Mixed Bag

Yesterday I was speaking before a committee of Edinburgh City Council on behalf of a charity I do some work with. We'd applied for funding but were refused a grant, despite the fact that the council has used our services for a number of years.

I was quite nervous before hand, but once I got up with my notes I was fluent and felt relaxed. Our project has excellent credentials and I think they were actually quite embarrassed at having turned us down, but we were reminded that it was a tight council tax year etc etc. They reserved their position, so we'll have to wait to see if they are going to offer us a compromise deal.

I really wouldn't want to go back to the corporate world, but it was good to use old skills in aid of a good cause.

However it annoys me that charities have to spend so much time and effort chasing wee pots of money instead of being able to get on with their core business.
I had this idea that we should try and set up a central charity in Edinburgh where ex administators like me could do volunarty work writing business plans and grant proposals for small charities freeing them up to get on with job. If I had the energy I'd pursue the idea, but I've too many irons in the fire at the moment.


Today my friend who is in chemo at present arrived asking if I could dress her feet. The chemo's caused blisters on the soles of her feet, which her doctor has treated with synthetic skin, but she still can't walk very well as it's just too painful. She lives alone and had gone out to the chemist and bought lint and bandages, thinking some more padding would help her walk a bit more comfortably. I wish she called me as I'd have picked it up and taken it over. But she's so independent and so determined to fight this bloody disease. So I patched her up and she padded off home with a DVD of mine to watch.

Today's picture is based on a shot I saw in the Observer by Howard Sooley (splg?), he shot Monty Don's hands with primroses. His point of focus was on one finger, but I put mine on the cowslips and the thumb. I got my husband to model for me, laugh is he never gardens, he just rubbed his wet hands in a bag of compost.