The return of the light and a spot of editing

The days are lengthening and it's such a relief. Like something slipping from my shoulders. I thought I'd coped well with the dark afternoons but it's only as they start to disappear and are replaced by daylight that I realise winter steals my happy chemicals.

I also edited my last few posts. Maybe rewriting takes away from the authenticity of a blog but it was getting even more self indulgent than usual and that's not what I set out do. In the end, I had a super moan to a manager I know about how stressed up the staff felt regarding observations and have ended up as a part of a group looking at management-staff communication and the interface between maintaining professional standards and supporting stressed out 'worker bees'.

I've also decided to join the March for the Alternative on March 26th with a friend and two of my colleagues. Stand up and be counted as they say. I just pray to God that I don't get 'kettled' somewhere where there are no toilets! Or worse being threatened with a knock on the head by a police officer: 'Listen mate, I'm very peaceable. Honest!"

The government's turn around on the selling off of our remaining national forests is a real victory. We need to make sure they honour this but with groups like 48 Degrees updating supporters on the net, they won't get away with doing anything on the quiet.

Another Year

In the bedroom, my wine purple velvet dress hangs from the wardrobe door, draped with a sparkly scarf that glitters in the lamplight and my long black cardigan, scattered with hundreds of tiny silver threads is drying across the radiator. A little make up and I'll soon be ready to help make the party shine, like they did in the war and the depression that preceded it.

What would I like in 2011? The ability to stay calm and keep a sense of perspective; a good sense of humour and enough money to keep the wolf from the door and maybe, in some small way, to make a positive difference. I'd like my friends and family to keep well and for reading ages to improve across the world and for everyone to have access to clean water. Oh yeah and for this blinkin' government to abandon their plan to sell off the forests. It's not that much to ask is it?