Activities
- A big company meeting on Tuesday, with the announcement we’re now a new company (well, sort of). A new name, new partners in the network. Instead of Havas EHS, we’re now Havas Helia. This was followed by a few drinks in the pub for the agency.
- Instead of sticking around for what I heard was a good night, I wandered off to my new book club, where a samll group of us dissected the story of a Quaker Girl in 1850 Ohio. And drank wine.
- Thursday morning was supposed to be a quick checkup at the fracture clinic, instead it ended up being a 4 hour trip around the various departments – doctor, therapist, X-ray before the conclusion was reached that I need an operation to put my finger back together properly. A&E had missed a fracture and the sprint had not held it properly. So I’m back there on Tuesday. I did get to take a picture of the x-ray though.
- Had my eyes tested for new glasses, as finally been discharged from the care of the team that looked after my detached retina. They take digital images of the retina and it was fascinating to see the difference between the two, where the left eye you can see all the various veins etc and the right eye has a big blurry bit where it was fixed. distance vision has definitely gone in the right eye, but close up is fine. New glasses ordered (and paid for!)
- More money spent on plumber. Appointment set for 8am and depsite me telling them what the problem was, what I had done and what i think needed to be done, Pimlico Plumbers failed to bring the right equiment 9as well as being 40mins late). So they came back in the afternoon and used plungers and hoovers and a big flailing metal rope thing on a drill. That finally got it sorted – when they got the right man for the job, it was sorted quickly. By the end of the day I think I’ve spent enough for a week’s holiday! 🙁
Reading
- Why I’m not a maker. With tech and geek culture groiwng, it is often expected that you ‘make’ things, as though that is the only activity that has worth. I like to experience, the author likes to educate, the premise of a maker community is that those that don’t are less. We need to avoid the rush into another binary.
- Downtown is for People. a classic article from 1958 by Jane Jacobs. Why the rush to rebuild town centres was forgetting it was about the people who lived there not about the architects who built them
- The story behind the King’s Cross Christmas problems. How a crisis can creep up on you even if each decision on the way seems sensible. A tight plan of railway engineering works failed over Christmas, this is a fascinating insight into why.
- Only one book finished, this was The King’s Curse by Philippa Gregory. She’s made a speciality of writing about the lesser known women of the Plantagenet’s and this is her take on Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury and her life in Tudor times. Daughter of the Duke of Clarence, she grew up during the Wars of the Roses as the neice of Edward IV. Another perspective on that time, especially with the new TV series of Wolf Hall focusing on Cromwell, who appears throughout this book as a villain.
Running
- A first outing with my new running club, an evening social run. It was supposed to be slow, but my slow is definitely not their slow. Only managed the one run into work, with meetings and hospital appointments complicating things. But I’ve managed 103 miles over the month.
