Where does the time go? It can't possibly be a year since I last put fingers to keyboard (I nearly said pen to paper) and told you what we've been up to? Mind you, a lot has happened, so it must be true.

At the end of last year, I said that Sue & I were looking for work and if Sue got a job, I'd end up as a house husband. Well, the inevitable happens and Sue finally got a job as IT Administrator for Age Concern Hertfordshire, which left me looking after the house. Typically, I didn't get a call from Abu Dhabi to get me out of it, so I knew my luck was out. I did, finally, get some temporary work doing an IT audit for the NHS in Hertfordshire. This involved me crawling under desks reading the serial number off the back of computers (why does everyone hide their PC under the desk?)

Nickie continued to do whatever temp jobs the agency found her. Then, as you will all remember, this year saw the general elections. After a suggestion from me, Nickie contacted our prospective Conservative MP to offer her assistance with his campaign. He initially took her on as an unpaid volunteer but quickly found that her knowledge of politics was so good that he started paying her. Not a lot but, as she admitted, 3 months experience in the run up to a general election is worth 3 years mid term. She worked extremely hard both in the office and out doing door knocking and campaigning. The end result was that Grant was elected MP, ousting the current Labour member with a firm majority. Nickie hoped that he would keep his promise to find her a job after the election but he decided he wasn't going to open a Westminster office until after the summer. (I still think his wife had something to do with it; she didn't want Nickie too close!) However, Grant introduced her to Anne Main, the new MP for St Albans and, after a chat over coffee in the House of Commons, Nickie suddenly found she'd been interviewed and offered a job. So now she's running the Westminster office for an MP. So far, she has been promoted twice and gone from a short term contract to permanent staff. As I write this, in November, she has just been selected as candidate for the local council, so now she's going to be putting her experience of the general election into practice for her own election campaign. From there, who knows what will transpire!

Meanwhile, Jo was doing better and better with her Holistic Therapy course, often getting 99% or more for her exams. As the academic year drew to a close, she became ever more nervous, despite getting continued good results. Unfortunately, the final results didn't come out until the end of August, which left Jo a bundle of nerves for most of the summer. We were all pleased for her when the results finally came out and she had passed with flying colours. So what next? Well, she's taken the steps to register herself as self employed and is looking for premises. Her first possibility was an offer of a room in a hair dressing salon but she felt it wasn't quite conducive to the calm, quiet background she needed. At the moment, she's working part time as receptionist for a landscape gardening company, to put some working capital in her pocket while she looks for premises. Anyone who needs an aromatherapy or reflexology massage, just give Jo a ring - her rates are reasonable! She's also trying, yet again, to pass her driving test because she feels she may need to be mobile and go to her clients rather than the other way round.

Ian finally returned from Abu Dhabi without a job but with possible prospects, so he was hopeful. Unfortunately, the company who had offered him a possible position, decided to advertise the post and it all went pear shaped. The end result was Ian on the dole and getting more and more frustrated and withdrawn. We were starting to get a bit worried about him because he couldn't even get temporary work. All they offered him was warehouse jobs at very little money. In the end, it was Nickie who found him a job. While she was running the Westminster office for Anne Main, the local constituency office was falling apart. The lady who was supposed to be running the office wasn't even answering the phone and Anne decided she had to find someone else. That's where Ian came in. Just as a temporary job, he was asked to step in and try and sort out the office. Now Ian is the first to admit he's not enthusiastic about office work or politics but, within a couple of weeks, he and Nickie were discussing work, problems and everything while the rest of us sat back in amazement. He now runs the constituency office with a couple of volunteer assistants and has been for the past 4 months. He says he's only staying there until he can get a "proper" job which he's hoping to look into over Christmas. He's off to Abu Dhabi to stay with our good friends Allan & Janis and their son Jonathon and he plans to look for a new job while he's out there.

That just leaves me. Well, in April, just as I was thinking of going to Cyprus to try my luck there, Sue came home with a job application for a new job at Age Concern. The job was for a project called Money Maze, funded by the Government, with the intention of persuading pensioners to open a bank account for payment of their pension. The main part of the job was to go out and talk to groups of pensioners. Now, as everyone who knows me is well aware, I'm a bit of a shy type, hardly the sort to get up in front of a group of strangers and give a talk. Oh, all right then, yes, it does sound like it was made for me. Luckily, the people interviewing me thought the same (my new boss, Bob, told me afterwards he knew it had to be me - I was the only applicant with any life in me) and I started in May. I've now been doing the job for 6 months with varying degrees of success and a lot of problems that I won't go into right now but I think I've done the job. It's only a short contract until the end of Feb 2006 and I don't know what I will do after that but if nothing else, it's something different to add to my CV.

I have also done something this year that I haven't done for many years. No this isn't about to get smutty - I started playing Bowls! I played about 25 years ago, when we were living in High Wycombe and I decided to give it another go. A friend suggested the Hatfield Bowls Club, so I went there and met a few friendly people who very quickly produced a membership form and signed as sponsors, so I was in before I had time to change my mind. I've played most weeks and have even turned out for the club on a few occasions, not exactly covering myself in glory but at least not making a complete fool of myself. It's a very friendly club, so friendly that someone put my name down as secretary and I got voted in 2 weeks ago. Looks as if I'm now a permanent member.

Sue & I have been to Cyprus twice this year. We went in June for 2 weeks on our own. The 3 younger members seemed a bit surprised when we said that we couldn't afford to pay their fares because I don't get air fare money any more. They complained that they couldn't afford the fares either. My comment was something along the lines of "welcome to the real world". As it turned out, Nickie couldn't have come with us anyway because she was busy with the election and its aftermath. Our friends Allan & Janis had organised their holiday for the same 2 weeks, so we were able to meet up in Cyprus and have a great, if slightly shorter than usual, holiday.

In October, we went back for another two weeks but this time we took my Mum & Dad along for a holiday. It meant that Mum didn't have to do anything for 2 weeks and came back looking a lot fitter than when we went out. I'm not so sure about Sue & me, but it was a good holiday. As luck would have it (and this wasn't planned) Janis & Allan were there as well. Janis decided that, as we weren't going to see each other at Christmas, we should have a Christmas dinner while we were there. So we did, at the side of the pool, with turkey, pudding, crackers and everything. The neighbours thought we were totally mad!

One pleasant surprise for me this year was getting in contact with my best friend from school days, who I haven't seen for 40 years. We "found" each other through friends re-united and Ken organised a meeting in a pub near where we both used to live (well, he still does) and managed to get 5 other old friends from school and scout days. Just as well they hadn't introduced the 24hr drinking by then because we really didn't want to break it up. Maybe we'll get together again some time, it was an amazing experience.

So that's been our year. I hope yours has been as eventful and pleasant and that the next one will be as good.

1 Ground Lane, Tel: 01707 276772

Hatfield

Herts. AL10 0HJ David e-mail: daviddorrington@hotmail.com Sue e-mail: susiedorrington@hotmail.com