17th March 2010 (Wednesday)

Many thanks to the Pie for starting up her blog! Fantastic. Sorry to hear about the dentist though - one can do without that sort of thing like a hole in the head (quite literally). Talking of dentists, hope the Woofie's visit went OK the other day, and you told them quite firmly 'you build bridge!' (always best to do this before the anaesthetic).

Busy day all round here, though nothing particularly of note (though of course I'll as usual go ahead and note it right down).

The Mr: pretty much teaching from 9 till 5:30. Firstly 'tutorial' with a bunch of students who apparently refuse to answer any questions as a point of honour (personally I'd threaten to ram their heads down the toilet unless they came up with something, sensible or not - mind you that's probably why Ian's a lecturer and I'm not), then all afternoon spent supervising practicals with a bunch of 40 of them who it seems mainly can't perform the simplest calculations (well on this occasion have to admit my sympathies are with the students). All in all not very inspiring for the Mr I think and he's come home dead tired and very unwilling to be dragged out of the bedroom.

The Non: School, then Work. She likes to get her playtime done before serious stuff. The teacher was complimenting her on the increased speed of her cutting and pasting. (Mind you she was on my [phonics -help] table at the time - although come to think of it not a soul of them lagged on my table, or stepped out of line for an instant.... strange. Apparently other parents have been complaining of bad behaviour - can't say I've noticed it in the slightest.) She was also playing pretty good hopscotch with a load of girls who joined in progressively because we were all having so much fun, first thing in the morning. Well, that's misleading - she refused to understand the first rules of hopscotch but we had a good load of jumping from one hoola hoop to the next and various different ways, all good stuff. Got home pretty tired, but settled down to read a book but half-way through said no, no, it's too difficult. Rubbish, said I, come downstairs and have some fruit and the tummy-magic will start to work. Half a pear and half a grapefuit later, the tummy magic worked and she sailed through the rest. Tummy-magic is absolutely not to be underestimated.

Mrs: School, then packing. Unpacking, rather. Mind you, so much of it was taking things out of one box and putting them straight into another that it's six of one and half a dozen of the other. Thing is we've not got an attic here, and there are simply a lot of things that one doesn't use all year round, or indeed unless you have people round (or a third bedroom). I took down three duvets, two blow-up mattresses, eight pillows, several bedcovers and bed protectors, two quilts, and goodness knows what other paraphenalia of simply bedding. Not to mention the whole winter clothes scenario- made me sweat just to look at some of the sweaters we've brought over. Luckily I threw out most of mine but the Mr has masses. Perspire, perspire. Anyway, after the Wednesday helping out with the Phonics lark I had a few hours and used it exclusively to clear out our bedroom a bit. That corner's sort of passable now. Usually when they pack and move stuff they keep things pretty much in the chests and drawers that they were in originally, just whip the things up and set them down in the new place - this time seems to be different. Everything's higgledy-piggledy, with shoes and bags in the cedar chest, trousers rammed into the t-shirt drawers, pictures and pullovers crammed into some boxes and random bits and pieces everywhere - its going to take a while.

 After school, reading and work with the Non. We just about managed to get the bath going before the Mr got back. That's about it. Spag sauce for dinner, Harry Potter (second book) before bed.

Kisses all round, V xxxx