chesneycat

Something like 18 months ago...

2009-12-11T13:51:45Z

... my parents were burgled. Amongst the things taken were five of my Dad's stamp albums (see tags for past posts). The police did a fair amount of legwork tracking down and charging one guy for handling stolen goods, but it's fair to say that my parents did most of the initial hard work. Thanks to a single number visible on a photo of the back of a stamp that I spotted on e-bay, Mum and the police together managed to track down the stamp shop in Manchester where the albums had been fenced, and the guy who was eventually charged.

Today, after many, many delays, everyone was in court again. The defense managed to come up with a valuation for the five books that was actually higher than that of the prosecution (Dad was basing it off 10% of the Stanley Gibbons catalogue value, which is pretty standard for re-sale), but the judge was having none of it. He'd consulted previous cases, and as there was no dispute over what the albums contained, he decided that the albums were worth the full catalogue face value of £215K. And he found Wayne Taylor guilty as charged.

And on top of that, he stated that despite the lack of evidence, it was pretty damn likely that he was present at the burglary as well, and gave him three and a half years. The tariff is actually higher for stolen goods than it would have been for burglary, particularly once they cross the five-figure threshold. Not something Mr Taylor was counting on at the start of the case, especially as he received only a few hundred quid from shop owner Mr Wang up in Manchester...

Anyway, today there is much rejoicing in the chesneycat household. A lot of it is thank-god-it's-over relief, of course - the whole thing has been unbelievably stressful for my parents, and it's nice symmetry to know this fucktard will be inside for equally as long as my parents have been suffering, and also that he'll miss two christmasses. He's a career criminal this guy, with more previous than you can shake a stick at, and given the chance I'm sure he'd have ruined the season for someone else.

*grin*

Justice is served. For dessert, I'll be sending my mum the recipe for Schadenfreude Pie

A ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

2009-12-11T08:19:51Z

And this is where Katherine's fit of hysterical laughter breaks down into frenzied coughing.

Damn, I shouldn't read links like this when I'm ill.

How to...

2009-12-07T10:36:19Z

Cheer people up

This was published just at the right time for me, but it's taken me an absolute age to track down the online version. Posted for future reference...

ETA: link fixed.

And yes, while I would be that evil, right now, in the state I'm in? [My physical reserves currently resemble the national debt of Dubai...]

Ha! As if.

chesneycat @ 2009-12-05T20:44:00

2009-12-05T19:44:32Z

So, Jez going over the handlebars four weeks back?

I did the same thing yesterday...

[This is the point where you point and laugh]

Not with the tramlines, oh noooo. We decided I needed to get my bike serviced, so that I didn't risk having an accident, particularly now I'm taking Matthew to nursery in the trailer twice a week. They replaced pretty much all of the back wheel, both brakes, and did some general tuning. Me, being a nitwit, failed to test the brakes out before hopping back on, under the foolish assumption that they wouldn't be set to 'back brake = somewhat normal' and 'front brake = hairtrigger'.

Which they were.

First corner, all of twenty five yards from the bike shop, I see an oncoming car in the middle of the road and gently squeeze both brakes, mostly the back, trusting the back end to do the stopping. Instead, I get rudely catapulted towards the tarmac before I can blink. Nice one, eh? Anyway, at least over here one can get nicely x-rayed and okayed within two hours door-to-door on public transport, so all is well, but that doesn't make me any less of an idiot, does it?

So, that bicycle accident my husband had nearly two weeks ago..

2009-11-18T10:33:18Z

He has two broken arms.

chesneycat @ 2009-11-07T21:42:00

2009-11-07T20:48:06Z

Matthew's been sooooo lovely today. He's a bit clingy, but that's only to be expected after a week settling in to nursery. We've been really busy today getting ready for his birthday party tomorrow - well, I've been really busy, and Jez has been immobile and swollen - but Matthew's put up with it really well, and has spent a lot of time babbling at me through the kitchen gate and playing peekaboo all over the house.

Best moment was earlier today when Jez was lying on the sofa, and Matthew ran over and said 'Yaaaah' like some kind of pirate's parrot. No idea what set it off, but Jez goes 'Yaaaaah' back again, and Matthew shrieks in laughter and runs away. And then back again, to and fro, getting louder and louder and gigglier and gigglier, while I'm practically wetting myself with silent laughter on the other side of the room. It was just so lovely, to see him interacting like that, getting a response from us and then making his own game of it.

*grin*

A year ago today...

2009-11-04T12:50:37Z

...at roughly this time, we were just getting out of a taxi at the hospital so I could be induced. Matthew had been pretending to show signs of distress on the CTG, so in we went. Obama was in the process of being elected, and it felt like the world was changing.

And it did, at least for us.

Today is Matthew's last day as a 0-year-old, and we can hardly believe it. He's still not talking, but boy can he run. We've both got a lovely little virus at the moment, probably courtesy of nursery, where he's doing okay for a first child (apparently second/third/later kids have an easier time of settling in, as they're not used to being the centre of attention) most of the time. Today wasn't so great, as he stayed in for lunch, and due to a huge staffing crisis due to all the bugs people have there was some miscommunication and he ended up eating some quark, and came home with a bright red lower face. Yup, those allergy super-powers are still with us. Marvel at allergy-baby's chamaeleon-like skin! Gasp at his ability to mimc a puffer-fish in an eyeblink. *le sigh* Well, we were going to run that exact test this week anyway, so at least we've been spared the burden of that particular guilt.

Anyway, he's happy, we're still knackered, and he's currently chewing a spade. Great fun!

chesneycat @ 2009-10-27T14:00:00

2009-10-27T13:01:09Z

I seem to have just trashed literary theory in its entirety.

Oops.

GO ME!!!

chesneycat @ 2009-10-19T12:15:00

2009-10-19T10:17:33Z

I got off the bus a few stops early, and spent half an hour taking photos before getting the next one up to the lab.

More later!

An open letter to the discovery channel store

2009-10-16T07:24:44Z

Why, when I do a search for 'telescopes' on your website, do the options for narrowing my results by category include 'boys 5 to 7' and 'boys 8 to 12' but not the equivalent categories for girls? I note that the same items are included in the direct listings for girls in those age groups (which mitigates the offensiveness of the omission to some extent), but those specific categories are currently invisible when someone runs an item-based search rather than an age/gender-based search.

For reference, the url of my search is this:

I'd also like to note that after a similar search for 'microscope', I'm given the choice of narrowing by category for 'boys 8-12' but not 'girls 8-12', despite the fact that the item in question for that age range appears in both the girls and boys listings.

I'm of the opinion that your website is majorly broken in this respect, as it suggests that scientific toys are of no interest to girls. Perhaps you might like to take these points into consideration and make some changes, so that the girl categories actually appear when someone makes a search of this type?

More context

2009-10-16T06:45:05Z

I'm going to add some more Outrage!!!111!, from earlier this week.

We had an official event a few days back, complete with outside speakers, one of whom thought it'd be a brilliant idea to make a joke (in German, but that's not why it wasn't funny) about the fact that the lab has a 'girls day' but not a 'boys day'. Oh yeah, real funny that. A surprising (or perhaps not surprising - I just wish it was otherwise) number of people laughed.

The following day, I was treated to the delights of someone saying he'd tell his landlord I was his secretary, after I happened to be the first person to get to the office phone. I joked back that in that case I'd say he was mine, but I'm thinking now I shouldn't have done, because he still doesn't realise exactly how offensive he was. I'm pretty sure it was driven by his own ego-driven superiority complex rather than any gender-based equivalent, but I can't see him making that comment if I'd been male, which, I'm afraid, is what makes it offensive.

I'm in two minds as to whether I should point that out to him, or just wait until he says something similar to one of the other women in the office. I'm pretty sure the reaction would be something like el_mcgruffle 's cat Chandra on a bad day, and that I want to see!

So yeah, lots of little things, all building up to a head. I might track down the women's rep for a chat later, assuming she exists.

Now we see the violence inherent in the system.

2009-10-15T20:06:48Z

Okay, no violence. But yes, Help, Help, I'm being repressed!

There are some great people out there in astronomy. Person A is undeniably one of them, and has one of the best attitudes towards getting equality in the workplace that I know. In fact, he's expressed an intention to make use of Germany's fantastic shared parental leave system, taking a couple of months of paternity leave after the birth of his child, and another couple when the baby is a bit older. This is just great for everyone.

Less great, however, is an attitude I encountered from person B, also male, and also someone who I (previously) considered to be pretty switched on, and part of the solution rather than the problem. Said person immediately raised the point that person A's decision surprised them, in light of A's intentions for career development, and how taking so much paternity leave might not be such a great idea.

That, in a nutshell, is a perfect encapsulation of the subtleties of the discrimination inherent in the system. It's not outright misogyny, it's not even veiled misogyny. What it is, is holding men and women to different standards, actively working against one of the most fundamental aspects of gender equality on offer, and even all of that is purely a symptom of a far deeper, far more insidious problem.

The hard thing is, when you encounter discrimination you want it to be something you can point to and say, yeah, that thing you're doing? Is wrong, blatantly so. But we're long past the days of the obvious issues - which is great - and this isn't an issue that can be raised anywhere outside of a simple rant on a personal journal. It's insubstantial, and there's nothing that can be done except trying and trying to get more people to act like person A, and less to think like person B. It's gonna be a long haul.

But DAMMIT we're not being over-emotional, flighty females when we react to these things. Subtle and insubstantial they may be, but they're an enormous part of the problem in retaining women in these types of career. No, let me re-phrase. They're a causal factor in actively driving us away. And I want it to stop.

[In a fitting touch of irony, this post was written to the tune of Tesco's latest advert, where they proudly proclaim the availability of cool stuff for boys and 'barbies for the girls'. Please excuse the mess. Just my head exploding...]

chesneycat @ 2009-10-15T08:44:00

2009-10-15T07:00:35Z

Each year that goes by, I learn something new. I was never a patient person as a child, and never thought I was one as an adult either. But living through infertility, losses, and a (let's just call it 'complex' and leave things there) pregnancy that could only be managed day by day, one tiny step at a time, has inevitably made a difference. It taught me to treasure each moment, and to put myself second, to love tightly with all my heart and soul, and to love lightly a life that is not my own.

I love you so much, Matthew.

And I'll never, ever forget Roo, Hope and Spark, three little blessings who mean so much to me, who changed my life for the better.

In their memory, three things:

A story - not my own, but it might have been.

“A Pair of Shoes”
Author Unknown

I am wearing a pair of shoes.
They are ugly shoes.
Uncomfortable shoes.
I hate my shoes.
Each day I wear them, and each day I wish I had another pair.
Some days my shoes hurt so bad that I do not think I can take another step.
Yet, I continue to wear them.
I get funny looks wearing these shoes.
They are looks of sympathy.
I can tell in others eyes that they are glad they are my shoes and not theirs.
They never talk about my shoes.
To learn how awful my shoes are might make them uncomfortable.
To truly understand these shoes you must walk in them.
But, once you put them on, you can never take them off.
I now realize that I am not the only one who wears these shoes.
There are many pairs in this world.
Some women are like me and ache daily as they try and walk in them.
Some have learned how to walk in them so they don’t hurt quite as much.
Some have worn the shoes so long that days will go by before they think about how much they hurt.
No woman deserves to wear these shoes.
Yet, because of these shoes I am a stronger woman.
These shoes have given me the strength to face anything.
They have made me who I am.
I will forever walk in the shoes of a woman who has lost a child.

And finally a couple of quotes, the first from Cordelia Naismith-Vorkosigan, possibly the wisest fictional character ever written:

Our children change us... whether they live or not.

Lois McMaster Bujold, Barrayar, 1991

The second comes from a rather wry article on grief published in the Observer a couple of years back. I don't recall who was responsible, sadly, but the line that stuck with me is this:

Time is a great healer, but it has a long waiting list

Oh, it is, and oh, it does. We're getting there.

chesneycat @ 2009-10-14T12:52:00

2009-10-14T11:04:30Z

today I weep
again
again the same
as sharp as ever
and the biting
let down ache
speaks only of the need
the thirst
the fury
and the screaming silent ache
behind my ears
as years and years
weigh down, frost-bitten
leaves, skeletal
whispers of the seasons
end

Katherine doesn't like being blindsided by those announcements, not in public. Especially not right on the verge of October 15th, when I've already spent the morning being too damn introspective for my own damn good.

Seriously though, no regrets here. None whatsoever. I wouldn't change a thing, but it STILL FUCKING HURTS, and at this point I'm sure it always will. I was blessed with ~~a challenge~~ challenges and the strength to survive and grow from them, and the best damn son on the planet. But I want the easy road too. I'm not bitter about it, just cowardly and afraid of the inevitable pain-to-come. Hence, the jealous raging turmoil and spontaneous eruption of shitty yet strangely cathartic poetry.

Oh well.

At least the view's nice way up here, despite the blisters.

We have self-feeding at last!

2009-10-13T12:47:24Z

Okay, so ninety-nine percent of the time the food ends up anywhere and everywhere else, quite possibly including alternative dimensions, but yesterday at last we had one instance of the spoon going into the food bowl, coming out with food attached, and then going straight into the mouth! His coordination is pretty good, and he LOVES putting spoon into bowl, and out again... but we finally seem to be making progress towards him actually eating the stuff rather than attempting to redecorate the house with it.

Also, putting food in mummy's mouth is totally the most hilarious thing ever...

<idiocy>

AND HE ALSO HAD HIS MMR YESTERDAY. CLEARLY, JABS MAKE BABIES CLEVERERERER.

</idiocy>

Less fun for all concerned was the blood draw, but hopefully we'll get some good news on the allergy front from that in a week or so. Fingers crossed.

Defriended! Oh noes!

2009-10-08T17:40:38Z

I made a post a while ago within the privacy of the friends-list about a certain someone, more or less repeating what I'd already posted on the certain someone's facebook profile in response to what seemed like genuine confusion over what they were using in a cream they were making, but with an added dose of snark.

Said person has now de-friended me. Oh noes! The calamity! The loss!

Don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting that the added snark from here got back to them over there... I'm just wondering what the last straw was.

Was it me pointing out the fact that the nasty evil chemicals they were trying to avoid using were identical to those in the 'natural' ingredients they were using instead? Or was it the mmr != autism news story I posted a few days later? Or just their own raging, rampant paranoia (which believe me shocked me the first time I witnessed it a few years back, and I very much doubt has faded with time)?

Ah well. I'll never know, and as far as I'm concerned it's no great loss. If she wants to put her fingers in her ears and lalalaican'thearyou over something I've said, so be it.... but it BUGS me that when confronted with cold, hard, rational facts people would rather run away than actually QUESTION their preconceptions with a bit of logic.

Still, at least I don't need to hold my tongue when it comes to homeopathy, anti-vaxers, lunaceptionists and their ilk any more...

As requested...

2009-10-05T16:22:28Z

Eleven months today!

2009-10-05T09:14:08Z

It's been far too long since the last Matthew update, and boy, is there a lot to be updated!

Matthew is really enjoying being able to walk. He toddles along cheerfully with hands in the air, usually with a toy in hand, but if not, grasping at the air sometimes as if he's just waiting for something fun to carry along with him to materialise. He's not perfect at it yet by a long way - yesterday, after spotting a dog in the street he tried to run over to it, and promptly tripped on a cobble and fell flat on his face, which was briefly upsetting for all of us - he's got a bruised forehead, nose and got a small cut on his gum - but ten minutes later he was happily playing in the park chasing pigeons. Of course, then another kid came up behind him and shoved him in the back, and over he went again. Not too bad, as he caught himself that time, but oooh, the mortification there'd have been if the other mummy had been able to see his face... thankfully she didn't, which spared me having to explain in broken German that my baby was already injured....

He's got six teeth now, and bit me with them this morning. Ow. He just wasn't hungry, I guess, which isn't surprising - after a week of undisturbed nights, he woke up at quarter to four convinced that it was morning, then proceeded to empty both boobs over the next hour. That played havoc with getting enough milk for him for today, but at least he wasn't hungry again on top of it!

Matthew still LOVES bicycles. He pointed at one in the park this weekend. Next year, little dude, next year. We'll get you a Laufrad for christmas. He's not going to be tall enough for one this year, I think - 73cm, and still only about 19lbs. He also loves dogs and cats, goats, birds, and all sorts of other critters. We showed him a grasshopper on Saturday, which he stared at curiously for a while. Clearly not as good as a pigeon, or a dog though!

Birthday next month - we've sent a card in to CBeebies. Watch that space...

wanderlust

2009-10-02T07:15:30Z

On the bus into work, past the Posseltslust Folly, I always look down the valley to the right. There's an orchard, full of apples trees hung with tiny scarlet apples and steadily browning leaves. Hares play by the dip near the hedgerow. Beyond the orchard and the hares, the pretty village of Alter Kohlhof is nestled amongst the trees. The rest of the landscape unfolds in sweeping curves that Capability Brown would've loved to get his hands on, open meadows beyond the orchard bordered by more trees, as the forest of Odenwald closes in on everything again, in a descending sequence of hills. In the distance, there's a walled town on a hilltop that I've never quite managed to identify.

This morning, the sky was a mixture of blue and red-gold clouds, the meadow was gleaming with dew, and the trees and nearby buidlings burning with colour. In the distance, everything becomes slightly muted in the white of dawn, and the valleys between the forested hills were filled with fluffy white clouds lying low over the ground.

Absolutely magical.

Another bookworm in the family...?

2009-09-26T19:52:50Z

*grin*

chesneycat @ 2009-09-02T19:03:00

2009-09-02T17:08:25Z

bloodyeffingallergens!

So.

Now, I'm a dairy, soy AND sesame free zone.

Photos of today's full torso+nappyzone+feet+backofknee rash have been taken. Doctor will be called tomorrow to arrange for some more serious allergy testing.

Because right now, this is doing our heads in.

9 months, 3 weeks, 1 day.

2009-08-27T17:01:38Z

He's walking.

*faints*

Lots of pictures...

2009-08-21T19:52:49Z

It's official. The little dude loves the beach. Even when he fell flat on his face in it, which was often...

The waves were a big hit.

He loves playing with sandcastles as well, mostly smashing them to pieces. As far as creation goes... look Mummy!

Okay, okay. This wasn't one of his!

Anyway. Moving on.

I've got a luvverly bunch of coconuts!
Really, Daddy? I'm not convinced.

Sugarloaf. I think someone was expecting something actually made of either sugar or bread. Whatever, he looks skeptical about something. The view up there was amazing though.

We also visited quite a few parks. Swings are his favourite.

A little bit rainy when we visited the big dude in the sky... It was much smaller than I expected, and nowhere near as awe-inspiring as the modern Cathedral in the centre, which was really quite something.

It wasn't all fun and games. I had a conference to go to. Matthew wasn't quite the youngest delegate, but I think he was second!

As you can see, Matthew's found his feet...

I just love this photo. He loves walking around (and running!) and only needs one hand, barely, in support. Here, he seems to be imitating the soldiers in the background, at the fort at the south-west end of Copacabana.

Ready... aim... FIRE!

Watch out world! ;-)

Back from Rio.

2009-08-20T20:18:54Z

We're back.

For the second night running, Matthew is doing a superb rendition of the Charlie & Lola episode "I'm not sleepy and I will not go to sleep".

*sigh*

At least tonight we're not keeping an entire transatlantic flight awake...

Still, it was great. Superb. And utterly knackering.
Next long (or short) haul holiday, we're taking the grandparents, I swear... Pics tomorrow, or whenever, when some semblance of humanity reemerges.

Pluto. Still not a planet.

2009-08-03T08:48:36Z

This time next week, I'll be in Rio, where if I do end up hotly debating anything, it won't be Pluto, or even planets, or even our own galaxy. But this is just a general shout-out in the direction of anyone thinking that Pluto's status might magically change again by the end of next week.

It won't.

If anything DOES happen on the topic, trust me, it'll be nothing more than 'how can we tighten up our semantics so that we have eight classical planets in one box and Pluto, Eris et al in the other, without people quibbling over it all the time'.