The Calm After The Storm ...

Today has been one of those days when all I want to do is sleep, sleep, sleep. Yesterday was our conference, and I am totally and utterly drained today. I'm happy to say the conference went very well and I had a lot of fun, but the last few weeks have been really hard work, I've been extremely stressed and haven't been sleeping.

At the end of the day though, I have the pride that comes with knowing that I did a fabulous job. Lots of people congratulated me yesterday on the superb organisation; but I had to be honest with everyone and tell them that really my boss Si was the one who should be congratulated - I just did what she asked me to do really. Anyway, as long as she's happy, I'm happy.

I've got two gold star awards to give out, firstly to Charlie, our lab guy, who is like the Daddy of our department with how he looks after us all so well. Despite being horrendously busy himself this week he found the time to pick me up from a garage miles away from work on Tuesday where I had taken the car for its annual MOT; and even dropped me back down there again later in the day to pick the car up; on Wednesday he helped transport a load of boxes from a drug rep's car up into our department for our delegate packs; and on Thursday he really helped us out by loading his car up with all of our delegate packs and dropping them over to the conference venue for us. This made a huge difference to both myself and Si, as we were really really stressing out at that point. So Charlie - thanks a million. He came to the post-Conference dinner last night, cos we like to treat our helpful friend well, and he likes nothing better than a good meal.

Second gold star award goes to Ioannis, who has been quietly supportive and encouraging as usual over the last few weeks when my stress level has been getting steadily higher; and who has quietly helped me out with some of the conferencey stuff I had to do, as well as totally working his arse off yesterday morning to help us out with registration. I am so so lucky to have such brilliant friends who will put themselves out to help me, don't you think??

So, we had a good day, and a great Dinner at the Edwardian Tea Rooms (part of the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery complex). Actually, the Dinner was superb, as it always is (the complex is part of The Council House complex, with the catering provided by the Civic Catering department - we've had many many functions there over the years, primarily because the catering cannot be beaten). There was only one cloud on the horizon ...

We had arranged for some lovely floral centrepieces for the dinner tables, that had a church candle at the centre. As we'd paid so much for them, Si had decided that we would take them all home. I went to blow one of the candles out as we were all preparing to leave, but I must've blown a bit too vigorously, as I ended up with a shower of very hot, molten wax all over my face (they'd been lit for about three hours, and the molten wax was trapped in a well at the top of the candle). To be more specific, in my hair, eyebrows, all over my eyelid and cheek, and in my eye. Ouch. Not to mention all over my clothes. To say I felt like a complete idiot is a big understatement. Trust me to do something so stupid and spoil the success of the day! The general consensus of opinion was that it was a good job that I had my contact lenses in or they really would have been rushing me off to eye casualty to assess the damage (so I suppose if you're going to do something so stupid as get boiling hot wax in your eye it is a good idea to do it when you're in a room full of eminent eye surgeons ...) One of our boys got most of the wax off my face, and Ioannis stuck some lubricating drops in my eye (which he wouldn't have had in his pocket if we hadn't been at the conference all day ... fortuitous or what!); and then off we went home. I dropped Ioannis off and then cried all the way home. You know when you get to that point where you just have had enough? I was there! I was ridiculously tired and overwhelmed by a day that had started at 5.30 am after virtually no sleep; and I think the shock must've caught up with me.

Today finds me with a big burn on one of my boobies, a sore face (but no obvious signs of burning) and a quite sore eye. If I had any brains I'd have gone into work today and got someone to take a look to make sure it's okay; but I never was very good at doing what I should - I can get Si to take a look at the end of the clinic on Monday if it still hurts, that'll be good enough.

Naturally, next time I blow out a candle I'll be taking a bit more care!

In a couple of days I'm sure I'll be able to laugh about it, but oh - the shame and humiliation!