Deirdre Geraghty

Why do so many female presenters on television, on serious programmes even, wear painful high heel shoes with no care that they are a bad example to our youngsters. There are thousands and thousands of women with deformed feet from wearing them which they did to please men. It should be a scandal. As one of my friends with deformed feet said yesterday “if only I had realised what I was doing “. And the very name ‘bunions’ is something that people make jokes about. And if I am being unkind and intolerant for saying it (time and time again) then so be it. It’s time someone did something about it. And if your excuse is what you are wearing then wear something else. There’s lots of different, even sexy, flat shoes about. And nowadays l am not the only female in the room in trousers and flat shoes. My feet don’t hurt.

My parents both died in November, my Mum near the beginning of the month and my Dad at the end. Both quite a few years ago now. They are both contemplative days each year.

So they are debating and voting on assisted dying today in parliament. Another step forward for humanity which many will fight against as they always do when progress is being debated. As a humanist I am very much in favour of such a bill. I believe people should have as many choices over their lives as possible including the right to end it for people who have less than six months to live in pain.

It is true to say that l am struggling. I had a lift to the community centre for a session of tea and chat and I did try to join in but I do find it difficult and the longer it went on the more nervous I became. Not being able to join in goes right back to my teenage years and my family but I have had a lifetime of these kind of feelings. It is just the way that it is.

It will probably sound like my paranoia but I believe that the Tories backed by big business have a plan to oust the Labour government and it’s working. Hopefully Labour are wise to it.

I haven’t been up long. From yesterday’s news I believe that there’s a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah. Hopefully it will hold.

I was expecting a parcel on Sunday. I looked out for it all afternoon. Eventually they said delivered – but not here. Yesterday I heard it was at a house further down the road and I went there three times. No signs of life. I have just been there before breakfast to catch them before work. Looks exactly like yesterday, blinds exactly the same, open a bit at the bottom and open upstairs. Perhaps they are away or something.

I have put on a little weight since my supported diet came to an end although I have mostly stuck to the eating plan – it’s the take aways that are to blame – they are delicious. I must be more careful.

I haven’t been up long – l was having very vivid dreams. Firstly I was telling my big sister about the Clapham Sect – that group of men – William Wilberforce and his friends who met in their big houses around Clapham Common and talked and prayed. They built the Holy Trinity Church on the Common towards Old Town. Then I dreamt that my younger sister had visited and she was on her way home to Ireland when I found her door keys and l was working through the options. Far too busy to wake up!

I was just watching a clinic in Kyiv on the television. They showed Ukrainians learning to use prosthetic limbs. One man was learning to move a completely mechanical arm and hand. Incredible.