for work tomorrow, if the dinner goes as dinners with policemen usually go. Meaning lots of fun, but also lots of alcohol, and maybe adjourning to some club afterwards. Fortunately bars, clubs etc. have to close at midnight during the week (1 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays), and the rule is strictly enforced, so I'll at least get home at a half-decent hour.
Tomorrow just lunch (with a guy from the OSCE mission) and dinner (farewell dinner for a very nice colleague from the Swedish Embassy, who was sent here for only half a year).
Gym between work and dinner is pretty much a given.
Irene and I went yesterday, but they didn't have electricity. Bummer, really. But I did 1,5 hrs of home sports, which I hadn't done in a while -- it's not as high-impact as gym or tennis, but one hour of step with 0,75 kg weights isn't bad either, especially as it targets different muscles than what I usually do.
Since I'm going to be more out of than at my office today, I'll get started tomorrow with the quarterly report. I'd like to have it finished when boss is back, i.e. on Monday, so he just has to read it through and we can send it off.
The last thing I saw, looking out of the taxi window and at my balcony when I went to work this morning, was Cornelius stretched out on the deck chair, enjoying the morning sun. There was a hint of "unfair!!!" tingeing the overall feeling of "awwww isn't he sweet!"
ETA after working breakfast: much better today than last time, much less boring. For some unfathomable reason, there are chickens in the yard of the restaurant where the breakfast was being held, and the cock crowed just at the right moment, i.e. when the Deputy Prime Minister was extolling Macedonia's fantastic performance on its way towards EU integration. Absolutely priceless.
Also, you wouldn't believe how difficult it is to say the word "cock" to the British Ambassador, even if it's in a merely fowl-related context. Should the occasion ever repeat itself, I swear I'm going to say rooster. Bonus points for Brit Ambassador: he's a smoker. I could hardly believe my eyes.
