musingsponderingsandrants

Parenting, profundities and humour

Author: sarahsmale

Hmm... about me...well three kids, a husband (not acquired in that order)... and a love of punctuation...
Rose Tinted Spectacles… — May 17, 2015

Rose Tinted Spectacles…

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rose tinted specs

As you may be aware I am shortly moving house. As such time is precious. I find my muse slightly drying up. It’s hard to be profound (and even harder to be amusing) when one is being harried by a conveyancing solicitor. So I am going to cheat…a little… just to keep you supplied with material you understand…

Some nights when I have finally sat down, normally around 8.30pm but on too many evenings more like nine,  I look back on those early days of parenthood and wish I was back there.  A time when all my children were in bed by seven in the evening. When they ate anything I gave them, mainly because I was shovelling it in or popping them on a boob, when I didn’t have to get up early for school runs, help with algebra or explain the complexities of the reproductive system and that, yes, believe it or not, sex is fun.

On such occasions I am wearing my rose tinted spectacles. Everyone has a pair. Some have several. My mum cannot remember us ever stepping out of line or being cheeky or answering back the way mine do… quite a large pair there then…

I find I am helped to remove my specs if I refer back to a series of articles I wrote when I was that person, juggling three children under 4, my Chairmanship of the local NCT and my sanity.

One particular article does quite a good job of outlining for me what my daily life was actually like. My kids love hearing the stories enclosed within. They almost wet themselves laughing. I am sure they won’t mind sharing. So this goes out to you with their full backing and with apologies to my old NCT friends who have heard it all before.

Synchronised Vomiting and other Olympic Sports

I had a vague idea when pregnant for the first time that I may have to deal with an element of bodily fluids as a mother. I knew children were not usually potty trained before the age of two and so I had set myself up for a certain amount of yuckiness. Nothing, and I mean nothing, could have prepared me for what was in store.

Let’s start at the beginning with that first poo. What is that all about? I was armed with water and cotton wool. What I needed to deal with the black tar that my son had eliminated was an industrial sand blaster and a jet wash. He started off with a dark green bottom and ended up with a dark green bottom covered in white fluff.

It got slightly better over time. In fact in some cases it was humorous. I have always been a fan of NFP (nappy free play) for my non sitting babies. I find it especially amusing when one’s son(s) manage to wee in their own eyes and then have the audacity to look surprised.

NFP has spectacularly back fired (literally) on several occasions. Now I have three children they have invented a new game, synchronised pooing. When my youngest was about 6 weeks old she was enjoying NFP in the lounge- its relatively safe with girls they just end up lying in a puddle. Middlest (2) had a smelly nappy so I was changing him on the lounge carpet, just so I was with youngest  in case eldest (3) decided now was a good time to try picking her up. (Are you getting a feel for the logistics of three small children yet?). Eldest disappeared. I was mid way through changing middlest- that delicate stage when you have hold of both legs but the bottom area is not yet clean and there is a risk of carpet soiling (as youngest is on the plastic changing mat, lying in a puddle) when eldest pipes up ‘I’ve finished!’. This means he has done a number 2 on the toilet and needs me to wipe up. I only have so long in these situations before he gets off the loo and sits down somewhere unfortunate. It was at this moment that youngest decided to projectile poo (for non parents amongst you, you have no idea) hitting the sofa in an attractive yellow arc. It was also around this time that I began silently weeping.

Synchronised pooing is bad. But the relay can be an even longer haul. My kids could enter the Olympics in both. You know how it is- you have to be at the doctors/ dentists/ hairdressers (I wish) in half an hour. Eldest just needs to go to the loo first. You wipe up, 20 minutes left (he’s a boy they start early needing at least 10 minutes per dump). Then as you put shoes on middlest a nasty whiff emanates from the nappy area. Whilst changing him the youngest gets ‘that look’ that babies get- it’s one of intense concentration. You are left so late it’s not worth bothering.

I don’t want you to think that we only deal with poo in this house. Oh no, vomit features heavily too. Middlest is particularly prone. I have now decided that it is no good just shoving soiled sheets and duvet covers in the wash- it just spreads the part digested carrot around. I find it difficult to rinse off bed sheets in the sink without flooding the kitchen so I have devised my own method. It involves a dessert spoon, a bowl and a lot of scraping. It’s icky but effective. I can now do it in my sleep at three in the morning.

Then what does one do when you are ill yourself? How old is old enough to hold your mother’s hair back whilst she vomits into the toilet? And that reminds me of my worst hour, body fluid wise.

I had been feeling ill all day. It was bath time and hubby was late. I had two kids to get to bed. Baby middlest was in the bath reclining on his bath support, eldest was running around nappy-less. I went to retrieve him and discovered that he had pooed on the landing floor, stood in it and trodden it all over the upstairs carpets, every one. In an increased state of nausea I plopped him in the bath with his younger brother and went to retrieve the carpet stain chemical spray, two bottles of which are permanently in a locked cupboard downstairs. (If there are any Social Workers reading I, of course, never, at any point, left two infants unattended in the bath). After I had managed to get into the child locked cupboard I came back upstairs to hear eldest crying hysterically. Now middlest had pooed- in the bath. Eldest had taken exception to it floating around his legs- fair do’s. They had to wait; I needed to vomit into the toilet. We all ended up in tears- but I was the only one an hour later on my hands and knees with a J cloth scrubbing at excrement.

So there you have it. Rose tinted specs firmly removed, safely placed in their case and locked in the drawer….for now….

Food Glorious Food… — May 15, 2015

Food Glorious Food…

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cooking

I recently watched ‘Back in Time For Dinner’, a series on BBC2 (other channels are available). It took one family on a culinary journey through each decade since the 1950s. They spent a summer living 10 days in each decade eating, cooking, shopping and using the kitchens of the period. The series used an amazing archive called the National Food Diary which ran from 1950 until 2000.

It was an interesting view. It helped that the family themselves were quite insightful. Of course I was most interested in the decades of my childhood and teenage years (the 70s and 80s) and it was a trip down memory lane especially as each time the decade moved on the whole house was redecorated in the style of the period.

The most obvious shift was the amount of time spent doing these chores, which has declined markedly, and the people doing them. In the 1950’s a wife spent hours shopping daily, and preparing and cooking meals all on ration. Now apparently we are convenience food junkies who spend 30 minutes a day on these jobs on average.

Why then does food seem to consume (pardon the pun) so much of my life?

It begins with the weekly planning. I menu plan. To save money, to save waste (which I loath) and to save time. This involves pinning down my husband for long enough to ascertain his whereabouts and cafeteria requirements over the coming working week. It also involves consulting the spreadsheet of child activities pinned to my fridge.

Then one must take into account the myriad different likes, dislikes, intolerances, and basic ‘fussinesses’ of my family.

I will eat anything. I think I might balk at sheep’s testicles or roast locusts (although if I was on that island without Bear Grylls even they would probably appeal). Clearly I prefer some things to others but on the whole I will eat anything. And in fact anything cooked by anyone other than myself is extra specially tasty, even those balls.

On the other hand my family are not so helpful. Lets start at the top. My husband does not like milk based products. Unless they are sweet. So he will happily chow down on custard, ice-cream, cream and yoghurt but will turn his nose up at anything cheesy, or involving roux, crème fraiche etc. Quite why I am not sure. When we were first going out and his complete inability to eat cheese was unknown to me- actually he may have mentioned it, I took it with a pinch of salt, maybe thinking I should just avoid proper cheese like stilton not the mild and inoffensive mozzarella- I bought us some ready cooked stuffed pasta for tea. He manfully tried to eat it so as not to offend. He hasn’t tried since. He will now place any cottage pie I produce under heavy scrutiny to ensure not one tiny worm of grated cheese has migrated to ‘his end’ of the dish.  I find this more than mildly irritating. On days he is out the kids can be heard shouting in glee  ‘Extra cheesey cottage pie!’

Eldest is a bit like me. He is not keen on raw tomatoes but hey I can live with that. He is really a quantity over quality type of chap and that is only really increasing with age. My main issue with him is that however much I feed him he is still hungry. I feel this may only get worse as time progresses. But then quite randomly he has an allergy to peaches. Again not a massive issue but we do have to be careful as the last time he accidentally ate a peach (clearly not a whole one as that would just be stupid, I believe it was hidden in a cobbler at school) he had a total body rash. For days.

Middlest has a genuine intolerance to gluten. I won’t bore you with the process we had to claw our way through for that diagnosis some years ago, but for everyone’s sake (especially me as chief (& lets face it the only) toilet cleaner) it is best if he avoids it as much as possible. This has actually got easier and easier since the diagnosis as supermarkets (especially the one I use regularly- heck I am going to name them as their Gluten Free (GF) range is so good- Sainsburys) have improved their offering in this regard.

I am however constantly on the look out for GF meals… in this regard I hit upon rice based dishes as a good idea. You know risotto, savoury rice (whispers even done quickly out of a packet), jambalaya, kedgeree etc etc. We tried them all. He will not eat any of them. Ever. He loves rice and will gaily eat huge quantities of plain boiled rice with something. But he will not eat it if it has been cooked together with other things, like stock. He will mix up plain boiled rice with his curry/ stir fry/ chilli into one gluppy mess but this is apparently totally different to eating it when it has been cooked with other things. Well yes its tastier I agree. The subtleties of this perversion somewhat allude me. Oddly youngest loves such dishes and so will often request them when middlest is absent, when we could be eating PIE for goodness sake.

Ah youngest. She develops and then loses food eccentricities. Regularly. Her current loathing is mushrooms. Actually this has been going on for some time now and I may soon class it as permanent. I have been serving my standard spag bol to her since she was weaned with no problems. She will now only eat it after picking out every single piece of fungi. I could make it without but then it would be really boring. And I wouldn’t be able to make my favourite joke every week (‘There’s not mush-room in here!’)

Then there are their common oddities. They will all eat onion, some of them actually like it raw (odd people) but the kids won’t eat shallots. Cooked in a stew. They peer at them suspiciously. I explain they are merely cooked onions that I haven’t had to chop.. nah we’ll pass thanks. Well fine but that’s ‘shallot’…

Similarly if I served mine chicken breast, carrots and potato they would all eat it. When it is slow cooked together with a bit of seasoning and gravy middlest and youngest ‘nearly vomit’ and even eldest’s enthusiasm wains.

I hear you shouting. Sausage and mash woman…And yes we do all like that (as long as its not served with peas (middlest), green beans (eldest) or broccoli (youngest)). But, and here is the rub, life is such that I have no time to cook it. Children are in and out at odd intervals, I am boomeranging between school and scout huts and piano lessons and football pitches. Time after school is so precious and scarce that I can only make meals that involve a slow cooker, the oven timer, or reheating with a quick cook carb, and potatoes don’t cut it in that regard. Jackets would work but one will only eat the inside and the other the skin, despite liking all other forms of potato. And don’t suggest Jamie’s 15 minute meals…because they only take 15 minutes if you have a sous chef. And anyway on a lot of days 15 minutes is all we have to actually eat so it needs to be there, ready and waiting.

So I have a basic repertoire. Which kind of repeats ad infinitum. Some will only work at the weekend and on Wednesdays, as long as I wash youngest’s hair as soon as we get in (don’t ask).

And to be honest I hate it. Cooking is a chore I will never be persuaded to enjoy. If it wasn’t for my intense mother guilt we would all be living off take away. Of course there isn’t actually any take away middlest can eat but even so…

Music maestro please… — May 12, 2015

Music maestro please…

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piano_2

One of my most precious possessions is my piano. There are a few reasons for this. It has come to me from my mother who in turn took possession of it from her grandmother. My mother learnt to play on it, as did I and both my brothers, and now my three children are also learning to play it. It is not the best piano in the world, it has a very heavy touch, is hard to play softly (in fact we all just play the loud bits extra loud to compensate) and it squats in my dining room in all its early 20th century ugliness as the very worst dust collector in my house.

But it has been my constant companion for nearly all my life. My mother played nursery rhymes to me on it, as I did for my kids. We sing carols round it at Christmas. I play duets on it with my children. I accompany them on their string instruments. I feel privileged to own it.

I am not a naturally talented pianist. I had to work extremely hard to reach the dizzy heights of a scraped Grade 6  before leaving home. I cannot pick out a tune by ear. I find modern, contemporary music almost impossible to play. My hands cannot span an octave comfortably. But still I gain immense pleasure from being able to sit down at it and thump out a reasonable rendition of something by Beethoven.

As a child I worked hard at it, mainly because I was that sort of child, but as I got older it then opened doors for me that I could never have forseen. I was asked to play double bass because I was a pianist with no other instrument. That led to orchestral playing both at school and in the County system. I was asked to play in bands for school productions and got to be a percussionist (one of my fondest memories from middle school was learning to play timpani).

And  importantly it taught me to read music. And that has been one of the most useful and enduring skills I learnt as a child (and there are many others I did not gain in a class room, sewing, baking, basic DIY to name a few). It now means I can help my kids with their music making. I can sight read music in the choir I now attend regularly. I could, if I wanted, pick up another instrument quite easily.

But more than that my music making taught me self discipline, team working, that nothing comes without hours and hours of work. It allowed me to experience the terror of exams, the highs of performance, it helped me to learn to overcome my nerves. It gave me a confidence that, as a shy child, I lacked in other areas.  I was never going to be picked for sports teams, star in the school show or be top of the class this, then, was my ‘thing’.

And so I am a passionate believer in music in the school curriculum. In every school having a thriving choir. For every child who wants to to have access to instrument lessons as cheaply as possible. I am nervous of politicians who label music as an ‘extra’ which should only be offered ‘after the basics are secure’. I believe that is fundamentally wrong.

Some of the high points of my childhood remain my participation in music making, in providing enjoyment to an audience, however partisan, in playing amazing classical music in fabulous acoustics. In my current life singing with my choir provides the same high. As does banging out a Chopin Nocturne on my ailing piano.

Footnote
This post has become even more poignant for me as I found out yesterday that my piano teacher of 7 years from age eleven to eighteen died last week. He was a lovely man who was unfailingly supportive and even got me (the shyest child in the world) singing and playing in public in his fledgling youth theatre enterprise.
RIP Andy

Rant Alert … update — May 10, 2015

Rant Alert … update

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So guess what the inevitable happened. LLP (in case you have forgotten, I am never likely to, Large Land Line Provider That Should Be Better at This) duly cut off my broadband and landline later that day. Despite everyone I had spoken to earlier assuring me that even though my vendor had been cut off I would not be.

I immediately got on my mobile and after dialling the original department- whose staff speak English without so heavy an accent that I have to repeat everything back to them to make sure I have understood- and being informed that I would be charged for the call at an undetermined rate- set by my mobile provider and so clearly not LLP’s fault- I spoke to a lady.

Let’s call her Charlotte because that was her name and I am now beyond protecting anonymity. She was actually apologetic which was refreshing. But still I needed to speak to the Order Management Department. I refused. Flatly.

She offered to speak to them on my behalf. I listened to some more Vivaldi, I would like to say it had progressed to Summer, it hadn’t, Spring seemed to be on some sort of continuous, mind numbing loop. Eventually Charlotte came back to say she had spoken to the Order Management Department but now needed to speak to someone else. Cognizant of my rapidly escalating mobile phone bill and my increasing intolerance of a piece of music I had previously loved so much it featured in my wedding day, I asked her to call me back. She said she would be ten minutes.

I used the next half an hour to put the kids to bed so I could give whatever LLP had to throw at me next my full attention.

Charlotte rang back. Apparently when I moved my home move order date the original order was still around in the background. And busy little imaginary beavers, and maybe some actual engineers, had been keeping their jobs by enacting that order. I think I could have guessed as much…

She had arranged to have the line reinstated. This could take up to 24 hours. I was not to call back until that time had elapsed. Someone from Order Mis-Management would call me during the day to check on progress. I remained sceptical.

So precisely 24 hours later-after making sure the kids were ready for bed- I got back on my mobile. I asked to speak to Charlotte. Stacy didn’t know who Charlotte was. I spoke to Stacy. What I needed by now was the whole sorry tale on some sort of tape that I could merely play down the phone. Stacy was at a complete loss, she called the OMD (I, by now, was so familiar with the internal workings of LLP’s ‘help’ lines that I didn’t even need her to explain the acronym) more classical music.

She came back,

“Well”, she opined “they weren’t much help!”

I could only agree. Wholeheartedly. Still at a loss she decide to speak to the Faults Department, she came back, they would not speak to her so with more than a little reluctance I agreed to be put through.

That tape would have been handy again. And an interpreter. Anyway suffice to say I got nowhere. I asked (well actually by this point I was really beyond asking, ordering with menaces was more like it) to speak to a supervisor, a manger, anyone who may have a clue how to help. She went away. I silently screamed down the phone.

She had spoken to her supervisor, who said I needed to speak to the dedicated Sales team.

I went through to the Sales team. I explained the situation. Again. She checked the computer and could not find a record of either home move order. I went into more than mild panic. The lady, who was clearly bored, needed to take advice, during this interlude I put the kids to bed.

She came back- she was not sure why I had been put through to her- neither was I. She wanted to put me back through to the OM-MD. On no account was I going back there, ever, more music, she then put me through to someone called Alex.

Alex had not been given even the gist of my issues by mystery sales woman so, yet again, I went through the story.

By this point I had been on the phone for an hour. Alex (whose surname I extracted for future reference but who didn’t know the phone number for his department- the Customer Options team- as he only ever took internal calls- he suggested I find him again by calling 150 and saying “Cancellations”- it was really very, very tempting) was quite helpful. He even suggested he call me back. By this point I was so addled I had forgotten that earlier on Charlotte had called me back, but anyway my arm needed a rest so I gratefully agreed.

He called me back. It wasn’t really his department’s area. But he could see from the notes that I had already spoken to several advisors (the mother of all misnomers) so he felt he ought to take some ownership of the issue. I metaphorically fell off my chair- I would have been sat on a chair but the only place in my house with decent mobile reception doesn’t have a chair. And if I wander off to get a chair I loose reception and the call and I was pretty sure I would never navigate my way back to Alex even if I left breadcrumbs or string.

Alex discussed my issue. He did something on the line and told me he thought it likely it was my buyer’s fault. Despite all evidence to the contrary, that is that my vendor had been cut off on the same day and that I had booked this home move for this exact date. Of course by now I was starting to doubt my own sanity. Alex asserted that if my buyer had taken over the line I would not be able to have it back at all. There were two more weeks before the move. In desperation my husband left to drive to the buyer’s current house to see if he could find out.

Meanwhile Alex suggested he talk to his supervisor, I asked to talk to his supervisor, he thought it best if he did it. I listened to more music- actually this was some sort of modern lift type music which at least gave the orchestra a break- but that too was becoming tedious after 15 minutes.

He came back. He needed to speak to the OM-MD which conveniently was now shut. I wished him all the luck in the world. He promised to call me back between 11 and 11.30 the next day. I explained I would be on a football pitch but would do my best to pick up. I asked him to persevere if he didn’t get me immediately. He offered to e mail me if he couldn’t get through. I explained that that would be problematic as I had no broadband.

“Well don’t you have an android phone?”- Well yes I do but I am 45, slightly long sighted, have patchy 3G and find reading e mails on it less than easy, never mind typing replies (this blog entry has so far taken two hours and I am only doing it in the hope that if it gets shared enough on social media LLP might be shamed into action). And anyway I would be grateful for an actual call.

Meanwhile husband had failed to raise our buyers.

Saturday morning dawned. I called my agent, who called my buyers, who- unsurprisingly- confirmed they had not instructed any phone line change.

By noon I was still waiting for Alex. For divine intervention. For a miracle.

I decided to risk following those breadcrumbs. I called 150. Was told- twice- that I would be charged for the call, said cancellations really quite emphatically at the correct juncture and spoke to a lady. She confirmed that I was indeed in the Customer Options Department- which was tea splutteringly funny, my options appearing somewhat limited. I asked to speak to Alex, she didn’t know who he was, there apparently being many Customer Options Teams spread around the country, she sounded like she was north of the border and very likely wishing she had voted yes in the referendum. Could she help? Not really I had neither the will nor the strength to go through it again.

She went away, came back, said she had e mailed Alex (thank goodness I had had the foresight to take that surname) but he was on his lunch break and would call me at 12.45p.m.

I went on my lunch break, from my full time job dealing with LLP. He did in fact call, provided me with more lift music, came back, told me he had the OM-MD mis-advisor on the line and I needed to hear what he had to say. I asked Alex how I would get back to him, he said I wouldn’t need to, clearly he had passed over his all too brief ownership of my problem.

So back to the OM-MD I went. This mis-advisor told me (I think) that in my case they could only restore my landline. What about my broadband I asked. Well that is your suppliers problem. You are my supplier I retorted. No we are not. I asked him to explain to me in words of one syllable who my providers were. My landline supplier is apparently Open Reach and my broadband supplier is the ‘wholesale team’. Well are these two suppliers not part of LLP then? Well yes but we only supply the land line. It was a good job there were no sharp implements lying around.

This mis-advisor said he was going to contact the Resolutions Team as my case was now classed as specialist (awkward). And someone would call back before 6p.m. I asked if I could stay on the line whilst he spoke to the Resolutions Team but apparently he needed to e mail them and was unwilling or unable to provide me with their number if for any ‘slim’ chance they did not call me back, or were on their lunch breaks and didn’t get my mobile number correctly etc etc.

I hung up. And shouted profanities.

Husband decide to try Twitter and got as far as filling in an on line form to plead for assistance.

It is now 6p.m. on the following day (Sunday for those who have lost track) and neither the Resolutions Team or @BTCare have had the courtesy to call.

So dear readers as we are at a total and complete loss as to how to proceed we are hoping the power of social media may help get us some action. I applaud you for getting this far. I’d like to say I feel better for getting it all down but my index finger just aches from typing this on my mobile phone.

If you feel able to share please do.

Senior moments… — May 9, 2015

Senior moments…

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Question Mark

Recently this happened to me. I could not find my car keys. This in itself is not unusual. I did my usual trick of reliving the last time I used them, imagining what I was wearing and emptying pockets, remembering where I went straight after arriving home and checking those locations, searching the drive way for a possible ‘drop’. No good.

During all this process there had been two new poly-pins of milk on the hall shelf. At first this didn’t register as odd. Things are often out of place Chez Harrison. A small child asked if they should put them away…fearing a dairy based gravity catastrophe I declined their offer, hoiked the milk to the kitchen, and found my car keys…in the fridge door.

And that folks sums up what is happening to my brain.

I like to think that my head is so full of ‘stuff’ (things like which child has to be where, when; which other child is somewhere else and needs collecting when; how, what, when will I feed them; what equipment does each child need, is any of it still wet; have I remembered x’s birthday; did I remember to buy oranges etc etc) that that is why I lose my keys.  In reality I think it is more likely to be (whispers) my age.

When I ask my children to describe an adult I have never met (for instance a random sports teacher, a friend’s mum) I often ask them if they are old or young. My kids look perplexed and merely reply

‘Old, of course’.

And that is because age is relative. My daughter’s form teacher looks about twelve to me but as far as youngest is concerned she is just an adult. I look back at teachers from my school days and sometimes find out that they have just retired so that they must have been really quite young when they taught me 30 years ago. All I remember are adults who all looked around the same age (with the possible exception of my middle school science teacher who always looked ancient).

I now believe that 45 is really quite young…

It is a shame, then, that physically and mentally my body is not living up to that belief.

I can no longer stay up late. If I am honest I was never that good at it anyway once, famously, falling asleep in a pub in Netheredge, Sheffield at around ten in the evening. But even so I do now start to panic if I am not upstairs with enough time to allow for ablutions yet still be asleep shortly after the clock strikes ten.  If I do stay up, you know New Year or something similar, I actually feel ill for around two days. And actually I don’t want to stay up late.

I don’t drink, again never a strong point, because any amount of alcohol will still be affecting me adversely by bed time the next night. And actually I don’t want to drink.

My face retains the creases of sleep until well past lunch time. In fact I now believe some of those creases are not actually temporary but form permanent features on my visage, which is slowly slipping south. And actually I don’t care that much.

I own a slanket, I like watching Vera and George Gently, I take the Radio Times and highlight programs of interest with an actual highlighter pen (although I have yet to colour code by channel), I obsess about the weather, I like to allow time in an itinerary to ‘park’, I struggle with gadgets, I listen to Radio 2.

I go upstairs for something, get side tracked by something else, come downstairs and carry on with what I was doing until I remember I can’t do it until I have been upstairs for something. I forget people’s names, especially if I meet them ‘out of context’. I cannot recall words.

I did start to worry about all this until I spoke to friends around the same age who have exactly the same issues, likes, new foibles.

And any way I actually think middle age sits quite well on me. Some of this stuff was always me, now it just suits me better. But still I wish I had appreciated my skin, my figure, my mind and mostly my freedom when I still had it. As the cliché goes ‘Youth, its wasted on the young’.

Rant Alert… — May 7, 2015

Rant Alert…

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So everyone knows moving house is stressful. I think it ranks third or fourth in the most stressful things to do. It is partly why I have resisted for so long.

Some days it feels like wading through treacle, whilst juggling three eggs and balancing a priceless Ming jar on my head…

And the process is made so much worse by having to deal with the ‘service’ companies. Of which there are seemingly hundreds. All with their different timescales, procedures, requirements and levels of awkwardness.

Like most people who are in a chain the date of our completion has slipped. I cannot believe this is an unusual event in the world of house moving. I knew it would cause problems.

One particularly helpful service company, lets call them ‘Large Landline Provider Who Really Should Be Better at This’ (LLP) stipulate that you must give four weeks notice of a house move. I duly did, I called the ‘Home Mover Centre’ and spoke to a really quite knowledgeable lady who booked my move and gave me a reference number. I discussed with her at length the notice requirements for changing the date of the move. I wrote down the last day I could possibly move the date, what number to call and hung up feeling remarkably optimistic.

Our date moved. I called LLP three days before my deadline. I spoke to someone who seemed really quite knowledgeable who moved the date. I got confirmation by text and e mail with a new reference number. This reference number actually worked on the LLP on line tracking system so I could see for myself on the t’internet that the dates were correct. I relaxed.

At no point should I have given in to optimism or relaxed. One should never relax. Ever.

On the original move date I got a call from my estate agent to say that my vendor had called. LLP had deactivated her landline a full 2 weeks before our new scheduled completion. I swore, apologised, asked him to apologise to her and promised I would call LLP to investigate.

I called the number I called to change the date. I spoke to a lady who seemed much less knowledgeable than the last two, maybe that was disappointment colouring my judgement, I am not sure. It didn’t help that she did not understand me. Or if I am honest me her. She took my reference number and merely kept repeating that ‘everything looked fine from her end’. She was presumably in the same system that I could access from the comfort of my study and so, I agreed, everything looked fine. But clearly wasn’t. As my vendor had been cut off. This seemed to confuse her.

By this point I had started to become increasingly concerned about the likelihood of my phone line actually moving on the actual correct date. Despite what it said at their end. She repeated her new mantra that ‘everything at their end looked fine’. I asked was she sure that my phone line, broadband and number would move successfully over at the correct juncture, she hesitated and said ‘Yes’, I asserted that she did not sound that sure. She re-iterated her affirmation. She then suggested I talk to the Faults Department.

I spoke to another confused lady in the Faults Department. This one seemed even less knowledgeable. Except that she was very certain she could not talk to me as it was not actually my phone line that had been de-activated. Despite the fact that it was my home move order that seemed to have gone awry. I guess all this could have been an amazing co-incidence with an engineer randomly cutting my vendor off for fun on the exact date I had originally booked for. Stranger things have happened.

I called the Agent back and explained that as far as LLP were concerned the move was scheduled for the correct day and I could not discuss with them the problems my vendor was having as it wasn’t my account. Interestingly the vendor had already tried to talk to LLP to get her phone re-instated but they would not talk to her either as according to ‘their’ records I now owned the line.

So new strategy. I called the number I called right at the start of the process when I spoke to someone who I understood and had filled me with confidence, however false. I dialled and got a lady, I think it was even the same woman. She could see the order had been changed. And it all looked ‘fine from her end’.  At this point I started searching LLP’s impenetrable web site for their complaints procedure. She needed to put me through to the ‘Order Management Department’. This sounded promising.  A department with a name, surely staffed by competents with better IT systems and more, well, knowledge.

I ended up in the same call centre I had spoken to first thing in the morning, this time a man, but still not easy to understand or make myself understood to. I imagine it somewhere in the tropics, the line, ironically, sounded bad enough. That mantra again, clearly it is on a list of  ‘responses to awkward customer questions’. He went away to see what else he could dig up, probably a cup of tea.

I like the Four Seasons as much as the next person, I think it was Spring at the time, I passed the few minutes ascertaining from the impenetrable web site that in order to complain I would need to call  the exact same number I was currently holding on with. He came back and stated that he needed to put me through to the Faults Department. Which he duly did. After a few more bars of soaring strings  I decided to hang up not relishing another round of ‘we cannot talk to you as it is not your phone line’.

The phone then rang. It was the ‘helpful’ chap I had hung up on. He noticed I had hung up and was concerned there was a problem. Well clearly there were several, not least of which was too much Vivaldi. This seemed to pass him by and he put my through again, after mentioning the long queue that would await me. I waited until I was firmly in that queue before hanging up.

Meanwhile the vendor had had more success, goodness knows how, and was hoping to have her line reinstated by the next day. The Agent said she could see the funny side, thankfully, I remained mortified at the inconvenience she had been put through.

I decided to give up and put my faith in the fact that it all ‘looks fine from their end’… I will probably be without phone line and internet for weeks…at least, dear reader, you will be spared my rant about it…

On the Hustings — May 6, 2015

On the Hustings

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polling station

Eldest is studying 12 bar blues in music at school this term which involves them, in small groups, composing their own blues piece. He came home yesterday and informed me that his group have decided to use politics as the theme.  He shared some of the lyrics. I was heartened to note the condemnation of Nigel Farage, but horrified to hear that the main thrust of the song appears to be supporting the Tories.

Don’t worry, says eldest, they loose, that’s why its a blues piece.

I metaphorically ran to the hills. Screaming.

We have been having many discussions at home about the up coming election. It is the first time they have been old enough to really grasp any of the concepts. Our political system is hard for children (and lets face it quite a lot of adults) to understand. So we have done our best to explain it’s complexities.  I think at least eldest and possibly middlest have got the basics. But the hardest question of all to answer is ‘What is the difference between the parties?’.

I would class myself as left wing. I was brought up in a fully fledged Guardian reading household. I have always had an aversion to the right wing.  My teenage years were characterised by the miners strike, by record unemployment, by the absolute, and seemingly callous, destruction of many ways of life by Margaret Thatcher.

At university, in the death throws of grants and housing benefit, my resolve only hardened. I distinctly remember in one election during that time, and living in a safe Tory seat in Sheffield, being galvanised into action to support the only viable alternative, a Lib Dem candidate. My household had a poster and we all voted tactically… to zero effect. I haven’t done it since.

Since being able to vote I have yet to actually live in any constituency where there wasn’t a safe Tory MP sitting smugly. I turn up to vote anyway. Futilely. How I long to live in a marginal, be important, possibly shape the future of this country, be Scottish. But, no, I am condemned for ever, it seems, to be a silent voter.

And anyway age, circumstances and the drift of most parties to the centre has numbed my zeal. Although I remain, for the most part, left wing I have a personal interest in not returning to the Labour of old. As a family it is possible we would suffer under a Labour government. But still I cannot bring myself to vote for the right wing party that arguably would do us, personally, the best service. Because fundamentally I want better things for the majority and am prepared to pay for it, although I am also not sure Ed and his friends would deliver that.

I took an online test which anonymously presented 5 party’s policies on areas important to me so I could gain an insight on who to vote for. It was, in the main, remarkably hard to tell whose policies were whose. And the outcome actually showed that no one party should get my vote.

So I am at a loss for this election. I will always vote, women died to gain me that privilege, but for whom is anyone’s guess. I haven’t been canvassed, no one has door-stepped me, I have had only one leaflet through my door. So no one is really making much effort.

Maybe I will just join eldest in his music lesson, play the walking bass for his blues song and stick my fingers in my ears… (although that would make playing bass really, really difficult)…

The Unfairness Indicator — May 2, 2015

The Unfairness Indicator

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unfairness

Bit of background. My husband and I had three kids within three and a half years. So really it is all our own fault. We were deluded. It is all you really need to know.

Our main current issue with the offspring (11, 9 and 7) is our Unfairness Indicator. You know that device which registers Unfairness between siblings and prompts at least one into uttering the immortal words ‘Its not fair!’.

Ours is hair triggered and prone to go off instantly over the smallest thing. Although it has always been there, well ever since they could all speak, no actually probably before, recently it has become a really, really, really highly tuned instrument. So sensitive that even possible future inequalities can move it up to DEFCON 10.

It drives me utterly mad. I shout ‘Life isn’t fair’ on an almost daily basis and hate myself for doing so. I am sure there is a much better way to deal with these episodes. I probably have a dusty book on a shelf somewhere about how to talk to kids properly and calmly and in such a way that they end up embracing each other in a tearful group hug. Or not.

I had hazy plans when I was considering a family of long, lazy Sunday afternoons with the rain pouring down outside and the fire on, playing board games in a harmonious and friendly way. Or taking advantage of a beautiful spring afternoon by cycling en famille around some beauty spot stopping only for a rustic picnic. That rarely pans out quite how I envisaged it…

And that is because all mine are uber competitive. No-one is cut any slack. Not even poor old me. There is no point playing in this house unless you are out to win*.

All mine have different strategies. Eldest just relies on his brute strength and height and innate bossiness* to ensure that winning is highly likely. That is because he sets the rules, enforces the rules, changes the rules when the rules he has already set are not favouring him; so basically he wins. In any physical game he wins almost every time, if someone else wins clearly they cheated so he won by default.

Middlest has the brains. He shines at all sorts of board games, but, and its a big but, he has no staying power. If he senses that he is not going to win he merely absents himself from the activity. And he can make this decision as soon as he has had his second go if someone, say, has the temerity to target him in some underhand way, like landing on him in Frustration. He has to be cadjoled, bribed, bullied and co-erced back to the table when usually his amazing general knowledge and logical thinking wins the day. But if it doesn’t he will sulk*.

Youngest has the staying power of an Everest Sherpa. Tenacious does not begin to describe her. She is smallest and youngest but does that stop her? By golly no. She was the first to do everything. Walk, skip, run, climb, cycle, swim, dive, kick a ball, play for her school, win a cross country race etc etc. Obviously chronologically she did it all last but if you compare her age at the time of these achievements to her brothers she beats them hands down. But that is not enough for her. So she keeps plugging away, somewhat futilely.

As for my dreams, that bike ride involves all three trying to outpace each other, or doing the whole route only in top gear, or doing the longest skid. They leave their poor old mum in the dust. And the board games descend into finger pointing, sulking hell.

I am sure it will stand them all in good stead. For something. Meanwhile I will go gently grey(er) and try to rise above…

Footnote * not sure where they get these things from…

Times, they are a-changing — April 29, 2015

Times, they are a-changing

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When I was pregnant with my first child I, along with, I am sure, many others in that position, rushed out and bought the having-a-baby-bible ‘What to Expect in the First Year’. I read, digested, cogitated, bought yet more stuff and felt mildly prepared.

Then, to make sure, I attended NCT ante-natal classes. Both of these educators were at pains to point out the fact that I was bound to get very little sleep with a new born in the house. In fact one exercise at the classes saw us mapping out what a typical night with a new born might look like. Apparently all the participants grossly over-estimated the amount of time we would actually spend asleep and we had to redo our ‘maps’.

I went into complete denial. I distinctly remember thinking ‘Well that won’t happen to me’.

I was completely, totally, stupendously and comprehensively wrong.

Recently I purchased a book entitled ‘Please Get out of My Life, But First Take Me and Alex to Town’. It is about teenagers. I got half way through and denial hit again. I have stopped reading. I have put my fingers in my ears and am singing ‘I can’t hear you. I can’t hear you, la la la la la la’. Clearly all this stuff will not happen to me and my family.

My eldest is 11 and now classed as a ‘pre teen’, whatever that means. Apparently this set of children have their own foibles, their own behavioural issues, their own forum subset on parenting websites to assist those afflicted with such beings.

However whatever the term, this period of childhood is certainly full of change. First born has not yet morphed into a grunting, monosyllabic, spotty hunchback as immortalised in the famous Kevin sketch but I can see flashes of the teenage years to come. He fluctuates between petulance and extreme neediness. On some mornings everything I have the temerity to ask will be met with a surly ‘No’, even such mild an enquiry as ‘Did you sleep well?’. On others he can be full of chatter, keen to engage me in his views on the day ahead over his Weetabix. I have yet to master the art of figuring out which mood will prevail when I enter his room to draw the curtains and greet him on another morn.

Other things are more constant. His siblings are universally annoying, especially his younger sister. He has started to speak in a language I don’t fully recognise. He will not hold my hand in public. I am becoming more and more embarrassing. Things I tell him are only believed when his peers or someone with more brain (a teacher) confirm them. He is quick to temper. He believes I interfere, am too strict, too draconian in my views on electronics, expect too much, do not provide him with all the various freedoms he craves.

And yet I can still hold onto some quiet moments when he is relaxed in my company, at ease, willing to share his thoughts and feelings, discuss politics, show me magic tricks he has perfected. He still wants to hug me, in private, he still requires tucking in at night, to be read aloud to, to cling onto the childishness of Christmas.

And now those times seem even more precious. The beginnings of him pulling away are kindling. And I do not want it to begin.

I want to turn back the clock to his toddler years when I felt claustrophobic from the pawing and was never allowed to go to the toilet alone. I want to go back and relive them because now I would relish those intimate periods when he literally felt a part of me, as if he wished he had never left my body and wanted to climb back in.

Time has flown. If the book is right I will probably loose him for a time, when friends and girls rise up the pecking order, and I become almost an irrelevance, consigned to providing a full fridge and clean laundry.  He will spend more time locked in his room or roaming with his mates. I know we may be lucky (denial again) and retain a decent relationship throughout but even so the fundamentals will change.

I have, possibly, a couple of short years left when I am more important to him than anyone else in the world. I can only hope that the fact that he is more important to me than life itself will eventually mean we weather whatever storms are ahead.

Women are from Venus, men are just, odd… — April 25, 2015

Women are from Venus, men are just, odd…

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venus

I have been following Bear Grylls, The Island recently. Brief synopsis: he drops 14 men and separately 14 women off on remote Pacific islands with 3 machetes, 3 knifes, 8 fishing hooks, a bow for fire lighting, 2 days survival training; and watches them starve. Essentially.

It makes for interesting if somewhat lively viewing. Bear interjects at various intervals outlining the perils they are in, repeating himself often but looking fetching in his rugged, Chief Scout way.

Apart from being amazed and appalled at the amount of rubbish the islands collect (which actually forms the basis of the survival of these people) it also makes plain major differences between the sexes. The hackneyed stuff we all know about. Women would rather befriend piglets than kill them. Men fight for dominance. Women cry (although conditions are such that the men are not immune to this). Men are obsessed with bowel movements. Women hug and support each other (mostly). Men are galvanised by the thrill of the hunt.

I have always been keen on men (steady on) and have many male friends. I can relate to them, I have brothers, I am not interested in traditionally girly pursuits. In fact other than a very few, very old girl friends I have the most female friends currently than I have ever had. And that is because I am a mother- the role that actually binds women together more than any other.

But that doesn’t mean I understand men. Or can get into their heads. Oh no most of that is still a mystery.

I have now lived with one man for nearly 15 years. Mostly we rub along fine. I am sure that he finds a lot of what I do and say  intensely irritating. The feeling is mutual. I guess marriage is like that. My current girl friends and I discuss our menfolk regularly. Here are just some incomprehensible male ‘things’ we struggle to, well, comprehend…

  • Putting the glass on the counter above the dishwasher is actually almost as much work as placing it in the dishwasher upside down
  • When opening a new 100m roll of Clingfilm that will last about a year it is better not to ruin the box. Thereby not allowing easy perforation of the film going forwards. For a year. Nearly always by the partner who didn’t break the box.
  • The suggestion on a Friday night of ‘doing something’ at the weekend means a trip out to a National Trust property or a local walk, not an overnight stay on a camp site in the Peaks. (see packing below)
  • If you need to spend 30 minutes on the toilet you need to see a GP
  • When the kids are calmed down for bed it is not a good idea to instigate a Nerf gun battle/ sword fight/ tickle torture session.
  • After packing ALL day for a holiday/ night away at a campsite in the Peaks the comment ‘have you packed xxxx’ is not appreciated.
  • The inability to find things. Ever.
  • Cooking is feeding a family day in day out to high nutritional standards, and involves planning, shopping and boring hours of chopping and stirring for no reward. What you do is  ‘chefing’. And no you don’t deserve special praise for it.
  • Looking after your own children is not babysitting.
  • No one over 20 looks good in lycra on a bike. Just accept that. Sundays are full of men of a certain age rekindling their youth in lycra (which probably wasn’t invented then) and getting in my way on the roads.
  • Please finish the old tomatoes before you start the new ones (see ‘finding things’ above).
  • Please check the stores before buying food items (see ‘chefing’ above).

I could go on but this is now turning into a serious rant. And although I have called this blog musingsponderingsandrants there must be a line somewhere. I am determined not to cross it so early.

My husband and I enjoy The Island. We shout at the screen. We believe we could do better. I know this is not true. In my case I would faint after about 3 days from low blood sugar. And my husband would loose his glasses rendering him entirely useless.