things I have recently discovered

So as part of my new found resolutions I have acquired a new personal trainer. I have now come to the belief that personal training is the career of choice for all sadists who don’t have a fancy for bondage gear. I am not by any stretch completely unfit but she wiped the floor with me and made muscles that i didn’t know I had ache.

Today, in an effort not to be feel so inadequate next Saturday I returned to the gym and went back through the work out. I swear that between the heat and work out I sweated more than I have ever before. This led me to a new discovery, for various reasons (mainly being an idiot and forgetting the case) I was wearing my contacts in the gym, now I am new to contacts and since I have stated wearing them I have found them dry and sticky in my eyes which is a little irritating all the time. That is all the time apart form while I was working out, it seems they finally had enough moisture to not feel scratchy in my eyes. Apparently if you work out hard enough you sweat through your eyes, who knew?

Reaffirming resolutions

so I looked over my new years resolutions and once again I had laughably put on losing weight. I don’t know why I bother, I do this every year and then fail, every year. So as it’s the summer holidays (yay teaching) I have decided that I will make a conscious effort to lose weight.

SO when school broke up I made three straight forward ‘summer resolutions’:

I resolve to go to the gym every day.
I resolve to cut my calorie intake
I resolve I will stop drinking every night.

I have now been off three weeks and I have been to the gym three times, all in the first three days of the holidays, I have eaten out five times and had take-out twice and last night went through the largest bottle of beer we had in the fridge. I don’t even like beer. The night before I rediscovered how to make long island iced teas.

It’s going well, so I’m starting again today, so to start as I mean to go on I set about removing temptations.

I’ve eaten half a packet of after eights and drank two bottles of wine. I don’t know why people think this dieting thing is hard

Back to reality

So I’ve been home long enough to work out that while you may think you’ve only been away a week your plants, pets, laundry and dust levels will in actual fact inform you it’s been closer to a year. The washing machine is having a nervous breakdown form overuse and the cats are having a jolly good time prowling around the lawn which has been making a good imitation of the long grass of the Serarengity. It’s taken the best part of the day to fight the front garden into something resembling order. Much to the displeasure of the kitten, and the several ant nests I disturbed (ARRRGH I’m being haunted by ants!).

Having finished the monumental task of cleaning up and deciding that I really need another holiday to recover from the clearing from the last holiday. To cap my wonderful day off, my lovely cat decided it would be good idea to roll over on the top of a chair, fall off, yelp and crap herself simultaneously.

Perfect. She’s now on next doors path looking shamefaced, and so she should.

Back home

8:20 Left the villa and head back to Malaga airport, which has gone straight in at number three in my all time most favourite airports, found where we needed to be, checked in early and had time to peruse the duty free. I have a shiny new watch, a lots of booze. Love duty free.

18:45 So I’m back home from Spain to the fun and frolics of Gatwick, saw the Irish and Jamaican Olympic teams bumbling round the airport looking more confused than your average flyers and after several hours made it back to my lovely abode.

Went up to the bathroom and after a week in solely my housemates care it smells like something has died in there, and we have two cats so this is a possibility. Went to put plates in the dishwasher after takeout and something DEFINITELY died in there, am thinking hot wash followed by bath of acid.

Neither of these two events fully prepared me for the biggest horror, after a week of being shut up, with my scuba and ski gear strewn all over the floor my not only smells like death but I’m pretty sure that the grim reaper himself is hiding in the corner fending off the odd sock.

22:00 Opened all the windows, upended luggage into laundry and employed age old techniques of drowning out rustling noises with film and smell with Vicks vapour rub. Will deal with it in the morning.

Diary of a first world girl

Thursday 12th July 2012

Tomorrow I have to get up stupidly early to go on holiday, so obviously tonight is a good night to go to the theatre. Off to see live radio recording of Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, with original cast, looking forward to it.

00:30 Hitchhiker was brilliant, may have got a little wet on the way home so will be travelling in wet clothes but don’t care. Had a brilliant time watching some very good actors bumbling round playing characters they have been playing for decades. Saw adverts for the 40th anniversary of Rocky Horror in December, will look into getting a box.

Friday 13th July 2012

Interesting date to decide to leave on holiday and yet this is the day that finds me waking at the god awful hour of 5 am and leaving for Gatport Airwick, err make that Gatwick Airport, sorry not enough coffee. Our flight leaves at 9, and we are on the road at 6. I think we are making good time until we are bought to a standstill on the A23, apparently there has been a four car pile up. How the hell can there be a four car pile up at this time?! why are there four cars on the road at this time!?!?

As it turns out we are just in time to make the boarding call for the plane, so tired and caffeine deprived I’m loaded onto a A300 for a short flight to Malaga.

Out of desperation we buy food on the plane, what I had was supposed to be a cheese and tomato toastie, I’m am not sure what the contents was but I am sure that it was sandwiched between two rather warm pieces of cardboard.

The plastic fantastic trolley dolly then announced that ‘to avoid disappointment buy duty free items on the outbound flight’ fine I thinks, I want a watch, they come by and I request said item only to be told they have sold out and to try on the inbound flight. Right nice to see consistency.

We were unceremoniously deposited in that airport a few minutes later. Finding the hire car was a little traumatic, but not as much as leaving the airport. Manual car on the wrong side of the road in a country with insane drivers took a few miles to get used too. Should donkeys be allowed on the motorways in Spain, enquiring minds want to know.

Our 70km excursion ended in a town called Nerja, which is from what I can see of it, a toilet. Turning off the roundabout and heading into what seemed to be be a cross between a constructions site and dust road did not fill me with confidence that we were heading the right way. It was only the written instructions that kept us going. Finally after heading up a windy road, avoiding mad locals on mopeds and the occasional goat herd we arrived.

It was a relief to finally find the vila and go in. The stark contrast with the surrounding area is something to be marvelled at as I walked through the gate. Pool table, table tennis, swimming pool and that was just the outside, shame they couldn’t make anything level so the pool table in chocked on pieces of wood, the table tennis table is leaning to the left, and the pool has a tendency to overflow. The villa itself has two bedrooms, two bathrooms(although one is outside and down by the pool) and a communal living area. The kitchen has just enough room for the dishwasher to open. On the plus side there is a dishwasher, and the bedrooms have air con. Moved welcome food hamper to find a colony of micro-ants have already beaten us to the villa, it was a hard fought battle but they have been evicted off the worktop for now.

The local supermarket is… an experience. Supersol, maybe a little bit of an overly optimistic name, the place is the biggest dive I have ever entered, but then again beggars can’t be choosers.

Stocked up and supplied I plan not to leave the villa for the rest of the week.

Have discovered that the electrics here seemed to be wired into the plumbing, every time the tap goes on or the toilet is flushed the lights flicker, not sure whether to call an electrician, plumber or exorcist.

Saturday 14th July 2012

Miles swum: half. Flys swatted: 2 pool games won: 6 (not bad)

So much for a stress free holiday. Apparently the steps down to the shower room are slippery. How did we find this out? Well that would be when my father went to use the room, coming from the pool only to slip and slam his back into the stairs. Perfect start to the week. Fortunately nothing appears to be broken, but is still is very painful. Have consigned ourselves to doing very little for the rest of the time.

Found out that the air con has two setting, tropical rain forest and Arctic. On consideration went for Artic only to then discover the beds were covered with a large piece of tissue paper that some one was trying to pass off as a sheet. So bedrooms are freezing and living area is sweltering and I am reluctant to open bedroom door for fear of starting a cyclone when the two air currents meet. I don’t want to go to Oz.

Also am not sure about the bars on my window. Feel a bit like Harry Potter, with no way out of the room. A little disconcerting to read the bumf that was left in the villa to find out that they recommend locking everything away in a safe, closing all windows and blinds and that’s just to go to the pool, which is onsite and over looks all said windows. I mean aside from needing to be a master climber to reach this place by any means other than the main road who the hell do they think is going to get through wrought iron grates without disturbing the people in the pool 10 ft away?! And as for approaching from the road, that’s all well and good until you get to the steel gates, which are locked and 10ft high. Am beginning to think that Fort Knox could learn a thing or two. Also is all this to keep us in or others out. Really I think the burglar alarm is way over the top as well but that’s just me.

03:30 Had thought about what if there was a fire and got stuck in room with barred window. Couldn’t sleep for the rest of the night.

Attempted to use bar-be-que. Dinner was late. Drank wine instead.

Sunday 15th July 2012

Miles swum: half, Flys swatted: 0 (pathetic), Pool games won 3/6 (am going backwards)

It’s Sunday. Nothing is open, nothing to do. Drunk wine and blew air rings. Ended up with sausages for dinner as the chicken bought yesterday (they went out NOT me) had already gone off. Beginning to develop a respectable tan, despite living under a black hat, shades and enough factor 30 to coat most of East Sussex. This had lead to the discovery that I apparently am useless at waxing my legs as hair has already grown back, or in most cases is ingrowing back. Bugger, three weeks my ass.

Listened to copious amounts of church bells while trying to extract annoying hairs, but couldn’t see a church.

Monday 16th July 2012

Miles swum: 1 (not bad) Flys swatted: 8 (have found electric fly swat woohooo!) Pool games won 4/6 (I seem to be better drunk)

Like this holiday; lather, rinse, repeat; in other words sit by pool, drink wine and swim. Only today we went and found a better shop. Now have 5 bottles of wine to last until Thursday night, and enough food to last the week. Not going anywhere else. Told parents that IMHO Nerja was a dump, dad got cross and insisted on going for a drive/walk on the seafront. Came back an hour later and agreed with me.

Have discovered a new game in the pool ‘wasp herding’ its very simple to play, find a dead wasp on the surface and using only the power of the water currents, waft it into the filters at the end. You get extra points if it doesn’t rebound against the filter trap on the way through. New game may have something to do with my recent discovery of a liking for white wine spritzers. Must stop swimming watch and sunglasses on, have interesting tan line which looks like a wrist band from an asylum and panda eyes from hell.

Blew fuse whilst making dinner. Apparently this family can’t even go on holiday without blowing something up.

Tuesday 17th July 2012

Miles swum; 1, Flys swatted; 12, pool games won; 0 (WTH?!)

Worked out that 100 lengths of the pool was half a mile. Then swum 100 lengths in 25 mins. Have been in pool over 4 hours everyday. Have swum rather a lot this holiday of doing nothing. have started to feed bar-be-qued flies to other insects, spider looked inordinately pleased.

Ankle is being itchy and uncomfortable, will rectify this with more swimming.
Went for a walk around the back of the villa, found dust, stables, goat shit and horses.

Spain is not a pretty place. Why are they trying to grow runner beans in a drought? Look like shrivelled dried peas on sticks. Also mad local tried to run us over, apparently the pavement is a good place to drive instead of the road.

On walk decided that we should contact rep about the state of rubbish, which has become a health hazard. Going near it makes me want to vomit. Also since power cut yesterday security light on porch has failed to turn off.

Yay, rep said she’ll take biohazard with her – she is a braver person then me, I’m pretty sure it’s evolved. The chicken has become living again at any rate. Colony of micro-ants under bag seem to think this is an escalation in hostilities. Sprayed them with antiseptic, so they won’t be able to report back to headquarters. Rep says someone will come and look at light, I’m not sure why, you look at it, yup still on so go unplug it surely?

Who let the dogs out: There is a dog that won’t stop barking, has been going all evening, seriously why have a pet if you can’t be bothered to give it attention?

Panda impression is quite impressive, also hair regrowth at this rate cannot be normal, must be part werewolf.

Wednesday 18th July 2012

Miles swum; 1 and half (want chips with dinner), flys swatted; infinite, pool games won; 3/5 (stupid wine rationing). Time spent fretting over invisible burrowing non-existent insect 5hours 41s. Time spent lamenting wine ration … how many hours are there in a day again?

Attempting bar-be-que for second time seems to be a better success apart from being allergic to the sausages. Lives and learns. Am still adjusting to contact lenses, it feels like there are a million little hairs in each eye, not necessarily pleasant but better than glasses.

Have discovered that the mirco-ants that have be launching an unrelentless invasion attempted on the villa since our arrival are partial to cooked fly. Have opened peace negotiations with the remains of eight flying insects, two lumps of fat and a broken up crisp.

Ant update: peace negotiations may have broken down as flys and crisps are too big to be dragged by the little buggers back down the holes in the grouting. Has led to a bit of a ant-fly-crisp blockage on the main ant thoroughfare. Ants seems to be taking this as an act of war and are invading the bread board. Will check later as to the state of play, but it’s too hot to worry so off to the pool.

Have to work to maintain my lead in pool length swimming, this has had the unfortunate side effect of knocking the filter cover loose. End of wasp herding then. On the plus side more white wine spritzers. Have developed a very itchy ankle, this may be because of an insect bite but there is no mark. Am blithely ignoring the small voice in the back of my head that says its a foreign evil relative of the bot fly and it’s something crawling around that I can feel. Tried burning it in the heat of the midday sun. Now have a red, sore and itchy ankle, next time I need to think these things through.

Have convinced female parental unit that white wine spritzers are the way to go in hot countries. Go me! On downside, having to ration wine to make sure it lasts.

Ant Update: Flys, crisps and ants seem to have disappeared from whence the ants came, maybe a treaty is not out the question? followed up initial gift with sausage fat at dinner and a second round of flies. Wonder is micro-ants can become obese, should probably advise against the dangers of a high cal diet and over eating.

Am spending an inordinate amount of time worrying about the health of micro-ants, this is probably not a good thing, possibly should consider getting a hobby. Micro-ant so fat that it cant get down burrow, or that could be because the the lump of fly it’s carrying, wonder if they know that fried fly is not a substitute for love.

In other news have got ring stuck on finger, am soaking in cold water to promote shrinkage to get sodding thing off. May need to adjust how much I am eating, will swim more tomorrow to make up for copious chip gorging.

Who let the dogs out: Seems to be continuous barking dogs all evening, am considering offering to walk them myself for peace and quiet.

Ants appear thirsty, found a group drowned in my wine glass. Offered corpses to colony as a warning against alcohol (it’s too late for me), hopefully they will learn.

Tomorrow is last full day and still haven’t seen a sombrero take take back for housemate, if there isn’t one at the airport he may have to make do with booze. Also haven’t found good postcard, so will again look in Airport and just give him the bloody thing.

Broken lamp update; still broken no one been to look, on the plus side – clean towels arrived yesterday.

Thursday 19th July 2012

Miles swum: 1 and half, flys swatted: 2, pool won: 4/5 (am hitting balls randomly in retaliation for no wine)

Ant update: appear confused this morning, can’t find flys to feed them. Have given them cereal crumbs which they have wondered in aimless circles rather than taking home. Am concerned that this is a side effect of fat clogging tiny ant brain.

Last day, will spend time swimming. Kept losing count of lengths, until came to the conclusion it would be easier to time them. This had the down side of having to count to ten. Which without falling asleep proved complicated, ended up chanting one, one, one, two, two, two, for every length. Rather pathetic really. Still worked in the long run.

Ant update: Flys more cooperative at lunch and managed to feed two to waiting ants, am not sure what ants will do tomorrow when we are not here to feed them. Maybe the low fat enforced diet will do them good, am sure they have all got significantly bigger.

Still smarting from wine rationing, but tomorrow will be back in civilisation. Well England, and can find more wine and restaurants. Am looking forward to it. Will leave early so have time to peruse duty free, yay duty free!

Hair update: not related to werewolf, related to wooly mammoth; its the only explanation, in desperate need of wax! am scaring myself, thanking god I can justifiably wear jeans, shame I can’t wear a paper bag too.

20:10 Right have packed and jumped on bag to make everything fit, briefly wondered if compacting luggage to make it fit would cause a black hole through the compression of matter but then decided that was ridiculous. After all everyone knows that black holes are really portals to other universes.

20:12 Started to wonder if the creation of luggage black holes would explain the mysterious disappearance of socks. Would that mean that my washing machine has a black hole in it? Maybe I should put the other half of the pair in there so that they don’t get lonely.

20:13 Considering that wine rationing is having a damaging effect on my psyche.

Broken lamp update: still broken.

Who let the dogs out: Yup still barking, only now one of the small yappy ones sounds less like barking and more like hiccuping.May be having a conversation, not sure.

21:10 won three games of pool, too hot still so stood back in pool, may have fallen in a bit deep, am trying not to show back of wet shorts for fear of ridicule, hope no one will notice wet chair or will pass it off as getting old.

Gym update….

So it’s been a while (again) since I wrote anything. I was scrolling through my blog – which admittedly didn’t take long as I haven’t really written much and I came across the post I wrote abut gyms. It made me chuckle as while I still stand by my opinion that you have to be clinically insane or lying to say that you acutally enjoy the experience of going to the gym, I have none the less conituned to go resolutely at least twice a week for several years. I have lost rather a lot of weight too. Not that I’m actually thin mind but I am 5 stone lighter then I was at the beginning, without resorting to poor concieved diets, pills or fads.

I have over the last three years become proficient at most peices of exercise equipment that are in my local gym. I can row 2000m in under 9min – which given my handicap of a lack of hieght isn’t bad and have maxed the weights on the some of the leg presses. I’m not bragging, I’m tyring to put into context the next shameful admission, which is no matter how hard I’ve tried I have never, ever maganged to get anywhere on the tread mills – no pun intended. I’ve fobbed it off with ‘oh I have stmaina for swimming and water sports’ and while that is true – you put me in a pool and I’ll happily punt up and down for ever. Or at least until my attention span has wondered. I could never run for more then 30seconds. A few weeks ago started to take on my arch nemesis and decided that I wanted to be able to run for half an hour non-stop. This is a mountain that I never thought I would ever have any hope of climbing but after a bit of jiggling on speed and setting myself to goal of improving my speed by just 15 seconds a week I can now run non-stop for 3mins 30. Still at the bottom of my mountain granted and I’m sure that most people out there will sneer at me, but I’m getting there and I will make it.

So what impossible goal have you set yourself lately?

Catch up

Let me just say to start with 2011 sucks.  I was told that the diagnosis I got for the dizziness I received in November is wrong so yay me more tests coming up in March – so year four of guess that condition coming up. Which on it’s own is a kick in the teeth that is indescribable. Added to that it’s been one drama after another.

It’s been a weird few weeks. Since the start of 2011 we have both been saying that thing have got to get better. We’ve been insisting on it. Since that a few things have happened. It all started with a phone call from Dom one evening saying his car won’t start, after several phones call and a lot of umming and ahhing I went and got him, leaving the car stranded at the office. The next day the RAC turned up and applied the ‘correct technique’ to start it. (see video clip).  As he had been travelling up by bike, he managed to get the car home, leaving the bike stuck until the weekend when we went and retrieved that.

Scroll to about 9:25 to see what I mean.

In between all the broken bone and car saga, I was told that the diagnosis I got for the dizziness I received in November is wrong so yay me more tests coming up in March – so year four of guess that condition coming up.

All was  fine until Monday, where upon some wonderful students of mine shut my fingers in the door and broke them. So this time when Dom phoned and said the car wouldn’t start there wasn’t a lot I could do. Still after about an hour he managed to get it started and nurse it home. This unfortunately meant that he was back on the bike. Two days later despite the frost and some misgivings he set out for work. And the inevitable happened…. At around two in the afternoon I’m sitting in my lab at work quietly getting on with some marking when I hear

“Tina, you’ve got a visitor…” You know that sick feeling you get when you just know something has happened? I do and that what I got just before I entered the prep room, whereupon I find Dom with a sheepish smile, scuffed bike gear and a sling.  Just when we’re thinking things can’t get any worse, we get a phone call from the States. Turns out Dom’s brother was playing that most dangerous of games, tennis and broke his wrist in 5 places. Even with insurance it will still cost a fortune to put right. Still we muster on through a few weeks and we make plans to fix the car. So thoughtfully so more of my students crash through my lab door, smashing my wrist meaning I need a trip to A&E to insure it’s not broken. Just to find it’s the nerves that have been jarred and I can’t drive meaning that as Dom can’t drive long distance, and certainly isn’t up to walking to the school first I have to call my mother to come and rescue my car.

That weekend we then attempt to fix the car. Only to find after replacing the ignition switch, starter motor and battery, that the alternator is dead, the exhaust needs patching, the front drive shaft is croaked and the tick over is running alarmingly high. So all in all rather a waste of time and money. Finally we cave and on Sunday we went car shopping and after trawling large numbers of garages settle on the first car we saw (isn’t that always the way?) a Honda Jazz. Dom puts down a deposit with the assumption that we will be able to pick it up this evening.

Several phone calls to and from the sales rep toady scuppered that idea. Long and short of it, he screwed the pooch on the finance package and is now running around like a blue assed fly trying to fix it. After not hearing anything for several hours I thought I’d drop in on my way home from work, it’s amazing the effect muttering words like ‘contract’ and ‘breach’ have on motivating people. So now all Dom apparently needs to do is sign the paper work and pick up the car. I’ll believe it when I see it. Still doesn’t solve what to do with the old one.

Anyone want a M-reg non starting fiesta? Going cheap….

Dispatches – do you know what’s in your breakfast? (warning rant imminent)

 

This was possibly the most ridiculous show I have seen in a long time and I can get Sky 1 I know ridiculous. It could be summed up in three sentences Do you know what’s in your cereal? Want to? Read the label. Instead it went on for a hour about how evil the cereal companies were for trying to hide all the horrible salt and sugar content of things like ‘Frosties’ now forgive me for being a little cynical but when I open the packet and icing sugar falls out with the product I don’t think to myself hmm I wonder if this is healthy. Failing that these day’s they even write it on the front of the sodding packet as well. Now admittedly some of the points they make about the packaging being misleading is true – Special K does brand itself a healthy breakfast and granted it does contain a hefty level of sugar but again all this is declared if you had bothered to read the packet!

 

Moving on from their insane start to the way the show was put together. Firstly they state that the market leading brand maintains that they add salt and sugar because people like the taste, so they do a taste test in a shopping mall. From the results we are show we are supposed to believe that people actually prefer the shop own brands that have less of these things. Right all well and good, but then they go on to rant and rave about the fact that the same market leader is advertising their sugary wears to children who ‘prefer the sweeter taste’ hang on back up, if people don’t like ’em what the problem? Let them advertise because the flavour of the others it better right? And surely if on the whole the general population really did prefer the less sweet, less salt equivalents then the leading brand in house testing would have shown this and they would save themselves a fortune by NOT adding it???

 

This is not even mentioning the insane supposed scientific test they ran on a ‘everyday’ family in which 3 children are forced to substitute their cereals for ‘sugar and salt free’ breakfast while mum starts drinking Atimel and dad takes up the drop a jean size in two week challenge. First off who ever decided on the substitute breakfasts is an idiot if they think that either porridge or eggs have no salt or sugar in or bread for that matter coupled with that the porridge was certainly not made right no wonder the kids didn’t want to eat it! Onto dad, who was eating less then 1000 calories a day and surprise surprise didn’t lose weight. The average calorie requirement for a male on an average day is 2500 by eating less then half that the body will go into starve mode and conserve any calories it can. Something any dietician would have told them, had they bothered to consult one. Now the show used this as proof of ‘all these things are lies’, so what did they do when mum said she felt better on the Actimel? ‘well there’s no real proof anyway so it’s probably something else’. Now don’t get me wrong I have about as much faith probiotics as I do in sticking a toad on my head for headaches and seaweed as a cure for cancer but the point is you can’t have it both ways – you cant say look the observational evidence on one person says what we want so we’ll use it and on the observational evidence on the other say what we don’t want so we’ll ignore it that’s bad science. Not that there was any good science in the whole thing. If they wanted to prove their point about probiotic why weren’t they asking the company what this ‘Scientific proof’ was? And then testing it? Why didn’t they take a white blood count at the beginning of the two weeks and then at the end if they were looking at immunity? Why didn’t they run fitness tests? And why didn’t they insist that mum keep the rest of her diet the same during the time period instead of suddenly starting to eat healthy? Because the sudden influx of fruit and veg might just might also have had an effect.

 

In the interests of fairness there was one point it made that while I was aware of I will acknowledge is not in the public domain and that is that companies can buy approval from things like the Heart charity to put approval stickers on their products. These stickers do not necessarily mean that the product lowers cholesterol merely that it may not harm those with high cholesterol.

But seriously folks just GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR *rant over*

You can’t make this stuff up…

Seriously, schools been in (avec kids) for two weeks now and in that time, the students have started to rip the top button off their shirts so they don’t have to do them up. The Head’s solution ‘well we bought cotton and buttons so the LADIES in the office can sew them back on. Our solution, the kids tore them off so they can bloody well sew them back on and we are not ladies, we’re woman and we do far to much work for you anyway ya sexist bar*d… !

According to said Head ‘there are too many seagulls on the school field’, his solution to go round with a little picker and pick up after the kids thus getting rid of the seagulls. Kid’s solution drop litter (when they never used too) and run a book on how long before in their terms that overpaid glorified cleaner (the Head) comes along and picks it up. Our solution: walk behind kids and shout at them until they pick it up and put it in the bin.

By the order of the Head – all students will be ‘sorted’ into chapters each with a predefined colour… except all the uniforms are identical, so the kids are not really aware of it. Kids solution: scrawl HOGWARTS in 2ft high red letters on the brand new patio outside his office. Our solution try to stop laughing long enough to breathe.

At the insistence of the Head: Lunchtime meals should be displayed on the internet for all to see. Our solution – you want it you do it. His solution to announce to the world that the options for lunch are chicken fajitas of VAGGIE fajitas. Our and the kids solution, don’t tell him just laugh manically every time it appears.

Head (and the sponsors to be fair) freeze the budget so we have no petty cash, so no dissection meats, no garlic or onions for plant sides, no stopwatches or thermometers for GCSE ISA exams. Our solution, to express the science syllabus through the medium of dance.

Seriously this guy thinks he can run the school??? The kids are running a bet on how long he’ll last. I might just have to have a punt on that. ..

Supoermarkets Seasons

I have to wonder who decides on the merchandise that supermarkets put into their obligatory ‘seasonal’ isle. For the most part what is there makes some sort of sense, even  supermarkets put into their obligatory ‘seasonal’ isle. For the most part what is there makes some sort of sense, even if they do start displaying the Christmas wears in September (which leads to three months of me squawking ‘IT’S NOT CHRISTMAS’) and I know for a fact – having worked in a supermarket that the first Easter Eggs arrive on boxing day. Even so, giving the little foibles of the commercial industry try to encourage to spend, spend, spend … or possibly remind us that there is a celebration coming up so save now – someone please explain to my why my local branch of Tesco has a big seasonal isle, with a third dedicated to bar-be-ques and the rest filled with nappies and babies bottles. Is it suddenly the season to procreate? Was there some memo 9 months ago I missed that said that this September was THE time to pop a sprog? Why wasn’t I in on this?? and more to the point what is the name of the season?? I don’t understand are we in ‘recession time’ where people came up with uh hem cheaper forms of recreation then the cinema? Or possibly ‘economic crisis holiday’s’ someone tell me! I missed this… or maybe it’s just because the schools are going back, and girls that planned ahead have come up with a cunning plan not to return to class. I certainly hope it’s not done to give them ideas!