As of yesterday I should be the luckiest person alive. Namely, I was attacked by a bird. Not attacked in the traditional hitchcockian (is that a word?) sense because there was no blood anywhere. No, this was the more subtle form of attack where I was bombarded with bird-droppings just as I was getting on the bus. So I had a lovely ride where I tried desperately to keep my soiled bag and sleeve away from the rest of the people and, especially, rest of me.

When I got home I tried to clean it off but by that time it had dried and seemed to enjoy being permanently stuck on my bag and sleeve. So I had no other alternative but to pile them next to the already impressive heap of dirty laundry.

They claim that being hit by bird-droppings brings good luck or wealth – which, in my current state of bankruptcy, is the same thing – but so far nothing has happened to prove that. I missed my bus again this morning (which, by the way, wasn't my fault since I was there on time) and my right knee hurts again.

That's right, I'm 23 and my knees hurt! I don't want to imagine what happens when I'm finally old enough to legitimately claim that. I'll probably be in a wheelchair. But they hurt randomly and therefore provide very little help in predicting the weather, which is what most old people seem to get out of their bad knees. And the worst thing is that it's completely my own fault for getting them into this state in the first place. You see, I used to love step-aerobics (that's the kind where you step on and off a bench for an hour) and that made my knees hurt. Finally I figured out the reason for the pain and gave up step-aerobics and the knees improved. Another thing I love is bicycle riding and that also tends to work one's knees quite a lot. So that's another reason for the pain. But what I most blame is the bus to work! (have you noticed how that's the root of all evil?)

I am not the kind of person who gets to the bus-stop early and waits there. I'm more the kind of a person running after the bus begging the driver to stop. Ay, there's the rub!, as Hamlet said it. There's nothing wrong with running if you've done the warm-up exercises and have the appropriate outfit. But when you've just got out of bed and are wearing heels for the first time since the spring it's something else altogether. A few weeks ago I'd put on my heeled warm boots for the first time and was late for the bus, as usual. So I sprinted, caught the bus, got on and felt something was wrong with my knee. Damn!

*****

Some of the workers of our firm work in Finland. There is a contractor there that uses our men and we present them with invoices and hope they find the time and money to pay them. For the past two weeks we've been getting invoices from the Finnish firm stating “puhelin 200€” etc. ('puhelin' means 'phone' in Finnish) When calling them we got no sensible answer whatsoever so on Tuesday my boss decided to go there in person to sort it out. He got back this morning and indignantly told me what it was about. Apparently the men have been given mobile phones, which are probably necessary since I imagine they need to be in contact with the foreman etc. But they haven't only been making those calls. No! Apparently, during the long lonely nights, they've been dialling numbers where friendly girls talk about sex.

That's right! They were calling sex hotlines and probably thought nobody would find out. Hello? Are your brains there? As far as I know these kinds of costs are marked separately on the phone bills. How dumb do you have to be not to figure that out?

Our Finnish contractor is another genius, trying to make us responsible for those costs. We didn't give them the phones. They did. And they should've also been the ones explaining the rules to the men. No sex-talk on the company phone! How hard can that be? Or, if they didn't do that, they should've deducted the money from their pay not make us, the intermediaries, responsible for it.

Of course, this all came later. My first reaction upon hearing the explanation was to laugh out loud. I think my boss expected some of that indignation from me as well. Instead I found it hilarious because I still can't grasp the full stupidity of the men. OK, you want to call the sex hotline. At least make sure you're the one paying for it! Use your common sense – most companies don't pay for the workers' sexual gratification. That will have to come out of your own salary!

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