Long live life-long learning!

Being gainfully unemployed can be a challenge. But I've met it headlong with a challenge of my own. I have decided to catch up on my classics reading. This came about chiefly when I risked my English degree being revoked by unmasking my horrifying total of Jane Austen books read (viz. zero, wince) to some of my learned friends and my hubs. So I have begun to make amends. My first port of call has been Thomas Hardy. Much to Mark's surprise I have loved "Far from the madding crowd" because of his gorgeous takes on the foibles of human nature. Check it out:

"He wished she knew his impressions; but he would as soon have thought of carrying an odour in a net as of attempting to convey the intangibilities of his feeling in the coarse meshes of language. So he remained silent." (pg.20)

Delicious, hey?

But life-long learning doesn't stop at books. Oh no. Living with my tannie and oom has been an education in itself. They are seriously into sustainable eating and living. We went to hear a talk by Rob Hopkins called, "From Oil Dependency to Local Resilience". Very inspiring. The UK feels light-years ahead of South Africa in terms of the transition we have to make due to peak oil and climate change.

And lastly, to convince you that I am aspiring to the upper echelons of educated society (ahem), I include an extract from the job description for the Saturday Invigilator job I have applied for at the Bodleian Library in Oxford. Yes, THE Bodleian Library:

"Sensory and physical demands:
1. Fetch manuscripts, rare books and archival objects (some extremely heavy) from locations around the building, including areas accessible only by stairs.
2. Handle rare and fragile objects with care.
3. Operate specialist equipment (e.g. stairwalkers) in order to move manuscripts, rare books and archival objects from delivery points."

Can anybody out there stand as a referee of my ability to operate a stairwalker? If you could just let me know what it is, that would be appreciated.

R

When it snows, find a steely grey lough

Taking Africa with me

In a wood panelled pub whose walls have known countless evenings of sheep farmers, pipe smoke and ribaldry, I sat and read my book. A few locals at the counter nursing quiet conversation and their beers. Me drinking the finest pint of Guinness that ever did grace the green isle- snow outside- could almost hear the angels. Welcome to Ireland- I’ll forgo the Northern Ireland bit, but that is where I am.
Conscripted by myself away from the loving arms of my dearest who has remained in Bristol, to the strange little town of Enniskillen in Co. Fermanagh. I have been engaged with a two week locum in the hospital here. A 16 year old with Anorexia, a 12 year old with too much Vodka and a few wee wheezy ones. Good, kindly nurses and doctors. Myself, Raj and Sree shoot the breeze most evenings. It seems that most Indian doctors do the forced separation from wives and family to get that coveted Fellowship of the Royal what-not College.
The full force of British paranoia descended upon my disease burdened body as that blemish on my Chest x-ray performed at Heathrow finally caught up with me. Public health folk here in a tizz as I was barred from having patient contact until I had had a full once over by a pulmonologist (seems like I did have TB once upon a time). Wrought unexpected opportunity to have my lovely fly over to Emerald Land and gambol about a now snow covered Isle. More Guinness (she always leads me astray), folk music into the wee hours, chips and blood sausages, tea in Donegal and more gambolling in the heather in the far reaches of Ireland- and then that swim…

One more night and then back to my hearth and then onto Jersey ...

One half in Bristol

The snow comes down relentlessly as I tickle away on the keys in this cosy home in Alveston, Bristol. I have attached some pics of "Whole Foods Mama" my snow woman, currently residing in the backyard of my aunt and uncle's house, of whom I am very proud. My aunt and uncle are organic, local produce people, hence her name. See if you can make out which veg have been used for which facial feature.
The British nation has gone mad with a mix of anxiety and a child-like thrill with all this white powdery stuff sifting down from the heavens. I watched a 2-minute long insert in a news programme on BBC where we heard three countdowns taking placing for the giant snowball to be launched down a hill on Hampstead Heath. Nothing happened during those 2-minutes but the anchors in the newsroom were flushed with excitement when the cameras cut back to them.

I'm supposed to be at an interview with another teaching agency in Bristol this morning but all bus services have been suspended. Hence, I was forced to spend half an hour building WFM. Snow people are back-breaking work, especially when there are no small people around to pack in the girth around hips and you have to keep bending down to thicken her out.

Mark is currently doing his ward round of the overwhelmingly daunting number of ... 4 children! in the paediatric ward in Enniskillen hospital in Northern Ireland. The highlight of his stay has been acquiring a cotton fitted sheet from M and S to replace the nylon he's been suffering on up 'til now. He's feeling much better since he moved from his room next to the boozing medical students and now goes around with an Indian doctor called Raj. "Is he Raj 1 or Raj 2?", I asked. But apparently he hasn't asked him because after promising to make Mark supper and then slotting two pieces of toast into the toaster, Mark felt perhaps the cultural barrier of commercials jokes might be a bit too much to overcome in this instance.

So, we continue to be two severed halves of the marital pear and are holding up bravely with only a few snivels into the pillow each night. Our reunion happens next week Friday, so what with Valentine's Day being the following day, if you feel the earth move...you know why.

PS What do you think of the new background? Cute or what?