Monday, December 4, 2006

The public will believe anything, so long as it is not founded on truth. Edith Sitwell

No work today as I appear to have picked up a rather spiteful little D&V bug (see picture - this was the bug, I know this for fact) that severely limited my ability to be out of the radius of a bathroom. The less said about that episode the better, however, I can honestly say that my stomach has probably done well out of the deal, as the only things to have passed my lips so far is half a mug of cupasoup, a slice of dry bread and a shack load of plain hot water (Miss Sally's health tip).

This has inspired me to try a couple of weeks of detox, eating healthily, building my yoga practice back up and cutting down on the hideous amount of caffeine I drink every day (and a damn good excuse to stop giving money to Costalots).

The worst thing about being even slightly ill (and in general, I suffer illness like a man) after you've watched the entire series of House (wistful sigh), is that I am severely tempted to diagnose myself with some of the most obscure diseases under the sun, the majority of which I rather suspect I've made up completely. However, the boiling water diet has obviously done some good as I'm feeling much better this evening than I was in the early hours of this morning.

I re-discovered Radio 4 today, and spent this evening listening first to a series presented by Michael Portillo (what can I say, the content was good) about a re-examination of the Second World War and then a really interesting programme on the enforced deportation of Mexican Americans during the Depression in the 1930's.

This latter was exceptionally shocking, and the hardest part to listen to was when the presenter visited one of the only schools in California (we love California for their progressive politics) that is prepared to teach its (predominantly Latino) students about this shameful part of America's racial history. Some of the students found it very hard to understand why the state would have deported so many people, especially families and children. Some of them were also afraid that this could still happen to them today.

I've been lucky enough over this year to have come across the concept of telling 'Hidden Histories' from a lot of different sources. I think you can listen to the episode of Crossing Continents on Mexican-American forced deportation from Radio 4 at their website.

Today's Beautiful Things

1. Compassion and caring

2. Lions and tigers and bears - oh my!

3. The threatened tornado outside my window

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Do you think perhaps you made up your illness just to pretend you were in an episode of house?......life immitates art and all that jazz.....

Dill. xx

My favourite thing today - home time.