Mostly lemon based

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  • Night shift

    Sometimes I disagree with what we do; I think that as a culture we cling desperately to the last shreds of life at whatever cost. It doesn’t mean I don’t do my job, I do my job to the best of my abilities, but sometimes I disagree with what I’m asked to do.

    We, being a Care of the Older Person ward have a lot of people who’s quality of life is pretty poor. Bedbound and incontinent, with dementia; many of our patients don’t, or won’t eat; don’t or can’t walk, and I wonder how much awareness of the world they truly have anymore.

    Certainly their personality seems largely gone (or changed beyond recognition); but we fight for their lives, with interventions that are painful, strip them of their dignity, and just seem… wrong, to me.

    But – where a patient’s not stated beforehand that they don’t want these moderately extreme interventions – like for example – surgery to put a feeding tube into their stomach – so we can safely feed them when they’ve lost their swallow/gag reflexes. Well, then we tend to go ahead and do it. And I wondered, last night, as I put a feeding tube into a patient who’s confused (dementia) and immobile whether it was really the right thing to do. I know it’s what the *family* want, but is it what he’d’ve wanted?

    I can’t say, except for myself, and y’know what, I don’t want heroic interventions to keep me alive. If I’ll recover, and be independent (at least largely) – or if that is a high probability (like 80%), then sure, heroic me all you want. But if my heart stops, it stays stopped (thanks all the same) and if my life will consist of nothing more than laying in a bed, then no; thank you. It’s not what I want.

  • As the world prepares to sleep

    Another couple of nights. Just two this time, although with the extremely silly need to drive to Manchester the day after the second one (don’t worry – plan is to come home, sleep and then go in the afternoon). Nights mean that, yet again I’m swinging my body clock around by 12 hours.

    It’s slightly harder to do this this time, ‘cos the builders were indeed here. Rather briefly; apparently he’s at college tonight (I have to ask him what he’s doing there), and his tooth became loose and painful (it was noticably wobbly) and he went off to the dentist earlier…

    So, in fact, they were here from 1030 til, maybe 3. And then at around 1730-1800 to drop off the wood. More unexciting photos of my floor being absent to follow, I’m sure.

    Anyhow, without too much trauma I’ve filled in the CRB form, tomorrow (all being well) I shall head to occupational health – and then in the name of trying to do as many things as possible tomorrow I’ll be mailing off my Oc Health reply and taking in the CRB form asap.

    4 weeks sounds a long time, but in reality it’s not a long time to get a CRB check done and contracts in and signed…

    Especially when you’re working nights, and one of the weeks includes a bank holiday.

    And in other news, my mum and I are off to view an Enfield on Sunday. Well, assuming the bloke agrees to us turning up on Sunday – he certainly seemed happy with such a suggestion. The filing cabinet’s fallen off my list of desired objects (I didn’t bid in the end)  – this is because it shot up by over 100 quid – with 2 hours still left in the auction. Since they’ve been known to go for around 20 and I was only thinking of bidding 30ish, well. Yeah.

    Was a nice one though – all old wood. I’m starting to entertain the concept of attempting to de-oil the metal one I used to have in the garage. It’s neat, if not beautiful. Anyway, I should go and make some sort of food type substance for me to take to work.

  • Random thoughs of a lass on a cofa

    So, it’s been four weeks since my bin was emptied. I realised that today. I’ve finally managed to fill my outside bin to the point I need it emptied… by putting two carpets in it.

    I’m not quite sure how I generate so little rubbish – obviously the fact that an awful lot of my food is not prepackaged; or is prepacked in plastic bags (recycled) or cling-wrap (binned, but very small) helps. And my habit of not always remembering to eat, that probably helps. But I still find it faintly odd that after 4 weeks all I have to dispose of as rubbish is two small carrier bags mostly full of tissues (and they’re *months* worth of rubbish from the lounge and bathroom), and two two-third’s full binbags of kitchen waste. Paper and card are recycled, plastic’s recycled…uh. Yeah. It’s kind of odd.

    But this week, yes, the bin is very full. 2 grotty old carpets filled it to fullness. So I’m kinda glad tomorrow is bin-day.

    On the matter of the car, we appear (touch wood) to have finally reached understanding of why the bloody thing wasn’t starting. It turns out that despite (when I checked) the coil appearing to get a full 12 volts of unballasted little flowing electrons when in the Starter position, it appears that it’s not *actually* working as-such. So current bodge is to slap a jump lead twixt coil+ and the battery, start the car, and then whip it off. This is fine, fine and indeed dandy, except that it’s been raining almost continuously today and I didn’t much enjoy getting wet.

    Still, that moves us onto the topic of the coming two weeks. And these weeks are special excitings week in Kateland. Kate’s hoping to:

    – Have a new floor (or at least a doubly strong floor) in her bathroom
    – Collect a (bathroom) sink, a boiler and the oven (you have *no* idea how much I’ve missed having an oven. Really. No. Idea.)
    – Receive via postymagic a new hob
    – Commence work on the upstairs plumbing
    But the list doesn’t end there. I’m also hoping to:
    – Win a filing cabinet, bath and a period radiator on e-bay
    – Collect said bath and filing cabinet, and then later said radiator.
    – Ideally reach a stage where I can get the gas-engineer in to fit the boiler, although I’m suspecting that’s beyond unlikely.
    And then there’s the ‘doing’ list:
    – Fix and service the Viva
    – Get bike back on road
    – Get welding sorted for Viva
    – Lay path in garden
    – Plant garden
    – Read about emergency nursing
    – Buy and collect mom’s electric car (I hope)
    – Complete my CRB form, the Occy Health form
    – Visit a clinic *and* the GP
    I’d also like to see friends.

    I’m thinking that I’ll both be ‘very busy’, ‘very tired’ and may have planned an excessive number of things into my not-quite-two weeks.

  • Uh, on what planet was that a good idea?

    So, my main plan with my entry *was* to talk about this talk  – it’s an interesting talk on biofuels, and specifically bio-ethanol; one of the things that I find most interesting about this is that from discussions and research with various people it seems that classics are probably very capable of running on E-85, mostly just needing a jetting and timing adjustment. Hence I rather like the idea of widespread E-85 availability. Mmm. Clean fuel. Or at least, much cleaner fuel.

    Then I was going to write about the Viva’s continued difficulty starting. Brick it seems, has not been cured by an electronic ignition system, but someone on the Viva Owners club has at least given me a suggestion as to where to go from here.

    But instead I’m forced to write, because Ali – the overzealous suitor from the takeaway food place from which I ordered food? He chose to ring *again* tonight – I simply said “I’m going to have to ask you not to ring me again”, and he seemed to accept and hung up. I did not give him my number, he took it from my takeaway order. And while I let him give me his number and may, had he not have rung me, have arranged to meet up for a drink (with a safety friend such as

    [info]jordax

    present!) on the basis that he may just have been lonely… (Me and the flashing neon sign of fancying again being required). But now I’m angsty about him turning up or ringing me again.

    Argh.

    Fucking *men* (friends of mine excluded).

  • Neglecting to share

    I neglected to share these with you, and I so should:

    Spamland #1
    Spamland #2
    Spamland #3

  • Progress of sorts

    So, having lazed on the sofa and eaten (oh goddess was I hungry. I could’ve eaten a horse. Well, maybe not a horse, but an extremely large feta cheese / mixed veg wrap. That sounds less impressive though) I managed to locate the enthusiasm to find my cheque book. I thought it was on my desk, but I couldn’t find it there. Eventually, having searched the lounge and the bedroom I finally went through each piece of paper in the now nearly half metre stack of documents to be filed.

    I reached the bottom and was a little perturbed to discover that I’d not found it. Finally I moved a notebook sat twixt the keyboard and the pile-of-documents-to-file; and y’know what? There it was. So anyway, the newly e-bay’d hob should be on it’s way to me. I need to collect the sink and the oven too (from Manchester area!) I also discovered that the doors I want are much cheaper from B&Q than their online prices suggest. Doh.

    I discovered this because my builder rang and apologised, saying he’d not be here today. This is largely why he’s chosen. Although he’s rarely turned up on time (I can’t say about the days when he’s worked while I’ve not been here, actually); he’s fairly tidy and he also rings when he’s not going to turn up. In building terms that’s almost like being here. So anyhow, he’s coming tomorrow now (“Before 11”) which meant that my aching tired legs and I could go to B&Q.

    The problem with walking to B&Q, as I discovered, while environmentally much better than driving is that when you discover the wheelbarrow you’re considering is a flat-pack, well, it screws with your plan somewhat. So I’ll have to make a separate wheel-barrow obtaining trip. I also need to sort through the left-behind stuff and pull out that which is hardcore and that which is just gunk to be binned. But the best thing about B&Q was buying weedkiller.

    See, my ‘lawn’ (on the left at least) is basically weed. In fact, there’s almost no grass at all. So my mum recommended some evil nasty weedkiller to destroy the weeds before I dig it over, turf it over and call it lawn.

    So, there I was at the till with my Fork, my Spade and my 3 litres of weed killer and the woman looked at me for a few seconds, held the weed killer and then said:

    “Are you over 21?”

    Heh. She looked quite shocked when I declared my 29itude. And then said:

    “Well, you don’t look 29” in a cheery way.

    I just grinned at her. Clearly, I am gorgeous and youthful. I suspect this is due to the careful care I take of my skin; washing every day with, uh, showergel and…bathing it regularly in fresh used engine-oil and grit. Also my routine of nights/lates/earlies which means that my body is constantly deprived of sleep is clearly the way to maintain a healthy young complexion.

    I didn’t show her the grey hairs *grins*

  • Mathematics

    Distance from here to work: 18 miles

    Time taken on a bank holiday to travel home from work: 1.5 hours

    Therefore we can calculate that the average speeed of the Kate who’d not had lunch and was therefore very hungry in the Viva with the slightly suspect cooling system and the ‘no cold air fan’ was: 12 miles per hour.

    *gibbers in the corner, while eating food*

  • The UK just keeps trying to make life more unpleasant

    Privacy? Civil liberties? Lets see how many we can work on eroding at once.

    Dystopian Future or Current Reality…

     

    Yes, we now have flying police drone CCTV cameras being trialled. Anyone want to ask me why I want to leave?

    *sighs*

  • Productivity gains

    So, today I’ve been a busy little Kate (as can be deduced from the 3 attempts it took me to spell ‘busy’) and am currently in an exhausted little heap at the end of the cofa listening to KK* and drinking ice-tea (well, I’m out of fruit juice; oh, and milk…and cereal…I think I need to go shopping tomorrow).

    Anyhow, this morning I woke up, flicked on the waterheater and bid on ebay. I munched toast, downloaded some shows, and drank my honeybush tea (‘cos I had no milk). Having cleansed myself utilising the warmish water, the hotwater heater was switched off, I dressed, hung out the laundry, drove 40 miles to my mum’s house. We then hopped in Brick (mum and I) and headed to my mum’s allotment; her little shed there had partially lost it’s roof in the storms and so I stripped off the felt, and re-roofed there and then. Not the best quality roofing job in the world, but it should do for a few more years.

    My mum strimmed the allotment a bit; and I did a teeny bit (the battery powered strimmer gave up soon after I took it) and we then headed…to Hungerford. It’s my little (other) Nephew’s birthday in a few days time. I’ve remembered, several times, that I needed to get prezzies. Unfortunately at times like, uh, now. When it’s too late to actually buy them. Anyhow, we managed to find appropriate gifts and card and then piled back into Brick and drove home.

    Having got back to my mom’s I faffed with some plants (involving being up a ladder and extracting dead Clematis (?) from my mum’s Wisteria. Istr cutting and strimming the grass came next. And then packing the bike, and some tools into the car; see this morning in the post came my shiny shiny electronic ignition.

    So I then came home and fitted the ignition. There was a brief hiatus when I realised that I didn’t have a multimeter, amazingly my multimeter has managed to remain in my mum’s garage, I thought I’d brought my electronics toolkit with me, but no. I also didn’t have any connectors with me which has meant that the fitting’s been a little less neat than normal. And the multimeter? I ended up buying an overpriced, overpackaged Gunson’s one. But hey, I blew up my other digital one with a cunning ‘ah, let’s measure volts with it connected to the unfused 10A range’ plan (the rest of the meter still works though…).

    Anyway, fitting complete we went out for a test run and all seems well at the moment.

    I’ll have a nose tomorrow and top up the oil, and the coolant I expect. I think I should make a list of jobs I need to do in my time off, otherwise I’ll forget things. Anyhow, I am now exhausted. Oooh, and there’s Sheridan’s in the larder. What a good idea.

    * A CD Kathryn made me, which is made of awesome (although has the unfortunate side effect of making me miss her more (something I’d previously not considered possible)).

  • Gardening…virtually

    So, I realised that even if the building work is progressing painfully slowly, which it may not be, but *if* it is, then there is one area I can work on, which is the garden; the garden can be done regardless of other…things. So; with that in mind I’ve been planning, thinking, and hurling bricks around with wild abandon. Well, maybe not wild abandon, but some vigour.

    I came up with this:

    The Flickr thing has notes, but essentially the upper left grassy bit stays grassy and mehaps has a twirly rotory dry-ee thing on it. The lower bit is kind of ‘home of the plants’, and suchlike. Maybe with a rockery or something. I dunno, I’ll let my mum decide that :-)

    The path is an as-cheap-as-I-can-make-it gravel affair with (probably) some plastic underneath to stop weed penetration.

    And that brown bit? That’s meant to signify decking. Whilst decking may wander in and out of favour, and everyone and their chicken has decking these days, I’ve got a huge-bloody-lump-of-concrete which exists outside my house, and which cannot be moved. So I’m thinking covering it up with some decking would be a marvellous idea.