Crazy Cat Lady Chapter 5 - Trying to recover from the pandemic

f0xh0les

Glad you got a blazer at least, you have saved yourself some money.  Our school had decided that the kids will go into school in their PE kit the days they have PE, so have added a hoody with logo, and a T shirt with logo - total cost £16 per child, which I do not really mind, but they are black, and they will have PE twice a week, and they will be washed twice a week, so they will be faded, and will go through the wash with a pack of dye in 6 months.  I care not a jot if the embroidered logo is no longer as yellow as they would like it.  The black will be as black as I like it. The joggers are recycled from the last PE kit (non branded). 

Everywhere is having trouble getting school kit, the Direct School Uniform place were only guaranteeing delivery before the start of school term on orders before 31 July.  I ordered on 2nd Aug and it was delivered Thursday.

beanielou

School uniform is a complete pain.

Honeysucklelou2

Well done on getting the uniform and shoe shop done. The school shoe shopping trip is the one I hate the most! At least it’s only 3 lots now, not the 6 at once, it used to be😂.

crazy_cat_lady

Morning all
Well my naughty tortie number one lives to fight another day, although she must surely be in negative equity with the number of lives she has left by now. I am in debt to the tune of another £607 but I still have my tiny old lady, back in her babygro and off her face on cat heroin. Vet says it all went very well, and we just need to wait and see what histology says and deal with whatever fall out comes from that. I picked her up at 6pm yesterday and have spoilt her since then, with supervised eating of the very expensive teeny gold tins of cat food (if you have cats you know) - has to be supervised otherwise all of the other cats (who are larger) will get their faces in and she will not eat. They don't get the expensive gold tins - they get the boxes from foods of the frozen farm in bulk. And as eight out of ten cats are meant to prefer it, then it should be good enough. She's slept next to me on my bed and had lots of head rubs and cuddles. Having just given her some cat heroin this morning she's had a snuggle, a golden tin of food and gone back to sleep on my pillow. I had a couple of gins last night and could use going back to sleep myself if I'm totally honest. However, I've done the trays, recycling, rubbish and fed the others and am now sitting with a cuppa.
I managed to get out for a reasonably decent walk at last, although it hasn't helped me with my sleep just yet. Only served to remind me that I need to be out walking. I was shattered doing it but felt so much better afterwards. Haven't managed to repeat the feat yet but I plan to get out today. I'm sure I'll get back into it quite quickly but confess to enjoying sitting crocheting and watching box sets more at the moment. I can't remember who recommended New Amsterdam to me, but thank you - I am really enjoying it.
Busy week again this week. I seem to have lots of bits to do everywhere. I'm supposed to be writing but I am procrastinating about that as much as I am about walking at the moment. Still just enjoying the back end of my holiday if I'm totally honest My mind is thinking about it lots though so I suppose stuff is getting done in some way. Obviously yesterday was vet day but after I dropped her off I went to visit my friend for a quick catch up over a coffee. Today I'm taking dd to enrol at sixth form - she seems to have landed on choosing geography after talking to one of the geography teachers from my school and my sister (a psychology lecturer at uni). I appreciated my sister's honesty that dd might not like the type of people who take psychology at A level. I have asked everyone I know to explain to me what a 'pick me' girl is but I still can't quite get my head around it. Apparently dd is not a 'pick me' girl and my sister thinks she will be switched off psychology at A level, and says that she could pick it up easily at uni having never done any A level. Whereas the geography man mentioned that he thought she might get a trip to Iceland if restrictions eased and I think that really appealed to her My joke about her bringing back pizza for tea if she went to Iceland fell very flat. But even I thought the content of a geography A level sounded quite interesting and I really hated geography at school. We shall see what happens at her appointment later but I think that we're pretty much decided.
Tomorrow I owe my stepdad a massive favour and am driving with him to a garage about 20 miles away to be his taxi while they 'do' the alloy wheels on his car. It is the very least I can do after all the help that he has given to me and dd with her car. He just did another repair on it this weekend that probably would have cost me £50 at the garage.
Right - I have a decision to make... another cuppa or a nap.

greent

I think that your daughter is much better off NOT being a pick me girl - they are often not that nice! They can put other girls down in quite a horrid way to make themselves look better in front of boys. X

jusferbrowsing

Glad to hear NT 1 is recovering well.

I think your daughter made a great choice... geography can be a helpful intro to a wide base of subjects and field trips rock ! 
Lol to the Iceland joke... it took me a bit of time but I did get there   

Tescodealqueen

Pleased Nt 1 is recovering. Glad you are enjoying New Amsterdam, I am liking it like I did the earlier episodes of ER. Some interesting looking crime dramas coming up on terrestrial tv in the autumn it’s my favourite time of year for tv I think

WinterWarrior

I’m so glad NT1 is recovering. Mine all have the little gold tins down at breakfast along with other things, but only pate, all others are rejected! Some rate the pate, some only rate certain flavours, some not at all, but for cost saving it’s just down with breakfast and not used as top ups throughout the day! The W is only liked as 7+ (I think they saw the price difference) and the F is only as good as (I think that’s on price too)…they know! Biscuits are only the shiny blue bags, not cheaper boxes! Treats are all branded varieties in as great a quantity as they can hoover up! 

Geography sounds a good choice. We’ve had many an office temp with a psychology degree that had nowhere to go with it, I guess there are only so many jobs you need that for. The last temp was taking a year out and then going back for teacher training! 

Honeysucklelou2

My DD3 is doing geography A level and loves it...if the Covid restrictions weren't in place, the class would have gone to Canada for a field trip.

Glad that NT1 is through the op.

Have a good day today!

crazy_cat_lady

Hello
So dd has enrolled at sixth form. She starts on Thursday next week - A levels in biology, chemistry, literature and geography. Her enthusiasm was marginally dampened (well seriously dampened) when she found out that her friend didn't get into sixth form - hadn't gotten the grades required for the course she wanted to do because it was so over subscribed. I can hear my own thoughts and words coming out of her mouth when she's stressing out and I wish that I could help her more. There's nothing I can do about it though except to reassure her that she will make friends and won't spend the next 2 years going in and out on her own and sitting and eating on her own etc.
I'm still procrastinating over a load of work that I really need to do and is now getting quite urgent but I just can't seem to get going with it. I don't know where my motivation has gotten to over the past couple of weeks, but school is coming up and I have exam stuff to do before then, but I seem to be spending more and more time sitting on my bum watching tv and crocheting rather than doing much. I'm hoping that now I actually have the computer open in front of me then I'll get something done tonight. 
Went for a walk with ds yesterday. Not too long or far, just a couple of km but it was enough to make sure that I slept a little better last night - better than I have done in a couple of weeks. I haven't been out yet today but I still intend to. Even if I only manage for half an hour then that's better than nothing and is almost certainly going to help me sleep. It's a nice day out there and looking like a beautiful evening for a walk once the temperature drops a little.
Had my friend round last night for a catch up over dinner and drinks. I usually do the drinks and she does the food. So it was a night of passion fruit martinis and home made lasagne. And brilliant company and lots of good chat. And I won at Articulate as well - turns out I know more words than I thought I did. 
Felt more hungover than I deserved to when I woke up this morning and have been feeling a bit emotional as well. I'm sure lots of it is hormonal, and also a massive chunk of destroyed confidence and self esteem during the pandemic. It's dug up a load of feelings that I thought/think that I have dealt with over the years. I have accepted that I have the feelings that I do, but I really want to get out of some of my unhelpful behaviours. Especially with food and money. I am so obsessive and self destructive but I don't know what I can do about it. For example - there was a discussion last week about getting weighed. Now I have no in between behaviours. I either don't weigh at all, or I weigh obsessively. Every time I'm in the bathroom - before I go to the loo, after I've been to the loo, when I go upstairs to feed NT1. I feel like I'm 'being good' if I'm hungry or an 'absolute failure' if I'm not hungry. I will not eat for 18 hours and then eat everything in sight for the next four hours. It is absolutely ridiculous, I know that it's wrong but I still can't seem to stop myself. Believe it or not, I have tried discussing this with the doctor, but because I am obese, the doctor sees no problem other than my desperate need to lose weight. Well... bearing in mind that I am an intelligent human being - don't we think that I would have done that by now if it was so easy just to eat less and move more.
I'm the same with money. Either I spend nothing and scrimp everywhere, or I go mad and buy loads of stuff that I don't want or need. Then feel like a failure when it all goes wrong as it inevitably does.
Sorry, this post is turning into a bit of a brain dump and like a little counselling session for me. I'm well aware of my problems but unfortunately I have been trying without success to come up with some solutions. I suppose as long as I don't give up trying then I must at least be heading in the right direction (even if it doesn't feel like it).
Anyway - went out with bestie this afternoon for 2 hours around Funelm (!! - not that much fun after 2 hours). She thought absolutely nothing at all of spending £90 on a pair of curtains for her spare bedroom, plus £135 on a framed print for her bedroom. I think we have really different ideas of what is good value... back home now and trying to make myself do something.