New York Mary ....

Mary, an Irish girl who has lived in Rochester New York for many

 years now, called into see me today while on a flying visit to the UK,

 wow, I do like Mary.

 Only put this on here as I don't keep a diary any more, and neither 

of us were sure, but I don't think we have met for three years or more.

      After a hug and a kiss, and as I watched her walk away, I thought of

how, chances are I'll never see her again. But hey, that's a sad thought,

and to think of Mary is to smile....

Silver leaves....

So, 'tis the season of the back-slapping politicians. We had a crowd of

them in town last week, not sure (they all sound the same to me) but

I think it was the "Nice but Dimlebs. Never listen to their words now,

doubt many of us do, but I did listen to a guy named John Davies on

the local radio, he's my new hero, (well almost) I guess it's because all

that he said echoed my own thoughts.

    He talked mostly about the mess the banks are in, said quite simply

it started when Regan and Thatcher ( man that was hard to type) 

de-regulated them.  In simple terms this meant instead of being limited

to loaning out £10 for every £1 we put in, they could loan out £10,000

or what ever they wanted.... Hey, lets just trade in money, sod the miners,

sod the steal workers, sod any manufacturing industry, just give that lot

of peasants,  mops and buckets and call them the 'Service Industry"

      Most chilling of his comments were on the bail-out of the banks. He 

said the myth that this was done to protect joe public, wasn't a myth, it

was a lie to protect bankers and the politicians themselves. He said that

three years ago, the "casino' side of banks could have been left to go to

the wall with little or no effect to the public's money. Asked could we

still do this, his answer was ... yes ...

      I say Mr. Davies is almost my hero, but not quite, because there are

many guys out there that have the words we don't have, many that have

the where-withal to help us,  but don't... 

footnote....  though it hurts me to say it...

the act of bailing out the banks was not capitalism ....

Gypsy vans ...

I see the United Nations have got involved with the latest

eviction of Gypsy and Irish Travellers from a site in Essex.

Seems a bit over the top to me, and yes, before you start, I

know the picture above is a romantic image and I could have

posted one of  a Gypsy site looking more like a combination

of a scrap metal yard and a rubbish tip, but hey, so we wear

different specs, that's ok.

    Well I thought it was ok 'till I heard a phone in on 5 live

this morning and I have to say comments from some quite

erudite people left me pretty sad. I know I'm old enough to

know better but to hear the dark side of us brought to the

surface so easily wasn't good.

  

Friday night out .....

... well it was a new one for me, although it was more a Friday
evening as it started about four pm. Started with me lying on the
floor of the chemist in the recovery position, Danny holding my
hand and saying "stay with me Derek,stay with me they'll be here
soon"( He's an ace guy Danny, but a bit of a 'drama queen'.) "They"
being two para-medics in an ambulance, they duly arrived and
spent best part of an hour getting my OBS stable, what ever that
means.
This entailed them putting sticky terminal points all over the
top half of my body, although that's not quite true, they only put
them where I had hair growing. Next they put plastic clothes pegs
on my fingers then shot some little needle thing into my thumb
for a blood sample ( nearly an arm full )all the while they kept me
talking, man, I don't do that, what they trying to do, kill me?
Eventually they decided it was ok to move me and bundled me
off to Solihull A & E.

Seems I got the last cubical/bed and they repeated all the
stuff the para-medics had done.. more sticky patches, more
blood tests (this time it was an arm full) and finally wheeled
down to the x-ray room etc. Of course everything was fine,
as I had already told them. This all took four or five hours,
most of which time I just sat on my bed watching what ever
was going on.
Best entertainment was the mobile x-ray machine, I swear
this was a scene from the ward in Catch22. Seems, unlike
me, no other patients could bemoved, hence the mobile
x-ray. Having wheeled it into a cubicle the nurse would
come back out, draw the curtain, and instead of shouting
"Fire inthe Hole" she shouted " X-ray , x-ray" as she
walked to the far end of the ward with a tv zapper in her
hand. Upon her cry, all the staff opposite the cubicles,
about ten of them behind a huge curved 'counter' left
their seats,and, still talking to each other crouched
down out of sight. The nurse with the zapper fired the
x-ray machine then shouted "All clear" at which all
the staff re-appeared from behind the 'counter', still
deep in conversation as if nothing had happened.
Well I guess you had to be there, but I thought it was
a hoot. By about ten, we, me and them, had had
enough of each other (and they wanted my bed)
so they signed me out and I got a taxi back to 60a.

Got to say what strange places hospitals are,
thankfully I have never stayed in one.To anyone
reading this and if you are into time travel, quantum
thingy or worm holes into parallel universes.... well,
they are real, we just call them"hospital entrances"
I spent four hours or more watching people coming
through them, leaving the world and all they know
outside, all with the same submissive demeanor,
as if they are saying " there you go doctor, there's my
body and soul for you to do as you will" Sure you get
the odd jerk like me who won't even put on those
stupid gown things with ribbons up the back,
well come on, maybe Jennifer Aniston can wear one,
but the rest of us?
If you want the last word on hospitals I suggest
you take out your copy of High Windows by Larkin
( of course you have one) and read "The Building"
brilliant. Anyway, spent the rest of the weekend
just me and Roland, cool ....

.... oh.... don't be so bloody stupid.... I'm fine ...        KRO.