Two screwdrivers
It's been another long week. Before it started, I thought it might be rather relaxed, but each day has thrown up a new challenge. This is the joy of having four children. Monday's dilemma involved an inset day and a broken down car. On Tuesday I got a call that a friend who we had spent the weekend with had developed measles which meant a quick dash to the doctor's to get the MMR booster for toddler boy [he'd only had the first round]. He was none too pleased. On Wednesday, due to the broken down car [see Monday], I had to get to London and found myself at the bus stop early in the morning. Unfortunately, buses do not come regularly in the countryside. Indeed, this particular bus did not turn up at all. About an hour later, I headed home as my partner, who was doing the school run, volunteered to drive me to the tube station. That meant bundling everyone into the car with their toast and school uniforms.
Miraculously I managed to arrive at my destination - the House of Commons - on time. However, in my rush I had forgotten to vet the contents of my bag. As I headed through security, the attendants fished out not only a nappy and various biscuit crumbs [emergency supplies for the kids] but two screwdrivers. I had been using these to lock the car doors after the car card key broke a couple of weeks ago. Oops. The screwdrivers were confiscated.
On the way home, as is becoming fairly typical whenever I go into London, we were "detrained" at Stratford. A tube had broken down further up the line and our tube was the dedicated rescue train. I was therefore late for picking up toddler boy from nursery [my mum was doing the afternoon shift]. I rang a friend who is in the throws of moving to Zambia. Luckily, she was in and had a free half hour. Armed with a top secret password, she drove to the nursery to pick him up and then came to meet me at the station. Toddler boy was sitting in the back of her car looking a bit puzzled and munching on some fruit flakes. "This lady has been attempting to kidnap me, mummy," he seemed to be saying. "Thank goodness you turned up just in time."
All I can say is thank goodness for friends. They [and parents] are the axis on which the world of working mums turns. I had been fretting about a humungous nursery fine after the nursery sent out an email earlier in the week warning that there would be no tolerance whatsoever for anyone being late during the Olympics...
The week has got slightly better since that point - daughter two has been in an athletics competition and daughter three has planned a rainbow fairy party for this evening which her sisters have reluctantly agreed to attend on the basis that there will be cake and sweets - and I am hoping for a very relaxed weekend of rain and gale force winds.
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