September - time to start again. 100words stopped being interesting to do - a chore: like Homer - if it's hard, don't do it. I ran out of things to write about, so stopping seemed a good idea. Not that I've suddenly got anything to write about now, but never mind. The endless free time is over, as I'm working 4 afternoons a week, but I have time to write in the mornings if I feel like it - so I might. Things have happened since May, life has changed, the old woman has died, and the house is ours again. It feels strange.

Organizing thoughts into neat blocks of 100 words takes discipline. Disorganized, undisciplined random thoughts float through my head. Putting them into words on the screen is a curious occupation, - I don't notice what rubbish I think usually, only when I record it in words does it appear so odd. The left hemisphere of the brain seeks pattern and order, logic, the mot juste, recording, analysing, seeking meaning. The right hemisphere just is, experiences, absorbs, responds. One of the tasks I have to set the people I teach is to decide whether they are right- or left- brain workers. Not easy.

A left-brain learner: processes information in little bits; follows instructions in order; organises work into categories; looks at the details; thinks things through before starting; recognises understanding may be cumulative; goes to the source; works steadily, and to a schedule; appreciates methods and instructions, the "right" way to do things. A right-brain learner goes for the whole impression; makes intuitive links and connections; only reads instructions when the solution is not immediately obvious; works out the method from the results; concentrates of the overall effect rather than the fine detail; relies on imagination and intuition for deeper understanding; likes experimentation .

Which is better? An accurate methodical painstaking worker can be seen as a plodder - unadventurous, pusillanimous, petty. A holistic, intuitive, imaginative worker is seen as a butterfly, inaccurate, dreamy, illogical, unrealistic and impractical. You need both You need both the dreamer and the clerk. Logic without intuition is limited, imagination without method is unproductive. Neither left nor right should predominate, synthesis is all...except of course, it never is. I swing from one to the other, never staying too long with either approach, the practical pragmatic self limits the dreamer, circumscribes the adventures and narrows the experiences. Life is hard.

Back to work - staff meetings and planning sessions, where no one turns up. Is this the way it will be? I turn up at the school for a meeting, to plan the course, organise the details of the where, and when and how, and what happens? The teacher involved has gone shopping! It's only the first week back at school, surely she's not in need of retail therapy already? Most embarrassed head teacher, confused supply teacher, annoyed co-ordinator, and me. I just shrug and laugh. These things happen, I get paid for just being here, so why should I worry

The Bike! I got a new bike not long after Easter. It was a choice between having a holiday in Budapest - where Apocalyptica were playing - or getting a power-assisted bike - difficult choice! We finally opted for the bike, on the grounds that it would last longer than a holiday, even seeing Apoclyptica. It's wonderful. Being power-assisted, rather than a straight forward electric bike, I still have to pedal, but instead of struggling along, knees grating, running out of energy half-way up a hill, I just click the power switch, and it's like someone giving me a gently push from behind .

Having got the Bike, we go for bike rides. When Joan came to visit in August, we were debating whether Shropshire is prettier than Derbyshire, so we decided to have a long weekend in Derbyshire to find out. We wanted to cycle along the old railway tracks across the White Peak, which we first did when we lived in Sheffield, pre-children. We put the bikes in the back of the Big Yellow beast ( a sensible vehicle really, despite appearances) and spent 4 days cycling. Got a trifle saddle-sore, but the bike was wonderful. I got face-ache from too much grinning.

While we were away, we discovered the Staffordshire Moorlands. Didn't know Staffordshire had moorlands - they're on the edge that borders the Peak District National Park. There are large outcrops of rocks called The Roaches, which are apparently famous for rock-climbing, not that I've ever been rock-climbing in my life, but while we were exploring them, what did we find but an extremely handsome little folly. A miniature castle built into the rock face, with one room actually carved out of the rock. It was built as a game keeper's cottage apparently. Alan was very pleased and took lots of photos.

Interesting phonecall to the bank today. When the old woman died, we contacted the banks to close her accounts, filled in various forms, supplied death certificates, and waited. All the bank had to do was transfer the money from her account into ours, but they haven't done it yet. When I rang them today to ask what the hold-up was, they said "pressure of work".? Has there been a rush of old ladies with Internet accounts dying this month, then? What kind of pressure of work do Probate departments work under? Should we worry about this? And where's the money?

After a long hard period bringing up their families, the rooks went off on a well deserved summer break - probably to Blackpool, or Skegness, or somewhere like that. We had peace for a few weeks. The only birdsong in the garden was from robins, not being seasonal, or pigeons sitting on the overhead wires being monotonous - cocoocook isn't an intrinsically interesting comment to make, so why do they repeat it so often? Then we started hearing a different noise, rather like a depressed and hysterical seagull, and discovered a pair of buzzards had taken over the rooks' nests. Trouble looms!

Ought I to grieve for the old woman? I don't. I don't feel sad that she's not around any more. The day after she died, dear Carl rang to see if I was alright, and Alan rang from work, in case I was missing my mummy. I wasn't. She hadn't been "my mummy" for many years. I can't remember when the role reversal happened, but it was long ago. She was my responsibility for so long, that all I feel now is relief that it is over, and I no longer have to be responsible for her health and happiness.

So I don't understand the grief for 9/11. No that's not true, I do understand personal grief, for those who die at the wrong time. Rohan died when he was twelve, that was wrong, and I grieved, but the old woman was nearly 81, she was losing her sight, her hearing, her mobility, her memory. The last thing I wanted her to lose was her dignity as well, but that is concomitant with illness and age, and I was glad that her last few weeks were spent in hospital, because I am not a nurse, and couldn't have nursed her.

There's Trouble up at t'treetops! As expected, the rooks are back from their summer travels, and not happy to find the buzzards in their nests. They collect on the top of the churchyard trees, muttering and cawing to each other, planning their attack on the buzzards. They tried mobbing this afternoon. One of the buzzards left the nest, so they mobbed it, wheeling about, dive-bombing and attacking, shrieking and flapping. It took no notice, and the attack failed. The buzzards are still in possession, and the rooks have to think of another strategy. Quiet reigns again, but not for long.

Late summer is glorious - it's hot and blue and sunny. The air is clear, and the sun is so bright it hurts, and though it's hot, it's not humid and heavy like it was earlier. The trees are beginning to change colour - early, I think. I'm sure it was October last year before they started. We went to Chester yesterday. The grass round the town walls was intensely green, and the sky an incredible blue, hardly english at all. We walked round the Walls, and found a water tower we didn't know anything about, and a camera obscura that worked.

I upset my fish yesterday. I paddled in the pond, and pulled up the reeds and grass clumps that were taking over, and the fish are sulking. The babies are growing fast, and changing colour again, but Little Fredder is still different, still bright orange with big black eyes. There may well be other little Fredders, (fredder seconder, as the Girl calls them), but they aren't so bright. The adult Ghost Koi are sinister, like all carp, they glide through the water and lurk in the depths under weeds and are enormous. I'd much rather have the babies little Shubunkins.

In a quiet pub, in an obscure little market town, in the depths of rural Shropshire, I wore my Apocalyptica t-shirt. Not a fashion or musical statement, only because it happened to be the nearest clean one I could find. Lo and behold! A complete stranger walks up to me to enthuse about the greatest band on earth. She was a heavy metal fan, and hadn't heard of any of our other favourite Finnish bands, but even so... The only other person I've met who was an Apocalyptica fan was a guy walking up the Main Street in Vilnius, Lithuania.

Just been working...planning my next few literacy sessions. It's not easy to do, sitting at home on my own. I get lots of ideas, jumping about all over the place, that I think will work, but never having done this before, I don't know whether they are "right". On the other hand, given the objectives of the course, there doesn't seem to be a "right" way to do things, only what is appropriate, what works, for each individual group. And being me, I'm sure my ideas are as good as any one else's. I call this confidence, not arrogance!

Interesting distinction - the difference between arrogance and confidence. In my regular attacks of self-doubt, I worry that I don't listen enough to other peoples' viewpoints, and follow my own ideas, because they are mine, and therefore naturally good. But I don't know worry myself to death, thinking I can't do this - of course I can, my ideas are good, people enjoy them, children respond etc, - confidence, not arrogance. I don't need nursing and hand-holding when starting something new. One of the advantages of being older, I suppose. No, not true - you can lack confidence in age as well as youth.

Spent today at a planning session with my new colleague at one of the schools, who has even less idea of what the course is supposed to be about than I have. So she accepted my ideas as "what we should do" without question, which is a little worrying. I hope the poor children involved don't get stuck with another Literacy Hour, since most of her suggestions for activities for them took the form of paper and pencil exercises. The idea of rhymes, games and dances seem to be quite alien to her. Oh well, we'll see how it goes.

Michelmas Fair in Bishop's Castle. We first saw it three years ago in the pouring rain when we were house-hunting here. The town goes in for street fairs - close the high street off to traffic, put stalls selling hippie-type junk( tie-dyed t-shirts, stripy hats, new-age crystals, empowering beads etc), antiques, plants, useless artifacts, hot dogs, doughnuts, jacket potatoes and burgers -Welsh Lamb rather than Macdonalds's admittedly - all along the pavements, and have bands playing throughout the day. Quite fun really. The best band were the kids playing percussion again. Teenagers (about 14 -15 years old) playing mixed percussion really well.

Sunday papers - too gloomy to remember: the hutton enquiry drags on, the government and the BBC digging ever deeper holes for themselves to fall into. Then there was the special music supplement, featuring - the Rolling Stones, Gram Parsons, the Fall, why I love pop music, hip-hop, rap and the links with drug culture, and of course the serious and adult classical music reviews. Nothing about any other sort of music. I don't expect intelligent reviews of the more obscure of our tastes, but doesn't anyone else listen to music from other countries? Europe, Scandinavia, Russia,? I think it's very sad.

One thing I did read in the paper which amused me -there is a new sight-seeing attraction: a Lego Perspex box containing a Lego David Blaine has been erected next to the Lego Tower Bridge at Legoland, Windsor. How sweet! The real man must be an idiot. What weird self-image must he have, to want to put himself in a perspex box suspended over the Thames, so that the public can watch him starve himself? Houdini at least exhibited some skill in extricating himself from his chains, but what skill is there in starving yourself? And who should care anyway?

New favourite CDs since April are One Ring Zero and Amy X Neuberg, both american, and both very good. We're not really obsessive about music, but Alan does have to track down every CD produced by current favourites, and get them all, even if the earlier ones are not terribly good. Very different, not at all Heavy Metal played on amplified cellos like Apocalyptica. Amy Neuberg has a lovely voice, - I wish I could sing. One of the painful memories from my school career - being told to stand at the back of the school choir, and not sing too loudly.

Another planning day, another school, a different colleague to work with. This one is fine. I met her last term, and we get on well. She said it seemed like we'd known each other for years - five months actually, but we laugh a lot, and have similar approaches to small children. And a willingness to look at problems from different angles - the school hasn't been very successful in enticing parents in for this course, so we suggested grabbing the children from their classrooms, getting them keen and let them persuade their parents to attend. Bribed with drinks and biscuits, naturally.

Came home from work full of enthusiasm today ( different school, different age group, different parent group,) It all went well today, parents attended, enjoyed the session, lost their shyness of each other and took part in the animated discussions. It's really nice to work with a group like this, makes me feel like it's a job worth doing, unlike a lot of other teaching, which is much more like beating your head against a brick wall. We were discussing writing, and one or two were horrified at the 100Words.net idea...but not all, maybe there ‘ll be some new recruits.

Being super-efficient and keen and so on, I forgot to go to a training meeting this morning. There I was, happily drinking tea and thinking vaguely about what I should be doing, and the phone rang - where was I? The meeting started 30 minutes ago - meeting? What meeting? So I rushed off to the meeting in a panic, not giving myself time to collect everything I needed for the afternoon's course, the meeting overran and I was late for setting up the classroom, unprepared for the session and then I dropped the coffee jar and broke it. A good day.

Got a new computer brain, so I spent time going through old files wondering what to delete and what to transfer. Delete all the old school rubbish. Found a lot of The Girl's schoolgirl nonsense, some of it very funny. Reading it again, I'd forgotten how young she was - only a little girl, about 13 or 14, I suppose....Before, by the tone. How quickly she had to grow up, how sad that we didn't have the time to really appreciate her then. We thought we had years ahead, for both of them, but two years later, they'd both gone.

Not that what we've got in her place isn't what we want. Great Daft idiot that she is. She rang this evening, to tell us about getting caught up in yet another anti-war march, this time in London. I don't know how she does it - she goes exploring. ends up on demonstrations, and marches, and meets strange people. Happens everywhere - London, Nicaragua - must be something about her, I suppose. She doesn't change as she gets older, just gets more herself. The potential was there in her 14-year-old nonsense. What she will be is what she was, only more so.

What would he have been? He should be 17, but it's hard to guess - what he would have been is what he was, only more so - but it's so hard now to remember what he was. You think you never forget, but time passes, life impinges, experiences overlay experiences, and memories get buried. I know what he was, but unlike the Girl, he never committed himself to print. He was only 12, he didn't keep a diary. He lived in the present, doing, not recording. I can only remember how sharply wicked his jokes were, not what they were about.

30 days hath September - last day of the month. It's been relatively easy to do my 100 words this month The discipline is good for me, I suppose. What would be better, I think, would be a more disciplined approach to the subject matter. Rather than just write 100 words about what ever happens to be in my head at the time, it would be better if I could stick to a single subject, and develop it in 100-word paragraphs through the month. But that would require work, and thought, and I don't know that I can be bothered.