More Radical than I Thought

I may be getting a new friend! When I was doing the garden last weekend the landlord was showing a lady called Victoria around one of the flats and brought her over to make introductions. She’d been planning to do a container garden so I explained my plans, including the ‘community fire area’ under the trees and said I would love to collaborate. I told her about the Lost Plot community allotment and she sounded really interested. Then she said she was going to Hulme Community Garden Centre potato day next Sunday. ‘Great!’ I said, getting my mobile phone out, ‘Give me your number and I’ll text you nearer the time’. She started to back away at this point and muttered something about dropping it in when she moves in so I said,’ Oh OK yes fine, lovely, oh OK then’ like a lonely loon with no friends who’s just scared off another potential buddy. A friend (because I do have some) suggested that she may have thought I was hitting on her but I explained that I had my new drastically short, sexuality stereotypyingly confusing haircut hidden under a hat........although I was wearing dungerees, ah well.

This morning I bumped into the guitar guy who lives with Lindsay in flat 4 coming out of their flat and he asked about the garden and what I was doing. He sounded really interested.

It’s nearly a week since I ‘just nipped into’ a shop on the off-chance of picking up a bargain and bought a load of random stuff I don’t really need and I’m still eating well – venison sausage and organic cider mustard ciabatta for lunch, fish and mushy peas for dinner – no chips as no potatoes but hey who would’ve thought that mushy peas were just overcooked peas!

A three mile run tonight seemed remarkably easy. Some kids were hanging out in the park and one humorously decided to join me. ‘You’re up for the whole ten miles are you?’ I asked and he said he was but dropped off after about 100 yards – thank god as otherwise I’d have had to run ten miles rather than being revealed as a liar. I sprint finished from the end of the shops and as I came back through the door guitar guy and Lindsay emerged with a load of bags – they’re moving out as well! So that just leaves me and Busha in Flat 6.

Over my mushy peas I started reading my first copy of New Internationalist. It had a pull out section of action groups across the UK including an events diary. ‘Huh,’ I thought, ‘Typical – all in bloody London’ and then realised that was because I was reading the London section so I turned to the Manchester pages and there was me! In print – in a photo doing a rather neat counter balance with the Spokes Bicycle Dancers – yes! How radical am I? Well radical - that’s how radical.