Thursday 23 October 2008

How to be a guiding light

Yesterday evening was generally fun, with the exception of the tidying. I still hadn't finished when Robert and Anne turned up (haven't done so yet, for that matter), but there is floor visible everywhere in the house except my bedroom, where the clothes have conspired to take over my floor. I obviously did not put them away firmly enough: more training is required.

The pasta and sauce seemed to be appreciated. The piano practice I compelled Anne to do was not. Poor thing. She is just at that stage where she doesn't really know what is going on, but she seems likely to continue in that way unless Steps are taken to remedy the situation. We concentrated on counting, timing and getting the right notes, before moving on to "How do you find "f" on the keyboard?", followed by "Well, how do I find "f", then?" For your information, it is just to the left of (below) the three black notes. I am hoping that she will find it a lot easier when she knows how to find the notes. We will have another session tonight, and she should then be the best she has ever been for her lesson tomorrow. Also, she may hate me; although she still seemed to like me at the end of yesterday evening, she was throwing a few dark looks in my direction, and playing rebellious notes.

Naturally, being the good and responsible big sister that I am, and in no way jeopardising her sleep so that I can gain popularity as the cool big sister,* I got her to bed on time, which meant an early night for me, and for Robert (I think he must normally get to bed at 6am, judging by how late he gets up).

This morning, I discovered that Robert had decided that my drive was not a good place to park his car, despite my gallant second-choice parking space usage with my own car, and instead decided to park so that my next-door neighbour couldn't get out of his drive. The mind boggles. I moved his car onto my drive (it seems quite nice, but makes a funny noise when I start it, and doesn't really want to lock - maybe it was hoping I'd take it out for a run), at which point my lift arrived. I left Anne and Robert lying cosily in my lovely warm house** and went to work.

Work was noisy. The deconstruction work they are doing outside my window has entered an even louder phase (including a circular saw larger than I imagined could exist in the scariest of my dreams. This is the ride-on version. I actually swore when I saw it). It's a bit like having birdsong in the background, if the birds were large, mechanical and tuneless.

Over the lunch break, Rose asked if I would like to sing/play the organ at a Christmas carol service. Last year was apparently dire, with the organist not turning up to practise, and failing miserably with the whole keeping time thing. It looks like I may have the opportunity to fail in a similar way this year! Hooray! I had better break out "O Come all ye Faithful", and give it a bit of an airing.

Onwards! Things to do! Children to torment!*** Washing to put in the machine!


*I think I established in the previous paragraph that I do not always pander to her desires, which adds credence to my story.

**In beds, not dead/cluttering up the place, or anything.

***Well, one child, anyway.

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