Online diary & blog with added tech geekery and travel writing
In the British Isles, it looks like 2025 is a mast year. https://medium.com/gardening-birding-and-outdoor-adventure/what-is-a-mast-year-e6ef751460d0 Please help the trees. Gather as many acorns & other big, easy to find tree seeds as you can find, & scatter them on any waste land you can reach.…
This is the outline of a sketch of something deep, maybe, possibly. Don't expect greatness from it. DON'T start in with "just let people like what they like". Not interested. I have a point, a question, here. I am not interested in your grumbling. A 1990s Britpop band called Oasis are touring the UK right now. Apparently it's the most massively sold-out tour _ever_ or something. My preferred radio…
Watching people posting about the Fallout TV series, I got curious and did a little reading up on it. I had almost no idea of this entire franchise, which has existed for half my lifetime. Never seen it, never played it -- I'm not a gamer and they definitely do not sound like my kind of game. (I don't like role playing or role playing games.) There's a fleshed-out world, canon and non-canon,…
Number 1. There is a rash of flavoured teas in British supermarkets since I returned. Shortbread flavoured tea, for instance. I find them weird and a bit sickly. So I tried a mixture of ordinary black teabags and flavoured teabags. This worked rather better and I recommend it. It takes the edge off. Number 2. *But* I did something bad and wrong: I made a pot with Earl Grey and shortcake flavoured…
(Not really update 22.) Huh. Missed the anniversary of the latest bike crash – it was on Monday. Today, the ever-helpful Google showed me a selfie I took from my hospital bed a year ago. (Thanks *so* much for the reminder, Googs.) So, a year ago today I had more or less got some kind of alertness back and was hoping to get transferred over to Liverpool for my arm to be reassembled. Little did I…
I am overdue. So, on Tuesday, as I said last week, I was up at 4:30 to fly to Liverpool. I saw Ms Helene Stephenson, a senior consultant there, who greeted me familiarly although I am ashamed to admit I don't remember meeting her before. I got good news (for a change). They are happy with how it's uniting, and as soon as 1 year post-operation, they could maybe remove the plate in my wrist -- that…
(Not really a proper instalment, but previous stage... https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159152766826691&id=608866690 ) [Fixup post compiled from a few FB posts and comments. Sorry for poor formatting. This was all last Friday.] ----- I decided to come to the clinic early, just to check I found the right place, etc. I figured that they weren't going to see me 4 hours early or anything.…
(Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159085978761691&id=608866690 ) Recovery continues. Yesterday I went up to see my mum. Just for a couple of hours, by taxi, but that's the furthest I've been since I got home. Today, I walked up to Little Diamonds Nursery with Jana Štůlová (or "my work" as Ada calls it.) It's only a couple of hundred metres, but I was…
(Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159083697221691&id=608866690 ) I got home last night. That's home as in rented house in the Isle of Man. The ward sister, Amy, at the Aintree University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust , is kicking me out at about midday. I had to find and book flight or boat, fast, myself, now. Stress levels now 11/10. Pain 5-6/10. Not pooped in 10…
(Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159079424981691&id=608866690 ) I am still here. Pain levels extreme, and this is after I/V morphine on PCA plus codeine tablets and intravenous paracetamol. Surprised nobody asked what PCA was last night. Stands for Patient Controlled Analgesia. It's a big button on a cable & you press it for a shot of I/V meds. It will only trigger…
I am in so much excruciating pain that I can't sleep... But sleeplessness makes it worse. And as the anaesthesia gradually wears off, it's spelt getting worse. I also keep vomiting, which provides only very brief transient relief. I have, or had, all sorts of profound insights I wanted to share, but I'm so unwell I just couldn't. I hope I can remember some, in a few days' time. I wanted to talk…
Part 12. (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159075501541691&id=608866690 ) Still absolutely knackered here. Spent most of the day in bed. Not ashamed one bit. Last afternoon boosted by an unexpected visit from Pete Young and Benji, though -- that was lovely. I'm OK, although they forgot to feed me at lunchtime. So I got cornflakes. Better than nothing! Pleasant…
Part 11... (Link to previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159073691646691&id=608866690 ) I was getting pretty desperate last night, as you could tell. The effort of sitting up and making some calls destroyed me. My health took a steep turn for the worse yesterday afternoon as a result, after spending a couple of hours trying to find another hospital on my own. This…
Part 1 (Saturday) https://lproven.dreamwidth.org/304633.html Part 2 (Sunday 1.45 AM) https://lproven.dreamwidth.org/304651.html Part 3 (Sunday 3 AM) https://lproven.dreamwidth.org/304974.html Part 4 (Sunday midday) https://lproven.dreamwidth.org/305303.html Part 5 (Sunday evening) https://lproven.dreamwidth.org/305657.html Part 6 (Monday) https://lproven.dreamwidth.org/305901.html Part 7 (later on…
Part 10, and this is your chance to help. (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159071726316691&id=608866690 ) I'm *still* in Nobles Hospital. It's now 5 days since I've had any medical treatment except some medications. For the last 3 days I've been kept on nil by mouth overnight, every night, just in case there was a bed available for me in the Aintree University…
Part 9... (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159069304821691&id=608866690 ) In theory I'm being transferred to Liverpool today but something happened last night and there is no bed available for me in Aintree. I was kept on nil by mouth all night and morning, and when I asked for some help with personal hygiene before trying to dress and fly, was told no. Apparently…
Part 8... (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159068820891691&id=608866690 ) After a couple of hours sitting up in the chair, it all became a bit too much for me. Returned to bed, hurting, quite a lot. My mum & Linda Robinson visited. I have had lots of tea, my mum washed my face and hand... and I can see again. Ada broke my good glasses some months ago. (Some rather…
Part 7... (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159067245306691&id=608866690 ) I am out of bed. Catheter removed, so eliminatory independence beckons. And I've been able to kinda sorta clean my teeth. Not a very good job, with one bandaged hand with a cannula in the wrist, but hey. On much less pain meds today and feeling brighter, but that's on a relative scale. As…
Part 6... (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159066260761691&id=608866690 ) Feeling very rough and sleepy but I feel I owe you all an update. No fluids from 3AM. Met the consultant at about 10. Preliminary op before the real one(s). Meet the anaesthesiologist at about 1. Tomáš, a Slovak. I managed to hold a conversation in Czech with him despite my poor…
Part 5... (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159065963886691&id=608866690 ) No fluids in 7 hours. Feel awful. I/V painkillers ran out and nurses too busy. Hospital pharmacy shut on the tenuous basis that it's Sunday. FFS. Jana Štůlová brought me 1 from home but it's empty. There is a severely special needs patient in the next room who spends a lot of her waking time…
Part 4... (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159065234316691&id=608866690 ) Got maybe an hour or 2 of uneasy sleep. They are going to operate. This morning. Basic clean-up because it's an open fracture... then fly me to Liverpool Aintree, because this is too much for a small provincial hospital. comments
Part 3... (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159065135951691&id=608866690 ) Holy crap on a cracker that was bad. It's straighter now, they tell me. That is possibly the worst thing that has ever happened to me. Holy hell that hurt. Entonox is great stuff. Feck. I'm shaking. Several years of meditation practice just paid off a hundred fold. You know when they tell you…
Part 2... (Previous instalment: https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10159064908616691&id=608866690 ) Oh hell. It's quarter to 2 in the morning and the consultant just came round to ask me if he can try to reset the shattered bones. They wouldn't do that now if it wasn't urgent. There's a risk of compartment syndrome. I'm already in too much pain to sleep even after 4 doses of morphine. But…
Part 1... Fell off my bicycle. Smashed right arm up very badly. Open compound fracture ulna & radius. Again. I'm in ward 11 and may need to be medevaced to Liverpool. It's 1986 all over again. 😢 comments
I am trying to train myself out of the marketing lizards weasel-words "climate change". It's not just change: it's a specific change which is very visible. At the end of last year, I posted about this. It did quite well. Here's the post I wrote then, when the Thwaites Glacier started to crumble: https://lproven.dreamwidth.org/303704.html It has some numbers for energy transport and things which…