Yesterday was yesterday, today is today

In this game it's weird how fast things change.

Yesterday everything looked like it was going one way.

Today, himself took himself off to see housing. I'm not sure what he was expecting, I suspect he thought he could move and have less expectations placed on him than he has here. Maybe he has been reading too much Daily Mail and UKIP propaganda. Whatever they offered him, seems like doing what he had to do to stay was the better option.  

He came from the housing office and sorted himself out some volunteer work within the hour and he has now got a progression course for next academic year in college.

Whether  this will keep the leaving care team happy, after all they were looking at a big drop in the cost of supporting him, remains to be seen.

The emails I sent might be their worst case outcome - have to carry on supporting him. 

R

   

Fin de siecle

20 - 7 isn't a big number. Well not when you first look at it. Make it 20 years take away 7 when those 20 years are your whole life then living somewhere from 7 is a big bit of your life. Big D arrived at age 7 and he is now 20. Long time.

We have watched him grow, stood there with him through the tough times, been there for the fun times, watched him grow. Of course with all kids there comes a point where they have to make that big leap into the unknown and a less than certain future. Branwen went 3 years ago, off to university announcing she was off forever. That's why she has just moved back into her bedroom expending lots of effort on shelves and constructing a monster cabin bed which means she does not always sleep with her nose against the ceiling and she can sit up in bed providing she is under the attic hatch at the time....

I digress, the last few years have been tough, D is determined to hold on to childhood. Others have holiday jobs, he has holidays. He is a determined Peter Pan trawling the college list of introductory courses. So far he has tried carpentry (twice) countryside management and bricklaying. None of them leading to any work, well they might have except he has been avoiding jobs.

Xmas was a bit of a watershed. It's a time for everyone to give and to take, everyone gave and D took. 

It was time for a bit of tough love and way back in January his worker came down, we had a meeting setting out    an agenda for change, everyone had something to do, everyone did their something except D.

He has taken to going out or hiding in his room. It's so sad when you have invested a lot in someone to see that wasted. Wasted, there's a word, he seems to do that too. It really is watching someone you spent a lot of time trying to help unravelling.

It would be really easy if he was just bone idle but no he has worked really hard at a music festival and, when the builders here needed a labourer he pitched in and worked hard for three weeks. He loved being paid, he liked the money. But when it comes to getting a regular job there is a cog not yet in place, he isn't ready. 

This week a lot of airtime has been given to the problems over young people not being taken into care when they should be. There is a back story too of serial taking kids into care when helping their parents was what was needed.

The other end of the story is when the care industry has to own the results of it's serial failures to meet needs. The young person gets to 20 and they have none of the skills they need. The response apparently is to dump them into the world and walk away. 

In a few years time when he is a hopeless parent the system will be there to take his children away.....

R


 

Time of our lives

Today is of course the day of the fathers.

Which is great. No one son gave me a model Bedford, no two daughter bought me a set of bits for my cordless that she is borrowing to put up shelves in her room, mainly i suspect because she needs them.

No one daughter phoned me from the festival she is at to say she loves her daddy.

That was nice as, this week has been a bit of a quiet one.

Monday was a review meeting with social services where we got offered a bit basically to keep us quiet I suspect.

Tuesday was a meeting in university could be some work from that, then another meeting straight after - 120 mile round trip. Home and pick up Bethan then a mad run for Plymouth and ferry. Another 250 miles.

Some roadworks, Bethan great company but tired. On to the ship and a lovely old night, decent meal and off to an early night.

Next morning and a tough old one from Roscoff to Lanvallay .  A great time with Peter and Mina then truck up and off to our house. Another 180 miles.

Of course, I haven't mentioned the management who bought a new bed settee for the house.

This was no way going in through the door so window it was then.  Heavy? Did we mention heavy?  It weighed a lot and it went in with much heaving and swearing through the front window just after it's pre decessor went out the back one.

Much running round and shopping then a walk into town for a crepe or 4.

Morning and a drive up to Roscoff, Brittany ferries really wanted me to know they had rescheduled the departure time for trip home. 1 email 3 texts and a phone call!  The run up to Roscoff 80 miles was pretty uneventful and being in Brittany we popped into the Vietnamese for lunch.

On the appointed time, the ship sailed and we settled to a calm sea crossing with the van parked virtually touching the bow door. I don't know how it happens but whenever we do the crossing from Plymouth to Roscoff we always seem to end up being one of the first off the ship.

This whole break had gone well suspiciously well, time to make things more normal. Off the ferry and quickly through immigration - all well with the world. Then the A38 or  rather not the A 38, it was closed for repairs so there followed an epic diversion across country. Still that was a lot of Devon visited I had never seen before, and the M5. Not to be outdone the people in charge of the M5 joined in, closing several lanes so they could do work on them during the day. At night of course all was quiet, just the average speed cameras to keep everyone at a steady 50 for mile after mile.

Eventually gone midnight I mads it home, could have been quite tricky, the last few miles I was very sleepy. That does not bear thinking about, last time i fell asleep at the wheel was the Olympics.
   

 

        

 

Bath time

So anyway, today I got up and did things that needed to be done like kids to school and college.

Bit of housework then into town to pick up Bethan.

Light the fire before I go so I can have a bath in a little while.

Bethan all urgency and need to get to work, obviously a bath needed first, lucky i lit the fire really.

Bath for Bethan and lift to work keep the fire in bath for me later.

Came home and Dai turns up with the new door, not a problem keep the fire in sit and chat with Dai.

Dai's gone, Taliesin and Chantelle walk past with towels, better keep the fire in.

Deal with tea and collect Bethan from work

Back home and time for a bath.

Hang on who's  that striding towards the bathroom with towels?

It's the management.

Better keep the fire in then...

R  

Phew

I don't think there has ever been a gap like this in my blog.

We are sitting here waiting for the contractors to insulate the house from the outside. Our lovely old stone walls will disappear under insulation. It will be a loss but in actuality this house gets very cold when the wind blows and the wind blows all the time!

This is also why we are debating if we want to gamble on going for planing for a serious wind turbine here, one that would guarantee our life here for the next ten years, except herself fancies moving sometime not too soon. It would still make the house worth more though, a guaranteed income for the future.

Trying to future proof is a big thing for anyone really, I can see the appeal of moving for herself, the house really is far too big for us if we don't have lots of kids bouncing off the walls.

Herself has had a major gardening buzz this year, we are well on our way to self sufficiency in   veggies and we should be up to our knees in soft fruit next year. Though unlike the last time we did serious gardening there is a restaurant in town which will take anything we have left over.

This year too I have managed to bring more of the fields here under control. We have about 4 acres mowed, well we would have if the weather had not turned all non temperate. Mowing operations are suspended with the ground wet and the wind blowing.

Time to get the fire going again.

R

 

Of cats and dogs

You have to recognize Cats and Dogs are very different psychological entities. The cat being a bit of a self contained individual hunter and dogs being pack animals working in a pack whit a definite hierarchy.

Lez Barker very wisely noted that cats like this master servant thing, just not that way round.

Dogs on the other hand can be shown who is boss and they damn well need to be too.

The reason for these observations is the recent arrival of Kenny, a cross between a collie and Labrador, a colliedoor. He's a rescue dog, about 18 months of limitless energy needing endless walks and capable of major soft furnishing destruction if bored and left on his own.

His arrival has not passed unnoticed amongst the other furry citizens of this household and the response has been interesting. The cats seem to want to avoid him, which is good all round. But he is hell bent on seeking them out and shows no evidence of learning. Da man walked away up until the point when he was cornered, the dog kept coming which was in retrospect a serious mistake. Out of the corner exploded a snarling biting scramming 3 legged ball of fury. The dog beat an increasingly hasty retreat which ended with a cat chasing the dog round the living room

You might have expected to see some learning, but no, next time out he decided to try his luck with Deimund. That ended no better with a cat demonstrating bearback dog riding as they went round and round the living room too.

He does have some endearing features, next doors sheep who considered our fields an extension of their terrain, Kenny, who seems to have a instinct for herding sheep into corners seems to have put them right off.

A fox who had started to make our place a part of his regular round has also thought better, since he broke cover right in front of Kenny and he nearly yanked the managements arm out it's socket in the wild pursuit that followed.

Bethan has invented a new sport, I'm sure you have heard of Bog snorkeling, Bethan has indulged in some wet field Dog log surfing, this involves getting yanked flying off your feet by the dog then dragged a selected route round the field. It's better not to scream.....

He has eaten 3 pairs of wellies so far,  consequently the field is paved with dog logs and shards of undigested rubber.     

Deimund and him have a sort of impasse, Deimund sits on the settee pretending the dog is not there and all is well so long as the dog does not try and approach the master being. Even then a hiss and growl is now usually enough.

R

Twas the night before Xmas

As we march our way into our 20th Xmas here it feels really quite odd.

We well OK the management has managed all the presants, it's all under the tree and it's not yet 9 pm, a normal Xmas would be a 2 am rush of parcels and paper.

This year, it is not yet nine and everything is done, we have watched a shed load of I player and retired, we are having a quiet night.

 20 years ago we had a telly, now we watch everything online.

She is reading a book, I am writing, well I suspect you guessed that one.

Think we might have an early night, we have a St Emillion Grand Cru to keep us company for lunch tomorrow, 2007 was an OK year too.

I probably paid about 10€ for it - lot of money for a bottle of wine.

Lots of things have changed this year.

We thought fostering was over and now we have G - here for at least a year.

Little D is gone, things have really unravelled for him, but you can only do so much.

We bid a sad farewell to Citroen C5 estates, they have been a big part of this last couple of years. But after a too long absence back into the fleet came a Solihull product. A Land Rover Discovery with the 3.9 V8, automatic box and LPG. I am a bit of a petrol head at heart and I love that toy.

It fits brilliantly into our needs, we have a mega fun AX for flitting back and fore into town. For practical stuff we have the VW T4 van. If we need to move 6 people we now have the Discovery, if the weather turns all horrid we now have the dircovery, actually, we discovered this week that, running on LPG, the disco is not bad for long trips either. On locals it's horrendous like pouring fuel into the floor.

I love it though, the distant muted V8 noise.

Starting to sound like Jeremy Clarkson so it's time to stop driveling