I am now rather puzzled about TTIP. As I wrote here a few days ago, I thought that the reason why so many sensible, thinking people voted to leave the EU was because it was heading for TTIP, a barbaric trade agreement which would give private companies precedence over state organisations like the NHS. On those grounds I’d agree we needed to leave. Yet according to this turd of an article in the Torygraph (don’t worry, I haven’t started reading that rag – I just found a link on facebook) the EU is anti-TTIP, anti free-trade. It sings the virtues of TTIP and relishes the fact that the door is now open to it. That would imply that my original position was correct: the EU was protecting us from this abhorrent deal, which was one of the reasons we needed to stay in. Now we’ve left, the capitalist greed-mongers will be free to take over our public services and turn society into the unequal, unfair dystopia people who read the torygraph dream of.

I’m considering changing my blogging style, just for a while. I realise that none of my entries have been very long, only occasionally going over a thousand words (this one, for instance), but I try to write a hundred words or more. For variety’s sake, I now want to experiment with shorter, more frequent entries of only a sentence or two, perhaps with a theme or themes linking them. I think it could liven things up on here a bit. That, after all, seems to be the way things are going on the web. Of course, no doubt a longer entry will sometimes be necessary, but I just want to see how this more abrupt style pans out.

Spot on again, I think I’ll direct you to this blog entry from my friend Chris. It concerns the Rio Paralympics, and the infamous recent airbrushing of photos of actors to make them look disabled. Chris notes that things don’t seem to be going very well, and I must agree. Frankly as a disabled person, I find it pretty insulting that the Brazilians have done this. There must be loads of models with disabilities in Brazil they could have used. It is akin to sticking a bunch of able-bodied musicians in wheelchairs and calling it a paraorchestra. I’d hoped that, after London, things like this would be a thing of the past – obviously not.

I’m under no illusion how big my blog is. I know that, apart from a few random websurfers, my readership is probably just my family, and a few friends who I’ve cajoled into reading it. That’s fine by me: I don’t think I’m an internet megastar read by millions every day. And that’s fine by me.

Yesterday, though, I got into quite a heated online debate about a guy who intended to charge people for reading his site. It is a disability-based ‘news service’ focussed on people on benefits. It has a lot of articles about the cuts. The guy was talking about asking people to donate money to him to help him keep it up. While I know that, these days, we’re all struggling for cash, that really got my goat. It seemed to imply that he thought he was some kind of big shot, the main or only news source in the disability community, and we should all be paying him to keep his site up. Of course, I know the guy could be really struggling to make ends meet, yet he seems to appointed himself ‘our’ news service and, in a way, spokesperson. He seems to have the same access to the primary news sources as anyone else.

I keep this blog for fun; to let the world know what I think about things. It is free to read. Yet if I started trying to charge people to read it, the dynamic would change. It would imply that I thought I was writing things worth paying for, and that I had access to special information nobody else has access to. I don’t, and neither does this guy. It just gets my goat how some bloggers seem to think they outrank the rest of us, when the web should be about plurality, equality and the free exchange of information.

I’m not sure whether to feel excited or skeptical about this. ‘Comedy god’ and one of my all time favourite actors John Cleese is reportedly in talks with the bbc about a return to small screen comedy. If it works, that could be great; just remember how awesome Monty Python Live was. But this is another kettle of fish: a sitcom has an entirely different dynamic to a stage show or film, and the question is, does Cleese still have it in him to hold up something like that? Does he still have the old magic in him which made characters like Basil Fawlty so timeless? Or might this just end up falling flat, and looking like a retired master trying to rekindle past glories, or, worse still, some studio exec’s attempt to use a well-loved name to get attention for his pet project? Either way, this is one to keep an eye on.

I think I ought to clear something up today: It was wrong of me to brand every outist a xenophobe, and to get so furious at everyone who voted to leave the EU. Fiftytwo percent of the country – or at least those who voted – cannot be racist; I know that. They had other reasons for voting as they did – legitimate, left-wing reasons, such as trying to avoid TTIP. I did a bit of research about that yesterday, and now understand why so many people found the EU so repugnant: it was hurtling towards a trade deal which would have foisted the most sickening form of capitalism upon us. Under those terms, of course we had to leave.

Yet the thing is, there are one or two niggles I have with that. I had previously thought that the reason business people were so keen to leave the EU was that it’s rules and regulations were getting in their way. Yet under TTIP, the free market would reign; why weren’t the tories embracing it then? If the EU was heading in tht direction, surely people who are so keen on neoliberalism and business outranking the state would welcome it with open arms. Another issue I have is, while we may have evaded it for now, there is still a possibility TTIP could be foisted upon us. Left-leaning outits might say that it is much harder now, but, as pointed out here, conversely, outside of the unified block of the EU, we might not now have the power to prevent it. The paradox is, we needed to stay part of the EU in order to block the trade deal it was forcing upon us.

That remains to be seen, though. My point is, I understand a little better now why so many well meaning people voted to leave the EU. I hadn’t realised it was so bent on such a sick form of capitalism. Yet I still feel that, these days, humanity should be uniting, not cutting ourselves off inside our nation-states, and pulling up drawbridges to international organisations. The EU had huge faults, but I fear that, in withdrawing from it, we might have played straight into the hands of the type of people eager to see TTIP instated.

I have now been completely off the booze for about two months, and I feel a hell of a lot better for it. I feel fitter and more alert. I’m (slightly) less argumentative too. Yesterday I made quite an interesting realisation about what attracted me to pubs and drinking: sat outside a cafe in charlton park, I found myself staring at my cappuccino as I once stared at pints of beer. I felt the same reflexive, relaxed daze which made pubs so attractive. Part of the reason I went to pubs was that they gave me time to think – some quiet, me time when I could just chill out over a drink. I also loved to observe people. Yet, yesterday, there I was doing exactly the same thing, but instead of beer, in front of me was nothing as innocuous as a cup of coffee. That was why I had been going there for the last few days – the cafe was filling the same niche as the pub did. It’s a nice little place, with books you can read and friendly staff, overlooking the cricket pitch. But instead of going home too drunk to do anything for the rest of the day, I would go home alert and invigorated, the rest of the day still usable, with no possibility of falling, damaging stuff, or having a hangover in the morning. Thus, I resolved yesterday, cafes are definitely cooler than pubs.

I have to ask any french people who might be reading this, what’s so wrong about burkinis? Secularist though I am, I think people have a right to wear what they chose. The moment a government starts dictating how people dress, for whatever reason, a line is crossed; you have taken a step towards fascism. One may not like religion and the problems it causes – I certainly don’t – but to dictate something like this, to ban an item of clothing on religious grounds and then to fine anyone for wearing it, surely exacerbates the problem. It will just make these islamist nut-jobs feel even more persecuted. People have a right to wear what they choose: I mean, what if I suddenly took a shining to burkinis and decided to get one? It would have nothing to do with religion, if we had were the same ban here as they do in france, I could presumably be fined. While I know those who made this ban would argue that they are standing up for women’s rights in the face of oppressive religious doctrine, women should still have the option to wear burkinis; the choice should be theirs. Making rules about what people can and cannot wear is surely no way to solve our current problems.

Very, very scary though it is, I think I need to flag this Guardian article dealing with the rise of the so-called ‘alt-right’ in america up. In this day and age, I had thought racism and the whole concept of racial difference had died out, utterly discredited, but these people are trying to revive it. They claim not only does race exist, but there is a correlation between race and intelligence. Anyone who has even glanced at the data, as I did back in A-Level psychology, knows that such a position is absurd, yet not only does this group claim such a link exists, but it has been repressed by mainstream science.

I don’t think we can ignore such people. Their rise is symptomatic of a growing deep distrust of mainstream politics, both here and in america. White working class people are starting to resent the privileges they perceive minorities getting.”The founding myth of the alt-right is that the disadvantaged groups in American politics are actually running things through a combination of fraud and intimidation. By doing this, they’re actually oppressing white men.” We have seen that here in the growing popularity of people like farage. I worry that such people seek to turn back time to a point when society was less equal and discrimination was the norm; they seem to resent the progress made to equality and pluralism. As this group gets more and more traction, with fools like Trump validating their insane views, I think that is surely something we should all be very, very concerned about.

I can’t believe that some of the tory morons currently ruling over us still cling to romanticised visions of empire, but it seems that they do. According to this Guardian piece, congratulated the british empire on twitter, using a map and the words ”empire goes for gold.” The article explains: ” The map, which appears to be the same as one used to illustrate the Wikipedia entry for the British empire and highlights not just the American colonies but also Ireland, Iraq and India, was graphically superimposed with Olympic medal tallies showing how the ’empire’ had thrashed not just the ”rest of the world” but also the post-Brexit European Union.” She was obviously trying to tether the positive feelings for our success in Rio to her quazi-xenophobic anti-eu agenda, as if the empire was some sort of friendly, compassionate society and not an oppressive imperial power which subjugated a quarter of the world. Surely we should have better people than this anachronism running the country.

I just caught up with (most of) Rio’s olympic closing ceremony. To be honest, I wasn’t really taken by it, and was wondering what, if anything, I was going to write on here about it. But then came Tokyo’s segment, and I broke into a grin.

While I’m not sure what Super Mario has to do with either Tokyo or Rio – I thought the character was Italian – using him as a device to introduce the Japanese Prime Minister could only have been a nod to Happy and Glorious. Both use a fictional figure to introduce a head of state. I think the Japanese must have taken their cue from London: in both we experience the same feeling of shock at seeing an actual politician appear on stage. Yet if anything I think what the japanese did was even more bizarre than having the queen parachute out of a helicopter with James Bond. At least 007 is supposed to be ‘on her majesty’s secret service’; what connects Mario to Japan? Why use that particular mode of transport. Thus it struck me as strange, yet still rather cool. I finally have my wish for more meetings of fictional characters and real people. It also makes me wonder what they’ll do for their olympic ceremonies in 2020.

I must admit I was somewhat pessimistic when it came to Team GB’s medal chances this time around. In the heat of brazil, I reasoned, we’d be lucky to get just a few. But then, what do I know? I was quite astonished to read just now that last night we surpassed our medal hall for 2012. (By we, of course, I mean the team representing great Britain in Rio. I had nothing to do with it, and nor would anyone reading this probably, but you know what I mean). How we managed this impressive feat I can only guess: no doubt it had something to do with the copious amounts of money currently being sunk into british sport – money which, at a time of austerity, could have been used to buy, say, essential communication or mobility equipment for disabled people, but hey ho. Whether this great success will be repeated at the Paralympics remains to be seen, but going by the news this morning, all bodes well. Hey, with the tories in government and Labour fast tearing itself apart, we all need something to cheer us up.

It would seem that my entry yesterday was oddly portentous. Last night, it was revealed that the Paralympics in Rio are in grave danger: funds for it are being slashed and the money is being used to fix problems at the olympics. Ticket sales are pitiful. To hear that made me very sad indeed: after Beijing and London, where the Paralympics were every bit the equal of the olympics, it would seem that the Brazilians are treating the second event as an afterthought – something they think nobody is interested in, far less important than the main feature. To see that being made so apparent on the news last night made me very angry indeed. After the triumph of london, after that wonderful celebration of disability sport where ‘we’ at last took centre stage, to see the Paralympics treated this way really pisses me off. Fair enough, I understand that the political and economic situation in Brazil is rather dire right now, but nonetheless the paralympics deserves as much respect as the olympics, and by using it as a source of cash for what they clearly as the only event that counts, the Brazilians are not giving it that respect.

For anyone who is, like me, interested in space-related research, however casually, this is surely a good bit of news. NASA has announced plans to make all its research available for free on the web. While that won’t include patents and material governed by personal privacy, proprietary, or security laws, surely this freeing up of knowledge is a good step. I wonder what gems of information you’ll be able to find. The database, Pubspace, can be found here.

I still remember the events of four years ago with a great deal of joy. To have been here, in London, in 2012 was a once in a lifetime experience. Living in london as it put on arguably the greatest olympics and paralympics ever was awesome. Not only that, but to have seen Lyn and the paraorchestra play at the ceremony which capped it all off, having appeared with her in a documentary preceding it, was mind-numbingly cool. Much has been said about the effect the london Parallmpic had on the perception of disability sport, and disabled people in general: For the briefest of moments, ‘we’ were presented on an equal footing to non-disabled people; for the briefest of moments, disability became cool.

I cannot help but wonder whether the same effect will be achieved in Rio. Sadly I doubt it. As Chris notes in a video blog here, lots of questions remain. I get the impression that the paralympics will be relegated back to an afterthought – a secondary event after the main show. I hope I’m wrong: I hope Rio takes London’s lead and goes to as much effort with the paralympics as they did with the olympics.

All that, however, remains to be seen. I’m looking forward to seeing how it goes. I especially can’t wait to see if Rio has created it’s own paraorchestra. It would be wonderful if it has, as the legacy of what Lyn and I were involved in four years ago would be shown to have lived on. For now, though, all we can do is wait and see, and hope that the effect we achieved here in London will also be achieved in Rio.

Lyn and I went over to Bromley yesterday. I don’t recall ever going there before: it’s quite a way, but worth it for the shopping. Getting there took three busses. Because only one wheelchair can go on a bus at a time, I set off before Lyn, my travel instructions firmly noted on my Ipad. It wasn’t that hard: the 422 to Royal Standard, the 202 from there to Lee, and the 261 from there to bromley – nothing any Londoner would worry about.

The incident that got me down a bit happened as I came to get on the second bus. Things had gone reasonably well until then. I was at the bus stop, and saw the 202 approaching, so I put my hand out. It stopped and the doors opened. It was then I noticed that thee prams were in the wheelchair space. The driver put his arms up in a reconciliatory gesture, saying there was nothing he could do. He was about to drive on, but I stuck to my guns. That space was hard fought and won by my disabled forebears; it is a wheelchair space, not a pram space. Besides, I needed to get to where I was going – the next bus along would probably have Lyn on it.

I protested to the driver, who looked behind hm. The three mums were not happy,, but to my horror, they thought they had to get off the bus so that I could get on. I didn’t mean for that to happen – my need to get somewhere doesn’t outstrip anyone else’s. I only wanted them to budge up, or perhaps fold their prams.

I got on anyway, and tried not to feel guilty. After all, was I not well within my rights? I thought I was sticking up for something I was entitled to, wasn’t I? I told myself I needed to get to where I was going, and that a bit of ruthlessness was sometimes necessary, or else I’d never get anywhere. Why, then, did I feel so ashamed, as if I’d been selfish?

I can be a silly sod sometimes. This morning I resolved something I’d been fretting about for over two years with a five minute Google search. The night before I submitted my masters thesis, I sent it to my parents for one final check. They sent it back to me, the Is dotted and the Ts crossed, as a .doc and a .pdf file, the latter of which I forwarded to my examiners. I saved the .doc to my Mac as a .odt file. The odd thing was, they didn’t match: the .pdf was a page longer, and the lines didn’t match.

That made me fret. Why were they not exactly alike? Fool that I am, I decided to do a wordcount by copying and pasting the pdf into word for mac, only to find there was a 99 word difference. That made me worry even more. It wasn’t until weeks later that it occurred to me that it was counting the page numbers from the copied file, so there was no difference.

My fretting, however, went on. I asked my parents about it, who told me to stop worrying and get on with something more constructive. I tried to, but although I put the issue to the back of my mind, I couldn’t shake the thought that the document had been altered somehow. My masters thesis is the piece of work I’m most proud of, but such a discrepancy may have implied that the work was not entirely my own.

I knew that such a thought was, of course, absurd. Why would my parents have changed it? And what could they have done to alter it, yet still keep the wordcount the same. No matter how hard I looked, I couldn’t find a mismatch in the wording. Even so, I couldn’t stop worrying. It wasn’t an issue as much as a nagging curiosity. While I couldn’t be bothered to compare the two files line by line, whole paragraphs in one appeared to be on totally different pages in the other. Yet how and why would anyone have made such changes, given they had so little time and still retained an almost identical wordcount? Why indeed go to so much effort on my masters thesis.

As ridiculous as these questions were, they refused to leave my mind. And then lying in bed last night it came to me. It was simple: the conversion from .doc to odt must have caused the slight change in formatting. That would also explain why my mum and dad didn’t know what I was talking about, as they would have saved the file to PDF before my computer changed it. All I had to do to resolve the whole dilemma was Google whether such changes can occur, and sure enough I found they can. So much fretting, all because of a simple change of file type. I can be a silly sod sometimes.

Lyn and I were just in Maryon Wilson park. A small wooded area, I think I’ve mentioned it on here before. I find it enchanting: you instantly forget you are in the middle of a sprawling metropolis, and find yourself surrounded by trees and birdsong. Save for the tarmac paths, there’s nothing to tell you that you are not suddenly a thousand miles away; even the sound of traffic grows faint. I find myself wondering, why was that place left like that – so untouched by the city? What is it’s history? The signs at the entrance tell that people were once hanged there, yet it feels so tranquil, as the small brook babbles along. A truly wonderful place to walk with the person you love after a bit of a busy day, it is an oasis of wilderness amid the urban sprawl, as the sun starts to set over the metropolis.

While part of me thinks I should just let it slide (after all, who am I to criticise anyone else’s writing style?) I think I’ll flag this ‘article’ up as an example of just how appalling journalism, and especially american journalism, has become. I still get a Google alert for news of the 2024 olympics, so I found it in my inbox this morning. It is nothing but a rant about the olympics, riddled with xenophobia and stereotype. I suspect it’s writer, Dave Barry, thinks he was being funny, but he comes across as extremely arrogant. For example, he writes ”Dong Dong won the silver medal, and although he was clearly disappointed, he showed his class afterward by making a remarkably thoughtful, generous and self-effacing statement, although nobody knows what it was because it was in Chinese.” I would expect such schoolboy stuff from a personal blog, but to see it printed in the Miami Herald, which I presume to be a proper paper, staggers me. It’s as if the writer hasn’t realised he’s writing for a paper rather than ranting his xenophobic bull on facebook. What worries me is that this is very revealing of a growing arrogance in american culture: such belittling of other states is becoming increasingly acceptable; they take the stance that only they matter, hence the jibe about nobody understanding Chinese. One hears it on their talk radio. Of course there is a time and a place for all opinions, but to call this journalism, and for barry to call himself a journalist rather than the arrogant little wanker he comes across as, makes a mockery of the profession. Could this, however, be the way writing, journalism, and indeed culture, are going?

Yesterday’s trip to Brighton was rather more sober than our previous one, but no less fun. A week or so ago, Lyn mooted the idea of popping down there for the day. At first I was hesitant – channeling my father, I thought such trips need to be thoroughly planned, but Lyn just wanted to go and see what happened – but I soon warmed to the idea. A good day out was precisely what we both needed.

And it was indeed a good day out. Although there was a bit of a problem with the lift being broken at London Bridge, meaning we had to get there via another station, we got there in the early afternoon. This left us plenty of time to explore. We headed down to the seafront, which looked lovely: you could see out to sea for miles. We didn’t go on the beach but walked beside it. Lyn had brought the GoPro and attached it to her Ipad stand, wanting to take as many pictures as possible. We headed up the pier and back again. I couldn’t help but notice that they still haven’t done anything with the burned-out west pier; to see it’s timbers slowly rotting into the sea was rather sad.

We spent a good few hours walking, looking and taking pictures. The place was full of people, and there was lots of music. It was getting late – sixish – so we decided to get dinner on the pier. And what could be more traditional than fish and chips? Unfortunately, this turned out to be a disappointment: the fish was overdone, the chips mouldy. Both Lyn and I left half of ours. The saving grace of that dinner was the view: from the pier as the sun set, the city and seafront looked stunning.

It was then time to head home. By then, my wheelchair battery was getting low (I really need to get that sorted) so I got a taxi back up the hill to the station while Lyn and paul walked. A short while later, we were back on the train, relishing memories of what had turned out to be a great afternoon. Both Lyn and Paul had taken some great photos.

Back in london, I got another taxi home while Lyn and Paul got the tube and bus. My battery issues aside, it had been a great day. We might not have slept on the beach this time, but it was great fun. Lyn had taken the photos we went for. It just leaves me wondering, where could we go next.

My absences are back again Daily. Twice yesterday. Sudden spurts of disorientation and fear.

Yet they soon pass

As quickly as they come.

And then I’m back

Back with the woman I love.

Back from the brief daze,

Looking forward to the day(s) ahead;

Back to a life of optimism, hope and fun. Of refusing to let the sudden spurts of fear

Dominate my thinking.

I can’t have seen Chris Whitaker in twenty or twenty-five years, but this morning for some reason I thought about him. We were in nursery school together. He has

CP, but early on he got included in mainstream. The last I heard he had passed his Phd. This morning I suddenly got the urge to google him: I was curious about his PhD thesis, and how it squared up to my masters. (I know, I can be stupidly competitive sometimes). To my joy I discovered that he now keeps a blog, too. Personally Speaking Out is a really interesting page. Chris seems to cover a lot of the same ground I try to, inasmuch as he attempts, in his entries, to define his role as a disabled blogger, and the extent to which he should emphasise his disability. I face the same issues, torn between the urge to play down my disability and just write about things as anyone else would, and the urge to acknowledge the point of view having a disability and belonging to the disability community awards me. It’s a subject I’ve returned to quite a bit, perhaps most notably in my Us and them entry, so it’s fascinating to see Chris deal with similar issues. Given his cp is milder than mine, his perspective is slightly different, yet we come to many of the same conclusions. For me, if the internet is to truly reflect human diversity, bloggers with disabilities surely have a duty to write about the world from their perspective. At the same time, to do so risks overegging the pudding, sounding like a one-track record; someone obsessed with the things which set him apart from others rather than a regular person, as complex and multi-faceted as anyone else, who just happens to have a disability.

Chris only started blogging in june, so I welcome him to the blogverse. He still seems to be finding his feet, so I wish him luck. Having regularly updated a blog for well over ten years, I can assure him it’s a habit he’ll soon find hard to kick.

I have to say I’m horrified by what is recounted here. A few weeks ago, I came across news of how american punk band The Descendents were being criticised for using the word ‘spaz’ in their latest album title. To many, including myself, that is a term of offense. The band seemed to think they were being clever for using it. That article details the appalling abuse the makers of the petition have received from the band’s fans. It’s staggering how childish they are being, hurling insults at anyone who objects to the name. Free speech is one thing, but to deliberately and knowingly use a hurtful word quite another. To then go on to attack those you’ve offended, insulting them further and refusing to admit you’re in the wrong, isn’t ‘punk’, it’s just childish.

I still don’t see that much of either of my brothers; we all now have our separate lives. Today is mark’s birthday, and I’m thinking of him, Kat and Oliver. It feels like I haven’t seen them in ages – Oliver is two now, and probably growing up fast – but that’s what you get for having a physics geek for a brother, off smashing particles together in france. Oh well, I’ll just wish him happy birthday, ask him to give O a hug from his uncle matt, and leave him to his particle-smashing. Found anything yet, bro?

Every week or so, Lyn records a ‘mix’ and uploads it to Mixcloud. It’s like a radio show, upon which she choses the playlist. She usually selects songs around a theme or mood. Until now, though, she hasn’t spoken during her mixes, just played music. Monday’s mix was different. On it she speaks, using a voice synthesiser to introduce tracks, and to incorporate a bit of banter into the show. I think I need to flag it up, because the result is excellent, and well worth listening to. Franky it was a hell of a lot of work for her, but she says she enjoys it, so I expect she’ll do more like this. I daresay it could lead to other things, too. Fancy a game of Mornington Crescent, dear?

There was a program on the bbc last night about brexit and ‘the battle for Britain’. It was a mistake for me to watch it. Since June I had just about calmed down over the referendum, and was trying not to think about it, but last night the rage came flooding back. This decision must not be allowed to stand. Either fifty-two percent of us were deceived, or fifty-two percent of us are morons. Either way, we were mislead into voting for something not in our best interest, which would make this country an irrelevance on the world stage and leave us open to the most perverse form of capitalism. It’s clear to me that many people didn’t understand what they were voting for, duped by the laughable con that brexit would bring back some kind of heyday for the uk. For example, a few days before the vote, I was talking to a pro-brexit internet radio presenter: I told him how worried I was that, outside the eu, the rights and protections disabled people get under it would be eroded. On his show he voiced my comment, adding that such protections would be replaced with our own, British ones. No you moron! People were campaigning to vote out precisely to get rid of such human rights laws, which they saw as a hinderance to business. That was the whole point. Vulnerable people are now even more vulnerable because of such stupidity; I am still very angry about it, and will be for quite some time. The country is alone, isolated, and at the back of the queue; the capitalists will now come in and screw us all; society is already becoming more individualist and xenophobic; and all because so many people allowed their selves to be misled. Brexit must not be allowed to stand!

Through my window it feels like the city beckons. My trip yesterday only added to the effect: it’s like a vast labyrinth is laid out before me, lying there, waiting for me to explore. There is just so much of it: every time I go out, I pass new buildings and streets, and I wonder ”what’s in there?” or ”what’s down there?” Even after six years living here, I know so little of it. Going up into the north-west of the city yesterday, it really struck home just how vast and complex the metropolis is, and how little I still know of it. Sat on the tube, looking at the map of the underground system, it felt as if something was beckoning me: each station, each point on the diagram, would be something new; new places and people, and the potential for something awesome. That is what I love about this city: London is a vast microcosm – the world in one spot. And, like the world, there will always be more of it to explore. That’s what I love about this incredible place.

It has been quite a day, and I’m fairly knackered. This morning, in our weekly Skype conversation, my parents told me that my uncle and aunt go home on Thursday. They have been in London for a few weeks, staying with my Yeaya (grandma) up near Kilburn. It seemed to me that it would be a shame for me to let them go without seeing them, so after checking how to get there on the TFL website, off I set.

This proved to be rather complicated. I took as much public transport as possible in order to save my chair batteries. It took about two hours, but a bus, the Jubilee line and two more busses later I got there. The thing was, I hadn’t warned anyone I was coming as I didn’t know how I’d get on or whether I’d have to turn back, so I wasn’t sure they would be in. I was in luck though, and to her surprise at about two this afternoon my aunt Toulla opened the door to my grinning face.

It was great to see them; they’re doing well. I hadn’t seen them since Christina and Tom’s wedding, so it was good to see them. As they live in Brazil, I asked for their take on the Rio opening ceremony, but they hadn’t seen it. I didn’t stay long – an hour or so – so unfortunately I didn’t get to see my cousin alex and his young family, who were out at the time. Nevertheless, as uncle David walked with me back to the bus stop, I felt pleased I had gone. I’ll certainly have to go up there more often: it wasn’t too difficult, and I think that part of north-west London is definitely worth exploring.

In the build up to their opening ceremony, someone in Rio said ”Athens was classical, Beijing was grandiose, London was smart – ours is going to be cool”. Having just watched it, I think that prediction was spot on. I began watching it last night, but the urge to go to bed got too much (hey, I’m a lightweight) so I caught up with it this morning (I fast forwarded through the athletes’ entrance). It struck me as magnificent. I’m not going to compare it to London or any other ceremony, as it was uniquely and totally Brazilian. The stadium was amazing, the dancing incredible. I thought the best bits were the floor of the stadium which doubled as a screen, and the sculpture behind the olympic cauldron, which made my jaw drop it was so beautiful. I was mildly disappointed there was nothing comparable to Happy And Glorious – no stand-out, stunning moment to capture my imagination and obsess over – but that’s fair enough. It was a great opening ceremony, at the start of what promises to be a great olympic and paralympic games.

At last, tonight we’ll find out the answer to the question I posed four years ago: how will Rio reply to Happy and Glorious? I know I said yesterday that I was looking forward to the Rio games being completely different to London’s, and that their ceremonies would be full of latin american flair, but I’m nonetheless itching to see if they continue that meme. I seems to me that to have the queen escorted to our opening ceremony by James Bond was so original, unexpected and jaw-droppingly brilliant that it demands a response. After all, who would ever expected us fusty old brits to pastiche one of our oldest institutions in such a way? Who would ever have expected to see the queen parachuting out of a helicopter with 007, Bond theme ablaze? I hope the Brazilians take up the gauntlet that film threw down, and echo it with something similarly novel.

I must say I’m really looking forward to tomorrow. The venues are ready, the athletes have arrived; it’s time for Rio De Janeiro to take centre stage. My enthusiasm for the olympics hasn’t waned since 2012: to have been here, in London, that year, was remarkable. The entire city was abuzz – it felt so alive, like we were the centre of the world’s attention. I feel truly privileged to have been here. Simply being here was a once in a lifetime experience, let alone watching Lyn play at the Paralympic closing ceremony.

Nobody can argue we didn’t do a wonderful, wonderful job. Yet London is an old, established city. It is a safe pair of hands. The first city to host the games three times, you could even call it old hat. What excites me about the Rio games is that they will be completely different. I can’t wait to see what latin flair they inject into the games. No doubt the city will be throbbing to samba beats, and, with any luck, the whole world will follow suit. I’m looking forward to seeing something new, uniquely Brazilian, and unlike anything that has been before. I think it’s what the Olympics, as a worldwide sociocultural event, needed – fusty old European cities are so 2012, it’s time to go somewhere exotic.

Whereas London was a safe choice, rio is a risk. I don’t mean that in a derogatory sense – although questions have been raised over whether the city is ready – but in the sense that it has an edginess to it: a new world edge that London lacks. It has a completely different history and culture to us. Seeing that culture, that contrast, reflected in the way the Brazilians put on their games, especially the ceremonies, is something I’m really looking forward to.

Mitchell worked his socks off yesterday. While I was out in Woolwich, he changed the furniture in my office around. Since moving in with Lyn six years ago, my computer, books and stuff have been set up in what had been her old studio. I left the desk where she had left it, and everything had basically stayed in the same place for six years. When I got home yesterday, though, everything had changed: my wardrobe is where the filing cabinet was, and my desk is where the wardrobe was. It was such a great surprise to get back to; the room feels so much more airy and light. I usually dislike change, so I opposed the idea at first, but this I could get used to. Today, to add the finishing touches, I plan to buy a book-shelf. Believe it or not, most of my books are still in boxes; I think this is the perfect time to at last sort them out too.

It has been another great tuesday afternoon. As I was last Tuesday, I was in woolwich for a film production group. I may have written tens, if not hundreds of thousands of words over the years about the finer points of film semiotics, but at last I am getting to grips with how to use a camera. It’s fairly basic, but by the end of the course I should have a couple of films to my name, and, perhaps more importantly, some good new contacts. It was, however, good to hear someone use the term ”mise-en-scene” for the first time in years. In fact, it began to feel so much like being back at uni that, at the end of the afternoon, when it was time to leave, for the briefest of moments I expected my old LSA Esther to help me with the door.

Although it is a bit deep for first thing on a Monday morning, let me just flag this short Tom Shakespeare talk for Radio Four up. In it, Professor Shakespeare discusses recent advances in prenatal screening, and their ethical ramifications. It might soon be possible to accurately screen for conditions like Downs Syndrome and Muscular Dystrophy, opening the possibility that far fewer babies will be born with such disabilities. In doing so, we enter a labyrinth of ethical dilemmas: while life with a disability can be harder than others, and the severity of any disability can vary hugely, most disabled people live full, productive lives. Most of us are happy as we are; we wouldn’t want to wish away our disabilities. I certainly don’t, as I believe it would take away a fundamental part of what makes me, me. While eradicating disability might at first glance seem like a good idea, in doing so we would strip society of part of it’s diversity: like skin colour and religion, disability adds to the variety of humanity. Thus, Shakespeare raises some interesting questions; questions which, as he says, we are increasingly having to deal with as medical science advances.