This is coming in via email, so I don’t know what it will look like – I
apologise for that in advance.
Anyway, it’s the final night at Melrose and the final countdown of families
remaining til the bitter end. There’s only 7 families left of the 17 who
started the week (numbers had dropped before we even got here). Kirsty visited
but has gone already (good to see you though Kirsty 🙂 ) We know several of our
number have made it home OK, though we’re still waiting on confirmation of a few
others, but you are all much missed already. Although it does mean the wine is
going further 😉
Kris has found her phone. Helen is bereft without Merry’s camera to take
piccies of us, although Barbara is stepping into the breach 🙂 We’re about to
break into the garlic bread and we’re making inroads into the red wine. Less
to clear up tomorrow.
Sarah, we’re still missing you, but trust me, you’re really glad you weren’t
here this afternoon.
Comments
34 responses to “The final countdown”
I guess that means there was plenty stew this year, then…..So what’s the vomit count standing at? Trying to work out who is left?
Sounds a nightmare!
Hope you manage to enjoy your last evening- though it sounds like you are!
Yikes – so more vomit today then? We’ve just got the D bit of the D&V still ongoing.
Sonds like I should be thankful I didn’t make it!
That really must be a record drop-out rate! You still sound very cheerful, Jax!
And yeah, I am kind of glad I wasn’t there 😉
we’re home – journey as erm, pleasant as 10.5 hours in a car with two small children armed with a dvd player and a Bump the Elephant’s Christmas dvd can possibly be 😉
Glad the stew went well and hope you all have safe journeys home tomorrow.
I’m new to all of this..what is Melrose? Why the vomit? Is it some sort of secret home education boot camp that we need to prevent the media from hearing about? Is it a place where people are forcibly deschooled (hence the vomit)? To the uninformed it sounds scandalously intriguing…do enlighten me.
rofl Elderfairy! Melrose is a town in the Scottish Borders where for the past three years a bunch of us (mainly from the blogring, but from the Early Years list too) have rented a youth hostel and had a camp there for a week. Unfortunately these camps seem to be plagued by germ-sharing!
I got back, as you know 🙂 Vomit here though and tonsilitis for me too, which i had an inkling was coming on earlier in the week. Not sure i could have got them home today so good jib i went but thanks to you and Kris for offering to be last women out; i really appreciated it 🙂
Buttercup still D *and* V 🙁
Just had to. Sorry
:sick:
Lol, looks familiar!
Ewww!
Are you home safe Jax?
I spoke to Jax after she left the hostel – apparently Youth Hostel Lady was much more pernickety than people who have signed us out before and insisting on mirrors being polished and all sorts of malarky. She sounded remarkably chirpy about it though!
Polished mirrors???? Well I guess my conscience is clear on that one – I didn’t do more than look in any, and I doubt my children did that much 😉 I did hoover my room, but didn’t really know what else I could have done whilst there were still loads of people in the place – never thought of polishing mirrors!
Thanks to all of those who stuck it out and were responsible for the rest of us xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
what does rofl mean? Nah, I’m just jealous ‘cos I wish I could have come, except for the pernickety laydee it all sounds like a fun, charector building experience. I hope there will be pictures..
rofl = [I’m] rolling on [the] floor laughing.
Merry has a link to loads of pics on her blog 🙂
I’m home! Still nauseous but kids are fine (so far)!
Hi
Jax is back, unloaded smalls into bed and now finishing unloading the car.
Well, what do you know -I usually polish the mirrors and glass sometime over the last day 😀 Did no one ever realise I was the polish fairy then?
Clearly not Joyce 😉
Ha! Nope, I didn’t realise you did that – but presumably not in all the bedrooms? Helen had to go back to do those too…
Alison, your room was deemed un hoovered I’m afraid, and we had to go back to it. Although I am wondering whether some of the kids had got into it with you saying you had done it – ‘cos it did look like a bombsite.
Hey, it’s all character building or something, and tbh, it wasn’t really that bad, it was just the finding of something else each time we thought we’d finished that was a bit wearing. Worth it though – she said see you next year at the end 🙂
Nope, not the bedrooms, except for my own. Bathrooms, halls, and the sitting room doors that the kids lick for some bizarre reason. I also hoovered (well Bob did), my room yesterday, and have to say, left the carpet in a better state than it was when I arrived.
! Oh that’s a bit weird – did it once everything was out, only a sleeping Buttercup still remained. It had been really crumb-y, but I’m sure I did it all! Pretty sure it didn’t look like a bombsite when I left 🙁 Feeling rather guilty now 🙁 At least I didn’t have a mirror in there to need polishing.
Actually, though, regarding responsibilities, see number 3 here http://www.rentahostel.com/Web/Site/Help/termsconditions.asp?menuID=-1&MenuItemID=18&MenuType=PAGE
Has anyone ever actually seen the toilets and showers being cleaned by the wardens while we are there? I’ve never seen any evidence of it.
Nope.
And Helen and I were cleaning toilets frantically on the top floor as they didn’t flush properly (they flushed, but not particularly effectively iyswim).
And I know Merry was doing loo rolls – surely that should be their responsibility too?
I think we left the hostel alot cleaner than we found it. In our room the sink was filthy and the carpet especially beneath the bunks was humming. Sorry she was nit picking at you.
That’s what I thought, Jax, but wasn’t sure enough of my ground till I looked at the T+Cs today, though I was sure I had seen it somewhere. Just asked Bob, as well, as he took Hannah to another rentahostel a couple of months ago, and he says that toilets and showers were cleaned, floors washed etc by the wardens every day after the first full one – so that would be right, after the second night. I think systematic cleaning like that (not the emergency cleans that lots of us were doing reactively during the week – ewww!) would help reduce the d+v strike rate.
Our room was certainly left cleaner than when we arrived too although have to confess to not having polished the mirror but I imagine just glancing in it from the other side of the sink didn’t have too great an impact on it really.
Sounds pretty crappy – well done Jax & Helen for doing it all 🙂
Oh bollocks – i was going to go and vac your room Alison, but Andrew told me you’d done it so i didn’t go in and check 🙁 I could have saved someone that anyway.
I’ve got a few ideas for reducing all that next year actually, though to be fair i *did* see the wardens cleaning some of the toilets and they came in to collect our tea towels at one point too.
Nah Merry, it probably got trashed last night knowing our luck 😉
It’s not a problem, honest!
We were a good team, Kris and Katy did loads before they went, Barbara had the kitchen well under control, Chris F hoovered wonderfully and Helen and I filled in where necessary. *and* we got stew for lunch 😀
Oh, and Jan and Jonathan were in charge downstairs – that’s who I’d lost in my headcount!
Yeah, it wasn’t so much waht needed doing, as the fact that they were fussier than before, so kept on thinkign we had it sorted. In retrospect, and given the way these things obviolsu get applied it seems sensible in future to clarify witht he warden at the start what they expect . On the roll call, tim did a good job with the toilets, and the other Chris was looking after the kiddies
apparently there was toothpaste in a sink! I went round all the sinks and cleaned them, as couldn’t actually identify any I thought were dirty!
They were *very* fussy and dour faced on the last day.
The stew was still gorgeous the enxt day, and there were no further d and v’s in the hostel – so the typhoid marys must have left!!!!
Actually, I think it was a big plus to the cleanliness and spraying etc that all the children didn’t go down with it, seeing what close contact there was.
next year I will bring my alco hand spray stuff for people to use as they go in and out of kitchen – will, certainly dissuade kids from entering!