The Goblin Diaries (previously Quitting Smoking)

Lorcan said:
Used to be I didn't technically need one. I've no drivers licence because I don't drive anyway and passports are...a British one's off the cards entirely because I legally can't get the right info on it. Irish ones I can, but then there's a massive backlog of those (which I'm not surprised at) and I can't remember what I was told I'd have to do to get the info right on an Irish one either. Plus, backlog.

What I used to travel on, when I did the coach+ferry run, was one of our voter IDs. Not that English people recognise it but both sides of the Irish border it's recognised just fine. But with Brexit (I think I was last over in 2015) I don't know if that's an option anymore and I should probably do something about that because it expires July next year.
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Aww Lorcan - that’s really difficult and frustrating. I can only say that after experiencing this with my dad - do all you can to get to see her. For her yes, but really as much for your own sake xx
 
You’re doing great Lorcan. Blips happen and as Ruth1 said don’t let it stop you carrying on.
We’re all so proud of what you’re doing.🎉🌟
It’s seems a marathon to get to see your Gran. Is there anyone with her that could arrange a zoom call / face time ?
I realise you want to get over to see her but it might do in the short time.
Also you have to look after yourself too.
 
Tbh my Dad probably could, for a good while he'd be going up to her house at the crack of dawn every so often to help with a video call to family in Australia. It would depend if it was on a laptop or a tablet, sometimes they can be iffy about laptops because of leads and so on. Don't get me wrong I hate travelling, but it's not really felt like an issue before. Sometimes I forget just how old she really is, she's been bad with arthritis to the extent her knees were already bad and her spine's been affected badly enough that she's lost a significant amount of height.

It's hard because she was not always a nice woman. @Ruth1 you might get the idea with this - my sister had been talking about a sub teacher covering her history class and said sub had been not the most...favourable, when talking about the B Specials. My gran was in the room when my sister said it and I can still hear gran say, in that Wait, what? kind of way, "Is she a Catholic?!"

My sister, in the most diplomatic answer I've ever seen her give, said, "I don't think so? Probably not." Gran shrugged and left it at that. That particular sub was an absolute legend in our school and everyone who'd had her as a sub said the same thing - moan about everyone else all you want, but don't start on Super Sub. And yes, that's what we called her and that's how everyone remembered her, lol. Gran's...old school, to say the least.
 
Lol! Well I work in an integrated school on an interface so I’ve heard it all before 🤣. I love our place - we all get along so well and as the years have gone on in school, the whole integration thing has become embedded and is just normal now. Your gran and my parents grew up in different times. I guess I did too - You don’t get much more Proddy than Norn Iron Baptist!
 
Apparently she was Presbyterian before she got married (not the Free Ps though, that's after her time). Dad grew up Methodist. My mum's English and grew up Anglican, but the high Anglican tradition where genuflecting was still common. You can imagine how well that went down the first time she did it in Belfast :)) Strangford College was our local integrated school, I didn't even know we had a local Catholic secondary school til my sister was in P7 and doing the Open Night rounds and I still couldn't tell you the name of the place or where it is.

Super Sub was genuinely great though. She subbed for almost every class except PE (hence the nickname), and everyone looked forward to her classes. Partly it was because you never really got much work written down but you'd still learn. Her history classes were my favourite though. My GCSE history teacher and I never got along and every time she covered his class she'd look at the sheet and go, "Nah, I've got a better idea." You'd get stories, sure, but since we were on the Troubles as part of the course anyway and she'd lived through it, you'd get topical stories that made more sense than most of the textbook. I was genuinely gutted to find out she'd died when I was in my 20s.

I had maths with some very odd people for GCSE, one of whom would just randomly say the name of an Irish politician (usually Bertie Ahern) in the middle of class for no reason. By the time we were taking the exams 2 years later, my maths teacher had set this guy punishment* essays on so many different aspects of politics in the South that we'd lost track. I say punishment, he always did the essays, I think he just liked doing them lol. Our poor maths teacher. She called 3 of us back at the end of class one day and was like, "I know you three know. What the hell did Skip do to himself at the weekend?" Yeah, we knew. He'd been skateboarding at the old Glenlola Collegiate building (which was no longer occupied by this point) and got caught trespassing and rather than feign ignorance or y'know, doing anything normal, elected instead to grab his skateboard and leap over a wall that was tall than he remembered it being, except he landed badly and broke both his arms and I think fractured his ankle? - and we all called him an idiot.

I don't miss school, but I do miss days like those. And that was a very long ramble, lol, sorry about that.
 
Lorcan said:
Apparently she was Presbyterian before she got married (not the Free Ps though, that's after her time). Dad grew up Methodist. My mum's English and grew up Anglican, but the high Anglican tradition where genuflecting was still common. You can imagine how well that went down the first time she did it in Belfast :)) Strangford College was our local integrated school, I didn't even know we had a local Catholic secondary school til my sister was in P7 and doing the Open Night rounds and I still couldn't tell you the name of the place or where it is.

Super Sub was genuinely great though. She subbed for almost every class except PE (hence the nickname), and everyone looked forward to her classes. Partly it was because you never really got much work written down but you'd still learn. Her history classes were my favourite though. My GCSE history teacher and I never got along and every time she covered his class she'd look at the sheet and go, "Nah, I've got a better idea." You'd get stories, sure, but since we were on the Troubles as part of the course anyway and she'd lived through it, you'd get topical stories that made more sense than most of the textbook. I was genuinely gutted to find out she'd died when I was in my 20s.

I had maths with some very odd people for GCSE, one of whom would just randomly say the name of an Irish politician (usually Bertie Ahern) in the middle of class for no reason. By the time we were taking the exams 2 years later, my maths teacher had set this guy punishment* essays on so many different aspects of politics in the South that we'd lost track. I say punishment, he always did the essays, I think he just liked doing them lol. Our poor maths teacher. She called 3 of us back at the end of class one day and was like, "I know you three know. What the hell did Skip do to himself at the weekend?" Yeah, we knew. He'd been skateboarding at the old Glenlola Collegiate building (which was no longer occupied by this point) and got caught trespassing and rather than feign ignorance or y'know, doing anything normal, elected instead to grab his skateboard and leap over a wall that was tall than he remembered it being, except he landed badly and broke both his arms and I think fractured his ankle? - and we all called him an idiot.

I don't miss school, but I do miss days like those. And that was a very long ramble, lol, sorry about that.
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Love the story!

We have an ongoing argument in work between our Catholic and Protestant teachers . So what would you call things like Fifteens, caramel squares, those raspberry ruffles, choc covered things - anything you bake in a rectangular tray…. They are ‘traybakes’ - UNLESS it would seem you are a Catholic! In which case they are just called ‘buns’! But if that’s the case then what do you call a bun and how do you differentiate between buns and traybakes?!

Before covid we all mucked in to provide tea and treats for families after sacraments at the chapel - so for first confession, first communion and confirmation. The lady in charge is Presbyterian and she always insisted that we’d serve ‘TRAY BAKES’ not buns (same thing) and we’d have a “good Presbyterian spread” at the chapel! 🤣🤣
 
I'm kind of appalled, buns are buns, traybakes are not! Mind you when I was wee someone my mum worked with would sometimes buy me a cream bun and I'd be very confused because, well, there was no cream. Which makes me wonder if it's traybakes and buns, and then buns and cream buns. And now I want raspberry ruffles because I haven't had those for years. And Club Orange. And Tayto beef and onion. Probably some wheaten. And whatever you call those biscuit and marshmallow things. And fig rolls! And now I'm hungry too, lol. I was horrified to find Club Orange in the World Foods aisle in the Asda over across from the Trafford Centre lol.
 
Lorcan said:
I'm kind of appalled, buns are buns, traybakes are not! Mind you when I was wee someone my mum worked with would sometimes buy me a cream bun and I'd be very confused because, well, there was no cream. Which makes me wonder if it's traybakes and buns, and then buns and cream buns. And now I want raspberry ruffles because I haven't had those for years. And Club Orange. And Tayto beef and onion. Probably some wheaten. And whatever you call those biscuit and marshmallow things. And fig rolls! And now I'm hungry too, lol. I was horrified to find Club Orange in the World Foods aisle in the Asda over across from the Trafford Centre lol.
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Club orange?! Seriously!?
I’ll bet you that’s the problem with them ‘uns up on the hill in the big white elephant - they can’t agree on their buns from their traybakes!
 
Hold on! A cream bun’s got cream in it! That’s just wrong! 🤣
 
I know! My mate found me just staring at the shelf and couldn't stop laughing about it but I was genuinely horrified. And don't get me started on the cream buns, it's like asking English people "is that a bap or a muffin" except you ask the question and then run away when the arguments start.
 
Lorcan said:
I know! My mate found me just staring at the shelf and couldn't stop laughing about it but I was genuinely horrified. And don't get me started on the cream buns, it's like asking English people "is that a bap or a muffin" except you ask the question and then run away when the arguments start.
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It’s a bap!
 
105!

Mostly because I've been too grumpy over the weather and the heat (I'm not made for these temperatures), then I couldn't find the wood shavings I knew I had when doing the cage so it had to be the Back2Nature and I dropped the bag twice and knocked the fan over once and basically traumatised the goblins and then once it was all done just sort of...lay down. Then Bann walked over my foot again, lol. That said maybe making the cage big enough so I could fall asleep in there isn't the most terrible plan in the world?
 
Lorcan said:
105!

Mostly because I've been too grumpy over the weather and the heat (I'm not made for these temperatures), then I couldn't find the wood shavings I knew I had when doing the cage so it had to be the Back2Nature and I dropped the bag twice and knocked the fan over once and basically traumatised the goblins and then once it was all done just sort of...lay down. Then Bann walked over my foot again, lol. That said maybe making the cage big enough so I could fall asleep in there isn't the most terrible plan in the world?
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We’ll as long as you don’t start wheeking at the sound of a rustling bag, you’ll be alright!
 
106!

You know the worst bit about the missing wood shavings? As soon as I left the pigs room again I found them, while I was getting some hay. Why? Because they were in the box of hay. I deliberately put them there because it would be harder to misplace them. 🤷‍♂️
 
Day #107!

"Cam, I need you to move."
"Cam, I need that Snugglesafe."
"Cam, you're sitting on the Snugglesafe."
"Cam, could you..."

So I figure, I'll chuck a couple of nuggets just far enough away from him he'll have to move to get them. Instead, he stands ON the Snugglesafe to beg at the bars for his nuggets instead. Cam 1, Tony 0.
 
Nice that he’s so tame tho to defy you 🤣🤣

I get..

“Oik!”
“No Zola it’s not for you - eat your hay.”
“Oik oik?!”
“Oik?!
“No Pansy - just eat your hay.”
“Oik oik Oik oik”
“Oik oik Oik oik!?
“Alright I’ll get youse dandelions!”

🥰
 
Ruth1 said:
Nice that he’s so tame tho to defy you 🤣🤣

I get..

“Oik!”
“No Zola it’s not for you - eat your hay.”
“Oik oik?!”
“Oik?!
“No Pansy - just eat your hay.”
“Oik oik Oik oik”
“Oik oik Oik oik!?
“Alright I’ll get youse dandelions!”

🥰
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It turns out the trick was to lift the dangly bits of fleece up so they no longer made a wall. That shifted him fairly quick, would've been nice to have worked that out before the nuggets though lol.

I woke up very late today, couldn't find him anywhere, although I could hear him just fine as I'm panic-chucking hay into the cage because it's about 1pm and I somehow overslept horrendously. Turns out I'd chucked hay on top of him because he'd dug himself in under some paper that was underneath the hay pile that I made a bigger hay pile by chucking more hay on to it.

He's going to give me a heart attack someday I swear.
 
For a while neither of them did and I put it down to them being skinnies, Bann still doesn't bother with them. Cam won't bother with them for weeks but he does get the notion every so often, particularly if they're getting hay that isn't timothy. Their timothy is stalky, which they adore to eat, and they don't generally bother with "bedding hay" either. But they're getting oat hay atm as a very rare treat and Cam's back to making hay burrows again lol.
 
Lorcan said:
For a while neither of them did and I put it down to them being skinnies, Bann still doesn't bother with them. Cam won't bother with them for weeks but he does get the notion every so often, particularly if they're getting hay that isn't timothy. Their timothy is stalky, which they adore to eat, and they don't generally bother with "bedding hay" either. But they're getting oat hay atm as a very rare treat and Cam's back to making hay burrows again lol.
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Wish I could let my wee ones have this all the time, but I have to be careful - I seem to be allergic to hay 🙄
 

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Day what, 109? I think it's 109.

Guess who's waiting on another Openreach visit? Thankfully for the phone line I never use this time rather than the internet, though I'm pretty sure Openreach are just marking it on a calendar now. "So there's February, March, April, May...have we had June's visit yet?"
 
Lorcan said:
Day what, 109? I think it's 109.

Guess who's waiting on another Openreach visit? Thankfully for the phone line I never use this time rather than the internet, though I'm pretty sure Openreach are just marking it on a calendar now. "So there's February, March, April, May...have we had June's visit yet?"
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What’s Openreach?
 
Ruth1 said:
What’s Openreach?
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The people that own the infrastructure as far as phone lines and broadband go (although not the cable stuff like Virgin Media). They're owned by BT, but are a separate company from BT, and they really hate my telephone exchange because...well, actually, the words he used aren't repeatable amongst such fine company.

But you get the gist.

I'd like to blame them outright for this but I can't, short of pulling out the entire exchange and starting from scratch it's never going to get permanently fixed, and the engineers can only do what they can and hope it doesn't break something else in the process.
 
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