Change

Just at a time when I'm about to start a new job, am in the middle of a slow, dusty and frustrating renovation, and have decided if I don't lose my post-baby blubber I might die, I got some more change going on. My cat died. He didn't turn up for dinner and I knew he was a goner. There was no pushing in front of me and the kids as we struggled to fit our bags, bodies and competitive heads into the entrance-way to our house. No, there was no bang, clunk-a-bang bang as the cat pulled on the fly-wire on the back door at night trying to get in. No moaning at the back door if you went into the kitchen at night to see what the time was, have a drink of water or avail yourself of the bathroom facilities etc. Nope, it was quiet. Which was kind of nice, given that he tended towards the annoying at times. But that annoying over-sized, stinky-breathed limping fluff-man was my constant companion for nearly 13 years and now he's gone.

So we told the kids he wasn't coming back and that it was sad etc. Then last night when I was just slopping grotty bits of plasticky pasta into bowls for the kids, our 90 year old next door neighbour fronted up with his cane a-tap-tapping across our balcony. Our woman's man neighbour is a bit of a sweet-talker usually and is desperately deaf. He is one of those oldies who is constantly fiddling with their hearing aid, in the (usually) vain hope that by tweaking the piercing feedback they'll be able to actually get beyond the tzswiiiiiiiinnnnnngggggggg and hear you. So he's really very deaf and after a more congenial attempt at describing what he found in the bushes beside his garage, he yelled "yar cat's DEAD in me back yard". Well, good thing we decided to tell the kids 1) the cat was gone 2) all about death...

So poor old puddy-tat has come to an end and we buried him last night, with the kids sprinkling some seeds across his grave. My son, who turned six today, asked "What are the seeds for?", which is a good question because it's really a bit daft to put seeds in with the corpse, after all. So I told him that every spring when the flowers come up they can think of the cat and remember how lovely he was.

So I have nearly a whole new kitchen, kids a year older, still no contract for my new job (another post altogether in that...) and birds have already settled in the back yard. I miss that annoying old boy.

Pushy students

In three weeks I will start my new role, heading up a research group at a new institution. I am taking two weeks of leave prior, leaving only one actual working day for me to complete all the things I have left on my never-ending to do list.

I also have two PhD students trying to write up, one of whom wants to be done in a similar time frame. This week I have had repeated requests to look over small sections of the student's first draft of various chapters. Due to the fact that I've had a bit going on myself at work, I haven't responded as quickly as I might normally and so the student now wishes to meet me in person on my last day at the old place to go through things in detail.

Whilst I realise that the student is anxious to get things done, my sense is there's a degree of pushiness, and something of a lack of appreciation of anyone else's situation. My reaction to the repeated requests this week (albeit, silently whilst I read yet another pleading email) has been to say "Leave me ALONE!". Instead, I am avoiding a reply but this will be hard on Friday when said student waltzes into my office and waits for a response (yes, they really do just walk on in. I've even tried locking the door, but due to my old boss' policy of not spending money on anything much all the rooms have the same keys (except his, naturally) and so people just knock, wait, unlock the door and exclaim "oh, I thought you might be hiding in there".)

So it annoys me that I am worrying about this amongst everything else going on. As a PhD student myself I made sure that I made myself available at times that suited my supervisor. I think I had a bit of R-E-S-P-E-C-T. Perhaps I'll just hum that dandy little tune all day Friday. Or lock the door and push a filing cabinet against it from the inside....

Tradesmen

Why do tradesmen turn up so early? Is it really the case that they need to get to the pub by 3.30 or their livers begin to shrivel?

I don't think I know the answer and as an academic I tend to keep odd working hours. But why would you elect to arrive at 7am each day when you could sleep in? It's not like people want to be thrown out of their houses before they've had a chance to brush teeth, eat breakfast, get their pants on etc. This morning I actually had to ask out loud (as we ran to the car at 7.12am, having outstayed our welcome inside our own homes, evidenced only by the fact that the sawing had commenced) "who's had brekky?". I never fail to eat in the morning but I realised that I'd not had the chance.

School lunch for boy. Check.
Lunch for Dad. Check
Lunch for me. Check, albeit soggy and left-over from daughter yesterday.
Bag for daughter. Check
Coat for daugter. Check
Umbrella for upcoming school concert rendition of "singing in the rain". Check.
Sanity. HOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK!

"Sorry Ma'am but you're all out of sanity pills. ha ha".

If there's one more hidden cost as part of this renovation then I think I'm likely to yell at someone.

If they have the audacity to arrive at 7.01am when my brain's only had 5 hours sleep and my hair still needs doing then I'll most certainly yell.

Tradies should start at 8.15, a respectable time by any fool's standards.

Grandmother's apron

My grandmother is nearly 85 and in recent years has had her fair share of medical mishaps. Through all of this, she's remained fiercely independent and cognitively top-notch. But age wearies her and although she can play bridge, debate politics and annoy the living daylights out of me, she's not the woman she once was.

When we arrived last night at her apartment for an early evening meal she was there in her old apron. Her hair looked different, mostly because she had to lie down in between each stage of the recipes she still recalls from the depths of her culinary heart. So ruffled squashed patches there were. But her blue and white checked apron was there, looking cleaner than I remember. That's probably because she doesn't have the energy to cook, even for herself. But she lay on her bed six or seven times yesterday; as long as it took to complete meal preparation for her family. Her face is different: OK, so it's wrinkly and spotted by the mark of sun-years, but she just looks tired. But the ties on her apron were neatly in a bow. The ends are shorter than they once were, probably because she hasn't been able to exercise for the past few years as she once did. But it still fit, that apron of my childhood.

And it felt like I was a child again. In the bosom of my crazy, multi-cultural, food-loving family. I felt safe and then I was nearly in tears. It's my turn to be the responsible mother. To nurture and to feed and to be the salve when the world wounds externally and within. The knowledge that last night will probably be the last time we sit at her table and eat, drink and laugh makes my heart ache, but it was nice to have the foresight to appreciate that possibility and soak it all up.

My grandmother's apron will be a more important keepsake than all the silver goblets and crazy trinkets she's collected through her most fascinating life. Lucky, really, given that my daughter decided that painting the paper whilst wearing my green apron was boring and decided to instead cover the apron in daubs of her hue of choice - murky brown (also known as 'all the shades of paint mixed together in the one pot').

The good, the bad, and the ugly

The Good:
I've been short-listed for a fellowship, which if successful would free up some of my budget in the new group for other activities

The Bad:
One of the key people to my group at the new centre has decided to give up research and go into industry.

The Ugly:
My head is pounding, which if I catastrophize means I've got a whopper of a tumor, but in all likelihood reflects my lack of sleep, poor posture and it-feels-like-a-head-cold-coming-on brain.

The net effect? Well, you know. It's wholly pleasing to me that I have reacted to the second by just getting on with business. This is all surmountable. A total pain in the a*!e but it will be OK.

The countdown is on. 4 weeks to go, with two of these on holidays. Hurrah to new jobs!