Things to not do on a Saturday afternnon

Things not to do:
Edit
Well looking at the title – don’t try anything other than hunt and peck when you’ve been stabbed in three different fingertips.

As a needle-phobic¹ (to a massive degree):
Visit your wife (or anyone I suppose) in the ward, post-op and allow them to describe what happened with the cannula and show you the marks.
Should you then (as someone is wont to do) go pale and clammy and curl up in the bedside chair people start doing lots of things.²
Among the things they like to do is check your blood sugar just in case you are an undiagnosed diabetic – this involves sticking something sharp in the tip of your finger.³
Don’t think about the sharp object or the nice BP machine they have connected up starts complaining about your BP dropping. However, if you think about the specific machines they use for both BM and BP and how they communicate on the network it helps.

You do get free biscuits and sugary tea, but you also have to go on an excursion to a non-ward area for checks to prove you have heart and it works correctly, oh and get stabbed⁴ a third time to check you still leak a decent red.
Furry chests are bad when they connect the ECG machines⁵ but if you avoid chest movement (including breathing) they get a level baseline and the “perfectly normal sinus rhythm is evident” to keep them happy. They do say the resting heart rate is slow, when asked what they think it should be indulging in a bit of bio-control and giving them that number on their BP machine may not be a good idea – it causes a stir.
Yep, mind-body control works very well and the unconscious bit is what started all this (if you discount someone who should know better flashing suitable triggers).

¹ Yes, I’m aware that a needle-phobic working for decades in a hospital is strange.

Things not to do on a Saturday?

Spend the entire day coming to terms with being very alone in a foreign country, knowing that the only person that ever understood me is no longer, that I actually have nobody to come home to nor talk to, and I’ll probably never find anybody that awesome in the rest of my life.

This Saturday I kept myself busy outside. Back is killing me but the distraction was good. And for the rest of the weekend, Castle (eight seasons) has just turned up on Prime Video. Lovely. Once my phone has charged…

BTW, I have a serious needle phobia too. Mom reckoned it was from a lumbar puncture when I was a baby. I don’t remember, but I guess my subconscious does.

I fainted one time up in the hospital in Rennes when it was mom giving eight vials of blood. Yeah, I’m a wuss.

I have a serious needle phobia too.

I have noticed a change of policy in the UK with regard to phlebotomy.

Once upon a time they used to advise: Just a little prick!

Now this has changed to: Just a little scratch!

What a humourless world!

Steve Pampling is me, and I claim my £5.

Vasovagal episodes, often (but not always) brought on by Medical Thoughts – last but one was caused by them putting a cannula in prepping me for having a loop heart monitor put in, which meant I got moved from first of four into the operating theatre to being number four. “You weren’t making it up then,” quipped Dr Pugh as my BP showed up 60/35 and pulse 37. I was still conscious but feeling like death chilled off.

Resting pulse typically 48. When it drops below about 43 I don’t feel very well…

Furry chests are bad when they connect the ECG machines

Well take the suit off then! I just can’t even

very alone in a foreign country

I sat and watched the dreaded referendum results come in with an Indian friend, who had been telling me about the kind of racist incidents he and his family had suffered in the UK. When the result was announced, I said “I feel like a minority in my own country”. He observed “You always were, you just didn’t notice”.

Don’t underestimate the possibility that you would, right now, feel alone wherever you were, whoever you were with. Remind yourself that perception is a story we tell ourselves… so try to tell yourself a different story. Perhaps the one where you have friends all over the world via an obsolete operating system. ;-)

Perhaps the one where you have friends all over the world via an obsolete operating system.

Well said. I was trying to work out how to express what I felt, and that’s pretty close.

Spend the entire day coming to terms with being very alone in a foreign country, knowing that the only person that ever understood me is no longer

I don’t recall seeing the info previously. I just read https://heyrick.eu/blog/index.php?diary=20190929 and…

Let’s just say it brought back memories of my father, and that’s a sad state.
Also cancer, but he skipped the chemo on the grounds that the prognosis with chemo was about 12 months of feeling naff at great expense vs. 4-5 months where most of it would be OK.
Being one source of my stubborn gene set he nearly tripled their estimate and finally went from being with me down the pub to hospital bed in the course of 6 days, told me, my sister and mother what we needed to do, sent us home and simply stopped about 10-15 minutes later.
Fortunately he had a couple of things going for him in his final months – the staff do care so things were good already, and when they found out he was related to two¹ members of staff (his name sort of gave it away in my case) – well royalty might not have fared so well.

Castle (eight seasons) has just turned up on Prime Video. Lovely.

You watch for the carefully crafted puzzles, obviously.

¹ My (slightly younger) sister took early retirement and now visit the hospital in working capacity two days a week.

Perhaps the one where you have friends all over the world via an obsolete operating system.

We’re RISCOSers :)

Once upon a time they used to advise: Just a little prick!

Still going. I did say they care, some things were done with a smile and a light heart.

Perhaps the one where you have friends all over the world via an obsolete operating system. ;-)

Like Clive I was trying to find words. All I had were my memories.
As Nemo says though we are all as alone as we make ourselves but choosing a different direction leads to a different place.

Furry chests are bad when they connect the ECG machines

Well take the suit off then! I just can’t even

I didn’t mention the leg electrodes as someone round here might have made more of any possible leg shaving¹ and the other stuff already provided adequate material for a few jokes.
Besides, I’d forgotten those. Totally…
OK, that’s story time of 7 hours and 15 minutes from start to finish, 6 for leg electrodes (which only removed a couple of hairs)

¹ Wasn’t deemed necessary

You watch for the carefully crafted puzzles, obviously.

If you think I’m watching for… oh god, let me Google this… Stana Katic, then… no. I find her mildly annoying.

I’m watching for the in-jokes, the humour, the blatant Stephen King expy, Captain Mal Reynolds (yes, I caught the references!)…
My favourite character is the daughter. She gets loads of good lines.
My least favourite character is the mother. The semi-tipsy over-theatrical drama queen? Wasn’t that stereotype done to death in Cybill?

Ah, but from my conversations at this end, anyone outside our age demographic (+- 10 years) has no recollection of Cybil at all!

You watch for the carefully crafted puzzles, obviously.

If you think I’m watching for… oh god, let me Google this… Stana Katic, then… no. I find her mildly annoying.

Oh, well, the irony regarding the script failed then.

Wasn’t that stereotype done to death in Cybill?

Had to look that up, I remember the Moonlighting thing but not something I paid that much attention to either.

Had to look that up,

Brits do programmes about dysfunctional poor people (EastEnders, Corrie, etc).
Americans do programmes about dysfunctional rich people (too many to name but Dallas is a highlight).

has no recollection of Cybil at all!

We have a three cubicle shared toilet at work near the production area.

Both genders use it, and one day when I was doing my work I came across a group of people talking, fiddling with their hair, etc.

“Jeez, this is just like Ally McBeal”, I said.
“Huh?” came the reply.

So at break time I looked up the programme on wiki, got the French version, and showed it to her.
Never heard of it.
Checked the broadcast date. “Oh, that’s why. I wasn’t even born then.”

Well s**t.
Do I feel old now.