Leaving on a jet plane....

So, here's my last post from Mountain View. Although don't stop reading next week, as I'll be blogging about the crazy shit in London then! Provided I can stay awake long enough to write stuff. Dreading the jetlag already, as I'm fully acclimatised to Mountain View time now. For instance, right now I'm just starting to feel sleepy and it's 11.44pm. Which is 7.44am in England. I need to be at work on Monday at 8.30am for my London induction. Which means I'm going to need to get the 7.15am train from Cambridge, so will have to get up at 6am or thereabouts. Which is 10pm over here. So I need to get up just as I'd be going to bed. However I look at this, it's not going to be good. Oh well. As long as I can make it in on Monday, I'm sure I'll survive... Lots of Pepsi Max. Maybe a cheeky Red Bull. Assuming I don't die trying to ride to the station in the morning due to excessive amounts of fro yo and lemon cheese pockets blocking my arteries...
The chefs must have known I was leaving, as there were lemon cheese pockets this morning at breakfast. Good job as I needed them to fuel what ended up being a really hectic day. There were problems with the UK site, so had to fix them. Then had some last minute panicky training on changing countries on my phone so I can test all the different versions of the store from the UK. Unfortunately as part of the process of setting my phone up with the test environments, all my stuff on it got wiped, including today's photos. But you probably don't want to see the gorgeous blue skies this morning, the palm trees, etc. as you all shiver in the snow. I'm on my way back. I'll be feeling your pain very soon.
Anyway, my training was finally done at 6pm tonight, as we struggled to get the thing to work. All good in the end. I came home with the Japanese version of the store on it. And managed to swap it back with the UK one all on my own. So that was a bit of a result!! I have the technology....
Had a lovely final lunch in the cafe with a load of the team. Feel really sad to be leaving, although there's talk of me coming back in February. Hurrah! Mostly cos January is already starting to look pretty rammed for me. It's a good feeling being busy again. Just need to make sure it doesn't get too crazy. Want to try and time my visit with the annual Google skiing trip - some crazy two day trip to the mountains for ski fun. Gotta be done really. So Midem at the end of January in France, then skiing in Feb. And fuckloads of work. Work hard, play hard, blah blah blah.
More meetings in the afternoon, and then the final TGIF of the year. There was a real buzz about this one, as it was the one in which Googles Xmas present to its staff was to be announced / given out. Last year everyone got $1,000 cash in hand and a 10% pay rise, so anticipation was high! We're all sworn to secrecy about what it is, so I can't divulge. Sorry. And actually after queuing up with all my colleagues, I found out I couldn't have mine til I get back to London as it'll be waiting for me there. I felt like the really bad kid at Xmas!! Santa didn't have anything for me :o( And after all I've done in the spirit of Google Xmas this week. Fuck you Santa.
The huge queues and huge amounts of people meant I didn't see most people for proper goodbyes, which was probably for the best, as I was getting quite emotional about going! Plus it's not like I'm leaving the company. I'm just moving to another office in a completely different timezone. I'll see them all again soon.
For some weird reason my GBus shuttle home tonight went missing. So i was stood outside waiting for 40 minutes. I couldn't help but feel that this was Google's way of making it clear that I shouldn't leave! That and the fact that England is covered in snow.... Nah, don't worry, I'm coming home. Can't miss seeing you all at Xmas. If anyone fancies seeing if I can stay awake for 30 hours straight (my current plan is to try and stay awake until Sunday night then pass out), I'm aiming to be in the Old Spring falling asleep face first in a chicken and bacon ciabatta on Sunday evening around 7pm if you want to come in and stick chips up my nose. Failing that, I'll see you all over the next couple of weeks to bore you all senseless banging on and on and on and on and on and on and on about how amazing the last three weeks of my life have been.
All packed up now, apart from this laptop obviously. I have three huge bags to get back. Paid the excess in advance. God knows how I'm going to get them all out of the apartment and down to the street for my taxi. Hopefully he'll give me a hand. Oh well, I'll find out tomorrow. If I end up crushed by a case full of Xmas shopping, you'll just have to share the stuff out between yourselves. I think you'll be able to work out who gets what....
See you all very very soon
Woo hoo! I'm coming home!
H xxxxx