11) AVOIDING "KEYBOARD FACE"

Blathering on about how amazing it is that women can have many different and often conflicting things going on in their pretty little lives at once is nothing new. But I thought I'd dwell on the subject of multi-tasking. Not in that annoyingly martyrish "Woe is me! I've got so much on my plate!" way we women sometimes do, that makes you just want to slap yourself and say, well, do less then. Just as a matter of interest and because I was inspired by a line in this: (http://www.emilycagle.co.uk/blog/2010/01/lost-for-words-five-novel-ways-to-beat-writers-block)

Take this week, for instance. On Monday, the snowpocalypse (as I've heard it nicknamed) finally permitted my children to return to what had become a novelty: school.  but at the later start time of 10 a.m.  Now, that's my sort of schedule!  In addition, the headteacher had organised for staff to meet us at the roadside and escort our children into class like a sort of concierge service so that we wouldn't clog up the already snow-clogged School Lane with our vehicles and could just drop and go.  What bliss!  While I missed saying a falsely (at that hectic time in the morning) cheery hello to all my playground mum-mates, as I haven't seen them yet this year due to snow and a shared school run with a neighbour, this was a great new system.  Only Ritz Hotel doormen-style uniforms would have added to the glamour!  But I digress...

I also had the luxury of the children being at After School Club till 6pm - something (and here's a top-tip for "Portfolio workers") I recently enrolled them in for two days a week so that I could try to organise my shifts around my availability to work, rather than vice-versa.  And even if I'm not working, I kid myself that it's worth them going so I can "catch up" (usually on blogging, tweeting and facebooking, which is - very sadly - unpaid, would that it were not!  But it's my new year resolution to make it housework- honest!)  They also love going now, as I've found when I'm trying to drag them home because I've tried to be organised and the sausages are burning!  I digress still further....

I'm trying to get onto Tuesday.  It was my school-run sharer's turn so I waved the boys off and switched the TV channel from some-cartoon-or-other to luxuriate in a bit of breakfast telly before I got cracking.  I had a one-off night shift that evening - I nearly wrote one-night-stand here as that's what it sometimes feels like the morning after - without the *naughty bits*!  But it actually involves being desk-bound from 9 pm to 9 am plus travel time of an extra hour - but longer in this Arctic weather - each way.  So, I needed to make the obligatory to-do list for my Other Half (hereafter to be known as OH, as I understand is the modern convention, though sometimes prefaced by other adjectives - usually The Saintly - because he is - but, occasionally more venomous terms!)  Then get dinner sorted early, make 'lunch' for my 2 a.m. break; do some voluntary work, clean up and pack for my eldest son's *scarey* three nights away on a school trip to Dorset.  This also entailed making a Tudor outfit that wouldn't have him backing away in horror, despite the fact that my clumsy needlework and inspiration merely ran to adapting one of my white blouses as I hadn't had the chance or the inclination to buy something more apt from eBay.

So, with the washing machine on the go; something in the slow cooker and my work bag (because I dread forgetting my ID card & bleeping pass for the building) and son's case mostly packed, I set off to meet the mum I'm helping.  Home-Start is an excellent charity (See here http://www.home-start.org.uk) that I wish I'd known more about when my two were babies & my not-so-saintly-on-this-occasion) OH was away a lot.  I did an 8-week course in the Autumn and now I've got a lovely but struggling Mum to look after.  On this particular visit, it involved settling her young daughter down for her day-time nap; something said child is non too keen on.  Or rather, she's so exhausted that she can't seem to settle herself to sleep. Having been there, done that & read all the Gina Ford-esque books on the subject, I have been known to put her down for a nap successfully and felt the warm glow of achievement as a result.  Not on this occasion.  Little One cried and cried until my inner resolve wavered and I ended up trying non controlled-crying methods of sending her off to the land of ZZZZs that enabled her mum to get some much-needed peace.  So, for an hour and a half, I held her in my arms, gazed down at her restful little eyelashes and perfectly relaxed complexion, and could do nothing but gingerly shift my position with bated breath, look around and think.  It made such a pleasant change!  So, of course, as well as admiring the wallpaper, I mentally planned the rest of my day and it occurred to me that maybe we multi-task, as a species, because we're trying to stay awake, just like a baby gets more and more hyper as she fights her need to sleep!

I say this because after getting home again, making batter for toad-in-the-hole, collecting and/or dropping off our shared children while leaving said sausages to almost burn, nevertheless having a cosy dinner together and seeing the children, chuntering, into the bath, I set off to work.  I have to admit, there was a spade in the boot and a blanket on the passenger seat just in case, but I wasn't expecting a difficult journey, it's just become habit lately.

Once in central-heated luxury, having arrived early for once, the blur of busy-ness began.  It was only when I filled in one of those endless job applications (something I've done a bit of lately, in moments when I feel the need to search for a 'proper' job) that I realised how complex my role is sometimes.  Watching the box in the corner of the room from home, it all looks so easy - until something goes wrong.  But a ton of work goes into each little segment of a programme.  Occasionally, your workload necessitates reading a book, going to a screening or watching a DVD on a future episode of something for much-needed research so I can hardly claim that the job is stressful compared to, say, risking billions on the stock market, coal-mining, open-heart surgery or engineering - or, indeed, teaching.  But it's getting ever more technical and definitely requires a methodical, organised approach, attention to detail and lots of double-checking.

So, with new stories breaking - like the tragic Haitian earthquake - and the blizzard outside taking on extra significance, the wee small hours went by in a scurrying blitz.  I worked out the clips for and (excuse the geek-speak) edited two packages and a set-up; wrote the cues to three news stories, cut the promos I'd been allocated, got up to speed on the briefs for three live interviewees and sighed phewingly when the reporter fronting a live from the snowed-in Midlands thankfully made it to his location on time despite the inclement environment.

By 7am, I was entering the danger zone.  In the absence of adrenaline, with the programme on air and with my caffeine intake already at its palpitationss-avoiding limit, keyboard-face threatened.  For the uninitiated, this is the moment where you drop off and, simultaneously, your propped-up face falls off its palm up, elbow-on-desk shaped perch and onto your keyboard.  Not a pleasant waking up experience but, more mortifying is the laughter on the amused faces of your, until now, zombie-like colleagues.

To avoid this, when my eyelids had been open for approximately 22 hours, I found myself doing an online course at the same time, while keeping an ear out for instructions and the general mellee around me, purely because (a) I had to do it sometime soon and don't have the software at home and (b) I needed some sort of extra stimulation to stay alert.

I was also at maximum worrying capacity: concerned about how I was going to get home in the snow that had not been predicted to affect our 'patch' & also about aforementioned son's trip away (which ended up being postponed due to the weather anyway) & also about my items as they went to air (Did I choose the right shots? Could that have been written better?) &, with apologies to Victoria Wood, also about moving house, wrinkles, life in general and the baggage retrieval system at Heathrow.

So what did I do?  More!  After surreptitiously taking a peek at Facebook & Twitter to get road home updates - and the rest - I also tested myself on editorial policy.  It worked!  No keyboard face.  Just the occasional bewildered "Uh?!" as I was asked to do something and forgot which of the 'worlds' I was inhabiting at that particular moment.

The adrenaline kicked in as I navigated my home in the newly (again) whitened world we're having to get accustomed to, grateful that I hadn't taken the train after all as services had been cancelled, and eventually made it back to my bed at around 11 am.  Sleep was swift but too brief and then it was back out in the wilderness to collect three boys, two of whom were disappointed that they weren't sleeping over elsewhere - but I wasn't!

So, after a solid block of sleep involving vivid dreams, which I'm told are your subconscious way of sorting things out - still multi-tasking then! - writing this has helped to clear my mind too.  I've also thoroughly enjoyed the simple creativity of it.  But while the telly's been on as sort of background newzac (instead of muzac), I haven't needed to do too much at once because I'm more-or-less alert now. For me, anyway.

Is there some logic in that? If not, thanks for reading anyway, especially if you were doing something else at the same time!

10) EVERY SNOWY CLOUD HAS A SILVER LINING

OOh! I've just been approved as a member of British Mummy Bloggers. How exciting. I've also gained at least one other reader, judging by my Twitter content, so I'd better get writing a bit more often. Here goes.....

Living in the south east, we've had our far share of the cold white stuff lately. It's meant three days without pay for me and three days off school for the boys - which I'm sure they regard as a good thing. In a way, it's felt like an extension of the Christmas holidays - hanging around at home, playing games, doing family things together, eating lots with the excuse that we need to stay warm. And despite our penury, I've loved every minute of it.

My OH has spent hours outside - way beyond my frozen toe-tolerance levels - carving out an igloo that I think he has enjoyed more than the neighbourhood toddlers it's enticed. And despite the argument going on within earshot right now over the Wii being turned off at last for the first time this morning, we've been able to achieve so much while we've been forcibly housebound.

I've finished the trim on an antique chair I started reupholstering six months ago in a fit of creativity. I'm so proud of it, because it's so against my nature to be that craftsy, that I may well have to post a photo of it here? When I get round to it.

Meanwhile, the ironing pile is more molehill than mountain for the first time in months - with a little help from the in-laws who stayed just after the New Year.

I've found all sorts of buried 'treasure' while rummaging under sofa cushions with the hoover so the lounge actually IS clean, instead of just looking it on the surface.

The children's scrapbooks are up-to-date - a project I started during that creative season I've only just realised I had - in an attempt to stop the house being wall-papered with their schoolwork, certificates and doodles.

The kitchen cupboards are only half-stocked, but that's a good thing because we're moving house next month so we need to get rid of the half-opened packets of lentils and soya mince that no one really likes but which I buy in regular fits of health angst.

We've had loads of quality time with the neighbours, who are now firm friends, thanks to the Blitz spirit the snow, ice and power cuts have inflicted on us. And we may even get to watch the Beowulf DVD my OH has been nagging about since before Christmas now that we've watched most of the Sky-plussed backlog.

Plus, I've been able to update this and I may even bake some bread later.

So, all in all, it's been very much like that situation I've often wished for: "Stop the World I want to get off!" That's the phrase I sometimes utter when I feel overwhelmed, overworked, stressed out and pulled in all directions. Now it's happened! If that's what winter's all about, this sun-worshipper may have to start liking the other end of the year too.

So when the Big Freeze turns into the Big Melt, floods permitting, I'll be ready for the world to start spinning again.

And instead of my usual New Year dieting resolutions, which have been postponed until February, it's been a refreshing change to start the new decade with a huge mental & physical spring clean. Whilst my To Do list is not actually Done (will it ever be?), at least it's shrunk.

9) REARRANGING ARRANGEMENTS

My dentist's secretary phoned yesterday to confirm today's appointment. I knew then, that because I would be charged a missed appointment fee, because they had bothered to reconfirm, because I had already postponed it once and was dreading it for all the impending jangling pain that renewing a filling would entail, that a spanner would be put in the works of that appointment.

It came, 3 hours later, in the shape of our elder son who repeatedly threw up on the way home from football practice - in someone else's car. As if that wasn't bad enough, said car was fairly posh with leather seats and the sort of owner who has probably vacuumed and polished it more than once on a Sunday morning.

I had taken my son and his friend to football training and the idea was that the friend's dad would bring them both home. It's a fairly new arrangement but benefits us both. I could crack on with making dinner (& doing some online 'research', of course!)

So after apologising and putting the freezing cold poorly boy in the bath and clearing up after him another two times before plonking him in our bed, banishing the husband to the spare room and steeling myself for a night of non-sleep, the non-sleep ensued. I won't go into the gory details but the poor child was up several times before 2 a.m. and then we were all woken by the automatic 'it's a school day' internal alarm clock.

Texts were sent, school was phoned and before long, a neighbour had taken younger son to school; said school had been phoned to forewarn them they'd be at least one child less for the Christmas lunch that day & appointments cancelled - except the pearly white one!

Then it snowed - but not enough to keep us in. Another near-miss thwarted. Along with the snow, an angel descended on my doorstep begging a favour. My neighbour needed me to babysit while she went to her son's Christmas nativity & she'd just found out that young siblings weren't allowed to attend. So I looked after her 18-month-old & managed to stop her from drawing on my furniture and sticking all my nearly-written Christmas cards together. In return, because her clan had just recovered from a week's lurgy, she didn't mind looking after poorly boy who told her where the teabags lived and, thankfully, wasn't at all ill in my absence. Meanwhile, I was injected, drilled and refilled to tunes from Classic FM.

And you know, the whole experience was fairly painless - aside from the bill. 90 quid for one tooth to be filled (with the white stuff not that old amalgam poison) and a scale & polish. No idea whether or not that was good value but after the injection, I felt not a thing and I'm happy to pay good money for that kind of non-pain.

So, here's my first posting about a potentially calamitous day that ended up not being and here's to the sisterhood for helping each other out when dire straits approach!

P.S. We all went on to get that horrid tummy bug - found out later it was norovirus.

8) HOME SWEET HOME

"All I want is a room somewhere
Far away from the cold night air
With one enormous chair
Oh wouldn't it be luvverly."

I often hum that song when I'm online, searching property 'porn' for our dream home. We've found it several times, as I shall explain, but in my usual calamitous fashion, things have gone awry at the last minute.

Having lived in rented houses for the last seven years, getting our own place is hugely significant. We want to be able to redecorate and hang things on the walls without having to put it all back to how it was in a while. But, more importantly, we want to become part of a community - something that seems to take seven years to establish, especially in Britain.

The first house we put in an offer on was taken off the market after the separated couple who owned it got back together. We put in a cheeky offer on a second house, which was perfect inside but lacked a big enough garden, and were pipped to the post by someone who offered the full asking price.

Then we compromised on road noise because a bungalow was in the perfect village location - only to find via the HIP report and several calls to the local council, that neighbouring properties had been bought up by a developer and it would soon turn into a building site. So we withdrew our offer. Then I got an email from the same estate agent, informing me that the property was back on the market - followed by a hasty apology after I hit 'reply' and said, yes I know, we put it there! To my immense surprise, the big boss of the estate agency then rang me and had the temerity to ask what it would take for us to change our minds about withdrawing our offer. He seemed surprised when I asked, "Would you want to live on a building site? In what was formerly a quiet cul-de-sac and was now being turned into an estate with seven houses where two bungalows existed?" He said it would only be for about six months and then all would be well. He just didn't get it. And he's in the business. I felt like referring the honourable (?) gentleman to my previous post on disliked individuals.

So we've now reached chapter four in our house hunt: We made a reasonable offer on a gorgeous bungalow, in the wrong part of town (but that was our Location, Location Location-inspired compromise - there always has to be one apparently), only to find that the owner wanted a £2000 mutual deposit and contract signed which (a) consisted of various points that should happen in the normal course of events anyway and (b) so that we would adhere to some kind of unrealistic time schedule. So, again, we had to pull out.

I know houses are in short supply at the moment, but should it be this difficult? It's seriously tempting to throw in the towel. But we've decided to wait until after Christmas and stick to our list of requirements and just persist. Our list is simply: Character features, garden, garage or off-road parking, village near to current and prospective schools, park or field nearby for essential football playing, walking distance to shops, near train station if at all possible. Now I know that property exists but is £100K out of our price range, so playing the lottery is also on our to-do list! Meanwhile...

I know that's slightly more than a room somewhere with a huge Lemsip-advert style chair but is that too much to ask?

7) ROTA RANT

LOVE TO HATE

People who draw up staff rosters, bless `em, must rank next to traffic wardens, estate agents, bankers and scruples-less journalists in the least-liked list.  It's a difficult job – factoring in people's leave, training, days' off and covering bank holidays fairly.  So you have to be as obliging as possible to the roster king or queen in order to get a good deal.  But when they make a mistake, it plays havoc with the lives of those staff.  A whole two days were turned upside down in my case.  I wouldn't mind if it was a one-off but this is the third time there's been an error in as many months.  

To explain:  I was expecting to be working on Thursday during the day but it turned out I was working overnight.  No big deal, you might think.  And, fortunately, I found this out before I'd bought my return train ticket – something I was just about to do in an extremely rare moment of over-organisation.  But I HAD already humiliated myself by grovelling for some extra childcare as a one-off at after school club; I HAD agreed to give a friend a lift to a fitness class on Friday morning and, most importantly, I HAD just adjusted an important meeting for some voluntary work that I'm doing.  Something I didn't feel I could adjust once I'd discovered, through phoning to double-check, that I was on a night shift.  So struggling through the day yesterday, after very few zzzzzs, was not that pleasant for me or those around me. 

Normal service should be resumed soon....... 

6) THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY

THINGS THAT GET MY GOAT

1) How supermarkets always stack bananas the wrong way up for maximum bruiseness.

2) Why you have to pay all those miscellaneous extra fees to banks and solicitors when you're buying a house - there's enough to fork out already!

3) How I always dwell on the past and my husband is forever planning the future.

4) How you always bump into people you admire/adore/don't want to see when you're at your worst in the hair, zits, fashion stakes.

5) The way chocolate muffins speak to me, but apples and oranges don't....

6) Shop-bought sandwiches in this country - why are they 90% mayo and not much else? And why do we accept that it's ok to pay £2 or more for them when we know full well they cost about 50p to make?

7) Adverts. They make me buy things I really shouldn't  & make my children nag about things they really don't need.

8) Children - the way they throw back your own personality at you when you're trying to tell them off.

9) My siblings - the way they've only got to make one reference (usually at huge family gatherings like at Christmas) to something you did when you were seven and you're back there, seething.

10) Exercise. I think more people would do it if it didn't make you sweat and look like you're about to internally combust. And if it didn't give you a huge appetite.

11) Arrogance - in anyone, no matter how wealthy, wise, or well-known. We're all just human.

12) The way my feet get too cold or too hot really easily.

13) Hearing tales of awful, unjust illnesses affecting innocent children or really good people in the prime of their lives. So unfair.

14) Defeatist attitudes.

Things that get me 'up' rather than down:

1) Cinnamon
2) Good coffee
3) Cheese and tomato toasties
4) Blue skies
5) Blue Jeans
6) My three really squishy 'down' pillows
7) Good books
8) Hugs
9) Elderflower cordial and sparkling water
10) Lovely clean new stationery
11) Eating grilled fish al fresco
12) Orange juice - no bits!
13) Radio 4 or 2 or Classic FM, depending on the time of day and levels of stress
14) Kind people.
15) The smell of baking bread or cut grass or tiny babies.
16) Children's giggles.
17) When I've written something that I think is alright.
18) When I lost 4 pounds and Wii Fit gave me an age of 29. Yay!
19) A really good gossip with old friends, preferably over a glass of wine.

To be continued......

5) TACT AND DIPLOMACY

You know how we mums have to carve out a network of people to help us achieve the unachievable? Like match working hours with school drop offs and pick ups somehow? Well, I've managed to do that with the help of an equally busy mother of two, who also owns a huge dog, and likes to keep herself fit through swimming and horse riding. So far, so much in common. The bad news, she's as tardy and disorganised as I am!

So, at parents' evening, having been told by my seven-year-old that he had to be at school for the register by 7:30 (when it's actually between 8:30 and 8:45) , I queried this with his teacher, to raise a laugh.

"Well, he would benefit from arriving at school a little earlier," was her exact response. That was me told! I hadn't realised that assembly was at ten to nine. So by showing up at quarter to, we weren't technically late but nor were we giving him much chance to take off his coat, hang up his bag, put his lunch bag on the trolley, hand in his homework, read a book and chat with his mates before being ushered into the hall.

Poor kid. I was a little chastened. Especially as he had truthfully told his teacher that he was always ready on time, but it was his mum or his neighbour that he always had to wait for! Oops! So how to broach this with my school-run sharer? My sister-in-arms. My fellow mum and tantrum-tolerator who's only too willing to divide up the odd bottle of wine or home-baked delight with me too?

Of course, I chose the coward's way out. At a night out with our other halves, after more than a few halves of the bottled kind, I told her a carefully edited version of the above story. I said we (noting to myself mentally that, of course, she was always waaaay later than I ever was when it was my turn to drop off) really must make a new half-term's resolution to get the kids to school earlier. Aim to leave home at ten past, then we might actually get to leave by quarter past and get to school by half past instead of quarter to.

She laughed, but my OH did tell me I'd handled it in a sneaky sort of way. How else could I have handled it without sounding obsessive-compulsive or seeming to rebuke her for being disorganised? Aside from that other playground etiquette dilemma where another child has hit or bitten your child (or vice versa, which is even worse) that must rank in the top ten of delicate matters we mums have to contemplate.  Any tips?