The plane crash has dominated everything today. Numbness, shock, horror at the vultures (press) descending, hungry for a story, a new angle, the greatest despair. Horrible to read panic-stricken calls on social media for news of a brother/friend/partner only for one (so far) to be named as a victim. Awful ebbing and flowing of fear that someone I love will be amongst the dead - they expect to take several more days searching the crash site before it's going to be clear how many people died, let alone who they were. The roads are all still clogged to buggery - there are only two bridges over the river estuary, and the major one is closed.

I usually stay right away from these kind of stories - I know shit happens, people die horrible deaths every day, leaving behind devastating grief - you can find something somewhere every day - but my knowing details about it does nothing for them and fucks my head up, so I turn the page, but this is right here, right now.

Bex asked on facebook who goes to these events. Well, my dad went to this one every year, right up until two days before his sudden death in 1997, manning the RAFA stall. Royal Air Force Association, for ex-members of the RAF. ED also went while she was able, with SIL and GS's dad previously. They all loved it. Bloke always watches, along with thousands of other people, from outside the airport, up on the surrounding hills, along the roadside verges (not the one the plane came down on, that's a busy major road, no pedestrians on that), outside pubs, in gardens and parks, along the beach. It's a massive family day out for many people.

I've always hated it, even before Dad died - he was interviewed at the last one (about being shot down over occupied France during WWII, being taken prisoner, escaping after almost two years and making his way back to England) for the paper which came out on the Thursday, all full of celebration, when he'd died on the Tuesday, so it's connected now with death of someone close, so scary. Before that I just hated the noise, the blokiness, the celebration of military, jingoistic bullshit, but I used to lie on the beach watching the displays anyway. Machinery is not interesting to me in anyway.

Now my sleeping pill is coming along, so I'm offski.

I am grateful for my family all being safe, and my closest friends; a quiet day; a takeaway curry when it became clear I didn't have the wherewithal to cook the dinner I'd planned; Kind comments about my daughter and her birthday; tomorrow being another day

Stay cool xx