Thursday is main day during the week when my timetable is set for me. A day when I arrive home in the evening feeling quite drained physically, emotionally and spiritually.
Popped into school this morning and was able to have a coffee in the staff room, Hallelujah, haven't been able to do this for sometime due to all the building work that is taking place so it was a delightful to be able to do that today. It's in the staff room that I am able to chat to folk more freely and I can sit in one place and greet various staff as they come in and out for their coffee breaks. Also did my usual classroom visits but not so many due to being in the staff room. It is wonderful, too, that we now a male teacher on board (even if he does look as though he's just out of nappies). I went and visited Mr Wood in his classroom and he was most welcoming and invited me to pop in at anytime, which I thought was very sweet of him. It was good,too, to visit Sarah in her new classroom setting and my word what a fantastic job she has achieved with the portercabins. Sarah has a brand new class (extra reception class) and they appeared to have settled in very well. I came away feeling today though that I needed to put 'something' in place 'something' abit more constructive BUT I'm not sure what that 'something' is yet.
On the way home for lunch I drove out the other end of the estate - pulled the car over and got and watched the demolition of the tower block. It was a sad experience really to see the rooms being torn apart and falling to the ground and to think of the families over the years that have called those 'rooms' home. Due to the demolition some of the residents that live opposite have new guests in their houses - mice and rats!!!
In the evening I picked up Sandy & Barbara (Jean is celebrating her 50th wedding anniversary so didn't come today) and we made our way to Thames View Lodge. Sadly one of the residents passed away on Tuesday so folk were a little down, plus there were a few more in hospital and few just out of hospital so we were down on numbers for the service this evening. I entitled the evening 'The Sound of Music' and invited my audience to share their favourite pieces of music and the reasons why. We sang some of the old hymns and I explained the reasons why the author had penned the words. Eve, who will be 90 in two weeks time, was a stage performer in her younger days so we listened with interest as she described some of the songs she had sung and the theatres she had sung in. Les told us all that his mother sent him for singing lessons and his teacher, after the 1st lesson, told him not to return because he had voice like a 'fog-horn' well we all had a good laugh at his expense. After the service, whilst the rest enjoyed their cuppa, I went off and visited a few of the folk who had not been able to attend this evening.
