Mostly lemon based

Category: General

  • I shouldn’t whine :)

    So, it’s been a bit of a busy week and posting (while it’s been in my head) has been a bit of a not-happening-thing.

    Amazingly, on Tuesday Jonathon at JLH informed me that Rebecca was (or would be) ready to pick up that evening. Sporting a new MOT, and despite the gearbox sounding like a blender filled with spanners, all the work that was paid for and asked for was done, with the exception of a few piddly jobs. I chatted with Kathryn and we decided to head up after work on Wednesday and bring Rebecca back to the fold.

    We flew up there on Wednesday, the trains being amazingly good to us (although Virgin had double booked our seats, but we found a pair together elsewhere on the train); and the timetable’s incredibly irritating, because you arrive from the FGW train in Reading just after the previous Leamington Spa Virgin train service has left, so all the staff go ‘oh, platform…no, sorry, you’ve just missed that one’…

    Having got there we were met at the station by Jonathon (who really is terribly nice), who also kept us entertained with tea while we waited for Rebecca to make her way back from the engine-place. She’d gone back there because she’d sucked up a bunch of crap from the petrol tank and wasn’t idling very well. Carb cleaned out (and apparently ‘could do with a rebuild’, *sigh*); she returned. She sounds *fabulous*.

    I’ve missed that A+ series engine. It doesn’t clatter musically the way the A series did (mind you, all my engines have been pretty worn out), and is apparently now developing a shocking 75bhp, approx. ISTR that it was originally rated at around 56 or 65bhp, but I doubt that the A+ I had was developing more than around 50 or possibly 40. It was pretty sick. And by the time we got up there, probably around 30 :)

    Anyhow, she sounds lovely, and quite sporty. But, in the way that’s traditional, Jonathon reckoned that they cold just pop the new heater control valve on, so we’d not cook on the way home. That 15 minute job took a couple of hours (waiting for the car to cool down, tap not fitting, different tap not fitting, studs going in, coming out…) – and when we finally went to leave, just as they’d locked up the garage and the gate they realised that Jonathon’s car had a flat tyre… and Jonathon was leading us to the nearest local petrol station…

    We finally started making our way home at about 2100… And finally got home, having not eaten dinner, just after 2300. I fell into bed and then had to get up at 0500, to get to work. But it was nice, driving the minor. The reason the journey home took that long is we have to run in the engine. People don’t seem to bother (or know) about running in engines anymore. But having just forked out a grand for an engine I’m going to give it lots of love; so I’ve been good about not taking it far over 45mph (I’ve not even hit 50 – as 45 was the limit that was proscribed by the engine builder).

    Apart from the sidelights stopping working (ack! turned out to be a corroded fuse) and the starter motor jamming on (and not working once, I think I need a new solenoid), it’s been trauma free. And I’ll tell you something, she’s darn nippy. Roundabouts in particular are standard-suspension-pushing.

    But one of the *bestest* things about having Rebecca back (apart from the stupid grin it puts on my face) is that we took her to my mum’s house at the weekend – and drove my mum to her wedding. Paint all washed and shiny (at least in quite a few places – particularly the back where she’s been painted, the roof which they ‘mopped’ and the bonnet which they seem to have also polished), sporting a cream ribbon (which Kathryn went and got, ‘cos she’s a *star*), we carried my mum to and her and her new hubbie from her wedding; which felt quite fun.

    The wedding itself was really beautiful. It was a small affair, my mum and Paramito invited only close family and a few friends; in all I think there were 10 or so people. The Register Office in Newbury is really grand – it’s a huge old Edwardian manor, and is quite beautiful. It’s just a shame that you only get a few seconds for photos – but James – who is also an awesome friend – came and took photos of the wedding.

    The rain even stopped long enough for M&P to be photo’d outside. It started again as we did the group shots…

    Once we got back to the house, and everyone was being fed by my mum (who remains a truly awesome cook) the weather cleared completely and we spent the afternoon and evening hanging around outside in the sun.

    Then Sunday we hurtled (for very low speed values of hurtling) back home, tidied and greeted Ali and Kris – two of my friends who Kathryn’d never met and I’d not seen for 2 years! We had a fairly chilled afternoon just sat chatting. There was a lot of catching up to do, and it was just really good to see them. With all my friends being so far away (well, um, 45 minutes in their case *embarassed*) it’s sometimes easy to forget how generally awesome they are.

    We then spent the evening doing a wedding gift list. We’d not been really intending to do one – on the basis that there’s not much we *need*. But the requests came in for one; so we sat down and worked out things that’d be useful, or that we want, but that aren’t insanely expensive. Annoyingly Ikea have no gift-list system, and their gift-card system is a non-online one. What planet are they on?!

    *le sigh*

    Finally, today’s been spent working on the house; well, more accurately it was spent at work, then in the supermarket, then working on the house. As it’s now ten to 12, I think it’s time for me to head to bed… I’ve run out of plaster and the wall is as smooth as I can manage in my tired state :-/

  • Disappointment

    I really feel like I’ve let down my mum on this; it’s not anything that I can really say is my fault, but just… I was meant to be taking her into Newbury for an appointment, which we had to cancel because I’d not got a car that worked. And I said at the time that I’d get there and we’d head in before she got married.

    I didn’t, because I’ve still not got a car.

    If I’d’ve spent 25 quid on the V5 for the DAF earlier, I’d’ve had it back by now, and would – to some extent – have a car.

    But worse; for me at least; is that I was meant to be providing the car to take my mum to the register office for her wedding. In my head I had Rebecca with some cream ribbon from the bonnet flash up to the front windows. Washed and even polished, to make her the shinest she can be. My mum’s given me so much over the years and it was a little something to give back…

    …and it looks like Rebecca won’t be ready for the wedding. The engine is still not back, I can’t say I’m exactly impressed. It’s not the fault of JLH – but the guy’s had the money for the engine, it was paid for in advance, and it’s been over a month. The crank’s still not been reground, and therefore my car while complete in every other regard is completely lacking in engine.

    I feel like I’m letting my mum down. Hell, as it stands we’ll have to get a lift to my mum’s house from Paramito (her fiance), and back on the of the wedding, or the day after. Unless the DAF’s V5 appears. Since I only sent off for the V5 a week and a half ago it seems unlikely (they say 4 – 6 weeks, and I’m suspecting that Joan, the previous owner, isn’t going to be lightning fast returning the ‘I sold the car’ letter).

    The bike’s showing the usual symptoms of warm-weather unhappiness; it’s top speed was down around 45 today. I just feel a bit like I suck, really. Which is an unfair damning of myself, but… money’s a big stressor at the moment, and because of that I’ve not been able to see as much of Kathryn as I want to, and… oh, it’s all just a bit of a problem at the moment. It’s being a lot of hard work, and I don’t feel like I’ve achieved anything much.

    Anyway, bed now, because Kate’s have to get up at 5:30am.

  • Theory and Practice

    About 6 or 7 weeks ago I sold the Viva; it had become somewhat of a millstone, sucking money in and making me miserable. It also had sprayed me with hot coolant, and looked likely to fail it’s next MOT without fairly substantial works to at least one sill, if not both.

    On the plus side, the Minor looked to be nearly ready and so it made sense to sell a car with an MOT, rather than sell it without. It’s now about 7 weeks on, and the minor hopefully should be ready this weekend. We’re apparently waiting on the engine, which itself is waiting on the crankshaft, which needs to be reground. I’m praying that it’s done and back and being assembled as we speak. I promised the Minor to my mum for her wedding, plans involving white ribbon and all that. I know she’s hardly the world’s shiniest minor, but she’s part of the family.

    Part of the reason for selling the Viva was, I’ll grant, that I thought I’d have the DAF up and running too. This was, of course, dependent on the original owner coming up with the V5. Which she hasn’t done. Which means that the DAF – while roadworthy (although needing brakes adjusting) is stuck on the drive – the ridiculousness of the DVLA’s policy (that an MOTd and insured car needs a V5 to get a tax disk) does frustrate me. If I’d stolen the car, d’y’think I’d *really* turn up at a DVLA office asking to *buy* a tax disk? Really?

    I can’t actually think of a criminal process which would involve buying a tax disk for an illegally obtained car, and therefore find the idea that I can’t have one dumb.

    At any rate, we’ve now been without a car of any road-legal sort for 7 weeks, and I’m beginning to tire of it. This wasn’t meant to be a long old whine, but frankly, it cost me 65 quid to make the journey to *agency nurse shift* and it should’ve cost me around 35 quid. To be fair I could’ve ridden the bike, but also to be fair, the bike’s top speed can drop as low as 45 on a really bad day, and 2-3 hours of riding at that speed would make me want to weep.

    Anyway, so, skipping the whining, we had a productive week- in so far as I made lots of money  (more than I make in a week at work) doing 2 agency shifts (does anyone see how ridiculous that is?) and we replaced the old metal shed with a new (attrociously poor quality, but looks the part) wooden shed. We spent almost 12 hours solidly working on the shed (apart from a very quick break for lunch), the old one being surprisingly hard to take down. Rotten though it was there was a lot of rusty old steel holding it together. The block-work back wall was as bad as I feared though and I just pushed it over. Kathryn and I broke it up a bit once it’d been pushed over – so as to clear it away somewhat more easily. Unfortunately, the guy who said he’d come take away the steel hasn’t turned up; and our back yard looks like a scrap yard. We need to get a skip in, and my plan to put the car on the neighbour’s drive (the one of the abandoned house) has been foiled by him turning up and putting his car there. The swine.

    I don’t see any action on the house though, so I guess he’s just dumped his car there and gone off on holiday (it’s a handy spot to park if you’re flying, I guess).

    Anyway, so I’m back at my usual work after a week of nights, and the week ‘off’ with the 2 agency shifts – and I’ve screwed my body up by doing one night in that bunch. I’m tired and grumpy feeling – and I meant to ring the doctor this morning to sort out an appointment (I’m due my regular blood test to see if my liver’s got worse, I need my allergy meds and I want a referral to Guy’s allergy clinic). Unfortunately, I sat being apathetic until I finally rang and they’d no appointments left. Some days I really suck :-/

    I’ll have to do it one day next week now, which is a shame because Kathryn might be at home and I’d much rather have spent time with Kathryn. The problem is, I’m achy and tired, and the sofa is terribly comfy.

    Other tasks which were up for this morning included wandering to B&Q and seeing if they still do the dire, cheap, wobbly metal shelving which I could screw to the back wall of the thin-staple and nail shed so as we could actually have our kitchen back. I reckon that with a couple of sets of shelves there’d actually be enough space in there to put *all* the decorating and DIY stuff. Possibly even the relevant bits of the Charlie when I bring her back from my mum’s.

    I’m, it must be said, getting desperate for a bike which does more than 50 mph. It’s mind blowingly tedious, the motorway at 50mph. And it’s not even like I’m getting awesome fuel efficiency from Cherry at this cruising speed, some of the petrol’s going into the gearbox, and lord knows where the rest of the 60mpg is going (it’s still running around 45mpg).

    I *am* in a whiny mood.

    I think I’ll go shower, and then put some more filler on Jejy, and watch We love XKCD a few more times. As a side point, one thing which I have noted for it’s awesomeness, apart from my luck at meeting Kathryn who is awesome beyond words, is that cooking one’s food from scratch does result in meals that are delicious. For years I’ve espoused this theory, and being one who can knock up a reasonable tomato sauce in the same time it takes to warm a pre-bought one (mine’s better :-P) had lived on basically: wraps, pasta, curry and pizza – those being the recipes I had in my head – for years. But being with Kathryn, and being bored of those minimal choices, we’ve started cooking our way through a couple of cook books – including the world’s most gorgeous chicken pie (coming again this weekend, because while it’s phenominally unhealthy (pot of cream, block of butter) it’s just so damn good that occasionally we have to eat it), calzone (we overcooked it slightly and it was still bloody delicious), curried parsnip soup (my dad’d be proud, bit too lemony but also great), and a miriad of other great dishes – and y’know what, my diet is much better and (apart from being knackered) I feel healthier. And it’s just damn spiffy.

    Yes, we loose an hour every night to cooking, but quite frankly it’s worth it. Unfortunately, however creatively I did the sums I couldn’t make buying cereal more expensive that making our own granola. Our own granola was excellent. Truly, we had hit on the celestial being’s own recipe for granola. But now we’re back to Tesco Crunchy and Kathryn (not being a huge fan of it) is back on Fruit and Fibre. It’s somewhat of a comedown.
    The other disappointing thing is not having time or space to invite others to come share with us. I miss having people come around to stay, and come for dinner. Hopefully, once I’ve got my debts a little more under control, and perhaps got money back from Charlie for the bodged restoration of Rebecca, and the house is more finished we can get back to a more luxurious lifestyle. Anyhow, I should move off this sofa, because I’ve been sat here all morning.

    …oh, I’m still tickled that we don’t look over 18 :)

  • *Cue manic laughter*

    We went to buy bread, taking only bare essentials with us (debit card, keys).

    We spotted ‘Peach Wine Cooler’ and y’know, it’s a nice day, and the idea sat well with dinner.

    We got ID’d. May I remind you that I’m 30.

    We don’t have peach wine cooler.

    *grins and bounces*

  • In which the computer says no, Kate gives in, and adds more stress.

    So, yesterday after my Violence and Aggression training (I’m just not aggressive enough with patients ;) ) I headed in to Theale to attempt to get the newly MOT’d Jejy Taxed. The government are usually overjoyed to make off with your cash, but giving a tax disk to a non-V5-having vehicle owner is a discretionary act, and may actually not be possible where the V5 lists the car as having the wrong tax band (Disabled == free tax; I’m not disabled, so need Private / Light goods == not free). At any rate, the chap was friendly, polite, cheerful, and determined not to give me a tax disk. More frustratingly I have to go *back* to Theale when I finally do get the V5 (the timescale for which is entirely dependent on whether the old owner deigns to send back the letter saying ‘yes, I’ve sold the car’) – because they can’t simultaneously issue a new V5 *and* change the tax band. No, they’re two separate and distinct processes which cannot be combined. *le sigh*

    So I rode back, and on the way back came to a decision. I would get a new bike jacket. My old jacket has done 5 years of hard abuse. It’s seams are disintegrating (relying on the hidden for extra-strength seams), the zip is broken, and it doesn’t even make a pretence of being waterproof anymore. Riding in the rain had become one long shower… since I may be stuck commuting on the bike for a month, possibly more, since the Minor continues to be a disaster area (did I mention, my old 1300 engine was apparently the subject of a welded repair both to the head *and* the bore, and is thus not worth reboring and rebuilding), and the V5 for the DAF could take 6 weeks to come back…

    Not only that, but I’m hoping to do some Agency work this week, although ironically today (for the first time in several days) I’ve not got a message saying ‘please come work for us’. Argh!
    So I stopped off at Hein Gerick (well, stopped off == rode through Sloughland’s awful traffic) and examined the huge range of women’s jackets (ha, all 4 of the textile ones). Was seduced into buying a better one than the one I was going to get (it’s more waterproof than the cheapest one, which I was looking at), piled it all onto the back of the ‘zed and rode home.

    It’s black, again, which is not what I really wanted; I wanted something with better visibility than my old jacket, but they didn’t have it in any other colour. Mind, it’ll show the dirt less, which is probably good given how filthy I was after riding home yesterday.

    And more stress? Because having so little money that bills are impossible to look at without wanting to hide, working more than full time, planning 2 wedding ceremonies (although, to be fair a lot of that’s being done by Kathryn’s Mom, Kathryn’s Dad’s Partner, Kathryn’s sister and my Mum), running 2 classics (well, theoretically) and struggling to keep a very sickly MZ on the road isn’t stressful enough I’ve agreed to go on a 5 day ATNC course (ATLS and Nursing, not observing this time)… partly in the week before our wedding.

    It’s one of those ‘take the opportunity or possibly loose it for years’ moments, and biting the bullet I took it.

    I’m scared witless, but there y’go. Anyway, I’m going to shower and then chase the agency and see if they need anyone in A&E anywhere this afternoon. I’m all set to go…

  • The advantage of sleep deprivation

    So, I would like to post about work; obviously. I mean, who wouldn’t? My job’s dead interesting – and I get to see all sorts of things I’d love to talk about. Some people seem to have this art of writing about nursing, paramedic/tech-ing, doctor-uh-ing (er, some of those didn’t work very well) in an interesting and entertaining way, and they also seem to have got down the art of not-getting-caught-at-it pretty well. I, on the other hand still exist in a world of paranoia, where talking about work is something I rarely do on here, and when I do it’s often a password protected, friends only post.

    Which is a shame, really. Because if you get me talking about it, I seem to be quite entertaining. This is apropos of nothing really, but I noted that I seem to (if I get in to it) be able to amuse Kathryn and my mother (and my friends) with my tales, but when it comes to putting them on paper they always feel dry  and uninspiring; like week-old-bread.

    But hey.

    There are several advantages, for me, of sleep deprevation (which is what I do to myself after my nights, and which is why my stomach currently feels like someone’s turning it inside out, I suspect. After all, I’ve been awake for 23 hours, 12 of which were spent at work). One of those advantages is I get to look back on these pseudo stream-of-consciousness rambly posts and go ‘my, my head really is not on right after nights’, and the other is something I discovered when I was MZ’ing in to London to get the Bike MOT’d.

    If you recall, the bike broke down, and although my approach to fixing it was initially dumb, I gave myself a lot of leeway because I knew I was phenominally tired. I took much more time than I normally would, and didn’t berate myself for mistakes so much. And when I felt that deep frustration welling up because it wasn’t working or going right I stood back and spent a few minutes contemplating the sky, or the huge amount of traffic, or just how truly rusty the petrol tank is.

    I’m actually a better mechanic when I’m exausted, because I’m more careful, and more willing to step back and re-examine where I’m at and what I’m doing to check that I’m not being dumb. When I’m full of energy and not so self-aware then I tend to assume the object is just being stubborn.

    So, anyhow, I got home to find that the Hub Puller, ordered 2 weeks ago had finally showed up. My convincedness of her postage costs, and the fact it took her 2 weeks to send it to me mean there’ll be some less than positive feedback on e-bay. But anyhow, finding it there meant that I could attack Jejy. And so, having scrambled some eggs, read my interweb and sat for a bit I set to on the brakes. Hub pullers are really very handy when removing splined on hubs. Thankfully the previous owner’d used copperslip, so the hub actually was only stuck on the brake. Having freed it, and adjusted it, I examined the other side and found it was just in need of adjustment.

    At last, the time had come. With some trepidation I set off to the MOT centre, and the journey containing such exciting discoveries as “oh, the brakes really are very 70s”, and “mmm, isn’t sitting in traffic fun (accident and lunch-time rush)”. By the time I got there I was convinced Jejy would fail, the brakes seemed only just adequate to me… and this is what I got:

    MOT Cert!

    I am still in awe. I look out and can’t quite believe that the DAF that has languished in a garden for 3 years passed it’s MOT first time. There were a couple of issues which he mentioned as needing sorting (while it’s not an MOT failure, because there’s no catagory for it, he didn’t like the missing indicator repeater, and the brakes passed the G-force meter test that the DAF has to go through (it can’t go on a rolling road, they damage the transmission) he felt the handbrake was weak (it is a bit)).

    I can count the number of MOT’s I’ve passed first time on one hand…. so it was quite a shock :)

    She, incidentally, performed flawlessly in the heavy traffic…

    She is, however, full of twigs – many of which have been blown up through the vents, and down through the vents, but moving the little ventilator thingie still feels crunchy in a ‘crushing dried leaves’ way. :-/

  • Polar opposites.

    So, yesterday I spent a few hours on the DAF and found out why she leaks (the windscreen wiper spindle seals are purely ornamental at the front, the window-seal-spreader strip is not fully in at the rear, and the mastic around the screen has failed), painted the sill and reattached the finisher strip and, bizzarely, replaced the windscreen wiper blades (how else d’y’think I noticed the spindle seals)!

    This done, we decided to take advantage of the summer sales.

    We’ve been contemplating a new set of garden furniture for a while and the summer sales are on at a wide variety of home improvement places. Having examined the options we opted for a set of director’s chairs and a table made of “hardwood” stained with teak-oil. This choice made, we went to B&Q to check the prices… and found them to be 15 quid more than the comparible homebase one. Now, B&Q is about 8 feet from our house. Homebase, a mile.

    We walked to homebase, discussed it, and in the end opted to buy the homebase set. The idea being to sled-it back along the grass (since we aren’t worried about the box it’s in). Yeah. We got most of the way but the last stretch is all pavement, and not sled-able. We struggled for a bit until a very nice polish chap offered us a lift.

    We considered the options. A: Take up the random bloke’s offer and hop in his car for the last 1/4 of a mile. B: Drag/lift/curse the furniture back to the house the last 1/4 of a mile. Exhausted as we were, option A was definately the best idea and we were given a lift back to the house by a really very nice polish gentleman. This is the opposite of our last experience with a local pole, who was, it must be said, both drunk and irritating. To be fair, at 3 in the morning being drunk on our doorstep and waking us up may have given him an unfair disadvantage in this race; but honestly? It does a country good when you meet someone truly nice who does something for no gain at all.

    We got back to the house, assembled the furniture and I was surprised to have the individual who I’ve been railing against for damaging our shed appear at our back gate. A surprisingly civilised conversation took place and he’s paid for a new shed. Granted a very cheap and probably not great quality shed. The kind of shed which’ll only last a few years, unless well looked after, but it’s a new shed. We’ll repair the base and rip out the old shed… more rubble to haul away. But hey.

    The new shed, also on sale, will be arriving in the next week. If anyone fancies giving us a hand removing the old one… repairing the concrete and putting the new one up… no? no one? Poot.

    Anyhow, having got the garden set it’s now raining *lots* and the DAF is slowly filling with water – because now it’s got no holes to go out of…and I’ve got to go to work in an hour and a half, and so am debating alternately weeping (for how wet I’ll be) and cursing (the e-bayer who one-week-on from purchase has failed to send me any notice of posting, and who’s not yet replied to my ‘where is it’ e-mail – and thus has kept me from my hub-puller).

    What we have done, however, is watch Juno – which I heartily recommend. It’s an excellent and quirky film – aided by the music of Kimya Dawson (who I think is awesome but continue to believe is mad as a teapot; her lyrics are just excellent but so strange). It’s really well shot, and I had little tears in the corners of my eyes as the end approached.

    And now we must go and make Potato Latkis, for it is time for an early dinner, as I’m working from 1830…

  • Frustration

    So, my mum asked me to make a playlist for her wedding; it’s only a few people who’ll be there, and my mother (as usual) wishes to shake her bootie (I think, knowing my mum, that’s about the best term for it).

    This is – in theory – easy. I have a vast collection of music, and I did in a past life DJ. So, plan was I’d sit down at the Mac, connect to the EntertainmentMac and throw together a playlist of 70s and 80s (and possibly some 90s) music that my mum could get her groove on to. Yeah.

    In the last few days the Router decided, somewhat randomly, that instead of taking the full 128bit insane-o-line-noise like password that we’ve been using for the past year it would, instead, take only the first 8 characters of it.

    This hasn’t been too much hastle, it’s been annoying, certainly, but not insane amounts of hastle because all I had to do was chop the passwords down on the connecting computers and suddenly network connectivity came back. I’ll grant it took me quite a long time to work out why the newly installed G4 laptop wouldn’t connect. But once I’d got there it was all fine and dandy. Except I’d forgotten about the evil that lurks upstairs.

    See the G5 has no posh apple gidgets to connect wirelessly, instead in has the fairly dismal Buffalo Airstation. It only has this because Nikki and Kate are very lovely and understanding my plight gave me one of their unused ones. I say dismal because while it functions adequately it’s certainly got it’s quirks and one of it’s major quirks is that the default IP address of the one they gave me is not mentioned online or in any manual anywhere. I’m convinced I wrote it down. I put it on a stickie or something. But… I’ve had to reinstall the mac, the ent mac and the laptop since then and I can’t find this vital piece of information.

    And Nikki is out.

    And so I’ve spent a frustrating hour going through all the ‘default’ IP addresses I could find:

    192.168.1.1

    1.1.1.1

    192.168.1.169

    192.168.11.1

    Trying to find out if I can get it’s IP address from it’s MAC address (theoretically, yes. Easily? No). Fiddled with resetting it, trying to use the auto-magic-connect-to-a-router (it connected to a neighbours one!). I’ve wrestled with a strong desire to hurl it from the house, along with all the other shonky pieces of crap that muck up technological equipement. And instead decided to wait, and I’ll do the music tomorrow, or whenever I’ve spoken to Nikki. Assuming she can recall it’s default IP address. Otherwise I suppose I can write a little script that cycles through and pings each IP address from 1.1.1.1 to 254.254.254.254, until it finds it. But I fear that might take some time. Why Buffalo did this I don’t know.

    At any rate, I’m going to go and spray the car, which while it’s not that rewarding (in so far as I’m doing a gash job incredibly quickly) is, at least, something I can actually *do*.

  • Plus content entry

    This week has been incredibly hard work – mostly due to short staffedness; well, that and doing 1.7 extra shifts. I know it’s bad when work call me at home and invite me to come in early,  because I’m about an hour away from work, and if they’ve reached the stage of calling someone who’s going to take an hour to get in, it’s going to be bad.

    We’ve actually been short, I think, every day I’ve been on. Our new method of work requires one extra nurse, and the shifts quite simply aren’t being filled. No one wants to do either of the new shifts – the early one is not different enough from an ordinary early, and in fact makes you leave at a worse time. The late shift goes on waaaay too late; meaning that, well, no one wants to do that either.

    Which has lead to us really, really struggling. Now I’m qualified to not-triage (we do something simpler and quicker than triage), this has also lead me into a minefield of being annoyed and frustrated. It is the most unrewarding job of all time. One of the most amusing things is that we pick people up who we think are likely to need an xray (mechanism of injury, obvious deformity, etc) and then will inform the doctor that we suspect they’ll need an Xray. Quite often they’ll listen to the mechanism of injury or the description from us and just order it without seeing the patient. In fact, I think I’ve only every had one turned down – who was later Xrayed anyway. That certainly doesn’t mean I’ve caught all the people who need X-rays, but means I generally catch the ones who are likely to. But much to my amusement, a poster has appeared at work reminding nurses that we’re not allowed to independently order Xrays for patients without our knowledge being assessed. I presume someone has been doing that; but the fact is, the Xrays that get ordered by me, following discussions with the Dr and them writing the card? Well, it’s essentially the same thing…

    I do, however, want to get a lot more knowledge on proper triage assessment, because I’d like to be better able to assess injuries.

    One other thing I’be picked up from a much more experienced nurse is to not say that I’m a nurse. We have a variety of protocols for ‘nurse led referrals’ – where we can see, assess and refer the patient without involving a doctor. Ear, Nose and Throat; pregnancy and gynae problems can quite often be sent straight to the specialists without wasting the patient’s time on two examinations and telling the story several times.

    This is a great idea – except that when you say it’s a nurse led referal, some docs have a strop and say that they have to be seen by an A&E doc; this is often all the more frustrating as you’ve spent 10 minutes bleeping them and trying the wards they’re on to try and find them. But my new method – which is really the only method I’ve known, is to say “Hi, this is [my first name] in A&E, I’ve got a referral for you…”. This seems to work much better, although they do still get a little stroppy sometimes…

    I’ve actually though, looked after a lot of really charming and lovely people. People who you feel real full-on good about looking after. You shouldn’t have favourites, and I have certain masochistic enjoyment when I’m looking after the stroppy indepentent sort, or the mad-as-a-badger-with-UTI-or-other-infection sort, or indeed the dementia-pissed-off sort. But looking after nice people who are just nice, is really a bit pleasant.

    Anyhow, all this work has got in the way of quality snuggling time with Kathryn; which has been quite distressing. We have however made some progress on the wedding and the ceremony in the states. Although they’ve both ended up being lots bigger than we originally planned. It’s funny how these things expand and expand :)

    It’s also led to slow progress on the DAF. Well, that and the hub puller’s frustrating absence from my life. All that’s left to do to make it road-worthy (not, you note, finished or anything. But roadworthy) is to reattach the end of the bumper and to unseize the brakes (well, I say ‘all’, it may be that the brake cylinders are shot). These are potentially trivial jobs, but I can’t actually *do* the latter because the hub-puller ordered from e-bay more than a week ago hasn’t turned up. The seller’s not answered an email yet, either, which is also frustrating.

    I’ve busied myself with prepping (in a very limited sense) and painting the new metalwork. One side’s got a coat of Nissan Arctic White on the sills and a bit of the back quarter (which looks a little whiter than the rest of the car, but never mind). It’s a gash job, I should, really have spent time with filler and carefully prepped things. But I didn’t have time for niceties and I’d rather get paint on there to protect the new metal than worry about getting it looking pretty. It also turns out my wire-wheel has vaporised, which is frustrating. I’ll have to go and pick up a new one. because the area by the rear window needs cleaning up before I fill it.

    And the side I sprayed (with one coat) and had left all the masking on so I could spray today? Well, it’s rained overnight…

    ….which is terribly annoying. I’m hoping the sun (which has come out now) will dry it out and then later in the day I’ll be able to throw another coat of paint on. I’ve had to take off all the newspaper though, which is quite bothersome.

  • Been meaning to post

    There’ve been a bunch of days where I thought I should post. There’s been stuff at work, and stuff about the wedding, and then there was a conversation I overheard, and then stuff about the DAF, and stuff about the Minor. It’s all been happening, and thanks to hayfever and exhaustion I’ve just not got around to it.

    I barely feel like getting around to it now. I woke up at 0652, which thankfully is somewhat better than the 0430s of late, but I’m feeling fairly awful. I appear to have got through almost an entire toilet roll, and the remainder of the box of ‘nice’ tissues and still can’t breathe. I’m tired now and my brain feels faintly like treacle.

    I shouldn’t complain though, we had a glorious day yesterday – and ignoring all possible hayfever related risks we headed out on a 4 mile wander down to Windsor. Apart from a brief stretch past the water-works (or sewage works, as they really are) the walk’s really beautiful; meandering down around the Jubilee river and then (rather more nicely) around the Thames. Eton Wick is also terribly pretty and filled with the kinds of houses I actually rather like (although it does appear to have been attacked by the 1970s, somewhat).

    We sat at the bathing place of Athens, we lay in long-grass eating cheese sandwiches and muching on Tomatoes, lay in the early evening sun and then wandered around Windsor. I picked up a couple of rock and roll gramophone records – which are extraordinarily loud (I can only actually listen to them by putting my portable gramophone in the next room, since it’s not as posh as Nikki’s and doesn’t have a volume control (or, as you might call it, a door)). I also got a Ketelbey gramophone (In a Persian Market / In a Monastry Garden) – Ketelbey was one of my dad’s favourite composers – and while I have his 45 of In a Persian Market / In a Monastry Garden I fancied hearing an earlier version; and there it was.

    At some point when I have more money I’m tempted to go back – because they had a couple more of the rock gramophones – which I’ve a bit of a fancy for – but it’s probably best that it’s too far for me to ‘pop’ back and get them. They also had pianola rolls, I’ve always fancied a pianola, but thankfully don’t have one (I can’t even get my own piano into our house!)…although there are several on e-bay for £0.99…

    We had one less positive incident, we got some cake from a cafe as a treat (we didn’t look too carefully at the menu and it said ‘organic cakes from £2.50’) – we’d already felt that their prices were a little high – but when Kathryn went to pay… £7! For two very average slices of cake. Sure they were nice, but not £7 nice.

    It put a bit of a dent in our otherwise excellent day. We rounded it off by wandering through Waitrose, buying a rather bizzare dinner (but very nice) and then lazing on the sofa at home drinking cider and snuggling. Photos from the set are here…

    Today I have kitchen based intentions, and have spent the morning trying to persude VMWare on the Hackintosh to see the USB (it won’t) so that I can update the music on my MP3 player. If anyone’s got software to make an iDJ 360 do it’s database update on a Mac or Linux, then that’d be very handy. The best I’ve found is this topic on the Ubuntu forum which is a few weeks old and hasn’t changed for a while…

    Tidying and cleaning also needs to happen today.

    Next week we have *lots* of DAF related activities scheduled. Painting the new metalwork, although despite my request he’s thrown underseal on some bits (I went to go and look, and the new sills are very shiny, solid and sill-ey); there’s floor in some of the boot and the driver’s side floor actually looks like floor now. To be restoration grade it’d need filler and smoothing and various things, but to be ‘useable’ and ‘solid’ it needs painting, and some waxoyl in through the clips for the trim and that’s it. The Brakes need to be unsiezed – they’ve resisted despite moving the car around a fair bit – I ordered a hub puller from ebay after ringing every auto-factor in slough. One had a bearing puller (“universal”) but had no idea what size it was, it was an order only item, and cost the same as the one on e-bay which I knew what size it was…

    So, the plan for next week is paint sills (and other new metalwork), unsieze brakes, check over (again), MOT, Tax (difficult, we’re still lacking a V5) and drive around happily. The mog should be done in about 2 more weeks, apparently. So then we’ll be back up to full strength….