h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

So that's it, all over. The final day of November, journals end, blogs cease, novels are finished and, presumably, people shave of their moustaches. Did I spell that properly? I'm not at all sure.

So I'm mulling over what to do with my last entry. It's been an interesting month, the Jimmy Saville Scandal and the resignation of the BBC DG have given me things to talk about, as well as Raven passing out in Iceland and our consequent visit to A&E. I'm still sort of dealing with the fallout from that and it reminds me of the last time Raven was so seriously incapacitated by ill health that I had to do a load more work.

But I'm leaving that, because I think there's an I couldn't care less article in there somewhere. Never fear, the story will be told in due course. Which leaves a gap for today. So decided not to do a summing up, and not to tell you what's going on at the moment, and I can't be doing with bitching about something on the last day, so what the hell and I going to say?

Well, just quickly, today is national carers day. Here's a link to the page on the Website of Carers UK, the charity principally involved in the event: http://www.carersuk.org/get-involved/carers-rights-day

So how can I persuade you, in the few minutes before I finish my lunch break and go back to work, that carers need rights? What do I, and we, do? Well you know that. We look after our friends, and our relatives, who are mentally and physically (sometimes both) disabled. We give them varying ranges of support but many of us are either living close by and spending all of our time popping over to them (rather than spending time with our own friends and family) attending to the needs of the person we care for, or we are living with that person and picking up the pieces 24 hours a day, with nowhere to hide. You will hear over and over again about how much money we save you. You're welcome, by the way, but what does that mean? Well it means that if we weren't doing what we do, then the NHS and Social Services would have to do it (and, in many cases, do it badly, I fear) and it would cost the treasury a tidy sum. So what we're asking, no, sorry, what we're telling, is that we need support, advice, guidance and expertise to perform our role.

Any time now would be good.

[Amy P]

Well done for seeing this through to the end despite the other stuff going on

Deb