What A Week

So this week has turned into quite the experience I must admit and on top of that busy as hell.
I mean not only have I been working like a absolute dog at work, ok nothing is unusual with that, it takes hard work and dedication to be a kick ass Vaktmästare haha!

But on top of that the last couple of days I've been basically coming home eating dinner, taking a shower and then heading out of the door within the space of a hour.

Firstly on Tuesday I had a meeting at Mikaela's school, this in itself was a experience of a lifetime, since it was the first meeting (school meeting that is) in Swedish that I have attended myself without Marie accompanying me and sitting half the time translating stuff that I don't understand, and although I didn't quite understand 100% of everything that was said I got enough of it to make me feel great about it.
Not to mention I think the main reason I didn't really understand everything fully is because I still even after living here 6 years fully understand the Swedish schooling system.

However I had to have a good laugh since when we first arrived at the school the first thing to come out of my beloved daughter's mouth as she walked up to a group of friends was.
"You can stand over there"
As she pointed half way across the school playground, safe to say I was more than a bit shocked I mean I'm still cool right?
Well apparently not....

But it went well apart from that, and I learned quite a bit about the education system in Sweden and about her next step in her education which will be happening next year, but we still have a lot to look into and sort out before then so we shall see.

Not only did I have that, I also ended up in another meeting on Wednesday although this time it was for the boys and actually in Järpås so at least I didn't have to travel into town like I did for Mikaela's meeting.

That meeting however was nothing really important and more along the lines of meet the teachers and see what they have been doing etc, and it seems like the boys have been doing well.
We obviously still have a proper teachers meeting to go to in the not so distant future but it was still nice to get a mini update I guess you could call it.

But that's been my week, working and meetings although now it's the weekend and the boys are away to their dads for the weekend and my oldest Mikaela is away saying at friends all weekend so it's nice to be able to just sit back and relax with Marie for a change without having to worry about kids hehe.

But for now I shall bid you all farewell and I hope you all have a great weekend as well.

If You Don't Laugh...

So i'm aware that the post is a bit later than i had originally planned but if you seen my photo over at The Angry Scot's Facebook Page you will have noticed that i finally decided to get outside and cut our damn grass, it took me about 2 hours and after it i was completely dead. But i said i was going to post one this weekend and i didn't want to let people down.

I have actually considered taking a small break away from blogging and just focussing on other things, because if i'm honest even though i love to do it, trying to find the time at the moment is becoming difficult. I honestly can't believe how much getting a job would affect the time i actually have to do things and i just feel that i'm stressing alot about not putting out content etc and always making promises that i'm going to post something and then not doing it because i end up doing other things.
But i don't know yet, perhaps i'll just download the blogger app to my iPhone and just write things up when i get time at work like on lunch etc and just post them up when they are finished we shall see, but i shall keep you all updated on what i decide.

But back to the post...

So the other day i got a big shock when i asked Marie to give the försäkringskassan (It's the people who pay my wages for being on this praktik i'm on) a quick call to confirm which dates i should write on the paper that i need to send into them in the next couple of weeks, the reason i asked her to do this is because we had apparently doing it wrongly and they were getting annoyed and it was holding up my money.
So to make sure it was right i had asked Marie when she was off work on Thursday to give them a call just to double confirm the dates.
However when she gave them a call she was told that they were not aware that i was still on my praktik, thus meaning i was not insured while i was at work for the first week of my second 3 months....

One word: Arbetsförmedlingen (Job Centre)

Yes indeed they have struck AGAIN!

It turns out that although my Job Centre point of contact had given me the go ahead to work another 3 months at the company i'm with, she had decided not to bother informing the rest of the Job Centre, aka she hadn't written anything in my file that i was granted a 3 month extension, thus meaning that Försäkringskassan was not informed either and thus meaning i was not insured or entitled to any money.

Fantastic right??

So of course, Marie gives me a call at work and informs me of this and i have to now try and get in contact with my person at the Job Centre to find out what the hell has happened, but in true Arbetsförmedlingen style whenever you try and get in contact with them, they always seem to be conveniently busy and not able to take your call, so i got sent through to customer services who tried to help me but was unable to sent me through someone random girl at the Lidköping Job Centre.

By this point you could imagine who stressed i was, i mean i shouldn't even be working since i was insured and if anything would have happened i would have been up shit creak without a paddle as they say. But i explained what happened and read out the e-mail that i had been sent by my point of contact at the Job Centre and the lovely lady at the other end said she would come back to me as soon as she could.

So after about 2 hours of waiting my work phone finally begins to ring and it's the job centre, and what can i said but the relief i felt when she informed me that she had fixed the problem and that i would be receiving a letter in the mail that i need to sign and send back to them was unbelievable.

I know that i shouldn't be surprised by anything that the Job Centre does or in this case doesn't do but still. It seems that every time i have some sort of dealing with these guys there is always some problem here or there that i end up spending hours of a phone trying to get resolved.

But it's fixed and all is well, and i'm now working with insurance again (So grateful that nothing happened!). 
It was just lucky that i had asked Marie to get in contact with the Försäkringskassan, otherwise i don't know what would have happened.

But that's my fun and games for this week, as i said i shall see how things go and maybe try and grab the app so i can write up a post during the week when i have time at lunch etc so all i need to do is do some edits on the computer and add images etc if i want to at the end of the week, but we shall see.

So until next time.. Have a great week guys!

Back From Holiday!

So i've been back from my little holiday to Scotland for a couple of days now and i finally got some stuff sorted out so i thought it was about time that i let everyone know how it went.

For the people that don't have me on Facebook the trip over to Scotland started out in pure disaster, as when we arrived in Lidköping to take the direct train to Gothenburg it was announced that the train was cancelled due to a train hitting a tree on the track, great right?!? Please explain how a train is meant to hit a tree? I thought tree's grew at the side of the tracks not on them.

Safe to say, what started out as a nice and calm start to the day turned quickly into a state of panic and what the hell are we going to do? However we were saved by 2 absolutely amazing woman who had overheard us talking on the phone to train company, and informed us that they were going to take another route to get to Gothenburg and that it would get us to the airport in time.
I have no idea who these ladies are but they saved our asses that is for sure and i am forever grateful for their help!

Saviours!

But we got over to Scotland eventually, and of course it wouldn't be the same if it wasn't pissing down with rain when we arrived, and of course my lovely homeland didn't disappoint!

Outside Edinburgh Airport, and of course it's pissing down!

But i have to admit the whole week was not like that infact the Scottish weather decided to be nice to us and even give us a few days of sun which was more than generous of it, unfortunately we didn't take advantage of it which was a bit stupid of us and we spent most of our holiday either visiting people or shopping. I'm thinking that next time we will scrap the whole visiting and shopping crap and just spend every day going around and seeing different parts of the country.

Not that i don't actually want to see people but for once i think i would rather come over and actually show the kids different things around where i come from rather than here is 4 walls enjoy! 

However the kids had a blast, not only were they spoiled rotten like always when we go over, but they got ANOTHER birthday party, which would make that Birthday Party number 3 for this year (They had one at ours, one at their dads and then one at their grandparents, not bad for some people eh)

and of course a Birthday Party wouldn't be complete without a cake!

The boys Birthday Cake, complete with a lovely picture of them lol.

However not the whole trip was awesome, if you recall from my previous post i was meant to finally meet my son Louis, who i hadn't seen in a little over 3 years, and although i had my reservations about meeting up with him after such a long time i was really looking forward to it as well, but it didn't happen........

I have no idea why it didn't happen, i had phoned him on the Thursday to arrange to meet up with him on the Friday which was them cancelled (By him) and moved to Sunday and i had said to him that he should just send me a text when and where he would like to meet, but as i waited on Sunday it occurred to me that he wasn't going to get in touch and i was right, i'm pretty gutted that i was their for a whole week and i didn't get the chance to meet up with him but as i said in my previous post after not seeing each other in such a long time perhaps it was just to much for him, and i didn't really want to push him.

Unfortunately i have not heard from him either since the last time i spoke to him on the phone last Friday but i'm hoping that he has just been busy and that he will be in touch with me soon, i have sent him messages but had no reply. 

Not only did i not get the chance to meet my son, but then my Grandad got taken into hospital while i was over their which wasn't the best, luckily it was nothing serious or at least the hospital has said it was nothing serious and he is now back home after a couple of nights in the hospital but it wasn't exactly the best thing to hear the day after you land for your holiday.

But other than that the trip was fun, and it was so great seeing everyone, especially my parents and sister and just hoping that it isn't that long again before we see each other, but for now i'm going to head off and leave you with some other pictures i took on my trip. 

Ever wondered what a Chippy is! Well here it is, and damn it's so good! Fried Pizza is the best thing ever created!

Decided to take a picture of the new hospital where i come from, when i went to visit my Grandad.

Perhaps the smallest Round-A-Bout in the world?

My Dad playing with the 2 boys.

Of course a trip back home, would not be complete without a small drink with my Dad, of course that small drink turned into me being absolutely hammered, but oh well it was great and Gentleman Jack was a pure Gentleman!