Today I have been to Manchester, mostly to get my hair done but also with a list of places I wanted to go and things I wanted to buy - a new sweater for Phil, odds and ends from the health food shop, some colouring books for the small people, going cheap in the post-Christmas period.
It’s been crisp and bright, quite cold but not raining or snowing, despite the weathermen’s prognostications. However, there is still time for it to snow today!
Manchester centre is festooned with red lanterns as Chinese New Year celebrations begin next weekend. I must complete the amigurumi rabbits I have been making for the small people. In fact, all they need is faces embroidered onto them and some red dungarees. That was another item on my list today: red yarn to make rabbit dungarees!
The gritters were out and about as I made my home, working at keeping drivers safe on the road.
Fun and games continue with our government: Westminster sets about preventing Scottish parliament decisions from becoming law. Decisions about when young people can decide what gender they want to be. The whole transgender business rumbles on and on.
And then we have policemen who turn out to be violent rapists. There has been a great outcry, as if somehow we all expected policemen to be pure as the driven snow. The vast majority of policemen probably are somewhere near to that but they are human beings after all and there are bound to be some bad ones. The worst of it is that cases like this latest one make women at risk reluctant to seek help.
On the subject of women, here’s a link to stuff going on in Missouri about what female legislators should wear to work. Apparently women’s bare arms could be detrimental to the course of justice in the USA. How long have we been talking about what women can and cannot do? Do they think female lawyers and the like plan to go to work dressed for partying?
More positively, here’s a link to an article about a new school in then outskirts of Madrid: a rather evolutionary design by all accounts, with a lot of open walls.
I love the fact that children were consulted about what the new school should be like. I especially admire the child who declared it should not be too big. This is one of my bugbears about schools in the UK - most of them are just too big and unwieldy. I also like the fact that so many Spanish schools seem to cater for early years to mid teens, which I am pretty sure encourages an atmosphere where older pupils car for the small one. Of course, I might be totally misinformed and big city schools might be just as much huge education factories as happens here.
And finally here is a little something that Phil passed on to me and which made me smile:
Starmer the Marrxist:
It can now be revealed that Sir Keir Starmer is a closet Marxist, a paid-up member of the Groucho Tendency.
"When I was running for leader I made pledges which reflected my values. Since then, we are now three years on..."
(Keir Starmer, in a very recent BBC interview with Laura Kuenssberg)
Clearly a tribute to the founder:
“These Are My Principles. If You Don’t Like Them, well, I Have Others.”
(Groucho Marx)
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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