Satan, rocks, and an x-rayted song.

Last week, Julie found she had somehow hurt her back, just below her neck. Don't be worried - all she has done is somehow pulled a muscle. However, on top of her little accident at work (see Monday's post), this comes as especially unwelcome timing. The pain turned out to be a tad worse than that in her foot, so she has been forced to speak to her doctor again, with the result that she has been prescribed painkillers and anti-inflammatories.
I know the pain must be rather nasty, because Julie is actually fine with taking the tablets (as far as having to take medication goes). That said, Julie is trying to limit the amount she takes. Not because she is concerned about becoming hooked on them, but because of the side-effects. It's a legitimate concern. especially so in the light of her weight-loss surgery. Because of the reduced stomach size, Julie is now both more and less reactive to the chemicals in the meds, so while some tablets seem to have lost their effectiveness, others will turn out to be more of a problem.
So it is with co-codamol (a mix of codeine and paracetamol). I'm not going to go into details. They're not icky; you just don't need to know them. Suffice it to say that Julie finds she has to work out if she's more concerned about the pain or the side-effects at any one point before taking and co-codamol. Or, as Julie put it,

A little note for the folks who may have got the wrong end of the stick here; hardcore - in this case - does not refer to 'action', but to the rubble that is used in construction. Although I'll freely admit that, when I first saw a sign advertising 'Free hardcore', I not only got the wrong end of the stick, I got the wrong stick altogether.
Ah, youth.

What with Julie's foot and her back and my ongoing headache issues (and occasional back troubles), a lot of our conversations turn to health matters. Usually, we'll lament our lot, and then follow it up by saying that there are many far worse off than we are... although that doesn't make it any better.
Julie said it best.

And on that note, we shall bid you fare-thee-well and have a great weekend!

Durr-an Duran...

I have a colleague who only works part-time. It's a good thing for him, as he came out of retirement to do the job. It's also a good thing for the company, as they don't want a full-timer.
Dave's a decent enough bloke, but he couldn't, to quote Terry Pratchett's Soul Music, carry a tune in a bucket. He can't even whistle tunefully. Seriously, it's almost painful. For someone like me, a person that needs a bit of music in the background, that needs the flow of music to be right, it really does verge on the painful.
Even worse, his grasp of lyrics is tenuous beyond belief. Again, to me, this is like fingernails down the chalkboard of my soul.

Some years ago, when the Bob Marley track Iron Lion Zion was suddenly a massive hit, I was living at my parents' house and they were having some work done on it. Unfortunately, I was working a night shift and trying to sleep through hot summer days with a workman listening to the radio and trying to sing along with Bob. Even more unluckily, the only words he knew were 'iron', 'lion' and 'Zion'. Even worse, they were out of tune too. Commercial radio being what it is, the song was repeated ad nauseum, and I got very little sleep.

Back in the present day, I was packing some boxes, when Dave came along, 'singing' along to Duran Duran...

Well, it beats "lalalalalaa", I suppose...
Here's the original - clean - video.

Julie vs the telesales people (part II)

We posted a Gem a short while ago about what happened when Julie received a call from a telesales person (click here to see the confusion). After that, we were talking about other ways we could baffle the buggers...
This hasn't happened, but we wish it would. We're just waiting for the right time.

Painting the sky with feathers

It's time for a certain young guest star once more :-)

Sharron and her family were visiting her mother-in-law, who had recently been seriously ill and now returned home. The weather was quite pleasant, apparently, which made a nice change from the wind and rain that had been hammering the northern parts of the country for some days. In fact, the sky was a beautiful shade of blue, so much so that Sharron remarked on it to her daughters. They looked out of the windows, and then the youngest daughter said:

You gotta love the surreal innocence of kids, eh?

Having a (non)sense of place

[My apologies, today's post is a little on the lengthy side.]

Working at the hospital can be dangerous. Quite apart from abusive drunks on the night shifts, germ-ridden people coughing into your face or razor-sharp instruments seemingly waiting to cut you at the first opportunity, there are the trolleys. Sorry if that reads like I am being flippant towards the last one, but I'm not. It's admittedly not as potentially lethal as the others, but it's a real danger nonetheless.
Imagine you have a trolley laden with its contents - and this goes for the hospital beds being pushed around, too - moving along a corridor. Maybe one wheel sticks, maybe they're all very free-flowing. However, the fact remains that a huge chunk of metal is being pushed and/or pulled by one or two people. What happens when you come to negotiate a corner, or go through a door? It's going to be tricky, holding the door open with one hand and manipulating the trolley with the other.

That's when you need to be careful.

Julie found this out to her cost recently, as she was trying to move a loaded food trolley (and they're very heavy, I am told) into a corridor, out of a lift (elevator, to US English speakers). One of the wheels caught her foot, which obviously hurt like blazes. Julie, being bought up to not worry about things and to get on as best as she can, didn't mention it at the time.
However, the top of her foot continued to hurt like blazes.
Eventually, Julie went to see a doctor, who referred her to the hospital for an x-ray. This, thankfully, turned up no broken bones, although there had been some fluid created as a result of the accident. This would apparently subside in a few more days. This was a relief, as we really didn't fancy Julie being signed off and not getting any pay. We can't afford that right now.

Julie and myself were talking about the accident, and I was asking some questions; Was it reported? (there isn't anyone around at the weekends to report to.) Was it recorded in the accident book? (see previous parentheses) Have you spoken to a team leader since the weekend? (well... no)
Gah.
It was about this point that I went on a little rant about how they should be issued and wearing protective footwear - what we in the business know as "toe-'tectors". I also hectored Julie about needing to tell someone about it as soon as possible; if nothing else, if it turned out there was something seriously wrong, then her employers would know why and how. Julie has a tendency, when I begin one of my little tirades, of letting me run my course and then saying something like, "well, we'll see." Which is quite aggravating.

In any event, Julie told her supervisor the next day. She was told that Occupational Health* would need to get in touch with her and go over the incident with her. However, there was an obvious problem or two. You see, Julie only works an early evening shift, one which has very little overlap with office staff. Not only that, but the day after Julie's chat with her supervisor, she was due to take a couple of days off. Just when were OH supposed to be getting hold of Julie?

If that wasn't enough, after I had written this Gem down, Julie dug herself in even further...

[Even better, Julie just came back from work as I was typing this out. Naturally curious as to what I may have been slandering her for (just kidding, it's all true), she had a glance and wanted to know the Gem involved. I read out what I had copied down and she stood there for a moment and then said,

"Well, that makes sense, doesn't it?"

Yes, dear.]

*Occupational Health is one of those departments within a company that has arisen as a direct result of the culture of litigation that has become prevalent in much of the western world these days. Essentially, they exist to give the company a reason to avoid paying out any money to an injured party. To this end, OH will ask you so many questions that you get fed up of it all and decide it's less hassle to go back to work.

Bonus post - "Seriously, Siri?" on The Devil's Panties

It's webcomic time, again, folks!
Today, I'm introducing you to The Devil's Panties, a comic which is a lot less demonic and some way less naughty than the name implies. Jennie Breeden, the writer and artist, presents us with a slice of her life every weekday and most Saturdays. It's not strictly true-to-life, as not many people do really have miniature good/evil/princess versions of themselves bickering between themselves over her shoulder.
Apart from that, the comic follows Jennie and her fiancée (he recently proposed to her at a kilt-blowing convention, which should tell you a lot about both them and the webcomic) as they try and make a living from making the webcomic...
...er.. can anyone else hear Edith Piaf singing "Je ne regrette rien" very slowly?*

In case that puts you off, let me also tell you that Jennie has some very idiosyncratic friends and relatives, which is hardly surprising, considering that she herself is into, yes, kilt-blowing and fantasy LARPing (that is, Live Action Role Play), in which Jennie roleplays as an orc called Dammit. She even has a secondary webcomic called 'Geebas on Parade' in which she draws about her experiences as a LARPer. In many ways, that comic is almost funnier than TDP, however, it is back to the satanic underwear for today's bonus Gem.

Recently, there was a big family event in the Breeden household, which meant that a lot of the family were around. and it appears that Jennie's family are just as funny - intentionally or otherwise - as the lady herself. Take, for example, the efforts of one Uncle Sidney to record something on his iPhone. Actually, the recording probably went well enough. It was trying to use the speech recognition software known as Siri to label the file that caused him a spot of bother...

(copyright Jennie Breeden)

Poor Uncle. I wonder if they've let him forget it yet...
If that wasn't enough, there is a semi-regular feature in TDP known as 'What not to say in the bedroom' (usually featured on Saturdays). Take a look at this example...

(copyright Jennie Breeden)

So there you have it, another webcomic. Hope you liked the introduction - now go and read The Devil's Panties.

*If you haven't seen the film 'Inception', you won't have a chance of getting that joke. Sorry.

Longer doesn't mean longer.

The passage of time is a very subjective experience. Poor situations seem to make the day drag out interminably. Conversely, if you're enjoying yourself, you're bound by the laws of conversational narrative to utter the immortal line, "what, already? I just started! I don't know - just where does the time go?" As the author Terry Pratchett has also noted, your perception of time already elapsed will vary too. You may look back on a work or school day and lament how it never seemed to come to an end. However... wait, what? We've just had the longest day of the year? I could have sworn it was February yesterday! Or, as Sir Terry has it...

Of course, you don't need any such mundane approach to time dilation when Julie is around. If nothing else, after a few Gemmed-up exchanges with my wife, you'll have only the vaguest idea as to what century you're in. What I wasn't aware of, however, is that even Julie is affected by her in-built temporal distortion field. Even more oddly, Julie can turn this field on by having a nice lie-in.

I'm not a morning person, never have been. Unfortunately, being Gemmed later in the day means my brain is awake and then ties itself into knots trying to figure out the meaning behind what the ears have just fed it. So, there I was, mug of tea raised partway to my mouth and an expression of terminal bafflement on my face. Julie saw my confusion and decided to help me out.

Well, that's nice. Do you think you could find the time to explain it to me?