Puppy vs Cat...

Hmmm....Fonz is not quite as thrilled about the whole 'puppy' thing as I seem to be. So far today we have at least managed to get her down stairs, but all she's really done so far is sit in the kitchen and glare at the puppy.

Fortuately puppy is pegged out fast asleep in the middle of the living room floor, but it may all get a bit interesting when Peerie wakes up...

Puppy!

The Puppy is here! At the moment the name is Peerie Mootie (translates from Shetlan' as Little Small!) but that may change over the weekend if I decide it doesn't suit her. We shall see.

Anyway, she's adorable. I think she's feeling a little bit lost without her mum, dad, or brother, but I'm sure she'll settle in. The cat is currently ignoring her - which is preferable to her trying to kill the wee thing! We shall see how that goes.

And now for the important bit...photos!

So Exciting!!!!!!!!

I'm getting a puppy!!!!!!!!!!

I'm so excited. I went to meet the pup (and her parents & breeders) today and she is just too cute! I did the sensible thing - I went home and thought about it without having the little ball of fluff sitting there trying to seduce me, and I did decide that I really did want her. She's just adorable.

She's a shih tzu, she's 10 weeks old on Tuesday and I'm bringing her home on Friday. (She's really small, so she didn't get her first jabs with the rest of her littermates and is getting the first ones on Wednesday.)

She is so so adorable. So now I need to think of a name for her...the breeders have been calling her Honey, but...I'm not overly enamoured of 'Honey'...not sure what I'll call her...I'm quite attached to Doodlebug for some unknown reason, but that sort of seems like more of a boy's name...

Photos and overly excited updates of her every move will no doubt follow in time. I'm so excited!

Festive Cheer

This website is a little gem that is guaranteed to provide hours of festive procrastination! www.elfyourself.com Enjoy!

Christmas time...

I cracked. A full week earlier then usual, and I cracked. My christmas tree is now up and decorated in my living room. My classroom is probably going to be decorated tomorrow afternoon. It's Christmas, I'm embracing it, it's fine!

It's actually all ITV's fault. I was doing ok. Holding out against the relentless pressures of retail, the kids at school, my neighbours who have decorated inside and out (christmas decorating is much bigger up here than I would have expected)...I even held strong against the fact that the radio is now playing Christmas songs. And then ITV had to go and put Love Actually on tonight. And I cracked. I'm now in the christmas zone. And I don't care. My christmas tree is lovely.

And for those of you who know my penchent for creating my own christmas tree fairies, you'll be glad to know that my trusty barbie has a new outfit this year. Isn't she fab? (If a tad Wonder Woman-esque...)

On a totally different topic, this is an appeal to anyone reading this for some advice. Should I get a puppy or not? I've been thinking about it for a while, and a couple of weeks ago a litter of Shih Tzus was advertised in the paper and I decided (rather sensibly I thought) to have a serious think, sleep on it, and if I still wanted one phone then. So I did, and I did still want one, but by the time I phoned, all the puppies had found homes.

And then today I got a call from the nice people to say that they've been told by their vet that the bitch they'd been planning on keeping is going to be too small as an adult to breed, so now they're looking for a new home for her. And do I want her? (On the strict condition I get her spayed - which I would have done anyway.)

Now...I know this is a big decision. I have until Saturday to think about it as I can't go out to meet the pup (and its parents and breeders) until Saturday. But I do want one... And so this is an appeal for sensible advice. At least, something slightly more helpful than my mother's somewhat useless: "oh, an ickle puppy! I could look after it when you go on holiday...oooohhhhh.....[assuming sickly baby voice] ickle-wickle puppy-dog for christmas...." And so on.

So...Puppy or not puppy? That is the question of the day. Any advice greatfully recieved (but do bear in mind that I may well choose to completely ignore it...)

Parent's Night

Parent's Night. *big sigh* My first full one as a proper teacher.

I'm exhausted.

I arrived at school at 8.30 am this morning, I did a full day teaching. I then stayed in school until parent's night started at 6.30 pm, (having changed into my 'I'm an adult, honest' costume) and at that point I started talking to parents. I did not stop talking until some time around 9pm (although rational speech had become tricky at least an hour earlier - note to self: gibbering at parents does not a good impression make!). By that point I'd been bursting for the loo for at least half an hour.

I'm now back at home in a brain-dead fug of tiredness. I might also have some post of post-traumatic stress disorder. A minor one, but PTS none the less. Bloody hell!

God help me when I'm back on the mainland dealing with classes of 30! Of course, Shetland parents are very keen to 'get involved' and all that jazz, and they don't bother with appointments, so you can't even use the 'I'm afraid that's your time up and others are waiting' excuse...still, at least there is very little chance of them lamping you when you tell them that little Jimmy is actually a little shite who may be possessed by Satan, and would they mind terribly if you got the priest in for a bit of an exorcism.

...bloody hell...I need to go to bed...or open a bottle of wine...bed is probably the more sensible option...I don't have a bottle of wine...I have a bottle of vodka...but bed would probably be better...

TV Coma

I HAVE SKY!!!! I'm so very excited, it really speaks volumes about the somewhat sorry state of affairs which is my social life at the moment. Also, having been swearing for years that I don't need Sky, it does feel like something of a defeat to finally have it installed. But, frankly, I'll get over it - I can now watch Lost! I can watch Sawyer getting his kit off on a regular basis! Woohoo! So many channels....it's truely amazing!
See, the main problem with living up here on the edge of the world, is that there isn't really that much to do. I leave the house in the morning to go to school, and it's dark. Depending on the weather it may or may not reach proper daylight at some point in the day, which means I may or may not get to appreciate the actually quite lovely views out of my classroom windows, and then by the time I get back home again, it's dark. And usually blowing a gale. Which does, somewhat, impinge on the possibilities for extra-curricular activities. In fact, the favourite at the moment is going to the gym (yes, me. Going to the gym, And - even stranger - enjoying it!) - and even though it's at the bottom of my road getting there through the rain and the wind is a bit of a struggle.
On the weekends, the prospect of going outside is always hugely dependent on the weather, and evening activites pretty much involve going to one or more of Lerwick's pubs. Which is fine and all, but if you don't fancy the pub, you're pretty much scuppered. And so I have Sky. Happy days.

Also...why is it that I can't seem to change the font/colour/size/etc? What's that about? Answers on the back of a postcard please... (as you might have noticed...I've now sorted this...tres bizarre...)

I'm scary!

Well, it's finally been confirmed by the kids - apparently I am, officially, a bit scary! They're even talking about it in the hallways. Cool, huh?

It's been a funny week on the teaching front. I'm no doubt tempting fate and a full-blown swinging-from-the-lights riot by saying this, but I think I might have turned a bit of a corner with the bad-boy S3 class. Of course, the fact that that class is now down to only 6 members may have something to do with it. Naturally, of course, karma kicks in and the 'good' S3 class is descending rather rapidly through the various circles of hell. Now, there is the fact that one of the 'bad boys' is now in this class because he got chucked out of Physics and now has to take Biology instead, but actually, it's not him causing the problems. No, it's one of the other boys who seems keen to take over the title of 'Most Likely to be a Total Wanker'. So he has been. He made me finally give out a detention, and now he's made me send him out of my class.

As a result of this, he told me that 'I hate you. I really do.'

Am I bothered? I did rather enjoy writing the referral that was fired off to guidance, and I'm now REALLY looking forward to Parent's Evening on Tuesday, but I can't say that I'm really losing much sleep over the fact that one 14 year old boy from Shetland hates me. I'm pretty sure I'll get over it. After all - I'm scary!

Shout out

This is a big birthday shout out to Chloe to make up for general crapness in sending birthday cards, etc!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

Cake!

It's official. I'm a domestic goddess.

Finding myself at something of a loose end this weekend, I decided to entertain myself with a bit of domestic magic. I make cake. It's very yummy. Then I made Roast Beef with all the trimmings. It was also very yummy! Although neither helped my waistline in any way...c'est la vie.

Woohoo!

Happy days are here again...

I got a phone call today from a very nice chappy from Sky who'll be coming to install my Sky dish & box - instead of waiting until the 19th of December, would I like it installed on the 2nd? Yes. Yes I would!

So...hurrah...I'm getting Sky over two weeks earlier than expected, and as a result will only have to put up with one more episode's worth of goading from the obnoxious PE teacher who has Sky+ but not a VCR and so can't record Lost for me, but who takes great pleasure in mocking me. Bastard.

I'm an idiot

Today it was confirmed, if there was every any doubt, that I am, in fact, a total and utter idiot. I've spent a large portion of the past week driving myself absolutely demented trying to find two DVDs I bought a while ago. I need them for my S3 class that I'm doing Dracula with - the DVDs are the 1931 Bela Lugosi Dracula, and a box set of Van Helsing, Bram Stoker's Dracula (the Gary Oldman one with Keanu Reeve's incredible-colour-changing-hair), and Mary Shelly's Frankenstein.

Now, I knew that the DVDs had arrived from Amazon. I knew I'd last seen them sitting on the arm chair in the living room. I knew I'd put them somewhere 'safe' when doing a rapid tidy-up prior to my departure south for the October break. (My landlady was going to be round painting the ceiling in the spare room so I figured I should leave the place tidy.) And then the trail went cold. The DVDs were no longer on the arm chair. They weren't in the large Sainsbury's bag in which my to-do ironing gets shoved (when it's not living on afore-mentioned arm chair). They weren't in the DVD rack - obviously. Nor were they to be found in any of the other six million places I've looked over the past seven days.

So where were they, I hear you ask. They were in the living room, as I'd always suspected. Turns out, in my wisdom, that although I'd opened the Amazon package to see what was inside, I'd never actually removed the DVDs from it. So in the October tidying frenzy, I'd shoved the entire thing away behind the clothes horse, between the bookcase and the wall. And there they've been until 6.45ish this evening when I spotted said Amazon package (having looked at it a million times before and assumed it was empty...) and thought "maybe...just maybe..."

Needless to say, a happy-dance-of-joy around the living room ensued, rapidly followed by the realisation that I'm an Idiot. No other words for it.

My name's Nyssa Anderson, and I'm an idiot.

Saturday night in Lerwick

Tonight I witnessed the true levels of excitement that Shetland has to offer.

I had decided on a sensible, quiet, peaceful weekend in this weekend, largely because I haven't been able to catch up on the tiredness that comes from thinking that getting the boat up one night and going straight in to school the next day really is a good idea. I'd even designated today to be a 'pyjama day'. That cunning plan was somewhat scuppered by the realisation that I had very little food in the house, and none that I could combine into something I actually wanted to eat. And it's a bit nippy up here to pop to the supermarket in your jammies. So I had to get to dressed. Nevermind. There's always tomorrow.

Anyway, so I'm in my living room, in a semi-coma of TV overdose brought on by Strictly Come Dancing (come on Smillie - it's national pride at stake now!), bits of X Factor (am I only one who just doesn't care who wins this series?), NCIS (Michael Weatherly is just lush - don't you agree?) and assorted bits of other channel hopping. Half-way through Special Victims Unit, possibly the most anti-climactic piece of potential excitement occurred. What began as a bad joke (how many attempts does it take ot land a helicopter?) turned into potential excitement as it became clear that said copter was, in fact, engaged in a search of the loch. Six times the copter slowly flew the length of the loch, circling Lerwick to come back and look again. Helicopters, as I'm sure you're aware, are a bit on the noisy side, so pretty much everyone who lives around the loch, and a fairly large number of passers by, had come out to watch the drama unfold - in very cold weather I might add. And then the helicopter just went away.

I have no idea whatever it was they were looking for, but they didn't seem to find it. I'm assuming it was a training exercise, but quite why they had to disturb/wake up half of Lerwick at 11.30 on a Saturday night, I'm not sure...

Surely they lie?

It is an incredibly sorry state of affairs when your third year boys class informs you of the sexual preferences of your current 'embarrassing, but I'm going with it' celebrity crush. Apparently John Barrowman (aka the rather lush Captain Jack) is, in one boy's words, "so bent he could suck his own knob". Delightful.

Anyone who may have information to the contrary, please let me know! To be fair....the clues were there, but I'm just not ready to resign him to batting for the other team just yet... And third year boys do lie...often...(see previous post for 'I lost the ability to sit')

Teachers laugh more often than any other profession...

And I believe it. To be honest, I really think it's because often you're in a laugh-or-cry situation. For example, when someone pipes up from the back of the class "So what page are we on?" when you've just finished saying "page 43" for the 23rd time in 2 minutes. Or when the reason given for non-attempted (never mind completed) homework is that "I lost the ability to sit. Honestly, it's tragic - I spent the entire night staring at the chair trying desperately to remember what to do..." At least it's more original that 'the dog ate it'!

Today was one of those giggle-inducing days.

Having spent almost the entire day finally marking the huge pile of essays that I've been studiously ignoring, I came upon an absolute corker. The only problem is that I can't decide if it's an accidentally hilarious example of why you shouldn't automaticaly click 'change' on the spellcheck, or if this pupil is actually a cheeky little shite staging a clever form of passive protest against my choice of class text. Maybe you can decide. The opening sentence of this young man's essay read...

"I have reticently been reading..."

That's right, "reticently". So, was he aiming for 'recently' but did something funny that sparked spell-check, or is he a bit clever, a bit funny, and a bit on his way to detention?

Who knows? You decide.

On a completely unrelated note, today I finally cracked and ordered Sky Digital. The Variety and Music mixes, if you're interested. It was a combination of factors that did it. There was the flyer offering 'half price subscription for three months' lying on the floor when I got home. There was the trailer for Lost series 3 that was on tv, mocking me with channel 4's shiteness. There was the obnoxious PE teacher at school who's been mocking my lack of sky (and hence lack of Lost) since the announcement of channel 4's shiteness. And then there was the prospect of the Shetland winter stretching before me...

So I cracked. I did have a mini-tantrum when I discovered that I couldn't order it online because I don't live on the UK mainland, but that was averted when the nice chappy on the end of the phone said that I could still have the £10 'book on-line' credit. And then I discovered that no-one will be around to install it until the 19th of December! Bastards!

PS: The 'I forgot how to sit down' excuse - I genuinely heard that on Tuesday. You have to admire the dedication to avoiding homework.

Visions of the Future...

11 weeks and 5 days. That's how long I lasted on this accursed island before turning.

Tuesday 7th Novenber, period 6, S3 English. I'm giving out books to be read (we're doing a play based on Dracula so I'm getting the kids to read a vampire novel of some ort for their personal reading this term). Anyway, I'm giving out books, deciding who gets what one, and I try to convince one boy to take Cirque du Freak because it's a short, easy read, and he's not a big reader.

So how do I describe this book to said chap? I tell him...oh the horror...I tell him...

"Don't worry, it's only a peerie wee book" (*gulp*)

"Peerie". Now, not only was it somewhat redundant as 'peerie' is the Shetlan' version of 'wee', it was my first unconscious use of dialect. Needless to say the boys (oh yeah, this was my all-boy S3 class) found this all very amusing. I see it as a worrying sign of assimilation.

Still, at least I'm getting off the island to do my Christmas shopping in Edinburgh this weekend... The Shetland influence is obviously much more pernicious than first suspected!

Little Buggers

There are those moments as a teacher when you genuinely wonder what the point is. These were fairly common as a student when I would frequently find myself wondering if it really was all worth it, and was office work really all that bad? I did, eventually, come to the decision that yes, it was worth it, and yes, office work most definitely was that bad. It had seemed that those 'what am I doing?' moments were at least mostly behind me now that I'm a fully fledged (well...mostly fledged) teacher. Turns out that it just means that the little buggers have longer to get under your skin - it's more of a long term project to try and break you down, as opposed to on placement when there's a definite end in sight.

Yes, the honeymoon is most definitely over as I found myself today in with the mentalist third years wondering what on earth the point was - when someone so clearly doesn't want to be in your class as P, there's only so much you can do to try and get them involved. And today that was barely even approaching crowd-control, never mind anything approaching education. Of ocurse, this has an effect on everyone n the classroom as even those few who actually want to learn and do well are skuppered by all the time and energy going in to keeping a lid on it. And today that lid pretty much boiled over. Tomorrow is another day, but it was undoubtedly compounded by the fact that I didn't get much sleep last night - tired and cranky does not a good teaher make. And so I'm now on the sofa in my tracksuit bottoms planning a bath and an early night.

Oh, and it turns out that it is INCREDIBLY cathartic to come home from a shitty day, put on comfy clothes, go out into your garden and spell out "***** [insert name of shitty pupil here] smells" with a sparkler!

Shetland's premier nightclub establishment

Last night I had an interesting experience revolving around Shetland's premier nightclub establishment (like there's so much competition up here...), the oh-so aptly named "Posers". This was only the third time I'd been to Posers, but what made this particularly special was that I was stome cold sober! Honestly. I know...it's unusual...but my back's been playing me up so I'd been taking painkillers all day and I didn't really think that mixing vodka and high-dosage ibuprofen is a recipe for success. And so I found myself in Posers, in the always-comic scenario of being the only sober person in the group.

Being sober in Posers also meant that I realised exactly what a shit-hole it really is! I always knew it was a shit-hole, just not how much of a shit-hole. On the plus side, I'm guessing they've had the cleaners in recently because it was definietly smelling better than usual. (Am I the only one who's noticed that since the smoking ban the assorted icky smells of stale drink and sweat have become a lot more noticable in many bars and clubs?)

Even more exciting...it turns out that there are actually good looking men in Shetland! Granted, I didn't get any numbers or anything, but the evening was definietly enlivened by the aesthetically pleasing nature of some of the Posers patrons. Things might just be looking up...

This is hallowe'en...

My God but they're a hardy bunch up here!

It's FREEZING cold. It's blowing a hurricane. I'm currently sitting in my living room, wrapped up in Ugg boots, tracky b's, a cashmere polo neck and a hoody, huddled in front of my electric heater hoping that if I keep on typing long enough I will regain feeling in my fingers (not sure what to do about my toes yet...) and wondering if there's any way I could teach the cat to turn on the heating before I get home from school.

Has this baltic weather discouraged sugar-hungry guisers? Has it buggery.

And so all efforts to warm myself or my house are being thwarted by the fact that every ten minutes or so I have to open the front door and give sweeties away. Of course, this inclement weather does mean that I have no interest whatsoever in any 'tricks' that the little demons/witches/vampires/school kids (no school uniforn up here so it has a bit of a novelty value)/old people/etc might have prepared to earn their sugar hit, and so I'm saved from my usual Hallowe'en tantrum that kiddies these days get arsey over the fact that you expect them to offer you some sort of entertainment in exchange for sugary goodness. Not that I have high standards - a simple joke will do. I distinctly remember being forced, age 13, to escort my 6 year old brother and his friends around North Berwick. My darling little bro's party piece was just such a simple joke - he'd made it up himself, and was indescribably proud of it:
Bhrian: "Knock knock"
Unsuspecting neighbour: "Who's there?"
Bhrian: "Dinosaur"
Unsuspecting neighbour: "Dinosaur who?"
Bhrian: "Dinosaur's don't say 'who', they say 'rooooaaaaarrrrr'!"
Cue hysterical six-year old laughter, unsuspecting neighbour bemusement, sugary goodness for all!

Needless to say, Bhrian has never yet been allowed to forget this early evidence of 'comic genius', but it has ensured that my trick-or-treat standards remain suitably low. I do usually expect some sort of effort, but tonight, what with the hurricane that appears to be blowing directly from the arctic circle (can you get hurricanes in the arctic?) I'm more than willing to waive my rights to demand entertainment if it at least means I don't need to have the door open for more than 30 seconds at a time.

Reader, she married him.

I'm well aware that this post is nearly two weeks late, but as I was on a boat at the time it aired, today was, in fact, my first opportunity to watch the final episode of the BBC's Jane Eyre (thank the gods for programmable VCRs).

And so, I now find myelf sitting in my living room, not giving a hoot that my fire is stubbornly refusing to catch, with an utterly ridiculous, probably bordering on the fatuous, smile upon my face, my whole faith in true love utterly reaffirmed. So much so, in fact, that I'm only marginally irritated by the fact that the iconic declaration of female empowerment that is "Reader, I married him" did not in any way, shape, or form feature in the episode. Give me time to come out of my 'true love conquers all' bubble of happiness and I've no doubt I'll find it in me to be truely outraged, but at the moment...couldn't care less! Likewise, I have no qualms whatsoever with their rather un-proprietous getting jiggy in the meadow at the end. I mean...Toby Stephens...who could blame Jane for wanting to finally get her rocks off?

She married him. He's lush (just look at him - would you say no?) and he loves her desperately. All is right with the world. *sigh*

I'm off to daydream delightfully about Mr R/Toby Stephens (either would do) declaring their undying love and affection...*sigh* I might even finally be ready to re-read the actual book...