Friday, January 07, 2005
Straw, Charity And Useless Bank Notes
I fell asleep last night to the sound of high winds battering the building and the neighbours pots and bins being flung against the four corners of our cul-de-sac. I like listening to severe weather in the dark; high winds, rain, whatever - it gives me a comfort feeling, as though all around can do its worst, but can never actually touch.
When I woke the winds had died down and rain had fallen at some point leaving the air mild and breezy. Evidence of the ‘storm’ lay about the garden as I left for work at an incredible 7:10am!! Yes, I know it’s astounding but as it is Friday I wanted to make the best of it and make it last as long as possible.
As I drank my coffee before leaving this morning I saw Jack Straw on the telly making a speech in Phuket about the recent Tsunami disaster in the Far East. Standing in his pristine white shirt and chinos serving contrasting against his glowing tan, he spouted a bunch of well-known statistics and obvious statements. Is that all he’s got to do? Does it make him feel important wandering around as if he's actually helping? Of course it does! Away back to your expensive hotel Jack and sup on those cocktails you've been dying to try out since you arrived.
A friend of mine hit the nail on the head recently in her Blog when she said she would have more respect for these people if they actually rolled up their sleeves and DID something, instead of strolling around like VIP's nodding at all the REAL heroes on the ground.
Last night I checked over and submitted issues 37 and 38 of Hunting Jack. I also remembered something I neglected to mention in my Blog a few weeks ago but I think is still worthy of a sentence or two here.
Charity.
Each year The Company has a Christmas appeal where you can buy a gift to the value of about a tenner for a boy or girl of certain age who will not receive anything from Santa. In recent years I have been buying for a girl the same age as Laura – it makes it easier when I am out shopping and ensures the recipient will get something appropriate.
At the same time, we can also choose to donate money to a homeless person instead, which gives them a meal on Christmas Day and a small gift. This year, due to my heavy research and interest in Hunting Jack (who is essentially a homeless person), I decided to divert my money in this direction.
My research for Hunting Jack has included talking to various people and organisations involved with homelessness, and a couple of these homeless stats I have uncovered have found their way into my story. For anyone who doesn’t subscribe to HJ (why not? ;-) ) here is a taste of the situation in Scotland today:
* 44% are single men
* 20% are single parents who are female * 20% are single women * 5% are couples with children * 5% are couples without children * 3% are single parents who are male * 25% of all Scotland’s homeless live on the streets of Glasgow * 2,267 households lost their home through evictions and abandonments in 2003-4. Every week approximately 985 households will go to their local council and apply as homeless. Of these:* 367 households will make a homeless application because their family, relatives and friends cannot offer them accommodation.
* 115 households will make a homeless application because a relationship has broken down.
* 104 households will make a homeless application because of domestic violence.
* 64 because they are fleeing violence or harassment.
* 44 because they cannot afford their rent or mortgage.
* 14 because they have had to sell their marital home because of divorce proceedings.
* 31 households will be making an application as homeless because they have lost their place in temporary housing.
* The remaining 246 households will face homelessness due to a wide variety of reasons: because they live in overcrowded conditions, because they live in unfit conditions, because the chief earner became unemployed, because of illness, because there has been a death in the family, because of problems with housing benefit, and so on.
* On 31 March 2004, there were 6,574households in temporary accommodation across Scotland. 1,208 (18%) of these households were in bed and breakfast hotels.
* On 31 March 2004, there were 3,833 children in temporary accommodation across Scotland. 234 of these children were in bed and breakfast hotels.
* The number of children living in temporary accommodation across Scotland increased by 27% between 31 March 2003 and 31 March 2004.
Pretty horrendous eh? Especially the children statistics.
The office was conducive to creativity this morning – mostly because it was empty when I arrived and remained so for at least an hour, but also because all my team-mates are off either on holiday or sick.
So by lunchtime I had written issue 39 of Hunting Jack, researched some information for issue 40, written most of today’s Blog, prepared some classified adverts for Hunting Jack, researched some non-fiction sites for possible article submissions about Scottish cities and cut the number of questions for the Hunting Jack competition from 10 to 5 as I think I am losing potential subscribers with a couple of the harder questions. Just think what I could do if I had every day to myself to make a living from this.
The IRA were today linked to the £27M bank robbery in Belfast last month (it was £20 million originally, but the bank upped the value at a recent revaluation). The thing that struck me was the sound of all the Republicans dancing about cheering their heroes and yet none of them will see any of the cash!! While their 'heroes' are out spending the cash (laundering it more precisely), they'll still be down the dole Q while them lot are living it up in Boca!! That is until the Northern Irish Police decided to withdraw every single Irish note from circulation and changing them for notes of different designs and colours! They have effectively told the robbers they went to all that trouble to steal millions of sheets of waste paper! HA HA!!
I was shattered by the time it came to head home. With no one in my work area for most of the day, I had no one to talk to and only got out the office between 12 and 12.20 for some lunch. I didn’t even get a pint in Clark’s! So I did a 9-hour shift and then headed home.
Gail’s pal Susan came down for dinner so I used the occasion to fire into a Chianti and make us all some Hoi Sin chicken with spring onions, red onions, garlic and basmati rice. A few more glasses of red wine to wash to down and I was ready for bed.