Accidental House Life

There's a slight shift in Accidental Houselife. As the kids get older and the possibility of returning to work beautifully glides into view, I find there is less I can write about regarding being a stay at home parent. Both in KS2 now, settled in school and friendship groups and with an abundance of after school activities to occupy them, being a stay at home parent becomes more about maid duties and food shopping. As exciting as that sounds it's now created space in the old grey matter for the things that always used to bash around in the space that used to be my brain. I realise this will only be a short interlude as the offsprings puberty beckons, but hey, I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts. So, dear reader, as you may remember two of my main joys in life are politics and economics. Sad but true. I love a good debate, a clash of minds, ideas swapped, facts whittled down to the bone and the satisfaction that comes with learning something new. I also love a good rant b

I consider myself smarter than the average bear. I don't mean Einstein levels of intelligence or that I could have gone toe to toe with Professor Hawking, but I can tie my own shoe laces and I left education with some very acceptable achievements. So trust me when I say this, what follows may hurt, and even though this is only my version of it, sometimes the truth does. I believe most people, with space in their head for thought will agree, the world is not as good as it should be. Climate change (yes it is real) is playing havoc across the globe, murders occur in the name of religious ideology (known in my house as "my god is better than your god" syndrome), school children are killed. It appears weekly, because Americans appear to be so afraid of ' something'.  They all need and want weapons of death, and no democracy in the world actual appears to listen to the will of the people. So, all pretty crappy I'm sure you'll agree. Now, I know there is good

One of the joys of getting older is watching the generations below puff out their chests, act as though they are the first to discover the wheel, and watch them deflate as an elderly has-been points out it's all been done before. You know the kind of thing, when my generation thought Thursday was the new Friday only for our parents to show old posters proclaiming the exact same thing, when the generation below think they've invented some new fashion until they see old photographs (I know, how old am I, photographs?) of what we used to wear. Well today while eating lunch, I was catching up with the political day on the radio (told you it would be different), I had one of those glorious moments. I adore politics, it was my second favourite lesson at college (Economics first, in case you were wondering) and something I keep regularly up to date with. Whether it be local issues involving housing and libraries, national debates regarding immigration and education or global events

Two golden rules to writing a blog. 1. Don't write about your politics. 2. Don't write about religion. These were the two thoughts I have always carried in my mind as I made a forlorn attempt to create a popular and widely read blog. Through this time I've voted in elections, made my opinion on Brexit known only to the ballot box and sat through countless school assemblies and Nativity plays without ever encroaching on these two rules. Well, I've suffered from writers block for over 2 months now and I've finally realised why. By editing myself, censoring even, my brain has given up thinking interesting thoughts whilst stood in front of the laptop. Every time I thought of something I'd like to put on the screen I've stopped. I've stopped, censored and edited and realised that what was about to be written I didn't want to put my name to. I began to concern myself with what people would think, what they would say. If they were offended would they

I cleaned the fridge today. Opened the door, thought "you could be cleaner" and cleaned it. Yesterday I wrote a timetable to better organise my time, not necessarily to be more productive, just to feel more in control. Then on Friday I had a drink. Nothing big in that you may think, most adults and parents have a drink on the weekend, but I'm not a regular "at home" drinker, I just felt like one so I had one. This may appear to be a ramble of a writer still suffering writers block but I have a point. I get in my own way. "What?" you may ask "You get in my own way! Has accidental house dad finally lost it? Has 8 and half years of child speak, laundry, shopping and cleaning finally got to him?" Well maybe, but hear me out. I'm sure I'm not alone in feeling as though I've under-achieved with my life, a feeling coupled with a frustration with where my life is at, where I want it to be and with no clue of how to get there. I feeli

Anger. That's what I'm feeling right now. Nothing but anger. For those of you who read this blog and employ people you may want to read this post twice. For those of you who are employed, please read and feel the anger of hundreds and thousands of people like me. For those of you who are like me, scream. No matter where you are, scream, you're allowed to, there's no law against it, just do it, you deserve it. In case you're not there yet, my anger is due to my employment status and that feeling that the whole world is against me. Interviews since September, lots. Down to the final few, lots minus 1, job offers, zero, zilch, nada, none, sweet FA. You know this, dear reader, I've written about it before, you also no my feelings on the word "experience" I just wish employers knew the meaning of the word. Honestly, ask any stay at home parent what "experience" they have for any role and take 10 steps back so you don't get caught in the blas

I decided to write a list. I'm male, I love lists. In fact I could write a list of all the reasons I love lists but that only leads to smaller sub lists and eventually madness. This is a list of the things that make me happy. Those aspects of life that create a smile, a warm fuzzy feeling, a genuine laugh or just make everything seem worthwhile. I need this list to create a barometer against which I can judge other aspects of my life. This is a continuation of my well being theme as a thought occurred to me late last night. Currently the wonderful wife is ill with a very nasty virus. As previously said this isn't a new phenomenon (not the wonderful wife being ill, she's a trooper) as my experiences in the playground tell me illness seems to be around a lot recently. So as I had a little extra head space time I started to create a list, no general purpose for it but I'm male, it's a list, enough said. While doodling away a little hypothesis began to grow, how much

Is it just me or are we getting weaker as a species? On returning to the school playground I have yet to encounter a single family that wasn't affected by illness in some shape or form over the Christmas holidays. For some it was just sniffles, for others it was make you stay in bed viruses and for the unfortunate few, hospitalisation. Now don't get nickers in a twist that I'm making a huge generalisation or down playing peoples individual sickness, but this winter seemed to floor the entire village I live in. My fellow "Stayers" will read this with a nod and a knowing smile. We, dear reader, are the hardy few. We may have the sniffles, we may even have a virus, but we've had those for about a year now, it's our new norm. I say this slightly tongue in cheek. You see, when you "Jobbers" aren't around and we have uncensored conversations, by golly do we moan. And by we and sincerely mean we. I have a stock phrase in answer to the question &q

There are many aspects of being a parent that you expect. Emotionally you know that not every day is going to be perfect, tantrums will be thrown, arguments will be had and you can guarantee tears will flow. Physically you know teeth will be lost, legs will be bruised, somewhere will be cut and eventually bones will be broken. We are nearing the stage at the Castle where the onset of puberty, although possibly years away, is also a  blink of an eye away and so is "The Talk" but that's for another post (a very long post, possibly 5 pages, with pictures and audio, I'm not doing it alone! You have been warned). But todays post is about the one closest to most of our hearts, the aspect of parenting we were warned about, the one we thought we had prepared for, the one that was the main topic of the decision (you know, who stays at home, does anyone stay at home, they do! Oh, it's me is it, right we are then).  Yesterday was subs day for the boy child and his Bea

The backs gone again. The joy of back pain and being a house husband is, well, nothing. Only when you hurt something do you realise how much you use it and only then do you realise how much you need it. Now I was going to go on a lovely long poetic metaphor upon how my situation mirrors aspects of our daily lives but dammit my back really does hurt! As you may remember dear reader I usually type my witterings whilst stood in my "office" but no more. I have had to join the world of those who sit. "What's his problem?" you may ask, well I'll tell you. If you are of average dimensions you may not be aware of the daily struggles anyone above 6 foot has. I myself stand at just shy of 6ft 4inches, coupled with a previously discussed weight of a small mountain gorilla, life can throw up some interesting challenges. For example, for the last 5 weeks the Castle has been awash with Christmas cheer, resulting in a constant crouch position being my main form of moveme

The wonderful wife asked a very interesting question the other evening. Whilst watching a particularly dull Christmas special on TV the usual post Boxing day adverts arrived prompting this; "what does a holiday mean to me?" An easy question to answer you may say, but on closer inspection, I disagree. Now for those of you of the working persuasion a holiday can quite simply be a break from work. Whether this be a long weekend, a week or even a fortnight, any break from the daily commute can be a welcome one. Even though it seems a lifetime ago I well remember that warm, glorious feeling of that final drive home prior to that wonderful break spending time away from my desk, not thinking about work and drinking in the afternoon purely because I could. Driving home for Christmas wasn't just an exceptionally good song but my official start of the holiday. Knowing that once parked that car of mine was only moving when I wanted to go somewhere, that, prior to children, the al