Don't worry Normal Service will be resumed.

I think this is the longest gap I have had since I restarted  blogging, I know I have missed the odd week and usually get to stressed and hassled at missed weeks, but the last few weeks have been so busy!

I have had to be prioritizing and organizing and make this my 'fun' thing, sadly that time has been sucked into the gaps just recently. Work has been fun, I took on certain things knowing it would be hard work. I just didn't think it would be this hard in places. Some of my work load has been lifted and I am getting a handle on the rest now, I also have a new assistant who is fab, but I need to bring them up to speed!

I had a weeks break from school only to find the other half of my job took over, I had to work most of the holiday and never got to my desk so had well over 100 emails to sort when I did get back. I am still catching up with missed calls and missed work and the end of the month things that I should have done and I so need to make a list.

Most of the last week was spent looking for a lost cat, it wasn't the usual lost one so we were very worried. She is a semi feral cat so can look after herself but rarely wanders far, she turned out to be next door stuck under floor boards that had been lifted for a few hours on Sunday and somehow she got under and too scared to come out again until too late! Some of the local children heard her on Thursday evening while waiting on the ice cream van (yes us hardy Scot's get an ice cream van in the mild winter, only minus 10 well bring it on) she was very thin and very very jumpy as they had been knocking walls down that week while she was stuck under the floor, never have I been so glad to open a food sachet than then.

I see that CPD23 has been revamped and is now 23 things uk and I for one love the idea, it was never meant to be static but needs someone to run it! or some way to keep it fresh, and this allows you to do some aspects and do it in your own time...

another area I am enjoying is the VLE from Cilip, I thought it would be annoying, or hard to keep track of but it is so much easier than before. I still need ideas and help, but I am getting round it more and more. I was a bit tough on my mentees, any who are not at submission point really need to think about transferring across! If they can't get done in 6 months then they need to start the new system. Some may do it but I know of two who really do not want to have to start again so both are now on a very short deadline! :-) how cruel of me (whistles as she walks away).

This is a feed me bacon face, we tend to have a small bacon roll fest every Sunday morning, we get up late and fry bacon, waking most of the teens and if they don't get up they don't get bacon, so its a bit of a first come gets the best bits idea, but of course as the furry ones can smell the packet opening and tend to haunt my feet they get bits of raw bacon while I cook. and this is very much the 'wheres mine' face! She is nearly long enough to reach the counter top, but not quite, and so she pulls herself up as high as she can and begs!

Normal service will be resumed in a week or so but thank you for your patience :-).

Strange Times of a Cat Lady

Who forgot to turn over my calendar and how dare it be December!

Sadly I have most of my Christmas cards done and out, and even went round delivering them to my neighbors on Sunday, but with an ulterior motive! One of my kittens went missing, no surprise, she wanders often but always comes home for tea, maybe late occasionally wet and windblown and one memorable night in a state after what we later found out was a fight with something bigger, which left her with a hole in her leg and very poorly and flat for a few weeks. Of the four cats we have had one to the vets more than all the others together and if any of them have an issue its her! but we love her and she is ours, we have had her from her birth (on my sofa!) she is pushy and loud, she starts fights and often breaks things, if something gets broken its her, directly or indirectly! But I spent a horrid sleepless night worrying about her and the day walking round checking empty sheds and garages, knocking on doors and asking passing folk. At 9pm on Sunday night someone I had chatted to during the day rang to say there was a lost cat on caitness.org, I checked and yes they describe her well but it may not be her! a benny hill esque series of phone calls led to a trip in my car at 10.15 at night to find that yes they had my Midnight, I gathered her up and hugged the stuffing out of her! The people had worried when she hadn't eaten! but as she is a madame and turns her nose up at all but one brand of sachet I wasn't too surprised! I could moan about folks who pick up cats who are not homeless or lost, and I could wax lyrical about people who care for even stray animals.
But Midnight is Home and now my husband isn't sure he will ever let her out again! Give that until Wednesday when she finally gets on his last nerve. :-)

Work is chaos and the weather is threatening 8 inches of snow later in the week when I have to be in Inverness! so we shall see what happens, we could do with some snow to make us feel christmassy!
Watching my pupils trying to write CV's and they have so few things they think are important! they run a social life and have a big social media presences and do not think they have skills! More in doing CV's and planning choices that are months off but more they do now the better they are aware come the spring choice forms. It is amazing how much they can find to do that isn't related to what they should be doing. I love being in contact with the pupils and their ideas and mindsets, keeps me on my toes.

I have been a part of the Good Reads web site for a while but haven't been as active as I should have been, and now I am catching up and enjoying reading for myself again. I even got some of the titles in the good reads for this year already read :-) the winners are here, and they look good there are some I really must read! When I went to Kindle I found I read more online and little formal books, but I now am trying to balance it back again. I even tried to read the Man Booker Prize list and got oms done :-) but sadly not the Luminaries as it was too thick! yes as a librarian I try to read thinner books! I do plan to get the Luminaries on my kindle for my Christmas read.

I also read this in my blog feed and it has given me ideas, both to do one for myself and to run something similar for the pupils in school!  A group of us used to meet up and share things here in the highlands, we used to call it tear and share, or more like steal and reshape as most things do not one size fit all, we have to adjust and develop our own resources, but I do object to reinventing the wheel! I will take it and make it fit us or use what I can but I do not like making from scratch!

Just been and signed a change petition, not my normal act but this was worth it. Set up by A Girl Called Jack, to debate the causes of the increase in use of food banks, and her quote that gets me every time...

In the words of Desmond Tutu: "There comes a point where we need to stop just pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they're falling in."

So I have signed and if you feel that way inclined please do so as well. #JacksPetition Thanks

Just to finish a quick shot of my much missing cat, who refused to look at the camera that day!