Huge fan of Sir David that I am, I’m slightly embarrassed that this wonderful news from yesterday slipped under my radar. “Sir David Attenborough has been named a Champion of the Earth by the UN’s Environment Programme. The prestigious award recognises the 95-year-old’s commitment to telling stories about the natural world and climate change.” Attenborough must have contributed more to our collective understanding of the natural world than anyone else, so I think this award is certainly well deserved. The article goes on to say that his more recent documentaries have also highlighted the impact of global warming, so his work has been vital in the fight against climate change. If anyone deserves to be named a Champion of the Earth, surely it’s Sir David Attenborough.

I think we have reached the point where I better not watch anything to do with politics any more. Whenever a Tory politician appears on tv, I instantly feel an uncontrollable, burning rage so intense it scares me. Watching the lunchtime news earlier, I had to turn it off: the sight of Johnson and his cronies taking us all for fools was simply too much. Everyone knows that Johnson broke the law and should resign, but rather than admit it, he behaves as if power is his to do with as he pleases and his opinions outrank everyone else’s. I loathe those Tory charlatans with every fibre of my being, but what makes it worse is knowing that I can’t really do anything to call them to account. I can only watch as they lie their entitled, arrogant heads off. That’s what make me so furious, so I better just stop watching.

I just got back from my first proper lunch out in absolutely ages, and it was a very good one indeed. A couple of days ago, on the family Skype call, my parents suggested meeting them for lunch today up in Stratford. Fan of the Olympic park that I am, I thought it was a great idea: we could meet up, have a nice walk together, and generally catch up.

By and large, then, that is what we did. I met my parents, plus my aunt Toula, on the Olympic park, having a coffee before enjoying a delicious lunch at a Greek restaurant. I didn’t think it would really be noteworthy here, but I just realised that it was the first meal mum fed me in a long time. At home, of course, I feed myself using my neater Eater; and if that falls short Serkan often feeds me. Yet, between living apart, the pandemic and everything else, I don’t think my mum had fed me a meal like that in years.

When I was growing up, of course, mum helped me eat every meal, especially when I was really young. She thus knows how to do it. These days though, living on my own, I don’t share many meals with my parents. The strange, noteworthy thing is, mum still feeds me better than anyone else, even after all this time apart. She still has a technique or rhythm which somehow makes eating really really easy; easier even than using my neater eater. This afternoon, eating some outstanding greek food, I felt like my ten year old self again, lovingly being fed by his mum as he listened to his parents talk. It’s probably something which is impossible to explain to anyone who has never experienced it, but which boils down to the unbreakable connection between a mother and the son she brought up. It had been far too long since that had last happened, and I resolved to make it happen again soon.

If you have ever wondered just how far up their own arse it’s possible for anyone to go, this could answer your question. I don’t want to name the person for fear of giving them the attention they so obviously desire, but a certain former tabloid newspaper editor has likened himself to Nelson Mandela for the way he has been supposedly silenced for expressing his views. Just how pretentious can anyone get? Mandela spent years in jail in his fight against apartheid; yet here we have a straight, white, male tabloid hack who has never experienced a second of persecution or discrimination in his life, melodramatically likening himself to the great South African freedom fighter simply because he was fired from presenting a TV program for spouting right wing drivel. He was being deliberately obnoxious and confrontational in an effort to stand out and establish himself on the right, and he got what he deserved. That such a scumbag would now compare himself to a hero of peace, democracy and equality such as Nelson Mandela is sickeningly crass and utterly, utterly contemptible.

I must admit I was quite pissed off when I saw the headlines this morning. Justin Welby, the man calling himself the Archbishop of Canterbury, has spoken out against the Tory plan to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda. While I don’t disagree with Welby per se, I have profound problems with this man trying to usurp current politics for his own anachronistic, regressive ends. Of course what the Tories are planning to do is utterly wrong, and I don’t think many thinking people would disagree with me; but by spouting such bollocks as ”the plan is opposite to the nature of God”, Welby is trying to use the issue to reinforce the outdated dogma he and preachers like him rely upon for their sociopolitical authority. This has nothing to do with God or any fantastical beings, yet this man, who nobody voted for, thinks he has a right to comment on it simply because he claims authority from God. If everyone stopped believing in the group of Roman myths he derives his authority from, Welby and preachers like him would be ignored like every other nutter spouting baseless, irrational rubbish on the streets. Why, then, are his views being reported in the news, as though he is a democratically elected politician? I have profound problems with him trying to use this very troubling issue as a means of reinforcing his own authority.

As far as I am concerned, it is now officially summer. Bright, sunny day that it is, Serkan suggested that I see if there was any cricket being played today. I kind of assumed that it was too early in the year, but I googled it and to my happy surprise I saw that there was a match on at Blackheath Cricket Club. Upon seeing that I eagerly set off over there – it had been far, far too long since I watched any live cricket – and I’m now happy to report that I spent a wonderful few hours watching my first cricket match of the year. Mind you, the team playing wasn’t the team I usually watch (the Mighty Eights, who I first came across in Charlton Park and got to know over the years) but I was told that they’re playing tomorrow, so guess where I’m going after my Sunday Lunch.

I’m not sure who wrote this or where it came from, but I have to say I agree with it passionately. I’m proud to be a Leftie.

Say that you’re the Prime Minister. Say that, a few days ago, you were found to have broken the law while in office, the only PM ever to do so, but you still don’t want to resign. What do you do? Why, suddenly announce a new policy on asylum seekers, in which people desperately trying to come to the UK will first be deported to Rwanda. That way, you’ll get everyone talking about something other than your lawbreaking: the right-wing morons who think you’re the best thing since sliced bread will naturally love it as it plays into their inherent xenophobia. The left-wing intellectuals who see through you will of course be revolted by it, describing it as “cruel”, “nasty” and “chilling”, but you don’t have to worry about them as they can then be dismissed as bleeding heart liberals by your support base. Thus this plan allows you to play into and ferment the widening cultural schism in society, throwing fresh red meat to your support base while horrifying your detractors. Above all, it hands you the reins of political discourse, moving the subject on from the fact you broke the law.

Given yesterday’s news, it is now my genuine position that the British Conservative Party ought to be disbanded. I know that may sound a bit extreme or even mad, but here we have a group of people, governing the country, who obviously think that they are above the law and that political power is their birthright. The Tory party was founded about two hundred years ago in order to ensure that wealth, privilege and power is conserved in the hands of the rich few; it’s raisin d’etre has always been the maintenance of class inequality and the suppression of those who the tories see as lesser or inferior. Their very goal is to prevent the type of social equality most of us now strive for: Their advocacy of free market capitalism is merely a device to perpetuate social stratification and class division, in that it leaves the rich free to exploit the poor, the advantaged to exploit the disadvantaged. A low tax, low regulation economy simply removes the barriers and regulations which prevent those with wealth exploiting those without it, while depriving the welfare state of the means to support those not born into privilege. Conservatism is therefore a manifestly oppressive, repressive social force set upon the perpetuation of the dominance of the rich over the poor and few over the many.

Surely any modern, progressive society should strive to outgrow such outdated forces. Last night we heard news that the man calling himself our Prime Minister knowingly broke the law while in office; laws which he and his government set down in order to ensure people’s safety. Yet these people clearly think that they are above the law and that the rules don’t apply to them, simply because of who they are. Any head of government with any honour would have resigned, but due to attitudes which go to the heart of conservatism itself, Johnson arrogantly still thinks he is fit to remain in office. Thus the problem is not just Johnson, but the entire Tory ‘born to rule’ mindset: a mindset which has seen them wreck the welfare state and impose an exit from the EU which they know will hold the country back for decades, yet have continued with purely for the sake of their party.

Yet any group of people who thinks political power is their birthright simply because of who they are or the family they were born into, manifestly isn’t in any democratic society. Therefore given the damage they have done and are doing to the country, as well as their misplaced, anachronistic attitudes to ideas such as a social equality and welfare, I genuinely believe the Conservative Party ought to be disbanded. We surely need a better, more qualified group of people running the country than a bunch of elitist, spoiled snobs.

Out on my trundle today, I began to reflect to myself that the deeper I fall in love with London, the more I miss the person who introduced me to it. I still miss Lyn, and probably always will. It was only after she invited me to move in with her, twelve years ago, that I began to really get to know this epic, sprawling metropolis. I have grown to love it’s cultures and people; it’s skyscrapers and parks, paths and mighty river. Its history and its surge into a brilliant future. Had I never met Lyn, I would not be here now, and I would never have fallen in love with this vibrant, amazing city.

Yet the fact remains that I had tastes of London before 2010: growing up, during my childhood and adolescence, my parents used to bring my brothers and I down to the city to visit my grandparents at their comfortable family house up in Harlesden. The capital has always been part of my life, more than, say, Liverpool, Birmingham or even Manchester. I have always had a relationship with London, although it was only through Lyn that that relationship became one of such intoxicated fascination.

My grandparents too are no longer with us now, though, leaving me more or less alone in the city. Of course I miss my grandparents just as I miss Lyn, and all three are deeply linked to this city for me. It’s true that the more I get to know London the more I love it, yet the deeper I miss the incredible people through whom I got to know it. I suppose London is now a different place for me: no longer the comfortable family house of weekends with my grandparents; nor the London of Lyn’s bungalow in Charlton – the London of coffee in Charlton park, music and concerts and getting up late. This is now a different London, a third London – my own London. And while it may always remind me of the people who brought me here, it also reminds me to go out and explore it, relishing the vibrant, intoxicating, wonderful life the city offers, just as they did.

I must confess that I don’t keep as close an eye on French politics as perhaps I should, given that France is one of our nearest neighbours. I thus don’t feel qualified to say much about the election there. I would point out, though, that if Marine Le Pen is elected, things might become interesting (but not in a good way) in two years time. Putting my Olympics geek hat on, in 2024 Paris at last hosts the games: can you imagine how appalling things could become if by then, France is being run by a far right bitch who, among other horrifying things, wants to ban women from wearing the head scarf? No doubt Le Pen would demand to impose her authoritarian mark on proceedings, but what message might that send out, and could the IOC tolerate it? After all, the Olympics and Paralympics are about global unity and acceptance: ideals which fascists like Le Pen manifestly oppose. Of Course, I’m not writing this to try to make light of what will be a very serious decision for our French neighbours in two weeks’ time, but simply to point out a consequence of that decision they might not necessarily have considered. After all, I’m sure that neither they nor the International Olympic Committee would want Paris 2024 to become Berlin 1936.

What kind of utterly pathetic politician would try to distract attention away from his failing, corrupt chancellor by flying across a continent into an active war zone so he can look like a hard man posing in front of tanks for the press? Well, that’s the kind of Prime Minister the UK currently has. Even if we leave aside the fact that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine could never have happened without Brexit, to see Johnson try to appear so masculine and statesmanlike – possibly even Churchillian – beside Zelensky, when we all know that he’s nothing but a weedy little coward desperate to distract people away from the catastrophic failures of his government, really is pathetic. I really hope people see Johnson for what he is: for him to fly all that way, putting himself and others in danger by entering an active war zone, a place where he can be of no use whatsoever, so he can project an image of himself which is the very antithesis of the egotistical cowardly charlatan the world knows him to be, really is contemptible.

I think this is the best thing I’ll be able to flag up on here today. “Pink Floyd have reunited to record their first new material in 28 years, a protest song against the Ukraine war.” Having just listened to it, it really is a powerful piece of music, based on an Ukrainian folk song. While such gestures could be just dismissed as tokenism, neither here nor there when people are getting killed, I think it is vital that we show our opposition to what Russia is doing in Ukraine however we can. Every day now, we are seeing reports of more and more appalling violence. For Pink Floyd to release this song is a great act, and I really hope we see more like it.

I would just like to note that Lost Voice Guy, Lee Ridley, was on the Beeb’s post breakfast morning show this morning, telling everyone how his communication aid now has a Newcastle accent. It had been generated for him by sampling the voices of local men. Being from that area, it obviously meant a lot to him; Ridley explained how he didn’t like sounding too posh, and that he could now use local Geordie phrases. He had a point, of course. It reminded me of one of my very first university interviews: I was using an old-style Lightwriter at the time, and my future film Lecturer, Alan, asked me why I had an American accent. If you think about it, a lad born and brought up in cheshire talking like an American is quite strange. I suppose this is thus an issue all communication aid users face: either we are told we sound like an American or, worse still, accused of sounding like Stephen Hawking. (while Hawking is one of my heroes, it is a pretty silly stereotype you must admit). I’m glad to hear that one of the most widely known VOCA users has found his own solution, and has been given a chance to speak like the man he feels himself to be.

I fear that this applies just as much to Russia under Putin as it does to the UK under Boris Johnson

My excitement about the upcoming seasons of Picard just grows and grows. In January I was blown away when I read that the great Whoopi Goldberg would be returning as Guinan, but I think that has now been eclipsed. I just came across some news which may well compete with that of Picard’s return in the first place, the reunion of Monty Python in 2014 or the announcement that James Bond would hook up with the queen in 2012, in terms of epic awesomeness. The entire cast of Star Trek the Next Generation is going to reunite for Season Three of Picard. As a TNG fan, I am over the moon. Those guys haven’t been on screen together since Star Trek Nemesis in 2002, so to see them back, together as a group, reprising roles I once loved so much, will be incredible. According to the article, producers want to give the TNG cast the send off they never really got – let’s face it, Nemesis was a bit of a flop – so I can’t wait to see them all back in character one final time.

You may remember, back in 2012, I appeared alongside Lyn in a Channel Four documentary about the British Paraorchestra. Of course, it was Lyn who was in the orchestra, and I just played a supporting role; yet that remains one of my greatest, fondest memories. The documentary itself was made by What Larks productions, commissioned by Channel Four to be aired just before the Paralympic closing ceremony. It thus gave viewers some background to the orchestra and why they were playing. If you ask me it was a great move, and the type of program Channel Four has a reputation for.

I have written on here before about how much I like the BBC and how much I admire it’s programmes, particularly things like the documentaries of Sir David Attenborough and Micheal Palin. That admiration must extend to Channel four too. Of course, the programmes C4 airs are rather different and less conventional, but no less interesting. So to hear that the company’s future is now at stake and that the Tories are considering privatising it, has me very concerned indeed. As the Beeb article I link to states, all that will happen if C4 is placed into private hands is that it will start producing more and more derivative, commercial pap. Sooner or later it will begin to axe it’s more cutting-edge, boundary-challenging output in favour of more tame, mainstream things, in order to appeal to wider, tamer audiences; and in the end British culture will lose something important.

Yet that may be why the Tories are doing this. They see broadcasters like Channel Four as a threat: it isn’t afraid to speak its mind, and its evening news bulletin is renowned for getting to the heart of the political matter. Indeed, its Dispatches documentary series has a reputation for exposing the social injustices caused by Tory benefit cuts. This may be an entirely political, retaliatory move on the part of the Tories; and all the more reason why we must fight to keep Channel Four as it is.

I realise that I shouldn’t just keep posting links to Youtube videos on here, but for anyone concerned with UK politics and the emerging catastrophe which is Brexit, I think this is worth listening to. It’s an analysis of an audio interview of Jacob Rees-Mogg broadcast on LBC, in which the Tory Toff tries to explain the tariffs and limits now imposed on the UK fishing industry as a direct result of Brexit as merely the EU trying to punish us for withdrawing from the block. Excuse me, but how stupid does the double-barrelled wankstain think we are? As the commentator behind the video points out, this was always going to be a consequence of Brexit: our fishing industry is now limited by the same rules the EU imposes on any non member, and the UK no longer had any say whatsoever in how those rules are set. Of course, Remain campaigners were saying this would happen from the very beginning – it’s bloody obvious – but what makes this video worth your attention is the degree to which Rees-Mogg tries to squirm and convince us to blame the nasty people in Brussels rather than the lying charlatans who took us out of the European Union for their own benefit. It’s as pathetic as it is sickening, and it pisses me off that we have liars like this running the country.

Just when I was starting to wonder what to blog about today, I came across this and burst out laughing. I don’t know who made it, but it took me a few moments to realise it was a fake…unless, of course, Kim Jon Un likes Monty Python.

Dear mums with prams,
My friends in DAN didn’t put their lives in danger, handcuffing their selves to busses and blockading streets in central London so you could park your baby in the wheelchair space on busses and refuse to move it. That space was very hard fought for indeed. For many years wheelchair users like myself were prevented from using public transport, and without the Direct Action Network we would still be unable to do so. As the signs on the busses themselves state, you can occupy the space only if it isn’t needed by a wheelchair user. It is thus called a wheelchair space for a reason, and for you to occupy it with your pram, as if it was created for prams, refusing to move, strikes me as the height of entitlement and arrogance.
Yours
An angry cripple

I went up to the Westfield Centre in Stratford again this afternoon. I’m aware that I head there rather too often, but today I wanted to go somewhere where my cap wouldn’t keep flying off. I’ve mentioned here before how gobsmacked I am at the regeneration of Stratford, yet to be fair it’s happening all over London: brand new buildings are going up all over the place, and the city is about to get a glittering, new, multi-billion pound tube line. To me, though, that raises an obvious question: are other parts of the country getting the same amount of investment?

To that end, I just tapped ‘Stoke On Trent regeneration’ into Google and came across this BBC article. Stoke has – or used to have – a reputation for being a bit of a run down, neglected city. According to the article though, “Plans to turn a former industrial site into homes, bars and cafes in a £60m scheme have been approved. Construction work on the Goods Yard project in Stoke-on-Trent, near the railway station, could start this year, the city council said….The scheme has received £16m from the government’s Levelling Up Fund.” Say what you will about the Tories and their ‘levelling up’ bullshit, surely this is great news. As much as I adore London, I come originally from Cheshire and I still care about other, smaller places in the UK. I’m also aware of the giant imbalance in investment there has been between the capital and places which aren’t in the south-east. If this really is a sign that things are changing, it will be good to see places like Stoke come into their own after so much neglect.

That is the second time that has happened in the last two or three weeks: I was just chilling at home on my computer, starting to think about lunch, when my doorbell rang. Of course I got up and answered it. A man I didn’t recognise was at the door, who started to explain that he was from some kind of alarm company. But as soon as he saw that I have CP, he started to back away and apologise for wasting my time. I tried to ask him what he wanted, but he continued to back away: he seemed to assume that I couldn’t understand what he was selling, or that I couldn’t be the person who is responsible for my own home. Not that I like door-to-door salesmen, but I find that very patronising indeed. Why do such people automatically think that someone else must be in charge of the security of my flat, or that I can’t be the person they need to speak to? As an independent man of nearly forty, such things really piss me off.

I think the best thing I can do here today is flag this Owen Jones article up. In it, Jones furiously damns Boris Johnson as the privileged charlatan he unquestionably is: “If the phrase “educated beyond his intelligence” could sprout arms, legs and a contrived untidy mop, it would be [Johnson]. Oxbridge does not, unfortunately, lack his type: mediocre youngsters ensconced in privilege, whose pretentious vocabulary and unnecessary use of Latin disguises a lack of depth and knowledge.” Here we have a man who thinks political power was his birthright, and that the rules don’t apply to him just because of who he is. Today, the Met has issued twenty fines due to breaches in COVID rules at Ten Downing Street: while the rest of us were desperately trying to shelter from the pandemic, Johnson and his friends were partying as if the rest of us didn’t matter. I find that disgraceful, and if Johnson is allowed to remain in power after this, it would be nothing but an absolute insult.

I suppose there’s a lot for me to write about today. For one, film seems to be going through a total paradigm shift: last night at the Oscars, for the first time, a film released on an internet platform won best film. Apple TV’s Coda – a moving film about a deaf family with a hearing daughter – became the first streaming film to scoop the best picture award. This surely marks a shift away from cinemas and film’s traditional home. While of course you could put it largely down to the pandemic, I can’t help worrying that film is losing something: in the cinema, film is an all-consuming event which holds our complete attention for two hours. Watched on a computer monitor or mobile phone screen, film is rendered pausable and ignorable; it becomes far more lightweight and superficial. While I’m not saying streaming will be the end of film – if anything, it encourages people to watch more films because it’s so easy – I worry that it will start to be taken far less seriously.

More importantly though, this was the night when film about Deaf people starring Deaf actors won Best Picture. This is huge news in terms of disability representation. A small, low-budget film about people who are usually totally ignored in mainstream film has scooped the top prize. Surely this is a monumental, watershed moment.

But instead of talking about what an important night it was for the Deaf and Disabled community, everyone is talking about one guy punching another on live television for insulting his wife. It really makes me want to despair.

Today is obviously Mother’s Day, so I’d first like to wish my Mum a great day. She and Dad are currently down in France with my brother Mark, Kat, and their grandchildren, having a great deal of fun playing Minecraft (among other things). More than that though, today is my friend Charlotte’s first ever Mother’s Day: the first Mother’s day since she gave birth to her daughter. I thought that was certainly worth noting. I really hope that she, little Olive and husband Alex are having a fantastic day, although, knowing them, I’m pretty sure they will be.

The more I explore this city, the more it intrigues me and the deeper I love it. Following on from my exploration of the Leaway a week or so ago, I wanted to see what I could find of London’s other small rivers. Just west of Greenwich, on the south bank of the Thames, I had noticed another small river flowing into London’s mighty central current. I’d come across it last April, but had yet to explore it properly. Today I set out to see what I could find of it – it could well be as charming as the Lea. This morning, then, I set off down to Greenwich town via it’s mighty park, before heading west a few metres to find the mouth of the Ravensbourne. A few days ago I’d come across it again, running through a charming little park, Brookmill Park, near Lewisham. Today I wanted to see how far south you could follow it.

I soon refound Brookmill Park, and followed The Ravensbourne as it meandered south through the park. It is a much narrower river than the Lea; barely more than a stream. South of Brookmill Park, though, I was in Lewisham, and the river wasn’t so easy to trace. Saturday traffic hurtled along roads under which the river flowed through pipes. Yet, with the help of the handy maps which often spring, sapling-like, from London’s pavements, I navigated my powerchair through the maelstrom to refind the stream as it flowed down concrete channels past building sites and blocks of flats. South of Lewisham, it weaves in and out of an overground railway line: following the often-buried river wasn’t easy, yet eventually it brought me to Ladywell Fields, a wide, newly-established park through which the stream flowed in two or three channels. There, well maintained paths allowed me to follow the stream south through that peaceful place until I reached Catford.

By then, though, the afternoon was drawing on; trying to follow the river even further south may have been fun, but I didn’t want to make it too difficult to get home. I headed back to Lewisham, noting to myself how much harder the Ravensbourne had been to follow than the Lea: there was no lovely, wheelchair-friendly riverside path, and it had clearly received far less attention. You can occasionally find it running through well-maintained parks like Brookmill Park or Ladywell Fields, but between them the river is diverted through channels running alongside forgotten back streets. This was obviously one of London’s lost rivers UA Fanthorpe wrote of in Rising Damp. Yet perhaps that’s part of the fun: you only find rivers like the Ravensbourne if you look for them, but knowing they’re there and trying to trace them amid all the chaos of the metropolis is part of their charm.

I’m not sure whether everyone has had a chance to watch the most recent episode of Picard, but I just did, and I really have to now flag up this moment of absolute gloriousness. It seems that Star Trek, as a franchise, has reached a stage where it can refer back and play with itself, nodding to previous episodes and films. Without wanting to spoil anything, this is one of those moments. As a fan of The Voyage Home, it really made my day not only to see this reference, but to see it being reread so amusingly. I love it!

Of course they’re livid, but it’s what they duped just over half the country into voting for.

Brexit has rendered the UK a total irrelevance, and the sooner the Tories crawl out of their own arses and admit that, the better.

I’m not sure how much anyone else will have heard about this, but a jaw-dropping new dome has just been given the green light to be built in Stratford. The Maddison Square Garden arena will apparently be as tall as Big Ben and contain the world’s largest screen. I find it incredible, I must say: Interested in things connected with Stratford and the Olympic Park that I am, this is a story I’ve kept an eye on for a while. The regeneration of that area of London has been phenomenal, and this massive new dome will take it up another level still. Alongside the biggest shopping centre in Europe, I think an events/music venue was a logical next step.

Yet, it must be said, this project is not without controversy.  A thousand local residents have raised concerns about possible light pollution, and the O2 Arena has objected to having a massive new rival built so close. After all, the two venues will only be four stops apart on the Jubilee Line, and vie for the same business. Then again, by the time the MSG arena is up and running, the O2 – itself quite controversial in it’s time – will be about 25 years old, so I reckon it’s due some competition. As fond of the O2 as I am, I’m quite sure it will survive. Indeed, the two venues may well complement one another, and make East London even greater than it already is by drawing even more business, culture and creativity into the area. Either way, this is a project I’ll be keeping an eye on; another excuse to visit Stratford.

I just found something rather cool out. I’ve mentioned here before how much I like to go for walks/trundles in my powerchair. Today’s was rather a long one, and I was wondering whether there was any way to plot my route out on Google maps. Getting home, I googled it and found there was quite a simple, straightforward way. It took me a couple of attempts due to the fact I ran out of destination points, and as a result only shows my rough route, but I’d like to invite you all to check this out.

I think it’s safe to say that Then Barbara Met Alan is a landmark piece of television. When it aired on BBC2 last night it marked a watershed moment in disability politics and culture. It tells the story of the birth of the disability rights movement like never before, addressing an issue almost completely ignored by the mainstream media. It does so with passion and humanity, depicting disabled people as normal and average , who just happen to be fighting for the rights denied them by a society not yet equipped to meet their needs. At last truths which I, as a man with a disability, have known for a long, long time are being articulated and given voice on national television; our civil rights movement is often overlooked, but is surely just as important as any other.

Just as importantly, the people presenting such truths are their selves disabled people. As detailed here, many of the cast and crew who helped produce the film were disabled. This wasn’t a case of anyone presuming to speak for us for once, but disabled people speaking for ourselves. We are hedonistic and rebellious people who don’t want to be patronised by charity fests or pity porn. We know what rights we deserve, and are willing to fight for them. It felt so good to see disabled people at last being represented in this way: it was like an important, watershed moment. At last we can be seen for who we are, forced to fight for freedoms everybody else takes for granted.

Then Barbara Met Alan tells the a history which needed to be told; it’s just a shame it was so long in the telling. And I certainly hope there are more films like it to come.

I suspect everyone might be expecting me to write something about certain comments made by a certain idiotic politician over the weekend, likening Ukrainian resistance to the Russian invasion to Brexit. But I’m not: I don’t want to comment on them, or even acknowledge that they were ever made. The fuckwit who made the comments is essentially likening those of us who oppose Brexit to Ukrainian traitors who side with Putin. How dare he? The scumbag must be booted from office immediately, simply for insulting the 48% of us who did not vote for Brexit so blatantly.

Writing anything more about these ridiculous comments would make me too furious; even the fact that the barely literate imbecile who made them has the audacity to think himself fit to be anything approaching our Prime Minister boils my blood. Thus I think I better just avoid the subject, for fear of damaging something.

On a far lighter note, remember to watch Then Barbara Met Alan, tonight, BBC2, 9PM. Should be awesome.

I don’t know whether anyone else does this, but I seem to have fallen into the bad habit of raising my hard and shouting “Zeeg heil” whenever I see anyone picking up or carrying a copy of The Express or Daily Mail. I know I probably shouldn’t, but I doubt anyone recognises what I am saying or doing. It’s just a little personal act of protest, to mark my disgust at those right wing rags and their readership. How anyone can read, let alone believe, the right wing dross those rags spew on a daily basis really gets to me, and I can’t help taking the piss whenever I see yet another fool being duped. As I say, nobody realises what I’m saying or doing, so in a way it’s just my personal in-joke. Oh, how I enjoy having CP sometimes.

I think it’s fair to say that yesterday was a very interesting day indeed. A week or so ago, I was invited by my friend Sue to go to a DAN protest up in Westminster. Truth be told, I didn’t quite know what to expect, but never having been to such a protest before I wanted to see what it was like. I have heard a lot about the historic actions of the Disabled People’s Direct Action Network (DAN): how, without their political activism in the seventies, eighties and nineties, guys like me wouldn’t be enjoying the freedom to live independently that I do; how, without them, public transport would still be totally inaccessible. The fact that yesterday was my birthday aside, I wanted to go and show my support for this historic movement.

I wasn’t disappointed by any means. I got there fairly early, giving me a chance to look at the statues. It had been a while since I’d been to Parliament Square, as every time I went I kept getting angry at the pro-brexit morons protesting there. Luckily yesterday they were gone, and the square was nice and peaceful. I waited a bit, before I began to spot other people in powerchairs arriving. I went to join them. I didn’t know them, but we instantly got chatting. As I said in my previous entry, it was a great chance to network.

Sat opposite the Houses of Parliament, close to the statue of Churchill (which sadly didn’t wave), we waited a bit. Before long, more crips arrived and the march got going. There were about twenty of us in all, with a wide range of disabilities. Sue Elsegood is a historic DAN activist of some renown, so she was asked to head the march. Escorted by two police officers, we headed from Parliament Square to the ministry of Health. There the plan was to deliver a list of demands and concerns to the Ministry, about the disproportionate impact COVID has had on people with disabilities. It hadn’t previously been clear to me that that was the purpose of the event, but nonetheless it had my full support.

Outside the Ministry we waited for a bit. The hope was that someone would come out to receive the list of demands, but it soon became clear that nobody was available. We were there for about an hour, blocking the doors: while the lives of many disabled people are a great deal better than they once were, there is a lot of work still to be done, making such provocative, direct action necessary. A lot of people with mental health conditions are still institutionalised, for example, making them especially vulnerable to things like COVID. I think it’s thus essential that we, as disabled people, keep alive the spirit of activism which got us to where we are.

After the protest, the plan was to meet up for a social at the BFI on the Southbank. Unfortunately this proved more complex than it should have been, but eventually most of the protesters met in a bar for a drink. Fascinatingly, I got talking to the producer of Then Barbera Met Alan, the forthcoming TV drama I mentioned a couple of days ago. By then it was getting late though, so I couldn’t stay long: I had dinner to eat. As I rode home on the tube, I reflected upon what a remarkable day it had been, the friends I had made and the networking I had done. It was my first proper experience of a DAN protest, but I hope now to get more involved in it. DAN is a truly historic, important movement: it has already won many battles, but it has a lot of work still to do. I hope I can now help it achieve it’s goals.

I’m looking forward to tomorrow, and not just because it’s my birthday. Tomorrow sees the largest gathering of DAN activists in quite some time, up in Parliament Square. It’s to mark/celebrate the airing of the (probably) landmark BBC drama Then Barbara Met Alan on Monday. Of course I intend to go: it will be fascinating to experience a bit of disability culture/activism after so long a drought, as well as finally do some networking with some fellow crips. As much as I can’t wait to watch – and no doubt review – the TV programme itself, to be honest I think it has just given us a great excuse to get together after so much isolation and celebrate who we are.

I woke up this morning with an almighty cough. It worried me slightly, because I had gone to bed feeling perfectly fine. I got up and turned my computer on, still spluttering. And then I remembered: a large cloud of Saharan Dust had been forecast to invade the area. That must be it. I felt fine otherwise, but I’ve been spluttering all day. Apart from a short trip to the shop, I’ve spent the day at home. When I went, though, the sight was quite amazing: a thin layer of sand coated all the car bonnets and surfaces; it was quite incredible. Perhaps it would have even been pretty if it wasn’t so difficult to breathe. John and I kind of have a rough plan to go to the Sahara for our next crazy trip, but if this is what the Sahara is like I may have second thoughts.

London isn’t a place you usually associate with rivers. Think of the metropolis and brick, concrete and steel come to mind rather than pleasant little brooks. Yet as I have grown to know London I have fallen in love with it’s waterways. There’s the mighty Thames, of course, which I fell in love with ten years ago; but more than that there are the little tributaries which feed it. The river Lea as it flows down from Stratford is particularly wonderful. You can now stroll along it’s banks all the way from Cody Dock to the Olympic park, along a wonderfully peaceful, accessible path. It is a route I now take quite often. A great deal of time and care has clearly been taken to restore the Lea and the footpath which runs beside it to its rightful glory, and there are plans to extend the path to the Thames itself. The Lea, slightly wider and deeper than the river Dane at Congleton, seems to help ease my mind as it winds it’s way past the Victorian warehouses and seventeenth century mills of north-east London. As I follow the path the sprawling metropolis around me and the troubled world beyond it fade into the background, so all I can hear is birdsong, the wind, and the soft whirr of my powerchair motors. Where I once rolled along the Dane as it flowed through my childhood hometown, I now spend hours exploring the waterways of east London, once famously so polluted, yet now one of the city’s greatest features. Surely the Lea is one of London’s hidden secrets: one of it’s lesser-known gems.

There isn’t much I feel I want to say about the Beijing Winter Paralympic Closing Ceremony. Having just watched it, there was nothing to get my teeth into really. It was shorter than usual, and I must say that, for a paralympic ceremony, I didn’t really see many performers with disabilities: for one, all of the musicians I saw appeared to be able bodied, which was disappointing.

Truth be told though, I’ve been too concerned about events in Ukraine to watch much sport recently, and it sort of crept under the radar. As I said about the opening ceremony a couple of weeks ago, sport is surely something which brings people together. It is a force for good in the world: opponents are not necessarily rivals or enemies. And yet, right now, such sentiments seem pretty pointless and futile when our news bulletins are full of images of suffering and destruction, and when a bald despotic nutcase seems intent on re-establishing a long faded empire at the cost of so much. While I still love global cultural events like the olympics, and am still enormously proud of what happened here in London in 2012, now doesn’t seem the time to be writing about ceremonies.

This is “The Face of War” by Ukrainian artist Dariya Marchenko. It was made with 5,000 bullet casings. It seemed simply too powerful and timely for me not to repost here.