Explosion at Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England.

I'd never heard of her either, which shows how out of touch I must be at the moment.  My heart goes out to the parents of the kids murdered last night, terrible tragedy.  No one should have to go through that.

These things, they always bring back memories of 7/7, I was working in central London, in the West End at the time and had to get the Piccadilly line from my then girlfriend's place in North London.  I remember the tube was particularly packed that morning as there had been some problems on the line (or it might have been the Victoria line that had the problems, so everyone was piling on the Piccadilly line which headed in more or less the same direction).   Nothing particularly out of the ordinary.  Except shortly after I got into the office we started hearing reports of short circuits on the tube.  And then we were getting mixed reports that there were some kind of explosions.  Then every person in the office's mobile phone signal went dead, we still had the landlines and internet access, but you knew then something must be seriously wrong. Then when the reports came in of the bus being blown up and all the rest of it you were left in no doubt.

If I'd have got on that packed tube just 15 minutes later that morning, chances are I would have been on the same train as the suicide bomber.  To be honest, you feel like you've dodged a bullet when something like that happens.  Someone actually came into work on that very train, covered in soot, they got straight back home.  All the buses and tubes had been cancelled that day, and couldn't get a taxi home for love or money, so potentially was going to have to walk I think 8 or 9 miles. I walked with an intern who was heading in the same direction, I'd never spoken to him before, but we were heading for King Cross to see if we could get an overhead train to cut out some of the walking, and on the way we walked straight past the site of the bus bombing on the square (I don't think either of us realised we were going to walk straight past it, it had been cornered off by this point and forensics in white suits and police were all over it).  As we talked I remember he had the same look in his eye that I was feeling, not of fear, but I think maybe more adrenaline, difficult to describe, maybe to say we were feeling a little pumped but also wondering wtf is happening, maybe feeling pumped is a natural primal body response when you feel like you under attack, although I was acting cool as if nothing could ever phase me. 

I didn't feel nervous at all though the next day, like I said earlier I felt like I missed a bullet.  It was only when the failed attacks happened a couple of weeks later I started feeling nervous about getting on the tube, because then it seemed like this might not be a one off.  But that passed after a day or so.

I'll always remember some words my mum told me when I was a kid, we were heading to meet an old army friend of hers to watch a military show in Essex, a 'tattoo' I think they called it, even at the age of 8 or 9 I knew something like that could be a target for the IRA and she said to me "son, you never let terrorists effect your life, you carry on as normal and you keep doing the things you enjoy, otherwise they win".  My mum was wrong about a lot of things, and I'm not sure if I'd have been quite so 'gung ho' as a parent in that age, but her words were as true then as they are today.  You carry on, as normal.  Always.

8 year old niece is a big fan so I know loads about this one.
Real scary if this is one of those bastards that came back from Syria.

I just read the death toll is up to 22. They've arrested a guy in connection with it. I want them to go old school. Take him to the tower for a few days and bust out the heavy equipment.

Targeting children? What is fucking wrong with people?

Eight year old girl confirmed as one of the victims.

Bastards.