another long and intensive day...but this one involved baking, which has to be good.

Today I was horrified to read this account of the man who died due to cuts in his benefits. The help this guy needed is exactly the help I spend my weekends giving to people - every-day support in all the little bits of life they can't cope with by themselves. Luckily, there is a little bit of money available here to pay it but we have to struggle and fight for it too. And the consequences of NOT doing it are awful. Support for adult people with asperger's is lacking on every level. Until people reach absolute crisis it is rare for them to get any help at all. Sadly, many of them never get the help they need - the suicide and early-death rate of people with asperger's is higher than in the general population. We are failing these people on so many levels. I do my bit by putting in long hours every weekend - I wish the politicians would do their bit and stop cutting corners - maybe pulling in the taxes of rich people makes more sense than penalising the poor? Hang on, I know the answer to that one!

In other news, it is St David's day. I have celebrated by listening to the Treorchy male voice choir on the car CD player. There wasn't a dry eye in the house (car). It's hard to beat back the hiraeth when I know that the land I knew will be singing....

Far away a voice is calling
Bells of memory chime
Come home again,come home again
They call through the oceans of time

We'll keep a welcome in the hillside
We'll keep a welcome in the Vales
This land you knew will still be singing
When you come home again to Wales

This land of song will keep a welcome
And with a love that never fails
We'll kiss away each hour of hiraeth
When you come home again to Wales