Supertramp - It's Raining Again

I ache!

Monday night is karate training, my family and I have been training for about two years and it's something we really enjoy. My other half trained years ago but the kids and I were total beginners; my other half started back at white belt and has since worked up to 1st kyu, I have worked up to 2nd kyu and the kids are almost at 4th kyu.

Recently I've started to help out with the kids' session before training in the adult session and last night I helped the kids out through all of their session before going at it hammer and tong in the adult session, during sparring I nearly ripped the other half's jacket. According to him I'm a 'grabber' and should probably give judo a try. Umm... I think I'll stick with karate for now although I'd love to give Iaido a try.

According to him I should also try sparring with someone else in future, I always end up sparring with him, as I'm improving and may surprise myself. I have sparred with others in the past when I've had to, including grading when I lost my balance and landed on my arse but I got up dusted myself off and carried on to receive my next belt. I just don't feel confident enough to want to spar with anyone else if that makes any sense, sparring isn't something I relish the thought of, I much prefer kata and I know I'm good at them.

Anyway a double session made me feel totally awesome last night but I'm really feeling it now! 
Same again next week? After a 5k race the day before? We'll see...

                                            I made this meme after being awarded 4th kyu

Monotony or tradition?

It's sunday afternoon and, as usual, I am cooking a roast dinner.
I can bet I am not the only person in the world doing so.

Via Google Images

Our favourite roast dinners are probably beef or pork but today it's roast chicken with bacon and mushroom stuffing, roast potatoes, yorkshire puds, green beans, sweet corn, bread sauce and gravy. Above is not one I prepared earlier!

I am a stickler for a Sunday roast, I could be hungover and knackered (although not so much over the last few years) and I would still spend hours cooking, knowing it will be enjoyed. I could probably count the amount of roast free Sundays on one hand.

However, it is not so much the cooking that I love, although it is something I enjoy and am good at, it is more what it stands for. It is the four of us sitting around at the table for at least one evening a week and having the most random and bizarre conversations with no distractions.

Some people would probably say it is rather monotonous to cook the same things every Sunday but I do love this tradition. On one hand I like some change and can adapt well to it but on the other hand I do like routine and things done in a certain way. I like the tradition of this Sunday roast.

Anthropological Mum: Thank you I'm Going Insane and I'm Taking You WIT...

I love the picture on this post, as a mum I can totally relate to it!

Anthropological Mum:
Thank you I'm Going Insane and I'm Taking You WIT...: Thank you I'm Going Insane and I'm Taking You WITH ME.

Going mobile

I installed the Blogger app onto my phone and am just testing it out...
Translation - I'm still in bed and can't be arsed to get up yet!

Update - Half hour later

I'm up and drinking coffee!

I rather like the idea of blogging on the go; I often think of ideas while I'm out and about, and usually I put them into my notes app, but I almost always forget about them by the time I get home. I have no reason to now!

How's about a piccy of my phone?

It's a Samsung Galaxy Pocket and ok it's not the best phone on the market but when my contract ran out on my HTC desire I opted for a downgrade on a cheaper tariff  and I only got a new phone because for the last year I'd been unable to charge it, swapping batteries with the other half every night for a year was an absolute pain in the arse! But, for what my phone is, it does a great job! I can still text, make calls, go on Facebook, Twitter and now Blogger, I can also check my uni page when I'm on the go too.

It's no iPhone *smirks* but I couldn't really ask for a better phone! 

I'm a terrible mother!

Watching TV with the other half, we start getting a bit peckish...

There's fish fingers in the freezer, usually saved for the kids to have, er... Not anymore!

I can't remember the last time I had a fish finger sandwich but they're so good and we've really got to have one! So by god we're going to have one!

I'll be good and replace them before the kids even realise, honest!

Out with the old...

This is my old blog
http://theviewfromthemount.wordpress.com/

I've copied a few posts over to here from there but I really can't be arsed to do anymore.
If you want to read anymore previous posts, feel free...

I will, however, finish with one of my favourite posts from my blog over there, enjoy.

(First published October 2012) 

Lost and found

Yesterday marks the fifth anniversary of my moving to "Mount Dizzy" with my kids, a day I'm not likely to ever forget.

Most of our stuff had already been moved to the house but when I left the refuge that had been our home for the last two months I still had a fair bit to carry. I'd been told by a girl at the ref that there was a bus stop about 5 minutes down the road where I could get a bus which would get us to our new home. Loaded up with bags we left, knowing we couldn't go back, for what should have been a short walk to the bus stop. Couldn't find the bus stop anywhere!

It was cold, dark, the kids were tearful and I was stressed. We stopped outside a house so I could calm down and compose myself for a couple of minutes. During this time an old lady came out of the house, saw us and asked where we were trying to get to. I explained where we were trying to get to, she said there wasn't a bus stop around but the bus we needed stopped at a bus station about 4 miles away and she insisted on driving us.  Who was I to argue?

We bundled into the car and she took us to the station. There I saw the bus we needed and, I was so relieved, got a little tearful. I couldn't help it, I'd tried to keep it together for so long. She gave my chin a friendly tap, the way a grandmother or aunt would, and made me promise to help someone else in need when the time came. The kids and I unloaded the car and got the bus home.

I don't know whether it was a coincidence that we should stop outside her house or God sent an angel when we needed one the most but I will always be grateful to her and, while I don't think I've done anyone a huge favour than I can see yet, I will always help when I can.

Little things mean a lot without you even realising.

The "Baffling with Bull" approach.

(first published 27/11/2012)

If you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bull. 
W. C. Fields
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/w/wcfields108794.html#BKHViHkQxTEI2JOy.99

Outside the OU centre in Cardiff, for my first tutorial last month, I met one of my fellow students. We were both really nervous and I said something about my trying to look intelligent for the next two hours, her response was the above quote albeit a little more profane which surprised me but also made me giggle and lightened the mood.

It’s a quote that I’ve thought about a lot over the weeks and an approach that I thought I’d try when it came to part two of my first assignment, comparing a painting by Cezanne and one by Vecchio. Part one involved my comparing passages about the relationship between Cleopatra and Antony.

I found part one fairly easy but struggled with part two, Art really isn’t my thing but I figured that as it mainly relied on my opinion of the two pieces and there was no right or wrong answers, as long as I could back my opinion up with some technical terms I’d scrape a pass. Winging it I did the best I could and submitted it…

Three highly stressful weeks later I got my result back! (Yesterday) Not only had I passed but I’d got just one point below my personal target of 70% and to my shock a higher mark for Cezanne than Cleopatra! I had been no nervous and scared of failing that when I finally got my result I couldn’t help but cry with relief and happiness. I AM smart enough to be doing this and I DESERVE to be on this course!

My tutor gave me some great feedback on how to redo Cleopatra for assignment two and as for Cezanne, well what was seemingly bull to me, my tutor could see exactly where I was going with my writing. Wow! And there was me thinking I was writing total bullsugar!!

All in all I wrote a “very promising assignment”, my confidence is sky high at the moment and I even went back to karate training last night for the first time in about a month. I have day school at the weekend and I’m determined to make the most of it. I’ve got my mojo back and I don’t intend to lose it again! 

Now I’m off for a coffee and to have a good read of my tutor’s comments and assessment to see what I can do for this next assignment, gonna totally smash my target this time!

Moral: What might seem like total bull to you might seem great to another so give it a go!

I'm so roll and roll

It’s the weekend!

Party time? Ha!

Last night I had one bottle of beer and was in bed before midnight…

This morning I was awake at 8:30am, up and on the phone to uni by 9:30am, not a single trace of a hangover at all and am enjoying a quiet lazy day 

I might even get my text books out in a bit as it’s so quiet!

I wouldn’t go as far as to say I had a drink problem years ago but I did drink a lot with my now ex husband and ‘friends’, which caused problems. However, I was able to get myself out of that hole and turn my life around over the last four or five years by surrounding myself with positive people instead of negative. I hardly drink, can stop at a few rather than get totally off my face everytime I drink, and, aside from a very rare crafty cigarette, gave up smoking over two and a half years ago. Just as well because I don’t think I’d be able to do my karate training with the family if I still smoked and I definitely wouldn’t be doing my degree if I went from drunk to hungover and back again, repeat as necessary!

But you know what? It feels so good to wake up at the weekend with no hangover, sober and cuddled up to my other half in the morning knowing that he loves me and would never hurt me in the way I have been in the past.

Some things money can’t buy, this is one of those things.

Better to remain silent and be thought a fool…

(First published 11/11/2012)

… Than to speak out and remove all doubt – Abraham Lincoln.

Is that really the case?

I had a tutorial yesterday and, having really low self confidence in my abilities, I always feel like I shouldn’t be there or should be sitting in the corner wearing a hat marked with the letter D. That in itself is really stupid but I can’t help the way I feel, it’s what I’ve been lead to believe in the past but God knows I’m trying to change that with the help of people who love and care about me.

Anyway the first part of the tutorial was a debate, moral traditionalism V moral rationalism. I felt seriously out my my depth there and stayed quiet, smiling and nodding which I think was at least better than switching sides halfway through like two of my “team-mates” did.

The second part of the tutorial was poetry, I’m not great poetry critic but I can at least say what I think about it and contribute one or two intelligent thoughts about it. We were discussing a particular poem and the tutor wrote a line on the board and asked us to look at it and if we noticed anything about it. Lots of suggestions about it but I still stayed quiet but not without thinking about it. My mind was actually going ten to the dozen, you see I’d stumbled upon something in the line but I was arguing with myself as to whether or not I should say anything.

For about 5 minutes, it seems, I was silently wrestling with myself. I really wanted to say what I’d spotted but fear of appearing a fool stopped me. Finally someone else spoke up, said exactly what I had seen and got it spot on! Damn I feel stupid for not saying anything when I had the chance!!

I can’t win! Feeling stupid for saying something and stupid for not! Talking to my other half last night about it and even he said I should have said something when I had the chance. I guess I do have more smarts than I give myself credit for. So next time, however stupid I think an observation is, I’m going to say something!

Better to talk even if you think you’re way off the mark than to keep quiet and think “What if?…”

My student life.

I left school when I was 14 with no GCSEs and have had a few disastrous attempts at trying to gain qualifications over the years before finding the right path.  

My first attempt at Open University was with technology course, code M150. Now, how I thought I could do this I will never know. First assignment, essay on The Large Hadron Collider. Ummm I didn't even know what it was without Google and couldn't even pronounce it until my other half told me, he’s done it with Cezanne and Shostakovich when I was doing my recently completed humanities module, what I'd do without him I'll never know! I must sound really dumb but honestly I'm not. This was just all new to me really, still is now, and sometimes I need a little nudge in the right direction. In my defence, I did pronounce Vecchio correctly the first time! 

But anyway, going back to M150. Let’s say the assignment did not get submitted and neither did any others as I quickly knew I was in over my head and swiftly departed the world of OU. 

2 years later I found myself with the courage to try “brick” college, BTEC level 3 in Technology. Older and wiser? Not in this case. Well some of it I coped with, what stumped me was having to create a logo using arty, graphic programs. Oh and Excel! A problem I managed to deal with by doing ITQ levels 1 and 2 last year, yaay!

I didn't even make it to half term on that course. It really wasn't the right time or environment for me, all school leavers and me with kids closer to their age than I was. I also had some family issues that needed to be addressed too so I quit, again!

Nearly three years later, I am on top form! As mentioned in previous blog posts, In the last two years I haven't stopped! I've successfully completed high grade GCSEs in Maths and English and ITQ levels 1 and 2. I've completed 60 credits out of 120 needed for level 1 of my degree, humanities/art history, with good grades but I should find out if I've passed the examinable final assignment in a few weeks. I'm also currently three assignments away from completing the second 60 credits, social sciences. Out of four assignments three of those gained a mark of 80%+ and two gained distinctions. 

So why now? What changed to enable me to do all this? On thinking about it, I've come to the realisation that Technology (to that high level) really isn't for me, No shit, Sherlock! However, it was the path that I thought was expected of me and not what I wanted. I was never going to succeed in something that my heart was never in so it’s really no wonder that I failed, if you can call it that. Is giving up on something because your heart’s not in it really failing?

Instead I started at the beginning, I got the qualifications that I was capable of; the ones I probably would have got if I didn’t leave school at 14. I got the IT qualifications that I was capable of too. Now I'm going for the big one, at least 3 years of hard work ahead of me, I'm almost a year into it now and just enrolled on level 2 modules starting in October and February.

How?

Simple…

I've been doing what I want to do, not what I think is expected of me and I'm absolutely loving it! I highly recommend it!

Living with a killer

(First published 14/07/2012)

We have a cat called Frankenstein (Red Dwarf), he is a 2yo domestic short hair – Translation: I don’t know wtf it is/mongrel breed.

We’ve had him since he was a 2 month old bundle of fur and, up until he had the snip a couple of months ago, we always thought him to be a bit of a wuss. He’d come in with minor injuries and sometimes bring other cats in with him. One morning I saw him sitting on my daughter’s bedroom windowsill and thought it was a bit odd because, since she locked him in her toy-box about a year ago, he doesn’t go in there. it was only when I got to the kitchen and found him eating breakfast that I realised he’d brought in a little friend. Probably the same friend I found him sitting with on my bedroom windowsill when I woke up on a different morning.

I’d heard about cats bringing in “presents” to show their love and gratitude to their adoptive parents but Frankie rarely brought anything in. I thought it was a little strange that he never caught anything but figured that cats are like people, all different.

Then he had the snip, thinking that it would stop him getting into fights and chill him out a bit. Ok he seems to have stopped fighting so much BUT is now a cold-blooded killer whose tokens of affection are now endless! Every other day I’m finding dead mice and birds, sometimes 2 or 3 bodies, seriously!!

WTF has happened to my wussy-pussy?? He has become a little black panther predator! I have been told that putting a collar with a bell on him will stop it but he refuses to wear one.

I guess I just have to come to terms with the fact that  the loss of his balls has resulted in the awakening of killer instincts.

Keep calm, it's only karma!

(First published on 14/07/2012)

Recently I read a book called Obedience by Jacqueline Yallop. Its about a nun in WW2 France and goes back and forth between that time and present time. She does something very bad, during the war, and spends the rest of her life paying for it.

Its made me think about Karma and whether or not we are totally immune to it.

I believe that, from experience, Karma catches up with all of us eventually.

Years ago I did some bad things, I won’t lie – No-one’s perfect and I don’t pretend to be! I have since paid for those mistakes and in doing so I have become a far better person.

I also know of other cases lately where people have done wrong in the past and are paying now. Do I feel sympathy? No! To feel sorry for their plight would mean I care and some people I stopped caring about years ago!

Does indifference make me a bitch? Maybe, maybe not!

My, how they grow up fast!

(first published on 13/07/2012)

My son, my baby boy, my first born, just turned 11 last week and today he is off for an adventure weekend with the school. Most parents I know cry at their kids getting so big so fast but me? I see it as a wonderful thing, I also have a daughter who is 9 and a half, because now they can make me coffee! Seriously though, I think that its great that my kids are growing up, its a big wide world out there just waiting for them and I go along with them for the ride.

My son is off to secondary school in September and, rather than cry tears of sadness, I think I may cry tears of pride. Ok so pride is a sin, “Bitch please” if I’m going to hell I’ve got a list of worse things I’ve done in my life than be a mother who is proud of her children! Get the marshmallows on!

A little about me

I'm "just a mum"

I'm a 30-something mum from London, residing in the valleys of South Wales with my geeky better half and my two children. I started an Open Degree with hons, with the Open University, last year; I hope to combine English with Social Sciences, marginally more Social sciences than English so I can put BSc after my name instead of BA. Following my degree I hope to train as an adult basic skills tutor and give adults, like myself, a second chance at education.

When I'm not studying I enjoying looking on the internet for random/geeky/funny stuff, I also like playing Dungeons and Dragons Online and, so I've not got my nose stuck in a text book or sat on the computer all day, participate in Karate with my family. We've been going for about two years and I'm currently a 2nd Kyu.

I've been blogging on and off for around eight years and, while I don't particularly have anything interesting to say, it's good to have a sounding block and to practise my writing skills.

I have quite a few posts on a blog powered by wordpress and will start moving them across to here.

Thanks for dropping by, please do call in again. 

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