Author: Justin Page 36 of 66

Friday. I wake up with a headache and manage about 20 words during my morning shift. Unfortunately, I have go to work because I have meetings I’ve organised that I can neither bail out of or reschedule. I make it to midday but by this point everything’s becoming a struggle and I know, for sure, that The Plague has returned.

I return home, make a Lemsip and retreat to bed. I have about an hour before the kinderbesten return from school. I end up being able to rest for a few hours more than that before Rachel takes Beryl home. I feel well enough to look after the kids, but I have to message Seb and advise him to stay away for our Fridate this week. It’s a drag, but I don’t want him to get sick, and I’m certainly not quality company on this Friday evening. I successfully feed the kids (pasta, by popular demand, with steamed veg and chicken fingers) and manage to survive until their bedtime; and, since I’m feeling so shabby, I allow both kinderbesten to take their iPads to bed with them.

I’m not quite sick enough to retreat immediately to bed so I decide to settle down on the sofa, with my sherpa throw, to watch a movie. I decide to keep up the Fridate Horror tradition and, after a protracted browse through Netflix and Stan, I finally settle on Triangle, a thriller I’ve been meaning to check out since it first came out in 2009.

It’s a good choice. I get stuck into quickly, even though I’m not 100% sure where it’s going until it gets there (I knew the basic premise, but it’s another film I’ve managed to avoid reading too much about). It stays with me afterwards, and I spend the weekend digging up various articles analysing its timey-wimey, psychodrama plot. I still haven’t got it quite figured out, which makes the whole thing even more satisfying.

Thursday. I get up with minimal urge to write, but I get to it anyway. I tackle a story I’d shelved, unfinished, several months. I work on the first two scenes and start to get a better feel for where it needs to go. Then it’s back into the regular daily schedule.

It’s one of those busy Thursdays. Drop the Kinderbeast at school. Drive the Elderbeast to PEAC. Go to work. Get coffee. Have a meeting.

Interlude: during the meeting my phone rings. It’s the school, so I excuse myself from the meeting and answer it. It’s not necessarily anything serious, but it could be; it could mean the Kinderbeast has finally come down with the same plague that took our the Elderbeast and then myself. The caller introduces herself as my son’s teacher. She goes on to explain that my son doesn’t have any lunch…

“Yes, he does,” I say, remembering quite clearly making it, packing it, and placing it in his classroom.

“He insists you’ve bought him canteen lunch today, but the canteen’s closed … ” the teacher says.

“No, he’s got his lunch …” I say.

“… and now he doesn’t have any lunch.”

“No, he’s definitely got his lunch. It’s in the Fireman Sam lunch box.”

” …. oh yes, it’s right here …”

I return to the meeting, which ends shortly after that. Then drive back to PEAC to collect the Elderbeast. Drop him at school. Return to work. Have lunch. Get some work done. Then a two-hour workshop. Then home.

Even though it’s not as cold as last night, I spend the evening feeling mostly cold and tired. Definitely a recipe for an early night.

Wednesday. I get up for my morning shift, but have nothing in particular to write and have forgotten to grind any coffee. So, I just have a cup of tea and loiter next to the heater until it’s time to get the kinderbesten ready for school.

In my caffeine-deprived state I manage to TWICE walk to the coffee shop only for it to start pouring as soon as it’s time to walk back to the office. I may get wet, but at least I have coffee.

I spend my evening trying to format a handful of my more recent short stories in the hopes of being able to submit them somewhere or other. It’s a tedious process. Scrivener is pretty awesome for the writing part, but I’ve not quite figured how to make it bend to my will when it comes to outputting beta-reader versions and submittable manuscripts. I tidy up the mess I’ve made in Word, and then browse some markets. I fail to find anything suitable and head to bed in the hopes of staying warm. It’s another one of those brutally cold nights, and I fall asleep in a pajama top, with a long-sleeved t-shirt over that, under my winter duvet, flannelette sheets, and sherpa throw. With socks on. Bloody winter.

Tuesday. I wake up unsure if I’m too sick to go to work, or not sick enough to stay at home. In the end I opt for a compromise: half a day at work followed by an afternoon’s rest. I battle the rain while dropping the kinderbesten at school, then manage a pretty fruitful morning’s work before finally leaving before it stops being worth leaving for the afternoon. I do more work at home, but it’s peaceful and oddly not-cold.

I cook up an enormous chicken satay for dinner, which promptly gets added to the list of things that the kinderbesten demonstrate little interest in eating (worth noting that they routinely eat their vegetables, which is why I don’t complain too hard about this sort of thing).

The Elderbeast manages to lose both his weekday gaming privileges and his TV watching privileges on account of being an arse who refuses to turn off the PS4 when his dinner is on the table He sulks a little but ultimately seems to accept that he’s screwed up, and that it’s down to him to earn those privileges back, which is nice sign of his developing maturity.

I spend some time catching up on diary posts, including this one, and then get myself to bed for another early night. Early nights are definitely a habit I could get on board with.

Monday. I wake up knowing for certain that I made the right decision asking Rachel to keep the kids. I feel terrible, and the alarm’s snooze button gets hit multiple times before I finally drag myself out from under the covers. I message the office to tell them I’ll be working from home (there’s a handful of things I can still get done). With the house to myself I plough through my to do list. By 9am, the time I usually get to the office on a normal day, I’ve gotten heaps done already.

I work for the morning before breaking for lunch. After that I reward myself with a belated morning shift. I’ve had an idea for a piece of flash fiction since watching Alien Covenant, and I manage to bash it out in one sitting. Which is very satisfying.

After the kinderbesten come home, we have an early dinner, which leaves us time for a few board games before bedtime. We play Machi Koro, which the Elderbeast wins. We then play Exploding Kittens. Which the Elderbeast also wins. I conclude by formally banning him from all future board games.

With the kinderbesten despatched to bed, it’s Game Of Thrones time which, as the entire internet will have told you by now, delivers some stupendous dragon action. It’s a suitably climactic ending to a suitably unclimactic extended weekend.

Sunday. I wake up certain that I’ve caught the Elderbeast’s bug. My nose is running, my head throbs, and my throat feels like a bag of razorblades. I stubbornly get up for my morning shift (and manage an epic, albeit slow-paced session that wraps up the latest draft of one story). I message my friends to excuse myself from games day, since I don’t want to infect them all, and prepare myself for a day on the sofa.

Having confined myself to quarters for the day I feel the ludicrous urge to head out for a change of scenery. I resist, but somehow find the energy to do some vigorous vacuuming of the disaster that has become my bedroom carpet. It does the trick: not only does the carpet look slightly less filthy, but it strips me of the last vestiges of energy and I finally sentence myself to sofa, blanket and TV.

I watch the second episode of The Night Manager, which is as excellent as the first, but decide it’s too tense and grim to provide appropriate viewing for the rest of my sick-day afternoon. Rather than spend another few hours deciding what to watch next, I settle for some more classic Doctor Who. Today’s choice is the immortal and brilliant Talons Of Weng-Chiang.

About halfway through I decide I’m not getting any better and ask Rachel if she can keep the kids for another night: while I can cope with feeding them and getting them to bed tonight (especially as dinner is already in the slow cooker) I have a sneaking suspicion that the energy required to get them ready for school in the morning will finish me off. Luckily she’s ok to keep them over. It’s bittersweet, however: this is the first of my #childfree weekends where I’ve really felt the absence of them in the house.

I treat myself to a plate of slow-cooked leg of lamb for dinner. I then treat myself to second plate because it’s so damn tasty. At least I haven’t lost my appetite. After that I return to the sofa and watch a pretty cool sci-fi drama on Netflix called ARQ. Given that its premise revolves around a group of people trapped in a time loop,  it’s almost too much for my plague-ridden brain to handle. However, I get into it before too long and thoroughly enjoy it.

I get to bed nice and early and finally turn the last page on Locke & Key. It’s been a great ride, and I feel a ridiculous sense of achievement having finally finished it. The best part is that I get to read it all over again, one day.

Saturday. I enjoy a brief Designated Lie In, then get myself to Coles nice and early for the weekly shop. I’m hoping, given the skimpiness of my shopping list, that this week’s shop will come in nice and cheap. However, it still totals around $140, which seems to be my standard weekly shop outlay. It’s true that I did buy about $25 of butter (because it was half price) and $10 of cheese for games day tomorrow, but I need to train myself to do a weekly shop without all the added extras.

After that I’m treated to a most excellent cooked breakfast by a good friend of mine, which causes me to seriously consider upping my breakfast game. I head home and, despite feeling very lazy, decide to clear up a few corners of the house that had started descending into chaos. I also file some paperwork (yawn). The end results are mighty pleasing however. After that I finally do something I’ve been meaning to do for the last x number of #childfree Saturdays: I veg out on the sofa and watch some TV. Rather than start getting into something new, which I will inevitably fail to make time to persist with, I opt for some classic Doctor Who: The Horror Of Fang Rock, to be precise. It’s a great choice.

I realise I’ve forgotten to make the lunchbox muffins I’d planned to make for the kinderbesten: I’m keen to give them something other than sandwiches for their lunches, at least occasionally. I’ve got time, so I knock them together before dinner.

Then it’s time for the traditional steak dinner and wine. Steak having been devoured, it’s Childfree Saturday Movie Night. Tonight I finally sit down to watch Alien Covenant. Having read the reviews, I’ve appropriately lowered my expectations, but I love it from the moment the opening titles begin; echoing the main theme and titles from the original movie. It’s an obvious ploy, cashing in on the nostalgia, but it does the trick for me. I thoroughly enjoy the movie, but leave it very much aware of its flaws. The problems are not as gaping as the ones Prometheus burdened itself with, but the promise of a balls-to-the-wall Alien movie ends up being somewhat compromised by a needlessly exposition-heavy middle act.

That said, I’m already keen to watch it again.

I go to bed with the worrying feeling that I’m coming down with the same bug that hit the Elderbeast on Thursday. That’s what I get for feeling smug about not catching it.

The Elderbeast decides he is still sick and stays off school. I’m erring towards him having a day of rest, rather than being sick for the weekend anyway. It means he misses a forensics related incursion at school, which he was looking forward to, so I figure it’s probably a genuine claim of illness.

I leave work early to collect the Kinderbesten from school, as Rachel has a migraine. I take the opportunity to take Beryl home earlier, which gives me more of my evening. Rachel collects the kinderbesten just before 6. I get stuck into the usual hoovering while playing loud music in the front room. I then decide to shave my (albeit very short) beard off. I’ve had it long enough that I’ve forgotten what I look like without it and am curious enough to temporarily abandon the facial hair. I quickly surmise that I prefer myself with it, not least because my face now feels very, very cold.

I’ve designated #childfree Friday as Pot Luck Dinner Night, which means I will challenge myself to make dinner with whatever is in the cupboard, fridge or freezer. Today I fry up the leftover risotto with some bacon and peas. It is truly delicious. A highly recommended option should you ever have leftover risotto.

I have a choice of movies for Seb and I to watch for Fridate Horror, and we eventually pick Session 9. It’s creepy as hell, but ends up perhaps a little more brooding and psychological than I was expecting.

I get up to another bastard cold morning. I still manage a 30-minute morning shift; which is good, considering that winter all but killed my writing efforts last year. I have a busy morning ahead, not least because I have yet to make lunches for the kinderbesten.

This is how the morning goes … I drop the Kinderbeast at school, then drive the Elderbeast to his PEAC class. I have a meeting to get to first thing at work, which I already know I’m going to be late to. The meeting is in another part of campus to my usual office. I manage to get a reasonably close parking place and arrive just a few minutes late. Remarkably I’m not the last person to turn up. This one lasts half an hour, giving me another half hour before a second meeting in exactly the same room. It’s not worth heading back to my office, so I grab a coffee check some emails and take a walk, with a call from my mortgage broker conveniently arriving in the middle. My second meeting more or less wraps up in time for me to leave and collec the Elderbeast from PEAC. The teacher tells me he’s not been feeling well all morning (though he has managed two bowls of goulash that one of the other kids has brought in). I decide to take him home to rest for the afternoon and then it’s back to work.

I have some lunch, reply to some emails, then it’s time for another meeting–it’s in the same place as my first two meetings of the day, so there’s a bit of a stroll. It’s sunny on the way there, and then pouring with rain on the way back. I field some more emails and then I have to leave early as I have an appointment with the bank to sign my new mortgage papers (this is the bit where I refinance the house and have it all transferred to my name only – it’s exactly as much fun as it sounds). I’m expecting this meeting to last less than half an hour (go in, sign papers, go out again). Instead it takes over 90 minutes. At the end of it my head is swimming and my stomach is groaning.

I head home, finally, and make a vat of cauliflower curry. It’s delicious. The Elderbeast, still feeling sorry for himself, does not eat. I strongly suspect he will not be going to school in the morning.

The Kinderbeast comes in during the night claiming he can’t sleep. I check my clock: it’s 6am. It’s touch and go whether he’ll go back to sleep, but I suggest he climbs into my bed; which he does and promptly nods off. I take the opportunity to nip out of bed and flick the heater on as the morning has achieved Utter Bastard levels of cold. My alarm goes off at 6:29am and the Kinderbeast decides it’s time to get up and watch TV. I get up for a slightly earlier than normal morning shift.

At the back of my mind is the knowledge that I have to get three children ready for school this morning instead of the usual two Kinderbesten. For once I’m grateful that it’s late start at school, which gives me an extra 20 minutes to play with. I successfully get the Elderbeast in the shower (he seems oblivious to the arctic chill) while his friend gets himself ready. They decide they want to walk to school, so I boot them out of the house at 8:30am and, feeling overwhelmed with generosity, give them $2.50 to spend at the canteen. A moment later the Elderbeast knocks on the door and asks for another 30c each so they can buy an Up’n’Go in Coles. I oblige and they are gone.

I drive the Kinderbeast to school at 8:50am and, being a responsible, make a point to look out for the Elderbeast and his friend. They are not in their class, and they are not lurking in the vicinity either. This is not altogether surprising, but I don’t want to have to tell the Elderbeast’s friend’s Mum that I mislaid her son so I decide to go looking for them, First, and most obvious port of call is Coles. I don’t see them at first, but then spot them sauntering away from the checkout, each with a bottle of coffee milk in their hand.

Now, the one thing that the Elderbeast is not allowed before school is … coffee milk. And he knows this. So I confiscate the milk, which displeases the Elderbeast greatly. He complains that they had to ‘borrow’ money off someone so they could afford to buy the coffee milk–all of which, to my mind, makes it even funnier that I swoop in at the last minute and steal the fruits of their hard-earned victory. I walk them both to their class, and then stash the coffee milk in my lunch bag so they can have them later.

Shortly before I head home Rachel messages me to let me know that not only does the Elderbeast have his friend over (as expected) but that the Kinderbeast has somehow managed to conjure up two friends to visit too. Fortunately by the time I get home the two additional friends have gone, but the house is a long way from being peaceful. I’ve offered to keep the Elderbeast’s friend for dinner, as his mother still can’t face the thought of cooking, but he decides he’s ready to head home after that.

Peace, more or less, descends on the house again.

Later, I finish volume 5 of Locke & Key. This is the point I reached last time. This is exciting. Tomorrow I get to read all new Locke & Key!