April 2009 - Episode 12 - 'I'm wearing mine pink one Princess Tutu'

[Feierabend]

Here we go!

Yes Fei - very sure indeed would love love love to see you x

Excellent. Will come over as soon as H has had her sleep and bottle. At the moment she's banging DD1's play pans and pots against each other so doesn't look like she'll have her nap any time soon!

Saw a house with the most amazing garden ever yesterday. It's so massive, it's practically like owning Kew Gardens The downside is, of course, that the house is small but can be extended in all sorts of ways, if we had the cash that is...

Yay can't wait to see you both.

Oooooooooo where was the house?

TBH Bicnod he doesn't seem that bothered by it, but then again, very little seems to bother him. He's a laid back kind of chap. They don't itch nor nuffink.

We have a party to go to on Friday and as I can't find out when he's going to be infectious until if they haven't healed over we aren't going. If we have snot we won't be either!

GottaGoCheckOnTheCubTiggaxx

I've ordered No Cry Sleep Solution on Amazon and am waiting for it with over excited anticipation!

Tigga my neice has just has hand, foot and mouth...it looked much nastier than I think it actually was, but hers cleared up after about 10 days (she's 3). I think she was infectious only for part of it, but can't remember - will call DSis

was going to say did you mean hand foot and mouth as foot and mouth is something cloven footed creatures get and I'm sure hes not the devil child. Then I saw that you did

My dream house goes to bids in two days so no chance, fingers crossed theres something better waiting for us. Our new carport wa sput up today so the place looks a bit better again.

Fei- we'll have to have a house thread on fb fanjos cos then we can post links to the houses we see

Oooo yes - have a house thread - I love looking at houses people are thinking of buying

Boo about your dream house Bronze

aoifesmama - hurrah for NCSS, I feel quite evangelical about it now that it seems to be working with O

I had to tell her dad she was dropping out as she bottled it.

Very grown up of her. NOT.

Having a shit day. Had a virus for two weeks, taking this week off to get better and deputy has been having a go at me for 'never being there' and 'she always has to cover for me'. Suffice it to say this is unjustified, more due to the fact she is hassled because she spends half her life doing other people's jobs for them and never delegating or closing her office door. And one week in four away overseas or in remote parts of the UK making merry at conferences. However frankly I could have done without it.

I am going to give it all up and start a buntingcupcake business.

oh, boff, I'm sorry.

Hellloooooo ginger!! Glad it is going well.

Looby, the no-cry is kind of working for us. A is down to one, hard to shift, 4am wakening. Better than before, by miles.

Tigga, that sounds scary. Hope Cub is OK.

Support to all looking for houses. I feel for you.

It has all gone massively tits up here, as we discovered that the lovely lady who has a hearing aid/test shop (what do you call them in English???) in what was the garage of our house had not been informed that the owners were planning to redo the electrics, with power drills, etc. for 6-8wks. She needs silence for her hearing tests. So the meeting arranged for last Sat to plan dates, etc. for the work was postponed until a time she can attend, I have no dates for the work, and can't organise accommodation.

On Sun the electricity went off and I had to go down into her shop, climb into her window and get at our meter where the trip switch lives. Passers-by looked oddly at me as I fumbled with scissors to open the damn box thing and get at it.

Then yesterday A and DS1 had a bath together, and while I was drying DS1, with A still in the bath beside us, standing up watching operations, the s*dding electricity went off again, plunging us into utter, total darkness. DS1 clung to me like a limpet in panic and I had to grope around and hoik A out of the bath w/o knocking him into it. Then navigate our way to the lower floor where there was power, dress them both in PJs and jumpers, go downstairs in the dark and 2°C temps to the outhouse where the fuses are and change a fuse, with A in my arms and DS1 holding the fuse box open with a handy butterfly net . End result: nowt.

Electrician came today and said that half the plugs upstairs are connected to the lighting circuit, which can't cope with anything very energy hungry, so the fuse exploded when I used a fan heater to warm the bathroom. I had been trying to change the wrong fuse last night

I am tired of being Mother s*dding courage and dealing with this kind of shite on my own.

And DS1 is being unbearable.

GrumpyAuld.

Oh Tigs poor Cub. A couple of people I know who've caught it from their kids say it's horrible so much sympathy.

Boff, wow how daring of your DD. I am much too law abiding for all that. Sorry you're having a rubbish day.

Auld that is beyond a joke isn't it? If power is connected to the lighting socket, electrics should be condemned. Do tenants have any rights in France?

Aha chicken kievs are ready

Tigga - DSis was told that DN could stay contagious for a few weeks after symptoms had gone, but that this was mainly problematic for schools kids due to toilets/not washing hands etc.

Auld - I thought we had it bad here with a boiler that broke down...thinking of you

Auld fgs poor you! Don't know how you manage.

Hand foot mouth - it's supposed to be mild but a friend's dd had it really bad. Hope cub is okay.

Chicken kievs, yum. My dinner was inspired by Bicnod. Pancakes with a spinach filling and tomato sauce and lots of cheese. It's pancake day after all!

Auld, that is deeply shit and my misfortunes seem relatively minor compared to that. Over here the landlord would be breaking the law and in trouble - surely they have similar laws in France too?

Personally I would give notice on grounds of the electrics being dangerous, and move out, but I daresay this will throw up all sorts of other problems for you.

Anyway, you have deepest sympathy from me and I hope it all gets resolved soon.

I did have to laugh at the Mother Courage thing though!

Blimey, came on here to regale you all with tales of my latest difficulties, only to find that poor old Boff and Auld are having much worse times!

Auld is there some kind of organisation that protects tenants in France, or Citizens' Advice or something? You can't possibly be expected to live in what sounds like a potential hazard, to say the least. Surely someone at the mairie must be responsible for ensuring that people don't explode in their own homes due to faulty wiring? Mind you, one of our landlords way back was French, he regarded laws about having boilers serviced as merely guidelines and when we informed him that the boiler had been condemned by a Corgi registered gas man he decided it was all some strange idea I had got into my head due to being a girl. Apparently we're like that, women, we have an odd fascination with not dying of carbon monoxide poisoning.

Boff I can't imagine how frustrating it must be to deal with DD's behaviour. I guess at her age all you can do is cut her loose - tell her what you think, refuse to support her in her madness and leave it at that. And resist the urge to do the Told You So dance if it all goes tits up

More in a mo, dinner's ready

Hi,
quick post before I do laundry chores and then collapse into bed.
There are indeed laws, which is why DH sent the letter demanding that the work be carried out, and the owners knew they had to comply. He was threatening to send a bailiff type person to witness the state of the premises and start legal proceedings.
They have agreed to do the work and had sent us the proposed calendar, but now it has all been postponed due to our gallant efforts to ensure that the lady downstairs is involved in the planning, so she doesn't go out of business.

We should just move out, but I spent months trying to find a new place before I found this, and there are hardly any rentals to be got here at the best of times. And I am just exhausted.
DH is in full battle mode, and swears the place will be great when it has been refitted.
Which is true.
If I live that long.

Boff, my woes are temporary (unless one of us is electrocuted, obv....), whereas I can quite see how stressful it must be to watch your DD play fast and loose with her long-term professional future, esp if you think it is partly motivated by fear of exams.

Anyhoo, off down to the outhouse to get the washing out of the machine. DH is snoring on the sofa, having kindly come down to read some case files there and thus keep me company while I did some late-night work (it's 10:30 here, I'm not that much of a wimp that I'm moaning at 9:30!).

Thanks for all the commiserations, I feel better for reading them. DH thinks I'm being a bit over-dramatic, he couldn't see why it was an adrenaline rush to have to fish Alex out of the bath in the pitch dark and then wield fuses with a pyjama-clad baby in my arms and poor old DS1 in his dressing gown in the freezing cold, valiantly propping open the fusebox with his butterfly net, at the ripe old age of not-quite-five.

I think your DS1 is well cool! Very creative, a butterfly net!

Have you seen the knitted boobs thread in Arts and Crafts?

Auld feel free to tell me to mind my own business, but, why son't you buy? Proprty in France is reasonable even in Provence!

Going to risk baby cafe but not let him touch anyone - all sores healed.

Was the butterflynet for those mahosive scary wasp things you get down there?

StillABitTerifiedByThemTiggaxx

Tigga, we can't really afford to. Property here is not reasonable when your salary is not very high (mine & DH's) and your job highly unstable (DH). I have some shares and savings in the UK, from my grandfather's inheritance, but they have halved in value, with the markets collapsing and the pound following suit.
If we wanted 2 bedrooms in the town where I work, then prices are almost as high as Paris: a dingy, cramped flat with a view of the motorway is just about within our budget.
We could afford to live in a semi-OK flat in a semi-OK part of Marseille, but I have already bored everyone with how much I dread that idea. I had given in and DH was flat-hunting in Marseille this time last year when his boss sacked him.
I said there was no way we were moving there if he didn't even have a fairly secure job.

We should have bought when we moved here in 2005, but DH was studying and we had no idea where he'd end up working, so it seemed a bit hasty. Ha.

Starting salary for a university lecturer in France is 1,800 euros/mth, if that helps give an idea of how low pay is.
I have over 10 yrs' experience and earn under 2,300 euros/mth.
DH earns half that, as he has to pay 45% of his earnings in contributions, since he is technically self-employed.

Sorry, missed t'other question. Butterfly net is DS1's from the cheapo shop, he races round chasing butterflies. Far too canny/scared to go after worms, we are!!

Woo hoo. No time to chat my loves, i'm trying to figure out my sexy, new, and totally free iphone.

Now I can mumsnet on the go.

Big kisses to you all. And a manly hug for Auld.

Auld, maybe you could put DH out to stud? I have considered that with my DH in the past as he produces fine offspring IMO. But then I suppose the downside of doing this would be that our DHs would be home even less ... in the meantime I think we ought to start writing chick lit or some such, so we come up with a bestseller. Or write a MN screenplay.

Boff, an interesting plan indeed. DH has been hinting that his testosterone levels are dangerously low due to lack of energy and mojo on my part. A spell as a stud would no doubt boost them.

Prefer the chick-lit idea, though. We could alternate chapters, à la Boff'n'Auld show.

A is really not well, very high temp and very miserable, seems to be in some kind of pain at times, he kind of goes all tense and whimmpers. I thought at first it was a combination of teeth & cold, but am now running scary scenarios of nasty diseases through my mind. He seemed better this afternoon, so I didn't take him to the docs. Am regretting it bitterly.

BA agrees with me.

I was going to link to her education thread the other day, but then she got so vicious that the whole thread was wiped.