Sour Crepes

[QueenQueenie]

Well someone had to do it....

Good luck with the interview.

Thank you all my crepey sisterhood. DS is in breakfast club, my trainers are on - a la Working Girl - and I'm off to do battle with buses.

I didn't sleep a wink, so am not on top form...

Yaay BTM's dd. Fab.

Being class rep (years 7 and 8) was the worst thing I have ever done too, apart from having to host annual dinners for a small group of classic car enthusiasts.

Go, Herbs!

Good luck Herbs!

The class rep thing... I was the only mother who worked, but all of the others were too busy having their nails done, going to the gym or having a lesbian affair with one of the other mothers (expat bubble) to be the class rep, so it fell to me. My great crimes were: trying to organise an end of term meal for the mummies and a) inviting the daddies and b) choosing a restaurant that wasn't in the village where everyone lived. I thought cocktails in the Brazilian bar down town, followed by dinner in a trendy brasserie would be great. They just wanted to go to the only restaurant in the village again and eat steak and chips. (They won.)

Second misdemeanour was to tell one of the other mummies that she could not dictate who brought what to the Christmas party - she needed to pin up a list of what was needed, and people could tick off and say what they were bringing. I had a Muslim woman coming to me in tears saying she had been told to bring ham sandwiches, and her friend sausage rolls, and they couldn't get halal sausages in the village. Another woman had been asked to bring chocolate fairy cakes, and she didn't bake, and was similarly stressed. I took down the list, put up a new one, and asked people to sign up to what they wanted to bring, so the bakers could make cakes, the non-bakers could bring juice and paper plates and crisps. I removed the ham sandwiches and replaced them with cheese, and replaced the sausage rolls with mini falafel. This cause more tears from the British mummies, whose children would only eat ham sandwiches and sausage rolls, provoked a "see me" in the home/school diary and being asked patronisingly by the teacher if I had ever dealt with foreigners before (I was working in a large international organisation at the time). I told her where to shove her class rep stuff and to get someone else to do it.

Go Herbs!

Am embarking on nightmarish day. After a night of quite repulsive sweating, and an even sweatier Ladyjog. Will be checking in, waving not drowning, from a pile of proofs...

MrsS, you rebel!

Am feeling very sad and sorry for the poor teacher (and her family, etc) who was stabbed to death yesterday. The interviews with ex-students, etc clearly showed that she, like many teachers, went the extra mile to support those who needed it. Does Gove realise that teaching involves more than just imparting academic knowledge?

Hello all have been having terrible problems with MN password made worse by the email address for a reset being a yahoo account I abandoned some time in 2002...

Anyway am back and have caught up a bit. Also heading into London and have an irritating meeting which means I have to somehow get across town this afternoon - not looking forward to that at all. Good luck to other commuters and to Herbs for the interview.

I have had terrible insomnia and have been told by friends it's probably peri-menopausal. Feel dreadfully unclued up about the whole thing so planning to do some reading - anyone of a similar age to me with recommendations? Meanwhile as I turn nocturnal, DD is complaining of stomach cramps and 'feeling cross' which could be the start of something.

Hello all have been having terrible problems with MN password made worse by the email address for a reset being a yahoo account I abandoned some time in 2002...

Anyway am back and have caught up a bit. Also heading into London and have an irritating meeting which means I have to somehow get across town this afternoon - not looking forward to that at all. Good luck to other commuters and to Herbs for the interview.

I have had terrible insomnia and have been told by friends it's probably peri-menopausal. Feel dreadfully unclued up about the whole thing so planning to do some reading - anyone of a similar age to me with recommendations? Meanwhile as I turn nocturnal, DD is complaining of stomach cramps and 'feeling cross' which could be the start of something.

Polly! I thought you'd abandoned us...

Today's challenge is find copyright-free images of Vera Brittain and George VI as a young man. VB not too much of a problem (Peace Pledge Union and Somerville College both have them). Georgie, otoh, more of a problem not least because in youth he was known as Prince Albert. There are some things I just don't want to Google.

Dd worked solidly all evening on more art stuff and I gave her a lift again to school this morning. Such a shame that - as ever - she procrastinated it all until the last minute. She is a genuinely talented artist with a fantastic gift for drawing, but I doubt that she will do herself justice in terms of grades. Something which she knows. She said she'll be lucky to get a B - and I've now seen the notes from the art teacher confirming this- when she was a potential A*. It will be the same with ICT, according to be her and her teacher. I hope that when she gets her grades in the summer she will be able to deal with it all in a robust manner. I also hope that she will have learnt that digging in her heels and insisting on doing things in her own time rather than doing them at the time and in the way suggested by her teachers is a bad plan. However, she is so immensely stubborn that I fear that this will not be the case. Or she will eventually learn this when she is about 40.

I too am feeling very sad about that poor teacher. Also takes me back nearly 20 years to sitting in shocked silence in the staff room in a school in London hearing about the murder of Philip Lawrence. Gove has no bloody clue.

The class rep nonsense has never taken off round here, thank god. Someone did try to instigate that kind of practice, but I refused to cooperate because the self-styled "rep" was essentially bullying people who couldn't necessarily afford it to give money for overly lavish and entirely unnecessary presents to the teaching staff every term and sorry, but I really don't want to go out with 30 other mums just because my dc is in the same class as theirs. Meh. I think I must not have been the only one who was unimpressed with the idea as the class rep idea seemed to die a death after only 3 terms and has never been spoken of again.

@ MI

Stropps I have a horror of being in just your situation in a cou

Gibber. I have been on a bus for two hours. It's past 10 o'clock, time of the interview, and I'm still at old street roundabout. I can't get through to anyone on the phone. And I left my interview notes at home.

Super.

Drat on phone on train!
What I meant to say was I have a horror of being in just your situation in a couple of years time with DS who shows worrying bone idle tendencies. He has had an ability to coast with little effort and I worry he's never learnt to apply himself.

How stressful Herbs! Am sure they'll be sympathetic when you do get there although awful for nerves and stress levels.

Herb - they know there is a tube strike so should be sympathetic.

Well done to everybody's DD's with their first exams. We haven't quite started yet.

Fab news on the orchestra Auriga. I often think there must be nothing more fabulous than playing in a big orchestra like that.

Oh herbs
Are you ok??

Hope herbs is there by now..

Racing against time to meet tonight's deadline. And after school today is one of ds's super-busy times. Youth theatre, followed by taekwando. Followed by a supper that I will magically have created in 4 seconds. Am just also having to quote for MASSIVE job that will completely collide with my invigilation commitments (although I did only say I would do mornings this time, except for the orals).

I would just like to say that the Lindt dark choc "Caramel with a touch of seasalt" is mmmmmmmmmmmmmm and a pleasing way to reduce stress levels, even if only momentarily.

Belated congrats to Auriga's dd! And well done to BTM's dd and glad to hear that you enjoyed a relaxed evening, BTM.

Oh Herbs how horribly stressful.
Hope you have managed to get there, have the interview, wowed them with your presentation and are now enjoying a stiff drink.
Let us know how you got on.

Oh Herbs, hope you got there OK and that it went well.

Lalsy. Epic:

I think once they get going and realise they are exams on things they have studied, not the stuff of nightmares where you forget your pencil case and your skirt falls off while people ask you questions in strange languages, it does get a bit easier.

Nooo, Herbs, your blood pressure must have been off the scale. Hope you made it. Maybe you couldn't reach the interviewer on the phone because he/she was also on a bus somewhere?

LOL at MrsS having never "dealt with forriners before". I was Class Rep briefly at Infant School, which was fine, because I was on maternity leave and they were a nice friendly bunch. I can't remember doing much beyond soliciting Christmas Hamper donations. I have since swerved the bullet seeing I am a "dump-and-run" mum, and set foot in the school playground twice a term, if that.

More LOLs at Prince Albert.

Polly - you are probably right in your diagnosis. All these little nuggets of information which are never shared with women of our age..... meanwhile our DCs sit through any number of talks at school, all about "bodily changes" and "what to expect as you go through puberty". Maybe there should be something similar as you approach 45. I've certainly had mucked-up sleep patterns, (amongst other more challenging symptoms) and it took me ages to put two and two together. I think I am coming out the other side, thank goodness (even though I'm only 47), with periods pretty much stopped, and the murderous rages considerably diminished.

DD1 had yoof theatre audition yesterday. About seventeen (17, XVII) places, so four people will lose out. To do an arts bronze award.

As it is both free and local - and also v unprecious, what with being free and local and delivered by delightful theatre in ed people - I v much hope she gets it. She had of course made numerous new BFFs by the end of the session. DD1 is quite pathologically sociable. She reminds me of Terry Pratchett's Captain Carrot in that way.

Oh Herbs, I hope you got there in the end and it was ok. What a nightmare! My journey in today involved a lot of swearing and swerving - had to get out the door with ds2 and dd at 7am to snag a free parking space (still didn't manage and had to use my very last 1 hr parking permit, saved for similar emergencies) then cycling along totally gridlocked streets and then the South Bank which was awash with people walking when it is usually only me and some tourists who don't realise the London Eye doesn't open til ten. Was in a right old knackered lather when I got in and have to do it all in reverse (inc getting ds2 to Cubs for an important meeting) this evening. Beachy, you were right to avoid London today.

Lalsy, love the exam dream. I once dreamed I was in a production of Pal Joey (one of the few musicals I know not one note from) with my old headmistress (person I hate most in the world). I still sweat just thinking about it. And the stapler is a genius idea if it stops yours being "borrowed". I may buy all my dcs staplers for Xmas.

Oh Herbs, hope you got there! Update us....

I am supposed to be in London tomorrow at a workshop - I might pass up on it.....