to say I'll sort myself out and potentially annoy friend?

[PoppyPopcorn]

I have a friend who lives along the road with childrne of similar ages to mine. Our two older children do swimming on a Thursday, the two younger ones do dancing. We usually try to share lifts between us and last year had a good system going involving a third mum whose child does swimming only. Her child has left the group this year.

Problem is, friend is rubbish with her mobile. They don't have a landline and she doesn't "do" facebook or messaging apps, so the best way of communicating is by me texting her. She never reads her texts. If you get a response, it's 2 days later. SO here we are, almost 4pm on the day all this is supposed to be happening, and I don't know which "run" she's planning on doing and what I'm doing. If it was a one off it wouldn't bother me, but it's every sodding week.

WIBU to tell her to sort herself out and just take my own kids? (Would involve a bit more driving and waiting for the younger one as activities overlap).

It's not working for you.

If she doesn't 'do' reliable forms of communication then you can't 'do' reliable car pools with her.

Yep, just sort yourself out. Waiting for her and never being sure must be extremely irritating and you will probably end up being late at least some of the time.

That is really annoying. Not much help for today, but could you get a former schedule set? So for X dates you'll do certain things and vice versa? Or would you worry she'd still be flakey then?

Firmer schedule not former

Just sort yourself out - if she wants to be involved she needs to sort her communication out

Do the run yourself. It will be a lot less hassle. If she says anything just say you hadn't heard from her!

Yes, I think you need to explain that you need a firmer plan in place and as she's difficult to reach by phone/text, you'll just sort yourselves out in future. She must know she's messing you around.

I really think she doesn't realise that she's messing people about or that it's frustrating. I'm not glued to my mobile but I do check it every couple of hours and respond to texts. She just doesn't think to look at it - or it's broken, not charged, the kids are playing on it, whatever. She's not the sort who would deliberately try to piss others off. Flakey is a good word for it.

I might ask for her husband's mobile number - he's FAR more together and organised.

Just do your children, tell her it can't work as she doesn't stay in contact. After many many years of many many lift shares ( too many kids, too many sports) I can confidently guess she won't improve and you'll get more and more upset. Lift shares like this only work with reliable people. It's not working so get out.

I would set it in stone.
I'll do all the drop off, you pick up every week for swimming, and other way roudn for dancing.

Please check your mobile by lunchtime to see if there is a problem, ie one child sick, otherwise we assume as we have it set.

As soon as it doesn't work, just back out and do it yourself.

Can't you ring her?

For 'rubbish with her mobile', read 'can't be arsed making arrangements and hoping to avoid doing any of the driving'.

Then one hour beforehand she can say, "oh, have you already arranged lifts? Silly, scatty old me!"