Parking and Walking

Well our boiler is fixed and we have heating in our bedroom, wahoo!

I haven't been up to much really, I'm trying to go to yoga twice a week as I can't seem to be able to force myself to go swimming when it's cold! The usual has happened at the gym, it gets cold and snows and everyone parks in the disabled bays! So when I went last Monday the only spaces left were ones right at the back of the carpark, so I parked right in front of the entrance, halfway on the pavement. They clearly have no intention of doing anything about people parking in the spaces, so I shall park there from now on if necessary.

I started my voluntary work again on Friday and have a new mentee, she seems nice and I'm meeting her again in two weeks. We were chatting for about two hours!

On Friday Pete and I met my brother and his girlfriend for a few drinks at the pub, I got to drive Pete's car for the first time since he got it as I was the designated driver for the evening. Pete thinks his car is better than mine because it's a BMW, well now it's snowing we will see who has the better car since his is a rear wheel drive and was sliding around on our road yesterday, he is working form home today which means I have to put up with him haha.

We went for a meal yesterday for late lunch/early tea. It started to snow again whilst we were driving around and we did consider going back home, however we were too hungry! We had to park near the restaurant as obviously I cannot walk far at all in this type of weather, we literally parked less than five minutes away and on the way back I was coughing really hard. So we parked on double yellow as with a disabled badge you can park on double yellow as long as your car isn't causing an obstruction which is wasn't as far as we could tell. When we got back, we had a parking fine!! A ticket officer was walking past so Pete queried the ticket, the man said there was yellow lines on the pavement which means nobody can park there, I know this and if we had seen them we wouldn't have parked there but they were completely covered in snow! The ticket man said if we took photos and sent an email we would get the ticket removed (he hadn't issued it so couldn't remove it), so fingers crossed it gets cancelled!

Sometimes I wonder why everyone seems to make parking so difficult for people with disabilities, do people think disabled people disappear in winter so their spaces are available for others to use, or that we can see things through the snow? Perhaps I shouldn't be trying to have a normal life and stay inside all winter. All I want to do is go to yoga or go for meal without having to walk far and end up coughing my guts up!

I imagine a few people wonder why I can't walk far from my car but then I can take Alfie for a walk. So let me explain........ When I take Alfie for a walk I wrap up really warm, I even put tights under my jeans and wear thermal socks etc. I do cough at first because of the temperature change, but I'm expecting it, I am prepared and I accept it as I'm going for a walk and I know in the long run it's good for me to get the exercise. Afterwards I come home, get a warm drink and sit down and recover.
When I'm out and about doing the things I do, I'm not wrapped up as well, I'm constantly going into different temperatures so my chest can't adjust. I can't recover and it's not nice to be constantly having a coughing fit and people looking at me and commenting on my cough.
Think of it like this - people go to the gym and jog for half an hour on the treadmill, but they wouldn't want to jog everywhere would they? Well walking Alfie is my jogging, but I don't want to be 'jogging' all the time do I?!