A Five Year Old Monster :(

Yesterday Jean went back to school and was taken by one of the other parents to their younger child's birthday party. Jean was returned before the end of the party under the claim of being tired (having apparently almost fallen asleep in assembly). But then I am told she has been told off by some of the other parents at the party for being naughty and aggressive to the other children :/

I asked Jean about this and she said she had tried being nice but the younger kids had been naughty to her. I gave her a speech about younger children and told her to go to her room and think about her behaviour especially as she had not been that well behaved with Al's cousins kid who came to visit the day before. She mantains she wants the younger kids to come and play but as far as I can see is being awful to them.

Her behaviour has been bad the last few weeks - I thought part of it was excitement over the party and part boredom of being at home with adults and no kids. Now I am ashamed and embarrassed

A situation not helped by the fact that Barbara then shouted at the mum for not turning around in the right place in our garden. How are we supposed to have friendships if she does that? The less people who visit the worse I feel Jean's behaviour comes :/

I know she has basically only mixed with boys over the summer when she has mixed at all but really that and tiredness is not an excuess - especially when the tiredness is her own fault for refusing to go to sleep :/

Local Hotels

The list of B&B's we have on the blog is a bit out of date but I found a lovely website that tells you all about the different hotels in Cheltenham - it gives a little summary and there are links to take you through to the hotels websites which is always nice

Now all we need is the same for Gloucester, Stroud and all the outlaying areas!

Anyway it's http://www.hotelscheltenham.org.uk/

A stroll in the countryside

On Sunday, I was looking after Jean as Sarah was in Cheltenham to run a writing workshop thing.

So I suggested that we might go for a walk, and Jean liked the idea - however, she decided she wanted a LONG walk! So after some discussion, we set off for the furthest of the three pubs in the Parish, which is about three miles away, with a packed lunch and lots of water, and Jean's teddy bear, who she decided should come with us.

To my delight, Jean didn't tire and demand to come home; we made frequent stops to drink water, and sat down in some shade in the woods to eat our cheese and biscuits, but we pressed on cheerily, past some lambs:

Eventually we reached the Fostons Ash for some lemonade and crisps.

Then Sarah rang as she was on the bus home, which stopped off by the Royal William, the pub nearest our home - so we decided to walk straight there to meet Sarah, taking a different route, where we got a little closer to some of the lambs:

At the Royal William we ate a filling dinner of chips (not so unhealthy if you've been walking all day!), and came home.

Jean was still enthusiastic at the end, despite having now walked about six miles from 2pm to 8pm!

The best thing was, I recorded about two hours of it on my concealed camera. It's mainly shaky footage of bushes and sky, but it offers the context for the audio track, which records all the awesome conversations Jean and I had.

Foundary to Close

Basically my favourite bar and art gallery in London is closing - this was where I had my 25th birthday (or was it the 26ths?), it is where Alaric used to take me to meet up with geeky people who knew when transits of space stations where going to happen and were to look even in the built up area. It is where my friends have had their art work displayed and where I was concidering doing an exhibition

Sucky sucky - and why? Is it not doing well? No! The site its on is being developed into a hotel and yet another main stream gallery - like we need any more of them especially in London :/

Anyway you can read more about it here.

Caroline Herschel

Caroline is the sister of the more famous astronomer Sir Friedrich Wilhelm Herschel but though he is known and well respected she is often seen as just his assistant.

Born 16 March 1750 to what really amounts to a rather abusive family in Germany she owed a lot to her brother for rescuing her at risk of his own freedom. He bought her to England where he had already started to establish himself as an astronomer. The siblings were basically self made financially and work hard.

Though she started off just assisting him she ended up carrying out the brunt of the work rising before her brother to write things up and generally going to bed after him.

She also made a great many discoveries on her own and even after her brothers death worked hard to varify his discoveries something that is often seen as dull but is if anything more valuable to the world at large. She produced a catalogue of nebulae which she recieved a Gold Medal from the Royal Astronomical Society in 1828. This helped her nephew John Herschel in his work - she took on the role of raising John and was the honoured guest at his graduation dispite an initial falling out with her sister-in-law.

Caroline and Mary Somerville were also elected as the first honorary women members of the Royal Astronomical Society In 1835. She obtain many other rewards and has craters and asterial bodies named after her - she was still going at 96 with the astronomy!

During work with her brother they both sustained physical hardship and injuries such as frost bite and in Carolines case being impaled on a peg holding down the telescope

She was a brave woman who had to over come alot on a personal front, her brothers hogging of the lime light is more an artifact of the age they lived in than a reflection on them. But even in such an age she won awards that would not be awarded to a women again in well over a hundred years.

And though she did not have any children she none the less raised a child and continued in her scientific endervours without neglect of his needs.

This is why I have chosen Caroline for this years Ada Lovelace Day - whilst I was in the meteoritics department I came across articles about her and it inspired me to keep going