No jo mo 1 in Hot town, summery in the city - 2017

I’m giving it a go…

1. Write an account of how you spend an average day in the life. Start with the moment you wake up.

Weeeeellll, I get up at 6am and go to the bathroom. I don’t think you need details of the ablutions though! Following this, I get dressed: normal clothes but with a logo-printed polo shirt for work.

Once downstairs I make my bucket of coffee and breakfast (today it’s 3 weetabix) and I enjoy a leisurely breakfast. During this breakfast my 7am alarm goes and I wake my youngest child to get ready for school. I then go back to the bucket…

Feed the cats ( if hubby hasn’t done it).

By about 7:30 (this is the time that hubby leaves for work) I begin to get ready for work. I put on my hi-viz jacket and my little hip bag which contains a note pad, work phone, pen and thermometer and I wait to be picked up.

On Mondays and Thursdays I do Covid tests.

My driver usually arrives at 8 in our minibus and I lock up the house and get on the bus. And so begins work.

Work is as a transport escort for a day centre. Once I have been picked up we go to pick up various service users for the centre. I knock on doors, welcome them and chat to the parents/Carers. I take the temperature of the service users and write it in my notepad. If it’s high, they don’t come in. I help anyone on to the bus who needs it, fasten anyone in who needs it and chat with everyone as we travel along. We get to the centre at 9ish and I reverse the actions of helping people on to the bus then escort them into the centre. Once everyone is in, temps have been handed over and any messages/monies given, the driver takes me back. Some days she takes me to the gym and some days to home. After the gym (swimming or treadmill) I walk the rest of the way home (about a mile).

At home I chat with my older child, see what’s on the plan for the day. Some days I have nail appointments (I run a business as a nail artist) and some days we have meetings to attend with regard to eldest’s education (that’s a whole other story for those of you that don’t know me).

Day time things happen such as shopping, cleaning etc. Or I practice nail designs that no one has asked for but I want to try, or I make a set of press on nails to sell.

Then, at 2:50, the driver picks me up again and we drive to the day centre and pick up our service users (there are four buses in total) and take them home again, passing messages on to parents/Carers and saying goodbye. I’m usually home by 4:30 at which point I deflate, have a drink and snack and chat with whichever child is around. Youngest usually leaves for school at the same time as I get picked up but arrives home before me.

After a while I go into the kitchen and look aimlessly around, trying to figure out what to cook that everyone will enjoy. Seriously, who came up with the idea that you have to feed your children every day for 18 years!!

Depending on buses, hubby gets back anywhere between 5:30 and 7!!

After we’ve eaten, hubby washes up and I go to my room because I’m battling an evil Toe-nail fungus . I have been painting this stuff on them every day for MONTHS! But I shall not be defeated because I miss having my toenails painted!!

Usually the kids (who resent being called kids because they’re teens) gravitate towards me .

The evening is a mix of watching TV with the kids (and hubby when the weather is bad, he would rather sit outside all year round) and “suggesting” (ie nagging) that they put their phones away and go to bed. There’s usually bedtime cuddles, sometimes a quick game of indoor football or being shot with a nerf gun (youngest found one at the bottom of a drawer recently and it’s hardly been away since!) and then I go to bed too (10-10:30ish). To be fair, eldest is usually still up and about when I go to bed but that’s what hubby is for. He does the late night shift with our insomniac while I do the morning.