Did you vote?

My mum tried to, but couldn’t. She got to the polling station and didn’t have her card with her, and the guy (before even asking whether she was registered) said ‘Only British citizens are allowed to vote.’ My mum said that she was a British citizen, showed him her passport and a utility bill, and said she’d voted before. He said ‘That was probably in local elections. It’s different with a general election.’ My mum explained that she’d lived in England for 33 years, and she had voted in many a general election. But he wouldn’t budge, and said she could vote in the next one. When my mum told me all of this, I was outraged, but she was totally unfazed. I guess if she got upset every time someone made a snide remark, she’d never get a damn thing done. And after 33 years, she’s sadly probably used to it. I’m just glad she doesn’t let the bastards get her down.

Did anyone else hear the very brief news story about a place in south Wales where all the candidates for the election were female, and this incensed a local guy so much that he stood for election? And won? I cannot believe that, after centuries of undoubtedly all-male candidates, the very thought of no men standing for election was so terrifying. And what, precisely, was his campaign built on? The fact that he has a penis, or the fact that he’s a big fucking misogynist? Who voted for this cock face? It’s men like this who drive me up the wall. Men who are so scared of women having just a little bit of power, that they will do anything – anything, even running for office when their only reason for doing so is to prevent a woman from getting in – to stop it.

Freaky local things yesterday

2.30pm, Kennington Road bus stop: man wearing jeans and T-shirt, riding a carthorse (no saddle), slowly heading towards Central London.

6.35pm, further up Kennington Road: walking back from Tesco, I saw a red estate car festooned with red balloons, pumping out Abba’s ‘I have a dream’, with a very embarrassed Kate Hoey in the front passenger seat. As the Hoeymobile cruised through Kennington and Vauxhall, the expressions on people’s faces ranged from horror to incredulity to pissing themselves laughing. However, of all the MPs standing in my constituency, Ms Hoey was the most visible (OK, her office/shopfront thing was around the corner from where I live, sandwiched between an estate agency and Kitsch & Curio, a secondhand store/florist). I didn't see the Lib Dem guy at all (although Champagne Charlie is regularly spied watering his front lawn or shopping in Tesco), and the Tory was pretty much invisible. Which is how I like 'em.

God I am really crabby today. I hate being at work when there is literally nothing for me to do. People keep coming up behind me while I’m searching eBay for kitchen doors, and I want to bat them away…