Maybe Yes, Maybe No, May Be Crepey

[QueenQueenie]

Unilateral decision... No space for consultation. Call me Dave...

Fingers crossed about the job Hatty!
Roman law

Herbs, this is the time to pull in as many favours as you can re childcare. Put out all feelers re Venal Teenagers, who are often vv good with kids that age - they will entertain them in the house while you get on with work for very reasonable rates. If you were any nearer us you could have DD1 and there must be similar near you.

(75,000 words. Nearing conclusion, I suspect!)

Hatty, my inner resources have pretty much run dry. And now my usual childcare option over half term is booked up. Various friends have offered to have DS over to play in the past, so I shall take them up on it. Thing is, this assignment really needs a good solid few days of actual concentration, rather than afternoons here and there...

Herbs, go proactive. Ask them about full days. Explain the situation, with DP and your work. Send out a group email saying you're throwing yourselves on their mercies, and can they either have DS or recommend an obliging teenager who might take him to the park - pref with friends and a picnic - and then distract him at home. Play your cards right and someone may invite him for an actual sleepover, thus freeing you up even more.

People are very kind. And teenagers like Top Shop money. Between them, a solution can be reached.

It's OK, dear crepeys. I have fallen upon their mercy. DP will take him for one day - possibly to visit granny, possibly just something nice for the two of them - and another friend will take him for a day out with her son, with whom he is very good friends.

I have in reserve two sleepover offers, and a posh sporty childcare thing at the local private school.

I explained the sitch to the childcare people, and they showed no mercy.

Herbs, so sorry to hear about your MiL; DP must be feeling so grim. Rose, good news about your appointment. A friend went along for her yearly review after several years in remission and the blasted cancer had come back (it had been so long that her DH didn't usually go with her, that time for some reason he did, and was so grateful that he was there). She is fine again now - the family history with breast cancer is horrendous.

MI, good that you're getting on with your book. My bit of good news is that my family member who has had to have several terminations due birth defects, is 14 weeks pregnant and all looks well atm.

Got to go - the nurse has come to see DH.

Herbs, sounds good.

From our experience, I really recommend finding a sporty childcare option when they are young. ds went to the same one until he was about 13 and could come and go on his own. He would have resented something that felt like childcare but had seen older boys going happily to this for years. dd liked it too as it was very chilled. Came in very handy on occasion, past the age when they strictly speaking needed childcare.

I may try him in the posh sporty club in the summer hols, and see if he takes to any of the activities. He's extremely unsporty at the moment! But feel I should introduce physical activity to him somehow - it's not going to come from DP or I!

That's what I felt about dd! Yeah, they seem to vary loads. The one my dc liked had a colouring in/eating sweets option for the little ones at the end of each day and wasn't populated by bouncy young things in matching T shirts who "never gave me a minute's peace and wouldn't let me wee when I wanted" (there are loads round us and we tried them all ) Some kids went to it who couldn't manage anything else - was definitely at the chilled end of the spectrum.

I anticipate DD2 drooping around the place next week and then regretting she didn't do more with it. I keep encouraging her to get in touch with her friends and she feels reluctant - though she definitely has friends: when we went to something her swing band was playing in on Sunday (in Dulwich Park) she ran off happily with her mates and climbed trees.

DD1 is thesp-a-gogo every day.

Herbs - so sorry to hear about your MIL, that's for your DP and you all, coming so soon after FIL. Glad you've at least sorted some childcare and at least the end of the course is in sight (even though the last bit of the road is clogged with assignments and teaching practice and and and...) Good idea to try out a few different childcare options - sports clubs, sleepovers etc - some work brilliantly, and some are pants.

Stropps, congrats to you on getting towards the end of the course too. Exciting to think of you both qualified soon! Oh, and on the personality test I got Multiple Personality Disorder (severe dissociation proper barking and borderline dangerous) which since I mostly answered butterflies and bats I can only blame on seeing two women arguing in one of the blots. I blame my sister for that one. So I wouldn't worry - unless administered by a professional, I can't see how these online tests can reveal anything of actual truth. Apart from the online Myers Briggs I took that said I was rare and wonderful and pretty much the heir to Nelson Mandela - that one was 100% accurate, for sure .

Flip, it's raining again. Wanted to get in the garden, even went to ds2's class assembly in my gardening clothes (classy - there will be a MN thread shortly about the tramp that drops a small boy at school in SW London), such was my determination to continue weeding. Grrr.

And Molly - good on you for talking about your horrible experience, I agree with the others that this kind of thing is far too grimly common and the only way it can be reduced is to discuss it openly and say it is Unacceptable and Wrong and Must Stop.

I don't think I should even attempt that test....I'll be put in a straight jacket by men in white coats.

On holiday schemes...and kids clubs, my younger two didn't seem to fit in anywhere and I was always subject to "Mrs RoseBag...can we please have a word." ..when I picked them up. Eventually we found a very low tech scheme in a reform synagogue which worked. It wasn't regimented...the kids just played, did colouring, papier mâché and went to the park.

tilly solidarity on the WiFi debacles. We have an ongoing problem with BT Yahoo and my emails. DH shouted at me yesterday when my emails went down for the umpteenth time. Apparently it's all my fault because I have several devices and do internet shopping and go on social media. I'm really upset with him actually. He's being a right arse over several things at the moment. And I'm half killing myself to lose this weight, and he's over indulging to compensate. What's that all about?

I am constantly on the verge of tears at the moment owing to the research for the new play...I have been watching episodes of Butterflies on YouTube and I remember laughing at it in the '80s when it was screened. Now it makes me well up. Then ConS and I decided we'd go away and each write something on our lives and highlight episodes of feeling invisible and being ignored. It was hard reading mine back...

Sorry Crepeys....in a very bad place...

Oh Rose sorry you're having a bad time. I don't think I could watch Butterflies now - like you I loved it originally, but I do remember my mum having a different reaction, and her identification with being taken for granted by everyone around her. I would feel that now, for sure. And I don't even have a handsome friend to pursue me so that I could feel a bit better about myself. Feeling invisible is something a lot of people have experienced, I think, and if you're writing something dealing with that, I imagine it could be very powerful. But unpleasant to re-live it, too.

Rose, I want to biff your DH. (DP is similarly arsey if technology perplexes him. I am having major computer issues at the moment - outlook won't download, word docs can't be saved from email - and similarly apparently this is my fault for Not Shutting Down The Computer Properly. Then I spotted it was still on, in the middle of the night, and shut it down...which apparently was also my fault because it was doing something Important. How the eff should I know?)

It's grim, losing weight, but you are doing it. And it's grim feeling invisible. And being huffed at by gorgeous young things (yes, DD1, I'm looking at you). And confronting that in doing writing must be really really tough.

(I am writing about a scheming manipulative woman, which oddly enough I find v cheering .)

[wilbur] glad it's not just me. I'm quite interested to know if other Crepeys harbour these sorts of feelings…

And if anyone wants to watch and comment on these clips…fab

www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDdRzBj4FNE

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gq43mdNKE-c

www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9SANJ7Tlsw

Thanks MI There's nothing like an IT crisis to bring out the best in all of us, eh?

It may be diverting to know my sister's friend had a massive crush on the boy in Butterflies and then went out with him as a student.

Ooh, thanks for the clips. Sadly, I think I only watched it to drool over the older son, Russell who I am still drooling over

I found her a bit pathetic back then, but I can see where she is coming from now.
My role-model was my DGodMum who was an incredibly capable mother and woman, totally unlike Ria.

Sorry to hear you are feeling down, Rose. You are doing brilliantly with your weight-loss. Maybe your DH is a bit jealous that he isn't as motivated as you and is going the other way?

What??? at your sister's friend. Presuming it wasn't Nicholas Lyndhurst

It was!

I'm going to ask a question, and I hope it doesn't annoy anyone. I am in solidarity with those whose computers are challenging them in the rudest possible way. My dh works in the field but it winds him up to be seen as the one who has to fix our software problems as a family - because the software he deals with is so airy-fairy super-special advanced etc and he fixes that all day.

So if you don't have a dh who knows about computer-y stuff, who are you meant to ask? Do you just have to search t'internet until you find the answer? Or what? We do sometimes resort to paying a guy who works under the name of Computer Guy to come and fix our systems. But I'm loathe to pay him just because my email account has gone wonky.

Aha, Molly, had you posed me that question (sorry am in 19th century mode) a week ago I would have burst into tears and said Search Me.

I have now identified a friend's son who is coming back from university where he is studying computer science. He will apparently be dispatched round here...as soon as he's fixed all the ones at home, apparently .

Molly, I think my first port of call would be a kick in the slats for DH, who seems to be rather unhelpful.

If that didn't work, I go onto the Mac forums, and see if anyone else has had a similar problem. They usually have. And hope that the answer is relatively straightforward, with minimal amount of acronyms - POP, SMTP, etc. WTF?

Just returned from my teaching, which went well, apart from the news that the college is making 30 people redundant thanks to the cuts. Other colleges are worse off, making 60 redundant. What a load of shit.

I consoled myself by going into the charity shop and buying a Louche t-shirt, a feather pendant and, wait for it, a cagoule. < hysterical laughter >

Honestly sometimes I'd rather pay a nice person to come and fix things rather than dare to ask dh and have him grump at me.

Nice charity shop haul, herbs. That's a lot of redundancy!

Molly, I do searches, yes. I have been freelance for years, in a tech-loving field. I have learned to dump software or services that are a) not very good or b) I don't understand or find intuitive, even if said to be marvellous/came free with the laptop. A lot of email managers are poor, I think. Also learned to try and understand what things are and do - I used not to and got into many more pickles, and also didn't understand when say, it was my email server that had gone down (nowt to do with me), or my system. Failing that, and especially when it comes to my highly volatile printer, dd has a friend....Sorry, too much detail probably.

Rose, I know what you mean, I am sure many people do and it is a painful and powerful topic....sorry it is getting you down, we'll be your handsome friends boosting you up, and yes get MI to biff your dh.