Tuesday's Child is full of grace...
Today was largely uneventful. Well, for me personally, at any rate - and there was only the one stabbing in the local paper for today. Do violent criminals hibernate?
I spent much of the morning continuing in my hunt for a job. A further problem (beyond the fact vacancies are either for people with 5 GCSEs or for people with three further degrees and twenty years of experience) with this is that I probably need to be looking for a place of work that does not involve my having to deal with an excess amount of stairs. I do not wish to be thought lazy, but stairs do still make my knees go a bit woggly, which is unlikely to be conducive to productivity. Alas.
When not looking for jobs, I sent rather a lot of e-mails, mostly about Guiding. You know, just for a change... To be fair, they were about lots of different bits of Guiding: some about Brownies, some about Guides, some about peer education sessions... Not that my life has been completely taken over by Guiding or anything, no...
When Daniel reappeared to do some PHD research online I relinquished the computer and went and played in the kitchen: attempt two at dairy-free chocolate marshmallow krispies, this time using marshmallow fluff, which is actually a quite alarming substance. It is viscous and sticky and smells overpoweringly sickly. Doubtless very popular with small children. It seemed to work okay though, and the end result tastes very nice, if I do say so myself. Of course, having had that for dessert means that the plum crumble I made yesterday remains untasted. Alas.
In the afternoon I wrote to half a dozen people (the art of letter-writing is indeed not lost, although some of my efforts may have been verging on the stream of consciousness - sadly without the finesse of Virginia Woolf). It feels very strange to be writing to people at Newnham (other than notes on the pads outside their doors, evidently) but I suppose I will get used to writing what was my address for three years on the front of envelopes instead of the back in time. I have bought some more writing paper, as I have used the last of my very fine fold&seal stuff. The new paper is scented. It smells a bit like the aftermath of an industrial accident involving vast quantities of Skittles, but never mind...
I also had my first group exercise class at the hospital this afternoon. Most of the other people there were middle aged +, including a guy who may be a bionic pensioner... I found it hard work - we do 8 sets of exercises in five minute blocks and by the last exercise I was having problems standing up as the muscles just above my knees were shaking & spasming quite impressively - and encouraging the rest of my legs to join in. Gah. Quite a few of the exercises on my list had to be adapted for me - when I did my assessment with the physio I'd been seeing, I wasn't doing things for five minutes, and the difference really is substantial. Although my knees are so much better than they were last month (and definitely better than they were two months ago, when I was lying in hospital, floating on a small cloud of morphine and trying to convince the nursing staff that no, I was not 16) they are still not up to all that much really. There were stretches at the end of the class that I just couldn't do at all - quite humiliating when the bionic pensioner was sitting on the floor with everyone else - and others that, in my netball-playing days, I would have had no problems with at all. Well, unless a kneecap had decided to seize the moment and make a bid for freedom, evidently.
After the class I wandered along the High Street into town, in search of another pair of jogging bottoms. I had a clothing cull a while ago in which all but one pair went (not that I ever had that many, you understand) but with two exercise classes a week I think two pairs of joggers are called for. I wouldn't really feel comfortable cavorting about the place in shorts - okay, so I am a size 8, but I am quite conscious of the scars on my knees - they're a couple of inches long and about half a cetimetre wide. Oh, and surrounded by smaller, circular scars from where my knees were stapled. Not exactly an attractive look. Jogging bottoms were duly purchased, and I managed to resist the temptation to buy any more stripy socks. Please all be impressed.
Most of this evening was spent reading - I was looking at the biographies of Lady Baden-Powell and Juliet Gordon Low, considering them from a gender history perspective & also in light of the assertion (made by my DOS) that they are not biography, but hagiography. Because now I can do things like that for fun...
Tomorrow I need to have a proper look at the Lottery Grant Application Form. It is lengthy. Makes "War and Peace" look brief, sort of thing. But it must be done. For the Brownies are going to France (huzzah) but we would like people to give us money so more of them are able to afford to go. Which seems reasonable to me. I also need to buy resources for the 4 session I am running at Guides on Friday. I need sweeties, amongst other things... Mwahaha. Happily, Catriona has said I can keep hold of one pair of the drunk-goggles (they distort your vision/depth-perception) to use in the session I am running at Ignition (Girlguiding LaSER's forum for young women aged 14-26) in a couple of weeks. The others I must return to her on Saturday when I go in to train In4mers on Sexual Health with Lizzi and Mel. I am due to have my flu jab (gah - asthma - gah) before going in for the training. Belmont Hill Surgery seem to have decided that flu jabs should be fun as the walk-in clinic is being advertised almost as a kind of social event. Which is, you know, special. I am not keen on needles (yes, that does add a whole other dimension to the epipen thing) but despite this while I am there being stabbed I should find out about how to arrange to have my annual bloodtest. Just to ensure a morning of concentrated joy.
*exit stage right, deep in thought*
I spent much of the morning continuing in my hunt for a job. A further problem (beyond the fact vacancies are either for people with 5 GCSEs or for people with three further degrees and twenty years of experience) with this is that I probably need to be looking for a place of work that does not involve my having to deal with an excess amount of stairs. I do not wish to be thought lazy, but stairs do still make my knees go a bit woggly, which is unlikely to be conducive to productivity. Alas.
When not looking for jobs, I sent rather a lot of e-mails, mostly about Guiding. You know, just for a change... To be fair, they were about lots of different bits of Guiding: some about Brownies, some about Guides, some about peer education sessions... Not that my life has been completely taken over by Guiding or anything, no...
When Daniel reappeared to do some PHD research online I relinquished the computer and went and played in the kitchen: attempt two at dairy-free chocolate marshmallow krispies, this time using marshmallow fluff, which is actually a quite alarming substance. It is viscous and sticky and smells overpoweringly sickly. Doubtless very popular with small children. It seemed to work okay though, and the end result tastes very nice, if I do say so myself. Of course, having had that for dessert means that the plum crumble I made yesterday remains untasted. Alas.
In the afternoon I wrote to half a dozen people (the art of letter-writing is indeed not lost, although some of my efforts may have been verging on the stream of consciousness - sadly without the finesse of Virginia Woolf). It feels very strange to be writing to people at Newnham (other than notes on the pads outside their doors, evidently) but I suppose I will get used to writing what was my address for three years on the front of envelopes instead of the back in time. I have bought some more writing paper, as I have used the last of my very fine fold&seal stuff. The new paper is scented. It smells a bit like the aftermath of an industrial accident involving vast quantities of Skittles, but never mind...
I also had my first group exercise class at the hospital this afternoon. Most of the other people there were middle aged +, including a guy who may be a bionic pensioner... I found it hard work - we do 8 sets of exercises in five minute blocks and by the last exercise I was having problems standing up as the muscles just above my knees were shaking & spasming quite impressively - and encouraging the rest of my legs to join in. Gah. Quite a few of the exercises on my list had to be adapted for me - when I did my assessment with the physio I'd been seeing, I wasn't doing things for five minutes, and the difference really is substantial. Although my knees are so much better than they were last month (and definitely better than they were two months ago, when I was lying in hospital, floating on a small cloud of morphine and trying to convince the nursing staff that no, I was not 16) they are still not up to all that much really. There were stretches at the end of the class that I just couldn't do at all - quite humiliating when the bionic pensioner was sitting on the floor with everyone else - and others that, in my netball-playing days, I would have had no problems with at all. Well, unless a kneecap had decided to seize the moment and make a bid for freedom, evidently.
After the class I wandered along the High Street into town, in search of another pair of jogging bottoms. I had a clothing cull a while ago in which all but one pair went (not that I ever had that many, you understand) but with two exercise classes a week I think two pairs of joggers are called for. I wouldn't really feel comfortable cavorting about the place in shorts - okay, so I am a size 8, but I am quite conscious of the scars on my knees - they're a couple of inches long and about half a cetimetre wide. Oh, and surrounded by smaller, circular scars from where my knees were stapled. Not exactly an attractive look. Jogging bottoms were duly purchased, and I managed to resist the temptation to buy any more stripy socks. Please all be impressed.
Most of this evening was spent reading - I was looking at the biographies of Lady Baden-Powell and Juliet Gordon Low, considering them from a gender history perspective & also in light of the assertion (made by my DOS) that they are not biography, but hagiography. Because now I can do things like that for fun...
Tomorrow I need to have a proper look at the Lottery Grant Application Form. It is lengthy. Makes "War and Peace" look brief, sort of thing. But it must be done. For the Brownies are going to France (huzzah) but we would like people to give us money so more of them are able to afford to go. Which seems reasonable to me. I also need to buy resources for the 4 session I am running at Guides on Friday. I need sweeties, amongst other things... Mwahaha. Happily, Catriona has said I can keep hold of one pair of the drunk-goggles (they distort your vision/depth-perception) to use in the session I am running at Ignition (Girlguiding LaSER's forum for young women aged 14-26) in a couple of weeks. The others I must return to her on Saturday when I go in to train In4mers on Sexual Health with Lizzi and Mel. I am due to have my flu jab (gah - asthma - gah) before going in for the training. Belmont Hill Surgery seem to have decided that flu jabs should be fun as the walk-in clinic is being advertised almost as a kind of social event. Which is, you know, special. I am not keen on needles (yes, that does add a whole other dimension to the epipen thing) but despite this while I am there being stabbed I should find out about how to arrange to have my annual bloodtest. Just to ensure a morning of concentrated joy.
*exit stage right, deep in thought*