Yikes - after a very short period of what could possibly be charitably described as productivity, I have once again been a very bad blogger. So, what has happened that is of note since my last update?
Well, it looks as though I am likely to be allowed to work for four days per week (as opposed to the standard five) in the very near future. This is not yet guaranteed, but the signs are looking good. This would leave me one day per week free to pursue some organ building work experience. It looks as though this work experience will be able to go ahead, so perhaps I will make some actual progress in my life quite soon!
Of course, cutting down my hours does have financial implications. I have calculated* that I shall be one car payment per month less well-off. The car payments must continue, however - there's no way I'm letting something so useful and reliable go; its running costs are about as low as car running costs can get, and it is incredibly capacious. Also, it is shiny (although in dire need of a wash). To return to the point, I have started to cut down on what I spend (starting, of course, by paying a £200 car insurance bill - way to go!), which will no doubt be painful when I actually want to buy something. Oh, but I have just worked out that I should still be on slightly more money than I was on when I started this job. Wow.
It will be my birthday shortly. Mother has offered to buy the next lot of wool for felting that I want, and I really need to think about if there is anything that I really want that my other relatives could buy for me. I think that HWSNBN is getting me some tools (I should be able to return the borrowed tenon saw to Father; hopefully he hasn't noticed its absence, although he did see me using it when I did a little joinery work for him. I made sure I put it back in my box when he wasn't looking. Never have children - they steal your things). Because what I need in my life is more stuff! He should also be getting me a tool bag in which to store some of the tools, and also for transportation purposes - the tool box I acquired a few years ago isn't exactly ergonomically designed!
I think that I need to up my felt production. I have two friends' birthdays coming up on 9th and 10th June, and want to make felt flowers for them both. One, I think, will like an iris or two (not to be too challenging to myself!), but I have no idea what the other would like.
I am also fixing a felt bag for another friend. Whoever made it didn't pay enough attention to crossing over some fibres (as opposed to have them all running alongside each other), and the strap was coming off. I removed it completely, cannibalised it (so that I had some matching wool to repair it elsewhere), and put it back on with a join that would be invisible had the bag itself not faded ever so slightly - the join is slightly darker. Now I am poking the strap with a needle repeatedly, in order to strengthen it and avoid a repeat performance. After I have decided that this has been done enough, I must repair the tears in the back. I would also like to reinforce that a bit, with fibres running in different directions, in order to avoid a repeat performance. I have wool in a colour which very nearly matches, and a little of the strap, although some of that went to reinforce it where it was getting thin on the opposite side to that on which it snapped.
I love felt, though - it is so easy to mend! Granted, a needle and thread might be quicker than poking, but that requires you to be accurate all the time. Felt is slower, and accuracy kind of builds up over time. Ha! This bodes really well for a career involving lots of accuracy with wood! Somehow, though, even wood feels easier than sewing (with the exception of the sewing of hems - I am good at hems. Probably because it's the only sewing skill I practise regularly).
Now to make lunch. Soup, methinks. Then, perhaps, I shall achieve something.
*This is a lie. I plugged some figures into a website, which did the calculations for me. I hope that it has not made me look potentially better-off than I shall actually be.
Showing posts with label Father. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Father. Show all posts
Thursday, 4 June 2009
Friday, 30 January 2009
I survived!
The maths lessons are now over: thank goodness for that.
The first one did not go well - the exercise sheet I prepared was not well-prepared and had difficult exercises at the beginning and easy ones at the end. I kind of lost the class, and ended up babbling and losing the ability to add up and to write on the board. This was about 20 minutes after I finally lost the attention of the class, but fortunately the lesson did not last long after that. I am not convinced that many of them will have learned anything. I think that the Oxford English Dictionary may now be in the process of re-defining the word "crap" to include my lesson.
Before the second lesson I re-jigged the exercise sheet so that it was in the right order; that lesson went a lot better. We nearly got through the whole lesson, and it went along at what I considered to be a good pace, with plenty of time to talk to individual students and also quite a few comparatively fun bits. This very nearly made up for the profoundly unimpressive performance I produced in the morning, and made me feel a lot better. The class behaved less well (like teenagers in their own clothes (as opposed to school uniform) away from school on a Friday afternoon, in fact), though. It was a pity that the unruly class got the good lesson while the well-behaved class had to put up with a shambles.
Now I have to start to concentrate on the business of moving house. Mother says that she and Father, along with Anne and maybe Robert will come on 27th Feb and help to clean the new house, then help me to move on 28th, then help to clean the old house on 1st March. This will be very useful; cleaning is a nightmare! Also, as HWSNBN's dad is no longer alive, we will not have his help with the moving of things - he helped a lot last time and also drove the van.
Tomorrow we will paint HWSNBN's garage floor to seal it (so that it stops shedding concrete), and we will then be able to use the garage to store our boxes for a few weeks. That will help a large amount: the thing I hate the very most about packing is that one fills loads of boxes, but then has no space to fill additional boxes because the place is already filled with boxes. This way we will be able to look as though we are organised, and stuff.
HWSNBN still doesn't know about the hammocks. Mother thinks that perhaps they were a bad idea, but that I might be able to put hooks in my walls from which to hang them. I think that the landlord may not be impressed. We then discussed my wrought iron candelabra and my desire to have it up in my new kitchen. Mother says that it will make the ceiling black, and that I should use it in my back yard. Given that I acquired this about 5 years ago, and that I have to cart it about with me, it really would be useful if I were to get to use it.
I am looking forward to the space in the new house, and am feeling less anxious with the (mostly) successful completion of the maths lessons (nobody died nor ran riot, nor was the projector hit with an exercise ball) and the doing of an unbloggable thing today. I am .looking forward to jettisoning some Things and moving...
The first one did not go well - the exercise sheet I prepared was not well-prepared and had difficult exercises at the beginning and easy ones at the end. I kind of lost the class, and ended up babbling and losing the ability to add up and to write on the board. This was about 20 minutes after I finally lost the attention of the class, but fortunately the lesson did not last long after that. I am not convinced that many of them will have learned anything. I think that the Oxford English Dictionary may now be in the process of re-defining the word "crap" to include my lesson.
Before the second lesson I re-jigged the exercise sheet so that it was in the right order; that lesson went a lot better. We nearly got through the whole lesson, and it went along at what I considered to be a good pace, with plenty of time to talk to individual students and also quite a few comparatively fun bits. This very nearly made up for the profoundly unimpressive performance I produced in the morning, and made me feel a lot better. The class behaved less well (like teenagers in their own clothes (as opposed to school uniform) away from school on a Friday afternoon, in fact), though. It was a pity that the unruly class got the good lesson while the well-behaved class had to put up with a shambles.
Now I have to start to concentrate on the business of moving house. Mother says that she and Father, along with Anne and maybe Robert will come on 27th Feb and help to clean the new house, then help me to move on 28th, then help to clean the old house on 1st March. This will be very useful; cleaning is a nightmare! Also, as HWSNBN's dad is no longer alive, we will not have his help with the moving of things - he helped a lot last time and also drove the van.
Tomorrow we will paint HWSNBN's garage floor to seal it (so that it stops shedding concrete), and we will then be able to use the garage to store our boxes for a few weeks. That will help a large amount: the thing I hate the very most about packing is that one fills loads of boxes, but then has no space to fill additional boxes because the place is already filled with boxes. This way we will be able to look as though we are organised, and stuff.
HWSNBN still doesn't know about the hammocks. Mother thinks that perhaps they were a bad idea, but that I might be able to put hooks in my walls from which to hang them. I think that the landlord may not be impressed. We then discussed my wrought iron candelabra and my desire to have it up in my new kitchen. Mother says that it will make the ceiling black, and that I should use it in my back yard. Given that I acquired this about 5 years ago, and that I have to cart it about with me, it really would be useful if I were to get to use it.
I am looking forward to the space in the new house, and am feeling less anxious with the (mostly) successful completion of the maths lessons (nobody died nor ran riot, nor was the projector hit with an exercise ball) and the doing of an unbloggable thing today. I am .looking forward to jettisoning some Things and moving...
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