June in all it's Glory.

June was a full on month of unexpected changes in terms of work which is partly why I haven't blogged sooner. The mad departmental reshuffle seemed to have hit the buffers, so on the plus side I wasn't having to re-apply for my own job, but on the other I wasn't getting paid for all the additional responsibilities either.
Out of the blue my friend Alex announced she had found a new job and was leaving. I can't say I blame her and the new role is great for her career plans, but oh lordy am I missing her already.
This was followed by not one, but two pregnancy announcements meaning three members of our team of ten will be on maternity leave at the same time! (This on top of three of the ten posts being vacant right now.)
The dust had barely settled when the head of our department announced he is leaving too. To be fair we had a feeling he might, but as his contract didn't end until November we certainly didn't expect it so soon and not when in theory he should have been giving six months notice...
It's a weird one because whilst I did like him, he did have a habit of hatching all these mad plans and never quite seeing them through (yes the reshuffle was his idea) so he has left chaos. His deputy is acting up, but as she is one of the pregnancies it looked like everything might be on hold indefinitely. Then apparently someone had a moan to the deputy dean (not me) and suddenly everything has to be sorted by the end of July!?! This is not in anyway way, shape or form enough time for the proper consultation period and everyone is feeling completely fraught again. The only good thing is that as we made it known in no uncertain terms how we felt about having to re-apply for our jobs we now only have to have a 'formal chat' rather than submit an actual application.

The joys of working in higher education. NOT.

Anyway I did have some fun times in June too, going out for dinner several times with friends was a definite highlight, though my waistline might not agree. As well as a trip to see Giffords Circus yet again. This time in University Parks with Alex and Charlotte from work. The show this year was called Xanadu and was an wonderful psychedelic summer of love confection with the usual amount of breath taking acts.
As ever I could have done without the horses, personally I don't feel there is a place for animals parading and performing in a ring in this day and age, but that is me, others seem to enjoy it.

For me the highlight of the show was Lil Rice who is described on the internet as a 'wheel performer and singer.' She started off standing with what looked like an oversized hoola hoop on the floor at her feet. She stepped into the middle of it and started singing a song. She then picked the hoop up and spun it on one arm then the other for a bit and you were kind of like nice voice and everything but is that it? She then got inside it and started swinging which was pretty impressive, see picture below.

(photo borrowed from official Giffords site)

 The next thing you know she is off spinning round the ring like a freaking gyroscope! Over, under, side ways you name it she did it! It was absolutely jaw dropping, and all the while singing, never missing a note or sounding out of breath, just incredible.
I also loved that they had a proper old fashioned slapstick clown routine with buckets of water and coloured slime. It does the soul good to have a good laugh. I highly recommend this year's show.

I also had a day out in good old Witney with Soo. We haven't seen each other for a while and Witney is always a good fall back for a shopping trip. The weather gods were kind that day too so though it started rainy it quickly cleared to the point where we even got to sit outside to eat our pub lunch.

We trawled the chazzas without much joy until we got to Oxfam, my purchases there being this Boden dress

(apologies for it's crumpled state) some birthday cards and this rather mad and very happy paper mache tiger decoration who I could not resist.

He had this weird thick red stripe on his back which I didn't like so I spent Sunday afternoon repainting and varnishing him. He's now hanging on the kitchen door handle grinning at anyone who enters the room.

I shall finish up with some handbag purchases. I really do need to stop, it's getting out of hand...

As you can see my obsession with Corde continues at a pace and I added these two to my collection

The brown one was from Australia and I just loved the star like pattern.

I also bought this lovely blue 1930's leather bag on the bay of E.

It looked lovely on it's listing and I particularly liked the deco style clasp.
Sadly when it arrived the seller had posted it in just a plastic carrier bag turned inside out an taped shut, with absolutely no other protection it arrived so bent and battered I could have wept.
I treated the leather which is fairly brittle with a restoring cream, and then carefully tried to reshape the bag. You can tell when you lift the flap originally it would have been a bright royal blue but years have darkened it to navy, so I used a navy leather cream I already had.
As you can see it's still a bit dented and creased but a million times better than it was. As someone on a selling site I'm part of said this week,  it breaks your heart to see beautiful things that have survived decades completely destroyed by careless and inadequate packaging. 

I have also been sorting out my earrings now I can wear them again (long boring story) and came across this nifty way to display them in the tinternet.

Aluminium craft mesh and a picture frame equals instant earring display. Result.

I shall return anon with a post about our trip to Cornwall.