100 Happy Days...Day 87

Day 87 - A feeling of accomplishment

For the last few weeks at work I've felt like I've constantly been busy with lots to do but I've not actually achieved anything. Today that changed.

Not only did I manage to complete and submit my tax return (which has taken twice as long as normal thanks to our new system), but I also managed to leave work on time. I can't remember the last ocassion that happened.

100 Happy Days...Day 67

Day 67 - Recognition for hard work

The last few months at work have largely revolved around testing our new system we were getting introduced. There's been so many problems and issues we've had to work with IT to get fixed that myself, and three of my team mates have spent more time testing the system than doing our actual day jobs, and co-ordinated the whole release amongst the three global finance teams.

This week we had our Q1 financial close presentation with our CFO and the four of us all received a Reward and Recognition award in-front of the whole global finance team for the work we'd done to get to the system ready for go-live. Thankfully all our hard work did pay off as we had a great April month end close yesterday, with no major issues.

Weigh in - 28th April

I am very pleased to announce, another 1.2 lbs loss this week. I'm now pretty much back where I started at the beginning of the month, but I'm not going to complain because that extra weight I ate from feeling sorry for myself is now gone and I'm looking to the future and not backwards.

I was back at dancing last week, training hard for our performance. It's amazing how much progress the ab challenge has helped me make at class. Our core ab exercises are a lot easier now than they were in January and it's definitely helping with my technique. I've still got a long way to go though, but thankfully I'm feeling quite motivated.

After coming up with 101 reasons why not to go to the gym on Thursday, I talked myself into going and managed a 20 min cardio workout and some leg presses. My head wasn't in it so I didn't fully achieve what I should have done but an 8 min run non-stop was good. I'm getting closer to that 10 min run, it's just taking longer than I'd hoped for. (I'm still not falling in love with running).

I'm now in the 4 week lead up to my exam which means there's going to be less working out for the next few weeks and more studying. I'm still going to aim to dance once a week, and one gym session but work has to take priority for a while. My weakness is going to be snacking. I like to eat whilst I study and I normally just grab chocolate/biscuits/cakes etc, but I'm going to keep my goal in my mind throughout and opt for the fruit option as best I can. I'm determined this study session wont put weight on my, if I have to I'll maintain but I'm still going for a loss.

I now have only 2 more days to go on my 30 day challenges. I'll take the last progress pictures on Thursday morning and when I do my monthly round up we'll all be able to judge if there's a difference in the photographs.

Happy Monday everyone!

100 Happy Days...Day 63

Having a lightbulb moment. In preparation for my exam I've been studying today and finally had that 'ding' moment when calculating NPVs on projects, including tax & interest rates. The concept behind it is all finally making sense, and I'm actually kind of excited to do some more. Yes I know it's not the most exciting topic but as an accountant, I'm allowed to get excited over such things.

100 Happy Days...Day 46

Day 46 - Lunch time trips

Although not great for my diet, lunch time trips out with the girls from work are a great way to have a little break from the office. Today we ventured to the cafe at the Marks & Spencer which has recently opened near our building. A nice chicken, mozzarella and pepper toastie, a drink and a nice chat to cheer us all up after a long week.

100 Happy Days...Day 32

Day 32 - Positive project outcomes

I'm lucky that in my job we're encouraged to try and improve upon how we do things on a daily basis, and for the last month or so I've been working on a simplification project that I was praying would work.

Although the solution was relatively straight-forward to come up with, it's taken a lot of time and effort to convince two other departments within the company that we do have a problem with current processes, but our lives could be made a lot easier with a few changes. The main problem I had was that I could only test the fix once a month, and prove to them that it would work.

Finally, today was the day to test.

After what felt like a forever long wait, the outcome was finally there to be seen and my little project had been a success. I don't think I've smiled so much at work, especially at a quarter end close. So proud of myself for doing my bit.