an interlude of a self indulgent kind

The past year, particularly the 2010/11 financial year (July to June) has been the most eventful I can remember.

It's hard not to reflect when a whole pile of things happen to you in a short period of time. Ahh! there's the first slip. When I write that these things "happened to me" I mean that most of them affected me and actually happened to other people.

June 2010 was looking OK! I was working on a project at Australia Post as a Training Manager, and only having stand-up fights with a couple of people a week. It was stressful, but at least I as in Melbourne. I was home one day checking emails, when I received a phone call. The caller was from Virgin Gyms. I had won a six month free membership to their brand new state-of-the-art gym that was coincidentally located across the road from work. I felt great! I started emailing a few people to tell them about it, when my phone rang again. "What have I won this time?" I muttered to myself, grinning like an idiot.

It was a woman's voice, vaguely familiar, then it hit me! My best mate's older sister. It was great to hear from her as I hadn't seen her in a long time, but through the dopey grinning afterglow of winning, I didn't immediately hear that something was very wrong.