Venerdi 11th Dicembre - Meeeeeester Lizard put it there

Dearest Diary,


Can I please apogolise {deliberate typo, rather bathetic of me, and pretentiously {natch} I do mean bathetic and not pathetic} for not having done nowt for the last couple of days. Sadly I have been super busy.

I shall push on regardless. Wednesday started bright and early. In the office by 8. Had the usual kerfuffle going through security. I probably mentioned that our office is a former villa and hotel that was bought by Novartis quite recently - it is right at the top of campus, for that reason, and possibly as we are middle management in the company, we get a special pass that allows us to drive in to the top of campus. Every day and every time I go in and out I go through the same charade with the security men. They look at my car quizically, and they look at me, sometimes I get out and say something in p1ss poor Italian but they always let me through. And we do have the special badge. Security are the only people I have met so far who do not arm wave. So, yes, in the office at 8am, and then into an all day meeting, running through a system check of a potential new append to a CTMS. Mmmm. The meeting was held in the Jonas Salk room, which is basically a 17th century ballroom complete with huge fireplace / the juxtaposition between amazing old building and arm waving about future science and computers amused me when I drifted off. But good day all in all. Excellent lunch of risotto and I had some caffeine for the first time in ages, a tea trolley came in and I had some tea. Shock horror but thought it might be required for this particular passage.

Knocked off around 7:30 and went straight out into the centre of Siena - first time since I've been here! - to have a meal with 2 reps from a vendor and 5 of my team. And what a meal it was. Some discrete little Italian place, tucked away in the cobbled streets. The Italians in our team decided we should have the starters surprise - and they brought us starter after starter after starter, and I'm not the biggest fan of Italian food, but this was AMZING. Lots of fish {one guy doesn't like fish so he had meat alternatives} but it was just the craziest different things of fish, and not amuse bouche size but good sized starters. My favourite, and those of you that know me well will know why - was this dish that seemed crazy to Italians - it was cheese, which were cheddary, with soft brown bread {Sienese bread is by and large tough and to be honest, a bit rubbish} and then something that looked like mango sauce from a curry house but turned out to be something like honey with wasabi in it. Amazing. Excellent wines, really the best I've tasted so far, accompanied the meal, and all in all it was a very pleasant and jolly evening. However, as is the Italian culture it was a late one, so I came home and pretty much collapsed straight away.

Thursday started early. In by 8, and tired, a quick catch up and then off for 4 hours of GMP training. Mmm. The lady who gave it had a bizarre sweating thing going on that amused me for a short while. No, it was a really good course actually and very important for the stuff that I'll be doing. Despite having thought that I would never ever never be able to eat again after last night's meal - 8 starters, main course, and then a deliciously devilish hot chocolate pudding with gooey centre and chocolate sauce - by the time it was lunch I was RAVENOUS. This does not bode well people! More risotto with chicken and the random yoghurt generator. For some reason, I seem to have a mental block when picking up the yoghurts and can never work out exactly what I've chosen until I sit down. For those of you who were with me in Aberystwyth, there is no danger of 2nd puddings, yoghurts and danones, or balking the system in any way. And nor is there any need at the minute as the most energetic I am being is looking at the empty swimming pool occasionally whilst I work.

One of my staff is going on long term sick leave so had to deal with the HR aspect of that in the afternoon - she is very good and will be sorely missed but she will be back and it benefits her and also the company, since Italian law requires that to be able to sell drugs to the national health system you must have a certain proportion of less-abled staff.

Knocked off just after 7pm to go a celebratin of the work that has been put in for the swine flu vaccine. Heh heh. None was mine. The location was a very exclusive villa resort just near Monteriggioni


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monteriggioni


which is about 15 minutes drive from Siena. There were instructions on how to get there but I decided to keep the faith and follow TomTom. Bit of a mistake, as I found the road that it was located on but there was no indication of where on the road the place was, and the road was little more than a dirt track in some places. I was driving up and down a little frantically, but to be honest I was enjoying using the hire car on the crazy roads just a little! I guess the location is one of those classic things - if you don't know where it is - then you are not the sort of person they want to be there! One of my PhD supervisors described it thus "I don't want to be part of a club that want's me as it's member". Like it!

Despite all this I eventually made it. Beautiful old villa with outdoor swimming pool and all wonderful stuff. Approximately 200 people there, all of clinical development in Siena, all having a whale of a time. What is "a whale of a time"? Do whales have a good time? Or is the Welsh? Does a whale have a better time when he's in, or outside of, Wales? Answers on a postcard please.

Good night, great food, good company. I decided to play it very cool, I was driving so had a glass or two of vino, and didn't get involved in any of the karaoke or dancing. It's far too early for the dark side of JJ to come out just yet! But those guys know how to party, loads of people dancing, and so much karaoke it was untrue. Another odd phrase. My team were leading it, which was funny. I sat right at the back and kept quiet! Chatted with a pregnant lady and a guy from Persia. Safe.


Back home very late, starting to get tired, these 4 day weeks are hard!

Friday 11th Dicembre.

Today is Mr Liiiiizard day, Mmmmm Mr. Lizard. For those of you too young, too innocent, too forgetful, or too intelligent to remember the Chris Morris vehicle "Jam" check out

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuoCiAok83M

Jam was a very very dark comedy program from the 90s. Chris Morris has always been controversial. This sketch stuck with me - as well as the one about "The Gush" - I'll leave you to research that on your own if you so desire. Jam was weird and controversial in a way that I have never experienced since. Maybe it's just that I was a student and really into this stuff and there is still such stuff out there? A prime is example of this is that Jam was shown about 11pm on a Friday night on Channel 4. It was then repeated about 3am on Saturday morning, played back at 2/3 speed to really freak out the drunks and dopers. I remember watching it when getting back from a club one night and finding it really weird - it was only later I found out that it was slowed down!!

I digress - Mr Lizard. Today is Mr Lizard day. I knew it was going to a bad day when I got to the office - 8 as usual - popped to the toilet and saw that the window was ajar {optional insert pun}. Hanging down from said window {I'm stealing Tambo language!} was a lizard - but one that had had its head crushed in the frame of the window. Needless to say I took some photos - I especially "like" the one of the shadow lizard. Anyhow - I knew it was going to be bad and it was. The entire team confronted me and the interim manager about an HR situation I mentioned last week, and rumours that had been circulating - queue some very awkward questions and some really unfortunate Italian-HR situation. The Italian HR laws really protect the employee and this has put me in a tricky situation, not of my own making for once!, and I am feeling it with both barrels. So, yes, not a good start. Spent about 2 hours with HR trying to sort the issues out. Had lunch in the villa. Risotto again. Mmm ricey goodness. And this was on top of someone in my team bringing in a selection of cakes including a sort of rice pudding cake that I had which was great.

Early afternoon I dashed home to meet my shipment of all my stuff from the UK. On Monday they had actually arrived before I did and then unloaded into one of the warehouses in the vineyard. I shouted at them as I didn't want to spend hours dragging 28 boxes to and fro the warehouse in our tiny Fiat. So they came and moved it to our flat. Hooray. Mixture of feelings. Great to have some things, guitars, wii, bikes, trainers, karate stuff, but I had reached the stage already when I didn't want it, and was really hoping they'd lost it and I would get the 37,000 EUR that it was insured for instead :) But yes, all my odds and sods are here. Why did I collect so much rubbish! It's all very special and magical though I'm sure. And it's important that Dawn feels that way too!! The workmen who unloaded the van were good fun. One was a former boxer, who spoke very little english, but more Italian than me, natch, who weighed himself on my scales when they were unpacked. He was 118 kg. When he boxed, 4 years ago, he weighed 81kg!! As we unpacked he saw some of my glutamine tablets and thought they were protein pills - he said to me "no protein pills - just Italian spaghetti!! And from the size of him I really believed him. As big as a small house.

Back to the office for a few hours, made a small announcement re: HR stuff to the team, watched yet another AMAZING sunset out of the window of the office, and then decided at 6 o'clock that it was POETS day (P Off Early, Tomorrow's Saturday) and came back. Bought some Xmas flowers for Dawn and then tried to make my stuff disappear as best as possible. Failed.

We opened the shiny new iMac. It is very shiny and lovely. However, I have no fricken idea at all how to use it. Also, we have an Italian keyboard but I've set it as a UK keyboard and I don't know how to change that back - help please, so I am guessing where all the special characters are - hence some wrong ones being used throughout tonight's update. Not even three bottles of Splugen is helping tonight. Also - I turned on Voice Over which was THE MOST ANNOYING SHOUTY PROGRAM ever - am I being a doofus or is that right - help please, MacAfficianados!

I'm glad the week is over. Review. Last week I did 3 days, this week I've done 4 days, next week I shall do 5 days - aaargh - but then it's Xmas so will scale down again. Maybe I timed this very well!

Ciao a tutti!