New Year, new starts.
My new job at Witney Library starts 20th January. I'm very happy about it as it's a permanent contract - 14 hrs, Tuesday morning, Wednesday afternoon and all day Friday. Whilst it's fewer hours than my present contract (18.5hrs), I'll be glad to have my weekends back. For the past two years I've worked every Saturday morning at Grove Library, and I'll be helping out by working alternate Saturdays until the volunteers take over at the start of May. My contracts at Grove were only temporary, and were due to end at the end of April, so I'm lucky to have a permanent contract at last.
As parents you (try to) do what you consider to be the best for your child. For many and various reasons we've gone down the private education route - up until now. Phoebe's well established at her lovely girls school in Abingdon, no worries there. Sadly, last week we received an e-mail/letter from Tom's school inviting us to a meeting to discuss the future of the school.
Unfortunately we'd already experienced the demise of the local prep school here in Wantage, which is why we ended up taking the children to a school in Faringdon.... Not ideal. Not local. (10 miles commute). Not environmentally friendly, not good for forming friendships, not good for fuel consumption and wear and tear on vehicles.... in all, not what we'd chosen, but then the choice was taken away from us.
And it's been a lovely lovely, school, our children have done well, and although there had been 4 head teachers in 5 years, we thought we'd weathered the storm, and stuck by them. Now it seems, they'd been subsidised by the parent company for the past 9 years, and they're no longer prepared to keep losing money.
So, here we are again, with the parents campaigning, raging, fighting, kicking, screaming, calming... forming a group, and negotiating, thinking, scheming, planning, hope against hoping that they can overcome the obstacle, and find a solution, rise above it, fix it, mend it, start it again, start over, afresh, new and clean, bright as a button, like a child on their first day of school. And I hope they can.
Because we can't. Because we've done it before. And last time we waited it out and that was a mistake. Because the school slowly disintegrates before your eyes. Week after week the children gradually drop away, like a rumour, drip away, like a whisper, if not in your class, then which class, how's it hanging together now, by a string, by a thread, by a cobweb?
So we're doing what we think is best. Again. And I'll not say anything further about it until everything's done and dusted because it doesn't seem right.
And, if that's not enough to be getting to grips with, on top of all that, we've had our own situation with the local floods.
We've had a long-standing problem with our drains. Or rather we experience problems with our drains when the main sewer/foul line is inundated with rain water. And on the occasions we experience a problem with our drains, it's usually sorted itself out, and receded within 12-24 hours. I could go on, but it's a bit of a bore. Suffice to say for the last 5 days we've been overflowing at the inspection chamber at the front of our house, at the inspection chamber at the rear of our house, and also from our neighbour's inspection chamber onto my hen patch and vegetable patch at the back of the garden. For 5 days.
Today it's finally receded and we've been able to sluice it down, rod it out, and start to feel that we're back to normal. Except we're not back to normal. Normal's not normal when you expect your drains to flood when there's heavy rain. So I've been on the phone - a lot. And I'm going to be on the phone - a lot. And I fully intend to get this resolved because I'm completely fed up of them taking the piss (pardon my language), or should that be them NOT taking the piss, because no piss was taken anywhere as it all overflowed into my garden.
Our two district Councillors visited and viewed the situation on Friday, and on Saturday I had a good chat about it to my County Councillor and I'm not letting this drop until something happens, because what's been happening for the last 5 years is just not good enough. So here's where I pin my fight. And I'm right in the mood for it.
Watch this space.
Kat.
My new job at Witney Library starts 20th January. I'm very happy about it as it's a permanent contract - 14 hrs, Tuesday morning, Wednesday afternoon and all day Friday. Whilst it's fewer hours than my present contract (18.5hrs), I'll be glad to have my weekends back. For the past two years I've worked every Saturday morning at Grove Library, and I'll be helping out by working alternate Saturdays until the volunteers take over at the start of May. My contracts at Grove were only temporary, and were due to end at the end of April, so I'm lucky to have a permanent contract at last.
As parents you (try to) do what you consider to be the best for your child. For many and various reasons we've gone down the private education route - up until now. Phoebe's well established at her lovely girls school in Abingdon, no worries there. Sadly, last week we received an e-mail/letter from Tom's school inviting us to a meeting to discuss the future of the school.
Unfortunately we'd already experienced the demise of the local prep school here in Wantage, which is why we ended up taking the children to a school in Faringdon.... Not ideal. Not local. (10 miles commute). Not environmentally friendly, not good for forming friendships, not good for fuel consumption and wear and tear on vehicles.... in all, not what we'd chosen, but then the choice was taken away from us.
And it's been a lovely lovely, school, our children have done well, and although there had been 4 head teachers in 5 years, we thought we'd weathered the storm, and stuck by them. Now it seems, they'd been subsidised by the parent company for the past 9 years, and they're no longer prepared to keep losing money.
So, here we are again, with the parents campaigning, raging, fighting, kicking, screaming, calming... forming a group, and negotiating, thinking, scheming, planning, hope against hoping that they can overcome the obstacle, and find a solution, rise above it, fix it, mend it, start it again, start over, afresh, new and clean, bright as a button, like a child on their first day of school. And I hope they can.
Because we can't. Because we've done it before. And last time we waited it out and that was a mistake. Because the school slowly disintegrates before your eyes. Week after week the children gradually drop away, like a rumour, drip away, like a whisper, if not in your class, then which class, how's it hanging together now, by a string, by a thread, by a cobweb?
So we're doing what we think is best. Again. And I'll not say anything further about it until everything's done and dusted because it doesn't seem right.
And, if that's not enough to be getting to grips with, on top of all that, we've had our own situation with the local floods.
We've had a long-standing problem with our drains. Or rather we experience problems with our drains when the main sewer/foul line is inundated with rain water. And on the occasions we experience a problem with our drains, it's usually sorted itself out, and receded within 12-24 hours. I could go on, but it's a bit of a bore. Suffice to say for the last 5 days we've been overflowing at the inspection chamber at the front of our house, at the inspection chamber at the rear of our house, and also from our neighbour's inspection chamber onto my hen patch and vegetable patch at the back of the garden. For 5 days.
Today it's finally receded and we've been able to sluice it down, rod it out, and start to feel that we're back to normal. Except we're not back to normal. Normal's not normal when you expect your drains to flood when there's heavy rain. So I've been on the phone - a lot. And I'm going to be on the phone - a lot. And I fully intend to get this resolved because I'm completely fed up of them taking the piss (pardon my language), or should that be them NOT taking the piss, because no piss was taken anywhere as it all overflowed into my garden.
Our two district Councillors visited and viewed the situation on Friday, and on Saturday I had a good chat about it to my County Councillor and I'm not letting this drop until something happens, because what's been happening for the last 5 years is just not good enough. So here's where I pin my fight. And I'm right in the mood for it.
Watch this space.
Kat.
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