Moving costs and the dog …

Hugely mixed emotions today.  The first quote for transporting Sally door to door from Sale to Hanoi arrived into my Inbox this morning and I need a lie down.  Crikey – even if you say it quickly that’s a lot of money!  Okay, add to my already overstretched To Do List – get more pet transport quotes!!!

On the other hand, and when my heart has stopped doing double quick time, the first of the relocation agents is coming this afternoon to advise/quote on shipping/storing etc.  At least we don’t have to pay this bit of the move (well, the storage I guess is down to us) but still a little nervous based on the dog quote experience!

If anyone living in Hanoi has a dog can you tell me please – are there places to take them to run and play off lead?  Sally’s a lively whippet/lurcher – like a little greyhound so a very fast runner.  I think in the hot weather she’ll be a bit lazier than she is here and she doesn’t like the rain very much so that will keep her indoors a bit too but realistically she is going to need to run.  Here I take her out, off lead (leash to American readers I think?), for 40-60 minutes a day.  She’d need that twice a week I think and a regular long walk on lead the other days.

Phew, I feel like I’ve done 5 rounds with Amir Khan and it’s only 09.30 🙂

Busyness, Priorities, Focus

What is they say about if you want a job doing giving it to be a busy person?  How on earth am I meant to fit everything into what was already a busy life?  The short answer I guess is to prioritise and focus.

No more rooms cleared yet but Kevin is threatening (well, that what it sounds like!) to start on the loft at the week end.  Yeuch, my heart has sunk to the bottom of my stomach.  On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being the most, how much don’t I want to clear the loft this week end?  Yep, no question, a 10.  Asking me to clear ‘clutter’ is a bit like a trip to the dentist with no hope of an anaesthetic 😦

However, before I even get to the week end there’s the small matter of a third evening of CELTA classes at Manchester Academy of English.  Last night we did a demonstration lesson observation and met the students we’ll be teaching over the coming weeks.

The demo observation flew past – an hour, I couldn’t believe it.  And then, much to my surprise, chatting to the students devoured another hour in no time at all (well 60 minutes if you want to be pedantic but it didn’t seem like it is my point!).

Anyway, much as I love writing here it isn’t really a priority today – writing up class notes, editing a client’s newsletter and taking the dog out before college – oops, forgot a client meeting – are priorities however so I’d better get going …

One down Eleven to Go

Yippee, we’ve agreed what we’re doing with all the items in one room of the house.  Okay, we haven’t done anything with them yet and I did pick the easiest room – the sitting room.  But, don’t knock it, for a hoarder this is amazing progress with 6 months still to go before we move!

I’ve devised a Ship, Store, Sell checklist; itemised everything in the room and then have a quickfire session where hubby gets to say what happens to each item.  Any that I don’t agree with we discuss before moving onto the next item.  I think this is called teamwork!

I haven’t quite worked out a prize system yet but really feel that something should be on offer to make a painful process a little more enticing! (Prize for me that is, Kevin (did I mention his name before – well, he’s the hubby!) isn’t sentimental about most ‘stuff’ and would happily get rid of 90% of it).

Ship and Store are pretty self explanatory but Sell actually means I need to give some thought to anyone who might want the item among our friends and family.  If not, whether it genuinely is worth selling, if it would better suit www.freecycle.org , the charity shop, local community furniture project, recycling or the dump.

Time for coffee and cake to give me the energy to tackle – the dining room 🙂

CELTA 1 Survived

That’s the first class done!  It’s always the trickiest because you don’t know any of your classmates, the tutors, or your way around the college.  You don’t know how long your journey will actually take at that time of day, whether you should have already bought the books on the Reading List and if so, do you need to bring them in with you?  And did you really need to do all 50 of the Pre-Course Tasks?

But, you’ll be pleased to hear that I survived all of it.  I arrived on time (which my friends will tell you is something of an achievement), participated without taking over (yep, there’s always one and ours is a young man who hasn’t yet learnt that you don’t need an entire back story with every single question you ask.  The question alone will usually suffice), found the coffee machine and even made a friend at break time.  Success!

Next week lessons begin in earnest and my next hurdle will be the very first teaching practice I undertake.  After that – it’s plain sailing.  Isn’t it?!

CELTA

I start my CELTA training this evening; 3 evenings a week for 4 months.  I confess to being a little bit nervous, partly because, even having taken a taster day, I don’t really know what to expect this evening.  The class is from 17.30 to 21.30 but does that include a break?  Long enough to grab  a coffee or eat a sandwich?  What’s actually going to happen?

This reminds me that whenever organising something it’s really important to make sure that the participants/guests/pupils or whoever is attending are comfortable with what is going to take place.  I feel slightly on the back foot before I’ve even started which is probably unnecessary.

So, I’m about to find out just how difficult it is to learn English as a foreign language.  Good luck to me, hope I can a) stay awake and b) concentrate for that long when I’m usually relaxing, reading or watching television!