Class of '18 Best foot forward through the autumn leaves.

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

old thread was getting big....

Lonicera that is so immature and pathetic. There are so many vegetarians now you would think that the younger generation would not blink an eye.

DD1 came home last weekend which was lovey. Not back til 21st Dec now. Started booking a few Xmas things for that weekend as that should be my best week luckily.

DD1 had a better nights sleep and is a little brighter today. She has emailed her lecturers to say she won't be in tomorrow and asked friends to get any notes. She hasn't missed anything yet. So proud of her handling it all. Normally she has her head in the clouds a bit but maybe I need to change my views on this. She is definitely growing up a lot this term.

I am selfishly looking forward to the cold weather but I am not sure how cold it will get in Devon.

Also thank you for all of your lovely thoughts and comments.

She's doing so well Marmite :) The 21st is really late, but she will be dropping straight into it being all Christmasy which is a lovely thing.

Not very much cooler in Devon, but the wind will make it feel colder. Maybe 6-7 degrees mid week.

We were much higher this week so should feel a bit cooler. 👍🏼

marmite good to hear from you and hope it goes as well as it can. Hope dd recovers quickly too.

kitten glad your dd is having a bit of break. It seems a shame to be somewhere so lovely and not able to enjoy it.

Good to hear your update marmite. Wishing you well. Hope your DD recovers quickly.

Good to hear from you marmite
DS is looking to sign contracts on house for next year. Quite a few alarm bells for me, but I don't know what's normal in a tenancy agreement.
No locks on bedroom doors?
Landlord can charge extra for above average bills (heating/water)
They have to contract broadband and Landlord refunds up to £30/month
Will landlord provide lawnmower? Will they need to weed ?
landlord only has property insurance they need to sort contents but only once? Very confused with that one.
Hmmm. Help?

I think DDs contract has a clause in for if the bills are over a set amount. Let's hope they don't have the heating and lights on all the time. But broadband is included. No idea about locks on doors. Although a friend's dd is in her second year and they are in a 5 bed house with only 4 of them so the landlord has locked one of the rooms up rather than charging them more.

Ds contract also has a set amount for bills with top up fees if they go over. I think that would be fairly standard for a bills included place.
Don't know about broadband but they have locks on all the doors and insurance (I think full, though actually I should double check will ds) is included.
If the bedroom doors don't have locks, it would restrict or invalidate any contents insurance they took out individually.

DS finally found a house on Friday, there are 7 of them sharing - one of the boys in his flat is leaving - probably before Christmas so they have been waiting until he was sure he was going as they had been looking for somewhere with 8 rooms. The one they have found is under renovation so they will be the first tenants in.

All utilities, broadband, Virgin TV and Contents Insurance (up to £5,00 per person) are included. I don't think the utilities are capped but will double check. The only thing that was odd that they have to pay £40 each at the end of the tenancy for the landlord to have the property contract cleaned. To be fair though they do provide a cleaner every week for the communal areas - bathrooms, kitchen and living area

I had an experienced landlord friend read through DS's tenancy agreement as I don't really know much about them - all seems to be above board and standard. Friend also checked out the letting company.

Thanks for the comments. The concern I have re the usage of electricity/gas is that the clause is woolly. No set amount or level. I'll be going through properly tonight listing all my queries/concerns/things he really needs to be aware of, but have asked him to do the same! (Don't mind supporting but not letting him not get involved). He'll then need to get the queries addressed.

flatmouse I suggested some questions that might be useful before DS and flatmates started looking. He did actually ask me what he needed to know and used his list as he had an answer for pretty much everything when quizzed/interrogated (apart from capped utilities which he is pretty sure aren't but said he'll email/ring the letting people to double check).

Just popping in to say hello.

Good to hear from you Marmite - I hope the better anti nausea meds keep working.

Ds seems happy and well.

We saw him 2 weeks ago for a quick 24 hour visit in his uni city - first time in 6 weeks :)

As we are overseas he can not get home for weekends so it was our first time seeing him in 6 weeks. He will be home for a MONTH :) on 16/12. Flying home and i can’t wait.

Academically things are going well he got a first on his first essay which was a good confidence boost.

Loving his rugby and seems to have made lots of good friends.

He and 9 friends from halls have found a house and signed the lease. Now we just need to arrange a UK based guarantor! Am sure my parents will step in and do this.

100 Christmas crackers in a car made me smile. We also love to get British bits and bobs for Christmas. We are meeting my parents in Bruges before Christmas and they will come with our Christmas food shopping :)

Wishing you and all your children uneventful last weeks before Christmas.

Lovely to read your update Downey, it sounds like your ds is absolutely thriving :)
Sounds like a big shared house next year.

How are our gap year and non uni students getting on? Lonicera how are your dds applications coming on?

Downey that is great news.

Just had a text from ds to say he was feeling very ill, two days in, after being bought "shots" on Monday or Tuesday night. So in otherwards, alcohol poisoning. He said he hadn't eaten anything since then, felt extremely nauseous, like vomiting, but hadn't. He is invited to a family meetup with second cousins his age this Friday and I think this is the only reason he told us, as he said he was too ill to attend. However, the text was at 7am, and by 10am, after our suggestions of bananas, flat coke, boiled eggs and dry toast (as it transpired he was eating and drinking nothing, he dislikes tap water) he said he was beginning to feel a bit better. I don't think he is ever going to mix his drinks again. The problem is he doesn't even like alcohol much, just likes the effect of being "sociable", and hates beer or wine.
Hopefullly we will see him tomorrow if he feels he can get on the bus without passing out (his words) His texts are getting more and more articulate and grownup, it is rather odd to observe even when their content is less than desirable..

Sounds like his blood sugar got really low. He should rapidly feel better now.
I think university drinking can be a bit of an issue for those who hardly drink - they don't have any experience at limits or recovery.
I remember my first drunk experience (at least I remember it!). I had lots of advice the next day and was forcibly taken for something to eat and hair of the dog I felt much better after

A British Rail sausage roll was always my go to hangover cure. (Totally outs self to anyone who knows me).

Every day I get a facetime call from DD, that I usually miss, then get texts telling me to answer my FT. There is always another drama to relate. Today's was that she had lost her ID yesterday - at least she couldn't find it when she was ready to go out last night (to see the remaining Chuckle brother ), She managed to nip past the security guards into one club, then blagged her way into the next, but was refused admission to the third. This morning she received texts from various people to tell her that her ID was being shared on a WhatsApp group for the student part of town as some kind soul had found it. She is now mortified that 'the whole of Uni know my middle name!'

She is coming home for the weekend to see a gig and bringing her new BFF who is small and southern. We are large and Northern.

Should be fun.

ha ha Ursula we have the Viking gene here too.

I am now trying to imagine what your dd's second name could possibly be, like the Queen in Rumpelstiltskin..Amelia, Mercy, Assumpta, Melania, Hermione, Leonora, Arabella..what could be wrong with such beautiful names

Dd has bought a milk frother to create homemade cappucinos. The nights are definitely drawing in. We found all three cats (who hate each other) sitting this morning together on the sofa with an airy look of don't you know it is frosty outside? the Lemon Tree is still standing although there are threats to cover it with a pointy hessian hat.

It's from King Lear..........

Last post from me before a name change I think. I might have to rename George the worm too.

DS lurches from drama to drama, he's still struggling with feeling worthy of the place so (in my view) looks for failure everywhere and panics over nothing. The library book is lost! Failure, consequences, woe, oh wait here it is. Other people are talking about an assignment, how could I have missed it, woe, failure, oh it's that one that's been marked and I got a 67.

Nettles I have a calamondin orange in the porch (Aldi). I take the little oranges off as they ripen, freeze them and make marmalade once a year.

I can't remember ever having more than a couple of iffy mornings after much drinking. I think it helped that I was a lager drinker and there was only so much I could drink before I'd had enough of it.

I worked at the student union bar - I don't drink. Even if I'd been tempted it would have put me off. Many many nights serving pints of snakebite and black and cheap shots was enough to deter anyone. That and finding pint pots of pink vomit in corners when the bar had closed and we had to clean up. Yuk.

oh no snakebite and black!

My issue was super strong blends of cider

I can't even read the word cider without getting a headache.

I feel that this thread has taken a traumatic turn

I think it's good for us to remember how we were at 18. I despair of DS sometimes and his inability to manage really simple stuff. The danger is that we compare them to ourselves now, with our decades of life skills and hard knocks, rather than to how we were at 18. I was inept and clueless but I learned.