M.O.T.

Today I went for what is affectionately known as my MOT, otherwise known as my annual visit to the heart outpatients clinic. I don't think that's the real name of the clinic but never mind. It is held at Harefield Hospital, in Middlesex, and I've been going there for more years than I can remember (literally).

Getting there is a bit of an epic journey, involving a train into London, going all the way across London and out the other side to the far end of the Metropolitan line on the Underground, and then a bus from Uxbridge station to the hospital. One of my favourite parts of the day is the lovely view from the bus on the way to the hospital, across some lovely green fields and a very nice looking lake/reservoir.

For once, we got there really early, so we had some food in the canteen bit, and saw the same ladies we see every year serving the food. The canteen at Harefield was built in 1974, and I have visited every year since about 1980. It's remained the same all that time. I think even the ladies are the same ones. They are what I call 'WI' ladies, and are very lovely and make excellent sandwiches and tea. Bizarre fact: you can buy a postcard of the canteen from the canteen. I have done this.

I had my ECG (electrocardiogram) and Echo (ultrasound). For anyone who wants to know and doesn't (if there is anyone), the ECG is the one where they stick lots of wires to your chest, ankles and wrists using sticky pads and then get a reading of your heart rate, beats per minute, 'pattern' and other things I'm not quite sure of. If you know please tell me - I meant to ask but forgot. This is the thing, after 20+ years of having these same tests I still don't know exactly what they do!

The Echo is basically an ultrasound similar to the ones you might have seen pregnant ladies having. The technician can see 'inside' the heart - the way the valves are moving and the blood is flowing through the heart. When you're having it done you can see your heart on screen, which is quite interesting, although obviously I wasn't sure which bit was which, but the opening and closing of the valves is quite easy to make out. I had a trainee technician for this at first, but as I'm an awkward customer and my heart isn't easy to see, she had to call in another lady, who is another person I've seen for years and knows what a problem patient I am. She recognised me, which was nice. It's quite comforting to see familiar faces each time I go.

Today was my first meeting with my new doctor, after having the same one for 25 years. Happily my new doctor seems very good, and friendly and approachable as well, which is always a bonus. She was more thorough than my old doctor, maybe partly because it was my first appointment with her and she needed to find out the status quo. She tried to take my pulse, but couldn't find it (noone else can either), and measured my oxygen levels by putting one of those things on my finger. I was interested to find out that this is what those things are for (sorry if you have no idea what I mean - they have them in Holby City (yes, apologies, I do watch this)). Apparently I have oxygen levels of 98%, which is good. She asked me quite a lot of questions about how I was feeling (ok), whether I was feeling more tired now than previously (a bit) and what exercise I do (not much). She also asked if I had any questions, which I appreciated, as not all doctors take the trouble to do this.

I asked her about timescales of having the valve replaced/repaired if we decide not to/can't have children. Basically it depends on whether I feel like I'm 'deteriorating', health wise - whether I'm becoming increasingly tired or unable to do as much as I used to, etc. This is something I'll have to monitor and let her know, even if it's only a slight change. It's quite hard to measure this though. Recently I've noticed that I feel tired/out of breath more easily, but I don't know whether this is (a) because I'm older and more aware of things (b) because I'm older (!) (c) because I'm just more unfit generally than I used to be or (d) an effect of the leaky valve.

The main factor though is still the 'children issue'. If we can physically have children we would then need to decide when (or if) we want to have them*, and then the valve would have to be repaired, and then we would start trying to have them. As you can tell, the timescale for all this could be rather long, and, cliche though it may be, I'm not getting any younger.

*You could argue that we should have discussed and know this already. However, we've found this difficult to do because we don't know whether we can have any. I hope that makes sense.

I also asked the doctor about the wire(s) (see a previous post). She said that they could remove them but obviously this would involve surgery, which it's better to avoid if possible. Although they're quite uncomfortable at times I don't really fancy any more surgery than is absolutely necessary, so I suppose I'll just have to put up with them.

I apologise if some bits of this post contain too much information! I know I find my medical history interesting, but I do appreciate that not everyone else will feel the same.

Watching people

Today, I was a bit strange. Ok, hold the comments! I was walking from work to the station, and I heard a sort of shouty whining very nearby. It turned out to be a teenage girl arguing with her mother. I then had a choice of whether to walk one way or the other, and I chose to follow the arguing people because I wanted to see what happened. The daughter refused to walk any further, walked away from her mum and plonked herself down on a bench. Mother kept on walking. I was a bit disturbed by my choice, as it does suggest that I am (a) nosey and (b) just a bit weird. Or maybe I'm just interested in people and the way they behave. I think, though, that this is just an excuse for me being nosey. Oh well.

I did worry about the girl and how she was going to get home, and how far away from home she might be, and whether the mother was worried or whether she was so angry she wasn't thinking and how far was she going to get before she stopped or turned to go back to her daughter. I did follow the mother for a bit, but then I was too early for the train (I'd left early to get the earlier train but by the time I actually got out of work I'd lost some time, then I was rushing, then I was tired, so I ended up mooching around Next and Boots to kill some time. I dread to think how many hours of my life I've wasted killing time while 'waiting' for trains) so I branched off and went on a very slightly longer route to the station.

I do like watching people. I use to get told off for staring a lot when I was younger. I probably still do it now. I must perfect my librarian stare, though.

On the way to the station

Today, I got the 5.15pm train. I never usually get this train, because it involves walking quite fast from work to the station, and I don't like walking quite fast because it can have a bad effect on the old ticker. I was persuaded to go for the earlier train by two of my colleagues, and I was glad I did really because I got home at 6pm, instead of 6.40pm (if I get the earlier train on any day other than Friday) or 7.05pm if I get my usual, later train. However, we did walk quite fast, and although one of my colleagues said "that wasn't a brisk walk" it was brisk enough to make me feel nauseous due to being out of breath. I felt the need to tell them I felt ill (not sure why, maybe to warn them I might have to stop), then I had to explain to one colleague about my dodgy heart, and so colleague one wanted to know why having a dodgy heart should lead to feeling sick. I realised I did not know the answer, but I thought it was due to lack of oxygen. I will now attempt to find out.

Mr C says it's some sort of defence mechanism: to prevent you from harming yourself by further exertion your body forces you to stop. Not knowing whether Mr C was right or not, I had a look on the web, and the only site I could find with an explanation was one about mountain biking! It was quite helpful. Apparently (according to the writer of the site) the nausea is the body's reaction to severe physiologic stress. It's the same type of nausea that you may feel if you injure yourself. That makes sense to me. I suppose Mr C was partly right - your body isn't liking what's happening to it, so it reacts, and does force you to stop, if the physiological stress gets so bad you have to stop and throw up. Sorry, this isn't a particularly pleasant thing to blog about!

I have my annual MOT next week. I dreamt about it the other night, which was unusual for me. I do dream a lot, but not usually about medical things. It was a classic anxiety dream - I was at my appointment with my consultant, but it wasn't my usual consultant, and she was foreign and I couldn't understand what she was saying. Then I was getting lost in hospital corridors and realising that Mr C wasn't there when he'd said he would come with me, and I was emerging from a tunnel out onto a corridor and thinking 'this is where Professor Yacoub met Princess Diana' and then I woke up. The strange wanderings of a (n assistant) Librarian's mind.

I think I'm more concerned about it this time because I have to ask the consultant about having the valve repaired, and timescales relating to this. Also I have had some trouble with wires which were left in my chest after my heart surgery - I think they were used to join the sternum back together. They lay low for 26 years, but last year I felt something pricking the inside of my chest (sorry, it's a bit hard to explain). It's more uncomfortable in certain positions, and doesn't do it all the time (which is just as well). It's quite a weird feeling, and can be quite painful. I mentioned it to the consultant last year, not knowing what it was (although I suspected), and she said she knew exactly what it was. She said that there was no need to do anything about them, as they weren't making a particular nuisance of themselves, but since last year there have been times when they have been painful and at the moment I can't lie in certain positions because they poke me, and it's not very nice. I don't know whether anything can be done, and I suspect that anything that could be done would involve surgery, and I don't think I want that. I expect I'll just have to put up with them/it. It's quite strange that it only happens some of the time - normally for a few days to a few weeks at a time. I've tried to work out what could cause them to poke sometimes and not others, but I haven't discovered anything yet. If anyone else out there has experienced this I'd be interested to hear about it.

Well, that's enough medical stuff for one night. Mr C is waiting to watch some more LOTR documentaries, so I'll go and join him.

Houses

Ahh well, the long weekend begins tonight. I'm not sure what we're going to do, but it might involve me trapsing round banks and building societies making appointments with mortgage advisors, which, I'm sure you'll agree, doesn't sound entirely thrilling. We're going to speak to mortgage people to see what we can borrow, but all the signs are that we could only get about half a terraced house in the dodgy part of town, due to our low salaries. The theory is that at least if we're told this by an expert we will know where we stand, rather than relying on my dubious calculations on various banks' websites.

People keep telling us we're wasting our money renting, but I think it's unrealistic to think we can afford to get a mortgage on our salaries. Most of our friends have finally realised that this is the case since I have been doing the test things on websites, but they think we should go to speak to some advisors, just so we do know what the situation is. People have suggested things like shared ownership and part-buy, part-rent (?), which might be better, but it depends how these things work. I have absolutely no idea what all the different types of mortgage mean, which is another reason we should go and speak to a mortgage advisor, I suppose.

We live in a very expensive part of the country, which doesn't help. If we lived in the North we would be able to buy something I think, but down here in the Saath it is not so realistic a plan.

At the moment, I'm not too bothered about buying something, although it would be nice to be able to do our own thing in the house decoration-wise, and have pets, children (if appropriate) and be able to plant stuff in the garden. The house we have is nice, and in a nice-ish area near to the railway station. I don't think we would be able to get anything near as nice or convenient for the amount we could afford to borrow.

I do worry slightly about what will happen if we never earn much more than we earn now, but need to have our own house, e.g. if we have children. (This isn't even on the horizon yet, but I'm good at worrying about non-existent things!) Even if we reach the top of our pay brackets I'm not sure we would be able to afford anything nice in the area we live in.

I suppose the answer is either to move to another area or move jobs. The difficulty is that Mr C's job is his ideal job, which is very specialised, and I wouldn't want him to have to leave it. Although I like my job I can see that one day I will have to leave in order to earn enough to continue living the extravagant lifestyle to which I have become accustomed. There is more scope for me to find a new job, because there are libraries everywhere, but the thought of applying doesn't fill me with pleasure. I almost always get an interview, and almost always fail it. Anyway, that can be left for later 'discussion' in another post, perhaps.

However, there is urgent need for us to buy a house and/or move jobs at the moment, I'm just thinking out...loud? (What is the writing equivalent of that?). I think a lot of this is triggered by other people's expectations of what we should be doing. Just because they've been fortunate enough to be able to afford to buy their houses they think we should be doing the same, and don't see that it's not actually a realistic option for us. I think they find it hard to believe how little we earn! This does make me quite cross.

I hope all this doesn't sound like all I think about it money, but I do take issue with the low salaries that people in the library profession are paid. As far as I know, I earn more than the rest of the people in my team, and I do wonder how they manage if I am struggling to save. Six years after graduating I'm still earning below the average graduate starting salary, which I believe is £18,000 (?). My job asks for a professional qualification, by the way. I know, I know, I shouldn't apply for jobs if they don't pay enough, but I'm in it for the love [and the fact that this was the only job I got offered in 18 months of trying escape my last, horrible, job*], not the money (although the pay is better than my last job!).

*I, as I have said before, do like my job (most of the time), which is an added bonus. I'm not sure whether I should have shared that part about it being the only job I was offered. Oh well, too late now. There was also the fact that it was in vaguely the right location to be able to carry on my relationship with Mr C and everyone I met at the interview was very friendly. I wouldn't have taken it had I thought I wasn't going to enjoy it and like the people I would be working with.

Generally, if you're going to be a librarian, don't expect to get paid enough. Well, I suppose I do get paid enough, just not as much as I would like. But I can live comfortably enough with what I earn so really I shouldn't be complaining. Having said that, library professionals are badly paid compared to other professions, and I think it is something that has to change, especially if we want to encourage new people into the profession. Maybe this is another discussion I should leave for another post...

Filming Tolkien

For the past few weeks we've been watching the extended DVD editions of the Lord of the Rings films. I really loved the films when I first saw them at the cinema, although I know some people weren't too happy about changes that were made to the storyline and other things when compared to the books. I'd read the books before I saw the films, but I couldn't remember them in great detail, so I wasn't too bothered by any changes. Avid Tolkien fans like my mum and Mr C were more upset by the changes. My mum was particularly peturbed by the fact that they didn't put 'The Scouring of the Shire' in, because she thinks that this part of the book makes an important point - that evil can happen in your own 'back yard'.

Mum has been a Tolkien fan since she first read The Hobbit as a teenager. She even thought about going on Mastermind and having Tolkien as her special subject! This isn't really relevant to the post, but we have a book at home called Father Christmas Letters, which is a book of letters from Father Christmas, written by Tolkien to his son. I really loved this book as a child. I must have a look at it again when I next visit my parents.

Anyway, we've watched all the extended films now, but I'm still working my way through the extra features about the making of the films. Sometimes watching the 'makings of...' things can take some of the enjoyment away from watching the films, because then you know that the special effects are just that. However, with these films seeing how they shot and made everything has added to my enjoyment of the films as films, because of the amazing detail that was gone into, and the skills that were employed in creating everything. I felt a bit bad when I first saw how much detail was put into the weapons, for example, because I hadn't noticed it when I watched the films, and someone had gone to so much trouble to create it. Next time I watch the films I'll make extra effort to look for all the details.

The documentaries do explain a bit about why they changed certain scenes, dialogue etc, and also tell you a bit about Tolkien and his worldview, which is quite interesting. I'm not sure whether he would have liked everything about the films- he seems like he was quite a 'stickler' and might not have liked some of the changes that were made. Hopefully he would be impressed that someone actually managed to 'film the books', though, as he is (apparently) on record as saying he thought they were un-filmable. I'm not sure if that is the word he used or if it is indeed a word at all!

Procrastination

Well, here I am again. It's Monday lunchtime. I'm half on lunch and half being a desk back-up person and I'm in the office. During my lunch hour I've done the following:

• Eaten my sandwiches and a chocolate bar.
• Booked my driving test. (After trying several times online and being forced to give up due to the computer not being able to cope with the fact that I've changed my name.)
• At a colleague's request, looked at a cheque without a cheque guarantee card number on the back, and then put it back in the till anyway.
• Sorted the post.

I'm trying to avoid (re)writing my Personal Development Plan for my chartership programme. I have already written it once, but Mrs Mentor says it's too detailed and full of irrelevant things. Even though I know she's right I just can't face writing the wretched thing for a second time. I went a bit too much to town on the last one, and put in everything I could possibly think of to do to develop myself professionally, and it was 11 pages long, so I do see Mrs Mentor's point. It's just fiddly and annoying to have to go through it all again and pick out what to leave in, what to change, add etc, especially as I'm having a sort of 'not bothered' period regarding chartership at the moment. Very Bad Librarian, I know.

Lacking in motivation.

Perhaps I'll just sit down tonight and do it in one fell swoop.

It just thundered very loudly.

Three days later...I have now re-written it.

Six months

Today it is six months since Mr C and I got married. Therefore, it seems an appropriate time to reflect on marriage and relationships, with reference to my own experiences. I know six months isn't very long, but it has been an important six months in terms of new experiences and emotions, and in terms of learning how to live with another person without driving them mad (although I'm not sure I have actually achieved this yet!).

I had never been an attachment of any sort before I started going out with (yucky term) Mr C, and I remember being quite scared of being in a committed relationship. I do sympathise with men who get scared about this sort of thing (but only to a certain extent). I suppose some of the fear came from selfishness, because, if I was going to do it properly and be a good other half, I was going to have to think about another person all the time. Not in the sense of being daydreamy about them, but in the practical sense of planning how I would spend my time etc. After being single for 24 years this takes some adjusting to. The other part of the fear came from the little voice in my head that was saying 'what if it all goes wrong? What if we fall out and we can't be friends anymore? What if I don't like being in a relationship?' and probably other things that I can't remember anymore.

As neither of us had been out with anyone before, we weren't actually sure what we were supposed to do! Going out with someone is a bit of a strange concept anyway, in my opinion. You could argue (as some people, especially Christians, do) that there's no point in going out with someone unless you intend to marry them. I'm not sure about this, mainly because I don't think it's realistic to expect people to know whether they want to marry someone without having been in a deeper relationship with them than as 'just' friends. I know you can have deep relationships with friends, but there is a line, and once you cross it you're not really 'just' friends. This is sort of what happened with me and Mr C. We crossed the line of feelings, and once we realised this (it took a while!) we weren't 'just' friends anymore. We were now...going out...

I felt too old be a girlfriend, but I hate the term 'partner'. Girlfriend just makes me think of being at school and annoying couples in the playground. Our relationship was much the same as our friendship really - we are still friends first, before any of the more complicated emotional stuff, and that's the way I like it. I hope Mr C likes it this way as well. Being shy and retiring types, we didn't tell lots of people about our change in 'status' but most of our friends who were around at the time had guessed anyway!

It took a long time for us to cross the line to 'going out', and it, understandably, it took longer to cross the line to 'engagement'. Being Christians, and with many of our friends already married, we faced a lot of pressure to get engaged quite soon after people found out we were a couple (of what?). I went through stages of being happy and sure we would get married, and then thinking that being in a relationship was too hard and wanting to escape. Having been used to my own company and way of doing things, and being a control freak in a relationship with someone who is nearly the complete opposite of me in many ways, this feeling of wanting to escape occured quite a lot, right up until we got married.*

In his own words: "Mr C had a fear of marriage and commitment. In fact he still does, but it's too late for him to back out now. He is mine. Actually he seems to be perversely enjoying it. Perhaps I have miscalculated [he says]. Marriage is great because you can indulge in silliness in front of each other and the other person can't get rid of you."

Seriously, though, we both found the concept of marriage extremely scary. Even though we knew it was the right thing to do, and, after much discussion and thought decided to get engaged, the idea of spending the rest of our lives together was still rather disturbing. I realise that this probably sounds like we didn't love each other enough or something, but this was not the case. It was more that we were, and are, both aware of our own weaknesses and recognise that those weaknesses could be detrimental to a marriage. I think it's more natural to be slightly afraid of being with one person for the rest of your life. It's the same with any sort of commitment - you are bound to worry whether you are making the right decision or not. I don't think that marriage is magically immune from this kind of worry, despite what fairy-tales and Hollywood would have us believe.

Actually, that was part of the problem for us, or for Mr C, at least, when we were considering each stage in our relationship. Being an optimist, he expected that when he fell in love and got married all would be Hollywood-style perfect, and if it wasn't there was something wrong and maybe we shouldn't go to the next stage. I've always been more of a pessimist!

I've always found being in a relationship quite difficult. This is not due to any fault on the part of my husband, I just don't think I'm a person who naturally shares their emotions, and I have all my weird ways and moods that he has to contend with. We are quite different in personality and don't share many of the same interests, but somehow (often to my surprise!) it works. It's probably just as well that we're so different - I don't think I could put up with another me! I am almost constantly amazed at Mr C's tolerance and patience, as I've mentioned on this blog before.

*Actually, if I'm having a bad day it still does occur occasionally. It's not really that I want to escape now, but sometimes I just don't feel able to be in a relationship and worry that my bad personality traits are going to mess everything up.

In summary: relationships aren't easy, but can lead to much happiness.

Sorry it was such a long post. Congratulations if you got to the end!

Beta Blogger

Sounds like beta blockers...

Anyway, since I found the cunning way to do categories, Beta Blogger has arrived, which gives one the ability to make categories with ease! Hooray! There are quite a few nice features, such as the ability to make posts private or for selected readers and to change the colours and font on your blog without having to do the html, and you can change the layout of your blog by dragging and dropping items. I think some (if not all) of these things have been available on other blog providers for a while, so I'm glad that Blogger has now caught up a bit.

The only thing is that I won't be practising html quite so much now. Still, I have my web authoring training to look forward to...

Singing

As I've said before, I love singing. I've done a lot of it over the years, in various choirs and things, but I'm not actually sure whether or not I'm any good at it.

I can pick up a tune easily enough, and I don't have much trouble learning parts and harmonies. I just don't know if the quality of my voice is any good, and I suspect it isn't. Being able to pick up harmonies and learn stuff isn't the same as being a good singer (although it helps).

I've heard myself on record before and I didn't really like what I heard, so I don't like listening to any recordings of me singing (there are a couple!). Somehow I always sound better in my head compared to the way I sound to other people. A colleague, who is a good singer, sings a lot in the office, which is a delight. I, despite my love of singing, do not normally sing in the office in case I make a horrible noise.

I think confidence is one of my main weaknesses (in general life as well as singing), as is my reduced breathing capacity. Weirdly, I can breathe perfectly well enough to play the flute, but not to sing. I suppose it's a different type of breathing. I know I don't sing very loudly, possibly due to my rubbish breathing technique, and I'm not very good at projecting my voice, unlike the aforementioned colleague, who is an excellent person to have around if you need someone to shout at the students to be quiet.

Because I love singing so much I dread that one day someone will turn round to me and say, 'you can't actually sing, you know' (or whatever) and then I'll be very sad. I suppose I live under this illusion of my own talent, so I'd rather not be disillusioned. I don't think I'm very good at many things, although I can do a lot of things passably well, but singing is one thing I've always thought I'm good at. I suppose I'm like those poor people on Pop Idol or similar who go in to the audition thinking they're the next Eva Cassidy*, and then Simon Cowell laughs in their face and says 'I don't mean to be rude but,...'

*I should just clarify, I don't think I'm that good. I just think I can hold a tune and do you a decent harmony should you require one. If I do my fake opera voice though... Kiri you should look out... ( =

I suppose if I love singing anyway I shouldn't really mind whether other people think I'm any good or not. But I do, I really badly want to be really good at something I love doing, and I want other to people to think I'm good at it, too. I guess I just have an ego that wants to be stroked, but I can't be a shy and retiring librarian all the time, can I?

Noise

Today I was doing some training for new Issue Desk staff and my colleagues in the adjoining office were so noisy that I had to shut the door. I'm not sure what they were doing, but they were louder than usual - or maybe I just noticed it more because I was trying to explain things to someone.

Now I'm on my lunch break and being annoyed by children outside my window making lots of noise. Gosh, I am beginning to sound like a cantankerous, miserable old librarian. Oh, hang on... Scrap the old, though (for now).

I am having an annoyed day for some reason. I think it may be because I had a meeting with the Sharks this morning. Such meetings, I feel, are always predestined to be irritating due to (a) the subject matter, and (b) who attends them. Having said that, today's meeting wasn't too bad, and we did (potentially) get a new shelver out of it, so I can't really complain. I just approach the meetings with a feeling of dread because most of the time I don't win, and I end up having to go back to other library staff and tell them that this or that permission has been taken away, or they're going to have more work to do, or something else that's not very good.

Yesterday, I had a meeting with a senior member of staff. I waited for five minutes, and then ten minutes, and then I went back to my office. At 35 minutes past the hour I telephoned her. I think she had forgotten, but she did say we could meet then (wow, such generosity) and we did sort out the issue in question.

I feel like there are not enough hours in the day, and not enough days in this week to fit everything into. But I'm sure it will be ok in the end.

Whenever I sing Can't help lovin' that man in my head, I always get the words the wrong way round and end up with swimming birds and flying fish.

Education, education, education: A rant

This weekend my one of my friends came to stay. We stayed up until 3am (at least that's when I went to bed, friend and Mr C stayed up for another hour) talking about many things including, politics, religion, forgiveness, people's rules for life, Islam, Jewishness, racist policies in Malaysia, overseas students in England, the university admissions system and many other things, but mainly about education.

Friend is a teacher. She works in a middle-of-the-road school. It's not a fantastically good school, but it's not a failing or particularly 'challenged' school either. In a way, the fact that her school isn't classed as failing is one of the most worrying things about what she says. I won't go into details, but the behaviour of students is appalling at all levels, the behaviour of staff isn't much better and the whole place is a big mess where very little actual education takes place. There is no respect for teachers from students, parents, other members of staff, management or the general public. There is no sense that the students are there to make some effort to learn, they are just there to be told things and spoon fed facts and theories until they can regurgitate them onto an exam paper. Most of a lesson consists of 'crowd control' and very little actual teaching. Even given that friend is prone to whinging about things, it sounds awful.

Whenever I have these conversations with friend I do try not to get upset, but inevitably the seeming hopelessness of the situation gets to me. I wouldn't be so concerned if I thought hers was an isolated case, but I know it's not. I see large numbers of school children on the train every day and I have never had the misfortune to be surrounded by so many selfish, ill-mannered, rude, and ignorant individuals. They just don't care - they don't care that they're ignorant, they don't care that they're rude and they don't care about other people.

The education system is failing thousands of children every year. As a nation, our literacy and numeracy levels are low - employers say they can't find people to employ because school leavers don't have the necessary skills for the working world. The liberal attitudes which started to influence education (and society in general) in the late 1960s and 1970s have created a society where the boundaries of acceptable behaviour are so wide that they're hardly recognised and even when they are people don't seem to care. Teachers can't discipline students for fear of retribution from parents, the government or the students themselves. The entertainment media portrays countless examples of nasty, selfish, rude and slobblish behaviour, but you can count the examples of honour, kindness and compassion on your fingers. Moral behaviour is seen as a weakness, and any kind of authority is reacted to with a mixture of suspicion and mockery.

Government policies have hampered teachers for years. The increase in beauracracy and emphasis on results and league tables hasn't improved anything for teachers or students.

I'm not claiming to know much about this, I just wanted to have a rant and air my views, but here are my (completely unworkable and impractical) solutions to the situation:

1. All subjects taught in schools should be setted according to ability.
2. No one under 16 should have a mobile phone.
3. All schools should have a strict uniform.
4. No swearing should be allowed on TV or radio. It is actually possible to write comedy without it.
5. No more Big Brother.
6. No one under 16 should be allowed to have a computer or a TV in their room.
7. Students should only be examined at 16 and 18.
8. League tables should be abolished.

I did warn you this was a rant. Please don't write in and have a go at me. I'm a shy and retiring librarian and I might not be able to take it.

P.S. I do realise that not all children and young people are horrible.

New things

At the moment, inspired by The Singing Librarian, I'm trying out new things on my blog. To this end, I have set up a test blog, so that if something goes horribly wrong I won't make a big mess where it matters. I think Blogger is slightly limited in the things you can do, e.g. you can't put posts into categories [or tag them], unless you use a 'hack' thought up by someone else. So this is what I intend to do, and I'm currently testing one way of doing it on the test blog. It's not working so far, but I live in hope! It sounds very cunning and I can see how it should work in theory, but we will see...

Later...

Well, it works on this blog, although not on the test one, which I think is to do with the age of posts. There are drawbacks in that, because it works using Blogger search, if you click on a category you get every post that even mentions the category title. This can be solved though, by putting a distinctive 'tag' on a post, e.g., changing music to -music- (or something) when it's specifically there as a tag (and also changing the category title to -music-) I will do this at some point. Anyway thanks to danchong for his clever idea.

Even later...

Well, I tried my cunning plan (see above) and it hasn't worked. I still get every post mentioning music. I will try other things when I've not been sitting at the computer for such a long time. Meanwhile, if you click on a category don't expect your results to be completely accurate. Sorry!
Having said that, it works ok for some things, e.g. 'GUCH', because it's quite specific. 'Books', however, doesn't necessarily turn up results about books, but it might turn up a post about shelving where books are mentioned.

The dilemmas of a blogger

I'm not sure whether I'm an anomaly amongst bloggers, but I feel a bit uncomfortable about people I know reading my blog. It's just disturbing to think that e.g. my colleagues could read all my inane ramblings and then I have to see them the next day at work after they have read about my fears of lying horizontally, for example.

Being read by fellow bloggers is not so disturbing, in a way, because fair's fair, I read their stuff and I think that, rightly, they should be subjected to my musings in return. [This is not entirely serious, I hasten to add - I enjoy reading other people's blogs very much]. Seriously though, somehow it is less worrying, maybe because...

[I must break off to tell you that there's a really odd version of 'Somewhere' from West Side Story on the radio at the moment. Very odd arrangement. Sounds like Barbara Streisand]

....I don't reallyknow why, but I think it is to do with them writing as well, and therefore, I assume, perhaps not being so judgmental about what other people write, knowing how it is to feel vulnerable about having their....

[It wasn't Barbara Streisand, it was Barbara Walsh, and it was supposed to be funny, apparently]

...work read and potentially judged by other people.

I suppose you could argue that I shouldn't write things I don't want people I know to read, but there are few people I know who read blogs. Also, having said all of the above this is going to sound weird, but the better I know someone the less worried I am that they'll judge me. So, for example, Mr C can read to his heart's content and I don't mind, but work colleagues I don't know very well* are more of a worry**. The exceptions to this 'rule' are parents and other relatives, whose judgement I still worry about, and who, it could be argued may not know me as well as they think.

As for people I don't know at all, I really don't mind what they think of me, so they can read as much as they like and (a), I probably won't know about it, and (b) I won't care.

If only I could draw a diagram I'm sure it would all become clearer.

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*Work colleagues I arguably don't know very well but who blog are less of a worry, because, rightly or wrongly, I feel like I know them better from reading their blogs, and they also come under the category of fellow bloggers (see above).

**No offence is intended by this statement.

A particularly funny Unshelved comic strip

I loved this one (although I'm not quite sure why!) so I thought I would share it with you...

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Unshelved by Bill Barnes and Gene Ambaum

Unshelved is a daily comic strip about a library. At http://www.overduemedia.com you can read the complete archive, buy stuff, sign up for free email delivery, or subscribe to an RSS feed.

Untitled

I realised after I wrote my post about the cathedral that I didn't mention God at all. I don't really know why. I think big, grand things can hide God as much as they (or at least the people who build them) would like to be a show-piece for him. Sometimes it's easier to 'see' God in the smaller things of life. Maybe the way I felt on Saturday was God-related, but I don't know, and I don't want to suggest that God is only found in cathedrals and such places.