Evenin' all!
I have had a decidedly odd week. Started off badly - finding out the school haven't kept any records relating to ds's SEN and support, which effectively means there's no evidence for our statement application. 
(Do they not have an angrier emoticon that one doesn't seem angry enough.)
Didn't exactly improve, thanks to a murderous day at the eye clinic with ds2 and dd in tow. Ds2 had been squeezed into a geriatric clinic because they cocked up and didn't send his follow up appointment in time - so I was stuck with a bored very-2-year-old dd and a bored ds2, who couldn't do anything to entertain himself due to the seemingly super strength eye drops they gave him - in a waiting room full of bad-tempered elderly people for the best part of an hour. Then I discovered that they had also messed up his Consultant's Opthamologist appointment and it hadn't been booked on the system. Fortunately the lovely Consultant Optician (who is also mightily p'd off with the way we've been treated) said she'd sort it all out for us.
On to the opticians to get his new glasses, only to be treated really shabbily, left standing at the desk for 10 minutes with the two dcs, then told to take a seat and left for another 20 minutes, whilst 3 other people that came in afterwards were served before us and dd became more and more fractious. Then we are asked to move so they could serve another lady who had an emergency - only to eavesdrop and find out her so-called emergency was that she was going on holiday the next day and her glasses were a bit tight! 
We were finally seen by a woman who clearly didn't know what she was doing and ended up having to wait while someone came over to help her anyway - by which time dd was well overdue for a nappy change and had leaked all through her clothes! Aaargh!
That particular delight was quickly followed by a descent into a lovely CFS/ME crisis, just in time for the holidays. 
But .... I did have two positive things that came out of my bad mood.
First off, I complained to Amazon because the bloomin' Pokemon Black game I ordered off them for ds1's birthday on Sunday still hadn't arrived and had no tracking, as for some ungodly reason they were sending it from somewhere in Europe rather than the UK. I sent them an extremely curt email and demanded they replace it on express delivery at no additional charge and within half an hour I not only had a response, but the new one was winging its way to us. Thankfully it arrived this morning - so major birthday meltdown averted - phew!
Secondly, still in a foul mood and trying to cost up our summer holiday I discovered that whilst vw campers have a £60 supplement on them when travelling by ferry to Ireland, MPVs such as Land Rover Discoveries (which are the same height and actually longer than VW campers) do not. Effectively the owners of the smaller vehicle are being penalised. 
So, I emailed both ferry companies to complain and got a response from Irish Ferries the next morning saying they will waive the supplement for us. (I'm still waiting to hear from Stena, but half a result 'ain't bad. 
)
I am still pursuing Irish Ferries to change their booking categories so that the problem doesn't keep reoccurring. I've always known about it - it was only this year that it really p'd me off enough to do something about it. Mainly because thanks to them changing the value of Tesco Vouchers despite saving up £111 of vouchers we still couldn't cover the whole cost of the ferry!
I am seriously looking forward to a couple of weeks with no school runs and will definitely not be missing my lovely chats with ds1's teacher in the playground after school each day.
Mind you, I had to separate my boys within half an hour of them coming home this afternoon - so I'm not holding out much hope for a peaceful holiday.
Its ds1's 9th birthday on Sunday and I have to bake and decorate a flipping Pichu cake somehow between now and then. Then a week on Monday its ds2's 7th birthday, so I have to do it all over again with yet another pokemon.