Cold feet

I have had the opportunity to go into school yesterday and today, but I haven’t taken up the offer.  I have plenty to do in order to get my classroom set up before the children start next Thursday, but despite the fact that I have been bursting with enthusiasm all summer it has now waned and I can’t seem to find the motivation.  I know I will get it done – and hopefully K is getting the day off on Tuesday so can come in with me for the purposes of being my general dogsbody – but right now, the thought is just not inspiring me.

The writing is going slowly at the moment, but it’s still all I want to do right now and some part of me is desperate to stay home and write write write.  Unfortunately that would involve K earning enough to keep me in chocolate and new pairs of Converse and that just isn’t the case at the moment.  Plus I am really looking forward to having an actual decent wage coming in and thinking about things like new bedroom furniture and mortgages like a proper grown up.

And I know that I love my class (so far anyway) and only a few weeks ago I couldn’t wait to help them shape their young impressionable minds into reasoned and valuable members of society.  I am sure that what I am feeling is cold feet, akin to what you allegedly feel before your wedding day – THREE YEARS of my life have been building up to this moment, that’s a pretty tall order to fill, but I’m not sure how to push through it.

But push through it I will, without a doubt, and I know I will love having my class and my own classroom and all the fun things that will happen this year.  I’m sure I will learn a lot. 

And who knows, maybe I’ll get another book out of it.

Bank holiday blues

I spent this weekend in Manchester.  I drank beer and vodka, visited clubs where the floors were so sticky your feet actually became superglued to them, partied to Roisin Murphy of Moloko by the main stage, went shopping and played a very silly drinking game where if one of us were to say “Ahoy” and raise their hand to their forehead, everyone else had to repond in kind.  Or face the penalty!  It was fun.

We went with two friends with the idea that I could share the driving, but as there were only two drivers out of the four of us, and as there was only one driver who wasn’t stoned out of the four of us, the joy of driving to Manchester and back fell to me.

In the spirit of the British bank holiday, we came down the slip road yesterday to witness the M6 in disguise as a busy car park.  Thankfully the traffic cleared when we reached Staffordshire and then moved mercifully quickly until we reached the M6 Toll, whereupon it ground to a rather unsatisfactory halt.  Conveniently just after the moment I turned to K and said, “I think I need a wee.”

So my rapidly swelling bladder and I had to fight through the traffic.  And to add insult to injury we had to pay £4.50 for the luxury of driving on the M6 Toll.

Finally we dropped the other two off and got home, having been on the road about 6 hours.  We then discovered that the kitten had had explosive diarrhoea and we were out of cat litter, so I had to speed to the nearest Co-op to get supplies.  Then I bent my nail back trying to open the living room door.  Being awake was no fun anymore.

Hercules is going to the vet today to get his second lot of jabs and his microchip so I will get my revenge for having to clear up his poo.

In other news, my novel is now over 22K words, but today is probably the last chance I will have to do any serious work on it for a while, as the school opens tomorrow and I keep having anxiety dreams about not being ready when my class start back in nine days time, so I will probably be in school every day from tomorrow onwards.

I should probably get showered as we have to be at the vets’ in 40 minutes.