storbarnsförälder

I woke with extreme difficulty and somewhat late, with a heavy cold. Several pints of water helped. So I got everyone washed and dressed and breakfasted and combed and so on, and we went to the Co-op supermarket, and bought various things, and then we went to the library and paid our fines and renewed the books we weren't returning and got some more books.

Emer hasn't had many toilet accidents lately but did have one in the library while I was at the counter, right on the steps of Marjorie's still-new gypsy caravan. Luckily I had a full complement of wipes and was able to clean it all up quickly but it was disappointing. Also, Emer is now three, and very three, and can do it herSELF, and doesn't WANT to talk quietly and MY AM NOT TALKING MAMMY MY AM SHOUTING NO SAY SSHH!

After that we came home and had bacon sandwiches and everyone went to the loo a few times and I changed Emer's clothes AGAIN and packed a little bag and we headed out to go to the Globe café before dancing class.

Except that shortly after we walked past Moondogs café on the Oxford Road I saw a woman I know talking to a clearly distressed woman I don't know, and a man standing nearby holding a bicycle, and a white van parked at a funny angle across the cycle lane and on the kerb with its hazard lights on. The distressed woman was telling everyone she was fine, so they gave up and gave her back her bike, but she obviously wasn't fine, so I went up to her and said "Excuse me, but I think you look like you're in shock," and she was shaking too much to respond coherently, so the man who had been holding her bike offered her a lift home in the van he'd used to knock her off her bike, and she refused nonverbally, and I said that if she didn't want to get a lift with a man she didn't know, then I could give her taxi fare, which she also refused nonverbally, so I said again "You really do seem to be in shock, would you like to treat it with tea and sugar? shall I take you to sit down?" and she started to cry and said yes, and we walked to Moondogs which wasn't very far, and I brought her bike in because she had no lock, and Craig made her tea (for which he didn't charge me, as far as I know) and someone else got her tissues, and I gave her the money for a taxi, and she ate some chocolates, and explained a bit about all the other rotten things that had happened today to make her stressed, and was a bit overwhelmed by people being nice to her, and then I left to take the kids to their dancing class.

So we were too late to have a rest and a snack first, and Emer refused completely to dance because she was wearing trousers and not a girt and you can't dance in trousers, whatever the teacher and other students might wear. I will remember to pack a dancing bag with drinks, snacks, and skirts, in future. Linnea was tired and seemed out of focus and a bit odd - and was then paired with an assistant teacher (teenage girl) who wasn't that able for the management of an inattentive five-year-old, and so Linnea dragged her feet a lot. She got on well with the dances she did with the actual teacher, but didn't raise her feet, kind of skidding through the steps. It seemed weird but no-one seemed worried by it.

Rob met us after the lesson and I handed him Emer and went to have a Quiet Moment by myself, and bought a bottle of water, and came back to them in time for the end of the lesson. Then we went to the Globe and had biscuits and drinks, and then we walked home again.

Dinner is late and then Rob has to go to the market. I hope the rest of the evening is easier.