Home again home again

[ailbhe]

So, we got off the train, and made our way to the main concourse, and found Rob, and had a Joyous Reunion tempered by the fact that I was tired, hungry, and dizzy, and then we found somewhere to sit and eat.

Linnea started making friends with a man eating a pasty, mainly by making big mouth-full-chewing faces back at him as he chewed, and we got chatting - he was very excited by Canada and is going to move there, and also loved Linnea and didn't want children because it's too hard to do it right. I can't pin down why the following exchange made me uncomfortable -

"I'm in IT, of course. What do you do?"
*points at Linnea* "I'm her mum."
"Well, that's a job in itself, of course."

He was trying to be nice, and I'm sure he meant it - but I also just plain don't believe that he believed me when I said "Or two - yeah. I was in IT before. It was easier than this," which I felt driven to do from some bizarre need to justify myself. Which is crazy.

Anyway, we had a nice chat, apart from that, and then we got a taxi home and the house is HUGE without all the fireguards around the gas fires. The radiators look fine, as radiators go, and aren't too terribly intrusive to the eye, except in the library, which is a shame as that's my favourite room. I need an idea of something to do to or with it that will make it less... well. It's exactly where the focal-point fire would be if we had one. It's huge and white. There's a picture over it. Should I try painting it? Or just leaving it alone? Can I dress it in a modesty muslin and pretend it's not there? Cover it in raffia or milk-bottle tops? scratch it with a wire brush and call it a feature? Any ideas?

Other than that - man, central heating is great. The bathroom is warm. The water is hot. There's a water softener, so the tap water is pleasanter, though it doesn't affect the cold water supply so our washing machine still turns our clothes stiff as Robin starch.

We got to bed at a reasonable time the day we got home, Wednesday, and on Thursday we got up at a reasonable time to be ready for the NCT toddler group, who didn't show up, which is fine. Then we moved some furniture - the big for-projects-and-art-and-stuff dining table is upstairs being a computer desk, and my lickle desk is downstairs being a dining table. So we have gained serious floorspace, and we may well be getting rid of Rob's huge computer desk, too - he's not likely to spend much time working at home in future, really, so won't need so much dedicated office space.

A smaller table should be easier to keep clear, too, since we won't be able to eat off it if it's covered in junk.

And then there's the NHS letters. One is fine - appointment with the same consultant as before about the traumatic birth thing. I think I might bring her some of my recent poems, actually, since they are more coherent than I usually manage to be myself. She's great.

The other is a bit annoying; it's to see a dermatologist about my vaginal vestibulitis, and it's for 14 weeks after the letter was sent, ie the 24th of January. That's AGES away. I'm so, so tired of this. I want it sorted. But this is the person my gynaecologist trusts to have me checked out by, so I'm very reluctant to ask for anyone else - there are others, he just wants me seen by someone he trusts not to mess me around. I believe it's a woman, too, which does help, actually. A bit, anyway.

Linnea tried to go to sleep at 9-ish last night and couldn't. At 11:30 pm we all went to bed together in the big bed, and at about 12:30 she fell asleep. She was uneasy and unsettled, though, and needed me to stay right there with her, so I couldn't drop off until after 5:30. Today I am still dizzy and sick, and have a seriously upset stomach. I wonder if we caught something on our travels, or whether she's just uneasy from ten days sans Daddy Waab and a return to a cosmetically altered home.

I got a three-hour nap this afternoon and Linnea got 90 minutes. Hurrah for children's television.

Comments

[richtermom.livejournal.com]

Home again home again, jiggity jig!

All our radiators are ugly, and when the girl was born, I strongly considered putting something around them. Turns out there are radiator guards out there -- kind of boxy, with screens for the front and side surfaces. You could get some more neutral or dark colored screens with an appropriately sized heatproof (marble?) shelf, and it can hold a small selection of books and be a lot more neutral.

[ai731.livejournal.com]

Library radiator suggestion: Buy or make a wooden radiator cover, and paint it to be interesting. That way you get a piece or art as a focal point rather than a radiator, as well as an extra (if narrow) shelf in the library. Of course you could just paint the radiator, but the radiator cover gives you more scope for painting possibilities, I think - Linnea's handprints, perhaps?

[kightp.livejournal.com]

When I lived in an apartment with an obtrusive radiator, I flung a pretty cloth over it and had a small shelf built to fit over the top (basically a flat piece with framing underneath that fit down around the curved top of the radiator far enough to keep the shelf from tipping). I treated it as mantel space (a bowl of dried flowers or holiday ornaments in winter; a couple of candlesticks in the warmer seasons when the heat was turned off.

Of course, my radiator never got all that *hot*. If yours does, you'd want to be judicious about the sort of fabric you use to drape it...

[k425.livejournal.com]

I'd suggest painting the rad the same colour as the wall, to start with.

Or disguise it. Our rads are all disguised as clothes-airers, this time of year...