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How to spend Christmas Eve. 1st Instalment

Published January 8th, 2010 in Cars, Family, Mother in law, Scotland and Travel. 1 Comment

So how do you like to spend Christmas Eve?

Option 1

A leisurely walk, maybe, in all that glittering new snow. Build a snowman and throw a friendly snowball or two at your offspring. Back home to a nice warm fire and listen to the Nine Lessons and Carols while making a few last minute mince pies and icing the Christmas cake. A pleasant family evening meal then enjoy a glass of port and one of those mince pies while wrapping up the last presents in front of that roaring fire. Perhaps venture out to Midnight Mass, although all that snow might pose a bit of a problem. Wait up until the small hours when your teenagers might possibly be asleep and do the Santa Claus routine. (I did wonder about getting up early and doing this bit in the morning, but teens can be very unpredictable.)

Option 2

You’ve spent the 23rd cleaning, emptying the fridge, putting the rubbish out, packing, having a family meal with leftovers. All that snow has been beckoning but has been firmly ignored. Come the late evening, there’s just time to collapse in front of the fire with a glass of port and a pile of presents to wrap. Early start on the 24th, pile into the car and head down the frozen motorway towards the green fields of the deep south of Somerset. Brave the traffic jams on the M6/M5 parking lots but arrive in time for a warm welcome, a glass of wine and a huge evening meal, courtesy of Mother-in-law. Head for the midnight service in the tiny village church and then the Santa Claus bit. Maybe next year I’ll set an alarm for the early hours so that we can sneak in unheralded. When do they grow out of stockings?

Option 3

Same scenario on the 23rd. Tramp through the snow to load the car in the early hours of the 24th and set out a little nervously on the frozen motorways for our Christmas adventure. The main roads are more or less clear so we decide not to take our normal route via Biggar through the hills of the Borders. Good decision. But in this version, the car breaks down near Glasgow. Stops. We turn round to head back along the M8 to home and the other car but it stops again. refuses to go any further. So, at 0830, we call the 4th emergency service, the AA.

With the prompt arrival of a 911 breakdown truck, things didn’t seem too bad initially. After all, we weren’t that far from home. But, as we drove off, our rescuer was told to drop us at the nearest services rather than take us home, and the AA would take over from there. So it would be that, rather than icing the Christmas cake or heading down the road to that welcoming dinner in Somerset, we were destined to spend the day at Harthill Services.

Option 3, our choice of course, went something like this:

“There’ll be someone there at 11 to take you home.”

Just time for a cup of coffee and bacon rolls, then.

“It’ll be 1pm before we get to you.”

More coffee, keep the coats on (the snow outside was deep) and make use of the free WiFi.

“There’s someone on the way - 2.30″.

Buy a pack of cards. Harthill Services is a petrol station with a small cafe, for those of you who haven’t had the pleasure.

“The earliest we can get to you is 4pm.”

Groan. Start wondering who we can call. Whose numbers we’ve got and who would be brave enough to venture out in the deteriorating weather. And then, at 4.30ish:

“It looks like it’ll be midnight before we can pick you up.”

More to follow…

East Coast FM 87.7

Published December 4th, 2009 in Communication, East Lothian and School. 2 Comments

Tuesday evening found us all glued to the radio listening to Sam, one of GP2’s classmates, in his new guise as DJ. East Lothian’s new community radio, East Coast FM 87.7 was launched on Monday, run entirely by volunteers and with a four week licence. Monday might have had Fish and the Red Hot Chilli Pipers to launch proceedings but Tuesday evening had Sam presenting a 2 hour slot for Ross High School and then his mum, Sally, with two hours of folk music. Of course we asked for autographs the following night at the brass Christmas concert.

Sam, I have to say, has been excited about this for weeks. There has been quite a long preparatory lead in that he and Sally have been involved in during what spare time they have Continue reading ‘East Coast FM 87.7′

The refined art of bribery

Published December 4th, 2009 in Boys, Children, Highers and teenagers. 10 Comments

This morning, at 9am, I found myself online with my finger hovering over the Buy This Instant button as T in the Park tickets came on sale. Apparently I agreed to buy GP1 a ticket in return for his fantastic exam results this year. That must have been during one of my more maternal “Let’s be positive and look on the bright side” moments, as my understanding of fantastic exam results doesn’t entirely coincide with my son’s. In fact, I don’t think our opinions even approximately match. Still, not being one to go back on my word, even if I can’t quite remember the conversation, I did the deed and bought the ticket.

So I’m now the proud owner of a ticket for the 2010 T in the Park. It’s my ticket. Mine. Not his. If he wants it, there will be conditions attached. And if he doesn’t get respectable marks in his prelims in February, I will be offering the ticket to the highest bidder. Or any bidder. Perhaps I’ll give it away. I’m sure there are some very deserving cousins who’d appreciate it. Who knows, I could even go myself.

If I were my son, I wouldn’t be calling my bluff. You have been warned, GP1.

Please form an orderly queue now. You can camp overnight if you want to be first in line. And no pushing at the back!

Hair today

Published November 19th, 2009 in Health, cancer and ovarian cancer. 14 Comments

My mad, unruly curls have all been chopped off. Shame - I’d grown quite fond of them once they’d moved on from the tight, grey, just had a perm stage. People pay good money for curls like that. But I knew they weren’t destined for a long life and my hair really did need cutting. It is now two years and about three weeks since that awful, dreamlike day when I was told I had cancer. Almost exactly two years since my hair started falling out, 19 months since I noticed the first hint of bum fluff returning to my bald head.

That’s not so long, really. All over and done with in the blink of an eye. My cancer is old history now and I’m just a statistic. I don’t think about it so often these days and I suspect most people around me don’t ever give it a thought any more. And that’s how it should be. I fully expect to be one of the 73% of ovarian cancer sufferers who survive to 5 years after diagnosis. I plan to be one of the 30% or so Continue reading ‘Hair today’

Eighteen and a half hours

Published November 18th, 2009 in Boys, Celebrations, Children and teenagers. 3 Comments

Things were easy when the boys were small. Birthday parties maybe involved booking the swimming pool or local bouncy castle for an hour or so, a few sandwiches and crispie cakes, grapes for the health conscious and a party bag or two. We went through taking a few friends to the pictures and then it all went quiet for a while before we got to paintballing.

So, this year… “Mu-um?” “Yes?” (note the nervous upward inflexion).

“Can we have a few friends in? And will you go out for the evening? Maybe you could stay out overnight?”

What?

“How many friends? Who? And there’s no way we’re staying out overnight.”

We hummed and haahed. We prevaricated. Continue reading ‘Eighteen and a half hours’

Ladies who lunch - or not

Published November 6th, 2009 in Friends, Miscellaneous stuff and Working at home. 4 Comments

I had a phone call from Outer Mongolia the other evening. It was so faint it certainly sounded as though it was from the furthest corner of the planet but I did decipher someone closer to home. Did I want to meet for coffee, asked the distant voice from another world? By now I’d figured it was one of my occasional running friends. I’m sure we all have friends who we meet in one context but rarely in others, so this invite was slightly unusual but very welcome. I work at home, you see, so I’m always up for being disturbed by not-to-be-missed social events. Call in for coffee any time you’re passing, I say to people, but they rarely do. “I wouldn’t want to disturb you if you’re working”.

Anyhow, we arranged to meet for lunch today, midday, in a local bookshop cum cafe. But I work at home, and the phone rang just before I left with a call I had to take. So I was late, about 7 minutes in my estimation. I looked round the cafe: noone I recognised. I browsed in the bookshop. Still noone I recognised. I ordered coffee and sat with the newspaper. The place was still full of strangers. Had she been and gone, I wondered, because I was late? But I wasn’t really that late. So eventually I phoned her. “I’m in the kitchen” she said. “But we arranged to meet for lunch!” I said. “Didn’t we? 12 at the cafe?”. Continue reading ‘Ladies who lunch - or not’

Home again, home again, jiggety-jig

Published October 19th, 2009 in Boys, Diving, Family, Marine biology, Out & about, Wales, Working at home and teenagers. 2 Comments

“It hasn’t stopped raining for two days! I haven’t been able to get any washing out” GP1 said.

Head snaps round. Eyes swivel left. Is that my son talking? The one who had six wet towels on his bedroom floor the last time I arrived home from fieldwork? Well, I have to confess it was those six towels that did it, particularly when combined with the five more I found on his brother’s floor and the distinct absence of clean, dry, sweet smelling towels in the airing cupboard. But I’ve already told you about those. What I maybe didn’t tell you was that I threw a wobbly and when shortly after I left for yet another two weeks work, there were rules. Continue reading ‘Home again, home again, jiggety-jig’

Family matters

Published August 31st, 2009 in Edinburgh, Family, Mother in law and Teachers. 2 Comments

We’ve had something of a family weekend. On Friday night we met my sister and her surely-will-be-famous-soon daughter for a meal at Mother India in Edinburgh. Great meal, we’ll be going back there again. It wasn’t quite long enough to catch up on all the news but we did hear a bit more about the impending permanent relocation to the Irish cottage and the difficulties of getting onto the Irish teaching register. Having to provide every address where you have ever lived throughout your whole life, for instance, is probably a whole lot easier when you’re 22 and home has always been in one place than when you’re 50 something and have lived all over the world. And she’s not quite sure of the relevance of all the units in her architecture degree, taken some 30+ years ago, even if the University can fill in the blanks, when she has been successfully teaching Design & technology or something like that for quite a number of years now.

As an aside, as we were leaving the restaurant the boys spotted an off-duty teacher, Continue reading ‘Family matters’

Neglect, n.

Published August 26th, 2009 in Blogging, Boys, Diving, Family, Friends, Health, Highers, Housekeeping, NHS, School, Scotland, Standard Grades, Travel, Wales, Working at home and teenagers. 8 Comments

Neglect. As in My blog has fallen into a state of neglect. I haven’t written anything. It has accumulated spam comments (now deleted, I hope). There are real comments, including some from Reluctant Memsahib, one of my favourite reads, and I haven’t responded. I’ve been busy. I’ve been away. I have lots of excuses. I don’t really like excuses, though. My sister has taken me to task. “Why doesn’t your blog work? It won’t load” she asked. I think it’s sulking.

It’s not that there’s a shortage of material. The holiday, for instance, is begging to be told. Stories about the fading American lady in Fiji Continue reading ‘Neglect, n.’

The Grand Tour

Published July 27th, 2009 in Boys, Diving, Family, Holidays and Travel. 7 Comments

We’re back. We’ve been, we’ve done it, we’ve come home again, the inheritance and all future salaries are spent. 600+ emails, 700+ piles of laundry and millions of raindrops and I know we’re back. Singapore-Port Douglas-Sydney-Fiji-San Diego are already memories. I have pictures and posts planned but am dashing off to Shetland for 2 weeks and first have to finish the work mountain that kept me busy before we left on our Grand Tour. Although, given that I’m still waking up at 5am courtesy of jet lag, I really should make use of those early mornings. But, with the promise to myself that I really will write down some of our tales, here are a couple of photos to make you envious. Or not, as the photo uploader won’t play.

Spending the inheritance

Published June 11th, 2009 in Diving, Family, Holidays and Travel. 8 Comments

I’ve been shaking out the piggy banks and flexing the credit cards for the past few weeks, eyes screwed up and fingers firmly in my ears. The BBC series South Pacific has become compulsory Sunday night viewing in the Guineapig household. We’re going on holiday. Had I mentioned that? A BIG holiday. The sort of holiday that consumes the boys’ inheritance. We’re off to the other side of the world.

I wasn’t much older than GP1 when I first decided I wanted to dive. We lived in Jamaica at the time and I had already spent many hours snorkelling over the coral reefs. Diving was the obvious next step. Being one of six children, though, nothing came on a plate Continue reading ‘Spending the inheritance’

On blood tests

Published May 27th, 2009 in cancer and ovarian cancer. 10 Comments

Needle in, blood out. Quick chat with Sally, the practice nurse. Go home. Forget about it. That’s been the normal 3 monthly routine for the past year or so, and far more frequently before that.

But there’s been a change at our local surgery. One practice has split into two and our surgery has an almost entirely new staff of doctors, nurses and whoever else works in a GP practice. So, today, there’s a new nurse, no Sally, and the blood test went something like this:

“What’s this for? CA 125? Oh, you’ve had a bone scan.”

(Thinks: Bone scan? Why’s she asking me about a bone scan? I’ve had cancer, I’ve had everything scanned and she’s asking me about a bone scan?)

“Which arm? OK, show me both arms. “

Taps veins. Continue reading ‘On blood tests’

Things to do

Published May 13th, 2009 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

I’ve done it. I’ve stopped prevaricating and finally done it.

More details will follow, I’m sure. But things to do, you know.

I’m not nervous!

Published May 6th, 2009 in Boys, Children, SQA, School and Standard Grades. 7 Comments

So, 10am I dropped off a jittery, jumpy, couldn’t-sit-still GP2 for his first exam. “I’m not nervous” he said. Hmm. By the time we got to the school he had my stomach turning somersaults. Maths.

It started yesterday, 3pm. “Mum! My calculator’s broken”. “It’ll be the battery” she said sagely and spent the next 20 minutes extricating one of those tiny silver buttons, the sort you never have spares of in the house, from an impossibly tight casing. Dashed up to town for spares. Dashed home to insert. It still didn’t work. Emergency phone call to GPD to purchase new calculator on his way home.

“I can’t do this question! How do I work this out? We’ve not done this.”

GPM thinks: Continue reading ‘I’m not nervous!’

To do. A list of things.

Published April 29th, 2009 in Family, Miscellaneous stuff, Running and Working at home. 2 Comments

This morning’s list:

Send off forms for school travel passes (oops - should have been on last week’s list. Oh well).
Book our holiday. ;-) Started. And we’re probably going here: Dolphin Bay Divers (among other things)
Tax the car :-( Why is the simplest thing never simple?
Go through tender application. A big one. It has to go out tomorrow. There’s a whole bunch of us working on it. I’m near Edinburgh. They’re in Edinburgh, Weardale, Pembrokeshire, Dublin, Galway. The world becomes small with email and phone conferencing.
Rearrange podiatry appointment for GP junior. He’s now hobbling after every football/basketball/tennis/whatever session. Good job he likes swimming.
Wonder if hubbie’s health insurance would deal with it more quickly. And how do I find out? Arrange it? Find a decent podiatrist? Will it cover follow ups? :-?
Book our holiday. Still not done that. :-D
Finish the next section of my current project. It’s already overdue and time’s running out. 8-O
Find accommodation for September survey.
Start on next tender for a job in north west Scotland.
Book our holiday :lol:
VAT return. :-(
Start (and finish) report for Menai Straits last year. :-(
Go for a run - Great Edinburgh Run this weekend. I’m not in Mud’s league but you do what you can do. I’m aiming for under an hour this year. She’s tagged me, by the way - I’ll get round to it soon. Put in on next week’s list perhaps.
Nag. When they come in from school, of course :roll:
Pay credit card bills :-(
Hang out the washing. We escaped for the weekend so there’s a backlog and yes it rained yesterday.
Wonder why the front door bell’s not working. Had three different lots of people wondering how to break in yesterday.
Book that holiday :-P
Displacement activity - write a blog post :twisted:

Must dash. Things to do, you know.

Why do some smilies work sometimes and not at others, she wonders?

Oh, and there are lots of entertaining blog posts to read in my spare time, in another blog carnival over at Mothership. Do drop by!

In denial

Published April 21st, 2009 in Boys, Highers, SQA, School and teenagers. 7 Comments

Three weeks and counting…

Nag, nag, nag, nag, nag, nag

GPM: “That’s 3 weeks. THREE weeks. Well OK 23 days and a few hours until Higher English. You won’t be able to put it off any longer then.”

GP1: “I kno-o-ow.”

Nag. Nag, nag, nag, nag.

“So have you learned that poem? Read that book? Written out those quotes?”

“I’ll do it tomorrow. Sigh.”

Nag, nag, nag, nag, nag, nag.

Bup-a-lup goes MSN.

Nag, nag, nag, nag.

I think I’m turning into a moany old nag.

And I wish someone would move that wall that’s making lumps on my head.

Nag, nag, nag. Nag, nag.

It must be summer - exams are upon us. It’ll all be over soon. Thank goodness. Until next year, that is.

And until then…

…nag, nag, nag, nag…

Bup-a-lup

On friends

Published April 20th, 2009 in Diving, Friends, Marine biology, cancer and ovarian cancer. 8 Comments

I’m sure we all have friends hovering on the periphery of our consciousness. Friends who have been important in a particular stage of our life but with whom we may have lost touch. Even so, we think about them often and know that if we were to meet up, we would pick up just where we left off all those years ago. Julia was one of those friends. We were at University together in Durham, mainstays of the diving club. Every weekend we all piled into the university minibus and headed off up the old A1 to St Abbs where we dived off the shore, either at Petticowick or outside the Harbour. Petticowick was a slog; a steep, grassy slope down with the gear and, of course, back up at the end of the dive.

My first dive in Britain was at Petticowick, after learning to dive during a gap year in Jamaica. I vividly remember my introduction to the cold, greenish murk of a November kelp forest, shivering in a too big borrowed wetsuit with a piece of orange canvas that purported to be a life jacket around my neck. “Wasn’t that wonderful!” proclaimed my buddy, Tim, later of Eden Project fame, as we staggered out of the water. “Drifting down through the kelp, in that beautiful clear water!” He clearly hadn’t been on the same dive as me. Still, I perservered and learned to like, if not love, kelp forests. The following year Julia and Chas arrived in Durham and joined me in the diving club while I switched subjects and joined them in Zoology lectures. We became firm friends within a wider group Continue reading ‘On friends’

Mothers and Sons

Published March 30th, 2009 in Boys, Family and Swimming club. 0 Comments

Mothers’ Day was spent sitting at the side of a swimming pool, watching one son win a well-earned bronze medal in backstroke, just reward for recent enthusiasm and hard work, whilst his younger brother swam a valiant 400m with his goggles in his mouth. You’ll probably realise that the mouth is not the ideal location for a pair of goggles, but they dislodged when he dived in and that’s where they ended up. He could have stopped and got out, as 400m is a lot of lengths, but he carried on almost as though nothing had happened in a creditable time, all things considered. They collected more metalwork with their teammates after some exciting relay swims. All in all, not a bad Mothers’ Day.

And by coincidence - because it was a long, long day - I happened to finish my current reading matter on poolside. Reading matter for Mothers’ Day. “Mothers and Sons”, a collection of short stories by Colm Toibin, has been sitting by my bedside for over a year. I don’t know why it has taken me so long to get around to reading this as I always enjoy the clarity of Toibin’s writing and, sure enough, once I was into it I couldn’t put it down. The stories were all very different but they tweaked a few emotional heartstrings and the predominantly Irish setting nudged out a childhood memory or two. I have to say that they’re not mother and son stories to lift the spirit and gladden the heart, but a good short story most certainly needs a twist in the tail. If you enjoy short stories, I can surely recommend this, although not necessarily for Mothers’ Day!

Life and times of a teenager

Published March 23rd, 2009 in Boys, Children, Highers, School and teenagers. 7 Comments

No. 37 Homage to Tracy Emin

Alternatively known as

No. 49. The horizontal filing cabinet

No. 51. Revision?

I warned him it would be blog fodder.

:roll:

Paranoid? Moi?

Published March 10th, 2009 in Internet and sport. 7 Comments

Oh dear. Personally, I blame Ollie. If it wasn’t for his internet safety evening, I would probably be totally relaxed, stress-free and friends with everyone. As it is, I’ve become embroiled in an argument with a sport’s Governing Body about personal information from their membership database that they are making freely available online, information that is currently available to view without any sort of password protection. It is an argument that is on the verge of escalating out of control.

I’ve been dealing recently with membership from our club, since our membership secretary moved away, and I knew that I could go online to check membership numbers. But what I only noticed recently was that all the numbers are hyperlinked and when you click on one it takes into another screen containing a lot of personal information. To remove your information, you have to register an email address. When I retrieved my jaw from the desk, Continue reading ‘Paranoid? Moi?’