Volunteering: paying for the privilege

Part way through the recent 'getting to know you weekend' the Guider in Charge asked me if I was paying the £25 fee for the weekend.  She picked a bad time to ask.  During a discussion over receipts on the Saturday night I had just worked out the Jailbreak account owed me over £200.
I had taken a day off work prior to the weekend to rest my back and do the final part of the shopping. That's a contradiction if ever there was one.

As always I had 'donated' an amount of my own stuff to keep costs down.  This time it was 13 candles, a roll of tartan ribbon, a pot of marmite, a pot of honey, packet of cleaning wipes, 50 freezer bags (for craft), a roll of flip chart paper, 2 shopping trips, fuel,  I had to buy a quality blow up bed because of my back and I'm sure if I spend long enough thinking about it, I'll come up with more.

There's the time spent agreeing and planning a menu for the weekend, putting together a shopping list, looking for the bargains so you pick up what you can cheapest.

There's washing and drying the tea towels afterwards.

It all takes time and money.

And it makes me tired.  Now I have to say, that weekend for 6 Rangers/Guides and 2 Guiders didn't touch the hassle of a full on pack holiday for 16 brownies and 4 leaders...there was no cooking craft to contend with for a start and no 7 year olds to teach how to butter bread.  None of the manicness of 20 people all washing up at once. If you don't know how it's done, I could write an entire post about the logistics of that one!

So my response to the Guider in Charge on that Saturday night was "You probably should have asked me before I was part way through the weekend and totally knackered but if you want me to pay £25, I'll find you £25 worth of receipts."  In fairness, she was cool with that and we let it lie.  I came in well under budget so it was no great stress.

Now don't get me wrong, I don't expect a free fun ride in Guiding.  I know I need to pay for big camp fees.  Those kinds of camp don't pay for themselves and the cost is often too great to be passed onto the girls.  I wouldn't dream of expecting the Guides to cover my Big Gig ticket- hell no.  I'm sure I paid my train fare to London, although we always use our personal family travel cards to get cheaper tickets for the Brownies.  I have already fund raised the full amount of the cost of my travel on Jailbreak, that money will be passed onto my replacement leader. 

I don't expect a free ride but I also don't expect to have the word mug tattooed about my person.  So please when I'm part way through what feels like a time of 'whoa, I'm giving a lot of me here' don't ask me to pay for the privilege.   I may be a volunteer but I am not an angel and the swear box would take one hell of a caning with my reply.

Read more...

The most awesome walk

This week's Gallery is walk.  This is an interesting topic for me because I write up my walks regularly.  So many of my pictures are from my local walks.  How do I pick any of those out?

I've decided to pick my most memorable rather than the best photography:

Of course it is the walk down the Mall with the Brownies, at the front of 250,000 people on the Queen's Diamond Jubilee.

As we got to the Victoria Memorial the crowds in the stands roared, clapped and waved, it was the most incredible thing. 

As the police lines broke, the crowd behind us surged and we hung onto our little Brownies for dear life, but we were well briefed by the police, well prepared and all was well.  We saw the Royal family as close as close can be.  

Even the walk back to the station in the rain, as we all chattered about how exciting it had been, holds moving memories for me.  Of course I have no decent photos, I was too busy counting heads all the time to even think about pulling out the camera.  We were all in the moment.

Isn't that just the way moments should be sometimes.

Read more...

A brush with the teen and potholing.

I finally found out why every home should own a teenager.

Well you know you can't leave a car engine running unattended these days whilst the car warms up.

It is important just on safety grounds that someone sits in the car warm and dry to protect it, whilst the chosen one brushes off the snow.

She's not daft mind, she understands the importance of keeping me in a good mood just before we go shopping.  Which clearly worked as we sat in a coffee shop a few hours later both sporting new boots.  Only I had left the house in new boots!  The review of my new Chatham-Marine's is here.

It's not great that we are getting towards the end of March and still needing boots that can cope with bad weather.  But at least I have some control over how comfy and dry our feet are.

 

The roads however are now falling apart.  The potholes are too numerous to even bat an eye at as you bang down yet another one.  Interestingly I regularly travel a road, too rural to have a number, that was recently patched up quite magnificantly.  I was amazed as there is rarely more than a handful of cars, tractors or horse boxes on it.  Although it does go past the drives of 2 extremely large houses in an incredibly expensive part of the countyside.

So when a bad patch suddenly appeared that was twice the size of any of those recently patched on Lord and Lady Ladidaaa's road, I knew the council would be straight onto it.  Once they'd finished reading the Sun in the cab of the van, obviously.

Oh stoooooopid, stoopid me.

"Dear Ms. K,
A Highway Inspector has assessed the issue that you reported to us and concluded that it is not currently a high priority. However, it has been noted for consideration in one of our future schedules of work.
Yours Sincerely,

Customer Service Centre Team
Environment & Transport"



"Yes I noticed you’d put the yellow marks around it.  As we discussed, the depth is still quite shallow despite it being 4’ square so I’m sure we can wait until cars are being damaged by it before patching it up. Wouldn’t want to pre-empt anything and fix it in advance of a bike coming off or anything like that.

Keep up the good work.    Yours MRS KelloggsVille"


"Dear Ms K,

I have added your further comments to the job notes and passed these on to the Highway's department who will be dealing with this matter.

Should you have any further questions please do not hesitate us"



"I'm sure that is another fantastic use of council time and resources.

I would be more than happy to discuss with any of the team about how 4' square pot holes on a heavy use* junction at the end if a chicane might affect the ability of drivers to do an emergency stop as the kids try to cross the main road to get to the high school bus stop.

But if they are too busy dealing with important issues, no worries.

As I said,  keep up the good work.

K"

*it took me a while to wait for the quiet moment to take the photo but trust me week mornings this is heaving!

Read more...

Kitting up for an International Guiding Adventure

We are still bag packing, coffee morninging(!), cake selling and all plethora of other things to fun raise for the international trip in the summer but the need to start kitting up has come.

 

We have been donated 8 cotton sleeping bags by SubZero. Brilliant online shop, HWMBO had his thermal gear from them when he went to the Ice Hotel in the Arctic Circle.  If you want to survive a winter camp with warm toes they are the people to go to. 

These sleeping bag liners are perfect for summer sleeping bags for a hostel.  We know will have our own clean bedding no matter where we stay yet they weigh in at only 300g.  Perfect peace of mind in the bottom of the rucksack.  (They sell those too!) 'We' is being used in the widest sense of the word as you all know, I am no longer travelling with them.

The  badges have arrived.

The company I used to do the badges, hoodies, polos and t-shirts was absolutely fantastic.  B-BE Clothing.  Doug went out of his way to help me get our design into a format that would work as a badge, embroidered clothes logo and a big print design with the team's names for the back. 

Initially I was worried, I chose them because their prices were so low and wondered if this was a wise move.  Yes, it was!

They were fantastic and everything is a really good quality.  My zoodie has already been through the wash it went in with the whites by mistake thanks to COG who grabbed it in with a pile of washing there was no colour run, no shrinkage - no problem lucky COG.

Read more...

Why a Guide is called a Guide

Why is a Guide called a Guide?  It seems like such a simple question.  COG asked me it recently.  I didn't know the answer and I have to say, it took a bit of digging.

We all know about Crystal Palace and about Baden-Powell, some of the more advanced will know about Brownies first being called Rosebuds.  But I've never known why we were called Guides.

At the rally at Crystal Palace in 1909, when asked who they were, the girls had declared "We are Girl Scouts".  At that time it was not the done thing for girls to be doing 'boy things' and calling the Girls 'Scouts' would have probably have stopped parents letting their daughters join.  It would have also annoyed the boys who didn't want their scouting watering down by trying to turn it into anything suitable for girls.

Baden-Powell asked his sister Agnes to come up with a movement for the girls.  It was decided that instead of copying men and being scouts that the women should lead them and become their guides.  "Guides were the people who knew the way and could show it to others"*

Baden-Powell's career had been in the British Army.  His Scout movement was based on the youth corps he set up during the siege of Mafeking .   He would have been very familiar with the elite Indian regiment called the Khyber Guides who served on the north-west frontier of India

Rudyard Kipling's Ballard of East and West from 1889 refers to these Guides and the book 'The story of Guides' by George John Younghusband was published in 1908.  Baden-Powell would no doubt have read or been aware of both.  So the word 'Guide' would have held an important definition for Baden-Powell, just like his 'Scouts'.

In 1910 the Girl Scouts became Guides, it was a special name with significance of which they (and we) can be proud.

The first Guide Company was Miss Baden-Powell's own the 1st Pinkneys Green Guides. But when we talk about 'Guides' in Guiding general, it is a term we can use to encompass all members of all ages, we are all Guides.



I met this Guider at our Cenetenary celebrations in 2009.  She was wearing her own and original uniform.  A lovely lady.  I was quite in awe.




*The World Chief Guide By Eileen K Wade

Read more...

Spot the Ranger

This week's Gallery is Red


I call this 'spot the Ranger'.  There really isn't much to put between Senior Section and Rainbows.

The crafts are pretty much on a par.  The general skill of trying to concentrate any discussion on the topic in hand with Rainbows or our Rangers is much like herding cats.

I love them and the challenges they bring.  They are frustrating, infuriating, unreliable, wonderful, funny, entertaining and a big ball of 'arrrrrrrrrrgh'.

Oh yes, I quite like little Rainbows too!

Read more...

It's Spring - Apparently

The daffodils are here but you can see the snow on the steps outside still.

Iced tea seems like forever away as the temperatures stay so very low, but a chai latte with a friend  makes up for that in spades.

It rains, sleets, snows at regular intervals and the ground is completely water logged.

A bath of mud that goes on forever.

Wet feet, muddy legs...

...and unrescuable socks.

I wish the sun could just dry us all out a little bit.

Read more...

How to play a board game without killing each other

Ok, I'll admit it, I may in my dim and distant past have thrown a scrabble board into the air, sent letters flying and tripped out of the room Miranda fashion whilst shouting "I'm not playing anymore".  Obviously it was a very long time ago.

COG also has a smattering of this gene pool and likes things to go her own way in board game land.

HWMBO  is Australian.  There is nothing else to say.  Losing is not an option.

Sometimes in our house playing games can be a little stressful. Sunday evening has always been games evening.  I am the Downfall champion.

I watched HWMBO, COG and my brother-in-law play a game of 'shopping basket' once.  COG was 4 years old.  They beat her over and over again until she was in tears and to my plea of 'can't you just give her a chance' they laughed a 'when she gets good enough she'll win one'.  COG went to bed in tears. 

A game where you all win or all lose was a new concept to me.  I rather like it.  I like the idea that we all play separate turns but at the end of the day my family are not trying to annihilate me, send me broke or make me look an idiot as yet again I put down a 2 letter word.

COG and I won our new game.  Obviously!


HWMBO hasn't managed to bring himself to join in the fun yet.  I'm not sure he can get his head around it!







I'm hoping the Rangers will try it out but I think it will work better if  I make giant game cards for them to play it.

I'll let you know.

Read more...

Are farmers getting younger?

I have hit the age where I cannot work out if new starters at work are permies or on school work experience, policemen look like boys and some politicians don't look old enough to vote.

But as a flock of sheep ambled towards me....

....and then got frightened by my fluorescent running clothes....

I realised the 'farmer' at the back was about 12 years old.   Actually, I think his dad was holding the gate open about 200 yards down this road and Grandad was driving a jeep a few cars down the queueing traffic.  But he was a very clever lad.

 Have you spotted the wee black lamb right at the back. It was all 'maaaaaar. maaaaaaar'.

I love this lamby time of year.

Read more...

Marital Coercion

The whole Vicky Price and Chris Huhne affair has left me thinking a lot about marital coercion.  I don't think it has a place as it currently stands as a defence in court.  It being sexist and totally out of date.  But that doesn't mean that marital coercion of some form doesn't exist in most partnerships.

coercion
the act of compelling by force of authority

ok, maybe that is the wrong word then.

cartel
A coalition or cooperative arrangement between political parties to promote a mutual interest

how about:

collective 
Assembled into or viewed as a whole.
Of, relating to, characteristic of, or made by a number of people acting as a group: a collective decision.

Often in marriage we do things that we probably wouldn't rationally choose to do if we lived alone.  Just think of the films you have watched with your partner that you would never have done if you were in your Bridget Jones pants (what is the man equivalent?) slobbed out on the sofa alone.

 

We eat meals based on what the family will all eat together.  We ask about what plays the other might like to see or whether they like the blue cushions.  We constantly compromise. Usually about things that don't have life changing consequences.

 

So when faced with a dilemma that threatens the course of current life plans it seems natural that as a couple a compromise will be sort.  No matter how sensible, logical, intelligent or independent either half of the partnership may be, a natural course of thought would be 'am I selfish if I don't do what seems right for my family unit right now'.  Perhaps at that point Vicky Pryce's marriage wasn't quite down the pan, but perhaps it had wavered.  What if she felt that by not taking the speeding points she was giving him an excuse to leave her or simply to like her a little bit less. What if by taking the points she thought he might love her just a little bit more. 

 

There is no well educated, affluent, power women thinking to be had in the 'will this help hold my family together' moment.  I don't believe for one moment either that this is a female thing.  I can imagine there are many times when a man will compromise his independent, sensible thinking self for the sake of his family unit.

 

Perverting the course of justice is a serious crime and we must stand by our laws, obviously. We cannot pick and choose which we will follow.  Even though we feel thoroughly put out when caught speeding. We talk about 'cash cows', 'stealth tax' and being 'trapped' by them like it is an unfair thing and it is generally socially acceptable to hate the speed camera. 

 

What they did as a couple was wrong but I can understand how it can happen as a couple, how a "strong minded, strong willed women who has spent her life making important choices" could end up in this position. 

 

This leads me to also understand how the first jury ended up asking so many questions, I know they have been ridiculed but the question of marital coercion as it stands now does not seem straight forward.  And the difference between coerced in the dictionary sense and the coercion of being part of a marriage collective or cartel seems to me to be quite complicated.

 

I think theirs is a sad story, a bit of a mess really.  There is a lot to be said for walking away from a divorce with your held held high and your private dirty laundry still buried deeply in the bowels of the basket neither of you really wanted to gain custody of. 

 

Had he have ended his marriage with respect before moving onto bed sheets new, he may have still been sleeping in silk.  And if she had held the moral high ground, which if you read the emails she did not,  she too could have been enjoying a more comfortable night.

 

We share so much in a marriage, so many things we would never tell anyone else. Should never tell anyone else.  No matter how loud it is screaming in your head.

 

Coercion is a constant and subtle part of a partnership, it is hidden in compromise through love.  It can force out something it shouldn't whether through violence, threats, passive aggression or simply the desire to 'do what seems right for the partnership' at the time.  I think the judge missed, or was not allowed to take into account, that part entirely.

 

A bit of a mess really.

Read more...

Crisis

This week's gallery is the letter C. It would have been too easy just to show you my lent swear box.   Yes, ok , it's not mine but it is the funniest part of Hot Fuzz.






But instead I decided to declare midlife crisis season open.

What do you do when you look in the mirror and see a stranger staring back at you.

When each day brings a new line or blemish you hadn't noticed before.

When aches and pains are part of the morning routine.

When you feel trapped by life and responsibility.

I tried shooting myself, literally, but to be honest my photoshop skills are about as good as a 5 year old on Picassa.

















Maybe I'll just buy a new phone to keep me occupied until my fading eyesight means I always look soft focus in the mirror.

Read more...

Happenings

HWMBO decided on Wednesday that he would be going to Australia for 2 weeks on Saturday. He has no problem with short notice. It just fitted into his plans and generally in HWMBO land that is all that matters.

I pleaded with COG to man the tabletop stall I had booked at the local village hall so I could do the airport run.  I went down with her to set it up and then made it back at the end to pack up.  Total profit: £7.80.  An utter waste of time.  The stall next to us made £2.00, so by comparison COG did very well.  But sometimes fund raising is like pulling teeth and this is for the jailbreak trip that neither of us are going on.  She deserves a medal or at least a treat, that will cost me more than the stall made.

I took HWMBO to the airport, we discussed the ceiling in that strange uneasy period where one is about to embarque on a fun trip to friends and sunshine and the other one is about to single handedly pull the home cart.


Still, he is gone.

The hunt was in the locality and apparently cars that follow the hunt do not have to apply any of the road laws that the rest of us must.  The irony is me taking photos whilst driving whilst complaining about the lack of law following of everybody else, I don't have photos at the truly hairy bits because it was too bloody dangerous, at this point I was stationary whilst many 4x4s stopped to get their binoculars out.  The clearway lines meant nothing,  hatchbacks up with people jumping in and out of the backs of cars whilst they were still moving and all this on  roads that carry lorries and boy racers at an average speed of 70-80 mph.  Mayhem.  I politely seriously I was very polite pointed out to a group of men clad in green stalker hats and wellies that they were sat on a car parked on a clearway blocking the traffic on a main road.  For the look they gave me, I could have been offering to slaughter and cook the horses for tea.

COG cured the stress with baking us a large coffee cake. Which has been eaten at every meal and at points in-between since.

I am introducing her to the best of Brit films.  We started with Sean of the Dead and Hot Fuzz a few weeks ago, the Full Monty last weekend and last night Love Actually.  I have Notting Hill, Four weddings and Funeral and Bridget Jones on order.

I think that will see us through until HWMBO returns and re-commandeers the TV.

Read more...

A Wedding in Gaucin

I been thinking recently about trips we have done, we go to many places but they are all so well planned and known that the adventure is sometimes stolen from them but one weekend we shot off to Spain not really knowing where we were going, or what was there except a lot of friends and a wedding.

The Hacienda hotel  was in the middle of nowhere,   in the hills about 10km from Gaucin (an hour from Marbella or Gibraltar.)

Each of the 'rooms' was a little 2 storey house with a living area and upstairs bedrooms, bathroom and balcony.

Overlooking beautiful court yards.

There was an outside bar area, an inside one, restaurant, pool and the whole hotel was completely occupied by all the people there for the wedding.  It was spacious but busy, private but full of friends.  It was quite perfect.

We went down to Gaucin and caught a train to Ronda.  It was a busy, hot train. COG and I sat on the steps of the carriage door probably quite dangerous and let the breeze rush over us.  Looking up into the mountains we could see eagles soaring.  It was a great train journey, one of the best I've ever done

Ronda was a beautiful town, we did a route march through it in the heat.

Look at how the gardens and houses are on the cliff edge.

Spain really is a beautiful country, Ronda seemed to capture so much of it.

But back to the wedding, we were only there for 3 days, so not much time to sight see.  The hotel was of course perfect for the wedding.

From the Spanish music and sherry pouring displays.

and the paella - it was a wonderful mix between the formal...

and the informal.

It was the only wedding I have ever been to where the bride jumped into the pool in her bridal gown!

It was such a wonderful adventure, 3 days of total contrast to what we would have done at home.  A really special time.

 All this talk of Adventures reminds me of a post I wrote many moons ago, a good way to look at life.  It's worth a read.

Read more...