Well folks, after a few misreable months of woe I can gladly announce that I have a new job. I have literally been doing cartwheels around my site today - I'm so pleased I could burst!
Last November I found out my present employers had effectively lost 95% of their business. Our company was a sub contractor to British Waterways and the vast majority of our dredging and bank protection work came from them. Every 5 years the contract was divied up between the 2 main protagonists and normally is was split 50/50. This time it all went to the opposition, meaning myself and about 30 other blokes would all be out of a job come the end of March. At least we had 4 months to get ourselves organised, many people don't get that benefit.
Anyhow, without going into every small detail, I have managed to bag myself a job with a large international dredging company and I will start in April. Perfect timing. Not only that, but my first assignment will either be working in Abu Dhabi or somewhere in Russia - so it'll either be +40c or -40c, I couldn't give a monkeys to be honest: this is absolutely my dream job and represents a huge jump up the career ladder for me. All the hard work I put in has finally paid off. I will start as a Superintendent, which is more akin to a site foreman and hopefully work my way up from there. First I have to learn how a 35,000t cutter/suction dredger works, but that should be a doddle :lol:
Sorry for blowing my own trumpet here and being a bit self obsessed, but given the crappy few months I've had (engine failure not withstanding) I think I'm entitled to a little celebration. The really, really good news is, I'll be able to get my Zed back to full health a lot quicker - just in time for summer :clap:
:biggrin::clap::biggrin:
Well folks, after a few misreable months of woe I can gladly announce that I have a new job. I have literally been doing cartwheels around my site today - I'm so pleased I could burst!
Last November I found out my present employers had effectively lost 95% of their business. Our company was a sub contractor to British Waterways and the vast majority of our dredging and bank protection work came from them. Every 5 years the contract was divied up between the 2 main protagonists and normally is was split 50/50. This time it all went to the opposition, meaning myself and about 30 other blokes would all be out of a job come the end of March. At least we had 4 months to get ourselves organised, many people don't get that benefit.
Anyhow, without going into every small detail, I have managed to bag myself a job with a large international dredging company and I will start in April. Perfect timing. Not only that, but my first assignment will either be working in Abu Dhabi or somewhere in Russia - so it'll either be +40c or -40c, I couldn't give a monkeys to be honest: this is absolutely my dream job and represents a huge jump up the career ladder for me. All the hard work I put in has finally paid off. I will start as a Superintendent, which is more akin to a site foreman and hopefully work my way up from there. First I have to learn how a 35,000t cutter/suction dredger works, but that should be a doddle :lol:
Sorry for blowing my own trumpet here and being a bit self obsessed, but given the crappy few months I've had (engine failure not withstanding) I think I'm entitled to a little celebration. The really, really good news is, I'll be able to get my Zed back to full health a lot quicker - just in time for summer :clap: