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

1st November - all souls' day. It's also my own personal new year's day, as it has been every year.

To me, the last day of October is for the dead and today is for the living. Yesterday was for looking at what needed to be released or got rid of, and today is about choosing what is held onto or even worth fighting for.

Maybe it's appropriate that half of today was spent trying to save the homes of council tenants. It might not have made for a joyful morning, but the solidarity shown by others from the wider area was a reminder that few people are ever as helpless and isolated as they think. Even a fairly well known harmless eccentric stuck around to show his support.

It's been Dia de los Muertes here - traditionally a more important day that Halloween.

2nd November

After this many years, it shouldn't shock me but it still does. Sorry, I should stop being indirect and get to the point about what's bothering me: The complete and utter cluelessness of people who I prefer to believe have good intentions but are a bit dim, unimaginative, or just plain forgetful.

Examples: "Ooh your birthday's on a weekend - great timing!" Yeah, thanks for that, had you forgotten that I don't get time off on account of being an unpaid carer?

"Yay, birthdays - let's get drunk!" It's been a very long time since I dared to have more than one drink while being responsible for somebody else.

"I hope .... is pampering you today" Thanks for that too, have you forgotten that this is their relapsing time of year, and if anyone's doing the running around and pampering it certainly won't be my husband?

Seriously, how can you forget that your own brother is long term sick (to a very disabling degree) and he doesn't magically get better for birthdays and anniversaries?

"So, going anywhere nice tonight?" If I were, it would have to be on my own, so no. Have I mentioned enough times that I'm a carer and my beloved can't be bundled into a wheelchair and taken wherever both of us would have liked to go?

The intention behind all of those comments (and similar) is appreciated, and accepted in the spirit they were given, but those comments are like a hideously unsuitable gift which somebody spent ages choosing or making. They remind me quite how alien my normal life is to most people.

Speaking as a space alien anthropologist to any noncarers reading this:
"Your good intentions are noted, but your gestures are clearly more about signalling to other outsiders that you are warm and caring than about the recipient; if you really were as warm and caring as you'd like to be perceived, perhaps you might have pondered more deeply before inserting a lower appendage into your nutritional and vocal interface."

Are there any ways, within the limits imposed on you, that you can celebrate?

Yes, there are TC, but they don't involve going out, being pampered, or getting drunk.

Made a cake, decorated the cake, bought myself some cheap flowers (cream with a hint of peach roses, with a trace of fragrance), bought a couple of packs of the type of buffet/picnic food which is usually too expensive to justify - do you see a link here? Everything bar a few birthday cards, a few presents, and taking a short phone call, was something I had to do for myself, in between the usual work.

Even the phone call was timed more for somebody else's convenience than mine. *gives inner whingeing brat a hard slap*

I certainly know what you mean, Herenna, being a carer myself. Hubby has to stumble into the Coop, supported by my son, to buy cards for me. He's such a stubborn git and won't give up, but it does tire him out.

3rd November

Traditionally, "the veil between the worlds" or what separates us from less tangible beings (eg ghosts, elementals, fairies, spirits of the place, local gods etc) is thinnner around Halloween and May Day.

I'm used to that, and make as many allowances for it as I'd make for expected seasonal weather; regarding it as a mixed blessing but, since it can't be stopped, you might as well learn to live with it.

All well and good, except this year, it's not the veil which is thin, but skin. There's only so carefully I can tread on this eggshell strewn floor, and even that doesn't seem good enough. Retracing my steps isn't an option, eggshells, cover the floor behind me, even the bits already stepped on.

What now? Shut up and stand still? Not possible for long.

Hope for an antigravity belt, thrown from the doorway? Learn to crawl across the ceiling instead of walking across of the floor? Impractical.

Sweep the eggshells out of the way, causing confusion but at least creating a relatively safe way out? Arrogant.

Insist that the person who left the eggshells there should move them to a safer place if they care so much about them getting damaged? And if they refuse to do it, what then?

Or lay a board over the eggshells, aiming to distribute the pressure and reduce damage, while still accepting that there will be breakages?

[Amy P]

I long ago stopped worrying about other people's thin skins and breaking the odd few dozen eggshells, those who are important in my life take me for what I am, those who can easily be offended can take their delicate shells somewhere where they may be appreciated. Life's too short, look after yourself and those you love, maybe those who have irked you may have thicker skins that you think, if not their loss?

4th November

I don't want it enough, although I want it a lot. How else do you explain neglecting my Polish for nearly two weeks (no lesson during halfterm) and leaving it until this morning to start the homework set then?

A sick and disabled husband is no excuse, he was that way long before I began last year's course. Nor is tiredness - that happens every autumn and winter as the workload increases. Even now, I'm procrastinating instead of getting on with it.

Enough. Na zadanie!

[Amy P]

5th November

The bit of the park (I'm not naming it here, but it's quite a large park) nearest this estate is out of bounds; usually there'd be special access after dark because of the fireworks, but this year it's a ticket only event. Children go free (as long as accompanied by a ticket-holding adult), but tickets for over sixteens started at £6 for borough residents only, and the gate price has now gone up to £10. In a poor area, with people only allowed to bring in a small bottle of water - and being searched for any other refreshments at all.

There will be a 20 minute firework display. The rest of the evening, supposedly justifying the ticket price, consists of roughly 4 hours of being allowed to wander around and pay well over the odds for light sabres etc. The music has just begun, I can hear it inside this flat, in spite of closed double glazed windows and doors.

Meanwhile, on this side of 3 (I kid you not) different security fences, I'm off to this council estate's fireworks party. There might not be fireworks, but there'll be (soft) refreshments, and nobody's going to be fleeced.

5th November - Part Two.

Well, the firework display in the park is over, but this edge of the estate got the best view ever. I'm just getting warm again, before editing the firework display photos.

[Amy P]

6th November

Penetrating cold and damp weather today, with a pale peach and grey sunrise. The concrete floor has become too cold for barefeet. It's the first day since spring that I've needed longjohns under leggings.

I've heard from some people who bought tickets to the display last night, it turns out that the most memorable part of their evening was trudging around a cold slightly muddy field, in the dark, and their view of the display wasn't nearly as good as what I saw for free fromm outside the park.

The small gathering we had on the mounds outside the fence was very last minute, with a table, cakes, biscuits, two large flasks of hot water, and the makings for hot drinks. We shared sparklers (and the means to light them) as far as possible with any child who asked. It was sad to see junior school children scared of holding them, but only to be expected in an urban area where a lot of them have nowhere to use sparklers, I suppose.

Not much got done today, which means tomorrow's going to be busy - a trip to the parcels office, a 2 hour so-called consultation to attend, some desperately needed time in the pool, the shopping...

Better make the most of relative idleness now.

[Amy P]

7th November

*Eeyore alert*

An earlyish start, to get the parcels from the parcels office. Two buses and an hour and a half later, one turned out to contain a V for vendetta mask (which'll need a lot of fettling before it's wearable), the other a compost caddy with charcoal filter for indoor use.

Went out again to get the shopping, then hurried back in the hope of just about catching the start of a so-called consultation workshop about the future of this estate.

Just about did it. Council trying to persuade us that we're only against regeneration (aka demolish and rebuild piecemeal and far more densely) because we don't understand it. Struggling to get across that peiple living here simply no longer trust the council. Wr've heard all the nice words and promises before, and we've seen precious little in the way of tangible outcome. Meanwhile, repairs (even quick and cheap ones) have been routinely delayed or just not done at all. The same goes for routine maintenance.

In spite of the neglect, most homes are in pretty good condition. Yet repair is being dismissed as "too expensive" compared with 15 or so years of living on a building site.

All for the net addition of maybe 65 extra flats, to an estate which only works well because it's relatively low rise and wasn't densely built.

So once more, we say "no thanks" and are treated like ignorant, selfish, ungrateful, plebians. That, by the way, even includes highly educated tenants and middleclass leaseholders - there's no way this could be described as a sink estate or slum.