In Crepey Remembrance Of CremCat Past

[GiddyGiddyGoat]

Hope that's an OK unilateral decision!

Job hunting is such blasted hard work. Takes an entire day to fill in the application form and write an accursed personal statement. (This is for the two-day a week, £200 a day gig. I am thus trying v hard, and will talk myself up make up SEO guff as I know I can do it.)

Love subscription boxes. Some pals bought me a Birchbox that arrived every month full of dear little samples of unguents. It expired after six months and I was bereft. Now it's back to the jumbo pot of Astral.

DS and I going to pick DP up from City Airport this evening. DS wants to make a sign saying 'daddy' to hold up. MiL is in a bad way. Still v confused, still in hospital and supposedly on anti-confusion drugs. But the hospital haven't been giving them to her, saying that 'she has to ask for them'. But she's not going to ask for them, as she thinks all the hospital staff are plotting to kill her. Catch 22.

Reasons to be cheerful:

Massive drifts of leaves on the streets to kick through (when not wet)
DP home tonight, and wine to be drunk
I have a lovely DS who doesn't mind going to school in a vast red spangly top because I forgot to arrange any other spots for CiN day.

Actually, would you recommend Astral? Or GGG, you're a Nivea fan, aren't you? Am sick of spending on snake oil.

I'm going down the route of putting Astral on top of 'faintly scientific serum'. It seems to work as well as anything else, and is v moisturising.

I use Nivea Soft, MI. It seems as good as anything.

Temp down to 39 now and still feeling terrible.

I love Astral and Nivea - my clarins moisturiser smelled nicer but is £££ and didn't do an appreciably better job.

Well done BTM's DD. 3 offers is fab. Can you remind me please what it is she will be reading.

Your DS sounds a star, Herbs. Mine has gone to school in a slightly damp onesie for CiN. I put it on the radiator and it was dry enough so bingo! Sorry your MIL isn't getting the drugs she needs when she needs them.

Looking listlessly at some work. Why did I agree to teach tomorrow? I am knackered from the week and just need to sleep.

I think I have signed up for SS already. Thanks for sorting, Rudy.

MrsS, hope you are keeping your paracetamol topped up at max levels and are lying in bed with plenty of water and rubbish mags. I hope you feel better soon

I agree with all others; water, paracetamol and sleep and I hope you feel better soon, Mrs S.

Thanks so much for the offer of a bed, GGG. I've looked again and I have a Xmas fair (or fayre!) on Sunday, so I should schlep home on the late train, but many thanks.

All quiet and a bit boring here at the mo, but I can live with that. I'm off to a lecture on post war submarine use tonight - get me! Taking ddad and his friend from the road, who is actually a fascinating and charming ex-BBC correspondent. Ds is also coming!

I really want to get on with Christmas, but I can't seem to get started. I was supposed to be at a Xmas Market today, but I turned up at 10am and it doesn't open until 12 noon - so I had a bacon bap instead! I need to play some spangly Christmas music to get me in the mood......

Back from shopping, have bought wool (well with acrylic) jacket at -50% and will wear it to death so am happy (retail therapy obviously worked). Now on with the humdrum - shower cleaning etc - cleaning the shower is always the thing I put off, and put off until it absolutely has to be done.

Mrs S - hope the temperature has dropped a little.

Lalsy - I also thought boarding schools were good for routine (and controlling mobile phone usage). Obviously I'm wrong.

BTM - I have a little girl (age 8) who is quite bright - reads well etc but is always last to get her pack her bag, get her coat on, get started on her work - is that dyspraxia - I'm not sure if there's a problem or if she's just a dreamer.

Herbs - good luck with the £200/day gig - although it sounds like you are an absolute whizz as a tutor.

Ha! I haven't started doing any actual 'tuting' as yet... I may be shit. I really should specialise in one area, to ease the planning load. It's all very well earning £30 per hour of teaching, but not if it takes me a day to plan the session! At the moment I've got potential clients ranging from a five-year-old primary school child to a university-employed Brazilian whizz.

I also have limited time available. Tuting is generally after school, or evenings for adults, so I'll have to juggle DS and whether DP is around in the evening. And fit in choir and orchestra!

Bloody cat is driving me insane. He either sits directly in front of the computer screen, lies on the keyboard, or sits so close to my 'mouse' hand that I can't use it. If I push him off he comes back, and stands right in front of my face.

Herbs, you need formal childcare. A helpful teenager or suchlike. Really. I'd rent you one but am on the other side of tahn...

Oh I know. I can probably put DS in teatime club, which covers me until 6, on some days... I'm in that chicken n egg sitch where I don't want to book anything, which costs money, until I know I'm going to need it.

The question is also... do I jack in my FE job? Pros: it's steady, it's good experience, I like the teaching. Cons: it's a pain in the arse, there's very little support or professional development, it is depressing, the money is dreadful.

Oh, another pro: I have a team, and colleagues, which I wouldn't have as a tutor.

Jack it in as and when you have an alternative, I'd say...

I only ask now as I have to give notice To The End of The Following Month, if you please. But I only get one notice if they want to fire me.

Wot MI says, Herbs.

Outlaws are here rictus Well, not yet, but it will be!

Addle, I can do Sat afternoon - what time? And can anyone else make it?

DD wants to do Sociology + has good grade predictions = less stress for once!

Hatty, it could be. Or she could just have some traits. Most of us have some traits of something or other!

Mmm. Outlaws. How long are they there for BTM? Can you 'rebadge' rictus grins as 'facial exercises' to make them seem worthwhile? You'll have cheeks like a baby's by the end of it.

Re jacking it in, it's just I need to plan it so I don't leave in the middle of a term. While I'd be quite within my rights to do so, it would be Bad Form and let my learners down. So, if I were to leave, giving notice by the end of November would be the only time I feel I could do it until March.

hatty sorry about DH and his work. I have one of those chez nous, i.e. My DH very up and down re his job. It's very wearing... I have a dyspraxic DD and have worked with many dyspraxics over the years. Diagnosis is very hard as it's often co morbid with other things, and can be related to one skill, or more generalised. Problems with executive function is common though, and slow onset of movement or tasks is also common. It was originally confined to an organisational disorder of muscle movement sequences but the scope is much wider now. OTs are brilliant with dyspraxia. shut up rose

tilly what brilliant news, about DDs offers...and so glad DS has been in school.

mrsS get well soon. Alternate nurofen with paracetamol. That's a stonker of a fever

herbs and Mi so glad opportunity is knocking at last!

I did something mad this morning...went back to sleep until 9.30. Not working today, didn't have to get up for anything early...I feel so much better. I have had a lovely lunch with an old school friend and DD has gone off to see a movie with friends. I have been on strike from Friday Night Dinner for a while however have decided to roast a chicken, with roast potatoes, squash etc and make the ubiquitous crumble for pudding. Mostly because I fancy it. I may share with others if they are nice to me...

Outlaws here for the weekend. Good for DS rictus

Rose, you are our resident dyspraxia expert! Between us crepeys, we could staff a great SEN consultancy. Maybe that's the way forward for us all

And how lovely to get back to sleep !

Oh Rudy

I am thinking about getting counselling for coping with DS's illness. But I'm not sure where to look

lusting after this in every colour

Wish it were merino though....worried the lambswool would make me itch. It's also a lot of £'s...
Rudy kind of like being left on the edge of a precipice...give it time.

That's the problem, Rudy - I need it now and not in 3 or more months!