NEW START
New year. New job. New life?

Work has been a huge shock to my sedentary system. After three months off, my body and I were becoming accustomed to neverending days of nothingness. Now I'm up at the crack and don't get home till it's closed again.

And as I dither over whether I ought to watch the end of Newsnight or start reading the biography of Marco Pantani, now is probably as good a time as any to take stock.

So what have I learned about turning 30 and surviving it?

1) Don't fall in love with your best friend. If you must, don't tell her. And if you do, don't bother blubbing like a Norwegian whaler who's forgotten his Neutrogena.

2) Don't stay in a dead-end job longer than is necessary. And if you do, try not to play a pivotal role in getting an unknown Congolese IT man on the News, and then watch in horror as his career as a novelty celebrity takes off and his appearances on TV multiply while yours become a distant memory.

3) Don't follow up a five-year old fantasy and expect the reality to match. And if you do, do it properly. Don't be lulled into thinking that, despite the distance, the time, the boyfriend of three years, and the 48 hour time limit, you're going to make her fall in love with you.

4) Don't look at years gone by with rose-tinted glasses. They weren't that great. They were just years you'd lived in a particular time, in a particular place, and perhaps with a particular person.

5) Don't write a blog that no-one reads, and even less people bother posting on. If it's for catharsis, then write a diary. Some things are best kept between you and your cluttered mind.

NOT THERE YET
I'm worried. Although I had an excellent interview at my prospective employers, the way things are going at my current home I could get sacked before I have a chance to quit.

Every time I go to work now, I dread the opening of my inbox, fearful of what awaits me inside. My heart literally sinks and my mood swings lower.

This time it stems from a panic just before deadline, precipitated by a costly new content management system which routinely fucks up. The fact that it does this at random, and therefore may not have affected my colleagues, is only likely to deepen my boss's loathing for me.

As and when my next reprimand comes, complete with the punishment he intends to mete out, I'll already have a considered response:

"I wouldn't do that for the following reason," I'd say.
"One - it's grossly unfair and part, I feel, of your campaign to discredit, demoralise and demotivate me, while at the same time hounding me out because of your managerial incompetence.
Two - I'll take it to the unions and take you to an industrial tribunal - I've been told I have a watertight case.
Three - I'm leaving anyway (please see my notice attached)."

But I need to be careful. Although I've almost landed the new job, they see me coming to them from a position of strength i.e. I have a job already. If I leave before signing for the new firm, then I might look desperate. Either way, I want to be out of there within a month. So let's just hope that new contract lands on my doormat sooner rather than later.