areet, petal?

i just went back and read all of my past blogs. there is a definite move from hopeful excitement at the beginning to the dull ache of boredom and despair more recently. i have actually been thinking about that over the last week, and how i was determined to show that it's not all mopey bottom lip dragging. i believe i'd planned to show you a picture of some daffodils growing in our garden.

but flowers, and spring, make me think of enid blyton actually. i grew up on a steady diet of the faraway tree, the wishing chair, brer rabbit, amelia jane, mr twiddle, and was always delighted at the pictures and descriptions of english flowers. when the first snowdrops appeared i was overcome with a childish sense of wonder. i'm dead keen to see bluebells, although jeff tells me there hard to come by.

so, snowdrops, and bluebells, and daffodils, and crocuses all mean that it's spring! the weather has been warm enough over the last week to prompt me to leave the house without a coat! i felt very brave and carefree! it also means that you start to see locals in tank tops and shorts, despite the fact that it's still only 12 degrees. there has been, of late, quite a lively debate on the radio about the best time to start wearing shorts. no real consensus has been reached though, which i find a little on the disappointing side, as i like to imagine that there would be a national leg baring day, a harbinger of spring, and warmer times to come!

and most excitedly of all, i have only five days left at my job! it is with a sense of relief and anticipation that i will leave that place, and head out into the unknown, my resume held before me, worn humbly, and proudly, and proclaiming "here is a woman who is in control and knows exactly what she is doing". i think...

burst

why are we surprised by bigotry? perhaps more appropriately why am i surprised by it? and why has it come as such a shock to me to find it in the uk? did i really think that i wouldn't? i mean i knew about the BMP, and jeff had shown me various articles in the daily mail. that should have prepared me right? nope...

last week, much to my personal horror and disgust, a vulnerable young woman was left out in the cold purely because she was different to those around her. and what surprised me most about it was that people seemed genuinely afraid to help her. and these were professional people, whose jobs are designed to help vulnerable people.

but i think that's what bother's me most about it, is the fear. look at japan. i actually can't watch any of the news reports about japan, because the amount of tension and fear they generate is intolerable. i'm enraged by the constant "let's talk to this professional about what might happen", and that, more worryingly, people in positions of responsibility seem to take these reactionary stories as "truth" and so make decisions, or offer advice to their ex-pats that is ill founded.

there are very few voices of calm out there, they get drowned out by the cacophonous din of "reporting" (i quite deliberately didn't use the word journalism here).

which, to end on a bitter note, is what happened to the young lady i mentioned before. the misconception about her situation was spread to others and so she was further disadvantaged. and finally, my happy idyllic bubble about life in england, was burst.

this is a field mouse. well, at least it's the picture i got when i typed field mouse into google. as we practically live on a field, they often come for a visit. we have, so far, been somewhat inhospitable hosts, having trapped four of them, terminally, if you know what i mean!

they seem to have forgotten this though, in their collective mouse memory, because jeff and i spent last night being periodically woken by a rustle, rustle coming from various points in the room. i bravely sent jeff forth to investigate, and on the last instance he discovered our house guest perching on the top of our clothes rack. these mice are pretty small, but this was a diminutive one. my husband then, in his reasonable way, found a shoe box, approached the clothes rack and kindly asked the mouse to get in it. no word of a lie. i believe the exact wording was "just get in the box and i'll take you outside." kept me awake for ages, giggling, that one did!

but it's funny the things you can't shake from your childhood, such as don't investigate the rustling coming from jeff's wardrobe because it will probably turn out to be hiding a taipan, or a redback, or some other such poisonous creature.

this conditioning is of course why i tell jeff to investigate the noises coming from his wardrobe, even if that involves waiting for him to actually get home, going downstairs to get him, or gently (by which i mean roughly) waking him from a deep restful slumber.

and also why i will never, ever, no matter how innocent they look, like spiders.