Got my visa :)

[featherB 1]

... the courier brought it this morning!! And very pretty it is too - like a kid has been given free rein with the colouring pencils.

Now, if only I had the faintest clue when exactly I'd be using it, I'd be *much* more excited. Will avoid boring anyone rigid with details, but... if I resign from my job, I'm supposed to give two months (ugh!!) notice - but I'm waiting to see if they're going to make me (voluntarily) redundant first. It should have been happening as of April 1st (perfect!) but it's all been held up... so now I don't know what to do - how long I should wait before just going 'buggger it!' and handing in my notice. The two month notice period doesn't appeal when they might well just pay me to leave (woohoo!) and let me go at much shorter notice... if I resigned and then a week later all my also-hoping-to-leave colleagues got their redundancies... that would be fairly, um, annoying!

I would sooooooooo love to just get on a plane ASAP and get over there. The Boy keeps telling me not to be hasty and to be patient and to wait and see what happens. Bah. I am sick of being patient, I've had it up to here with being patient!

*stamps foot*

Um, anyway. That is all. The mini-vent felt good, though. Damn it, I've got my visa - now I want to be counting down to the day I can actually make use of it!

Right, back to eBaying my entire life away... people really will buy anything on there...

[no name 1]

6 months & counting down...

[Teddy406 0]

... the courier brought it this morning!! And very pretty it is too - like a kid has been given free rein with the colouring pencils.

Now, if only I had the faintest clue when exactly I'd be using it, I'd be *much* more excited. Will avoid boring anyone rigid with details, but... if I resign from my job, I'm supposed to give two months (ugh!!) notice - but I'm waiting to see if they're going to make me (voluntarily) redundant first. It should have been happening as of April 1st (perfect!) but it's all been held up... so now I don't know what to do - how long I should wait before just going 'buggger it!' and handing in my notice. The two month notice period doesn't appeal when they might well just pay me to leave (woohoo!) and let me go at much shorter notice... if I resigned and then a week later all my also-hoping-to-leave colleagues got their redundancies... that would be fairly, um, annoying!

I would sooooooooo love to just get on a plane ASAP and get over there. The Boy keeps telling me not to be hasty and to be patient and to wait and see what happens. Bah. I am sick of being patient, I've had it up to here with being patient!

*stamps foot*

Um, anyway. That is all. The mini-vent felt good, though. Damn it, I've got my visa - now I want to be counting down to the day I can actually make use of it!

Right, back to eBaying my entire life away... people really will buy anything on there...

Congratulations, and Good Luck with the "push" before you "jump"

[Buxton babe 0]

Congrats, Well done.

[Boiler 45,481]

Hang on for the money!

[Aymerlu 3]

[Bill and Hayley 0]

Congrats I feel the same, got mine today and dont know when im leaving, most probably july, just seems sooooo long to wait.

[rebeccajo 14]

I don't suppose you have an "in" with anybody in your HR department?

[garyandkris 0]

I really hope you are made redundant. There's a phrase I never thought I'd say to anyone.

[ajames79 0]

Fantastic!!!!

Congrats! Feels good doesn't it!?

[TheZilla 0]

#######, that is such a hard call. I hate when companies hold that 'possible redundancy' up in the air that way. I don't know if I could deal, especially if I had that VISA in hand.

Still, if you two would greatly benefit from redundancy pay, I'd say perhaps stick it out. I'm just notoriously irresponsible though. If I had enough to get by during the period of not being able to work in America, I'd just be concerned about getting out of my job with good references intact and take off A.S.A.P. I'm just being honest, I just tend to lead with the "I want to start my new life!" heart than I do with my "Sound financial choices" head. If the redundancy pay would make a big difference though, I think I'd stick it out.

I just hope that if you stick it out, they DO make you redundant. Corporate just sucks that way.

Whichever you choose to do, CONGRATS on getting that VISA and good luck for the future!

[Savanphil 3]

Congratz!!!

[Mags 112]

Wonderful news, congratulations!

[featherB 1]

Thank you all, lovely VJer people! It's hard to believe that garishly-coloured bit of paper is what all these months (okay, so not *that* many months in my case - we've been incredibly lucky, all things considered!) of form-filling and evidence-gathering and waiting and more form-filling and evidence-gathering have been in aid of! It's weird... I keep opening my passport and peering at it and thinking 'I could get the train to Heathrow now, and be on the next flight outta here...!' :)

I'm going to try some quoting-and-replying now, and will probably ####### it all up.

I don't suppose you have an "in" with anybody in your HR department?

I wish... until a couple of years ago, yep - I knew the relevant people well enough that there might have been some hope of wheedling, grovelling, plying with alcohol and similar... sadly their jobs were all outsourced (the last of the 'old' HR people I actually knew to talk to took redundancy a few months ago... curses!) and our new HR people are mysterious, automaton-like types who seem incapable or unwilling to hold any conversation that hasn't been pre-scripted for them. Damn.

#######, that is such a hard call. I hate when companies hold that 'possible redundancy' up in the air that way. I don't know if I could deal, especially if I had that VISA in hand.

Still, if you two would greatly benefit from redundancy pay, I'd say perhaps stick it out. I'm just notoriously irresponsible though. If I had enough to get by during the period of not being able to work in America, I'd just be concerned about getting out of my job with good references intact and take off A.S.A.P. I'm just being honest, I just tend to lead with the "I want to start my new life!" heart than I do with my "Sound financial choices" head. If the redundancy pay would make a big difference though, I think I'd stick it out.

I just hope that if you stick it out, they DO make you redundant. Corporate just sucks that way.

Whichever you choose to do, CONGRATS on getting that VISA and good luck for the future!

Ahh, you have it exactly... and I'm being very strongly influenced by the "I want to start my new life!" head, and thinking 'meh, it's only money, life's too short!' etc - if it weren't for Sensible Mr. Fiance and his "sound financial choices" head, I'd almost certainly have lost my cool entirely and thrown myself over my manager's desk as soon as I knew my interview date, and been pathetically grateful if they'd agreed to let me give, say, six weeks notice instead of eight. Teddy406 mentioned 'being pushed before I jump' - made me smile, 'cos I've been repeatedly 'talked down from the ledge' (as it were) by assorted colleagues, friends & family members every time I decide I've had enough of the waiting, and announced that as soon as I get the visa, I'm outta here. In fact, my mother had to do just that (from a beach in Egypt, where she's on holiday right now - must have cost her a fortune in mobile phone bill ) after I texted her to say the visa had arrived, and that I was therefore finding it hard to resist the urge to jump straight on a plane and email work to say 'uhh... I can't come in tomorrow... or ever!'. Obviously I was (mostly) joking, but I think she missed that part.

I'm going to wait a bit and see what happens... I feel like such a whiny little b!tch that I'm even complaining 'oh poor me, shall I leave now or hold on in the hope of getting a bit of free money?' - it does sound truly pathetic! Anyway... thank you all for 'listening' to my musings and ramblings - I will stop whingeing for now! Thank you again for all the congrats... now let me just go and stare at my visa again for a bit...

[BelwinMills 0]

Congrats safe travels