Bargain hunting!

So I bagged a bargain yesterday.  Popped into the charity shop in Grove, looking for cheap saucepans for Tom to wear on World Book Day on 7th March.  The usual thing, go to school dressed as your favourite character from a book... Tom and I are currently reading the Enid Blyton trilogy of Faraway Tree stories - 'The Enchanted Forest', 'The Magic Faraway Tree', and 'The Folk of the Faraway Tree'.

Tom's particularly enjoyed the Saucepan Man with his deafness and mis-heard words.  I'm just revelling in nostalgia as these were my favourite books when I was his age. Lovely.

Anyway, I did find an individual stainless steel teapot for 70p, which has come out all shiny from the dishwasher. More to work on for the costume, and there's time to play with.  But.  My real bargain was a vacuum cleaner.  I know what you're thinking, it's not remotely like a saucepan, but when you see a bargain in a charity shop you've got to get it.

So the vacuum cleaner in question is a Miele S7210 in lemon yellow!  It said it had been tested and cost me £40, with 1 pack of unopened bags included.

Now, obviously you've to keep your wits about you buying electrical goods 2nd hand, but this seemed genuine to me.  I've already replaced the dust and exhaust filters and it works just fine, much better suction than my existing vacuum!  'Which' magazine say it was one of their 'bestbuys' when launched in September 2008.  And the current rrp is £270 or so.  So I've got a 4-5 yr old MIELE vacuum cleaner for £40 which, to my mind is a bargain!!!

Simon and Phoebe were both incredulous when I showed them my purchase.  Why do you need that? was their question.

Well.  Seeing as I'm the only one here who ever does the vacuuming, and also seeing as my existing Sebo X1 vacuum is over 12 years old, and stinks of dog, even with the in-bag freshners, it seemed blindingly obvious to me why I'd want to trade up to a Miele, even second-hand.

Sebo X4 - the current version of my X1 vacuum cleaner

What to do with the Sebo?  The drawback was I'd only just got a set of replacement bags for the Sebo.    Cost me £24 for 10 bags, was £21 last time.   So I don't feel like freecycling it straight away.  I'll keep it on the go for the timebeing, to ensure the Miele isn't a dud.  Once I'm half-way through the bags for the Sebo, and confident of the Miele, I'll offer it on freecycle.

Well, guess what I'm doing this afternoon....  vacuuming of course!

Thanks for reading, keep it sweet,  Kat ;)

Distracted

Not been myself lately. Not in a bad way. Just distracted.

I've applied for a job.

It's a full-time thing to apply for a job. To apply.  To apply yourself.  To apply yourself to the task. To apply yourself to the task of applying for a job.

And the thing is, I'm happy in my job at the Library.  Very happy.  But.  My contract ends in September, and even if it's extended the hours will be reduced - guaranteed, Council budget cuts.  This is the dilemma.  There's a chance that my boss there will take early retirement, and, in theory I could apply for her job. Who knows, if things don't fall my way, then I might well do that, if it came to that. And who's to say I'd get the job?

Who's to say I'll get this job?  Don't want to say too much for now in case I jinx it, but I've an informal interview on Wednesday.  When I called to confirm my attendance I asked what an 'informal' interview was. They said they'd had 41 applications, so had selected the strongest 15 to have a quick chat with in order to draw up a formal interview list of 5.  That's how competitive the job market is in 2013!

So, keeping this short, it's time for bed again, and there's a busy week of half-term holidays ahead of me.  Keep it sweet.  Kat :)

Deflation subtract effort equals knowledge

By rights I should be feeling deflated.  I didn't get the job I applied for.  I didn't get the interview.  I did get the sift interview - whereby to whittle the 41 applicants(!) down to 5 to interview they held 'informal 15 minute discussions' with 15 of the candidates.  I was one of the 15, and then one of the 10 who got the letter saying we'd not got the interview.

So essentially I got the elbow.  But did I?  What I did get was an updated CV, always useful.  Interview experience, always useful.  And did I really want the job?  I wanted a job in school because working 'term-time only' makes childcare less expensive.  So I had a reason for wanting to work in administration in a school, but was it reason enough?  Obviously not.  So food for thought, which is also useful.... and my CV is up to date.

My poor hens have had a rough time of it.  The quantity of rain that fell on this country last year was record breaking.  We're all now aware of the water-table and aquifers that supply our water, and the floods that have happened up and down the country, but what does this mean in hen terms?  What effect has all the rain had on them?  I''ll show you.

This photo was taken a week ago. There had actually been a lull in the relentless rain of late, a few days of dryish weather, recovering from the snow melt, which wouldn't have helped.  Then one day of rain and  quagmire again. The land is so wet, so sodden, so squishy, there's no where for the water to go anymore.  Even the local park had floods...

Wantage Memorial Park Recreation Ground, flooding Jan/Feb 2013

above Faringdon new Cricket Ground, looking towards the Vale of the White Horse in the mist

So morning dog walks are feeling a bit more hopeful, there's Spring in the air, full of birdsong, leafbuds sprouting, snowdrops and daffodils straining, and yes, even a glimpse of blue sky, the promise of Spring, the start of something, a new beginning, again.  And it feels good. The recognition of the cycle, the groundedness of belonging to the routine of family, the routine of work, the routine of routine.

Kat.

Questions, questions...

reminds me of the Spandau Ballet song 'To Cut a Long Story Short'.

(Things I like about the internet:  1.  Google.  verb. as in:  'I google, you google, he googles, she googles, we google, you google, they google....'  I digress.  I googled the Spandau Ballet song title, and found the lyrics...  how good is that?!!!  :)

To Cut a Long Story Short (by Spandau Ballet, 1980)
Soldier is turning 

See him through white light 
Running from strangers 
See you in the valley 
War upon war 
Heat upon heat 
To cut a long story short 
I lost my mind 
Sitting on a park bench 
Years away from fighting 
To cut a long story short 
I lost my mind 
Standing in the dark 
Oh I was waiting for man to come 
I am beautiful and clean 
And so very very young 
To be standing in the street 
To be taken by someone 
Questions questions 
Give me no answers 
That's all they ever give me 
Questions questions 
Oh look at the strange boy 
He finds it hard existing 
To cut a long story short 
I lost my mind

Now that song takes me back, but that's another story.  The reason this post is titled 'Questions questions' is because of the questions my children have asked me recently.

Tom (age 6, nearly 7) asked me, whilst I was driving him home from school the other day, 'Why do cars get petrol?'  So, to answer his question, on a level he can understand, I used a food analogy, to explain that while he gets energy from food, so he can run, and play and grow, and do all the things his body needs to do, and the things that he wants to do, a car needs petrol to give it energy.  'So it can grow?' he asked me.  'No, cars don't grow.  They need energy to drive.'  I replied.  His silence meant either he was thinking about it, or my answer wasn't good enough.  So I tried to explain where the petrol went in the engine, that there was a spark and an explosion and a piston, and then I got a bit out of my depth...   So all Tom said was 'so that's why I'm hot then'.

The pleasure of driving my son to and from school is the opportunity to foist my musical tastes on him, especially the joy of mis-heard lyrics.  Current favourite is the Beyonce song 'Crazy in Love'.  We wack the volume up loud and join in the 'uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh, banana'.  Try it!

Tonight, Phoebe, now 12, asked why the cover of 'The Week' magazine featured David Cameron standing on the white cliffs of Dover looking out towards Europe.  So. Well.  It's complicated. I could have said 'ask your Father', but I didn't.  I had a go.

..'so although we're an island, we're part of Europe.  We're also part of the political part of Europe, the European Union, which used to be called the EEC (European Economic Community) and which we joined in 1973.  But, we don't have the same money, the same coin as Europe, we've kept our money, the Pound, and they've got the Euro.  David Cameron has stated that if his party win the next election they will hold a referendum (what's a referendum? it's like another vote, but on a specific question, a single item, not for who's going to be in government/power) to ask whether we should stay 'in' Europe (politically) or get out.  Phew.

And then I thought, how do I know all this?  All this to Phoebe is history.  And the EEC has ceded / merged / obliviated(?) from the European Community and then into the European Union of today.  But all this (recent!) history I've lived through.  In 1973 I was 7, turning 8 in the summer.  I vaguely remember a jolly faced man, Edward Heath, the then Conservative Prime Minister, and his rival, Harold Wilson, the pipe-smoker.  And it's been going on since then.  You just sort of know.  To a greater or lesser extent.  You take an interest.

In 1973 the oil crisis meant that at home the electricity went off, and we had to use candles.  I was 7. It was fun.  I'm almost sure that one night there was a thunder storm which so frightened my mother we ended up sitting under the table in the living room. My father was a police man and worked shifts, so he wasn't there for that.  In 1973 we had dreadful haircuts, the school photos attest to that.  And we wore floral polyester blouses with round peter pan collars or roll-necked tops, and jeans with butterflies on them.

We were luckier then. Children had much more freedom to roam. In fact we were more often shoo-ed away, told to go and play with your friends after school, and not come back until tea (supper) time. We ran everywhere, or cycled. We played hunting games, war games, hide and seek spy games, copied the Scooby Doo story line, or Hong Kong Phoeey, or whichever cartoon was popular that week. We climbed trees, played by and in the stream, roamed the farmers' fields, and were chased away with him waving his stick at us.  We made dens, read comics, fell over, bumped our heads, cut our knees, had playfights, real fights, tears and dirt.  We had grubby fingers, grubbed in the mud with sticks, dammed the stream, ate apples from the trees, ate blackberries, spat out elderberries (too sour) and didn't want to go in when called.

This is my (not so recent) history. Histoire. Story.  This is my story. And now, as always, it's bedtime. So there's my bedtime story for you.  I hope you enjoyed it.

ttfn. keep it sweet. Kat.