Thursday, May 27, 2010
Little and large
People say to me: "Ooh, you're brave, starting all that again!", gazing upon the beaming 9 month old daughter.
In truth, although she is not the world's bet sleeper, I lose less sleep over her than I do over Sim.
Sim is now nearly 17, and supposedly studying for the first year of A levels, the English school-leaving exams. This means that he ought to be studying ^very^ damned hard.
Instead, he is whiling his idle moments away with watching Pirates of the Caribbean for the umpteenth time.
Sample conversation between him and me would go thus:
Me: "So, Sim, anything more important you could be doing?"
Sim: "Weeeeell, I suppose I ^could^ revise X."
Me: "So??"
Sim: "Hmmm".
Some time later...and he's still ensconced in front of the telly.
Me: "SIM!"
Sim: "Huh?"
Me (switching off telly): "GET YOURSELF UPSTAIRS ^RIGHT^ BLOODY NOW, AND GET SOME WORK DONE!!!!"
Apparently this makes me Unreasonable, Angry and possibly slightly Unhinged. As well as being Counterproductive and Misguided, because simply ^all^ the major business people in the world have no qualifications anyway and who needs A levels to be a fireman?
I know I should not compare children and on the whole I don't but, meanwhile, upstairs, Hen (15) is writing out 42 pages of Biology revision notes for internal school exams, not even proper exams.
In truth, although she is not the world's bet sleeper, I lose less sleep over her than I do over Sim.
Sim is now nearly 17, and supposedly studying for the first year of A levels, the English school-leaving exams. This means that he ought to be studying ^very^ damned hard.
Instead, he is whiling his idle moments away with watching Pirates of the Caribbean for the umpteenth time.
Sample conversation between him and me would go thus:
Me: "So, Sim, anything more important you could be doing?"
Sim: "Weeeeell, I suppose I ^could^ revise X."
Me: "So??"
Sim: "Hmmm".
Some time later...and he's still ensconced in front of the telly.
Me: "SIM!"
Sim: "Huh?"
Me (switching off telly): "GET YOURSELF UPSTAIRS ^RIGHT^ BLOODY NOW, AND GET SOME WORK DONE!!!!"
Apparently this makes me Unreasonable, Angry and possibly slightly Unhinged. As well as being Counterproductive and Misguided, because simply ^all^ the major business people in the world have no qualifications anyway and who needs A levels to be a fireman?
I know I should not compare children and on the whole I don't but, meanwhile, upstairs, Hen (15) is writing out 42 pages of Biology revision notes for internal school exams, not even proper exams.
