So, I’ve been looking on in joy watching the new Obama led government put a stop to torture in their name, signing orders to close Guantanamo, and generally being shiny in all the ways I’d hoped they’d be. Happily reading good things in the papers. It’s been a bit, well, different.
Feeling quite positive about the world.
And my MP wrote back to my previous ‘please vote against this’ with a ‘already was, but thanks’; which I rather liked. And then I came across this: who needs privacy?
So, today I crafted another e-mail to my MP – I’m hoping she’ll be on-side with this one as well. I never really thought of myself as being a political creature, but as I’ve got older and realised that I disagree with a lot of things that are going on, and I am really unhappy with where the country’s going (in general terms) I find myself being more and more politically motivated. Even though I don’t intend to be here much longer I don’t think that anyone should have to put up with the level of invasion of privacy that they’re suggesting.
The irony is I’m one of these weird people who’s pro the NHS having a massive database of health records; or at least basic information shared across the country. Why? Because I stand there and have patients who are dying in front of me who might have hideous allergies to the drugs we’re about to give them, who’ve been in accidents and can’t tell me that they’ve got some medical condition or other and I think, well, it’d make sense to have that information available. However, I disagree with the way they’ve done it. I disagree with virtually everything about computers in the NHS that I’ve encountered. Ironically the best (and most reliable) systems I’ve encountered are the early 80s ones with the text interfaces running on Unix based systems. Although ours has a really dumb-ass bug where if you press any of the arrow keys (except the up/down ones) it instantly crashes your instance of the software, which can be dreadfully annoying when you’re hurridly discharging the patient walking out the door at 3hours 59mins (4 hours is a breach, and a great sin).
But having the government having access to that information? Makes me want to go back to storing all information on paper cards and in little folders, just to make life as difficult for them as possible.
In other news, the TV appears to be soldiering on, I’m suspecting it was just a loose connector (bad me, should have checked) – it seems happy enough though. I’ve had to give in and order a new HDD for the Hackintosh though, it still freaks me out, that once a 20Meg HDD was ‘huge’ and now I’m about to stick a 1Tb drive into this computer.
I’m actually tempted to keep the 500Gig one as a ‘backup’ and just decruft it a bit and stick it in a box. I’ve no way to back up stuff otherwise.
In other (other) news, it has come to my attention that I’m not being as good about ‘doing things’ as I should be. I’ve got a pile of paperwork building up, again, which needs sorting. I need to get off my ass and do something about my (non-new-year’s but) resolution (all the same) to put in at least an hour a day into my development as a nurse. I need to get the cars sorted. I need to assemble the MZ. I need to finish decorating this house so we can escape this damn country and get (me) somewhere I can get paid a reasonable amount for my skills without pimping myself out to any trust that’ll pay me – no job security there. And to a place where Kathryn can truly start the process of getting the job she wants.
I want to only work one job, not 3. I want to be able to see Kathryn. I don’t want to stand staring at my off duty and looking at the request I do two sets of nights in a month and think ‘well, shit, I could do with the money’ and end up saying yes.
The wonderful nature of the people around me has kept me going thus far, and I shall miss my friends greatly when I leave this little island, but this little island has no respect for public servants. And working 3 jobs means I have no time or energy to express my creativity. I want to be off urbexing, I want to create the animation that runs through my head whenever I listen to Rock ‘n’ Roll or Trains (in fact, quite a few of the tracks on Today Is.. inspire me and I’m wondering if I could animate the entire album).
A lot of this is down to me. I sit down of a morning and browse the internet until I’m bored and then sit and watch Blackadder, or BSG, or House, or Hustle instead of doing things that would actually make me feel a creative and interesting person. I am disappointed in my lack of activity. I’m disappointed that I’ve not written the book that lurks in my head. Even if it’s crap, I should have written it.
I sound down on myself, and sad. I’m not, I’m feeling positive. I have the power to change these things. I have the power to give myself the time to do these things. Not necessarily creative time right now (with 2 cars sick and needing input of time and energy, and a bike that needs assembling, and a house in need of decorating). But I’ve remembered that I can do this. I used to come home after an early and work. I used to make progress on the house. That will start to happen again.
I’m going to finish the kitchen over the next couple of weeks. The walls and the ceiling need washing down (Kathryn’s started). The cars are going to get sorted too. So; so we all know what the plan is:
Late days: Paperwork and Development on Nursing.
Earlys: Work on house or cars
Days off: Spending time with Kathryn, doing creative stuff or seeing friends or family
Uh, and cleaning the bathroom :)
Which I’m off to do now.
Time to decruft :)
