Archives
Passing through
Life is in utter turmoil - still. My computer was taken away to be cleaned, and has now been written off. I insisted they return it so that I can download files etc (and have a quick blog).
We have moved into rented accomodation about a mile away from home. It's a new build, so has no land lines, and our mobiles have no signal there, it is carpeted throughout in off-white, the aperture for the washing-machine was too small, we have rented furniture, and I hate it. On the plus side, I have been out on a major spending spree for kitchen essentials and am about to order new baby stuff.
All my woes pale into insignificance though after the carnage in London today. I must learn to count my blessings.
Amy is growing apace. After a minor blip, in the hot weather, she is back to sleeping through the night, 11pm to 8am. Her Mummy appreciates that things might change but is keeping everything crossed that they don't. Jack is still angelic looking, but is now developing a very definite personality, and it's not angelic! He is hugely loving, but uses his kisses and cuddles to get his own way, at the moment it's amusing.
Right, must sign off now and return to the temporary quarters.
They call me the wanderer
I sleep and eat at the 'other' house, I work driving around the countryside, and I return to my real home to garden, blog, and try to sort out problems (no land lines - still, at the 'other' house). I follow the stars in a black sky. My life is the blackness, and then the stars are when I go out, visitors come round or something happens that doesn't require mammoth effort and co-operation from faceless individuals at the other end of the phone. Last week I had a little star, or so I thought. I bought a new mobile phone, camera, infra-red, bluetooth, I was so happy. My 'up-front' was due to run out so went on-line to CPW, useless, I phoned them, equally useless, I went in store, asked about my 'up-front', they don't do them anymore. Very helpful chappy, eventually chose new phone etc., they tried porting my number - gave up after half an hour. Went back two days later, number sorted, phones out of stock. After another 48 hours I was the proud possessor of a phone that belonged in the 21st century, at the princely sum of £ 110. My star was positively illuminating the dark sky. The next day I received a letter from CPW, inviting me to renew my 'up-front' deal, with a new wonder phone for £29.99, my star became a super nova and is now a black hole. Head office think I was mis-sold, O2 think I was mis-sold, but the manager of the store is 'unavailable', and the final decision rests with him. Grrrr. Everything seems to be such a battle at the moment.
There are bright moments though, BIL and sister came over yesterday and cleaned out my computer. We had Jack for the day whilst his Mummy and Daddy went to British Superbikes. He has an obsession with anything in the sky, and spends all the time in the garden pointing skywards and eventually falling over backwards. We were all humouring him and then a Spitfire flew over, Grandad became very excited, so we all followed suit, pointing, waving, shouting, clapping and then we looked at Jack. he was staring at us with a confused expression and decided that playing with gravel was a less hysteria provoking pastime.
In the morning, before Jack arrived, I was tidying up in the kitchen, and thinking how sad it was that Jack wouldn't remember my cats, he had loved Kizzy, the little black and white one. Suddenly I felt a familiar rubbing around my calf, I nearly screamed, and there was this little white cat with a stripey tail circling around my legs. How she got in I have no idea but I spent the next few minutes sitting on the kitchen floor stroking her, her ID tells me that she is called Ginny. Anyway she stayed around for most of the morning, even Jack arriving didn't drive her away. He thought it was wonderful 'cos she would let him stroke her and she even went over to him and rubbed around his legs. Another bright star.
This afternoon I am off to see Amy and her Mummy to go and feed the ducks. Yesterday they came round and Amy charmed my sister with huge smiles and strange babbles, another bright star.
In the background the phone is on loudspeaker assuring me that 'an energy specialist' will speak to me soon. Yet another little item that needs sorting, the bills at the 'other' house. My estimate is that by the time everything is sorted out we will be moving out again, and it can start all over again.
Another victory, the land-lines are on.
Ginny continues to visit. She loves the Grandchildren and they love her.
I'm beginning to feel a tiny bit excited now, we have got to start choosing paint, wallpaper and carpet. Next week we will decide on our new kitchen units and floor tiles, but the most wonderful thing is that, for the first time EVER, someone else will be doing it all, AND, we won't even be living in the middle of it all.
My new Graco Contour Electra travel cot was delivered on Thursday, Glasgow Pram Centre, fast service, free delivery and £20 less than RRP. Excellent. Brilliant cot for where we are now as it has a changing mat and basinette so it's space saving, something we really need in our rented place.
We are babysitting Amy tonight, she has turned against bottles at the moment so I have invested in a Nuk in the hope that it's the Avent ones she objects to, fingers crossed.
Must get on with the garden now, it's looking neglected.
Papering over the cracks
Amy didn't like the Nuk.......... or the Avent, or the Tommee Tippee. Panic, me. No. It's not as though I have got Jack and Amy all day and all night in two weeks whilst their parents go to a wedding and Hubby is away on a golfing weekend.
I am slowly coming to terms with the concept of living in an off-white, 'perfect' environment. I hardly winced yesterday when Jack through my trowel into the sitting-room yesterday, denting the paint work, and then caught the buckle of his sandals in the carpet and snagged it.
Hubby and I are in the process of chosing wallpaper - from books. Gosh, that takes me back to when I was a child. I have been banned from floral designs, looks like our 'busy' walls are going to be quite tasteful (bland). The builder who is going to be sorting out the house has directed me to where I can choose my new kitchen, it's down to three, all pine, and Hubby and I have agreed (that's a miracle in itself) on the new floor tiles, very rustic, but the colour of the grout is causing some disagreement.
Later I am having my hair trimmed. Before Christmas I decided that my usual crop was going to turn into long, flowing locks. I had visions of a pre-raphaelite look, unfortunately it doesn't seem to be achieving that, curls, yes, but flowing, no. The deciding factor was when Jack's Mummy straightened it and said it looked better, it looked horrendous. Something has to be done.
Work is getting me down. Not the Mum's and babies, but the ever- increasing demands being made on us. We now have new time-sheets which don't allow us to claim for extra hours worked, we have to put them down , and then take time-back. Management aren't stupid, if you consistently have to work longer, just to fit everything in, how on earth can you claim time-back? In three months I have accumulated 18 hours time-owing, and there is no way, now that we are in the school holidays and shorter staffed than ever, that I am ever going to get it back, it will just carry on mounting up.
Oh well, back to design possibilities.
Desperate Midwife
There's trouble at mill. One of the members of our team is being redeployed, and not being replaced until the end of September. I freaked when this news was imparted to me, my job-share immediately started ranting, and then proceeded to phone me 6 times with her objections. Next port of call was our manager, she was desperately trying to avoid me but had reckoned without my super-sleuth abilities, eventually I cornered her and explained that if she would just outline any contingency plans, like what was going to happen when my job-share goes on leave for 3 weeks, I would calm down. Mumble, mumble, her hands are tied, understands that it will be difficult, will help out herself if she can, but, she is away for two weeks etc. Sitting there in her heart to heart posture, leaning forward, hands clasped earnestly, she said that we would all have to work together and share out the extra workload. Brilliant, in principle, but the other member of our team, S, is not known for 'picking-up' work outside her caseload, and will only work certain days. Our manager knows this, two people have left the team because of S, so why should now be any different? I have requested a meeting to sort out working practices during the next 2 months, with the manager present, perhaps this will force S to work as part of a team. Sometimes dreams do come true.