Signs of spring

Thank goodness a much quieter day. It's a pleasure to sit down this evening for an evening in....which I haven't had since Monday in, ooh, Tain.... It's been a really strange week. I expected it to be tiring and I thought I would be limping over the finish line this evening in Edinburgh, possibly going to a book launch. Or possibly not. But obviously this week has outdone itself in strangeness.

I didn't sleep especially well, although I thought I had done. Fitbit contradicted that. But I'm sure it was better than it would have been anywhere else. I had to get up at the crack of dawn to do a zoom webinar for a civil society group in a country in south east Asia at 7.30am - a piece of knowledge exchange. It was very interesting, but strange circumstances to be doing it in. At least the wifi was robust and did not let me down, but I felt strangely "out of body" most of the time. I had another Teams meeting at the other end of the day, where I actually ended up being more loquacious than I expected to be. I was a bit annoyed by someone suggesting that I had suggested that the fire was not serious and so now it seemed it was more serious than I said.... I lost it a bit at that moment, and gave them a fairly long rant about how traumatic it is watching your neighbours' flats going up in smoke for four hours straight. And worrying about your flat. And now not knowing when the hell you might get access.

Anyway, we've sorted a lot out today. Mr A has got access to his OU stuff via an old tablet he'd left here which he has repurposed. That's amazing luck. He's unearthed some earbuds for me to have as I need these to listen to podcasts and music in bed and on trains. I didn't even have to buy some new ones. I've registered "claims" with both the contents insurance and buildings insurance, even though we might not need them. You have to do it immediately. I've kept up to date with reports from those closer to the ground (which have been mixed messaging, to say the least). Our factors, as ever, are shite. Enough said. A lot of people have messaged with kind words, including two university vice chancellors, neither of them my "own". Not heard from my boss either :-( Many offers of support and help. Nothing needed directly right now, but I was extremely pleased to see that tomorrow the weather will be good in the north and LJ has organised a 10am swim at Shandwick. Top work! And I've continued to feel indecently smug about moving the car out of the garage in the middle of the night. And slightly annoyed with myself about not going back to the flat whilst things were still chaotic and the police had not taken control of the situation to collect a "grab bag" of stuff. And overwhelming thankful to have our bolthole in the north. When I eventually got round to having a shower this afternoon, it felt like the last shower I'd taken was earlier on this week in Tain. In fact, I'd managed one in Edinburgh, but I was barely in the flat.

I have to go back to Edinburgh on Sunday at some point to take the sleeper to London for an event in Oxford, so we've come up with various potential plans so far predicated on the possibility of supervised access to our flat to get hold of some of the key items we need on Sunday afternoon. I've also worried a bit about security and about our heating perhaps being on because the power has been off and it resets when it comes on again. But the power is still off in our core, I suspect. So that's a freezer full of food to chuck away in due course. But since it seems we will not have access to our flat even under supervised conditions until at least next week, I think that Mr A will stay here for a while, and we'll see what happens when I get back from my trip south on Tuesday. Luckily, I'm not travelling out of the country....last time I checked you still didn't need a passport to go Oxford, although it will feel strange travelling without a wallet, although everything I need is on my phone. So it's all about keeping power in your phone now. I will guard it with my life.

At various times, we've both felt pretty emotional about stuff, but hopefully we will be able to combine a sense of processing those emotions along with a sense of purpose in doing the things necessary to ensure some sort of normal life continues. And for me that includes things like this - writing a fairly detailed account of the things that are occurring to me. Whilst also keeping our thoughts on those who have experienced much more traumatic loss as a result of the fire.

Now I'm going to read a book, but not the one I was reading in Edinburgh (and previously in Tain) as it's stuck in our flat in Edinburgh. With a lot of our life. But thankfully there is just enough of our lives up here to get by for now.