Mumble’s Blog

It’s great when the children get taken out. They seem to enjoy trips more with the school than they do with us. I don’t know how the teachers do it. They seem to be able to make them enthusiastic about going places that if I suggested them would be met with groans of, oh do we HAVE to?

The eldest headed off skiing recently (Hillend, not actual snow) and insisted I drop him some way off.

Me: And why is that, child?
Him: You are embarassing.
Me: Everybody has parents, it is not just you, you know.
Him: I know that. But not everybody has one like you.
Me: Well of course. If we are all the same it would be boring.
Him:Yes. But. It’s…
Me: Yes?
Him: …
Me: It’s?
Him: It’s. It’s. You give me last minute safety advice! When me and R went cycling you told me to remember to put my helmet on. Last time we went to Hillend you told me to do what the instructor said. And when I went to school last week you told me to look both ways before I crossed the road. I KNOW THESE THINGS!
Me: Right. Hmm. I see. I’d better stay in the car then.
Him: You’d better. And don’t forget to put the handbrake on.

That is it, then. Of all the myriad ways in which I could embarass my children (and there are many) it is the last minute safety advice that puts me beyond the pale. He has a point.

Today saw the middlies heading off to panto land. The PTA subsidised the trip (thank you, PTA) and the entire school were bussed off to the Brunton Theatre to see Cinderella. Our boy had somehow got the idea that the panto was girlie, and showed huge resistance to going. He said it wouldn’t have enough boy things in it, like fighting. He compensated for this by putting up an enormous struggle on the way in.

My wee girl was looking forward to it hugely, and thanks to her brother’s battling, she was spared a last minute injunction to listen to what the teachers tell her and on no account to miss the bus. Both of them were both full of the panto when I picked them up, having surprisingly, without prompting, managed to catch the bus.

Haddington Infants are pretty brave at taking them on trips - the P2’s have an overnight stay, last year at Alison Cargill house, which my wee boy loved. They must have a lot of commitment from the staff to be able to do this. I don’t remember much about my primary school trips, other than one where we went to Vane Farm and the teachers kept telling this girl to stop going on and on about her sore stomach. It was only when she finally passed out that they conceded she maybe had a point. It turned out she had appendicitis and had to get ambulanced off. It was apparently pretty lucky that was not her final journey. Educational, even though we did miss the visit to the hide.

Secondary school trips were another matter entirely. In S2, the staff put us to bed then headed off for the pub, whereupon we promptly got up, snuck out and started setting things on fire (old planks, cigarettes, vodka). The deal seemed to be the teachers wouldn’t tell on us if we didn’t tell on them.

On the same trip, we were walking round the top of a large valley with the intention of climbing a hill on the far side then going down. Part way round, my friend and I, thinking that looked quite a long way and with unsuitable shoes and thin jackets, asked if we couldn’t dip into the valley, climb the hill and meet them on the top. The teacher okayed this, and we set off, climbing up the alloted hill to what seemed to be the top, despite a sleety drizzle coming on and off. Once there, we thought all we had to do was wait for the rest of the party. But they didn’t come and they didn’t come.
At last, below, we saw a straggly band plodding along at the bottom of the valley. Not our lot, obviously, as we were meeting them here. Other hikers. “Do you think that is them?” asks my friend, enentually. How could we tell? They must have been over 1000ft below us. We sat some more. The hikers disappeared down the valley. She looked at me and I looked at her. We decided on balance even if it wasn’t them and we got into trouble for not waiting, we were going down. About halfway down the hill it started getting dark, slippy already. We found a stream and followed that, figuring it probably knew where it was going. There was a loch past the end of the valley which you had to cross the road to get to (we’d had a while to survey the terrain, sitting on top of the hill) and we reckoned it was making for that.

When we finally got back, we were in trouble, though not for not waiting, but for not coming down when they came past.

This trip pretty much set the tone for the rest. I do wonder how much of it the teachers knew was going on. I don’t recall anyone ever being dangerously drunk - the only time anyone was actually unconscious that I remember was the result of leaping onto the minibus a tad too enthusiastically (i.e before the door was open). Maybe they knew it always happened and it was always fine.

So against this background, it is with some trepidation I went to a presentation on the Knox 28 day trip to Zambia. No, make that considerable alarm. No, make that barely suppressed panic. On the one hand: what an opportunity. To get to see life ‘behind the scenes’ somewhere so completely different from here - it must stay with them for the rest of their lives. I’ve never been anywhere like this. To get to see that when you’re just starting out, it must be fantastic. On the other hand, as the picture of person looking over the edge of the Victoria Falls comes on screen with the caption “Imagine your child here” I can feel it coming over me… “For heavens sake STAND BACK A BIT!”

What I want, really, is a school full of small children following him round going “It’s behind you!” anytime anything dangerous pops up. Wait a minute. I think I might know where you could get one of those actually…

It is good to see your children take steps, however small, to becoming competent adults. Today, my younger boy volunteered to do the packed lunches. I’m not sure what inspired this - not the leaflet we recently got home about how to make your lunches healthy anyway. The middlies are fairly conservative about their lunches. They do not want bagels and cream cheese. They do not like mangetout and celery sticks and dip. And they most certainly would never ever eat cold rice and chicken drumstick.

They will however eat nutella, and unfortunately this is what the boy decided to put on the sandwiches. As I was dressing the tiddler at the time I didn’t notice till he’d used all the bread. Peanuts I know are not to be taken into school (allergies), but I thought the hazelnuts they use in the nutella might be OK. Last of the bread v. child with anaphalaptic shock; hmm. I called the school. “There are” said the secretary confidently “no nuts in our school” (well p’raps not by 8:30 in the morning, right enough…). So that’s the nutella out then, along with the last of the bread.

He did do a fine job with the rest of the packed lunch, though. Juice in. Apple, in. Cheesestring, in. Even carrot batons, in, and wrapped. Do I remember to take it with us? Yes! Hooray!

Which leaves only: emergency dash round Tesco’s on the way in to fill up with rolls, and now, the boy is fully equipped with packed lunch. Hooray!

Do I remember to give it to him to take in? Yes. Hooray!

Does he remember to eat it?

Does he remember what?

To eat it?

No.

He gets a school dinner, and I get a slip saying I owe Elite Catering £1.50. Again.

The second last time this happened, I slightly complained about having to pay for it as I had supplied him with a perfectly good packed lunch (albeit wholemeal bread and not nutella). How were they, the school argued, to know that he had a packed lunch? Good point. I arranged to inform the teacher if he had a packed lunch. He did it again - lured by jelly? Forgot? Badness? Who knows? I put it to the school that I might not have to pay for the school dinner this time. They looked me in the eye and asked who brought him up. Seeing no-one else in the immediate vicinity that could be blamed for this, I was forced to admit it was me. And (killer blow) if you refuse to pay for this we will have to take it out of the school funds. You know, the money the poor old parents have worked their fingers to the bone raising so the dear children can have books. Those school funds. But we can do that, reluctantly, if you insist on not paying.

I shelled out. I expect I shall have to do the same tomorrow. What am I supposed to do though? Staple it to his nose?

“I say I say I say, what is black, weighs 16 lbs and would be illegal in Austria?”
- I don’t know, what is black, weighs….
Wait a minute, wait a minute. It’s not a joke. It is my eldest’s school bag. I picked it up the other day - and picked is not really the word - to discover (Gripe 1) it was heavier than the tiddler. My first instincts were that there must be something in there that was not school work. The child was duly summoned. I was half-expecting a rock collection, though he is a bit past that sort of thing, finally. But no. It was all his weighty learning. (Almost all. It did also contain my response to the travel survey, pored over and commented on at great length and NOT handed in last term so I did NOT win a day at the McDonald Marine Hotel which I would have had a good chance at as the School Travel coordinator said there were only 10 responses presumably as they are ALL still in the school bags but that’s enough of that!).

Apparently in Austria school bags are only allowed to be a tenth of your body weight. While this does raise slightly disturbing visions of school children becoming anorexic in an attempt to weigh less than 10 x their homework so they can’t bring it home, it does seem to have a bit of sense to it. If they were at work, I would’ve thought they would be covered by manual handling regulations. As it is, (Gripe 2) they all seem to have these hugely heavy bags dangling round their bums. This is definitely not the style suggested by the leaflet I was given when seeing about back problems probably caused by carting the tiddler. I did show him the leaflet. I have to say it hasn’t made much difference. I don’t know if the school has had no better luck or if they don’t try.

And finally, Gripe 3. We had an amendment to the dress code last term saying that the school bag should be black. Where do we live? Scotland. What do they walk home in? The dark. I can see the point of a dark school uniform, I can see that formal colours might give a more formal attitude. But I’ve always found it slightly comforting that as he mucks about with his mates on the way home, flopping on and off the pavement as they seem to do at that age, wearing his invisibility cloak er I mean his school jacket, that his school bag was not only bright orange but also reflective. No more.