ストライキ ！

Here is an old picture of my office building (from 20 years ago).


We heard today at the office that our Top Management wants to "change" our Pension System: the Union told us that this would mean that our Pensions, after we retire, will be *reduced* by 10-20%. The Union organized a "Wildcat Strike" this afternoon, and invited the Staff to walk-out at 15.00. I don't know what is going to happen next.

I'm thoroughly dismayed by this news: it was my plan to (*possibly* !) retire in 4 or 5 (?) years time, but this might mean that I have to continue working at the office for several more years.
I know that I am not in the mood to produce any "extra" work at the office in the coming weeks/months.

Today I finished writing a letter in German to a Client: I needed help from a German colleague to write parts of the letter, because my knowledge of German is not good enough to write these letters by myself.
My next piece of work involves *Chemistry*, and I'm not looking forward to it.



I read the Blog of a friend today, and her life is *much* more interesting that my life - I tell myself it is because she is a Housewife, and she has *more* free-time to do different, interesting things. But I *also* think that she is a more interesting, more "social" person than I am, and that *this* is why she has a more interesting life.
- I *wish* that *more* of my friends would write a Blog.



I sent a gift to a friend last week, and I think that the gift has made her angry with me - I sent an e-mail to her mobile-telephone today, but she did not reply. Now I have to wait for her to contact me. That is, ... *if* she wants to contact me .....



About 8 years ago, my "favourite" niece stopped talking to me.
We haven't spoken to each other since then. I didn't know why she stopped talking to me, but when there is no communication, there are no answers.
She is now 24 years old.
However, out-of-the-blue she sent me an e-mail; she said that the breakdown in our relationship had left a "dark cloud" over her life (?!), and that she wanted to see if we could start "talking" to each other again.
I wrote back to her, and said to her that any problems between us were on *her* side, and not on *my* side.
Now she has arranged a trip to Holland next month to visit me, but I really have no idea what it will be like to meet her.
[I imagine that in the future our "new relationship" will *only* be the exchange of Christmas Cards. And if this is the case ... then why bother to "re-start" a relationship. I really don't understand her. In the future, I think that it is very unlikely that she is going to call me on the telephone to ask me about my health, my problems, etc].



This brings me onto the subject of my health - For the past 3 weeks, I have not been feeling 100% healthy, but I didn't want to waste the Doctor's time with my "little problems". However, I'm thinking that 3 weeks is long enough, ... and that I will go to his office tomorrow, and make an appointment with him for one day next week.
Hopefully, the problem will be "trivial", and everything will be "normal" again soon.