In light of last year's crisis at Christmas (see only other blog entry), this year the family hope to enjoy a more relaxed affair.
The Autumnal months have been full, so we have reached December 1st with Advent calendars at the ready, and that's all thus far for the festive season. Yet again, my children rest assured in the knowledge that they are the only people in Somerset, nay Britain, perhaps the western world, not to have a chocolate filled piece of card. Call me Bah Humbug, but I don't need zippy little ones pumped up on choc and firing on all cylinders over the cereal; besides which I'm the traditional type and I'm not sure how a Barbie pink calendar with corresponding chocolates corroborates the Christmas story.
Building works in the early Autumn began with a burst pipe flooding the appropriate floor. I hadn't appreciated how many stopcocks could be located in hedges and under sinks before the new water feature fountain could be persuaded to slow to a trickle. The joy continued with a humourless door-fitter with the charm of a toad. He shouted, was rude, insulted anyone within a 5 metre radius - and then left with the frame propped with pieces of plastic, the door certainly not the one I ordered, and a seething monologue about the height of the floor. His offensive barrage was effective, it took me twenty four hours to realise that the entire farce had been of his making and not mine.
Hit and run accidents no doubt happen all the time. Being a victim (albeit unharmed) of one is no fun. Over two months after an unthinking and unrepentant teen decided to drive into my car and continue on her journey without stopping (leaving me hopping up and down on the pavement like a demented banshee), the insurance issues have still not been resolved. The inter-dependence of this multi-faceted industry left me reeling. My breakdown service of choice were unable to help, a third party was sent at vast expense. Familiarity with our local garage paid dividends, they stayed open for me to arrive on the back of a vast lorry and soothed appropriately. The police are efficient, take all details and dispatch you. Your insurers are not who you think they are - but you tell them the story in second-by-second detail anyway. Repeat this performance with the underwriters, aka your real insurance company; and in case you haven't got a sore ear from being on the 'phone all morning, repeat the process yet again with the firm delegated to provide you with a courtesy car. Except it isn't a courtesy car, it's a replacement car which, let me tell you, is an entirely different kettle of fish. Should you so much as think of driving near a falling leaf, woe betide you, all blemishes are charged for. Efficient people, but they make their money that way. Deal with local school to try and ensure said hit-&-run driver knows that you, the injured party, is distinctly unamused and insurance companies will be in touch. But that takes weeks. Estimates for car damage have to be agreed, faxes (yes they're still used!) went missing, as did e-mails. It's too boring to continue. I have my car back, but my faith in the system is somewhat jaundiced. The happy teen is still driving her undamaged car each and every day. I don't wave.
November was NaNoWriMo - National Novel Writing Month - a sign-on-if-you're-mad scheme that challenges the writer to write 50,000 words between 1st and 30th November. I made an early calculation that the days I had available would mean 2,300 words per day. And then a child was ill. And a far-flung relation came to visit. Oh, and there's an inset day at school. The car insurance problems rumbled on. Building work finally finished, my supply of tea bags exhausted. Other half assumed that a visiting work mate coming to stay with 24 hours notice was no problem. Cleaning showers, making up beds, finding something in the fridge and cupboards to cook, whilst writing my now 4,000 words per day made for an interesting start to this week. And then the strike and all children at home! Someone was conspiring against me.
However, 50,252 words later, I stuttered to a halt on Tuesday afternoon, too tired to think and wondering how the hell I'd got there. I begin again on Monday, this time back to my pen and paper and a more modest daily word count.
Thursday, 1 December 2011
Friday, 14 January 2011
Did you have a good Christmas?
Did you have a good Christmas?
"But they all sound like jobs. I don't really want to do any jobs."
Preparing for Christmas Day can be a solitary occupation.
We had booked a skiing trip for ten days of the school holidays and wouldn't be at home on 25th December.
"Really? Great!" The response from our keenest skiier.
"I don't want to go away for Christmas." The youngest child was concerned that the magic of yuletide would be lost somewhere on a red run.
In light of the planned holiday, my other half had issued an edict: "No fuss this year. Shopping won't take up too much time that way." I still spent hours traipsing round the retail outlets of West Country towns and cities in a bid to buy suitable presents for a minimal festive season.
We combined enthusiasm with encouragement and made plans. Drive to France, eight full days' skiing, and back home. A twenty-four hour hiatus, and then we would hold Christmas Day on New Year's Day. We would close the curtains, ignore the 'phone and the internet, open stockings and go the whole hog, or turkey.
"My salopettes are too small."
"Mum, I don't have any skiing gloves. Remember?" No.
Where had the one hundred and one pairs of ski socks gone? Purloined by members of the extended family, all eager to borrow, none prepared to drive the pilfered posssessions back to their original owners. With roads like ice rinks, we could hardly blame them. "Remind me never to lend anything to ... again," I hissed and added socks to my no-fuss list.
For reasons of fuel economy a roof-box was decided against. We have a large car, and a large family. No longer sub-ten tots, the teens rebelled against being holed up in a confined space; bags of clothing, towels, essential food supplies, snow-chains, a box of crackers and an insisted-upon two-foot-high fake tree, piled about them. The six-foot son is more comfortable sitting in the front, as are his parents, but three people into two seats don't go.
The worst driving conditions for some years meant an earlier departure than planned, in order to make it to our scheduled tunnel crossing. We excelled ourselves (the weather held back for a few hours) and arrived early. Previous trains had been cancelled and there were none running for at least an hour. At four-thirty in the morning, I played Hangman in the back of a cramped people-carrier with our ten year old; her last burst of energy for the entire holiday.
Northern France was kind to us. No snow storms or ice, just driving rain and fog, but my temperature of the past forty-eight hours peaked whenever the paracetamol wore thin. As we approached the bottom or the mountain the dashboard beeped and lit up. This was not an attempt on the car's behalf to bring Christmas cheer. 'Brake disc pads,' it flashed importantly. Days of driving cautiously on snow and ice in the Alps doesn't do much for one's nerves.
Rarely have there been such perfect skiing conditions.
All too often 'flu' times its appearance to perfection. Just two members of the family, so I can't complain. My only feeling of well-being came from knowing that I was in a better state than our younger daughter, whose temperature rose ever higher and whose consumption of Calpol and all other medicines was commendable. She and I didn't leave the apartment for three days and spent much time huddled under duvets, twin beds pushed together for comfort, and tissues littering the floor. Try reading Holes, wonderful book though it is, out loud with a sore throat. I made her read War Horse to herself when she was well enough to do so.
Two days after we arrived in France, we had a 'phone call. A burst pipe had brought itself to the attention of our neighbour, who had been on her way to shut up the chickens. The pipe concerned was in a garage; but in one filled with my brother-in-law's furniture. In our household, all drainage, maintenance and 'facilities' comes under M for Mum. This time, D for Dad had to assume responsibility as I swayed to and fro' with sick-bowls and swilled more drugs. In my early-illness state of health, I had failed either to leave a mobile number or a key to the house. We have good neighbours who had spent time trying to contact us, and then at least two hours in the dark, scraping snow and ice from under a hedge in an attempt to locate our stopcock, and further time breaking into the garage. They had also called the local water company - whose van arrived three days later.
Christmas Eve and Day were a combination of video watching (I have revisited most of the Disney collection), and a determination to celebrate made only possible by doubling all recommended doses and borrowing from my sister-in-law's medical supplies.
My first full day on the slopes was notable for one reason. It was -16 degrees Celsius, at the bottom of the chairlift. My freeze-dried complexion warranted comment upon our return.
We made it back to Somerset, safely. On New Year's Eve, our one-day Christmas Day preparation, I washed a necessary number of socks and essentials, hammered on the supermarket door at dawn, collected dogs from kennels and listened to a diatribe from the owner (a local councillor) about the "ridiculous rubbish collection." On my way to collect the guinea pig from her holiday home, I called in to see our neighbours. And grovelled.
Having given gifts of thanks, I moved on. The turkey was collected from the butcher. "You'll have to leave it out all the time until you cook it. It hasn't really defrosted yet. See!" He poked at the large bird obligingly and when I returned home, having dropped off a child at a train station, I placed the turkey on a platter next to the cooker. The kitchen fug would help to di-ice the fowl. I left a ham simmering, whilst I wrapped presents hastily and not terribly secretly. And then, with mince pies sitting on the side and cooling; I made the roulade, put it in the oven and ten minutes later I heard it.
"Click. Click. Click..." The dual-fuel cooker had run out of bottled gas. The hot plate on the electric side is broken, which left one fan oven and a warming plate to cook Christmas lunch.
So, on New Year's Eve, when you were perhaps preparing to celebrate, or sitting back and relaxing, I passed the fourteen-year-old (who had spent the morning in his pyjamas), a wrapped and labelled present to place under the tree. He had to cross the kitchen and a reception room to undertake the task. Some suggestions regarding possible ways he might help the whole Christmas Day theme to take place, elicited the response, "But they all sound like jobs."
I didn't kill him, but I nearly cancelled Christmas.
"But they all sound like jobs. I don't really want to do any jobs."
Preparing for Christmas Day can be a solitary occupation.
We had booked a skiing trip for ten days of the school holidays and wouldn't be at home on 25th December.
"Really? Great!" The response from our keenest skiier.
"I don't want to go away for Christmas." The youngest child was concerned that the magic of yuletide would be lost somewhere on a red run.
In light of the planned holiday, my other half had issued an edict: "No fuss this year. Shopping won't take up too much time that way." I still spent hours traipsing round the retail outlets of West Country towns and cities in a bid to buy suitable presents for a minimal festive season.
We combined enthusiasm with encouragement and made plans. Drive to France, eight full days' skiing, and back home. A twenty-four hour hiatus, and then we would hold Christmas Day on New Year's Day. We would close the curtains, ignore the 'phone and the internet, open stockings and go the whole hog, or turkey.
"My salopettes are too small."
"Mum, I don't have any skiing gloves. Remember?" No.
Where had the one hundred and one pairs of ski socks gone? Purloined by members of the extended family, all eager to borrow, none prepared to drive the pilfered posssessions back to their original owners. With roads like ice rinks, we could hardly blame them. "Remind me never to lend anything to ... again," I hissed and added socks to my no-fuss list.
For reasons of fuel economy a roof-box was decided against. We have a large car, and a large family. No longer sub-ten tots, the teens rebelled against being holed up in a confined space; bags of clothing, towels, essential food supplies, snow-chains, a box of crackers and an insisted-upon two-foot-high fake tree, piled about them. The six-foot son is more comfortable sitting in the front, as are his parents, but three people into two seats don't go.
The worst driving conditions for some years meant an earlier departure than planned, in order to make it to our scheduled tunnel crossing. We excelled ourselves (the weather held back for a few hours) and arrived early. Previous trains had been cancelled and there were none running for at least an hour. At four-thirty in the morning, I played Hangman in the back of a cramped people-carrier with our ten year old; her last burst of energy for the entire holiday.
Northern France was kind to us. No snow storms or ice, just driving rain and fog, but my temperature of the past forty-eight hours peaked whenever the paracetamol wore thin. As we approached the bottom or the mountain the dashboard beeped and lit up. This was not an attempt on the car's behalf to bring Christmas cheer. 'Brake disc pads,' it flashed importantly. Days of driving cautiously on snow and ice in the Alps doesn't do much for one's nerves.
Rarely have there been such perfect skiing conditions.
All too often 'flu' times its appearance to perfection. Just two members of the family, so I can't complain. My only feeling of well-being came from knowing that I was in a better state than our younger daughter, whose temperature rose ever higher and whose consumption of Calpol and all other medicines was commendable. She and I didn't leave the apartment for three days and spent much time huddled under duvets, twin beds pushed together for comfort, and tissues littering the floor. Try reading Holes, wonderful book though it is, out loud with a sore throat. I made her read War Horse to herself when she was well enough to do so.
Two days after we arrived in France, we had a 'phone call. A burst pipe had brought itself to the attention of our neighbour, who had been on her way to shut up the chickens. The pipe concerned was in a garage; but in one filled with my brother-in-law's furniture. In our household, all drainage, maintenance and 'facilities' comes under M for Mum. This time, D for Dad had to assume responsibility as I swayed to and fro' with sick-bowls and swilled more drugs. In my early-illness state of health, I had failed either to leave a mobile number or a key to the house. We have good neighbours who had spent time trying to contact us, and then at least two hours in the dark, scraping snow and ice from under a hedge in an attempt to locate our stopcock, and further time breaking into the garage. They had also called the local water company - whose van arrived three days later.
Christmas Eve and Day were a combination of video watching (I have revisited most of the Disney collection), and a determination to celebrate made only possible by doubling all recommended doses and borrowing from my sister-in-law's medical supplies.
My first full day on the slopes was notable for one reason. It was -16 degrees Celsius, at the bottom of the chairlift. My freeze-dried complexion warranted comment upon our return.
We made it back to Somerset, safely. On New Year's Eve, our one-day Christmas Day preparation, I washed a necessary number of socks and essentials, hammered on the supermarket door at dawn, collected dogs from kennels and listened to a diatribe from the owner (a local councillor) about the "ridiculous rubbish collection." On my way to collect the guinea pig from her holiday home, I called in to see our neighbours. And grovelled.
Having given gifts of thanks, I moved on. The turkey was collected from the butcher. "You'll have to leave it out all the time until you cook it. It hasn't really defrosted yet. See!" He poked at the large bird obligingly and when I returned home, having dropped off a child at a train station, I placed the turkey on a platter next to the cooker. The kitchen fug would help to di-ice the fowl. I left a ham simmering, whilst I wrapped presents hastily and not terribly secretly. And then, with mince pies sitting on the side and cooling; I made the roulade, put it in the oven and ten minutes later I heard it.
"Click. Click. Click..." The dual-fuel cooker had run out of bottled gas. The hot plate on the electric side is broken, which left one fan oven and a warming plate to cook Christmas lunch.
So, on New Year's Eve, when you were perhaps preparing to celebrate, or sitting back and relaxing, I passed the fourteen-year-old (who had spent the morning in his pyjamas), a wrapped and labelled present to place under the tree. He had to cross the kitchen and a reception room to undertake the task. Some suggestions regarding possible ways he might help the whole Christmas Day theme to take place, elicited the response, "But they all sound like jobs."
I didn't kill him, but I nearly cancelled Christmas.
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