Planet of the Crepes

[DukesOfTripHazard]

New bowl of crisps, tuck in Ruby!

I am thrilled at this Pixi lust. Another of their things wot I like is the cheek gel in natural. It doesn't stay on very long but while it does it's well pretty.

I felt a bit rubbish yesterday and spent much too long hunched over the computer looking at not very edifying things. Today is better. Have shredded, spot cleaned the stair carpet, written a letter to DD who will be at an outdoor pursuity place with school next week and am now going out to buy some fabric conditioner at Wilkos. When the mice are away the cat does rather boring things, it would seem .

Short term, can you - and/or would it be a good idea - to up your hours in your own job?

Have just been googling the ACAS site and will get dh to insist his employer emails their dismissal procedure info over to him tomorrow. Will try and get him to ring the helpline in the morning, too.

I am going to ask at work and see if I can do an extra day a week, not sure they can afford it, but they are short-staffed, so I'll see.

oh wilbur, that all sounds truly crap. giving him so short a time to make such a big decision without any opportunity to get independent advice must be wrong?? employment thread always has some shit hot legal types advising.... worth a go?

Wilbur. That's SO unfair. And SO typical that it's down to some Alpha-wanker of a boss.

But what they're doing isn't legal. There are really strict guidelines on how to dismiss someone fairly, and they're not following them. He could easily sue them for unfair dismissal. Or, at least, get together some advice, and threaten to do so.

I was once made redundant in an inept fashion - though not as ineptly as your DH - and offered about £1200. I spent £300 on a lawyer, who told me I had a watertight case for unfair dismissal. I went back in, armed with this info, wouldn't back down, and came away with six months' salary - the maximum an employment tribunal would give out.

Oh Wilbur - as bad weeks go that's pretty bad. I hope your DH manages to get a fair deal on the redundancy, but I imagine it won't be easy. I know where you are coming from when you mention his passivity with regards to getting a new job - I am pretty sure my DH would be exactly the same. Touch wood his job is pretty secure, although he's been told that he has to lose one of his team and his long-awaited and much-deserved promotion has gone on the back-burner yet again.

About your DS's school - are you certain that the local comp won't give him what he needs? Is it worth another visit, and maybe a chat with the science department?

Oh wilbur how positively shit. Yes to getting advice re payout. Your dh sounds like me, I loath networking and am awful at it and also take job loss very badly (tries not to think of last time). Re schools, if you don't have to make a decision right now look carefully at all options - eg extra private tutoring if necessary?
Herbs fingers crossed for friend.
Just to an almighty bang as half of next doors cladding has dropped off the side of their house!

Oh dear Wilbur Not sure what to suggest about your DH's job, but lots of good advice above. And I second CV about the school - definitely go and see them and talk to them about your concerns. They MUST have had at least some other children who are sciencey. And BD's suggestion of tutoring if absolutely necessary.

I made a crepey error last night - was just arguing with DH over watching the footy/not when my friend texted me to ask where I was as she was in the pub waiting for me. In my mind our drinks were tomorrow (well, today now!) [bluxh] Lucky it was only round the corner, so I grabbed my coat and ran!

Yes to ACAS helpline, Wilbur, good first step. And lawyer.

I need to lose some weight (OK, I have needed to lose some weight since I was about 24). I do not want to do DH's nuts and flaxseeds diet. I probably need to exercise more as well (no excuse, we have a rowing machine). I don't think I eat excessively - I never eat between meals, don't have an overly sweet tooth (only eat chocolate when I am due on), but I just never seem to shift any weight, no matter what I do. I was in hospital on a drip for 10 days, nil by mouth, and had lost just half a kilo at the end of the 10 days. I've had amoebic dysentery and lost a similar amount - the nurse said to me, oooh, you'll have lost pounds, and I hadn't. On the positive side, it doesn't seem to go up, either. I have cut right back on alcohol and (apart from a champagne lapse earlier this week) now only drink at the weekend, and about a glass (largeish one, but not the type that holds a third of a bottle) an evening. Oh, I also throw up quite regularly, which may be lack of gall bladder related. I very rarely eat fried food (due to lack of gall bladder).

MrsS its our age dontcha know....I uesd to be able to eat and drink what I liked and still be a size eight, then whilst I wasn't looking all this extra fat crept onto me. I used to be able to just cut out bread and wine and it would drop off me. Not any more. So if you have any bright ideas pass them on! (or do I just accept the inevitable and buy a big wardrobe...)

Realised on inspection that it was a jolly good thing the drive is taken up by a skip, otherwise dp's car would have taken a direct hit. Bit worrying really - wonder how much more of the cladding is going to come crashing down.

Mrs S, I have the same problem. All that's left to suggest is portion control: when I was at my aged Ps, I ate normal food but in much small portions than I normally would, and lost weight. Trying to do it now, but greed keeps scuppering my plans!

MrsS, I have a similarly impressive metabolism in terms of weight loss - dh and his best friend and I all got the most disgusting notifiable (had to poo in a jar on return to the UK, bleerugh) stomach parasite in Venezuela - dh and friend both lost a stone, a whole stone, and I lost 2 lbs. What I have realised for me is that it is carbs that keep me going, and that when I remove them and up the protein, it makes a big difference. So a very short, 2 week blast of Dukan can get things going for me - and it's low fat too, so I think that's helpful for your lack of gall bladder? Dukan is a mad bastard though, so I'm not sure I would do that for long term weightloss, but I remember hearing a prog on Radio 4 that said even Atkins is fine, healthwise, for a month or so, bit after that you need a wider range of food. The other thing I have done, which sounds like a terrible fad, but there seems to be decent research behind it is the day on day off diet (it was this one that shifted the 20lbs I lost a couple of years ago, and which I have pretty much kept off). There's an article about it here (sorry about the Daily Mail link) and then this is the website. I spoke to a friend who is a GP about this and he said yes, it's a good approach because your body doesn't go into starvation mode because you're eating normally on the alternate days. Obviously, if you eat an entire cheeseboard and a whole chocolate cake on your up day, it's going to be less effective, but I have found a weird desire not to cheat comes over me when I do it and I don't overeat even when I have "permission".

Thanks everyone for all the advice and support re dh. He is considering his options and has spoken to ACAS this morning who were very helpful. He's not in a good position as he has been there just less than a year, but is thinking about getting the company to reframe his employment there as a one year contract (he was originally covering someone on long-term sick leave) and then take the money and run.

Oh Wilbur that is so crap - and indeed frankly outrageous - about your poor dh's job. Hope he gets some joy from the ACAS helpline and his grotbag boss will be forced to have a rethink.

I am having a rather tiresome day so far. It was supposed to be the day of dh's prostate biopsy and ds was supposed to be in school an hour early (something to do with World Maths Day) and I was supposed to be invigilating and in school by 8.30. And there were complex after-school childcare arrangements to enable me to taxi dh about and provide moral support yadda yadda. At 7.50am, ds derailed all of this in one go by puking copiously (all over the piano - o joy). Hospital are, needless to say, not interested in dealing with anyone who has been in contact with a puker (and said puker has also now got the squits, of course) and have rearranged dh's appmt for late pm next Tues. Anxiety levels in our household are running quite high right now and we could have done without the delay for a large number of reasons.

It has taken me an hour to clean all the sick off the piano and out of the piano stool (how the hell he managed that I'll never know). I have not yet managed to be sympathetic to ds.

Sorry x-post.

'Don't puke on my piano'. It could be the new 'don't rain on my parade'. That is truly grim and very poor timing indeed. Sympathies.

Wilbur really sorry about rubbish sitch with your DH, particularly the sitting on the sofa part

oh Stropps, sorry to hear this....
I don't even wnat to think about the mechanics involed in cleaning up a piano....

Wilbur, I am liking your day on /day off diet as I got fed up with trying to be sensible all the time about a year ago (hence why I now need to lose a good few pounds!). Well, I was liking it till I put my details into the calculator and it said that I need to stick to 400 cals a day on the "on" days

MrsS, I am sure that our bodies (well, mine at any rate) are happiest at a certain weight. Sadly that is not necessarily the weight we want to be. My body seems to revert back to half to a stone heavier than I would like to be whenever I take my eye off the ball. Hence the need for a diet

MrsS you have my sympathies. Cleaning vomit from a piano, yuk. I was sadly very unsympathetic when DS managed to puke 3 times on my friends bed when we were skiing, the second and third times missing the towels/bucket spectacularly and causing 3 washing loads.... there was no sympathy at 1 and 3am AT ALL

So sorry you've had to delay dh's biopsy stropps, that's very frustrating. At least they've given you a new date straight away, but still a pain to have to wait again. And sick on the piano, that's really beyond the call of maternal duty, poor you. We don't do a lot of puking here, thank god, but I have noticed that when dd is ill and thinks she is about to vom, she will sit up try and get to the loo, or if there is a bucket provided in anticipation, she will neatly upchuck into it. The boys however, will just sit up and puke all over the bed, or on the floor next to said bucket. [makes mental note to keep any sick boys well away from the piano]

Just been to my accupuncturist and am feeling a lot calmer, although that could also be because I stated my anxiety and frustration to dh quite loudly before I left which was probably not my most supportive marriage moment. There's going to be a lot of talking later, I think, which is a good thing.

Strops - sending my best wishes for a speedy recovery to your poor piano DS.

Wilbur, good luck for the lots of talking and I am glad you got some stuff off your chest this morning. I too had a not very supportive marriage moment this morning when ds did his technicolour yawn and dh flapped about feebly saying "What shall I do?" and I told him that the most helpful thing would be if he went away and boiled his head.

I have just broken into the Easter Egg stash as a couple of squares of grownup "healthy" dark chocolate was not going to help, whereas a big handful of Lindor eggs def did (er, I don't think I'll make any contribution to the diet convo at the moment ).

Dh has got his head back together by getting on with work - luckily he took on far too much this week, biopsy or no biopsy . I have laid in extra stocks of Dettox and rubber gloves. We have not had any D&V in the house for years - not since ds was in nursery, I think, so I am out of practice with sick clearance.

Now that I have finished scraping macerated pieces of apple from between the piano keys I can look on the bright side and say thank god ds threw up this morning and not this evening. It would have been v. nasty if dh got these bugs post-op.

Am still fecked off with the fact that ds's puke into the piano stool means that my lovely "vintage" 1970s piano music is now irredeemably whiffy. Disclaimer: I cannot actually play the piano any more - I just think I can after 2 glasses of wine. I suppose crispy bits of vomit floating off the pages when I am playing will add to the lovely ambience created by my wondrous renditions of horrible choons.

Thank you CV

I looked at that diet and I am allowed 466 calories an 'on' day - wow, three bowls of porridge then.
Ds is remarkably good on the puke front - largely makes the bowl!

Sorry everyone is having a crappy time, makes my falling masonery seem trivial (bet I get to pick it off the drive tonight though.)

DS so far fails to understand the concept of puke vessels. I hope shortly he will.

Tweaked the settings of the Dodo diet to get it to allow me 800 cals on the down days, which I suppose is manageable. Can I be arsed, however? I did spot a roll of back fat in the loo at soft play however, so maybe I should make the effort.

Ooh, soft play. Marvellous opportunities for judging. Massive family came in, each one about 16 stone, ate chips, and proceeded to make formula up for their babies with Cold Tap Water. My cars bum mouth nearly went inside out.

Herbs

And I meant to say sorry about your DH's delay, Strops.

Wilbur, good luck with your "talking" Will a help?!

We went to parents' evening...

....it's next week