Lunch thief

Today was one of those days which is more if a roller coaster than anything else. To start with we got a team call out at about 3am due to this and the fact I had got in after midnight, I managed to over sleep by half an hour. Doh! When I arrived at the field, the horse had decided to clamber in to the adjoining paddock and stand with her friend, meaning I had to get her back through and sort out the fencing. Double  Doh!
At 11am I set off with Rafi to Sussex County dog training for his first session of 1 to 1's we are going to see if we can get him used to being in dog company without him being overbearing and trying to pull their tail fur out... (I have no idea why!) The session went really well and this evening we managed to put some of what we had learned into  practice on our short walk. Our next session is next week but before then I intend to go to places where we can practice, he also has his first pool swim booked in for tomorrow.
..But I digress, cut back to this afternoon, lunchtime to be precise, my husband had decided to take a pack up and do a quick bird watch at Lavington common, he parked the car and off he went, when he ggot back to the car someone had smashed the back window and passenger window and stolen two jackets a bottle of orange tango and half a tub of pringles(!!) He called me then called the police. When I arrived at the car park there was evidence of two further break ins and a couple who came over and spoke to us said they had had their car broken into just down the road earlier that week.
For the sake of 2 jackets and my husbands lunch, they caused so much damage and trouble!
I hope they choked on the pringles!

Panic stations

My horse doesn't  sleep laying down very much and when she does she is usually up and awake as soon as I get to the the gate!
Today however she was laying flat out and as still as can be right until I was in the paddock with her I called her name twice before she responded and even then she had the look of a horse which had possibly had a stroke! Her ear was flicked inside out and her face was stiff and strange. It took a few minutes for her to regain some form of normality, talk about scaring me half to death!

Elephants Ears

The trouble with puppies is they chew, they also eat anything and everything that they can fit in their mouth! True fact!
This afternoon I caught Rafi eating a plant, on further investigation it turned out to be elephants ears also known as Bergina I think. After asking on facebook if this could be a problem I decided to call our vets who told me to bring Rafi in.
All the way there I could feel panic, we have only just lost our beautiful Skye dog, and now we are going to loose this bundle of puppiness.
The vets decided it would be best to keep him in over night for observation meaning I went home without him. Poor boy must be so confused.
Tomorrow can't come soon enough.

In coming.......

Today I drove to collect our new family member, a JRT X Springer! All the way home in the car he just lay down and was quiet, no whining or squeaking. I took him into the house where he proceeded to 'kill' his favorite toy snake, which he had brought with him!  When he had calmed a little went  for a walk, after dinner he decided that he liked his bed VERY much and humped it for two and a half hours solid! Very stressy behaviour, eventually he just slept! I wonder how he will be through the night?!

Van Gogh!

When you have a dog your house has movement in it, swirls of air rushing behind its every move, its every breath...
When you don't have a dog the house is two dimensional flat it lacks life.
I want my house to feel like a Van Gogh, I dont like this Lowry lifelessness!

Resignation

Today I posted my resignation. I don't have a job to go to but I know I can no longer do the job I am doing at the moment!

Aaaagggghhhhh!

I have a shiny new laptop!
It is very shiny and it is very new!
Its also very different from any laptop I have ever had before, to the extent I nearly launched it through the nearest window!
Grateful for litlun coming round in her lunch break to pick up her post, she managed to show me how to do a few things!
Now all I have to do is remember all my log ins and pass words which were automatically saved to my old laptop which has died and gone to cyber heaven!

Slacker....(or writers block)

Father forgive me for I have sinned... it has been months since my last blog update!
I must try harder!
Today I have mainly spent in the warm snugglyness of my bed I am not sick, and I don't consider myself lazy...I just had a hellish night shift. I was always under the impression you could only have one job at a time in the ambulance service! Multiple casualties yes but just one job. Sadly people this is not the case as last night I was given (together with my crewmate...) two genuine jobs. We have six jobs stacking and no vehicle to send sorry! Well what can I say.. Chaos ( utter confusion.utterly without order. Formless welter of matter conceived as preceding creation.....the choice is yours!) An hour and fifteen minutes overtime, well thanks but after the night I just had I would have prefered to finish on time!
Still a fried egg sandwich three cups of tea and three hours sleep later I think I'm good to go!
So the battle plan is this... feed hay water muck out the horse, walk the dog, cook and eat dinner then and only then shall I be off out for a drink with one of my friends... and a well deserved drink it will be too!
Amen.

Sweet Itch!

Mouse has sweet itch! This, for the not so horse knowledgeable is an allergy to midgie saliva, poor Mouse was rubbing her mane and tail bald! to mention nothing of her back and bottom.
I was given lots of advice from fellow horse owners at the yard where I keep her, some sounded crazy others made sense. It turns out that even the crazy sounding things make sense if you dissect

the information, for instance, "Give her Marmite sandwiches!" Well vitamin B is required to help heal and the Midgies don't like it! Marmite is high in vitamin B. So as well as Marmite in her feed, she has daily baths and has thick white cream (Sudocreme) rubbed into her mane, tail and back. After two days she has already calmed down with the itching and the sore areas are no longer looking angry. I hope things are on the up for her!
Once the itching has calmed down she can come in for the evening and night which is when the little pests are at their worse, but until then she will continue the strict hose down and cream up.
(Please note the two images have been borrowed from the internet, they are not of Mouse, hers is no where near as bad as these luckily)

Flat as a pancake.

When everyone thought the world was flat Columbus said its round, he went down in history and America was found! According to an Elvis Presley record I was given for Christmas as a child.
Well, my world is still as flat as a pancake at the moment, so please someone I need a bicycle pump. (Why do they call it a bike pump? I mean, its not the bike you are pumping up, its the tyres on the bike, ahh well!)
 I could really do with some nice positive news or something.
To be honest I could just do with something going along smoothly.
 

Reeling

I am still reeling from yesterday.

The wait!

Walking on the beach with my Mum and our two lovely Border Collies... the best thing to do after a stressful day.

 Apologies for the short posts.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water...

Just to add insult to injury, as well as having an out of control daughter, my work has decided that my contract is wrong and that it needs to be dramatically changed, well, they are saying that what I requested last year and was agreed hasn't been put in place properly so I have to re submit it which makes me a new contract and oh yes, all new part time contracts don't keep their line or their crewmate. This is so not helpful, I will now have to do the shifts that they can't cover anywhere within the seven stations in my locale.

This is how they define family friendly..........

What did I do wrong??

I probably shouldn't be writing this post, but as its anonymous what the heck I am going to. Today I was called by the police from an adjoining county telling me that my youngest daughter had been caught steeling! This sadly is the second time in two weeks and I am at my wits end to know what to do.

We have brought all the kids up to know right from wrong, but she just doesn't seem to care. She is clever and pretty and has everything going for her but just seems to be throwing everything away. We have tried grounding and every other deterrent but she doesn't care and won't comply. I don't know what I did or where I went wrong, I just want my daughter back.

spinning

For the past week I have been signed off sick, thanks in the most to my 14 year old daughter who sees fit to trample all over us, she comes in at gone midnight... on a school night and will not do anything at all that we ask. She lies to us and has tins of food in her room that we have not bought?? She is not getting any pocket money as her room is a tip and she is so rude! Where is this stuff coming from? To add insult to injury she expects us to do things for her, and if we do the good will is thrown straight back at us and if we wont, oh does she make us pay! I have another week signed off then its back to work. I don't know if I am coming or going at the moment, and am beginning to feel as if I am on a constant fair ground ride which is making my head spin but the operator wont let me off............. Where do we go from here?? Answers on a post card PLEASE!

Out of control

Father forgive me for I have sinned, it has been way too long since my last blog!
It has as you can see been over a month since my last blog. Things here are in a muddle, my youngest daughter is totally out of control (I blame the parents!) and she acts as if she hates us. We have tried to get help but where do you turn for help with things like this? I even tried social services, who have twice said they will send me a letter with some information sheets in and have twice NOT done so. I am getting close to the end of my tether, and when I reach it I'm sure I don't know what will happen. One or two of my friends know whats going on but to be honest its not the sort of thing you go round talking about! This sucks.
To add to this we are receiving constant text and phone calls from one of our friends ex partners, I have not replied or answered the phone so I have no idea whet they want but I have no wish to be drawn into a slanging match...My friends are my friends I will always be on their side (unless they do the dirty on me, at which point they no longer qualify as friends!)
On the plus side, My husband will be ordained priest this June, we also have a three day event with the Army to go to, this is to see for our selves if this is the path we want to take once my husband has finished his curacy. He is seriously thinking of becoming an Army Chaplain, personally I think he would be perfectly suited to the job, what with his past military experience and the things he does now, it'll be me who will have to get a grip with the military way.... still can't be any worse than the Ambulance service!
Amen.

Hissy fits and flowers

• 

• 0610 hrs arrive on station to find there are already two day crew there!

• 0630 hrs discuss who is the one who got it wrong

• 0635 hrs check the online schedule

• 0640 hrs throw toys out of pram when my shift has been given out as overtime!

• 0700 hrs ring scheduling, create like mad have a hissy fit.

• 0705 hrs get offered a shift at a station five Minutes from home!

• 0740 hrs get run off road by white van man texting!

• 0742 hrs check damage.. hole in tyre pranged bumper!

• 0745 hrs ring RAC

• 0750 hrs ring police

• 0830 hrs RAC changes tyre having drilled out random locking nut on (bald) spare tyre

• 0900 hrs go buy a new tyre for £64 (glad I was in uniform!)

• 0930 hrs set off again for work!

• 1020 hrs after getting stuck at two slow sets of traffic lights arrive at station
• 
  
• 1055 hrs crew mate gets to station after being on a job using the car
• 
  
• 1115 hrs take car to another station to swap it for an ambulance
  

• 1150 hrs get back with ambulance look in back!!!! Oh boy

• 1200 hrs have second hissy fit at the dirty linen and blood in the ambulance

• 1203 hrs clean ambulance

• 1230 hrs take vehicle to get fuel as it was left with less than a quarter of a tank!
• 1234 hrs ring line manager as fuel card is incorrect!!!!

• 1244 hrs line manager arrives, pay for fuel
• 
  
• 1259 hrs return to base for a meal break!

• 1505 hrs cover at the local hospital

• 1512 hrs Job outside the post office, transport to hospital

• 1620 hrs cover 8 miles away

• 1625 hrs Job behind super market backing up car.

• 1639 hrs Transport to hospital

• 1644 hrs get tooted at by husband and his watch in their fire truck as I go to the hospital

• 1730 hrs chat to two friends outside A&E

• 1745 hrs return to base

• 1758 hrs cuppa on station with two other crews

• 1830 hrs End of shift

• 1835 hrs drive to mechanics to collect husband after he left his car there for its MOT tomorrow

• 1901 hrs fish and chips for dinner thanks to my lovely husband

• 1912 hrs surprise box of flowers from my lovely Northern Bird

• WHAT A LOVELY END TO A DAY THAT STARTED OFF SO BADLY!

Lunch

Today is supposed to be our day, the day that the Vic and I have to ourselves and go out for the day! Too much going on at the moment for this to happen, so instead we settled for lunch, next weeks day off together will have to make up for it! We both have a bit of a thing for Ploughman's lunches... so that is what we both had today, the Vic had a ham ploughman's and I had brie, and very good it was too. We went to a pub in town, I have been there before for a meal, last time it was dinner with two friends several years ago just before Christmas, that was actually the last time I saw them, I must ring and see if we can arrange another catch up (and dinner even). I am unable to put on here why the present time is stressful as it is ongoing and there are a lot of people involved! I just hope it gets sorted and things can get back to some degree of normality, where every email and phone call doesn't have us living on our nerves, and we don't have to wonder what is going to happen next! Still back to work tomorrow.... oh the joy!!
If you are observant you will notice that this picture is not a brie or ham ploughman's, that is because it was taken at a different time, see I told you we had a thing about ploughman's!

Do not quit

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you're trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit-
Rest if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a fellow turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out.
Don't give up though the pace seems slow -
You may succeed with another blow.

Often the goal is nearer than
It seems to a faint and faltering man;
Often the struggler has given up
When he might have captured the victor's cup;
And he learned too late when the night came down,
How close he was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out -
The silver tint in the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It might be near when it seems afar;
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit -
It's when things seem worst that you must not quit.

The incredible journey

Yesterday I couldn't post, by the end of this you will see why!
I had text a message to the Blonde bird asking if we could swap horse duties, as I didn't think I would be home in time to do the evening, she agreed and I put the horses out, mucked out and got Mouses things ready for the evening.
Then after getting a few bits of shopping, Beth and I got in the car armed with a small pet carrier and began our trip to get Twiglet, I had decided to go Sunday as the weather forecast was for snow on the Monday evening and I didn't want to chance a journey to somewhere I had never been (460 miles at that) in the snow!
Once we were on the M25 it had started to flurry small wispy bits of snow occasionally, but it wasn't due for another 24 hours and we had started so.......
230 miles later we had arrived at our destination, there was a good 2 inches of snow (sorry I don't work in new money) on the ground already.
We tucked her up well and had a chat with her breeder, before heading home.
Oh boy! we got onto the M11 eventually! and here we had to travel at 20 mph max, it was down to one lane, of crawling traffic, a motorbiker came off his bike, the two cars in front of me and me skidded either into the fast lane or the hard shoulder even at 20mph, we helped him get his bike onto the hard shoulder and made sure he and the bike were ok before traveling again. Then I couldn't clear my windscreen, the wiper blades had frozen solid, Beth said it was like wiping them with cricket bats, so we had to find a services and sort that out, there were lots of other people in the same situation so we had to queue up for the hoses to clean the windscreens and (for what it was worth) refill the washer bottles. Once on the M25 we could go a bit faster as it was very clear, but then as we came off again it was back to crawl all the way home. half past midnight we arrived home!
The good thing was we got to watch some of the Superbowl, Steelers V Cardinals, we watched to the halftime whistle then as my Husband had work in the morning we decided to go to bed, and record the second half.