Following on from my post last week...
Mum: musicfreak, I really think you need to work on making more friends.
Me: (genuinely surprised) What do you mean? I've got loads of friends!!
Mum: Well, they never ask you to go out with them or anything, do they?
Me: They did last weekend, remember? And they have done several weekends on the run! And you said no!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I think that's almost the exact duplicate of a conversation I had with my mum not so long ago!

Those kind of conversations aren't too helpful... *hugs*

Oh dear, mothers are contrary, aren't they? Actually, I can imagine myself acting just the same - you want your children to have a balanced life, but somehow the invitations from friends always seem to come at a time when you feel work should be the priority!!

When I was a teenager I was going to be a much better mum to my kids than my mum was to me (in my eyes!), but somehow once you get to that stage you turn into a replica of your own mum! Just grin and bear it for now; once you're at uni you can do just as you like!

My mum was and is a brilliant mum - but I probably didn't think so when I was a teenager

Don't say that about turning into a replica! The other day I said without thinking to a pupil, "take your coat off or you won't feel the benefit when you go back out again".... Oh no! It's happening

Oh, it does, it DOES...Bag reckons I'm morphing into my mother...

I can see it a lot with my mum and grandmother - they are so similar! I think they're the only two people I know who could spend a couple of hours discussing the lack of decent service in a carpet shop.

On the other hand, I wouldn't mind looking like my mum...

In many ways, my mum was more like her dad than her mum. Her dad was very placid and mild-mannered.

However, my mum's sister is turning into a clone of my Grandma. They now live very near to each other, and do everything together, and always say "we", never "I". They think in the same way, and everything must be done to suit them, and they're very fussy and over-protective. They are very precise with money ("you owe me £1.43"), and go into car parks and say "eeee, it's chocca!"

My mum never really showed any signs of turning into my Grandma, but I think her sister already has done...

Late last week's ARGH: the toilet stopped flushing.

This wasn't disasterous as we have two toilets. I read our DIY book and it was clearly a problem with the flap valve. Not that hard to replace.

So, we went shopping and discovered these things were not that expensive, so rather than just replace the flap valve, while we've got the thing apart, let's replace the ball valve, ball arm, float, siphon unit. Basically, whole new inside gubbins of cistern. £30 for parts.

Took it all apart this morning. Had a bit of a problem with one nut, which meant that perhaps we couldn't do the ball valve. No matter, we can replace the siphon, which is the home of the defunct flap valve, and have a working toilet again.

Put it all back together. Turn water back on. Water falls out of bottom of cistern. The twenty-some years of gunk that were around the overflow pipe entrance appear to be the only thing keeping it water tight! Ho hum. Well, it's today's ARGH, really.

But still, we have one functional toilet, we have a good plumber mate, so we'll get it fixed by someone who can put it together a bit better than the idiots who built this house (honestly, the only things we have problems with are the few remaining original 1983-5ish bits).

Argh!! Attempting to write up some physics, trying to put equations in. Okay, no problem, except that whenever I'm not looking the program insists on turning my f into a phi. Not that they're totally different or anything!!!

Edit: Now my v has morphed into an omega. Why?????!!!!!!

is this using a computer? if yes: they are all out to get everyone - that's why. unfortunately.

my argh: i have the concentration span of a fig.

argh.

what is the point?

We have had toilet issues of late. For some reason, the tank (or whatever it's called) wouldn't fill up without one doing something temperamental with a screwdriver...

AAAAAAAAAAARRRGH!!!

My brother's playing that mosquito ringtone thing outside my room and wont turn it off! AND, because we're the only ones who can hear it, i'm getting shouted at for shouting at him for 'no reason'

Arggggg

My elderly dog is peeing in the kitchen at night again (the vet says it's just her age)


..and she prefers the floor to the newspapers I put down for her. Thankfully it's not carpet.

Grrrrrr rather than Aaaagh

Last November the students went on strike and blocked access to the university. We were told on no account to attempt to go in to teach. When lessons resumed again the calendar was changed so that lost lessons could be made up. One of the things that was done was to have classes held this week which was supposed to be a week without lessons so that students could revise for exams which start next week and so that staff could mark all the continous assessment papers.

I went into teach today to discover that 4/5 of my students in every class had decided to stay at home and revise (which I think is actually quite sensible given that they have already been assessed for the courses I teach). However, at lunchtime I discovered that the staff canteen, the student canteens and the sandwich outlet are all shut for the holiday Given that the campus is a 30 minute tram ride from the centre of town and anywhere that sells food and that I only have a 30 minute lunch break I was not pleased.

This had been one of those days anyway, but, to cut a long story short, our car broke down at 1700, and had run out of diesel, owing to a faulty fuel gague. My dad is still at the garage and won't be back for another hour or so. It had to be towed. I walked home half an hour ago, and it's quite a way, and I had work to do... It all sounds very mild, but believe me, I am very displeased tonight!

At least there was someone to talk to when you got back.

Hope you feel less displeased today. xxx

And I was very appreciative!

I'm on the mend... xxx

Argh! I feel like crying at almost anything

Everything seems to be going wrong... I'm down a big hole and can't get out....!

You can get out - don't try and jump the whole lot at once, just take it one step at a time

My friend's violin case fell on my nose.
















And my grandad is sick again...but I'm trying not to think about that.

*wimper* revision...

ARggggggggg!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We have just have a very sudden and frightening thunder and lightning storm! I didn't have time before it started to give two of my dogs the sedative they need because they go into a blind panic so I ended up with drool and pee all over the kitchen floor.

At least it's stopped now and they are much more calm but I've just washed the floor for the second time today Poor dogs... although some of the crashes made me jump and hide on the sofa too

Hope the oils "drying in the sun" were rescued, lottie!

Yes! Just in time - you've never seen me shoot outside so fast when the first raindrops fell!!!


(Dogs are ok now.. just sleepy )

argh!
I have put my exam timetable down somewhere, but I dont know where

Why must i be allergic to suncream?!!? I really can't win! Aaaargh

Poor Sarah - better stay indoors to revise next time!

Please dont mention the R word

Sorry! Didn't mean to catch a sore point. Best of luck with the exams - it'll all be over soon.

First exam is on Monday That one should be ok, but i really oought to do some work for the ones on Friday and next week. At the moment though, I'm doing a very good job of ignoring the little voice in my head that keeps telling me i should be working

good luck to everyone who has exams looming.... you will survive them!

my scream: i feel like i'm going INSAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANE!

My house nearly burned down this evening!!!

I smelt this weird smell (not unusual in our house given my brothers always doing weird things with gas and stuff), so shut my bedroom door to try and shut it out. About 20 mins later, my brother shouted 'Sarah, you really should come and see this!...no you REALLY should come downstairs NOW!' I opened my door and the whole house was filled with thick smoke Went downstairs and a the plastic bag holder thing was up in flames (what was really odd was that there was no signs of anything starting a fire, it just seemed to have spontaneously combusted ) Just as we got to it, it was literally just starting to start on the wood pile, so lucky we werent a couple of minutes later really!! When we'd finally got the fire out properly, opened all the doors and windows, the smoke took ages to clear.

Then our parents got home...lets just say they weren't too amused!

Everything stinks of burning plastic now

The scary thing is that the house was really full of smoke and the smoke alarm didnt go off...it could easily have happened at night or when noone was at home! I'm a bit scared to go to bed now tbh.

Apart from that and physics revision not going brilliantly, today hasnt been too bad!

Has someone checked the battery?

When I moved into my new house I found what I thought was a smoke alarm on the wall in the hall. I checked it by lighting a match in front of it and it didn't seem to work, so I changed the battery and it still didn't work. Then I threw it away and bought and installed a new one (plus an extra one upstairs, and a CO monitor, can't be too careful!) - this one passed the lit match test. It was many months later that I worked out that the "original" smoke alarm was actually the ringer for the front door bell. I have now removed the bell push by the front door to force people to use the knocker but only after the nth time I found a "We tried to deliver this parcel but you were out" card through the door when I knew I'd been in at the time!

Maybe you should have words with your brother?! Plastic bag holders do not spontaneously ignite - something or someone started that fire, and if your parents were out... I'm not suggesting that he did it deliberately, but if he often does "weird things with gas"...?

I hope he's learned his lesson and you don't have any more "spontaneous" combustion incidents.

I just feel like screaming... very very loudly in fact:

ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

There I feel a bit better now...

It definitely wasnt him, as he was on the computer upstairs for the couple of hours before we caught it and hadnt been burning anything since the afternoon.

As for the smoke detector, its going to be replaced asap!

Oh pull the other one! He 'hadn't been burning anything since the afternoon'???!! Let's examine the evidence, shall we: you have a brother with apparent pyromanic tendencies and a plastic bag that spontaneously combusts. Hmmm...

Don't think we need to call in Miss Marple quite yet.

Exams
ARGGHHHHHHHHHH

And while we're on the subject of boys and fires...
Last week a 14 year-old set fire to one of the stations my train goes and the signal box was damaged. This was the station where the line divided in two and trains can no longer go through the station to the town where I live. We now have to take a train, then a bus (which goes round the damaged station), then a train, instead of taking an hour and ten minutes the journey takes two and a half hours. It is going to take two months to repair the damage

Bad week?
It's been AWFUL.
I hate hate hate exams!
ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Post Office closes at 5.
by the time I walk up there I shall have missed the post
and tomorrow I am working...
never mind

Aaaaaaghhh! I drive into town to visit the bank and WH Smith - just two shops, so I put half an hour's parking on the car. Big mistake!!

Queue in bank + seductive sale sign in the book shop window (how could I resist? ) = 9 minutes late back. Too late! Wretched parking man is just writing out my ticket and refuses to be swayed by my wheedling. Result: £30 fine.

Aaaaaghhh! Is it fair, I ask you? (Well, possibly - but it's daylight robbery! It would only have cost an extra 40p to have put an hour on; just didn't think I'd be so long.)

Bet he said something like " rules is rules, lady .... more than my job's worth..."
but it does seem so unfair .... not as if you were causing a problem. it's revenue earning... no more no less.
As you say, another 40p and he would have been sweet as pie!

so sorry for you though...

Thanks for your sympathy, SaxFan - very soothing.

Matters were not improved by my husband's reaction, which was to laugh and say it was all my fault for being so penny pinching! I am speaking to him again now - just!

Call this morning from my mother. My father has fallen off a stepladder while trying to finish cutting the hedge.

Apparently he's not broken anything, and is currently refusing to go to hospital to get checked out - even though I've said I'll pay for a taxi for them.

So after teaching today, I'm off over there to see what's what, and if necessary to take him to get looked at myself....

I hope he's Ok