Little kid made the card at school and one of the parents handed out Happy Eid bags to the kids as they left for home.

Two Eid cards, one blue with a yellow crescent and star, and the other in black and gold with elegant writing, are displayed on a polka-dotted tablecloth.

“One night, I opened my front door to such a strong gas smell I actually thought someone was trying to gas me and I rang the police”.

More on wtf and why.

Woken at 1 am by the sicky sweet smell of petrol wafting in through our open bedroom window.

This substation fire is nearer to where I live than Heathrow.

Woke up around 1 am to discover we had a power cut. Helicopter overhead, no mobile signal, no way of finding out what was going on.

Eventually mobile signal returned and called 105. Recorded message informed me that there were 67,000 homes without power from Northolt to Heston, and power expected to be restored by 3 am.

For a few moments I thought Starmer had nuked Moscow.

What we know so far about the Heathrow closure: bbc.com

You’d never know from this headline, of course, that it’s Israel who broke the ceasefire agreement.

US rejects 'impractical' Hamas demands as Gaza truce hangs in balance: bbc.com

Think of the children

Ealing Council are consulting on their proposals to improve services offered by the borough’s children’s centres to children under five and their parents by reducing the number of centres from 25 to 12.

In Southall, the poorest and most deprived of the seven towns in the borough, and the town with the highest rates of new arrivals to the country, English as a second language, and up to 40,000 new residents occupying all the new builds homes currently being developed, the council proposes to improve uptake of services at the six Southall children’s centres by reducing their number to two.

If you’re not already persuaded that this is an obvious, winning and ever-so-centristly adult and professional management of the local economy, then let me elaborate further with some data!

The problem with the children’s centres as they are now is that they are very inefficient. In some parts of Southall where there are no children’s centres, for instance, as few as a third of children are accessing services offered by children’s centres based in other parts of the town. And while arguably one of the best and most successful of the purpose-built and award-winning children’s centres reaches over two thirds of children in its locality, if we close this one down, repurpose the building as something else (more unaffordable high-rise flat$$$? [like we tried to do with Southall Young Adult Centre, the only youth club in town]), and get our (private) less-qualified and experienced partners to deliver cheaper and less effective children’s services in community venues such as the recently repurposed community-centre-as-a-library, churches, mosques, gurdwaras and mandirs, everyone’s a winner, right?

I should be a highly paid consultant!

To those of you who actually live in Southall, and who are mostly women (of colour) and have children who have used or use these services now, and who say to me, “Hmmm…. This sounds like cost-cutting. We need more children’s centres not fewer. What you’re proposing is madness. You’re a Labour council, why are you doing this? Many people won’t be able to travel half an hour or more on foot or be able to afford public transport to the two remaining centres. Many people won’t want to go to the places where they worship and which are highly patriarchal, not known for confidentiality, and not designed for children’s safe and secure play and development. The library is too small, and small children like to make a lot of noise and run around. Instead of looking for new exclusionary venues, why not just use the safe and secure, purpose-built inclusive children’s centres we already have? Market the services offered in the library and the faith centres”: your feedback is valuable and I have no answers. Please fill in the survey and rate my brass neck out of five.

It’s all a bit rich coming from the same council who lectured Warren Farm campaigners on the health and wellbeing of Southall’s children two short years ago. Local people fought the council’s plans to destroy much of the rewilded land at Warren Farm Nature Reserve in order to build new football and cricket pitches on it, and instead wanted to preserve Warren Farm as a nature reserve so that local children living in an otherwise urban environment would have some wildlife and peace and quiet on open land to visit. Meanwhile, the two cricket pitches at Southall Recreation Ground which are used all day every weekend in all weathers are dilapidated and dangerous.

Robin having a bath in the rainwater captured by the cover of the kids’ sandpit.

Big kid can breathe again.

Plan to ban smart phones in schools scrapped by MP: bbc.com

Big kid brought home a June 1983 copy of National Geographic from the school library today (I said it needs an update!).

Auto-generated description: A National Geographic cover from June 1983 features an image of space with the Horsehead Nebula and list of articles inside.

Some things never change.

A comment and a response discuss perceptions of bias in a National Geographic article on the Beirut destruction in February 1983, with differing views on anti-Semitism.

This morning’s walk.

I don’t know why this area is fenced off, but it has the effect of creating a private space for local alcoholics, drug users and homeless people to relax.

Auto-generated description: A small, partially fenced park area with a wooden bench and overgrown trees and bushes.

Water flowing through the gates into the lock.

A canal lock is seen with water flowing through the partially open gate, surrounded by weathered wood and stone.

I took a few moments to enjoy the sound of the flowing water.

How it was.

Auto-generated description: A frosty park landscape features an empty information board with trees and a path in the background.

How it’s going.

Auto-generated description: A bulletin board in a park is covered with leaves inside its glass display.