• Turned 30.
• Changed jobs.
• My son started school.
• Visited Windermere on a family holiday.
• Started writing #! code.

Whatever you are doing in 2010 I wish you happiness and prosperity.

However, I’m not sure what else to say really.

Maybe I’ll think of something in the new year.

If anyone is reading this, then I wish you a happy and properous new year. By prosperous I mean both financially and in terms of happiness.

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So after phoing my Dad to see what I should do I set about changing it, although I had to move the car onto the pavement as my driveway is quite steep. However, once I had started to change the front wheel the back wheel was totally flat. Two flat tires on the same side! I must have driven through something nasty.

So anyway, what I did was get my Dad to give me and the front wheel a lift to a garage where we got the tire repaired, took this wheel back to the car and swapped it for the back wheel. We then drove into the garage in my car and got the back tire repaired. Actually, the back tire had a 2 inch screw stuck in it and it was too close to the wall to be able to repair it. So the guy at the garage sold me a spare tire that had been repaired for the cost of the repair. This was a bargain as the tire was almost new.

I finally started off to Aber at about 4PM and as It has been snowing for the past few days so I was a bit apprehensive about travelling as I thought I might get stuck in the snow, but it went well. Although there was quite a bit of snow around Shrewsbury.

• Sold a house in Aberystwyth next to some terrible neighbours and moved into a little cottage in Llanon to rent it.
• Matthew started walking.
• Dad gave me his Skoda Octavia.
• Attended Ian and Debbies wedding.
• Crashed the Octavia into a curb.
• Spent buckets of money on the Octavia
• Got a new job.
• Moved house to Cheshire to be near new job.
• Spent more money on the Octavia.

Not exactly a big list, but I have worked hard in all aspects of my life. With the cars and the move being a big drain on the money we havn´t had much to spend on other things.

So what is in store for the next year? One word, “Stuff”. I don´t tend to dwell much on future events, I am more of a here and now sort of person. If you are reading this then good luck with the next year.

It all started on Friday when I had a call from a girl called Jill from a recruitment agency in Manchester. She said that there was a web development job available in a company in Poynton and would I be interested in going for an interview on Tuesday. I had the Octavia booked in on Monday so I didn’t know if I would be able to make the interview or not. I said I would let her know how things went at the garage. She actually called me on my mobile phone, which almost never has reception, it just happened to be out of the office on an errand at the time. Amazing coincidence really.

Everything went great at the garage and I now have a fully functioning car again. Although they had ordered the wrong type of alloy wheel so I’ll have to go back for that.

Anyway I called her back Tuesday morning to let her know that I could attend the next day. The interview was quite near to my parent’s house so I went to stay there on Tuesday night so I could get there in good time on Wednesday.

So I went for an interview with a company called Just Search who are involved with search engine optimisation (SEO) and some other bits of web development and design. They are a new company, started around 2004 by just one man, but seem to be very strong in the SEO market. Just try searching Google for just search or search engine optimisation and you will see them on either the first or second result. The fact that they can do it for their own site is evidence of their skills.

The interview went very well and they agreed to give me a ring on my mobile later on that day. I talked with the managing director and the head of technical development. It was more like a chat about who I was than anything technical (although there was some technical questions), but I’m so used to interviews now that I was expecting most of the questions. The director pointed out that I was one of many that they had been looking at, with the actual number of applicants around 30. He also said that I impressed him, but I’m really too modest a person to know how I did this. Within half an hour of leaving they where trying to ring me (I was on the road at that point) so when I pulled over and answered they offered me the job. I said I would have to talk it over with Mandy, but I would let them know as soon as I could.

After much discussion with Mandy, my parents, Mandy’s parents, even Jill from the agency I eventually decided that it was an opportunity that I couldn’t miss. So I took the job. I don’t think I would be able to get a web development job with as good a salary as this ever again. Looks like we are moving to Poynton soon! Mandy is ready to leave with me and we have already started looking for a place to live on rightmove.co.uk.

The manager at Kwik-Fit gave me the number of the nearest Skoda dealership, which I will take it to on Monday. I did get a new tire at the same time, so that is one less thing to worry about.