I think I really must be getting old. I reckon it is a sure sign that you are getting older when become less tolerant of your glasses being dirty. I’ve been wearing specs since I was nine or so, and, growing up, I always had dirty glasses. Unless they were absolutely filthy, I didn’t seem to mind. My grandma always wanted to clean them, and, often without warning, used to rip them off my face and take them to the sink. Needless to say, this used to irritate the life out of me. Yet, these days, I’m the opposite: I can’t stand dirty glasses. The thing is, I can’t clean them myself, and whenever I try they always seem to end up dirtier than when I started, so I usually hand them to my PA to do. Ironically, though, this has become such a regular occurrence that I’m sure soon they’ll be the ones getting irritated. In fact, I think I might go ask for them to be cleaned right now.

I still need to write that entry about the word cripple. It’s not as simple as it seems: the thing is, it’s what I call a reclaimed word – a word once used as a term of offence but is now used sort of as a badge of membership. My friends in the disability community use it, for the most part ironically, to refer to themselves. The thing is, as Ricardio points out in his comments, it’s like the word nigger; it’s used by black people to refer to themselves, but should anyone else use it, it is seen as extremely offensive. It might be more complicated than that, though, because I let some of my non-disabled friends use it to refer to me, and it’s sort of funny. Mind you, it all depends on when and where it’s used, and how it’s meant. In this way, I don’t think it can fully be explained: as with the N word, there are still instances when the word cripple can be highly offensive. Yet I still find it okay to use it to refer to myself. I suppose this is a case where Ferdinand de Sesseur’s observation that, in language, the relationship between sign and signified is arbitrary holds most sharply and takes on a new dimension.

More on this intriguing subject soon.

I fully intend to respond to Ricardio’s request for an explanation of my use of the word cripple, and I have been thinking about it all day. It’s an interesting debate he raises, and one which deserves a fairly long entry. However, I hope my good friend will understand when I say it’ll have to wait for another day, as today I have something even more controversial on my mind.

I find myself, tonight, questioning a person’s right to protest. Even typing those words feels faintly ridiculous: everyone has an inalienable right to express their point of view, whatever it is. But earlier I came across something which boiled my blood: something proclaiming itself a ”rally against debt” – a counter-protest to the recent anti-cuts march in London. It was on facebook so I told them exactly what I thought of them. Frankly I told them I felt that I thought they had no right to hold any such protest.

They do, of course, but I have a right to raise my objections to it. If this thing goes ahead, it strikes me as a childish act, deliberately inflammatory to those concerned about the cuts. It’s almost hateful in the way it presents itself. I guess I’m opening up myself up to accusations of holding my right to protest up while denying other people theirs, and the irony of my use of the word ‘fascist’ is not lost on me, but if you saw someone intending to protest against your way of life, your livelihood, would you knot object? We all realise what these cuts will do; I’m very concerned indeed about the impact they will have on me and Lyn, and all disabled people. So I think my objection to this puerile act is justifiable; I see it as a march against the wealth fare state, the NHS, and pretty much all I hold dear, just as Osbourne’s cuts are manifestly an attack on those things. Thus I have a right to try to stop this insipid rally from happening.

All in all it has been quite an amazing few days. As I said, on Thursday we had the surprise of our lives; to suddenly hear a camera crew and quite a famous and prolific reporter were coming was quite a shock. Then on Friday we had all the excitement and anticipation of seeing ourselves on the news, and then the subsequent mild disappointment of our piece not being shown. It turns out that the reporters were still working on it, and it’ll probably be shown at a later date. On Saturday, of course, there was all the sound and fury of the protests in central London. It isn’t every day that you get to march alongside about a quarter of a million people. Yesterday was somewhat tamer, in comparison, although we got to go to quite a cool music night in a small restaurant we know around the corner. It was intimate and friendly, and I now know where I can get a decent martini.

It is now, however, Monday morning, and we have the real world to contend with again. Life in London does, though, seem to throw up these odd stints of excitement – maybe there’s something in the water. I wonder what this lunatic of a city will throw up next.

I once wrote on here that I felt a riot is no place for a cripple. I stand by that. A protest is another matter, of course: anyone can and should be able to attend a peaceful protest and have their voice heard. I went to the protest in central London today, together with Lyn and Adrian, where I saw a great many people using wheelchairs. They were all, I assume, as worried as I am about what this government is doing. Like last time, there was a carnival atmosphere at the protest for most of today. We walked along, listening to the drums and whistles. I was eager to get up to hyde park, where I knew a rally was being held, and where I suspected some of my friends to be. I also suspected there would be less chance of trouble there.

But it wasn’t to be: we were following the crowd past fortnum and mason when trouble started. Some protesters – mostly masked – were on the roof. Suddenly a bunch of riot police rushed past. I decided it was time to press on, when a woman told us to get out of there, as the police were about to kettle.

We got out just in time. I felt the same sense of fear I felt last time, and told Adrian we needed to go somewhere safe. We decided this was home, and about ninety minutes later we were back here, pizza in the oven and beer open on the table. I guess I’m not the revolutionary I want myself to be, but at least it seems a great many others who are feel as strongly as I do about the cuts.

How the smeg am I going to even start explaining this one? I better start at the beginning. Yesterday morning I popped over to see chopper; I think we like each other, and I find him interesting on a number of levels. I often pop over to his place for a cup of coffee and a natter. At about half twelve or one, I decided to come home to see what Lyn was up to. Our PA, Adrian, opened the door.

”You’re gonna be on television” he said. I was dumbfounded. It turns out that my friend Becca, to whom I am now profoundly and forever indebted, had reposted the film Lyn made about the theft of her computer onto a site called Pistonheads, where it had been seen by someone who knew someone at Channel Four. They were interested in the story, and decided to come and investigate. Even when I write it that seems incredible, but that’s what happened. At about half five last night, after a flurry of emails on Lyn’s part and much worrying and squealing on mine, a camera man and a reporter came.

I think it went well. I had promised Becca I wouldn’t let them turn it into a cripsploitation story, and, although I cannot be sure, I don’t think it will be. The reporter, Carl Dennon, was obviously very used to disabled people; they included us in the choice of shots, which, as a film student, I loved. I suppose we can only be sure when we see it on channel four, tonight, between seven and eight.

I better go warn my parents.

If you can do so, I’d ask anyone reading this to go to Lyn’s facebook page. There she has posted a short film about recent events. Without wanting to be too blunt about it, in January we were burgled; the video is her appeal for information and help. It hasn’t appeared on Youtube yet, but I’ll post a link to it as and when it does.

Edit: the film can be found here

I know that yesterday I stated that I wanted to blog about subjects other than disability and politics, but last night this guardian article got my attention. It’s about the reforms to the wealth fare system the coalition government propose to push through, and, quite frankly, they are fucking stupid. The system we have at the moment isn’t perfect, but it works. Why, then, does disability living allowance need to become personal independence payment? How, exactly, do the Tories want to cut the claimant number by twenty percent? And where is the logic in saying ”you already have a wheelchair, therefore you don’t need the mobility component”? It is totally and utterly stupid – a cost-cutting scam from a narrow-minded government.

I was thinking earlier, and I reckon that I have good reason to be rather pleased with my blog – even proud. Granted, it may not be as incisive the main blogs, and hardly gets any traffic (in fact I doubt it’s read by anyone other than family and friends), but I’ve kept it up for eight years, and I think that’s something to be proud of. I was thinking the other day, if I blog every two days, at about 100 to 200 words an entry, that’s 500 words a week, 26000 a year; in fact I reckon I’ve written over a hundred thousand words on my website over the years, which is pretty good going for a lazy little cripple.

With that in mind, I think a change is in order. I’ve been trying to keep on the subject of disability, but while presenting the perspective of a disabled person in the current political climate is incredibly important, I don’t want to define myself just by my disability. I think I’ve earned the right to expand into other areas: There are other sides to me too, I’ll have you know, and it’s important people realise that we crips are well-rounded individuals. This occurred to me last night, when I saw that the cast of The Hobbit films had been announced; I was highly tempted to make a blog entry simply linking to the appropriate website with some short yet highly enthusiastic message. But this would have been a poor excuse for a blog entry, and would have had nothing to do with the purpose of my blog.

And yet the fact is I adore Tolkien, and I can’t wait to see these films. As with my interest in star trek and james bond, this obsession is part of who I am. As a student of film, I find myself wanting to wax lyrical about what I think if this film, how glad I am that Peter Jackson is helming it, or about how I almost wet my pants when I heard that Brian Blessed might be in it, playing one of the dwarfs*. But this would have had nothing whatsoever to do with disability, so I kind of censor myself, trying to keep on subject.

However, I think from now on a new blogging philosophy is in order. Trying to keep to a fixed set of subjects** – disability, politics or world affairs – has given rise to a load of lacklustre entries recently, and I think that has to stop. From now on I’ll be broadening out: I’ll try to give a disability slant if I can, but as long as I don’t go back to simply making one-line entries linking to youtube videos, as I did in the early days of my blogging career, I think it’s all good.

So, how about that English cricket team…?

*unfortunately, this turned out only to be a rumour it seems, but had Blessed been cast as, say, Balin, it would have been up there with other pieces of casting genius, such as Sean Bean as Boromir, Alan Rickman as Marvin the paranoid android, and so on.

**I know I often strayed from this, but it was what I tried to do.

We were just watching the news. Like most people, I suppose, I like to keep up to date with what is going on in the world. Yet increasingly these days I turn the bbc news channel on reluctantly. I cannot remember ever seeing two such big stories break at the same time: we are currently seeing a major world economy crippled by the most terrible natural disaster, and simultaneously allied forces are in action over Libya. I am worried about what horrifying images will appear on our screens next. I should say that, while I’m in two minds about the UNs involvement in Libya, I think, on the whole, going in was the right thing to do: gadaffi is a lunatic despot unafraid to kill his own people. we can see how fragile his grip on reality is from the speeches he makes. The UN needed to intervene,. At the same time, as I was saying to dad on Friday, since when was it our role to decide the course of history. Mind you, if we decided to keep out of this conflict, it might mean sitting idly by while Gadaffi’s thugs slaughter thousands, and I doubt any off us could stomach that.

I think I just ought to record that I had a wonderful birthday yesterday. I saw mum and dad for the first time since Christmas – it was, as ever good to see them. I opened my presents after breakfast, with everyone sitting round, watching. We talked a bit, and started to sort some things out that needed to be sorted. In the afternoon, Lyn needed to pop to the bank, and then we went to the pub for a bit and came home. Unfortunately, the party we intended to have never materialised as nobody came, but we had a great time anyway listening to the cat Empire and Beatles.

Well, today is bright and sunny, and I have things to do. May the birthday weekend continue!

I can’t help reflecting upon the fact that it has now been a week since the earthquake and tsunami hit Japan. I remember, last Friday morning, warming up my computer and turning on facebook. I often check out the news first, but that morning I felt like checking what everyone was up to. I noticed a few odd status messages, referring to something in Japan, but then one referred specifically to an earthquake. I ran through and put the TV news on, and what I saw totally horrified me. I suspect it will be one of those events where you will always remember where you were where you first heard about it – like the death of Princess Dianna, or the September 11 attacks, events of sufficient magnitude stick in your mind, imprinting firmly onto one’s memory. Of course, that was even before the tsunami struck, and days before the nuclear crisis. In Japan, horror is following horror, and my heart goes out to the Japanese people.

I noticed something rather irritating about my lightwriter yesterday. We were in Costa’s, talking about puns. Lyn and I both like to play with words, and she is especially good at coming up with naff, often cringeworthy ones. I decided to tell her my favourite play on words, which can be attributed to Humphrey Lyttelton, if memory serves: ”this is called orthinology, the art of word-botching” I said, using my lightwriter. This is a deliberate mispronunciation of ornithology, of course, which is bird watching. This pun is, in my opinion, a thing of absolute genius – the pinnacle of wit; but the problem was my lightwriter didn’t pronounce orthinology correctly. The damn thing said it as though there was a C in there somewhere. Needless to say I was extremely dischuffed, and spent about the next five minutes trying to get my lightwriter to say orthinology the right way, by which time all comic effect was lost. I suppose it just goes to show the chaps at Toby Churchill still have some bugs to work out, especially when it comes to things like puns.

Last night on channel 4 we saw the first open comparison between CaMoron’s ‘Big Society’ and privatisation. In a great programme, Dispatches openly likened the big society to opening the wealth fare state up to free-market economics. This is the first time I have seen the mainstream media declare what I, and I’m sure many others, have suspected: the big society is a con – a ruse. Far from empowering people, as last night’s programme made it clear, the big society simply hands services which should be controlled by the state over to big business. And what the Tories don’t seem to get is that does not work. Far from pushing up standards through competition, the free-market model pushes standard down: corners are cut, prices go up. Because we are marginal, the needs of minorities like people with disabilities are pushed to the back of the queue in the drive for profit. Things like schools and hospitals need to be controlled centrally by the state, or else we get falling standards and a two tier system. Because those people who already have wealth behind them are better placed to get involved with the big society, it will also maintain power in the hands of the few rather than empowering the many. In other words, it will help re-establish class divisions Is this the kind of place we want Britain to be? Or perhaps a better question would be, now the big society is being exposed for the lie it is, how long can the Tories stay in power? Anyway, go look dispatches up on 4oD

I was just watching ‘the big questions’ – one of these debate shows where a studio audience discuss the topics of the day. They were talking about whether the disaster in Japan was a reason not to believe in god. as anyone who has seen me watching such a thing knows, pretty soon I was hurling abuse at the telly: it gets to me that people can go on there, defend a bronze-age superstition and an invisible being for which they have no empirical evidence, and then accuse sceptics of being arrogant and aggressive. Even more frighteningly, I learned to day that there is a ‘centre for intelligent design’ in Britain – I thought that bullshit was confined to America, and had died out after Michael Behe took the stand in Dover.

This has, of course, nothing to do with the thrust of this blog, but it’s impossible for any blogger not to say how horrified they were at the images coming from Japan. I’ve never seen anything more terrible. Yet, it strikes me that, just two days after the event, we have a TV program with a studio audience discussing whether it was the work of some Sky Fairy or not. It’s crass, puerile, and makes me very angry…and somewhat scared.

I may have stumbled upon this at random, but this joke strikes me as so fitting with my current thoughts to be worth repeating: ”A banker, a Daily Mail reader and a benefit claimant are sat round a table and have 12 biscuits to share. The banker grabs 11 of them, then leans over to the Daily Mail reader and says ”Watch out for the benefit claimant – he’s after your biscuit.’ ”

Very apt, don’t you think?

Bit of a lazy post today: I think I ought to direct you here, to my friend Sally’s band. I know sally from university, where she did music and drama; she was also in the campus gospel choir, which I was sort of involved in. it’s good to see her doing something she loves, and I think they are well on the way to breaking into the music industry.

I realise my recent entries have sort of been all over the place; I really must get round to doing a proper entry. For one thing, I must do a properly researched article on how the cuts will affect disabled people. But spring is almost here and I have other things on my mind. For instance, this morning I watched quite a cool film called Chopper. My friend of the same name dropped it off for me to watch last night, and what I expected to be a puerile splatterfest turned out to be a very interesting portrait of quite an intriguing, if somewhat violent, man. This afternoon I’ll do some reading and then take the DVD back in a bit. In other words, I’m simply not in the mood for all this political doom and gloom.

I think I’ll just link to this today, not just because it mixes two of my prime interests – james bond and dressing up – but it carries with it a very important message. Sexism is a very real issue, and I have no doubt that all of what this advert claims is true. Frankly, though, I think something similar could be said about people with disabilities, although the discrimination people like me face is different. We are not beaten up by our partners, but we are often abused in other ways. Anyway, having the actor who plays one of the biggest misogynists in fiction help deliver a message about sexism is a stroke of ironic genius. Go watch.

Thiis naturally caught my eye yesterday afternoon, althoughh I can’t find a link to it now. It’s about a new type of voice for communication aids, one modelled on a real voice. It was created by a guy who has motor-neurone disease, and who wants to be able to keep speaking to his son using his own voice. He recorded something like 2000 sentences, which are then broken down into their constituent chunks so the sounds can be used to create new sentences. It’s quite touching really, but it strikes me that we VOCA users could do with something like that too. Although voice synthesisers are improving, I have long wished for a more natural sounding voice. Quite an obvious idea occurred to me. What if we got actors to record the voice – actors like Daniel Craig, Judi Dench or Patrick Stewart? How awesome would that be? Mind you, I’d be forever asking my PA for ”Tea, earl grey, hot.”

I was just trying to decide what I should write about today. The cricket is going well: we had a dramatic win over South Africa yesterday, and, although we lost to the Irish, we’re doing surprisingly well. To be honest I expected England just to give up after the emotional effort of winning the ashes. Mind you, how well we’ll do now Pietersen has come home remains to be seen.

I could also blog about Libya, where the situation continues to unsettle me. The bbc still refuse to call it a civil war, even though that is obviously what is happening. How much more like a civil war could it get before they call it one? I also don’t know what to make of the reports that members of the SAS were captured by rebel forces: the SAS are the most elite fighting force on earth – how could they have been captured by a militia? It just adds to my belief that we aren’t being told all the facts.

I could also blog about the Tory party conference. I didn’t watch much of it, having no interest in watching a bunch of arrogant toffs plot how they will fuck us all over, but I did catch the gist of CaMoron’s speech. It was the same old free-market nonsense we get from the Tories. What they fail to understand is it was freemarket economics that got us into this crisis, and it would have been even worse without the regulation put in place by labour. CaMoron may rail against the red tape, but what he doesn’t seem to grasp is that it is there for a reason: it ensures equality, transparency and a level playing field. Without it, the banks and business run amock, screwing each other and the rest of us over. If he were to remove this red tape, we will slip back into a recession which would make the current one look like a picnic. It’s clear that CaMoron and osbourne simply do not have the mental capacity to grasp the realities, and can only see the world through a right-wing distortion. Surely they cannot be allowed to remain in power.

But the biggest thing to get my attention is this: just as I was coming to the computer, I heard that the Barclays chief executive Bob Diamond has got a £6.5m bonus. This is at a time when the rest of us are struggling to survive thanks to a crisis created in the banking sector. How the hell can these bastards give themselves such bonuses, and, more importantly, how can CaMoron do nothing to prevent it and instead speak of deregulating the banks even further? If you ask me it is not only immoral but criminal; all of them – the bankers, osbourne, CaMoron – should not only loose their jobs but their liberty for it. Jail the dishonourable fuckers!

Something rather odd happened last night. I was in the antigalligan with chopper, having used his short-cut, enjoying my Friday night pint. Chopper, or Eddie to give him his proper name, is one of those people who knows just about everyone in the local area, so he was introducing me to some of his mates. I think they were a bit surprised to see him out with a ‘raspberry ripple’, but that’s another entry. At one point, anyway, one fairly young guy came over; he was about my age or maybe slightly younger. I thought he looked a bit like someone I once knew, but I thought nothing of it to begin with. But then he introduced himself: he said his name was Richard, and was a farmer.

Now, anyone who knows me knows I am not superstitious or anything. I am an atheist. But something in this fellows face and hair reminded me of Richard Simpson. When he told me his name and job, I did a double take – it was very strange indeed. I told myself that there are no such things and ghosts, and it was a coincidence, but the resemblance of this man to my old school friend struck me as very odd indeed. Could it be that this man was some sort of metaphysical echo of my oldest friend?

Such an idea is, of course, nonsense. We went through special school together, seeing each other every term-time day for over ten years. We had lessons and breaktimes together, and together we lost three classmates to their conditions. But Rich Simpson has himself been dead now for four or five years; he is gone in the most final, brutal sense. Yet I’m sure it wasn’t just the beer playing tricks on my sight – although the guy was ambulant, the resemblance was astonishing. In the end I put it down to chance, and didn’t mention it to the guy, other than to say ‘you remind me of someone I knew a very, very long time ago.”

I am not sure it is my rightful place to mention it, but the memorial and celebration of Gordon Smith will take place in Chester this Saturday. Gordon was the partner of Miss Denis queen, one of the leading lights of the modern disability rights movement. Denis and I have only met once, and I never met Gordon, but by all accounts they were and are pioneers in the fields of disability and gender. Denis, who also sometimes goes by the name Claire, is one of those people at the cutting edge of culture and politics. It makes me very sad to hear that she has lost someone so dear to her.

link

I just came back from one of my voyages of exploration – my first proper roll this year. I don’t know why but going out in my chair seems to relax me, as I’ve written on here before. I can spend hours, literally just driving, not knowing quite where I’m going, simply seeing what there is to see. When I was living with my parents, there was a route I called the Swettenham run, which took me up into the lanes to the north of Congleton, past the centuries old Swettenham arms, along the bridal paths which extend beyond the back of the pub, and back via the main Congleton to Holmes Chapel road. The whole route must have been seven or eight miles, and took me hours.

Ever since I moved down to London, I’ve been looking for a route which is similar in length and beauty, and today I think I found it. A few days ago, my friend Chopper showed me a shortcut up to the north Greenwich Peninsular. It’s a sunny day for once, and this afternoon I fancied a look at the Thames, so, taking my new shortcut, I headed for the Anchor and Hope Lane. As I had suspected, the river looked pretty in the sun, full of ships and smaller boats going about their business. I watched them for a while, resisting the urge to get a pint in the pub which lends the lane it’s name, before pressing on along the Thames path towards the dome. This is a very industrial area, where large trucks shift dirt and coal on and off the ships. It felt a very long way from the bridal paths, country lanes and streams I used to know. Yet, with the Thames Barrier glinting in the sun, it was just as beautiful.

I headed west for a while, till I got to north Greenwich. There I turned back, having seen the dome and it’s surroundings many timed before, and, passing the pub again, headed eastwards towards the barrier. This was uncharted territory, but I knew roughly where I was going. I must admit I got slightly lost – London can be fairly labyrinthine at times – but my knowledge of geography and my nose held me in good stead. I left the river at the barrier and headed south, through an industrial area and back into residential. Part of the thrill of following one’s nose is being faintly surprised when you discover where you are, and so I was faintly surprised when I eventually found myself on the road to Woolwich. From there it was a simple journey home, stopping by at chopper’s en route.

London continues o thrill and intrigue me. It is, of course, quite different to rural Cheshire, and part of me still misses the fields and the hedges. London is chaotic and beguiling; like any city, it is, as Benjamin put it, a maelstrom. I now think I understand what he meant more fully now, not just in terms of people but in terms of geography. Roads and paths run in all directions; there are buildings of every conceivable shape and size; it is a three-dimensional cacophony of brick and tarmac. And in it people of every kind and creed go about, talking thousands of languages, doing a thousand jobs. It is truly fascinating, a little frightening, yet utterly exhilarating. Never have I felt so alive than in such a place.

I have absolutely no clue why these guys are so angry, nor any idea what they are saying, but this will have me laughing until bedtime. It has nothing to do with my blog, and I may be being slightly xenophobic in a ‘laugh at the angry french men’ way, but it was so laugh out loud funny that I just had to link to it.