Well, we had our orientation day, and are now employees of a much larger software company that takes over other companies every five minutes! You may be able to guess which one. There were six people from another company like ours (although smaller) in with us, they seemed nice. Actually everyone seemed nice, but it was all so disorganised. We got there for an 8:30 start, then they told us it would be 9 am, and we didn't have passwords, which were supposed to have been set up for us. I was ravenous by the time they gave us coffee and croissants.

The good thing is that the photo on my access pass is stunning, far the best I have had for years. People have been saying, is that really me, all day. I used one that was taken in Agia Napa last year, it actually had Nicky and me, I cropped him out (sad....) and sent it to them, but I think they did something with the light and shade, it looks great.

And the lunch was good, and I got to see Derek and Casey as well, they are sweet, also Gil. We did have someone giving us the corporate rah-rah during lunch, but it was OK, I was eating smoked salmon at the time. And they had Badoit, which is my favourite water.

Bad thing is I have lost a day with PA report, but Suzette has done heaps today, she sent it to me. She starts her French lessons tonight, she is a complete beginner, so this lovely language is completely in front of her, what fun. The instructor today started to apologise to me that she hadn't prepared the course in English - that's OK, I said, I understand French! And I do, although I speak it with what everyone thinks is an English accent. Of course, it is a NZ accent, but fortunately they think it is "cute".

Actually I had huge problems when I was in the US for work because of my accent - again, it is "cute", and they haven't usually heard it, so I got asked, where do I come from? And when I said NZ, the lady in the supermarket in NJ asked me whether they had microwaves in NZ (I was buying something that goes in the microwave at the time. Sweet! Although I got a few surprises as well - opposite the office was a wine shop, and as soon as the lady heard me speak, she said, we have a lot of wine from NZ and it's one of our biggest sellers. Actually I remember that little town in NJ quite fondly, there was also a great knitting wool shop, and a lovely filipino man who had a soup bar at the bottom of the building, he was so nice. I had soup every day, as it was snowing madly.

Of course, no stitching today, but I may fondle silks before I go to bed, this is a good way of dealing with trauma. Somtimes I think I hate computers, or PCs anyway. It doesn't mean I hate my job, because really my job is not about computers, it is about how things are done, and it just happens that these days it is with PCs. In the age of Dickens, I would have been advising on copperplate handwriting, I guess, and what colour each ledger should be bound in.