A Black Woman from Hackney tells it as it is

I didn't want to listen to the news...(see previous post)

But sometimes you see and hear something that makes a little more sense

There is always something.......

With all this dreadful news on the radio I have had to resort to Classic Fm for my morning listening...I know that the media has a duty to let us know what is happening with "the riots", the credit crunch AND a effing double dip recession, but, I for one have had enough of all the doom,gloom and depression and now am blissfully taking my cue from the mythical ostrich and am happily sticking my head into the sand.

Pirrie upset being away from his own hens

One of my Rhode Island Red girls had a swollen eyes over the weekend. "Bubble eye" can be a sign of a more serious respiratory infection and has to be sorted immediately as the infection can rage through a flock with devastating results.
I isolated the bird immediately and treated it with baytril and eye baths, The rest of the birds were checked and all seemed ok  (I make it a point of keeping hens separated into a whole array of small coops so potential infections can be hopefully minimised to one area )....but after discussion with my new vet we decided to treat the flock with  prophylactic antibiotics. Which is a decision I am happy I kind of pushed for..
(and no it was not the George Clooney lookalike vet ...mores the pity)


Yesterday, as the Rhode Island was more or less back to her old self, I caught, Pirrie, an old bantam cockerel looking slightly quieter than usual, and so I have isolated and treated him too. Good observation and knowing your animals is vital in keeping them safe. I just hope I have noticed the potential problem early.


I was discussing all this with the vet's nurse this morning. She had just bought four hens and I was trying to flirt with her just a little so that she would take one of my spare frizzle cockerels from me...and although she obviously knows animal care, she was taken aback just a little with the amount of work that is involved if you are to look after a  group of animals properly.


"When I started " she said ruefully " I thought you just stuck them in the garden and left them to it!"


........if only........

The "I LOVE YOU" Bridge

I am just about to leave the house to help take my brother to the hospice for a week of respite care. It's 8.40 am and I need more coffee as I have just got off from another night shift. My work days are just like the old crosville buses from the 1970's...they all seem to some at once!
Yesterday I caught a fascinating documentary on Radio 4 where filmmaker and Opera director Penny Woolcock discussed a piece of graffitti on a Sheffield tower block walkway which seems to have taken on a rather magical and indeed mystical life of its own, since it was written a few years back.

High up on the grade II listed Hyde Park Flats, sprayed in an unsteady childish scrawl is the message
"Will you marry me Claire Middleton?"


Was it Destructive? (yeap just a little) 
Is it Romantic? (well... we all love a love story)
But it is the myth around the whole message that has caught the imagination of the bog standard Sheffielders as well as  the "artists" of the city........photographs of the graffiti circulated in the press; the developers of the flats comissioned a neon lighting up of the "Will you marry me?" part of the message saying rather whimsically that it was ;
""an iconic symbol of hope and romance central to the heritage of the flats"
Humm....even romantic old me can feel the bile rising somewhat, at this rather cloying statement......

so I was intrigued when Penny Woolcock started to delve into the real history of Claire and her "beau" Jason who as it turned out "penned" the proposal! 
The reality of the message is a sad one. 
Apparently Claire died in 2007.....there was talk that drugs and a chaotic lifestyle took their toll.....the proposal, it was said, distanced Claire from Jason....and today Claire's family seem to hate the perceived fairy tale reminder of a painful reality even though her name is now allowed ( as Woolcock sadly concluded in her moving programme) "To fade into the concrete"


The whole thing is a example of imagination clouding reality

An afternoon Airshow

I see no ships ( or f*cking any of the Red Arrows Either)

Rhyl Air Show sounded rather good fun, especially given the fact the the famed "Red Arrows" were due to turn up around 12.30pm. Chris made a picnic and asked me to pick him up from Church, so that we could take the dogs up the Gop behind the village and watch the fun, so to speak from afar!
Chris got out of the service slightly late, we had a row racing up to the top of the hill and got there just on 12.30pm to find out that a large patch of pine trees were effectively screening the whole of the Rhyl coastline!

Pine Tree view

Like little boys on a school trip, we ate our sandwiches as soon as we sat down, bickered a little more and finally caught the briefest of glimpses of the "arrows" as they streaked impressively down the Vale of Clwyd towards the sea.
Just as the rain started we craned out necks around the branches to enjoy the odd loop the loop....then we gave it all up as a bad job to return home for a cup of tea and for me a sleep before night shift tonight.
Ah a typical British Sunday afternoon out!

Nurse Humour

Nurse humour can be likened to perhaps gallows humour, as it often takes a side swipe at all those taboo subjects....such as death, dying, colostomy bags,incontinence and the whole plethora of bodily fluids and toilet parts we see,prod and hold each day of our working lives.
I remember my mother, on one of her many admissions to hospital, describing a "middle of the night" conversation she over heard between a harassed support worker and two over worked staff nurses....
It was four thirty in the morning and the former hissed loudly to the latter
"I can't believe it! ....." she gasped " I've just found another one dead!!!!"
There was a muffled gasp then all three collapsed into weary giggles!
Thus is the hysterical humour of nurses.

Intubation of a patient for ventilation with an endotracheal tube

It has been that sort of day shift today. 13 hours of admissions, seriously ill patients and no staff.
We were all dropping just a little, when the A&E staff ( ER staff to you Americans) brought another critically ill patient up to us.
As the slightly self important A&E staff nurse gave his hurried handover to my colleagues , he made a point of saying that the doctors very nearly intubated the patient in resus....but he actually said that the patient has nearly been incubated in resus....a simple mistake......and not a particularly funny comment
But to us,six nurses on duty...it was the best joke we has all heard since Noah did the "wide mouth frog joke"....we were laughing our heads off at it for an hour....
You have to be a nurse to truly appreciate the titters
Off to bed another 13 hour shift tomorrow night
x

Pig Day

Margie chasing me  through the shit

Some days morph into nothingness don't they?
Blink and the day is gone....
and you look at all you have achieved , which is , more often than not, a huge load of nothingness.
On reflection I have been putting my time to good use, but clearing the poo and flotsam out of the pig enclosure, hardly sounds like glamorous or even interesting work.....
The pigs seem to love human contact and this afternoon, they had me all to themselves for over an hour and a half.albeit with hoe,spade and bucket of shit in hand. Margie spend most of the time galloping around  the enclosure in a full blown display of playfulness! Every few minutes she would charge me in an effort to get me to chase her and when I was not looking she would nip the back of my Wellington boots, taking small slivers of rubber off with her 

No 12 is much more laid back and somewhat friendlier

No 12 is a much more placid individual .Despite his impressive size and power..he is clearly a gentle giant of a pig, who is actually more endearing than the prettier Margie (Who is still chewing small mouthfuls of green rubber as we speak)
Everywhere I walked he would slowly follow, quietly amused at my huffing ,puffing and slopping out....he watched EVERYTHING I did with some precision, occasionally tip toeing up to me from time to time to check just how much I had placed inside the bucket before stepping back to his observation spot beneath  the trees
I now stink like an old drain

Its all this gay talk

there's nothing like a bitch slap
June Allyson's slap at 1.27 is perhaps the BEST

Ginger

Go on Ginger SLUG her