Plans for 2022
When I look at that date, I can hardly believe it’s already 2022 – where do the years go?
But unlike the somnolence of last year – the lingering uncertainties around lockdown, movement and meeting people anywhere but on Zoom – it looks as if travel will be possible this year and I hope to take full advantage of that freedom. I won’t be taking it for granted; which is another way of suggesting that I intend to enjoy my travels, in the full awareness that travelling any distance anywhere outside my immediate neighbourhood is a privilege.
Thinking back to pre-Covid times, many of us used to travel routinely to and from work on early flights. In the last few years, I’ve also made good use of early planes to get to Schiphol before the morning rush. Now, so many meetings take place “remotely”, I can’t help but wonder why it took a national pandemic, and all the crises management that that implies, to get me to change my ways. It’s not about “having” to meet people in the flesh, though that is undoubtedly a wonderful thing; but so much of what we formerly assumed was indispensable to our way of doing business, has been revealed as a luxury, a thing to appreciate and enjoy, and hopefully take more carefully than we usually would have done formerly. If only one good thing comes out of the last couple of years, it is that we are learning, I hope, not to take what we can do for granted.
Plans for 2022 include a visit the London Book Fair, which this year is open for visitors and happening between 5th and 7th April. Hotels nearby that used to charge a king’s ransom and insist that their bookings were non-refundable without the payment of a hefty premium, and that all sums be collected at point of booking, are now falling over themselves to be accommodating. Bookings are about half of the price they used to be, refundable practically up to the point of arrival and payable only when inside the hotel doors. All of which makes travel arrangements much more relaxed, enjoyable and affordable than they used to be.
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March 31, 2022
Have lateral flow tests, will travel
Fran Macilvey 'Trapped: My Life with Cerebral Palsy', Memoir, Path To Publication 2 Comments
Have Lateral Flow Tests will travel
After a break of two years, I’m taking my three novels, now completed, to the London Book Fair 2022.
They are printed double sided, on lighter paper, which I calculate will save me about a kilo of carrying weight, which is a significant blessing. I’ve been triple vaccinated and will take a clutch of lateral flow tests, masks and sanitiser, which I hope will see me through the two-and-a-half days of my attendance at the Fair without major mishap. Here’s hoping. While Covid will, in all likelihood, become endemic before too long, so far, I have escaped infection and I hope my luck will hold while I am in London.
I did book to go to the London Book Fair in 2019, saying then that it would be my last visit. And, as on so many other occasions, my prediction proved premature: life had other ideas, the 2019 Event being cancelled at the very last minute. This year, hospitality prices have plunged, are all refundable until point of travel and can be paid for as one arrives at the hotel, so there is every reason to travel. And with a kilo less of weight, it looks as though this year is going to be a win-win-win, whatever happens.
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I have other good news to celebrate. As part of events to celebrate International Women’s Day 2022, Engender, Scotland’s Feminist Policy and Advocacy Organisation published this post on their blog, for which I thank them most sincerely. It’s wonderful to work with others who are dedicated to meeting the challenges of equal representation for women in all parts of our lives, public and private. If women were more equally represented, I do believe the world would be a more balanced place to live, and everyone would benefit.
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