QA High Care Unit
Hi there and welcome to A Bit Of A Rant with your host, me. Today I’m going to be talking about the Surgical High Care Unit, also known as ward E4, a ward in the Queen Alexandra Hospital in Cosham, Portsmouth. And I’m going to be ranting. Maybe even raving. I’m always a little bit raving. But it’s mostly ranting today. Now, you see, I’ve visited the Queen Alexandra Hospital (QA to its friends which is why I’ll be referring to it in full) quite a bit over the past few weeks. Don’t panic! It’s not me! My mum, however, has cancer and – to be brutally honest – the chemotherapy route has been tried and has failed and it is simply going to cut short her life sooner rather than later. We don’t like to think about such things but it’s true. Recently, my mum needed an emergency operation; as a result of the cancer she developed an obstruction that gave her two options: ileostomy or ten days of agony followed by death. She took the former option and we were all glad of it. The operation went well and she recovered in wards E1 and then E2 at Queen Alexandra. We visited. It was nice. Lovely view, pleasant wards, helpful nurses and doctors; you couldn’t fault a thing. This was a good hopsital experience. However, after getting discharged my mum developed a very painful pain (those painful pains are the worst pains) which we (her family and friends) diagnosed (because we’d been in a hospital recently and felt some of the nursey-doctory knowledge had oozed into our brain holes (I know all the medical terms)) as being probably sciataca. When her toes went black we figured that maybe a doctor might have another idea; he did. Deep vein thrombosis was the culprit this time and a blood clot had formed in the back of my mum’s knee. She was in agony. We were concerned and a little annoyed that she hadn’t been put on blood thinners to prevent this happening after the surgery but then again we thought it had been sciataca so what would we know? My mum was transferred to ward E4, the Surgical High Care Unit at Queen Alexandra Hospital in Portsmouth. Rant. Begins. It’s a high care unit so – and tell me if you think otherwise – I was expecting care of the high variety. Care of the high variety was not forthcoming. The care was negligible, bordering on the coincidental to there being a member of the nursing profession present. The ward had an unpleasant feel to it; ten patients and...
Reactions To Israel’s Gaza Flotilla Murders
Brief timeline of events: Britain screws up the Middle East, Israelis get a stiffy from all the power and subjugate the Palestinians, Israelis stick two fingers up at the rest of the world when called out, the rest of the world demonstrates its might and abhorrence of bullies by doing not a damn thing, a handful of people think "what’s the worst that could happen if we bring in some supplies to all the people Israel are deliberately starving in a slow genocide?", Israel commandoes shoot some as a warning, the world instantly reacts by phoning up agents to get quotes from people who might have a salesworthy opinion… … but those quotes are censored. Not any longer. Reported Quote The armada of hate and violence in support of the Hamas terror organisation was a premeditated and outrageous provocation. The organisers are well known for their ties with global jihad, al-Qaeda and Hamas. They have a history of arms smuggling and deadly terror. On board the ship, we found weapons prepared in advance and used against our forces. The organisers intent was violent, their method was violent and the results were unfortunately violent. Israel regrets any loss of life and did everything to avoid this outcome. Actual Quote The handful of vessels filled with supplies filled our elite military with a fear like no other. Humanitarians are well known for their ties with global jihad, al-Qaeda, Hamas, Hitler, Dracula, chicken pox, that sound you make when you scrape your nails down a chalk board, M. Night Shyamalan movies, and mushrooms. On board the ship, we found weapons in the hands of crazed militants; admittedly, those were our own troops but it was early in the morning and dark and really quite confusing. Israel regrets any loss of life and did everything to avoid this outcome short of not actually storming a ship of civilians in international waters and shooting people for kicks. DANIEL AYALON, ISRAELI DEPUTY FOREIGN MINISTER Reported Quote Though our naval servicemen were instructed to exercise maximum restraint, they were attacked. They were attacked with knives, with iron clubs, and also with live fire. We have unfortunately 10 servicemen injured, one of them very, very seriously. The violence was initiated unfortunately by these activists, and this is regrettable. Actual Quote Though our naval servicemen were instructed to exercise maximum restraint, the in-flight movie prior to the assault was Weekend At Bernie’s 2 and I defy anyone not to be enraged after that. They were attacked with spoons, cereal – Weetabix or, unconfirmed, Coco Pops – and lots of nasty names. We have unfortunately 10 servicemen injured, one...
Eurovision
Well, it’s the Eurovision Song Contest final tonight so I’ll be drinking and mocking and adoring the spectacle and coming over all nostalgic for when the show was really great back in the 1970s. And with that thought – and with this one: I really should update this site more often – why not present a selection of "classic" (or, more accurately, "random") videos of Eurovision’s yesteryear? I can’t think of a reason why not; after all, it’s a lazy way to refresh the site’s home page and video embedding will slow down the render time to a crawl when YouTube has one of its inevitable funny five minutes annoying any passing or potentially regular (who knows?) visitors so that’s the double whammy of excellence in my view. It might even kickstart my brain into thinking of new things to write so I can push this post off the front of the site sooner rather than later. You never know. Stranger things have happened. Never say never. Too many cooks spoil the bird in the hand. And so on. 1970s Eurovision Song Contest Videos… ACTIVATE! Helen & Joseph (full names Helen Micallef and Joseph Cutajar) performing ‘L’imhabba’, the Maltese entry at the 1972 Eurovision Song Contest. I would kill for that shirt. Jacques Raymond and Lily Castel performing ‘Goeiemorgen,Morgen’ (Good Morning, Morning), the Belgian entry at the 1971 Eurovision Song Contest. A bit of a Diana Rigg look going on there from Lily. Nice. Anne Karine Strom performing ‘Mata Hari’, the Norwegian entry at the 1976 Eurovision Song Contest. If, like me, you’re always forgetting just when it was that one-piece gold trouser suits and glasses with lenses the size of grapefruits was in fashion then here’s a helpful reminder that it was 1976. Chocolate Menta Mastik performing ‘Emor Shalom’ (Say Hello), the Israeli entry at the 1976 Eurovision Song Contest. Let’s bypass the awesomeness that is the awesome name of Chocolate Menta Mastik and concentrate on the three women performing this song instead: stunning choreography (I was stunned) and faces that are somehow more disturbing than those multi-mouthed, quad-eyed singers from Battlestar Galactica equals major win. Nicole and Hugo performing ‘Baby, Baby’, the Belgian entry at the 1973 Eurovision Song Contest. Classic. Who doesn’t look good in purple? Nobody, that’s who. Fun fact: Phil Spector was so influenced by this song that he stole a white afro wig from one of the backing singers. The Les Humphries Singers performing ‘Sing Sang Song’, the German entry at the 1976 Eurovision Song Contest. Nonsense lyrics, no coordination in the clothing, not even a semblance of dance choreography or even the...
Farlington Marshes: Birds And Other Wildlife
There’s something incredibly enjoyable about taking a walk around the Farlington Marshes reserve on the outskirt of Portsmouth, passing the ever-present groups of geriatric bird watchers huddled around their scopes pointed at a gathering of reeds, casually remarking "isn’t that a Pallid Swift?", and then watching the ensuing frantic swivelling of heads and bodies that follows accompanied by the hilarious sounds of arthritic popping. Still, when I’m not having fun at the expense of the elderly I can also enjoy the genuine beauty and abundance of wildlife that is present in and around the marshes, some of which I thought I’d share with you now. Marsh Ducks I’m no ornithologist so I might be wrong but I don’t really see much difference between Marsh Ducks and Regular Ducks. Maybe the one on the right has slightly browner plumage. Ducks have plumage, don’t they? Or do they have gills? I couldn’t tell if these ones had gills because I was far away and there was a fence in the way and long grass which is where hippos hide. Hippos are very dangerous but there aren’t any in Farlington Marshes to the best of my knowledge. But my knowledge about Marsh Hippos is also limited so I didn’t want to risk a traipse through the undergrowth. Egret "It’s white," I told my wife, looking through the camera at full zoom. "Bigger than a small owl and it’s not a gull because I’m fairly confident it doesn’t have an ice cream or a bag of chips in its mouth. It’s kind of like a stork or a pelican that’s been bleached,” I continued, relaying an accurate description of what I could see. "Egret," she replied. "Well, there’s no need for that!" I exclaimed and we didn’t talk for the rest of the circuit around the marshes. Western Goldwing Ibis One of the rarest birds I’ve spotted so it was quite an exciting moment to actually capture it first on camera and then in the nearby tree snare. Lightly seasoned with lemon garlic granules, cooked slowly over an open fire, and served with roast potatoes the Ibis was a truly pleasant way to anger the birdwatchers who trundled past wondering what all the squawking and smoke was. Flat-Cap Caterpillars I may not know my birds but I do know my caterpillars and these aren’t mine. But I can tell you that they are Flat-Cap Caterpillars, named obviously for their beautiful upper head markings that resemble the flat caps popular with northerners. The black specks you can see around the cocoon are caterpillar eggs and not caviar; if you do make the mistake and...
Product Placement On Vintage Book Covers
Long before the advertising behemoth sunk its behemothy teeth into the pure and unspoilt film industry it had successfully raped the once-innocent book realm. If you’re of a certain age and liked a certain kind of novel then you probably won’t have been able to have avoided some of the more gratuitous examples of the world of merchandising’s grotesque product placements. The Rasp It may look subtle but Fyffes paid for the addition of over forty bananas onto the dustjackets of hardcover books over the course of a two-year period and received a sales bump of nearly 19% as a result. The Edge Of Doom Switzerland’s neutrality in post-war America was a point of contention for those who’d grudgingly turned up to fight in it four years late themselves but a blitzkrieg advertising attack of cuckoo clocks, dull-looking heroes, and chocolate bars that hurt the roof of the mouth when eaten carelessly on the fronts of popular books helped raise the status of the little country to shrug level in double-quick time. The Passion Hunters It’s easy to think that Jenga just appeared from out of nowhere in the 1990s but the push for dominance in the world of games a bit like KerPlunk can be traced back to the vintage books on which its form first graced the covers. Swamp Hoyden If you thought the popular-with-rednecks sport of Nascar just magically hit upon the formula of "tiny little sponsorship logos all over things make money!" then think again: the lusting-after-hillbillies genre of vintage books was pushing the boundaries of just how many adverts were too many adverts decades earlier. Satan Was A Lesbian When market research tells you that sales of musical instruments are low among the important lesbian and Satan-worshipping demographics there’s only one thing you can do to turn that frown upside down. The Lust Pigs In a rare case the attempt to persuade the delinquents of society to take up curling through subliminal product placement on book covers failed spectacularly. Happily for the global curling cartel a switch in the seventies from alley-based play to ice and the removal of the ten-second rat rule paved the way for its inclusion in the Winter Olympics and its acceptance today as one of the things worth watching in the...
My Religious Experience
I’ve had a religious experience. It was your average, everyday, run-of-the-mill religious experience in that it involved indoctrination and the use of time that could otherwise have better been spent doing pretty much anything at all. I’m talking about my upbringing and not some delusional "ooh, I’ve spotted the beard of Jesus in dry rot" or "I’ve got no grasp of probability so two random events are clearly a physical manifestation of an ethereal omnipresence" situation. I was raised to believe in an Irish-whisked, Rome-centric, Italian interpretation of the fictional Greek account of a group of Middle Eastern gentlemen along with all the popular legends passed down generation-to-generation by word of exaggeration and borrowed from numerous other disparate cultures: Catholicism to the layman. I was brought up this way by my mother and I can be thankful for the small mercy that at least the brain-pummelling attempt was in English; she had latin to cope with too. Now, of course, it’s not my mum’s fault that she encouraged fear of doing anything lest the invisible man in the clouds punish me; she underwent a similar indoctrination process herself and it worked to some extent on her. Nor is it her fault that she utterly, utterly wasted an hour every week of both our lives engaging in the ritual of – now let’s see if I can remember – genuflecting, sitting, standing, sitting, kneeling, sitting, standing, kneeling, getting soggy paper-tasting wafer stuck in the roof of the mouth, kneeling, sitting, standing, swapping germs through the act of shaking hands with random, nearby, homeless people and those who figured the nineteen layers of clothing they were wearing would probably absorb any leakage so why not skip the whole visiting a loo experience, sitting, standing, and genuflecting once more; all interspersed with monotonous tunes and the same stories over and over again. Religion: helpful hint! Try writing a few new Jesus stories to keep the kids coming back! My Catholic indoctrination was proceeding well, it thought. Baptism was completed, stamping my fortunately-difficult-to-detect soul with a "Property of The Pope" mark. The repetitive tall tales and body-training kneely-standy-sitty routines were becoming ingrained. There was even… The Confirmation. The Confirmation is another way of saying "Hey! I didn’t ask to be baptised but strangely after being instructed over and over and over and over and over again about how good being a Catholic is I’ve decided of my own free will that I’ll repeat the process to show there are no hard feelings." I didn’t get the option to choose not to be Confirmed; that would have been crazy. Being Confirmed means you get...
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