Just back from yet another visit to the hospital. I know the place pretty well by now, and as I wandered between endoscopy and audiology, I passed a number of departments that i have spent many an hour in. I even saw the surgeon who last spilled my blood. There are still some departments that I have yet to visit but no doubt if I hang around long enough I will get to see them too.
I seem to have spent a significant part of my life in the hands of the NHS and i guess that i am grateful to still be here, to be walking and seeing clearly, and yet here i am grumbling about the time i spend there. There are many people who go their whole lives without any intervention by the medical profession, and they are so lucky.
Just entering a hospital fills me with feelings of dread. The smells, the noises and even the decoration on the walls, are all triggers to me. They bring back memories from childhood that are best left alone, and whenever i leave the premises it wis with great relief.
The outcome from today was good, and a weight has been lifted for sure. next week it is my turn again and I will learn the outcome of my CT scan. Oddly I don't look forward to it at all. I wonder if i have a brain?
Friday 29 August 2008
Wednesday 20 August 2008
Sod's law
My understanding of Sod's law, is that if anything can go wrong, then it will. There are many variations on this of course, one of them being that if you drop a piece of buttered toast then it will always land butter side down.
Yesterday I had a CT scan. An interesting experience andI have to say that our health service is a wonderful institution. My appointment was at 1.30m and i was seen as soon as I arrived. The women in charge were courteous and kind and made me feel very relaxed.
As I lay on the conveyor belt, everything that I needed to know was explained and all I had to do was lie still, while the wonders of modern technology whirled around me. It was rather like a giant, soap and water free washing machine, all controlled by the appropriate program, and as it whirled, I slid in and out of the aperture, like a hollywood cliché. Then i got an itch on my nose! It is almost impossible to stay still when you have an itch, and that is all I had to do - just stay still. In and out i went like a slow moving piston; round and round the scanner went, and the itch got worse and worse. Never have I lost interest in technology so swiftly, as all I could perceive was the itch which by now had grown out of all proportion in its significance.
Then the whirring stopped, I was withdrawn from the cavity and it was all over. I sat up and of course the itch had run its course too.
Now i have to wait a week or so for the results!
Yesterday I had a CT scan. An interesting experience andI have to say that our health service is a wonderful institution. My appointment was at 1.30m and i was seen as soon as I arrived. The women in charge were courteous and kind and made me feel very relaxed.
As I lay on the conveyor belt, everything that I needed to know was explained and all I had to do was lie still, while the wonders of modern technology whirled around me. It was rather like a giant, soap and water free washing machine, all controlled by the appropriate program, and as it whirled, I slid in and out of the aperture, like a hollywood cliché. Then i got an itch on my nose! It is almost impossible to stay still when you have an itch, and that is all I had to do - just stay still. In and out i went like a slow moving piston; round and round the scanner went, and the itch got worse and worse. Never have I lost interest in technology so swiftly, as all I could perceive was the itch which by now had grown out of all proportion in its significance.
Then the whirring stopped, I was withdrawn from the cavity and it was all over. I sat up and of course the itch had run its course too.
Now i have to wait a week or so for the results!
Saturday 16 August 2008
Personal spaces
It has been a while since I received any comments here. Clearly I am not being controversial enough, either that or my reader is agreeing with me.
I was reading the other day about a woman who was injured on a plane. She was suing the airline because she was crushed by the passenger sitting next to her.
Whenever I have flown, I have waited with a great deal of trepidation in the departure lounge, examining the assembly of fellow passengers and assessing the ones that I really did not want to sit next to. There are many stereotypes that are always present. The ones with the loud voices, loud shirts or worse, loud children, then there are the ones who look like they might be terrorists, the very tall, like me, whose legs will spread through necessity into the surrounding spaces. There are the elderly who one guesses will be up and down visiting the toilet throughout the flight, there are those that look as if they are about to die of fright, and those that just look ill. By far the worst nightmare though has to be the enormously obese person who cannot possibly fit into a normal seat without overflowing into all the surrounding spaces.
When such a person arrives in the departure lounge, you can see the feeling of panic spread through the passengers each trying to glimpse the seat number on the boarding pass, checking it against their own. The nightmare has to come true for someone, and everyone hopes that it isn't them. More people pray at this time than they do at take off and landing. If I had any proclivity for prayer, this would be the time for me to do it.
I, like many others, loathe invasions of my personal space. I am not naturally gregarious and treat most people distantly and hope that they will remain that way. When i enter a room, i will choose a seat as far away from anyone as possible, and hate being touched in any way by strange people. To be overwhelmed by folds of adipose tissue is my idea of hell.
According to the story, the husband of the large woman, had requested that he sat somewhere else, and so a poor unsuspecting woman was saddled with the experience. Fat lady was so vast that the arm rest between the seats had to be removed and so the poor soul next to her was crushed and needed hospital treatment.
A doctor friend of mine tells me that there really is no excuse for obesity. Even though there are many contributing factors, a fat person fundamentally eats too much. For whatever reason, they eat more than they need to and that is a personal choice.
Everyone who flies is limited in the weight of baggage that they can carry, regardless of their own mass. So a 120lb passenger has the same limitations as one of 600lb. THis is a ludicrous situation and maybe it should be redressed. Perhaps there should be a restriction on total weight carried and that penalty tarriffs for those whose combine mass exceeds a reasonable norm. I am tall and probably carry more pounds than I should and would accept this system, even though we tall people are discriminated against by the ridiculous seat pitch of most airliners.
Discrimination is part of life and maybe by discriminating in favour of the non obese, that might provide some incentive for some people to make life style changes, even if it is just choosing not to fly!
I was reading the other day about a woman who was injured on a plane. She was suing the airline because she was crushed by the passenger sitting next to her.
Whenever I have flown, I have waited with a great deal of trepidation in the departure lounge, examining the assembly of fellow passengers and assessing the ones that I really did not want to sit next to. There are many stereotypes that are always present. The ones with the loud voices, loud shirts or worse, loud children, then there are the ones who look like they might be terrorists, the very tall, like me, whose legs will spread through necessity into the surrounding spaces. There are the elderly who one guesses will be up and down visiting the toilet throughout the flight, there are those that look as if they are about to die of fright, and those that just look ill. By far the worst nightmare though has to be the enormously obese person who cannot possibly fit into a normal seat without overflowing into all the surrounding spaces.
When such a person arrives in the departure lounge, you can see the feeling of panic spread through the passengers each trying to glimpse the seat number on the boarding pass, checking it against their own. The nightmare has to come true for someone, and everyone hopes that it isn't them. More people pray at this time than they do at take off and landing. If I had any proclivity for prayer, this would be the time for me to do it.
I, like many others, loathe invasions of my personal space. I am not naturally gregarious and treat most people distantly and hope that they will remain that way. When i enter a room, i will choose a seat as far away from anyone as possible, and hate being touched in any way by strange people. To be overwhelmed by folds of adipose tissue is my idea of hell.
According to the story, the husband of the large woman, had requested that he sat somewhere else, and so a poor unsuspecting woman was saddled with the experience. Fat lady was so vast that the arm rest between the seats had to be removed and so the poor soul next to her was crushed and needed hospital treatment.
A doctor friend of mine tells me that there really is no excuse for obesity. Even though there are many contributing factors, a fat person fundamentally eats too much. For whatever reason, they eat more than they need to and that is a personal choice.
Everyone who flies is limited in the weight of baggage that they can carry, regardless of their own mass. So a 120lb passenger has the same limitations as one of 600lb. THis is a ludicrous situation and maybe it should be redressed. Perhaps there should be a restriction on total weight carried and that penalty tarriffs for those whose combine mass exceeds a reasonable norm. I am tall and probably carry more pounds than I should and would accept this system, even though we tall people are discriminated against by the ridiculous seat pitch of most airliners.
Discrimination is part of life and maybe by discriminating in favour of the non obese, that might provide some incentive for some people to make life style changes, even if it is just choosing not to fly!
Thursday 14 August 2008
There is no point!
I feel that I should be outside in the sunshine, soaking up every last photon while it is here, but I have been doing a little gardening after having played golf and frankly I feel weary. There was a time when i could go on doing physical stuff all day, but clearly those days are behind me and I am on the slippery slope downhill.
Yesterday I ranted about the ill informed and ludicrously self aggrandised member of the ruling classes and his attempts to inform the public of his perceived disasters. Today the press is full of the same sort of arguments and so I feel quite justified in my comments. Having said that, i haven't seen the sun or the mail, and either or both of them are likely to be sucking up to the royals as usual.
I wish that more people would listen to the arguments put forward so eloquently by Richard Dawkins. Now he too is highly opinionated, but at least he bases his opinions on solid facts and not on whims and fairy tales. If you really want to see a cage rattle, then ask Mr Dawkins about his opinions on intelligent design, a topic that because of religious sensibilities, is being mooted as a valid theory in many schools, both here and in the United States. How on Earth can people, when faced with the facts, even begin to believe what was written down by men in the middle east, long before people began to understand the world around them. It isn't as if the process of evolution is subject to dispute. It is very simple and is borne out by evidence. Evidence is of course what the creationists lack but is does not deter them even for a second.
Basically Evolution is based on the following observations
1. Living things reproduce sexually and produce far more offspring than they need to replace themselves.
2. Within the offspring there is variation, due to the process of cell division that produces the sex cells.
3. There is a struggle to survive - eg a female plaice may lay a million eggs, but only two of them need to survive to breed.
4. Some of the offspring may be better suited to survive in the conditions that prevail.
5. They are the ones that become adults and breed, passing their genetic code onto the next generation.
A simple set of ideas put forward by Charles Darwin in the late nineteenth century, and since then more and more evidence is being unearthed that supports what was once referred to as a theory. Evolution is fact and once you accept that there can be no turning back.
Perhaps that is the problem with the creationists - to open your heart to your faith is one thing, but to open your head to common sense and scientific principles might just undermine the shaky ground upon which their faith is based. Once one accepts the principle of evolution as a series of chance events, then the question, why are we here? becomes an irrelevance and we can stop looking for a supernatural raison d'etre.
Yesterday I ranted about the ill informed and ludicrously self aggrandised member of the ruling classes and his attempts to inform the public of his perceived disasters. Today the press is full of the same sort of arguments and so I feel quite justified in my comments. Having said that, i haven't seen the sun or the mail, and either or both of them are likely to be sucking up to the royals as usual.
I wish that more people would listen to the arguments put forward so eloquently by Richard Dawkins. Now he too is highly opinionated, but at least he bases his opinions on solid facts and not on whims and fairy tales. If you really want to see a cage rattle, then ask Mr Dawkins about his opinions on intelligent design, a topic that because of religious sensibilities, is being mooted as a valid theory in many schools, both here and in the United States. How on Earth can people, when faced with the facts, even begin to believe what was written down by men in the middle east, long before people began to understand the world around them. It isn't as if the process of evolution is subject to dispute. It is very simple and is borne out by evidence. Evidence is of course what the creationists lack but is does not deter them even for a second.
Basically Evolution is based on the following observations
1. Living things reproduce sexually and produce far more offspring than they need to replace themselves.
2. Within the offspring there is variation, due to the process of cell division that produces the sex cells.
3. There is a struggle to survive - eg a female plaice may lay a million eggs, but only two of them need to survive to breed.
4. Some of the offspring may be better suited to survive in the conditions that prevail.
5. They are the ones that become adults and breed, passing their genetic code onto the next generation.
A simple set of ideas put forward by Charles Darwin in the late nineteenth century, and since then more and more evidence is being unearthed that supports what was once referred to as a theory. Evolution is fact and once you accept that there can be no turning back.
Perhaps that is the problem with the creationists - to open your heart to your faith is one thing, but to open your head to common sense and scientific principles might just undermine the shaky ground upon which their faith is based. Once one accepts the principle of evolution as a series of chance events, then the question, why are we here? becomes an irrelevance and we can stop looking for a supernatural raison d'etre.
Wednesday 13 August 2008
GM food
I have never been much of a fan of the Royal Family, and cannot really appreciate the arguments that people put forward for maintaining them. I am sure that Oliver Cromwell hoped to have got rid of the institution and probably turns in whatever grave he is in, at the current state of affairs. We have a priveleged and wealthy bunch of "Aristocrats", powerless to do very much other than make public appearances for the sake of the readers of the sun and the daily mail, who seem to think that millions of pounds of tax payers money is well spent on their upkeep and maintenance, and all they seem to do is produce more mouths for the public purse to feed.
The reason for my outburst, is the recent attacks made by "wingnut" Charlie on the whole of GM technology. According to him, and this guy has no qualifications in Science that I am aware of, the whole GM experiment has been a catastrophe. The evidence that he has, seems to be in his own imagination.
Man has been genetically modifying foods since farmers first bred livestock and cereal crops. Each time a breeder selects a characteristic that he deems apt, and carries out a program leading to that character's development is guilty of genetic manipulation. Without that having taken place, we would have little in the way of food and would of course probably be still living in tribes and painting our faces blue.
It is all part of evolution, which of course is based upon natural selection or the survival of the fittest. The difference is that instead of allowing natural processes to make the selection, man is giving the process a hand. Should he produce something that is unfit to survive in the wild then it will simply die out, which is of course the fate of inbred lines!
GM technology is simply extending our abilities to produce food that will be required to feed the ever growing population. Agreed it needs to be regulated and secure safeguards built in, but surely this is a technology that can produce miraculous results, given time and sufficient research.
Wingnut's problem is that he comes from a long line of inbreds, whose own gene pool has become dangerously limited. His own understanding of the technology is very limited, but in order to justify his own existence, he feels that he must pontificate on all issues that have any degree of controversy. I am sure that he means well, but the problem is that too many people actually listen to him and believe that he knows what he is talking about.
The reason for my outburst, is the recent attacks made by "wingnut" Charlie on the whole of GM technology. According to him, and this guy has no qualifications in Science that I am aware of, the whole GM experiment has been a catastrophe. The evidence that he has, seems to be in his own imagination.
Man has been genetically modifying foods since farmers first bred livestock and cereal crops. Each time a breeder selects a characteristic that he deems apt, and carries out a program leading to that character's development is guilty of genetic manipulation. Without that having taken place, we would have little in the way of food and would of course probably be still living in tribes and painting our faces blue.
It is all part of evolution, which of course is based upon natural selection or the survival of the fittest. The difference is that instead of allowing natural processes to make the selection, man is giving the process a hand. Should he produce something that is unfit to survive in the wild then it will simply die out, which is of course the fate of inbred lines!
GM technology is simply extending our abilities to produce food that will be required to feed the ever growing population. Agreed it needs to be regulated and secure safeguards built in, but surely this is a technology that can produce miraculous results, given time and sufficient research.
Wingnut's problem is that he comes from a long line of inbreds, whose own gene pool has become dangerously limited. His own understanding of the technology is very limited, but in order to justify his own existence, he feels that he must pontificate on all issues that have any degree of controversy. I am sure that he means well, but the problem is that too many people actually listen to him and believe that he knows what he is talking about.
Monday 11 August 2008
Football fans
Generally speaking, football fans have a pretty poor reputation. Yesterday I was one of then, travelling by train to Wembley, along with thousands of Portsmouth fans. Being a Manchester United follower, I kept myself to myself and sat reading a book to while away the journey.
There was much banter, a great deal of noise, and even at 8 something in the morning, a lot of alcohol consumed. There was however nothing in the way of bad behaviour or even unpleasantness. This continued on the London Transport system as 84,000 fans, half in red and half in blue, converged on the Mecca of English football, to witness the fundamentally friendly game that heralds the start of the season.
I met up with my son and we joined the masses heading for North London. Fortunately we had been given tickets, and very good were the seats. Arriving in plenty of time, we were able to spend ridiculous amounts of money on food and drink - (Non alcoholic!), while watching the stadium fill. We were on the halfway line and had an excellent view of the entire pitch. The reds to our right and the blues to our left. I have to say that the Portsmouth fans made the most noise - until they lost of course, and then they went quiet - in fact most of them went home very swiftly, while the red fans, including yours truly stayed behind to watch the presentations and all that goes with it.
Leaving the stadium is an experience not to be repeated. It is hard to describe what it is like to be in a column of 84,000, all heading for the same tube station, all being herded onto the same trains. I guess it is quite close to being a sort of hell on Earth, and it is as close as I ever want to come to the great British public. At least being taller than most I didn't have my nose in anyone's armpit, and i did feel sorry for those vertically challenged.
At no point was there any sign of aggression or of friction between the fans. Ok they are loud, crude and devoted to their teams, but what is wrong with that? I felt no shame for being a part of the day.
There was much banter, a great deal of noise, and even at 8 something in the morning, a lot of alcohol consumed. There was however nothing in the way of bad behaviour or even unpleasantness. This continued on the London Transport system as 84,000 fans, half in red and half in blue, converged on the Mecca of English football, to witness the fundamentally friendly game that heralds the start of the season.
I met up with my son and we joined the masses heading for North London. Fortunately we had been given tickets, and very good were the seats. Arriving in plenty of time, we were able to spend ridiculous amounts of money on food and drink - (Non alcoholic!), while watching the stadium fill. We were on the halfway line and had an excellent view of the entire pitch. The reds to our right and the blues to our left. I have to say that the Portsmouth fans made the most noise - until they lost of course, and then they went quiet - in fact most of them went home very swiftly, while the red fans, including yours truly stayed behind to watch the presentations and all that goes with it.
Leaving the stadium is an experience not to be repeated. It is hard to describe what it is like to be in a column of 84,000, all heading for the same tube station, all being herded onto the same trains. I guess it is quite close to being a sort of hell on Earth, and it is as close as I ever want to come to the great British public. At least being taller than most I didn't have my nose in anyone's armpit, and i did feel sorry for those vertically challenged.
At no point was there any sign of aggression or of friction between the fans. Ok they are loud, crude and devoted to their teams, but what is wrong with that? I felt no shame for being a part of the day.
Wednesday 6 August 2008
Pain
Something happened to me yesterday that has not happened in a long time. I was reaching up to harvest a fresh and very ripe fig from the tree next to the greenhouse, when a sharp pain shot through my hand. I had bee stung by a wasp, who i can only imagine was irked with me for stealing his lunch. The pain grew and coursed through my palm, and could i remember the best treatment? Is it vinegar or baking soda? I couldn't remember whether the wasp sting is acidic or alkaline and so i opted for vinegar. It didn't make it any worse, nor do i think it made it any better.
I know that for some people that such stings are life threatening, and I once had a friend who carried an epipen, as she was so subject to anaphylactic responses to such things. People have died from single stings, and so really in the whole scheme of things, my own discomfort was trivial.
It reminded me of other occasions when i have been stung, and to be frank they are few and far between. I can only recall two other events, though there may have been more. The first time i remember being stung, i must have been about 17 yrs old. I was fishing on a river bank and keeping very still and very quiet, concentrating on the fish or lack of them. A wasp managed to get into my mouth when i wasn't looking, and promptly stung me inside my lip. That hurt! My lips swelled and the pain was like no other. The wasp escaped unhurt and lived to sting someone else. My fishing day was over, as i stumbled home feeling sorry for myself.
I still feel the remnants of yesterday and there is a small red spot where the assault took place, and as before the individual responsible has escaped to fight another day. I picked some more figs this morning, but this time took a lot more care about where i put my hand. Pain is a great tutor!
I know that for some people that such stings are life threatening, and I once had a friend who carried an epipen, as she was so subject to anaphylactic responses to such things. People have died from single stings, and so really in the whole scheme of things, my own discomfort was trivial.
It reminded me of other occasions when i have been stung, and to be frank they are few and far between. I can only recall two other events, though there may have been more. The first time i remember being stung, i must have been about 17 yrs old. I was fishing on a river bank and keeping very still and very quiet, concentrating on the fish or lack of them. A wasp managed to get into my mouth when i wasn't looking, and promptly stung me inside my lip. That hurt! My lips swelled and the pain was like no other. The wasp escaped unhurt and lived to sting someone else. My fishing day was over, as i stumbled home feeling sorry for myself.
I still feel the remnants of yesterday and there is a small red spot where the assault took place, and as before the individual responsible has escaped to fight another day. I picked some more figs this morning, but this time took a lot more care about where i put my hand. Pain is a great tutor!
Tuesday 5 August 2008
Cowes Week
Well it is Cowes week, the big sailing festival of the year, and it is raining. The forecast for the rest of the week looks to be pretty much the same.
The town of course is full, and the locals welcome all the visitors with inflated prices and hand over your money ingratiation. The town loves Cowes Week as it brings in money and also keeps Cowes on the map. It may be a tiny seaside town with only one hotel, but it has the accolade of sailing Mecca for the rich and famous for one week in the year.
I guess there were times when it was just for the upper classes, and was part of the "Season". Nowadays it is for everyone who wants to drink all day and sit watching people passing by. Even since I have been here, I sense that it is gradually slipping down the same slope as everything else, into a fully accessible, commercialised miasmic plateau of dumbed down mediocrity.
The town at night is becoming the meeting point for the chavs, who occupy the bars, and with their carrier bags full of cheap supermarket vodka, generate an atmosphere that is becoming less and less appealing and to some extent even threatening. They bring little to the festivities other than an erosion of freedom for others.
Dumbing down is a slippery slope with no ending. However we wrap it up, society is a mixed bag and always will be. Making everything accessible to everyone is sheer nonsense. I agree fully with equality of opportunity, and there should always be ways out of the holes that people dig for themselves, or that they fall into, but should everything be downgraded to accommodate the lowest common denominator?
Should Jemima, with her three grade D GCSE's be encouraged to become a doctor or an airline pilot? Should we make sure that all books are produced as cartoons? Should the Royal Opera House open a McDonalds franchise while reducing perormances to bursts of 5 minutes in order to take into account short attention spans?
I worry about the way that we are heading. I'd like to think that there are pinnacles that are inaccessible to me, and places that I cannot go and targets that I cannot meet. Such things raise aspirations for self improvement as well as adding to life's mysteries.
Groucho Marx once said that he wouldn't want to join a club that would have him as a member. Oh how right he was!
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