Saturday, February 28, 2009

Stuff and nonsense

That's how I feel tonight. I'm tired, I ache in places I didn't know I had, my shoulders are on fire, and I'm having a beer. It's late at night, and I suppose I shouldn't but that's how I feel lol! This will hopefully relax me enough to sleep. I'm watching Girls of the Playboy Mansion, listening to the boys talk about DPS, and warriors, and paladins over druids and so on, and just basically being happy with everything that's going on in my life except my shoulders. I'm such a girly wuss!

The AC has come home with a Stage Six book which he read fluently with R this evening, no problems. Actually, one problem - he got stuck on "bounced" but they read the rest of the sentence together "Nobody bounced on the bed, Nobody bumped Big Bad Bill's head" (or something like that) and then they looked at the picture to see where Nobody was. His reading and writing is really coming on now. His intervention group finishes this week, and it's really made a difference to the way that he views reading and writing. He's always loved reading, but because his writing wasn't as good as he wanted it to be, he's never wanted to do it so much. Now it is better, so he's happier to do it! (and now he's idolising R, whose writing is never the neatest, then it takes the pressure off of him, although I have no idea where the pressure comes from because it isn't me lol!)

Oh well. I think it's time to head to bed for this tired person. The boys will be up until late, snacking on shortbread and double chocolate biscuits, made this afternoon inside 30 mins when Mr B decided he was coming after all!

Tomorrow is a quiet day of church, starting the home brewing, (using a kit for the first time of doing it.) buying pillows for all of us and binning the old ones, marking and planning. AC and R will sort out the homebrewing after I've sterilised it all. It's something R remembers doing with his Daddy, so we thought we'd involve AC as well. We might go out in the afternoon somewhere, but it may depend on how I feel, or rather, how R thinks I feel - he's very careful about me doing too much when I'm not well lol!

The washing is done and sorted - everyone has pants and socks for the week, AC has uniform for the week. I'll do a shirt wash tomorrow and then R will have uniform for the week - counting down now! My clothes are almost sorted, I need to do more washing for those to have a weeks worth of school stuff clean, (obviously I have lots of other clothes lol!)

Oooooh! Big news! I treated myself to a DS title today and got the 100 classic books module. It has some great books on that I have always wanted to read and never got round to getting a copy of, as well as lots that I've read before and would love to read again. So I'm starting with Louisa M Alcotts "Little Women". And so I'm off to bed, leaving the boys chatting and chomping.

I love the fact that R likes inviting people here, and people like coming, and I like having them. It's all good!

Just up again....

..... Just had a 2 hour nappette!

Weird morning. Utterly weird in many ways.

I was up at 0545 as usual, and by 0630 I was sat down to mark with the dishwasher on, the washing machine on, the tumbledrier on, the bread machine on, the dining room table cleared, the animals all fed, and life was good.

I marked for a couple of hours, and R got up. At this point I had cooled down from being tucked up in bed, and discovered I couldn't move my shoulder. It wasn't painful unless I put any stress on the muscle, but it couldn't be moved. I had just dragged a t-shirt and joggers on when I got up, as I don't like to wake R up that early by having a shower. As he was up, I thought well, I would get on and have my shower as we needed to go to town, get a few things done.

It was an utter comedy!

I had to have R help me undress.
He had to wash my hair, rinse it and condition it, rinse it again.
I couldn't wash my own back, or anything else really!
He had to dry me, and then help me get dressed.

It was funny in so many ways, except that laughing hurts lol! The Ibuprofen is great but has upset my stomach but if I don't take it then the muscle will struggle to come out of spasm. We could be in for a few days of this! (R says he doesn't mind lol - he certainly seemed to be enjoying himself lol ;-) )

We went to town, which was fine, and then SUDDENLY it was heaving, so we left. There's a couple of things we need to get tomorrow, but that's ok, we'll go in when it's quieter tomorrow and sort them out. There's a couple of things that will have to wait until later in the week, but they can wait, no big deal.

More weirdness came when we were accosted in town by the Red Cross people, wanting us to do direct debit things, which was amusing as R went into play against that particularly patronsing young man, RC man saying what the RC did, and R saying "No you don't, what you actually do is x,y,z."

And on the way out of town, we were accosted by a matched pair of young Elders from the church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints. Who were surprised to find someone who knew the history of the Book of Mormon, and had read some of it, and thought it was barking, and wasn't afraid to say so. R sat down and waited whilst we discussed the facts of the matter, and then they tried to rope him in by asking if he believed in God, he told them that he believed in lots of Gods, and was Pagan, so they asked me if I felt the same way, and I said no, I was a Methodist, but religious freedom and freedom of speech was a vital part of what was happening in the world and suppression of the same was against God's will. They asked what we knew about the Mormons, and R explained he was still married to one, but she was in the States!

And then they went.

They were very nice, but they are barking, IMHO, just like the Jehovah's Witnesses, who I studied with for 2.5 years on a Thursday evening, and came to the conclusion that they are just wrong about so many things.

Ah well.

Must get on and do some things. Like have a cup of tea, except I've given it up for Lent. So I'll make him a cup of tea, and get myself a drink of something, and look at the washing machine and see what needs doing there, and then start on the marking again.

Life is good!

Friday, February 27, 2009

How amazingly cool?

Dave has moulted.

He looks massive now. Utterly massive, compared to what he was, and his empty shell is just sitting there. He may well eat it in the next few days.

I'll put pictures up later.

WOW then bed for me I think!

And we're back to a 10

The neurofen has worked!

I'm back to a 10 and not feeling so sick. I can't move my arm, but that's fine lol, it's balanced on the laptop!

And the chinese is on the way. Well. It is payday!

Beer, crisps and nurophen

Ok, after all my talk of holistic stuff and wanting to get homeopathic stuff, we didn't get into town, so I'm having a beer, eating smoky bacon crisps, and I've taken 2 neurophen. It's working.

By the end of today I was stiff in both shoulders, although my neck was fine, and my stomach had blown. It always does when I am in pain type pain, as at a certain level of pain I start to feel sick. A certain more level and I will be sick. It's fine, it's just the way my body is. *shrug* It's rare that I get to the being sick stage - although when I had the AC I was sick every 30 minutes, all the way through the 20 hours. I don't do pain like that. Aches I can do. Aching is easy. Actual pain, and bleugh. It's not pretty. But the beauty of knowing what your body is likely to do, is that I know where I need to be, so if the pain gets worse I will just take a duvet and a good book into the bathroom, tie my hair back, and wait. It's all good. In a sick kind of way.

Right now my stomach is too big for my size 14 fat joggers. It'll go, because it's just a reaction to the pain, but it is HUGE! I look pregnant! (I'm not though!)

I also managed to *really* annoy my children today. Every now and again I have to remind my children who is boss. And it's me. They are the pack, I am the Alpha female. Pretty much, I let them sort out their own pack order, ensuring that noone gets hurt, physically or mentally on the way. I love them, care for them, guide them and nurture them, but at the end of the day, I am not going to be there at the weekends, at the holidays, at the end of the year, so they have to be able to stand without me. I will always have their backs, because that's my job - but I also have their best interests at heart and that means that I have to teach them right from wrong. That's as much my job as teaching them that 2+2=4. So today, after 2 days of warning about their noise levels, their work attitudes, and their manners, they got back to the classroom after lunch to find that I had changed their desks to straight lines, right across the classroom, no fussing, no talking, and if you get to me any more I will sit you boy/girl/boy/girl, which, at 7/8/9 years old is the biggest threat I can give them lol! They settled in. They read, in silence through their reading session. They went to the library, lining up with the minimum of noise, even though I hadn't reminded them. They were polite and well mannered in the library, and came back, got on with handwriting and then went into assembly with no fuss and by this point they knew I wasn't cross, just being firm, and that no one was in major trouble. We shared a few jokes and did some Show and Tell and life was good.

The best way to judge their mood though, is with the "Good afternoon my children."

Today was "Good afternoon Queen C********, Good afternoon Prince H********, Good afternoon Royal Subjects."

If they leave with a joke like that, then they understand, and it's all good. If it had been Miss C, Mr H, children, then we'd have had to have a chat and sort a few things out.

They are good children, gorgeous people in the making. I'm lucky to have them. All 31 of them.

A not so good night

I would hesitate to say a bad night - there are mothers out there with new babies who had far worse ones than me - but by my standards, it was a bad night. I sleep on the side that has the problem, so I had to sleep on my back, which was fine, it didn't hurt, right up to the point where I kept trying to roll over onto the bad side. In the end, R kind of pinned me down with his leg to stop me doing it. Several benefits there ;-) Necessity ended up being the mother of invention and I slept much better after that!

I feel there is a long day ahead. Loooooooooooooong day. But with plenty of work to do. The highlight of today will be the phonecall to BG tonight, which didn't happen on Wednesday, although we phoned there 3 or 4 times. Times like that I have to work hard to remember that the She-Ex is indeed a nice person. And she is, a very nice person. I have always been quite fond of her, very fond of the BG, and I do wish it could all have worked out another way. I have no bad feelings towards her though, which is nice for me! I don't think it's nice for her, but it's certainly easier for me. We were quite friendly on the net for a while, which was fine and quite enjoyable, but every now and again she gets ansty and swears and then I just don't like talking to that person in her, so I don't. TBH, she is the way she is, I am the way I am, and I don't have to make room in my life for the person that she turns into. I like the other person in her a lot. But there we go. I stopped doing anything for her a while ago, and so if it means the child support is late, it's late. She has a really good job now, so doesn't really need it, and after all the times when I busted a gut to get it done and get it to her when she did need it with barely a thankyou, I thought "Sod it!" It gets done when R has chance to do it now. I still do the other blog for the BG, and one day she'll sit with us and see it all I hope and then she'll know that we never forgot her, never walked away, never just ignored her, and always, always kept her informed and loved her. I sent her the pictures last night of Daddy getting his medal. I hope she sees them. And if not now, then later in her life, it'll be ok :-)

Sad now. I always end up thinking about the BG when I'm tired or down. It's not about the She-Ex, it's about the BG, same as we aren't about us, we're about the AC. I have a very good relationship with the AC's father, which I nurtured and grew because I didn't want this animosity for the AC to grow up in. I want him to come to conclusions about his father because that's what *he* thinks, not because that's what I want him to think. And so far, he wants to change his name when he is bigger to the same as R's surname! I'd never even thought about it, but obviously he has! Bless him. Having said that, currently he wants to be R. They are always together doing something and the look on the AC's face when R told him off the other day was heartbreaking. Obviously R finished up with positive statements, which rebuilt the AC's self esteem, and let him know he was still loved, but the AC threw his arms around him a bit later on, just randomly, just to be sure!

But I'll get over the sadness - I always do! A short trip around the blogosphere should do the trick! And then to school for a full day of teaching, and then we're done for the weekend, which will be mainly marking ready for parents evening. YAY! (not!)

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Ow.

*Beware - this post contains moaning, complaining, and general misery* (but it'll probably end on a happy note, so buckets may be required.)

Ow.

I woke up this morning, with weirdness. Over the last couple of days I've had a slightly stiff neck which has worked it's way loose by around 8am. So a couple of hours, max. Yesterday it was barely there.

Today, oh m'word, it was there. I was leaning my head to one side, (the left!) and couldn't actually straighten it up. It was funny, in a painful kind of way. The pain extended from my right ear, across my neck, and down my right shoulder to the bottom of the shoulderblade. By playtime, it was across both shoulders, and I couldn't move my head at all, which made the children concerned, until I laughed about it, and then they laughed. I phoned the doc at break, and they squeezed me in at lunchtime with the On-Call team.

And then, at around 1130, I got the hiccups. I have never had bizarre pain like it. It's practically impossible to hiccup without moving my shoulders, and yet moving hurt like a thump with a tenderiser to the spine. I could not wait to get to the doc.

Lovely nurse on call said I had this.

Acute (sudden onset) primary torticollis. This is sometimes called 'wry neck'. A torticollis is when the head becomes twisted to one side and it is very painful to move the head back straight. Most cases are thought to be due to a minor injury or poor posture while sleeping which causes one or more muscles on one side of the neck to go ito 'spasm'. The pain and spasm usually ease and clear away over a few days without any treatment. Occasionally, torticollis is due to more serious causes.

She said to take Nurophen, 400mg every 4 hours (must take some now!) and co-codamol if the pain is bad. TBH, I'll leave that bit, I don't need painkillers, and if I did I'd be off work, and as I'm not off work unless I'm dead or have no voice, then I'll be fine. Work is for doing, and going to.

R has been so considerate and lovely this evening, even though the battery went on the car at Tesco and he had to get a jump to get back, but we had friends we could call on, and they helped us out, which was super. But he has run me a bath, helped me undress, brought me a dressing gown, cleared up tea, all kinds of things that he usually does some of, but tonight he did all of it. He's amazing and I am so lucky!

On top of walking like Quasimodo today, the AC's teacher came into me in the middle of Circle Time to tell me that the AC had bumped his head, it was coming out like an egg, and Mrs Y was dealing with him. That was cool, because I was able to ask her to tell Mrs Y that as long as the bump was coming out, that was ok, if he didn't have a bump then we needed to keep a REALLY close eye on him. He must have heard me, because he had a lovely sized bump and was absolutely fine this evening, scoffing down lots of tea. I wanted to put some arnica on it, but we're out of it, so I must get some. In fact, I must get a whole load of stuff for home medicine. Any ideas?

And so to bed!

And that's my day!

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

10 favourites.... sounds.

Courtesy of the Earthenwitch, who supplied the question, here are mine.

1) The AC when he giggles in his sleep.
2) "Hey you" as spoken by R in his low and affectionate voice.
3) the bread machine whirring.
4) the 'busy hum' of my children working
5) a V8 engine.
6) a class 60 diesel locomotive powering up.
7) loud rock music
8) quiet classical music (mainstream I'm afraid!)
9) The silence of a Saturday morning in the house.
10) The door opening as someone comes home.

Works for me.

What about you?

Procrastination is the name of the game

If there is one thing I am good at, it's procrastinating.

In fact, I'll finish this later..... :-)

I have to say it's that kind of slightly pointless joke that makes me laugh. But I am also a great procrastinator who will cheerfully use anything to avoid work, and then have to slog away until stupid o'clock am to get things done at the last minute.

What I need, is ideas for not doing this.

Obviously, getting off of the internet is one.
Not drinking so much tea is another. (Must blog on that later)

But I wil clean, phone people, do washing, whatever it is that avoids the work, I will do. These days I'll blog as well. Like now.

I need to mark assessment books, update Thetford targets, complete marking the literacy books, and write the parents evening notes for next week. It's just not possible. It's going to be a late one.

And I'll be ranting later about it all I'm sure.

Up early again.

Can't sleep, don't want to wake R up before I have to - he's due in the gym at 7 and then is on a course.

So I thought I'd come down here, mark a few books, blog a bit, and now I'm sat here, and there's nothing through my brain!

Writers block? Hardly. Writers block should be something that lasts ages, that involves angst and wailing and gnashing of teeth. This is a temporary hiatus in the artistic flow. LOL

Are blogs artistic though? Could I count this as writing? I mean, all that really happens is that my brain vomits onto the screen via my keyboard. There is very little censorship or thought involved. What is in my head comes out onto the page, which is the way I've always written. It's useful for story writing, and I love it for poetry, both of which I am sometimes bad at and sometimes reasonably good at.

In fact, I haven't written a story for a long time, but I write poetry fairly often. I wrote a lot when I was breaking up with Ex1. I wrote some when I was breaking up with Ex2. These days I do things because I'm happy, not because I'm breaking up with someone lol!

Speaking of Ex2, I found a letter the other day, written by me, in 2000, to Ex2. It was quite a nice letter, written on the train on the way to see him, and I had meant to leave it at his for him. It reminded me of how it was all supposed to be, and it made me feel sad that it wasn't like that in the end. Not at all because I would rather be with him than R, not *at* all! They are like night and day, physically, mentally, emotionally, and I love R, more than I ever thought possible to love anyone or anything. I meant in the way that it makes me feel sad when I think about the end of Ex1 and I. And again, I loved Ex1. He made me feel odd when he walked in, I couldn't find the right words to say to him, I was classically, and tragically, in love with him. In many ways, R is an older, settled down version, and last I heard from Ex1, he was following the same belief pattern, had a similar life pattern and was doing really well.

It's more a sadness, a grief, for what should have been. Ex1 and I were Uni sweethearts, we were devoted to one another, and, had his mother not got involved in the way that she did, I think things would have gone differently. We should have had a lovely family, worked our way up the property ladder, loved in suburbia and so on.

Ex2 and I should have been two wounded souls finding each other on the net, working things out together and raising our son together.

Instead, R and I are indeed like the phoenix, rising once again from the ashes of destroyed relationships, trying to put them aside and move on, to build our own lives and loves.

Other peoples actions - Ex1's alcholism, my inability to cope with that, his mothers inability to let him hit rock bottom, Ex2's alcoholism, depression, online infidelity, potential real life infidelity, and emotional bullying, have robbed me, as they have robbed others, of myself for several years, of the joy that is a long and happy marriage, of raising children in a blood family, and have added complications of phonecalls to people that don't want to talk to us, pain, mistrust, and so on. Not to mention the effect on the children, and the pain and trauma, often unrecognised, that they go through. There is a knock on effect on Grandparents, who don't want to see their child go through this trauma, who have reduced or non-existent time with the child.

In fact, the scars of divorce go deeper than might first be thought.

Positively speaking though, it is a joy to see what there is in this house now. And none of it would be there without what we have gone through, physically, and emotionally.

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Off to bed...

..... I am so tired that my head might just fall off right now.

BANG!

oh.

It did.

So now it's bedtime. Another almost productive school work evening, finished off with playing a game with R.

Oh, ok, and I watched ANTM. That wasn't productive, but it was funny. The photographers make me laugh and the pictures are so lovely. I don't understand fashion at all, never have, probably never will do. I know I'll never be as fat as I was when I was having the AC, and hopefully never as big as I was when I first met R, but I never want to be as body obsessed as these women.

(Did I mention the size 12 petite suit? Not that it matters, clearly..... And the fact that there was a LOT of room at the waist.... Again, it's not important lol!)

And so to bed.

After feeding the cat, hamster, guinea pig, 3 fishtanks and the cray called Dave.

Snuggle time is on it's way!

Tonight

Well, I'm home, R is at Governors being a grown-up and helping along the process of electing a new Headteacher. He takes the AC's education so seriously, and just wants to do his bit for the AC and for the community. He would take the BG's education this seriously, but, well, it's hard to be on a School Board from a different continent. We can't even make sure she takes her homework in from here. *sigh*

Anyway.

Let's not dwell.

Let's think about sucesses!

Bread is in the breadmaker.
Blog is being written.
Dishwasher is emptied.
Gorgeous child is in bed and asleep.
I've marked 2 books.

All is well.

And he's home :-) I love it when he comes home!

Well...

... I didn't get chance to post yesterday, because life was a little hectic. And that's ok, it's just hectic. Which meant that when I finally sat down around 9pm, having started around 6am, I went to sleep on the sofa! Rock and Roll!

We had an exciting staff meeting (which I think is an oxymoron) about APP, which should be either brilliant, or an utter waste of time and paperwork. Obviously there's more paperwork. There's always more paperwork. It sould be brilliant though and it should enable the end of SATs if the govt can be convinced that teachers actually know what they are talking about and can actualy do their jobs. Which we can. Very well. Thankyou, so much.

Home life was good yesterday as well. The AC went to Kuk Sool Won, which was heaving yesterday, and did really well. His kicks and blocks are coming on nicely, although R is going to carry on working on him with his hand positions as getting it right now will improve things in the future for him. He's excited about moving up a group, getting a proper Do Bok (must ckeck spelling of that!) and white belt. He knows it's not until he's six though.

R and I were mapping out how things will work for us, and it all seems very doable, so that side of things all looks very exciting as well. We've always had plans for the future, and at just about 3 years together it seems right to start to put them into operation! Once his divorce comes through, if it ever does, then we can move forward a bit more, but if it doesn't, we're going to carry on anyway! We've spent long enough thinking about how other people think now, and getting so little back in return it's ludicrous.

Enough! Says we! Onwards and Upwards!

Speaking of Up, I should go and shift his Lordship. He's on another course (there's a series of them on the way! YAY!) which means later into work thankfully. For him. Not for the AC and I.

I did the postit note thing, and I shall get on with that tonight if I get chance.

Monday, February 23, 2009

O555 - Wht does the 0 stand for?

It's still dark and I should be getting on.

But there are things bubbling under my surface today, things that I do not have time to express here.

I shall make a postit list of them, and blog them later if there is time. The next few weeks will be stressful, methinks.

Saturday, February 21, 2009

Tired and achy

For some reason today, I feel like I have been run over by a bus. I am not kidding.

Ok, well maybe I am, because in actual fact I have not been run over by a bus, and I never have been, so it probably doesn't feel like this, but I am feeling exhausted, achy, sleepy but can't sleep, just ... odd I suppose.

We've been to Walsoken today and bought a crab and 2 red tipped sharks to go in the barb tank, alongside the barbs, who, according to Walsoken fish man, will have bullied the gourami to death and that's why we lost them. Can you believe that little fish would be so mean? Dear reader, it is true. *nods sagely* So a quick run down of the current tanks......

Tank 1 - 2 orange Molly's, full grown. 1 silver baby Molly. 1 hardcore, as nails, Danio. (He's survived bactierial bloom, calcium precipitation, white spot cysts, the works!), 3 blue platys (evacuated from tank 2 in case of victimisation by the barbs, on the advice of fish man) 1 sucking loach.

Tank 2 - 10 golden barbs, 2 red tipped sharks, 1 red crab, 1 sucking loach, 1 platy who is being grown on to go eventually in tank 3.

Tank 3 - Dave. An Australian crayfish.

Tank 4 - 5 neon tetra, 5 black neon tetra, 5 silver sharks, 1 albino plec.

I saw tinfoil barbs today, and they were gorgeous. I mean GORGEOUS! However, they take 18 months to reach full size, and there is no guarentee that we will have a tank big enough for them in that time, so until we have a big enough tank, I don't want to get them. I hate seeing fish in tanks that are too small for them.

And now I need to do baking. We have people coming round, and more importantly, the Adorable Child is home in 2 hours and my house smells of boiling bogwood.

Nice.



I have baking to do.

Thursday, February 19, 2009

A very enjoyable morning.

Well, we left here, and we went to town.

We had a lovely morning, that involved the Adorable Child sitting in an amoured vehicle as the Weekend Warriors were recruiting. Actually, I feel mean calling them that now that they are all seeing active service in the desert. I'll stop. Probably. Moving on....

..... we had £30 of accident in the Works, and for that £30 got 6 books about different kinds of machines for the AC, a Dot to Dot book for him, some notecards for me - technically for other people as I do tend to send them - and some cooking books. Oh and a tub of dinosaurs.

..... we went to the Mart and bought sweets and I will feel sick soon. That's a given. I don't eat sweets as a rule, and nougat and fudge and candy floss are bound to have an effect on me soon!

..... we had lunch at Burger King and apparently gave a lady hope that her stoppy 18month old will one day be a calm and gentle and well behaved 5 year old, after telling her that the AC used to do the same thing.

..... we pottered about town, got my boots reheeled, front door key cut, all that kind of thing that needed doing, did the She-Ex's money, which took ages, and we're just vegging out now for a little bit. We might go to the Aquatics shop for plants, and we might not lol! I've written to my Nanna.

I love days like today! I must remember to blog about the Incident in the Post Office later.

Slow chicken?

So in the slow cooker for tonights tea is a whole chicken.

I've never done one like this before, but having dug around on the web I've cobbled together a recipe, but no cooking time - guess I just have to leave it until it's done!

In the bottom of the pot is

3 quarters of lemon,
3 quarters of onion
3 garlic cloves

Then the chicken, which I took all the skin off of (apart from the wings - too darn fiddly!) which has the other quarter of lemon, the other quarter of onion, and the other clove of garlic delicately placed into it's internals!

There's about 1/4 pint of water in there as well.

It's on HIGH.

We'll see what happens.

In other news, everything is much better today. The house feels different - I think we did get rid of the misunderstandings. We got complacent about having dealt with all our baggage, and then when it cropped up again, we just had to redeal. It's all good!

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

More tears

Mainly, because of tiredness, because of the way this week has gone, because of how the next few weeks are shaping up, just because really.

R and I have had a major misunderstanding (no ones fault, just an interpretation of an event issue) and it's lead to more and more misunderstandings until we had an argument tonight, realised what the problems were, and moved on.

All is well now.

It has to be, right?

I'm up....

.... what more do you want?

I have a list of things to do as long as my arm (actually as long as 3 columns of A4 paper!) and it doesn't include schoolwork, which I have no impetus for.

Because R was wound up last night, deliberately, I might add, I stayed up with him until 2am so I've had 5.5 hours sleep. Not enough. And the winding will continue today, and will continue to continue until she comes off of her time of the month. It always does. Lots of reasonableness, and then "wham" she PMS' and we get it in the neck for breathing. Seriously.

Oh well.

She unfollowed me last night on twitter, and apparently that felt good. As a) I never asked her to follow me, and b) I am not going to stop using it because actually, I didn't just use it to wind her up, and c) I have no interest in her life, then this is all a bit "whatever!"

So, onto the long list.

I shall prevail!

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

So today...

... went really, really well.

The Adorable Child and the Man looked gorgeous, I was smart and so proud I could have burst. We went, he got his medal with the appropriate pomp and ceremony, and we had tea and biscuits afterwards.

Then we went over to where he works and a fabulous chap called Keith showed us round, and had a loooong chat to the AC about how the stuff works, what the names of the different parts are and so on. He was fabulous.

In other news, tomorrow is for cleaning, today isn't! Tonight is for vegging a bit more, and then early bed, and then chilling.

I shall start upon this heavy schedule now! (I had intended a much more weighty blog on the morals of medals and meaning and so on, but not for the right now!)

Excited.

Today is an exciting day.

Yesterday was full of getting ready, which included some fabulous shopping by yours truely.

Not fabulous in the traditional sense of shopping, but in my sense. I went into town with the Adorable Child to get a suit for me, and one for him.

Autonomy - big sale - £36 - Jacket and two skirts. In size 12Petite! (Not that size matters to me, I am above such things but YES YES YES!!!!!!)

ShoeZone - shoes - sale - £6.99

BHS tights - Hmmmm. Will be returning to BHS to ask why there was 1 pair of tights in my 2 pair pack. However, I have them. Medium tummy control. As pointed out by my son "You need magic knickers because I stretched all your skin, don't you mummy." In the shop. In a clear 5 year old voice.

Shirt (already had it!)

Adorable Child - BHS - liked the suits, but he doesn't really need one and even in the sale they were £40. And I won't grow out of mine in 6 weeks. And they had pink ties. So he has a new shirt and grey stripe tie. Very smart!

The only down side is that BG isn't here. I wish she was. Her mother said she was going to tell BG that all Daddy was was a monkey in a suit. I'll send her the pictures from today, obviously, but it's not the same as being really proud of Daddy with the rest of us.

Oh well. Her mother has no intention of her coming over here. Ever.

Need to clean his shoes. Must do it now!

Sunday, February 15, 2009

So. What was all that about then?

The Adorable Child and I went to church today. Twice. That's two times.

We usually go once, to the Methodist Church, and on the way back we pass school, and today the Adorable Child saw the advert for another church, and asked about going. I have no aversion to him going to church, and, contrary to his fathers thoughts, I am not attempting to brainwash him into the belief system he carries for the rest of his life, so if he asks to go somewhere, then if we can, we will.

Anyway.

We went.

There was singing. This is good. We like singing.
There was praying, of the less-than-formal-from-the-front kind, and with the addition of mumbling from the congregation, which is not good, as I find it hard to concentrate. However, I accept that they find it hard to praise without talking, so that's all good.
There was singing, of the repeated kind, but it was good.
There was talking, of a based-on-the-bible kind, with references and a chap who really *knew* his Old Testament, and could reference people who were around with Moses (literally lol!)
There was exhortation, not for money, but for the Spirit - have we had it? Do we need topping up? And then prayers of the praying for people to be filled kind.

Then there were falling overs, sleepynesses, and tears.

I have to think on these things. I sat, at the back, and I did cry, but mainly because it was a week since last week, and I need to do a whole set of weeks since last week before the tears will stop. And that's ok, I know me, I know my process, I'm happy with that. I was talked to, and prayed for, by a very lovely person, who really does know what she believes and is honest in her prayers. She is utterly fabulous, and a good reason to go back.

The rest of it needs thinking on. A lot.

Sometimes life does.

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Lovely little while

Now this, this is good.

I have cakes in the oven, cakes cooling on the side, cakes in the stomachs of R and the lovely G-man who is here for the rugby. It's all good.

There is more biscuits to make, the dining room table to clear and washing to do, but life is lovely.

It's been a hard few days....

On Wednesday, one of my major wants was suddenly and abruptly unrealised. In my own way, for the last few days, I have decided that that means that it will never be realised, and in fact I should just stop even wanting it to be realised. I have cried, sworn, and prayed, not in that order, and none of them just once, and I have spent a lot of time just ... sat.

It's a verb, to sit. A doing word. And yet, in the last few days, when I have just "sat" I have not done anything. My brain suddenly turns off - overloads, I suspect - and when my body has rebooted my brain, I discover that anything up to 30 minutes has gone by. It's a strange feeling, and not one I enjoy.

The good part of what has happened, and you know me dear reader, I must find the good part, is that the words from R have been amazing. He has opened up with his feelings, with his wants, with his own self in a way that he hasn't for a few months because life has been busy. I needed to hear the things he said. He needed to say them. We needed to do this together, and we did.

Thursday, I went to work. The boss asked me what was wrong because one of the others said I wasn't so well. I tried to say nothing, but apparently the tears were a giveaway. I explained the situation, and he was supportive, he was lovely in fact. I stayed, I taught, I managed all day, the children were adorably lovely, as my class so often are, we created, and we played and we listened to a fabulous author who told us how to write, and we swam and had the worlds most lovely day. IN the back of my mind, was the aching though, but I squashed and squeezed it back, and I wouldn't give in.

I have taught through bereavements, through divorce, through moving, through eviction, through a partners alcoholism, through huge domestic problems, and now through this, and I love my job. All the little achievements were just that bit more special today, all the things that happened, the little cards from children made in wet play, the little messages left on the board, the random hugs, the silly jokes, the models, all mattered that little bit more today.

Friday was more of the same. Easier, in many ways, but the same.

And today is Saturday morning.

We have a friend coming to watch rugby at 2pm ish. We have friends coming around tonight to game. I have a million, million books to mark, and a science scheme to think about and a folder to set up for next half term, and planning for the last week to catch up on.

But it will, it *will* all be fine. It has to be. It cannot be any other way.

Monday, February 9, 2009

Want realised? Wants relative?

Today is one day nearer want being satisfied. No specific want, just all wants. After all, everything is closer than it was, isn't it?

Today I acheived a want. A child spoke in my classroom. He rarely speaks, rarely joins in, rarely is part of our world, being locked deep in his own.

Today he spoke, chose to interact, and, whilst there was still a different world in his blue eyes, for a brief moment he touched our world.

His words?

"No. No work!"

I was proud of him.

Wants have to be relative. I could want and want and want for him to be conversational, but it will not happen whilst he is with us. He's doing a lot better, he speaks some words now. I could want and want and want for him to write and draw, but whilst we are developing his fine motor skills, he sees no purpose in what we do, and so I can want all I like, he does what he does for the reasons he does it.

I want him to achieve, at his pace, with all the support I can give him. Those wants are realised.

Realistic wants can be achieved. But are unrealistic wants still more than dreams? They should be.

Saturday, February 7, 2009

Thinking away

Thinking away
Thinking away - by sarahthesuburbanite on Polyvore.com

So much going on in my brain today. Just thinking so much about so many things. I need to record them somewhere, but where?

Friday, February 6, 2009

New blog place.

I'm blogging in a new place as well, as part of a blogging every day for a month thing. I really want to be able to do this - I feel better when I've blogged, even when it's just a picture, or a story of what we've done, or something like that.

So. This place has a theme of the month - and says that it's because sometimes limits set us free. I need to grok that. (Grok - 10 points if you get the reference!)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


The theme is want.

Want.

WANT!

What springs to mind?

Toddlers shouting "I want it Mummy"
Adverts telling me if I have a certain problem, I need a certain product. Or that I want to live a certain way and so therefore I want to own this tv/laptop/kitchen/lifestyle.
Teachers saying "I want this in by Thursday."
Me, now the teacher, saying "I want this in by Thursday."

Want is a funny word.

Dictionary definition today I think! Courtesy of Merriam Webster.http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/want

want
3 entries found.

1. 1want (verb)
2. 2want (noun)
3. want ad


Main Entry:
1want Listen to the pronunciation of 1want
Pronunciation:
\ˈwȯnt also ˈwänt & ˈwÉ™nt\
Function:
verb
Etymology:
Middle English, from Old Norse vanta; akin to Old English wan deficient
Date:
13th century

intransitive verb
1: to be needy or destitute
2: to have or feel need
3: to be necessary or needed
4: to desire to come, go, or be

transitive verb
1: to fail to possess especially in customary or required amount : lack
2 a: to have a strong desire for
b: to have an inclination to : like
3 a: to have need of : require
b: to suffer from the lack of
4: ought —used with the infinitive
5: to wish or demand the presence of
6: to hunt or seek in order to apprehend

That's it for now.

I'm going to copy and paste this over to my blog, and see how we go.

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Lady of the night

lady of the night
lady of the night - by sarahthesuburbanite on Polyvore.com

Bedtime. Enough is too much already....

Night Night all - only MTuWe nights alone to go! YAY!

So...... what now?


 

It's been a loooooooooooong day. We went out with my parents and all was good and froody – we went to church, we went to lunch, we went to their place and made train tracks witht eh stuff that we used when Ru and I were children (and that was fab and weird in places) and then we went to Tesco's and came home. Nothing hugely exciting really. There was snow, but I think all the UK had snow. There's a lot of panicing about the snow, but it's all good. It's just snow.


 

Then we came home. R was just on the way out of the door, but I was able to make sure he had his lunch with him and all that stuff for yet another night duty. The AC was playing, R went out, then the She-ex phoned! She knew he was working nights! Weirdness! I know what she's after, but I don't want anything to do with her anymore. I love the BG totally and utterly, but her mother has told me too many lies, and half-truths, sworn too many times and just been plain horrible far more than she has been nice, so I made the decision that I don't need that in my life, so I won't have anything more to do with her. And to be honest, she started the not having anything to do with me, but I decided to carry it on, because it was quieter and nicer that way!


 

Now I'm sitting here, long list of things to do, and I'm going to get on whilst the laptop recharges.


 

Laters people.