Crashing out as I type...

Thought I'd better stick a note or two on tonight before the weekend passes in a blur of activity and I forget. It's been a really busy week and I'm soooooo tired I could just about fall asleep standing up - not that I do, just that I could! Sat down after getting home after 8.30, to catch my breath and relax for five minutes and zoned out totally, not resurfacing until nearly 10!!!! Yet here I am still trying to pretend that I'm actually achieving something! Having a small brandy and coke instead of the ubiquitous glass of wine and then I'm off to my cozy warm snooze-pit. Even though I sat in school until I had completed major chunks of marking I still had to bring a bag of it home!! Had a meeting this afternoon and went back into school after it in order to try and leave myself a clear weekend - HA! Some hope that was! Dearly Beloved has pupils sitting a music theory exam in the morning and I'm invigilating for him - this means I have an enforced sitting down doing nothing for three hours. Nice work if you can get it, I hear you say, but when I have so much needing done I can think of at least twenty things I could be doing instead. Never mind - I have my potted panto to revamp. I'm calling it Moggie Mia and it's based on Puss In Boots. We'll be doing it as part of the Workshop Christmas Revue. It's a piece I wrote a few years ago for the school I was in and it was nicely done by the children. However, I need to make it much funnier for the workshop, and I'll be directing it of course! Hopefully I'll get enough bods turning up on Monday night to cast it and not have to be part of it myself. We'll wait and see who all turns up! Right that's sunk the last dregs of booze so I'm off t'pit. Nightie night, sleep tight and don't let those pesky bedbugs bite!!!
Till next time....

Busy, buzzy and brainbustin'!

Well here it is - November! I am stunned and amazed at how quickly the last week has simply scudded past!! Like weasels crossing the M8! In rush hour! All of the holiday week benefits are long gone and the wind up/running down to the 'C' word has begun. The visit to the Dungeon was tons of fun, even if the weather decided to join in and be as awful as it could be, presumably providing the dragon part to the day, however, we still had a darned good time! the special shopping has been fairly successful - in fact it was so successful that my plastic decided it had had enough and was not keen to let me use it for about four days!!!! and that was even though I had a balance available - something to do with nailing fraud before it gets all yer cash apparently, according to an old pal who used to work in a bank! Spent a lot of time after hours in school doing the forward plans and getting sorted for the next block - but really must get my act together and find myself a job, it's all very well having a supply maternity cover, secure job till Easter, but if I don't get out into the market very, very soon I'll find myself competing with this year's probationers for any posts that come up. Going to see a pal who will help me complete an application form for my own authority - if I can get onto the supply list here, I may manage to get a job more locally and save a fortune in diesel!!

Taking another tack, I think I may have given myself another 'smack yourself over the head' problem. Have started a wee drama club after school for the P5 and P6 kids and have taken in a wee mini panto that I wrote for a school I worked in a few years ago. It's basically the story of Puss in Boots but the music is all Abba songs. The idea is that they learn it and perform it for the rest of the school before 'C' ; if it's ready, in the New Year if it's not. Knowing that the busy souls who are pulling together the Ch******s Revue were in deep need of stuff to fill the time slot, I fancied they might be able to use a longish sketch and said I would do a little bit of a re-write to make it funnier and put in all the stage directions. Then I offered to direct it and rehearse it every week just after my Junior Workshop. Silly me!!! And I may well have reason to beat myself up before the end of the month. this is a simple, straightforward, short, one act, tiny cast required, practically no set needed mini panto, but as I have directed it before and am currently directing it at school I have, perhaps naively, assumed it would be easy to direct a few adults in something I don't have to spend a fair bit of time on with the kids. Then reality raises it's head and looks me squarely in the eye. The attitude to panto is often ' it doesn't matter really - this is just panto, nobody cares as long as they get a good laugh', which is fine to an extent, but when it's a wee short thing like this it really needs to be slick, otherwise it becomes boring, so to prevent this from happening or (with a meglamaniacal 'bwah ha hah!) so nobody else put in their tuppenceworth and tries to rewrite bits to make their parts bigger - now really Madam! - I'd rather have a modicum of control. My other potential problem is that I'll be using a karaoke CD for the music as I like Abba arrangements and think they will add to the whole piece - introductions are instantly recognisable - and to work with only a piano would sould a little bit empty. Anyhow that's a battle I may not have to fight, depends on whether anyone else throws their hat in the ring regarding it!

Have to go now as am adult in the room at the Youth Fellowship tonight and I have to gather all my marking together to take with me!! Ah the joys of parenting!!!

Till next time....