Life in the life lane

Hello - where am I – Oh it’s Blog World!!!!

I haven’t been here in such a long time, so much and nothing has happened I don’t really know where to start.

My holiday was a bit of a washout for several reasons:

I hate where my parent’s flat is, it’s noisy, smelly, hot and dusty and if you don’t have a car, walking in 40 degrees of heat is no laughing matter.

The nearest beach is 25 minutes walk away – in 40 degrees heat.

The flat – in 40 degrees heat – has no air conditioning!!

My poor niece was ill for most of the holiday and was unable for most of the time to leave the flat or even eat anything and the temperature (40 degrees) for her was unbearable.

Did I mention the heat – heh heh!!

Most of the rest of the holidays was spent DIYing, my eldest son has built himself a wardrobe, it was his first attempt at carpentry and he has built a solid fitted wardrobe in his room – the doors don’t fit too well and are slightly different sizes, he has yet to put on the handles and the whole thing still needs painting, but for a first attempt, I think it is marvellous!!

We got a new garage door, new guttering, new slabs for under the little tool shed, cleared out: the garage, behind the garage, the big garden shed and loads from the attic into a giant skip.


The skip had amazing magical properties as whenever a metallic item was placed into it, the following morning it had disappeared – washing machines, garden rollers, old vacuum cleaners, metal chairs and assorted chains and rusty tools all vanished mysteriously – well actually they were taken away by rag and bone men (scrap merchants), who clambered all over the container looking for anything they might be able to salvage for scrap. This was actually a bonus for us as we were able to get rid of far more rubbish due to the self-emptying properties of this device.

Back to work at the beginning of September and the perennial problem of trying to find a new staff member – I am very fussy and know exactly what I am looking for, so interviewing has been quite a depressing affair, I have now interviewed around 12 people for the post of Librarian/Open learning officer and fussiness aside none of them have been suitable.
They either have no experience working with children, they cannot speak English, they cannot understand English, they do not read books or know anything about books, they know nothing about computers – the list goes on. How do they expect to be able to cope with a job where children are constantly asking, demanding, requesting all sorts of help?? I do find sometimes, that we are holding X factor auditions and have to stop myself laughing at the answers some people give to questions at interviews.

For the last 10 days I have been spending a lot of time with my Dad. My mother has gone away for a well deserved holiday with my brother London Cabby, so the rest of the family: Sister from Palmers Green, Sister from Harrow and Wealdstone and Brother Agnostic Joe, including assorted children and partners have all taken turns in spending as much time as possible with him. Since my Father was literally on death’s door, two years ago, he has been on a huge number of medications, having all kinds of treatments and numerous hospital appointments. For all these reasons we thought that we would draw up a Rota of times when we could all help out – it all worked out really well although it was tiring for all concerned trying to fit in this extra responsibility with out normal busy lives. My Dad loved being fussed over and was delighted with all the attention, he even showed the District Nurse the rota, which had been laid out in chart form by my sister in Harrow & Wealdstone. When my Mum returned from her holiday my Dad also showed it to her and she became quite emotional. I am just glad that my parents have such a big family, because looking after anyone is a huge responsibility and we only did it for a short time, some people have to look after their loved ones for years.

To all of you out there, you unsung heroes, carers of family or friends, my love and admiration goes out to you all.

Best wishes and Big hugs to you all.

Jo xx