The Way of the Wombat

Sorry for those who are only here - I keep forgetting to copy things over from LJ now and again.

So - quick potted version of the last month;

A few trips to the hospital for S2C and I to both go to blood clinic, and for him to see the urologist.

Coffee with friends a few times.

A Remembrance Day service in which we considered the repercussions of war on the whole world.

Held a small social event to raise funds for Christian Aid, during which I showed people how to make needle-felted Christmas cards.

Helped NYK2 make a hat for Edith -



Went to a chocolate workshop with a WI group, where we made our own chocolate bars, and then had decadent hot chocktails. (Mine involved pain chocolate, maple syrup spices, biscoff crumbs and a shot of amaretto...)



Spent an evening with my daughter at a wreath making workshop. (We do this every year now - it is a sign of the beginning of the Christmas season.)

Mine is on the right, hers on the left -





Did the Advent ring for Church;




Attended a whole-village craft fair in a very wet Laxey (there were indoor and outdoor venues all around the village with over 100 different stalls). Both of us did some Christmas shopping.

Bought 25 small gifts to fill the family Advent Calendar



Which is now over 30 years old!

And yesterday we had Messy Christmas at church where our main theme was stars-









We told the story of the Star of Bethlehem, and added making night light holders and window decorationd.





And my contribution to the food was Christmas tree brownies -



Oh, and NYK2 had her 13th birthday, I have knitted small Christmas gifts to leave as anonymous surprise gifts here and there, and I have been involved with the all-island 'Warm Spaces' initiative; through the winter various places are committed to providing somewhere where people can come along, have a bit of company, hot drinks, and not need their heating on at home. Our church has opted in and we open our coffee room on Tuesday afternoons. So far some members of the congregation are coming along, and also some people who are not, both of which are good.

This afternoon the plan is to flop out for a while!

I am still worried that LJ may disappear outside Russia. After all, we are a point of contact with the outside world and, as Putin tries to convince Russians that black is white and up is down, this might eventually be noticed. Apart from the possibility of it being cut off at our end.

But, as I mentioned to cairistiona7, I know that my journal is often read by 200+ people in a day as I leave many of my entries set to public. And who knows, some of those anonymous readers may be from the Russian side of LJ. So this is a post about Ukraine. And if my journal disappears my friends know I have one ready to use at Dreamwidth, and I have all my entries archived on a pen drive! Not that I really think my journal is that important.

Ukraine - I am very distressed by the unprovoked invasion of this independent country by the Russian forces. I am upset and distressed by the pictures coming out of the whole country of Ukraine of apartment blocks being demolished by Russian forces, of families with small children sheltering in underground stations from aerial bombardment by Russian war planes in scenes reminiscent of WW2.

I am just as saddened for the young Russian soldiers, and their families. It is clear that most of them have no idea why they are there. If they even vaguely are aware that they are meant to be crushing a nazist oppressive regime they quickly realise this is not true.

Whilst they may not realise just how pointedly insulting President Putin is to President Zelenskiy, who had relatives who died in Nazi Concentration Camps, to use that term, they are told, in no uncertain terms, by the Ukrainians they are now meeting face to face.

They are not welcomed as some sort of liberators. The Russian military is invading an innocent neighbour. The captain of the Russian warship who demanded that the 13 coastal guards on what we know as Snake Island (between Ukraine and Romania) hand over any weapons, learnt that he was not welcome when they told him to F*** Off. It is thought that all 13 may have been killed when the warship then opened fire on them.

The Russian soldiers confronted by an elderly lady, at least as old as their Grandmothers, realised they were not wanted when she told them to go home - and, if they would not go, to take some of her sunflower seeds and put them in their pockets... so that something Ukrainian might grow from their bodies if they died on Ukrainian soil.

The Russian troops confronted by fellow Russians whose homes and lives are in Ukraine, know they are not liberating anyone - for they have been told so face to face. Especially the ones who got lost and ran out of fuel for their tank... the local populace told them to turn around and go home.

The people they are fighting against are the people who usually sit at desks, deliver the mail, work behind shop counters - they are learning how to make petrol bombs because they do not want to be 'liberated' - they want Russians to come for holidays, for business, to visit friends and family, not to try to overthrow a democratically elected government. They were planning birthday parties for their children - the children now sheltering in the underground stations building tanks and guns from the new lego set birthday presents.

And now President Putin is telling his people that 'Western countries are being unfriendly' and so it is all their fault. So unfriendly that he might have to use nuclear weapons.

The Western countries are being so unfriendly that they have decided not to hold the European Champions League final in Russia, have cancelled the Russian Formula 1 Grand Prix, and told Russia they are no longer welcome to take part in the Eurovision Song Contest. So unfriendly that some countries have said they won't play international football against Russia, even if it means being classed as defaulting.

Now this is sad for all the people of Russia who enjoy the football, the motor-racing, and Eurovision and we would much rather have you enjoying the fun with the rest of us - but would you want to spend your leisure time with someone who has just turned on another of your friends and tried to batter them to death?

And now the Western countries are being so unfriendly that they have decided to slow down money transferring between themselves and Russia, and are preparing to not buy your oil and gas rather than waiting for President Putin to say they can't have it.

But let's get this straight in simple terms we can all understand. He is the guy who has sent his kids out with instructions to totally trash his next door neighbour's garden, dig up the plants and shit in the grass - and now he says the rest of the neighbourhood is totally at fault because they won't let him play in their gardens with their ball... and so he might just get a bulldozer and smash their houses.

And, finally -

The Joint Public Issues Team of the United Reformed Church, Methodist Church and Baptist Union in the UK has issued the following prayer:

God of all,
with alarm and concern we bring before you
the military intervention in Ukraine.

In a world you made for peace and flourishing,
we lament the use of armed force.

We mourn every casualty of this conflict,
every precious life extinguished by war.

We pray comfort for those who grieve
and those who are fearful.

Hear our longing that leaders and nations
will honour the worth of all people
by having the courage
to resolve conflict through dialogue.

May all our human failings be transformed
by your wonderful grace and goodness.

We ask this in the name of Christ,
the author of peace and sustainer of Creation.
Amen.

A young man whose family attend our church is a teacher in Nottingham, and his school is involved with a charity in Uganda.

We have asked what we can do to help; raise money perhaps? Actually, said Richard, a collection of clothes really would be useful. He is going out in July, and others also do, regularly, and they take a suitcase or two each.

Whilst football kit for young boys is greeted with glee, there are actually two things that are especially useful.

The first is basic school uniform, as parents have to pay school fees and send the children in uniform, or the child will be sent home. So plain black or grey trousers and skirts, plain white school shirts, and school shoes, are very useful.

That is more or less as you would expect. But there is something else which is really prized, and much needed. Before I tell you what, think back to how they get these clothes there...

They need bras. Many of the women in the poor areas cannot afford bras. And as those of you who are female will know, unsupported breasts can be downright uncomfortable, to say the least.

So I have just been checking my underwear drawer so that I can help to, literally, support Ugandan women!

And I still get the giggles at the idea of this rather serious young man carrying a large suitcase full of bras as his main luggage :)

I have three things to share with you - One is inspirational, another makes me just want to beat someone's head against a wall, and the third is a gloriously silly WTF moment!


Thing 1. The first thing is an article posted by the BBC World Service. It just wonderful, inspiring, fascinating - and also has some of the most wonderful photographs I've seen. I could just look at THIS for ages.


Also - I have just got to include something like that into a story somewhere.

........

Thing 2. This is about a very, very, ignorant man who actually managed to make it to being Mayor of Swindon. There have been reports in a number of the newspapers, and on the BBC, about him being asked to apologise for something he said in a 'semi-public' place - i.e. a training meeting for councillors.

What he said was shocking in itself - what was worse was that he really didn't seem to understand why he was asked to apologise. ( Read more... )
.........

And Thing 3; Today I got an e-mail from Amazon about something that was part of an order I made a couple of days ago, explaining that

Unfortunately, due to delivery restrictions on such items, we won’t be able to send you this item and have cancelled it from your order. This is because this item contains flammable, pressurised, corrosive, environmentally hazardous or otherwise harmful substances classified as dangerous goods under the European Agreement concerning the International Carriage of Dangerous Goods by Air.

Although the amount of these substances in these products is usually quite limited, these products need to be transported in a certain way to ensure that they are handled with care and are therefore assigned to a specialist carrier. Unfortunately this means that we can’t dispatch this to any destination outside of mainland UK.

We’re sorry for any inconvenience caused and hope to see you again soon.

What do you think I might have been ordering? It sounds dangerous, doesn't it?

Actually it was a bottle of Avon Skin so Soft in a non-pressurised pump action bottle. I only added it to the Amazon order as there wasn't anything else I wanted from Avon at the moment.

That seems pretty silly in itself - but the rest of the order arrived in the post this morning - including this... Which is a high pressurised container of a rather more likely substance to be any or all of the above!

OK - this is a quick résumé of my week at work starting last Friday.

Friday; computer in community hospital won't let me access my patient notes. Techie is nice middle aged lady who understands why this is a problem, recognises the cause of the problem, gets someone else to remotely fix it. Hurrah!

Monday; encounter identical problem at main hospital - however I was prepared, had written down name of person who corrected problem remotely on Friday, and managed to contact them so they were able to do the same fix. Cause is, apparently, a system update.

Tuesday; into my own office to find I can't log onto the system at all. Neither office-mate is in so I eventually try one of their computers to find it isn't just my lap-top... ring our own admin support to discover entire government system has crashed. Can't even ring patients as I can't access notes or schedule for the day - do some sorting of paper stuff, and some shredding. Finally enough of system restored for me to do some proper  work about 10.30 - good thing our bit is regarded as a priority - other bits, like the courts, were down much longer, D-d tells me later.

Wednesday; into office to discover the programme that handles my patient notes is down - something to do with Tuesday's 'fix' I gather. However, I knew where I was going and who I was going to see, so just went. Called in at Mum's at lunchtime as I was nearby - she is convinced, after conversation with GP surgery (also on government computer system...) that the receptionist blames everything on computer problems and actually doesn't do anything. Reassure mother there really WAS a computer problem. She is unimpressed; a bit of paper was all you needed in her day...

Today; into office, everything works! Until about 9.30 when we get a message via the intra-net to explain that the main Isle-of-Man internet link to the rest of the world has been damaged and we are, basically, cut off from the outside world... Takes until 13.40 to mend, and then there is an enormous backlog - but at least it didn't really interfere with work!

Goodness knows what it will be like tomorrow....

I feel like Lucy in my icon. I am fed up with winter now, I would like spring. If we can't have spring can we at least have a week without winds gusting to 70mph - which are due tonight and tomorrow again? At the moment it is just beginning to blow a hooley again, but at least I don't have to go out any more today, so that's of the good, I guess.

Poor S2C has hurt his back. It was improving, and he'd even walked down to the shops before he went to bed for the afternoon. But he must have moved awkwardly in his sleep or something, as it is very sore again.

I know this because I heard him yelling at me from the landing. I went as soon as I heard him, only for him to berate me because he had, apparently, been calling for me to help him out of bed - but the bedroom door was shut, I had the living room door pushed to because the tumble drier is on, and I was listening to the rugby on the TV, which had a lot of crowd cheering, whilst also concentrating on what I was doing on the computer.

But, it seems, he believes firmly that I had heard him and was ignoring him... So he's crabby too.

As for what I was concentrating on on the computer...AAAARGH! D-d and I are going up to Skye in early May to meet up with dougalsservant and another friend from my uni days. It should be straightforward to organise. After all, 1,200 years ago there was regular traffic between her island and ours. But these days it takes 2 days.

First attempt was to leave here on a Saturday morning, go to Heysham by sea, then train to Glasgow, stay overnight and get a train from Glasgow to Mallaig on Sunday morning, and a boat from Mallaig to Skye. Except that the morning train doesn't run on Sundays, and the afternoon one only gives 10 minutes to get the boat at Mallaig. If the train is late you are stuck at Mallaig overnight.

dougalsservant came up with a fix involving hiring a car at Fort William, rather than once we got to Skye.

Then we find the train from Heysham/Lancaster to Glasgow is not running on the Saturday because of track works. There is a detour which adds 5 hours to the journey.

D-d manages to get an extra day off work, we bring everything forward by a day and it all looks smooth. The lady at the car hire place says it is fine to have the car for an extra day, so the only thing to do is change the hotel booking made for the Saturday night in Glasgow, before we found out about the train problem. Finally got this organised this afternoon. Good job I did, as it seem the hotel website had assumed that when I booked a room for the return journey, just after booking for the one on the outward journey - that it was instead of the first one, not as well as it... WTF?

However, hotel all organised now, tickets all bought for the travelling, everything is fine. Except that now they have changed our boat times between home and Heysham... The big boat is going into dock, despite it being a bank holiday weekend, and the fastcraft is doing the route instead; so we can only hope for good weather. And then D-d and I will be stuck in Lancaster, with our luggage, for about 3.5 hours because our Lancaster-> Glasgow tickets are non transferable. Don't ask about the trip home.

However - we will get there, come hell or high water! And at least I am in the house, warm and dry, and have comfort food - toast with black cherry jam. And hopefully S2C's back will be better when he wakes up. But I still feel crabby...

Firstly - the back; it is much better - just the odd twinge on standing from sitting and if I am not careful bending or twisting.

Secondly - the fridge magnets;
I was asked for some close-ups and I have put them ( below this cut... )

And a final picture, taken this morning to amuse you, of the contents of the fridge...



Yep - two plain yoghurts, two corner yoghurts, a small bowl of cooked rice, a small amount of cheese, a jar of goose-fat and a Co-op ready cooked mini beef-joint, which is my emergency food for putting with veg from the freezer, or making hot beef sandwiches... other than that it is really a bit like Mother Hubbard's cupboard!

You have to bear in mind that I was going to go shopping after work on Thursday, but didn't because of my back, and didn't do any shopping yesterday as S2C and I were going out for a meal - I really am going to go to Tescos in a few minutes, honestly.

The great snowstorms sweeping across the British Isles have swept across the bottom half of the small island - blown by steady 35mph winds. It began to snow at 9am. It snowed almost constantly until 5pm - and not a single flake has stuck below about 1,000ft. I am really quite disappointed as I am a bit of a big kid when it snows - at least for the first couple of days.

I do, still, send warm wishes, mugs of virtual hot chocolate, woolly blankets and so on to those of you who are knee-deep in snow and feeling the need to cuddle up by the fire. I hope you are all enjoying the weather rather than finding it makes life too difficult.

And now for something completely different.

Across the Atlantic, The New York Daily News went out to find Mr Perfect after revealing the results of a survey by an online dating site into what women look for in a man. They reckon that they've found him - and guess what? He's a Manxman. Actually his father taught me French at school and I can vaguely remember him as a small child...

I've got a day off today. Hurrah! I popped into my hairdresser to see if there was any chance of a cut and blow-dry today or tomorrow - and was told she could fit me in in about 15 minutes, if I'd like to wait.

Excellent! So I sat and read a Good Food magazine. And I have learnt three things -

Firstly that, although stollen topped mince pies sound wonderful, four of them together would contain a whole day's worth of calories...

Secondly that there are some things in life that I am never likely to need - I am never going to have the lifestyle that would require me to use place-holders on my table so that guests know where to sit. Any guests would already know to sit within reach of the food...

Thirdly that there are some gifts that could be a step too far for some people; you can buy someone a rare-breed piglet and they will receive regular pictures of it and can go and visit it regularly - you know, like sponsoring a tiger-cub or whatever. But once their piglet reaches a certain weight it then comes to them - in a series of nicely packaged portions ready for the table or the freezer...

Can I just record how much I love Kimi Raikonnen. S2C - if you are reading this and don't want to know why, as it would be a spoiler for the result of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, read no further....
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Firstly when the people on the team radio try to give him car information, and just how he should proceed now that he is in the lead, he says "Go away and stop bothering me - I know what I am doing here!" Followed, when they were discussing making sure he kept all four tyres equal whilst behind the safety car, by "Yes, yes, yes, I know all about having four tyres...."

Then he has just been asked for his feelings as he stood on the podium for the first time since he came back to F1 after 2 years rallying... "Not much really. Last time I was here I was given shit for not smiling enough - probably still not smiling enough for you."

DC tried again only to get "OK I'm happy, but it's nothing to jump around about. I'm just happy for the team." DC gave up trying to get wild enthusiasm after that.