Christine, Wondering

Random Musings of a Human Becoming

Sunday, March 4, 2007

Ohh, Jemmy-Cat!

Jemima's latest trick is that she's found some way of getting up on top of the pantry, and she likes to sleep there. I'm not going to try to stop her - she's not doing any harm up there, and besides I can't reach her to get her down. But it was quite alarming the first time, to walk into the kitchen and be miaowed at from above!

Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

She also did something hilarious the other day: in my house there is a stairwell which has metal banisters with metal mesh panels underneath them. I was on the lower flight of stairs and she was on the upper flight (the two flights run parallel and are separated by aforementioned mesh panels). Jem decided to try to leap over the banister at me. She got her front paws on to the banister and obviously meant to hook her back claws into the mesh, but she didn’t manage it in time and slid, hanging by her front paws, about a metre down the banister and fell off on to the landing. She was quite alright but looked very taken aback! I sat down on the stairs and laughed until I cried, it was that funny to watch.

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General update: uni is still good, I’m very busy and I’m part of a few spontaneous study partnerships and study groups now. Work is also fine. I’ve started packing to move, and that’s going fine too. All is good.

I’ve also started examining more carefully the education department’s breakdown of the state, to work out what order I’m going to put the regions in on my job application form towards the end of the year. If I’m going to live in the country permanently, rather than moving back to the city, then I want to live in the Warren-Blackwood education district, or in the south-eastern parts of the Bunbury district. But for my first placement I’m actually favouring the Midlands district and the southern half of the Mid West district. You can check out maps of the districts here:

http://www.det.wa.edu.au/education/districts/maps.htm

As it stands, my current ranking list is:

Warren-Blackwood
Bunbury
Midlands
Narrogin
Mid West
Albany
Esperance
Goldfields
Swan (Perth metro)
West Coast (Perth metro & north of the city)
Fremantle-Peel (Perth metro & south of the city)
Canning (Perth metro)
Pilbara
Kimberley

As you can see - if you look at the maps lol - I've left the two far north regions, Pilbara and Kimberley, right at the bottom. I really don't want to go that far! And the four metro regions are only just above those, as I do want to experience country teaching and besides it takes longer to get a job if they think you only want a metro placement. The Goldfields and Esperance are further away but still mostly feasible, and Albany, Mid West, Narrogin and Midlands are all close enough, and pleasant enough in terms of climate and vegetation, to be very comfortable to live in (apart from the upper reaches of the Mid West, but there aren’t many schools up there anyway, apart from Remote Community Schools, and I don’t intend to apply for a remote schools placement). Bunbury and Warren-Blackwood districts are my ideal – not only are they within a few hours’ drive of the city (as are Narrogin and the Midlands), but they have a splendid climate and the kind of vegetation I love. They’re also, however, highly competitive areas to teach in, so I don’t expect to get a graduate placement there. I’d be more than happy with a placement in the Midlands, Narrogin or the southern Mid West.

I spent a lot of hours with the education department’s directory of schools and a book of maps of Western Australia, to figure all that out!

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Oh, and Matthew found some RAM he didn’t need and gave it to me, so my computer now works splendidly. Yay!

2 comments:

Oh, what a lovely cat. Is she part Russian Blue?

I'm glad you're feeling better, and I apologize for some of my comments. I was lashing out at you because I am beyond miserable of late. I do want to make one thing clear: I left no anonymous comments. I got them quite often in my own journal, and I would not do it to someone else.

You seem to be doing amazingly well, and I'm proud of you. Keep it up - I hope I can follow your footsteps soon.
 
Hi Elizabeth :-)

Jemima could be part anything - she's a good old moggie and her parentage is unknown. But I suspect she's got at least some of a Blue breed or some Siamese.

Her colouring isn't shown very well in photos - she's a soft grey-blue, but she actually has grey-on-grey tabby markings, which show up on her sides and as rings on her tail. So she's clearly part tabby of some sort!

Thanks for the other comments. I've been through a rough patch, no doubt about it, and I'm not saying I didn't act a little obnoxious at times because of it lol (I'm human!) - I only take exception to people who act like I must be wholly evil or psychotic on the basis of a little superficial silliness. Not that you said anything like that, but others did.

Things have settled down for me now - I hope they do for you too :-)
 

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