in the living room of the city

Prof Cuschieri

I enjoy visiting the Living Room of the City, the V&A Dundee, to knit socks and gaze out on the River Tay, read books upstairs and/or attend free events.  Today I'm booked on the lunchtime talk 'Surgeons made Superhuman by Robots' [photo album from talk by Prof Sir Alfred Cuschieri] 

 Here are some tweets and photos from recent visits:

New sock casting on in Living Room of the City #Dundee V&A 😊🧦

Relaxin 🎶🎵 pic.twitter.com/PZn0Veq022

— Chrys Muirhead (@ChrysMuirhead) November 14, 2019

 

Sock knit heel expansion.
From armchair in V&A living room. pic.twitter.com/AZ4g0nBlTw

— Chrys Muirhead (@ChrysMuirhead) November 11, 2019

14Nov19

11Nov19

chillin out 23Oct19

Back again in the #LivingRoom of the City #KengoKuma #Dundee @VADundee with ma sock knittin 🧦😊 chilling out, Tay view ...

(last photo of 1st sock taken in my living room #Springfield Fife last night 😁)

Fyi @JoeFitzSNP @ShonaRobison @willie_rennie @Campbell_NEFife pic.twitter.com/3P2lcQFCSl

— Chrys Muirhead (@ChrysMuirhead) October 23, 2019

BBC News - Is Dundee's V&A 'a living room for the city'?

(I found it useful last winter after swimming at Olympia, sitting knitting socks, watching River Tay, didn't have car then, it was a warm place before getting bus back to Fife, @CllrAlexander)https://t.co/8gRYh8gBGi

— Chrys Muirhead (@ChrysMuirhead) September 17, 2019

volunteering, helping others

I'm getting back into volunteering, helping others, through organisations, something I've always done, since the early days, in Rigside, Lanarkshire.  I did this in 2003 when recovering from psychiatric treatment, volunteering with Link East Fife Befriending Project and North East Fife Association for Mental Health, also Express Groups Fife and Barnardo's charity shop in Cupar.  The latter I got paid work with, a keyholder, before getting a job as a Relief Library Worker in NE Fife, on permitted work, 2005, then a FT post at Adam Smith/Fife College 2006.

Before this I had worked in the voluntary sector, various jobs over the years, with all ages of people and children eg Strathclyde Youth Clubs Association & Youth Clubs Fife, Age Concern & YMCA/YWCA Cupar, WRVS Kirkcaldy Youth Project.  I have also worked with and alongside Councils in Lanarkshire, Fife and Perth, in grassroots posts, alongside folk in communities.

And since 2008 I've worked voluntarily in mental health matters, setting up Peer Support Fife to promote recovery and more recently campaigning for better MH services by whistleblowing about Stratheden Hospital, resulting in a new £4.4m IPCU, Hollyview Ward, funded by Scottish Government.

I've retreated from mental health matters and frontline campaigning although still look on via social networks.  My interests these days are broader and include the social history of Dundee, creative crafts and fitness.  

Trottick Ponds Dundee walk 29Oct19

Swans at Trottick Ponds:

after swim at Olympia Dundee 25Oct19

at Lamb Gallery to view this exhibition 12Nov19

Alexander St Multis

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revolving door patients/psychiatrists

I saw this tweet yesterday, it came up up on my Notifications:

I made a series of twitter responses from my own Lived Experience before heading out to Dundee for a swim at the Olympia.  Then afterwards as I walked down the Hilltown I made a wee video and tweeted it:

Just reflecting on the difference between a revolving door psychiatric patient who's on benefits/welfare with no hope of paid work & a revolving door patient who's a psychiatrist @rcpsych @wendyburn @SameiHuda

I think a world of difference. Financially, vocally etc etc. pic.twitter.com/43FXSlnXUb

— Chrys Muirhead (@ChrysMuirhead) November 6, 2019

I was annoyed at the inequalities, the throwaway tweet about being a revolving-door mental patient/psychiatrist, thinking of family members who got caught up in the psychiatric system, how tough it was for them and others like them.  

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later on walking up the Perth Road Dundee