Friday 13th 2015

I said to John as I left the residential home at 6.40pm into the suddenly cold night, 'Well, at least Friday the thirteenth is almost over.' How wrong I was.
 
The day had gone well with thoughts of posting a photo of me in my new shin protectors clubbing the last of the Holm oak into submission with a title like 'Lord of the Rings'.

T, the window cleaner passed through with a pretty harrowing tale of his marriage busting up and I felt frightened for his future but he seemed buoyed up by a sense of resolution and burning anger.

The feedback from the Estate Agent was that the viewer felt the house ‘lacked storage’ and that the arrangement of the rooms did not meet ‘her purposes’. The previous one had said the garden – a fifth of an acre – was ‘too small for her dogs’.

Then I tried to comment on Blipfoto and eventually realised the system was down. I posted a few things to the Blipfoto Friends page on Facebook and used the time to reorganise all those blog posts I did about Blipfoto Ltd's demise. They are now here as separate pages on my website. It feels about time we were told something/anything from the new owners and their team (?).

I popped over to see John before picking up the The Principal from the station.  She had M and S curries which were pretty good. We ploughed through a few more back numbers of the slightly stolid ‘River’ and as the fire burned down to ashes the news from Paris started to come in.

We sat transfixed as BBC News and then Sky News kept up a rolling update on the horror. I was also keeping an eye on Twitter which was often in front of the broadcasters but also prone to the rapid dissemination of false rumours – such as the burning of the migrant/refugee camp in Calais and the turning off of the Eiffel Tower lights.

At half past midnight it was pretty clear that the bombings and massacres were over with a terrible count of deaths and critical injuries. I stumbled up to bed and checked on the lights of Calais over the Strait. They were burning bright.

I had a song by Malian musicians, Amadou and Mariam, churning in my head, 'Vivez la solidariete entre le peuple'.