A friend of mine has started doing this thing she calls her Happiness Project where about once a week she posts something on facebook that she's really grateful for.  A year ago, i would have found this completely wank and probably blocked her, but now i think what she's been doing is pretty sweet.  So here's some things i am sincerely grateful for.

My mum.  I though i was going to lose her 11 years ago, and every day since then i have grown to love her more and more.  The thought of life without her is probably the worst thing that could happen so i am so grateful to have her.

I still have two grandparents and i'm so lucky.  They are amazing people who i adore.

I recently started a new job, and i'm pretty happy there. The experience that some of my colleagues who started at the same time as me have had has been significantly worse.

So that's it.  Some stuff is still shit, but that stuff is all pretty good.

One of the reasons i'm really enjoying my job at the moment are because of the people i am meeting each day.  It's not all roses and I do still meet an extraordinary number of absolute dicksucks, but i try not to waste too much time on them and give each person the benefit of the doubt that they're going to be awesome... and sometimes, they actually are!

Yesterday i had an old guy come and sit in front of me with barely discernable English... i tried really hard, listened really carefully... but i just had no idea what he was saying to me.  So i took him over to the map on the wall and got him to point where he wanted to go and worked out it was Barbados.  Sweet... So i set about trying to find a fare with reasonable connections straight through to freakin' Barbados, kinda skipping over the 'conversation' part of the sale process.

It was taking ages cause what d'ya know, it's neither cheap nor easy to get from Melbourne to Barbados but i found something i could offer the guy which posed the next problem; trying to get his name out of him.  I asked him if he'd booked at the store before and after a while finally understood that his wife had booked here before when he added 'but she died'.

Then he just kinda kept repeating it... 'my wife, she died... now i got no one'.  Meanwhile i've stopped looking at the computer, as every time he said this, he was getting more and more upset.  'My wife, she died... now i got no one'.  And he's starting to get visibly distressed, and well up... so im starting to well up too, then he starts crying, so i start crying as well.  He just kept saying it like he couldnt believe it - couldnt believe his wife had died and that he's been left here, with no one.  Suddenly, i understood him perfectly and it was so fucking upsetting i cant even begin to express it.

He said he had no family here and had to go back to Barbados.  I agreed, he should go to where his people are.  The store is full and people waiting to be served, he's crying, i'm crying and i cant find a routing with reasonable fucking connections.

So that was pretty fucking... real.  Not the funnest day at work ever, but definitely proof that i am actually a human.

Dear Dottie.

Interface is hard. I am reporting in from my phone - try that, it's pretty simple.

I ate some fruit.