Tomorrow is now today........

the cat (awwwwww!)

The cat is great. He is adorable. His name is Joe and he is enormous and gorgeous and very very affectionate.

He has taken no time at all to settle in. He's clearly nervous around people sometimes, and we think he's been kicked about (but then the kind of stupid lazy and feckless people who leave a cat when they move house *are* the kind of people who kick cats and shouldn't have animals.) He is perpetually hungry, but as I write he is upstairs, curled up on the bed with R. Joe is a very big and solid cat, and has his first vets appointment next week for what is basically an MOT for cats!





The new car

How gorgeous? How big? How environmentally friendly? Well the answer to all those is very, as she is very gorgeous (some small work needed, but spares will come from the black Range Rover) she is huge (3.9lt EFI Vogue) and she is LPG converted, so doesn't have to run on petrol all the time. It's all good! We picked her up last night and she was a very comfortable ride home. It made us realise just how bad the big black one had got. R already feels more of an affinity with this one than he did the big black one, which never had a name, but always had a grumpy old man attitude!


the Bokashi buckets (coooooooool!)


They turned up yesterday from http://www.bokashibucket.co.uk/ for a very reasonable price and immediate delivery. There is a smell, but it's like a brewing smell, and if I keep the lid airtight on the bucket there is much less. I think it'll stop completely when I get an airtight tub to keep the bran in. There would have been pictures but the camera battery was dead. It's on charge now though!


going back to school. (humph!)

OK. Struggling with this one a bit. Basically just don't want to go. Want to see the kids. Want to teach. Want to spend time with like minded professionals. Tired of the paperwork, the pointlessness, the copying of results from one format to another just to please a different computer system, tired of the rubbish that goes with the excellence that is teaching. I'm a teacher. I'm not a secretary - why am I form filling? I'm not an admin worker - why am I filing? I'm not an analyst - sort out your own results from the raw info I give you. I'm a teacher. I'D LIKE TO HAVE TIME TO TEACH. Please.

the evening.

Least said, soonest mended. The He-Ex got caught in bad traffic on the way back from seeing his mother who is in the same place he lost his dad less than a year ago. Therefore he didn't pick up the Adorable Child, AC cried because he was promised camping, AC had to come with us to look at the car, eat McD's because we were late, didn't go to bed until 10, and was up at 6. Like I say, enough said.

And that's life so far!

Things to write about tomorrow.

I'm going to bed.

Tomorrow I shall write about

the cat (awwwwww!)

the new car (swoon!)

the Bokashi buckets (coooooooool!)

going back to school. (humph!)

the evening.

So until tomorrow lovely people.

Life is good.

I can't complain really.

(well, I could, but I shan't!)

Joe comes home today, and so there's a little bt of reshuffling to do in the front room so that he has some quiet space of his own as well as access to the rest of us. We're still working out where his litter box will go eventually, but for now it's going at the end of the sofa with his food bowls and bed, and we'll close him off in there a bit until such time as he is settled and wants to come out. He will have a whole patio door to look through, and eventually we'll get that changed when we get the rest of the windows done (hah!) so that it's one of those that tilts inwards as well as slides open, and that way we can get fresh air as well as keep him in.

We'll see how he goes.

I'm feeling better, and I think some of that is due to pulling back completely from the She-Ex situation. She didn't phone on Wednesday for him to speak to his daughter, and I've kind of got to the stage now where I think, well, if that's the way you're going to be, that's the way you're going to be. We've made life so easy for her over the last 3 years in terms of phoning and money and so on, and it's got to stop, because we deserve a life as well. All we ever get is grief and good intentions but no follow through anyway, so what's the point?

There's more about this somewhere else, but for now, I've had enough.

I'm going to go and sew. The quilt is coming on really well and going together really fast!

Catching up!

So.

I have poorly belly (reaction to pepper we think) and apparently now nits. I will deal with the latter and the former is sorting itself out.

My son is exhausted after his camping trip, because his father didn't put him to bed until late (fair enough, he was excited and somewhere new), he was uncomfortable all night, and then he was got up at 6 to get back here for 8.30 because his father was determindly going, even though he had to work the next day. As a consequence he was very unsettled and unsettleable yesterday and it was a loooooooooong day.

The cat people think the house is lovely, and that we are great, and that Joe will be very happy here. We pick him up at the weekend.

The starter has finally started making an effort after I mixed 1 cup of what was there, 1 cup bread flour, and 1 cup water together on Tuesday, then the same last night. It'll need to be done tonight, and then can just sit, and I'll slow bake with it on Saturday/Sunday.

We have one week of holiday left, and whilst we've done a lot it's not been loads but that's ok, if you see what I mean. The He-Ex has taken him to several places we were planning on taking him, because the money situation got so stuffed. Never mind.

And the child is up, so laters people!

Mundane Monday?

Monday was not the best day I every could have had.

It was not the best day we ever could have had.

I apparently have started the laziest starter in the world, although it has only had 17 of it's 24 hours as yet, so I shall keep an eye on it this morning. It came from here and seems to make sense. I shall update as the day progresses.

I achieved nothing in the house except cleaning the kitchen and bathroom. Actually, as I write that, it is quite a lot, especially as I made spag bol as well, and had enough meat sauce stuff left over to make lasagne this morning which is cling wrapped and ready for Wednesday night.

The AC and I also went for a looooooong walk to town to get the parcel which was indeed the bits for the Range Rover. We played in the park on the way home and eventually had sandwiches for lunch around 2pm!

And as a finale for yesterday, just as R got stuck into fixing the Rangy, the AC rolled off the sofa (in the midst of rolly pollying *on* the sofa) and smacked his head on his play table, which promptly came up so fast he nearly split the skin. I shouted R, he came in right away, and we put peas on it until it started to go down. AC was very quiet, not crying, nothing. We decided that if he wasn't interested in his tea than we would take him up to A&E, but he ate like a horse, and then perked up a lot, so he's fine.

Phew.

And now he's put the TV on, turned it onto the Olympics, and said "Look, the Olympics is on, would you like to watch it? and please may I use the puter?"

Got to love him......

Of fish and finances.

Well, we went out and got the fish and they are gorgeous and great and less than a tenner for all 12.



Right now, that matters.





The tanks we have had sitting around for a while, one I bought when he and I were first together, and then I decided I was going to buy a house and we decided that it was unlikely he would be staying in the box that he had been forced into, so there was no point in setting it up.

Both tanks are now set up as tropicals, with Danio's swimming about in them looking rather lovely.

This was the tank that the Danio's and the Golden Sucking Loaches were in at the fish shop. Fabulous, fabulous fish shop. Walsoken Aquatics, if you happen to be around this way and need fish.




They had some huge reef tanks and so on there as well, but that's a long way and a different house away for us.

Finances, are just tricky. R didn't get paid the bonus that he was supposed to for being away, and in fact got stiffed a bit. That meant that not only were we well out of pocket following the wedding and the hotel and the car hire and so on, but that we couldn't make the child support payment that we voluntarily make to the She-Ex. There wasn't the money. It couldn't happen. I said I would try and see if we could make it out of my wages, but we can't. Basically, I used to pay it out of my wages, and then she had one hissy fit too many, and wanted nothing to do with me, so I stopped paying it and it went from his wages instead, and I paid a couple of extra bills from mine instead of his. No problems.

The money isn't there, so we can't send it to her. When the work sort everything out and we get the money, then we can send it. There you go!

R is back to work tomorrow after his few days off, and the cat people come on Tuesday to see about Joe's home visit to live here. The part for the Range Rover should be here tomorrow, if it wasn't already here on Saturday - we missed the postman and then the post office, so the AC and I will pick up the parcel tomorrow and see what it is.

And I'm to bed soon - I've had very bad stomach in the night, I won't distress anyone with details, but something I had eaten had not agreed with me at all. I've slept most of the day, R has taken care of me and the AC, and life has been drowsy and sofa based. AC has been fabulous, lovely and snuggly and caring.

I have a great life.

There will be no Derek and Clive, but there will be a Joe.

Joe is a big, fat-to-the-point-of-being-on-a-diet tabby, who was left behind by his owners the first time he came to the cat place, (don't even start me on the selfish, lazy, STUPIDNESS, of people who won't take care of an animal when they move) and was then rehomed. Unfortunately, his new owner then became ill and went blind, meaning that she couldn't have Joe anymore, and he was back to the cat place again. He is also FIV positive, which is fine, just makes him an indoor cat. Sorted! He can't be with other cats because of the FIV, but he's cool. He loves having a fuss made of him, he approached the AC as opposed to the other way around, R thought he was fabulous, we're sorted!

I have a busting head today though. Off to find the Beechams. Then we're out on the bike to pick up the fish, as the Range Rover blew a hose yesterday on the way back from the cat place. It's all cool, we've ordered the parts, R will fix it, no worries. Just a pain in the rear as we have things to do that involve getting all three of us somewhere, and that *can't* be done on a bike.

We're talking about taking the tarp off of Ellie and starting her. As soon as I pass my test, she's my beast.

No Derek and Clive for us.

The pair of cats that we thought we might have found to live here turn out to be excellent mousers and not fond of small children. Reluctantly, we have decided that they are not the cats for us, even though we had already mentally renamed them in our heads (yes, Derek and Clive of Peter Cook and Dudley Moore creation - they looked like Pete and Dud, what can I say?)

So tomorrow we head over to the CPL again, to see what animals they have available. I know it would be easier just to get kittens, but we don't have a house suitable for kittens, nor a lifestyle suitable for them. And we refuse to make them fit our lives, making them unhappy in the process, when the perfect place for Derek and Clive is out there somewhere, and the perfect cats for us are in there somewhere.

The AC is cool about it, he's a very mature and understanding little boy, who I was told today was an utter credit to me. We were out in a coffee shop, having had a major disappointment in being turned away from the pool because it was full until 4pm, and he was calm, not all sobbing and trantruming, just gently disappointed and secure in the knowledge that as soon as I could take him I would!

I made a phonecall home, and it was all sorted. We went to the later swimming session, and got home to find that R had made tea for us. Quality bloke. He was disappointed not to have come swimming with us, but he says he will next time. Once again, a few hours away from the He-Ex, and the AC and R have an excellent relationship, playing snakes and ladders with the stone minibeasts we made, arranging to go to aircraft museums together and so on. Oh well.

Off to bed for me now. Busy day tomorrow!

Fish

We are embarking down the fish route. For the last couple of years, we have moved 2 fish tanks around the house, complete with kit, that we "accquired" and then didn't use because we were still having building work done in the house. Now we can.

There is still building work to be done but we can't get them done at the moment and they won't be done for a while, so we are having the fish.

Today we went to a fish place recommended to us, and it was ok. When we got back, we discovered that we actually had been to a different fish place, and not the one recommended to us, which was slightly further down the road! So we went there and it was really nice. We still have no fish (we can't have fish until the weekend at least because of the water having to settle down and then we have to test the water and see what the *insert technical words I have to learn* levels are and then we can have some little fish called Danio's.


Anyway, I'll finish this later as I have to take care of the Adorable Child who is Very Excited About Fish.

Lots of looking at......

Right now we are doing lots of looking at stuff.

We are looking at bokashi bins.
We are looking at cats. (and may have found a pair!)
We are looking at setting up the office properly.
We are looking at carpeting the office with what was going to go down here, and reflooring down here with wood.
We are looking at shelving.

We are looking at lots of stuff. But it's when you look deeply at anything that the environmental considerations become apparent.

For example - bokashi bins. Great idea. I really want to do this, I think it'll work for us, I think that this is a practical solution to our composting difficulties and my inherent abhorance of going out in the cold and wet to put potato peelings in the compost. Plus, I can compost more things this way. They are here and really look to be the solution. But I'm trying to factor in the cost of them coming here, in terms of miles, find a local supplier, so we can pick them up on the way to somewhere as opposed to having them posted, and so on.

I suppose the question is, how concious should I be? What are the biggest considerations as far as your environmental life is concerned?

The cat's are easy - they are coming from the local Cat's Protection place. Recycled? lol! There is a slight difficulty in that the enormous boy pair that I like are long hairs, and the little girl pair that we both liked are only from down the road to us and so may try and return home - literally it's within a mile.

The rest of it, well, R has said that all of his time and energy are going to go on making me happy in this home because he knows I'm not at the moment. How wonderful is that?

Back on the ish wagon

Well, I have been quite unenvironmentally sound recently, by our standards, and it's mainly through a lack of movement caused by the arthritis, and the fact that that gets me down a bit really. In combination with The Wedding Of The Millenium, and The Funeral Day it's been tricky. Emotionally I've been slightly bleah, especially when the stress (and yes, it was surprisingly stressful) of the Return Of The Man From The Desert Lands and the resultant change in attitude and behaviour of the She-Ex and He-Ex.

But we are starting a new environmental leaf, so to speak. And there are things that must be done. I've restarted paying attention to what goes in the bin. I've started cooking more from scratch again and it's all good. I shall keep you informed, oh blog of mine. I tend to use selfsufficientish.com quite a lot for ideas and help, and recently bought the Selfsufficientish Bible which I am really enjoying, as is the Adorable Child, and we have lots of things to make!

Laters people. Off to play with the new phone.

And of course the Olympics beckon.........