Tag: commuting

319: is it safe to come out yet?

This blog post finds me lurking in my lair, dear readers, while untold numbers of small children and twenty/thirty somethings rampage about the garden in the name of GT2’s birthday. There are Fruit Shoots in industrial quantities, brightly coloured icing, one of the twins already has a split lip and there has been a minor meltdown over a small and innocuous beetle on the trampoline. Thing 2 has discovered my hiding place and is querying what I am doing up here….send help, or at least quantities of rum. I have written before about my feelings on children’s birthday parties but apparently when you live in the venue it’s not OK to drop and run. Motherland was entirely too accurate at times, I can tell you. Thing 2 has made the most amazing cake, so I’ll show that off next week – Spiderman and Bluey and other things three year olds like.

It’s been a funny old week all round, to be honest, with things not going terribly wrong but also not going terribly right either. There’s been two days of tube strikes – but not nice polite tube strikes from midnight to midnight, oh no, but midday to midday ones which meant I could get to work or from work on any given day but not (crucially) both on the same day. I support people’s right to strike of course, and more than half of services were running in the end, but it wasn’t guaranteed that the ones you needed would be online.

So I have been at home since Monday and have been really missing my commute – I know, weird but as I noted in lockdown before being happily furloughed, that hour long slice of day between work and home allows my brain to process the difference between work me and home me. So, in desperation, I have been for a long walk every evening after work to clear my head. Thing 2 joined me on Tuesday as we hadn’t been out on Sunday (I went for a glorious lake swim with Rachel instead, and tomorrow I am going with Jill) but on other afternoons I have been out by myself.

I have used the time for the occasional non-work phone call while I’ve been walking, and on Friday it was so sunny and nice that I walked to Toot Hill and had half a cider (knowing I had to walk home and being rubbish at drinking these days) in the courtyard at The Green Man while making friends with some cute dogs and relaxing. It felt like a real treat.

The rest of the week has been conspiring to irritate. On Monday I managed to see a doctor – I had an actual list of things to speak to him about and the 30 minute wait to see him after my appointment time only honed my determination. The ongoing wait to see the rheumatologist consultant again (I now have an appointment over the border in Hertfordshire at the end of May, and I’ll work out how the heck I’ll get there nearer the time), the latest unwanted menopausal symptoms (I had to suggest a solution to him after doing some reading, as he’d have been OK with things carrying on but he’s not living with it. ‘Oh yes, that might be an option’ he said) and the possibility of getting my med review out of the way. It was a helpful visit but then I was that person who left the pharmacy with a large bag full of drugs. Let’s see if things improve, shall we?

Alongside that, my beloved GHD hair straighteners had decided to give up the ghost on Monday morning, with a pretty shower of sparks, an odd crackling noise and strange smell. And I was only halfway through my hair.

On Tuesday night I found the idiot cat calibrating in the middle of the airbed I am currently sleeping on and shortly after I tucked myself up I discovered I was slowly deflating and decamped to the sofa. Fixed the suspiciously claw-shaped puncture on Wednesday but failed to spot the second one, so after another night on the sofa after that sense of deflation, I finally got it sorted with the aid of some sticky fix-everything stuff. Cross fingers it seems OK now, but I now have an emergency airbed just in case.

At work we were supposed to be moving our kit from the offsite office to the Creative Studio but since we had no guarantee we could all get that’s now been postponed to this week when it’ll be done in a patchwork when people are in. I’m only in till Thursday lunchtime before heading to Wales for the long weekend again, but V in my team is queen of the resources so she’ll get it sorted. Let’s hope it all runs smoothly!

And now I had better head down and join the party for a bit….you can thank the newly three year old for the early blog this week!

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

Fire and Bones – Kathy Reichs

220: a commuter story

On Friday morning I discovered to my utter horror that I’d forgotten to charge my phone overnight and faced the prospect of a tube journey actually having to listen to other people at 6.45am. After only one cup of coffee this is an alarming prospect. There is always one person who feels the need to have a loud conversation on their mobile with someone they have presumably left mere moments earlier. There is also, inevitably, someone with an extremely irritating sniff or cough – sometimes both – who is not in possession of a tissue or, indeed, any manners. There are people who feel entitled to play their music on their phones without earphones, as if we would all benefit from their hideous musical choices. It’s never anything I would ever choose to listen to. I can only assume this is the planet-friendly 2024 version of driving around in a knackered Ford Fiesta with a dodgy exhaust and a massive speaker in the boot, as was de rigueur when I was a teenager. Tube etiquette frowns, for some reason, on throwing oneself across the aisle* and strangling people, and a deep loathing of horrible music is not considered a mitigating circumstance in the eyes of the law**. Being able to immerse myself in the sounds of my choice is really a public service.

As it turned out, Friday’s journey was worth the lack of earphones. There was a small person and his dad. Small person was full of questions and poor Dad was clearly regretting his life choices, probably because he hadn’t had enough coffee either. Peppa Pig Hide ‘n’ Seek on the ipad was not cutting it, and this was even before they got to the Natural History Museum on a rainy day in half term. Small boy was hopelessly excited at the prospect of REAL DINOSAURS and Dad was trying to check emails against a constant bombardment of ‘Is this our stop? Is this our stop? DAD, I found Pedro Pony! Is THIS our stop?? Suzy Sheep, Dad! How many more stops? Are we underground yet? When will we be underground?’ Poor Dad. After a while I took pity on Dad and helped count stations, and answered questions – What’s that on your finger? What are you making? Where are you going? My Things, these days, bring their own earphones on the tube and don’t ask me questions any more – in fact they prefer to pretend I am not with them until we get off the tube and they need the Oyster card.

My absolute favourite moment, however, was when he threw his arms round his dad, gave him a huge squeeze and shouted ‘DADDY! DADDY’ (plaintive ‘whaaaaattttt’ from Daddy)…. ‘I’VE NEVER HUGGED YOU ON A TRAIN BEFORE, DADDY!’ The gentle ping of stony little commuter hearts melting was practically audible.

*also, you’d lose your seat. It’s fierce on the Central in rush hour.

**Law, schmaw. The rest of the carriage would probably help me.

Other things making me happy this week

  • Finally visiting the Barbican Conservatory, for a celebration of their project with Headway East London, a brilliant charity for people with acquired brain injuries. It was like those pictures of concrete cities that have been taken over by the jungle. I liked it a lot
  • A really useful strategy meeting. Adding 70s & 80s rock stars, Prince and Harry Styles to my powerpoint entertained me, at least, and people got extra points for recognising Journey.
  • A partnership event with the Museum of the Order of St John and our lovely illustrator Grace Holliday exploring ‘Fabulous Ferns’.
  • Coffee with Amanda and her Thing 3 on Thursday morning
  • The new series of The Outlaws and a ludicrous new episode of Midsomer Murders

Today I am off to Copped Hall with all those crochet toadstools and cacti!

Kirsty x

What I’ve been reading:

The Sentry/Indigo Slam/L.A. Requiem – Robert Crais

Bridgerton 1-7 – Julia Quinn

The Lost Continent – Bill Bryson (Audible)