I can’t believe we are at the end of December 2022 and 2023 is only around the corner. This month has consisted of finishing up work content for the year. watching the knockout stages of the men’s World Cup and enjoying Christmas festivities including food, films and music.
Disability Horizons
Continuing from the last couple of months, as well as all my usual work at Disability Horizons – writing news stories, featured articles, interviews, shop blogs and editing content – I’ve continued to commission other writers’ work.
Here are the articles I published and edited this month:
- 7 fun, original and imaginative accessible Christmas gifts for disabled children
- 8 cute, elegant and fashionable Christmas gifts made by disabled artists and entrepreneurs
- 8 accessible festive events and attractions to explore this Christmas
- George Webster: CBeebies presenter with Down’s syndrome will take part in Strictly Christmas Special 2022
- 10 films and documentaries with disabled characters played by disabled actors
- Hamza Yassin believes his dyslexia was the secret weapon to winning Strictly Come Dancing 2022
- 5 accessible virtual ways to celebrate New Year’s Eve
All my Disability Horizons content is now available to view in one place on the Emma Purcell Author’s page. This link can also be accessed on the “Disability Horizons” button on the menu page on the left of this site.
My featured content, product articles and sponsored posts for Disability Horizons can be viewed in my Journo Portfolio.
To read my latest news stories, interviews and featured articles regularly, as well as browse other content from the rest of the amazing DH team, subscribe to the Disability Horizons newsletter.
Christmas
My family and I had a nice quiet Christmas with no visitors and buffet food instead of a cooked lunch, which was awesome. We then enjoyed a game of Scrabble and watched Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I also got some lovely gifts including fluffy clothes, chocolate and Friends (TV show) themed gifts.
The only sad thing was I noticed how much my sight has deteriorated this year when I could not identify any of the gifts I opened. I also could not read the Scrabble board at all and needed verbal descriptions of what spaces were available.
Earlier this month, I went to see the Christmas production of The Emperor’s New Outfit performed by my former drama group at the West End Centre in Aldershot. It was a very entertaining and funny show with plenty of topical issues such as the cost of living. It was also nice to catch up with some of my fellow actors after the show.
I also attended a couple of virtual Christmas parties – one with members of the peer support group Spokz People and another with my colleagues at Disability Horizons – which were both fun with silly games and laughter.
Donations
This is your final chance to give a donation in 2022 to support the funding of Rock For Disability and give 20% to a worthy organisation.
So far this year, we’ve raised £85, which is great but we’d love to reach £150 by 31st December 2022. If you enjoy reading my content and happy to support disability communities, I’d appreciate you giving anything you can.
Head to the Donations page to donate. You can make a one-off payment or a monthly donation, which will go straight to the Rock For Disability PayPal account. 20% of each donation will be given to a disability charity at the end of each year. You can pay via PayPal or by card.
Please donate by Saturday 31st December 2022 at 11:59pm.
Books
As I mentioned last month, I began reading the book series The School for Good and Evil, which I discovered after watching a film adaptation on Netflix. It is an 8-book series and I’ve finished book one and just begun book two.
I felt book one was good but longer than expected. I think it would’ve been harder to follow if I hadn’t watched the film first.
I’m still in the early stages of book two but I’m loving it so far. This story sees the girls Sophie and Agatha return to the school to discover there are no princes in the school for good, which has turned into the school for girls, and all the boys have switched to evil.
TV and films
I have managed to watch a lot of TV shows and films in December – it is mandatory at Christmas! As I’ve watched so many, I won’t bore you with full reviews of each title but give you a single word or phrase to sum them up:
- FIFA World Cup – Argentina were the deserving winner!
- Matilda the Musical movie – jolly and marvellous
- Strike: Troubled Blood – mysterious and frustrating
- His Dark Materials: series three – dramatic and emotional
- Casualty – a nice return to my favourite medical series after a five-month hiatus
- Spirited (film) – festive and musical
- Elf – Best Christmas film ever!!!
- Christmas with the Kranks – funny and crazy
- The Holiday – beautiful romance
- Love Actually – romantic festive fun
- 4 Christmases – a crazy love story
- Home Alone – Christmas classic
- The Santa Clauses – a TV series sequel to The Santa Claus Movies 30 years later starring Tim Allen
Audio Description petition
This Christmas, I was very disappointed by the number of festive films that did not have audio description. Last year I was buzzing to find that Netflix had Love Actually with AD but this year it was on Amazon Prime without AD.
Fortunately, I can understand a majority of the film but the two vital bits are when Colin Firth speaks Portuguese to his cleaner and the love message on Kiera Knightly’s doorstep.
There was another version of Love Actually with AD on ITVX but includes adverts and is only available on tablets or phones and not a smart TV.
A majority of my other favourite Christmas films were on Amazon Prime without AD, despite knowing AD has been available in these films before.
This goes to show we need to continue campaigning for audio description on ALL TV shows and films on EVERY platform.
My campaign for audio description has continued throughout December 2022 and the petition has reached a total of 3626 signatures, which is incredible!
But I’m eager to reach thousands more. The more signatures we get, the more likely changes could be made within the TV & film industries. Please, please, PLEASE continue to sign & share my petition!
Guest Bloggers Wanted
I’m still eager to collaborate with even more bloggers in 2023. So, if you’re a lifestyle, disability and/or music blogger, send me your blog stories. Plus let me know if you’d like me to feature on your blog as a guest blogger.
I’m flexible with any type of blog post; life story, disability awareness, music event, musician promotion – basically anything to do with life, disability or music!
In addition, I have a guest blog series called “RFD Question Time with…” where I interview disabled people and/or bloggers. If you’d like to be interviewed in this series, please also contact me.
Blog post roundup
In case you missed any of my blog posts this month, here is a roundup of them:
- Music Interview: Ginger May
- Blogmas: The Christmas Song Book Tag 2022
- Music Interviews: 2022 roundup
- Christmas is a time for…
- Live Music Reviews: 2020 to 2022
5 favourite blog posts
Here are my 5 favourite blog posts I’ve read this month:
- How to support your disabled colleagues at Life of a Blind Girl
- Luke Loves Christmas 2022 | How I’ve Decorated My Room This Year at Luke Sam Sowden
- Blogmas | Games for the Holidays! at Got Meghan
- Stereotypes and The Assumptions They Make at Hannah’s Hope
- A Cripple Carol: Yet Another Christmas Short Story at Simply Emma
