Princess

Listen, I Can Explain

29 March, 2016
Posted in: Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

Childminders are proving a bit difficult at the moment. We have our regular woman who, alas, is returning to France at the end of April. We have someone who is covering Tuesday afternoons which I cannot since I started the new job (and our regular woman cannot as she has lectures). We have the new woman who is starting in May. We have our regular evening babysitting woman who is doing some day time cover for us over the school holidays (but can only do bits and pieces as she has another job). Even with Mr. Waffle dutifully filling in the gaps, it’s been a bit of a whirlwind of interviewing and checking references and introducing new people. I offer this as an explanation for why the Princess came home from school on a Tuesday afternoon to find an unknown stranger in the hall welcoming her back. You see we’d told the boys and their school and just, somehow, neglected to tell herself, that we had someone new covering Tuesday afternoons. She was not pleased.

Once the boys start secondary school, I think there will be no more childminders.

47

12 March, 2016
Posted in: Family, Hodge, Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

I was 47 on Thursday. It was a bit unsatisfactory. For a range of reasons. Firstly, I was at work, having decided that it would be inappropriate to take a day’s holiday too early in the new job. I think that was a mistake. Secondly, I had arranged to meet someone for lunch when, really, I would have preferred to go somewhere nice on my own and then a couple of other people came and even though all of these people were very nice, I ended up being the conversational glue holding everyone together and that is tiring.

Thirdly, when I came home that evening, I turned around and headed out the door with Daniel who was singing at the school first confession that evening. We were there about 7. The priest was late. We only finally emerged about 9. Daniel got to sing a verse of one of the hymns with a smaller group and it all went well, so he was pleased. I had hoped to have a celebratory birthday take-away (the excitement!). But, fourthly, by the time I got home after 9 it was really too late. Then, fifthly, I trudged disconsolately to the fridge to get a birthday dinner of cheese and crackers only to find that the cat had got into the fridge and food was scattered everywhere and she was wolfing down some chicken scraps. Under the pile of chicken, inevitably really, was the cheese which I had been hoping to eat.

All in all, sub-optimal. On Friday, Mr. Waffle proposed that we go out for a nice dinner on Saturday to make up for the debacle of my birthday. Babysitter and restaurant were booked. Poor Mr. Waffle, this morning he had to do some urgent work thing and around lunch time he started to feel ill. He retired to bed. About 4 we cancelled dinner and babysitter and, as I type, he is still in bed having eaten nothing since lunch time. Oh woe.

Inauspicious, I feel. However, if you sent a card or an email, please know that this year of all years, it was welcome. Also, herself bought me Toffifees which was pleasing. Daniel and Michael made me a card. Daniel tried to give me â‚¬50 of his money and Mr. Waffle bought me this picture. So not all bad either.

Updated to add: I forgot to mention my birthday message from vodafone –

Please note you have reached 100% of your monthly data and will not be able to use data until your next allowance begins on 15-03-2016. To purchase our best value data freetext INFO to 50226 or for more details visit www.vodafone.ie/datacharges. To continue using data for the remainder of your billing period, freetext NO DATA BAR to 50226.

I moved on to a new tariff last month and the man said I had more data than I would ever need. I see.

Updated to add: My father said to me when I told him of my various woes “forsan et haec olim meminisse iuvabit”. I had to look it up (having only done Latin for a couple of years and never having liked it much). Possibly, it means, one day you will look back on this and laugh. Thanks Virgil, not yet though.

Update

6 March, 2016
Posted in: Cork, Family, Ireland, Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Travel, Twins, Youngest Child

Hello, cruel world. A fortnight into the new job and I am absolutely flattened. I have gone from knowing everyone and everything to knowing no one and nothing. It’s very tiring. And I lost all my swipe cards on Friday night, so I may not even be able to get to my desk tomorrow. Quite the achievement.

So what news, I hear you ask. Well, the boys and I went to Cork. We went to Charles Fort and the Bulman for lunch. It didn’t rain on us. I call that a success. Then we saw a seal near the slip way beside the car park. Very exciting.

Nevertheless, probably the highlight was passing a shop selling holy statutes. Daniel looked dubiously at Padre Pio and asked, “Is that Obi Wan Kenobi?”

While the boys and I were in Cork, herself was in Rome for the week. Actually, Rome, Pompeii, Sorrento, Montecassino and Naples. Notwithstanding the exhausting programme, she had a wonderful time. She liked the Trevi fountain and the Map Room in the Vatican Museums the best.

Early on in proceedings, I got this email.

From: Herself
To: Me

Have successfully ordered McDonald’s in Italian. Forgot to ask for ketchup and was thrown by the choice between mela and kiwi but all in all quite successful.

Clearly, the trip was not entirely about expanding culinary horizons.

The boys and Mr. Waffle featured briefly on Irish language television talking about house swapping. I was at work and the Princess was at school but the boys were off being minded by their father so they got to star. Actually every word they spoke was edited out so they were a bit crushed. Former colleagues of mine (husband and wife team) saw it and when they saw the photo albums (to show the TV people the houses we had stayed in), carefully labelled they said in unison “That is so typical of Anne.” My filing fame has spread and in the most positive way, I’m sure.

Last Monday night was a bit hideous. Daniel had GAA, Michael had scouts and herself was in a massive Dublin archdiocese concert. They were bringing 600 secondary school students together every night last week to sing a range of hymns. 2,000 years of liturgical music and the focus was very strongly on those pieces composed for saxophone and guitar. Sigh. Some of the pieces were composed for the event. I particularly enjoyed the combination of jazzy upbeat music and the very old testament type lyrics “If the just strike me down, it’s done out of kindness” and “Let all that stray from what is good, be thrown a rock of judgement”. I did not get any dinner but I did have a large packet of maltesers at the concert.

On Friday night, Daniel and herself had speaking parts at some ecumenical event. The service was “prepared by the Christian women of Cuba” and it was held at the local Protestant church. Michael refused point blank to attend saying that he was not going to Mass on Friday and Sunday. The booklet giving the details of readings etc. also featured a couple of prayers like our prayers of the faithful. This one caught my eye:

” We recognize that we did not lift up our voices sufficiently to denounce an injustice like the economic blockade that affected the Cuban people for more than 50 years. We recognize our responsibility in allowing walls to be built up which destroy community.”

In the end Michael had to go as I couldn’t and Mr. Waffle brought them all. Daniel and the Princess carried out their roles with aplomb but attendance was poor. Elderly local Protestants and Catholics turned out but not many of them. Mr. Waffle feels that the women of Cuba may have been expecting a different kind of congregation when they decided to put the butterfly hymn on the programme. Apparently, you haven’t lived until you have heard a group of elderly people singing: “If I were a wiggly worm I’d thank you Lord that I could squirm/ If I were a fuzzy, wuzzy bear /I’d thank you Lord for my fuzzy, wuzzy hair”.

Daniel got to deliver the immortal line: “We will now collect our butterflies and bring them to the Scared Prayer Space”.

I was, alas, not in attendance at the Cuban prayer gig, because on Tuesday morning, my poor father fell and broke his hip. My parents are now the proud possessors of four plastic hips. I went down to Cork to see him on Friday night. He was remarkably cheerful given that a) he had a newly inserted plastic hip b) he is nearly 91 c) he spent about 24 hours on a trolley in A&E, and d) he has acquired the winter vomiting bug while in the hospital. My sister and I left him with the paper which he read and my sister tells me he has started to eat again today. He is remarkably resilient.

Final news items. We had parent-teacher meetings for all three children. They are all fine. All of the secondary school teachers told us that herself makes regular announcements over the school intercom. They were more impressed by this achievement than any other as far as I can see. All to the good, I suppose. Also, unrelated, she has won a 1916 poetry competition.

That is all.

Updated to add: I forgot – the dishwasher is broken. A new pump is said to be coming but in the interim we are washing the dishes by hand. The novelty has worn off.

That really is all.

The Great Filing Catastrophe of 2016 and Other News

14 February, 2016
Posted in: Dublin, Ireland, Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

Mr. Waffle and I are tidy. I am the queen of filing and he is the king. People gasp in amazement when they see my tidy office. All of our domestic administration is carefully filed away and (somewhat) regularly sorted through to throw out papers that we no longer need to keep (although, to my knowledge, Mr. Waffle’s bank statements from when we lived in Belgium are still filed in the attic, a fact of which I deeply disapprove – you may recall that we last lived in Belgium in 2008). All this to say that, you know, we are not the kind of people who can’t find guarantees or passports or papers when we need to. You know how this is going to end, I assume. Stay with me anyhow, why don’t you?

Herself is going to Rome horribly early tomorrow morning for a mid-term school trip. She has been counting the days since September when she first heard about it. The programme is daunting. They are going for five days and will visit Rome (Vatican museums, the Forum, Pantheon, Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain and anything else they feel up to – one of the teachers seriously suggested to me that they might go bowling one evening, insert your own sardonic comment here), Pompeii, Naples, Sorrento and the Amalfi coast.

She spent the weekend packing. After dinner this evening I went to get her passport out of the drawer and it was there. Of course it was there. I went to get her European health card from the shoebox where we keep these things. Daniel’s was there. Michael’s was there. I emptied out all of the non-EU currency, the Belgian bus tickets, the Paris metro tickets and the foreign stamps which also live in the shoebox but there was no sign of the Princess’s health insurance card. We searched in all the likely places: the desk drawers, the health insurance folder, the folder for herself, all the other folders just in case. It was unfindable. She had had to bring it into school twice so that they could verify that she had it. In light of this I felt that the authorities were likely to check in the cold, pre-dawn Dublin airport whether she had brought it with her. We kept searching. It turned up sticking out of the Lonely Planet guide to Paris on the book shelf. I am not the better of it.

It was also Valentine’s day and my husband got me lovely flowers and a card. I got him some stroopwafels and only because yesterday morning, herself said to me, “I hope you know that Daddy is getting you something for Valentine’s Day.” He took the boys to a reading in the National Library while I scuttled around hoping to find something he might like. I am not sure that he was absolutely thrilled with the packet of biscuits, now. Sometimes I feel that Mr. Waffle gets a poor deal. Guess who is getting up at 4 in the morning to drive our precious first-born to the airport? Not me, I fear.

Have a photo of the boys checking out the National Library reading room:

Earlier today we climbed Bray Head. This was inspired by Michael who needed to do it for some scouting badge. He was pleased to be going. The others, possibly less so. However, we met the cousins and they were all happy to see each other and ran up cheerfully despite the biting wind. A further aim of the trip was to ensure that herself and Mr. Waffle were tired enough to go to sleep early. Any benefits in this regard were entirely offset by the health insurance card trauma.

Still, nice views from the top:

Sunday Reflections

7 February, 2016
Posted in: Dublin, Ireland, Princess

Our church serves a diverse community. In the children’s choir, although all of the children are local, there are a number whose parents are from India, the Philippines, Romania (I think) and even Cork. Last weekend the children from the local school brought up the gifts. The priest called on Caspar and Anastasia to come up to the altar. What delightful names and not typical Dublin ones.

It’s all much more exciting than when I was a child and there was never anyone at mass who wasn’t from Cork, except for the odd priest from Kerry.

In one respect, however, matters are not improving. The choir mistress is both talented and dedicated but her musical tastes do not chime with mine and I wish that the choir would do some more classical church numbers. I expressed this to the Princess and she said, “Mum, these are new songs for the next generation; all ten of us.” Oh very funny.

My children continue to star in readings and prayers of the faithful and I am regularly congratulated on their prowess by elderly members of the congregation, leading to a definite instance of the sin of pride on my part, so it’s all going to hell in a handcart etc. Amusingly, last weekend herself had to read “When I was a child, I used to talk like a child, and think like a child, and argue like a child, but now I am a man, all childish ways are put behind me.” No better child to make it work for her.

The Perils of Public Transport

26 January, 2016
Posted in: Dublin, Ireland, Princess

It was windy and wet this morning and Mr. Waffle gave herself a lift to school. She rang me just before she got the bus home. Later she told me that this was the last moment before her life changed irrevocably (slight exaggeration but prepare yourself mentally).

She sat beside her friend and realised that she was feeling a bit damp. She hopped up and discovered that there was a distinct tang of urine from the plush seat and, now, her school skirt and tights were wet too. Some incontinent Dublin bus customer had pre-enjoyed her seat. As she said to me later when she had emerged from a lengthy shower and the skirt and tights were through the wash, “I know it’s an odd thing to say but I think it was worse that it was the wee of a person who would wee on a bus.” I totally know what she means.

I’d say she will be keener on the bike tomorrow regardless of the weather.