So as this job is going to, in less than two weeks, swiftly deny me the opportunity to travel where and when I wish, which I've enjoyed for the past thirteen years, I thought that I ought to take advantage of the time before I start, to get something under my belt that'll keep me going until I can take some holiday.
I mean, goodbye spontaneous camping trips - hello month's notice and limited time off! Nightmare!
As travelling and trips away and exploration are basically what make life worthwhile for me (they really are the total meaning of my life!), I thought I'd do as exotic and as strange as I could, in the short notice available, with my budget constraints. I tried to go for something random in Africa at lastminute.com, but everything was booked up. So I decided to find something in the British Isles, and picked Scotland.
After all, to me as a Lincolnshire man, what can be more exotic than mountains? And mountains in the winter, with snow, and wildlife and trees and shit... awesome! True: Wales has mountains. But Wales is nearer and my mother's family are from there, so it's not quite unknown territory. As well as it being generally more expensive than Scotland. So I found a place online and went for it. The fact that it was the one place listed that Google maps couldn't find did play a small part in my choosing it, I admit. As did the fact that it had only one photo of just the outside of the place, whilst the others all had loads of detailed interior pics.
The unknown - yay!
And I can even take the dog.
I can't afford it, but what the hell. It's not dear at this time of year, I can get there on one tank of diesel, and we just might see the Northern Lights. If we do, it'll keep me going through the routine, scheduled, timetabled boredom for quite a while :)
Wednesday, 30 December 2009
Tuesday, 29 December 2009
Fail
After the success of the previous 4 week period, I set myself a target of increasing my daily exercising average from 30 to 40 minutes, and getting my sleeping hours to be more regular and during the appropriate times.
Spectacular fail on both fronts. I was doing really well with the exercise - the average was in fact a whole hour per day, before I crunched my toes against the bannister. Which is partly my fault and partly not. The injury's my fault, for not looking where I was going, but it's not my fault that because of it, I've been unable to exercise.
The sleeping thing though - pathetic. [!SNIP! /tedious self-castigations /!SNIP!] And now work is going to force me back into sociable hours, as it takes them all away from me!
Bugger.
Spectacular fail on both fronts. I was doing really well with the exercise - the average was in fact a whole hour per day, before I crunched my toes against the bannister. Which is partly my fault and partly not. The injury's my fault, for not looking where I was going, but it's not my fault that because of it, I've been unable to exercise.
The sleeping thing though - pathetic. [!SNIP! /tedious self-castigations /!SNIP!] And now work is going to force me back into sociable hours, as it takes them all away from me!
Bugger.
Sunday, 27 December 2009
Christmas 2009
Okay, so I did the grouch version, here's the happy version!
Last year, we went to my parents' house for Christmas. We were all packed in like sardines (as it should be) and there was much festive joy, including the obligatory time slot that my siblings are allowed to use for the sole purpose of getting under my skin, after which I become Mr Taciturn in order to avoid saying things I'll regret. Good stuff (in hindsight, the last bit...).
This year, I was the host... not for the first time. But although my lodgings are greatly upgraded since the last time I played host to a banquet, my cooking facilities are greatly downgraded. Remember, I had that fantastic cooker that I treated myself to in the flat, after 11 years of struggling with the shittiest, cheapest, eye-level-grill gas cooker in the shop? And how it was one single inch too wide to fit in the gap in the worktop in this house, so I had to get rid of it and go with the landlord's ready-plumbed-in piece of shit instead? Well, that made the cooking experience interesting...
In fact, I think I didn't do too badly, all things considered. I had to start preparing three days in advance, and even then I couldn't manage to get the roasties done in time, though this was mainly due there being a veggie present, so I had to do them in a separate dish. Otherwise they'd have all gone in with the bird and been ready together with it. But never mind - by the time they were done, we were all so full up from what else was on offer, that they were barely touched. The kids and I just had the remainders for dinner tonight - there's thrift for you.
On Christmas Eve I went to Midnight Mass. My first Midnight Mass was at the age of about 17: bunch of mates and I came rolling out of the pub, having been kicked out past closing time, and heard bells coming from the church over the road. We drunkenly loped over to check it out, and found ourselves joining in a very packed and very festive carol singing sesh, which I've since repeated every year.
I went to Birchwood this year, which gave a distinctly lower-key experience than the big catholic affairs I've been used to, but what it lacked in candles and general ceremonial grandeur, it made up for in friendliness and warmth of welcome. Even Dave came, which I was very pleased about. And I was told that I was "still" being prayed for there, which touched me very deeply; I hadn't imagined I was prayed for at all, let alone "still"!
Christmas Day saw us at the same venue again for the morning Mass (though they probably don't call it that there). We saw Lindsay and her family there, which was lovely, though no George, mysteriously. I wonder where he was?
After that, we came home and waited for Dave and Wayne to arrive as I held the kids off from opening their presents. When you're a grown-up and hardly get any presents any more, most of the fun of Christmas is in watching the kids open theirs, innit? They didn't have to wait long for their chance to cover the living room with shiny paper. I was delighted to receive a set of chisels (and sharpening kit) and a brilliant cookbook from Wayne, the usual bottle of wine and pair of slipper socks from my parents, and a set of Peep Show DVD's and the usual book on gender politics/biology that Dave gets me at least twice a year.
I often wonder about that... I mean, I was born with this medical condition right? It's not a personal passion or interest of mine - would you get books on bunions as a birthday gift for someone who had them on their feet? Seems strange to me that, knowing me as well as he does, he'd think I'd want to read about every conceivable angle of my condition and any others that vaguely share some of the symptoms! But I don't want to sound ungrateful... ;)
Anyway, I also got a £25 Amazon voucher from one of my sisters, which arrived a bit before Christmas and which I spent mostly on presents for the kids haha... well, there isn't much I really want to own at Amazon, to tell the truth... ebay would've been a better bet. But the chisels were by far and away the best present I got this year - major hit, well done Wayne! :)
The kids were both happy with what they got - particularly the wads of cash! Kit's presents had an overall more ladylike tone to them this year: jewellery, book tokens, toileteries etc., in sharp contrast to Helga's generally Pokémon/gross/annoying themes.
Yesterday it was over to Greg's, though to start with it was the last thing I felt like doing, with the fuzzy head I woke up with and the realisation of the full horror and scale of the tidying/cleaning job ahead of me. But it's always an interesting crowd round his place, and I got another present of some yummy cookies and posh preserves to put on my Tesco Value bread in the morning :D By the time I found myself constrained to leave by the combined factors of extreme tiredness, compression-related pain and the dog needing to be let out/fed/walked, I was actually sorry to leave.
And today I went into town with the kids, who were desperate to spend some of their Christmas money. I spent most of mine on a badly needed wardrobe replenishment for Helga; she spent hers on Fimo modelling stuff and a cheat chip for her DS, while Kit bought earrings and a book, after dragging us all round every clothes shop and deciding she didn't like anything in any of them...
I've got pencilled in, in my head, for some point in the not-too-distant future, a day of taking Kit around town and getting her to leave her clothing comfort zone for a bit. She seems to just choose the same few items of clothing, each time it gets too small she just gets it again in the next size up. Or something so similar it might as well be the same thing. She needs a push to be a bit more adventurous - she resists it at first, but when I make her try things on and she looks in the mirror, she's always like "oh wow yeah, I didn't imagine it like this when it was on the hanger, I love it!" Tsk! SJ's eh? ;)
And there we have it. Next year it's over to the parents again!
Last year, we went to my parents' house for Christmas. We were all packed in like sardines (as it should be) and there was much festive joy, including the obligatory time slot that my siblings are allowed to use for the sole purpose of getting under my skin, after which I become Mr Taciturn in order to avoid saying things I'll regret. Good stuff (in hindsight, the last bit...).
This year, I was the host... not for the first time. But although my lodgings are greatly upgraded since the last time I played host to a banquet, my cooking facilities are greatly downgraded. Remember, I had that fantastic cooker that I treated myself to in the flat, after 11 years of struggling with the shittiest, cheapest, eye-level-grill gas cooker in the shop? And how it was one single inch too wide to fit in the gap in the worktop in this house, so I had to get rid of it and go with the landlord's ready-plumbed-in piece of shit instead? Well, that made the cooking experience interesting...
In fact, I think I didn't do too badly, all things considered. I had to start preparing three days in advance, and even then I couldn't manage to get the roasties done in time, though this was mainly due there being a veggie present, so I had to do them in a separate dish. Otherwise they'd have all gone in with the bird and been ready together with it. But never mind - by the time they were done, we were all so full up from what else was on offer, that they were barely touched. The kids and I just had the remainders for dinner tonight - there's thrift for you.
On Christmas Eve I went to Midnight Mass. My first Midnight Mass was at the age of about 17: bunch of mates and I came rolling out of the pub, having been kicked out past closing time, and heard bells coming from the church over the road. We drunkenly loped over to check it out, and found ourselves joining in a very packed and very festive carol singing sesh, which I've since repeated every year.
I went to Birchwood this year, which gave a distinctly lower-key experience than the big catholic affairs I've been used to, but what it lacked in candles and general ceremonial grandeur, it made up for in friendliness and warmth of welcome. Even Dave came, which I was very pleased about. And I was told that I was "still" being prayed for there, which touched me very deeply; I hadn't imagined I was prayed for at all, let alone "still"!
Christmas Day saw us at the same venue again for the morning Mass (though they probably don't call it that there). We saw Lindsay and her family there, which was lovely, though no George, mysteriously. I wonder where he was?
After that, we came home and waited for Dave and Wayne to arrive as I held the kids off from opening their presents. When you're a grown-up and hardly get any presents any more, most of the fun of Christmas is in watching the kids open theirs, innit? They didn't have to wait long for their chance to cover the living room with shiny paper. I was delighted to receive a set of chisels (and sharpening kit) and a brilliant cookbook from Wayne, the usual bottle of wine and pair of slipper socks from my parents, and a set of Peep Show DVD's and the usual book on gender politics/biology that Dave gets me at least twice a year.
I often wonder about that... I mean, I was born with this medical condition right? It's not a personal passion or interest of mine - would you get books on bunions as a birthday gift for someone who had them on their feet? Seems strange to me that, knowing me as well as he does, he'd think I'd want to read about every conceivable angle of my condition and any others that vaguely share some of the symptoms! But I don't want to sound ungrateful... ;)
Anyway, I also got a £25 Amazon voucher from one of my sisters, which arrived a bit before Christmas and which I spent mostly on presents for the kids haha... well, there isn't much I really want to own at Amazon, to tell the truth... ebay would've been a better bet. But the chisels were by far and away the best present I got this year - major hit, well done Wayne! :)
The kids were both happy with what they got - particularly the wads of cash! Kit's presents had an overall more ladylike tone to them this year: jewellery, book tokens, toileteries etc., in sharp contrast to Helga's generally Pokémon/gross/annoying themes.
Yesterday it was over to Greg's, though to start with it was the last thing I felt like doing, with the fuzzy head I woke up with and the realisation of the full horror and scale of the tidying/cleaning job ahead of me. But it's always an interesting crowd round his place, and I got another present of some yummy cookies and posh preserves to put on my Tesco Value bread in the morning :D By the time I found myself constrained to leave by the combined factors of extreme tiredness, compression-related pain and the dog needing to be let out/fed/walked, I was actually sorry to leave.
And today I went into town with the kids, who were desperate to spend some of their Christmas money. I spent most of mine on a badly needed wardrobe replenishment for Helga; she spent hers on Fimo modelling stuff and a cheat chip for her DS, while Kit bought earrings and a book, after dragging us all round every clothes shop and deciding she didn't like anything in any of them...
I've got pencilled in, in my head, for some point in the not-too-distant future, a day of taking Kit around town and getting her to leave her clothing comfort zone for a bit. She seems to just choose the same few items of clothing, each time it gets too small she just gets it again in the next size up. Or something so similar it might as well be the same thing. She needs a push to be a bit more adventurous - she resists it at first, but when I make her try things on and she looks in the mirror, she's always like "oh wow yeah, I didn't imagine it like this when it was on the hanger, I love it!" Tsk! SJ's eh? ;)
And there we have it. Next year it's over to the parents again!
I think it's all over
Yes, yes, festive spirit, warm fuzzies, friends and family all around and all that jazz. Yes, it was nice. But it's at a price, isn't it?
Cost me the best part of £350 altogether, which I know is a fraction of what a lot of people (many of them poorer than I am) foolishly lavish on their Christmas experience, but it was £350 I could ill afford, being already pretty screwed, financially speaking, before it started. The anxiety that's made an irritable fucker out of me these last 8 months or so (that of the very real threat of losing our home) is now all the worse. Dave and Wayne contributed towards it (the cost, not the anxiety!), which certainly helped - Wayne, going mad with Christmas spirit, donated twice his share. What a guy :)
And then there's the food, and the toll it's taken on my hard-won weight loss. I don't really understand how it happened, because I recall being pretty abstemious both on the day and at Greg's yesterday. I remember my plate being piled high, but mostly with boiled vegetables - not many calories in that! I only took a small slither of meat, just to fall in with custom; I didn't even eat a single roast potato, and in the evening buffet I just nibbled on the odd Quorn (low fat veggie) snack.
I was pretty restrained on the alcohol too: two glasses of wine and two and a half bottles of ale is hardly a patch on what most people imbibe on Christmas Day, and yesterday I didn't touch a drop.
Well, regardless, I seem to have put back on almost all of the half stone in took me all last month to lose. I'm guessing it's mostly down to the alcohol and, having broken my toe, the fact that I've not been able to exerise at all this week. Well, I did go out for a couple of walks, but as I could only limp very slowly, it wasn't exactly exercise.
I am pretty glad it's all over. Though it won't be quite - not until the 2nd January. I've yet got to put up with all the ridiculousness of New Year's Eve, where I'll find myself feeling like a loser, despite myself, for not being at some hip and trendy party full of dancing and alcohol and people to sing Auld Lang Syne with, and listening to sentimental radio shows full of countdowns and top-whatevers of songs, events and shit that I didn't care about all year round, but now pretend are defining, nostalgic moments in my life. Whilst trying not to be irritated by all the drunk people walking past my window into and past the small hours. And then battling to find somewhere - anywhere - that's open and sells a loaf of bread (or whatever) on New Year's Day.
This was the grumpy Christmas post - I thought I'd get it out of the way first, and later I'll do the cheerful one, where I talk about the nice stuff :)
Cost me the best part of £350 altogether, which I know is a fraction of what a lot of people (many of them poorer than I am) foolishly lavish on their Christmas experience, but it was £350 I could ill afford, being already pretty screwed, financially speaking, before it started. The anxiety that's made an irritable fucker out of me these last 8 months or so (that of the very real threat of losing our home) is now all the worse. Dave and Wayne contributed towards it (the cost, not the anxiety!), which certainly helped - Wayne, going mad with Christmas spirit, donated twice his share. What a guy :)
And then there's the food, and the toll it's taken on my hard-won weight loss. I don't really understand how it happened, because I recall being pretty abstemious both on the day and at Greg's yesterday. I remember my plate being piled high, but mostly with boiled vegetables - not many calories in that! I only took a small slither of meat, just to fall in with custom; I didn't even eat a single roast potato, and in the evening buffet I just nibbled on the odd Quorn (low fat veggie) snack.
I was pretty restrained on the alcohol too: two glasses of wine and two and a half bottles of ale is hardly a patch on what most people imbibe on Christmas Day, and yesterday I didn't touch a drop.
Well, regardless, I seem to have put back on almost all of the half stone in took me all last month to lose. I'm guessing it's mostly down to the alcohol and, having broken my toe, the fact that I've not been able to exerise at all this week. Well, I did go out for a couple of walks, but as I could only limp very slowly, it wasn't exactly exercise.
I am pretty glad it's all over. Though it won't be quite - not until the 2nd January. I've yet got to put up with all the ridiculousness of New Year's Eve, where I'll find myself feeling like a loser, despite myself, for not being at some hip and trendy party full of dancing and alcohol and people to sing Auld Lang Syne with, and listening to sentimental radio shows full of countdowns and top-whatevers of songs, events and shit that I didn't care about all year round, but now pretend are defining, nostalgic moments in my life. Whilst trying not to be irritated by all the drunk people walking past my window into and past the small hours. And then battling to find somewhere - anywhere - that's open and sells a loaf of bread (or whatever) on New Year's Day.
This was the grumpy Christmas post - I thought I'd get it out of the way first, and later I'll do the cheerful one, where I talk about the nice stuff :)
Wednesday, 23 December 2009
Well 'ard
As of this afternoon I'm on my holidays from work. That's right, I mean the full time teaching job that I do without getting paid, since I'm doing it for my own kids and not somebody else's. Christmas break time! The other job doesn't start until the middle of January. That'll be full-time too, for the first six weeks. Don't worry, I'll cope :)
Been going stir-crazy with this bloody foot. I decided last night that, regardless of what state of healing it was in today, I'd go out for a walk, no matter what. And so I did. And when I say "no matter what", you'll see I really mean it.
It was pissing down with rain for a start, turning the slippery ice all over the place into slippery, wet, slushy ice. I was wearing sandals, since they're the only shoes I can get on over the still-swollen and painful little toe (though the bruising elsewhere on the foot has mostly gone down... well, green anyway, which is less painful). It was dark, and fucking cold.
But my feet were protected by the thermal, waterproof hiking socks that I bought a few years ago, which everyone told me were a waste of money. I felt more sorry for the poor horses - who'd leave a horse out on the common in this weather? They can't eat anything, the grass is all covered with snow! Poor buggers, they looked so miserable!
I've got Christmas Day's dessert sorted now. It's a totally fool-proof chocolate cake. You just melt about four or five bars of chocolate (I use dark) and then mix it into a bit of whatever you fancy. I used glacé cherries, shortbread pieces, hazelnuts, almonds and raisins. Then you tip it into a (lined, greased) tin, and when it hardens you dust it with icing sugar and serve with cream. Can't go wrong! Looks impressive though :)
Been going stir-crazy with this bloody foot. I decided last night that, regardless of what state of healing it was in today, I'd go out for a walk, no matter what. And so I did. And when I say "no matter what", you'll see I really mean it.
It was pissing down with rain for a start, turning the slippery ice all over the place into slippery, wet, slushy ice. I was wearing sandals, since they're the only shoes I can get on over the still-swollen and painful little toe (though the bruising elsewhere on the foot has mostly gone down... well, green anyway, which is less painful). It was dark, and fucking cold.
But my feet were protected by the thermal, waterproof hiking socks that I bought a few years ago, which everyone told me were a waste of money. I felt more sorry for the poor horses - who'd leave a horse out on the common in this weather? They can't eat anything, the grass is all covered with snow! Poor buggers, they looked so miserable!
I've got Christmas Day's dessert sorted now. It's a totally fool-proof chocolate cake. You just melt about four or five bars of chocolate (I use dark) and then mix it into a bit of whatever you fancy. I used glacé cherries, shortbread pieces, hazelnuts, almonds and raisins. Then you tip it into a (lined, greased) tin, and when it hardens you dust it with icing sugar and serve with cream. Can't go wrong! Looks impressive though :)
Monday, 21 December 2009
Looking up
Strange... things seem to be coming together at the moment. There was the job offer, then the excellent chaps whose correspondence I've been enjoying recently. Christmas is working out nicely, I've found a huge load of resources that've solved the "what now?" problem I was dithering over in our home ed efforts, the weight I've been after losing for ages is finally coming off, and now I've just come back from a very positive session at the clinic, where a very sympathetic consultant has vowed his full support to us as a family, and with our DLA claim.
I mean sure, there's the small detail of the broken toe, but that's just physical pain - no big deal. The stuff that matters seems to be going right, for a change!
Now, if I can only get my sleep pattern right for just a few days in a row, and see my way to getting to a church service or two, I'll end the year on a high note.
I started this year with a strong belief that it would be a Good Year. 2006 was my last Very Good Year; 2007 and 2008 were fucking rubbish. I had the impression as this year progressed, that it was in fact even more rubbish than ever, but I'm going to do my review later on and I've a feeling it might turn up some positive moves forward that, though they've come at some cost, have at least come.
I mean sure, there's the small detail of the broken toe, but that's just physical pain - no big deal. The stuff that matters seems to be going right, for a change!
Now, if I can only get my sleep pattern right for just a few days in a row, and see my way to getting to a church service or two, I'll end the year on a high note.
I started this year with a strong belief that it would be a Good Year. 2006 was my last Very Good Year; 2007 and 2008 were fucking rubbish. I had the impression as this year progressed, that it was in fact even more rubbish than ever, but I'm going to do my review later on and I've a feeling it might turn up some positive moves forward that, though they've come at some cost, have at least come.
Eek!
Okay... well I've had four hours' sleep and my foot's still too swollen and bruised to get into a proper shoe. The closest I can manage is a sandal with the toe buckle undone, and it's going to have to do despite its blatant unsuitability in the current weather!
Gotta take Helga up to the clinic, fought too hard and waited too long for this appointment for anything to stop us going to it. I just hope I can find somewhere to park nearby!
I'm just hoping Helga decides to show her most autistic traits today, and doesn't have one of her "I'm not autistic actually" moments right now!
Gotta take Helga up to the clinic, fought too hard and waited too long for this appointment for anything to stop us going to it. I just hope I can find somewhere to park nearby!
I'm just hoping Helga decides to show her most autistic traits today, and doesn't have one of her "I'm not autistic actually" moments right now!
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