Wednesday 5 November 2014

Yesterday was chaos

and living in chaos is rather uncomfortable. We are not tidy people but the Senior Cat likes a little order in his life with respect to pots of tea at regular intervals, meals at certain times and so on.
Yesterday was different.
To begin with I had to rise extra early and deal with a slew of e-mail and the blog post. I managed.
The Senior Cat was late up. He had, like many very elderly humans, been up and down during the night. (It wakes me up as well.) He was eating breakfast when my brother made his at least weekly phone call before starting work for the day. I managed to reheat the Senior Cat's breakfast milk before the power went off and then left him to it.
I had to go into the city - a place I normally avoid, especially getting closer to the end of the year. The train was late getting in and was sent to the far end of the platform. It took me some minutes to reach the ticket barrier because I had to wheel the tricycle out - no riding in the station of course.
I went to the university. I went to the bank. I then tried to go to the
Central Market and found my way blocked by a protest march. I love protest marches - not. I have never participated in one. If I want to protest I have other, much more effective, means of doing it. I dislike crowds.
I think this march had gathered together every Muslim in the city. They moved like a line of sleepy ants down one of the main city thoroughfares. They were protesting against the shooting of one of their own outside a mosque in another sitting. The man is, fortunately, alive but it was a violent incident and one which is to be deplored.
I always find protest marches confronting but this was more confronting than most. There were, I think, two reasons for that. One is that they were almost all wearing black. The other is that they were almost silent. It was not the way in which protest marches are normally conducted.
Was I being prejudiced?
I did make it to the market. I went home to a house without electricity. The power came on later and two visitors came with it. The first came to collect something we were donating to an elderly woman in a nursing home. The second came to do something the Senior Cat did not know how to do even if he had the physical strength to do it - he pruned the old grapefruit tree. We won't get too much fruit next year but it means the tree will last for some years yet. It was almost seven in the evening when he left.
I was catching up on work that had not been done during the power cut - in between making the tea and providing information for the first visitor. My e-mail seemed to go crazy. I was still answering mail late into the evening.
The Senior Cat has to go out this morning. I am hoping for a quieter morning - but I am expecting someone to call with some work.
Perhaps later will be less chaotic?

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