Paper Isn’t What It Used To Be
I do find reading a newspaper these days to be an absolute trial, as turning the pages in order seems almost impossible.
I did think it was the stroke, but it now appears to me to be the quality of paper that is now used by papers like The Times and The Evening Standard.
Increasingly, I am using the on-line versions of both papers. And others that I don’t buy or pick up.
I Had Another Spasm In My Arm Yesterday
At lunch time yesterday, I went to a meeting, where I sat in a chair with wooden arms, not unlike the ones I have where I sit at my computer.
As I walked to the bus, I felt that my arm was starting to do what it did a couple of weeks ago. It obviously wasn’t as bad and I decided to continue to my dental appointment at Notting Hill.
Luckily, the spasm seemed to die down in the bus, so I changed my plan and instead of going to Bank, I went to Kings Cross for the Circle line, as if it got worse I could get off at Euston Square for the hospital.
But it behaved itself and nothing further happened.
I should say that in the morning, I’d had physio on the arm and my physio had felt it wasn’t too good.
I’ve now decided to move my physio appointments to later in the day, as the problems seem to happen around lunchtime, after the arm has been working hard or lying in a particular way on a hard service.
I’ve also taken the decision to not sit in a chair, with my hand on the arm.
Thinking back over the last thirty years or so, most of my sitting has either been in a swivel office chair with a padded arm or on a hard stool. I’ve gone back to using the hard stool most of the time.
Dentists
Why does the media ratchet up this fear of the dentist? Children watching BBC Breakfast this morning will have had their fears increased.
My current and previous dentists would be unable to frighten anybody.
I must admit, I’ve had some painful times in the dentist, like when I had my last tooth out. But you have to take it in your stride.
Defibrillators on Buses
If you search for defibrillators on buses, you will find that some companies do have them on buses and train staff to use them.
So perhaps where you have a two-man bus, like the New Bus for London, they should be carried and staff should be trained. Note that some of the newer buses have got bigger, so I suspect there might be a space to store a defibrillator.
Offering Pineapple on the Tube
Coming back from Oxford Street today, I took a bus to Euston, where I picked up my supper in the Marks & Spencer there.
I had read somewhere that pineapple chunks are good when you have a dry mouth like I have, so I bought some to have with my supper and keep in the fridge to snack on.
There were signalling problems when I got to the Victoria line and by the time the train moved off it was very hot. So I took out the pineapple chunks and ate a few.
I offered them round and there were no takers.
When I got home, I then had a thought that they might react with my warfarin. They don’t.
The Solution to Smoking and Obesity
Why not allow towns to have referenda about whether they want to allow smoking and lots of unhealthy food shops?
It would be interesting to see what happened in the towns that voted to allow it after a few years.
Hopefully, they would see sense.
My old GP once exchanged with a doctor in Canada for a year, where there were lots of Native American patients, most of whom were heavy smokers. His statistics and stories about that time, would fill a large book. But sadly he’s dead now.
He was one of the better GPs, I’ve had in my life.
Giles Coren In Today’s Times
I always read Giles Coren, as I find him funny and today in his piece in the Times he’s excelled himself on stockpiling. This is part of his piece on Gregg’s, which as I’m a coeliac, I find even funnier for some reason.
On a personal note — I have not eaten a Greggs pie in 15 years, and that was too recent. Everything Greggs sells is as grey, flabby and nutritionally otiose as a braised portion of George Galloway’s arse. The whole point of having a job and a few quid is so that you don’t have to eat at Greggs. It makes me sick to see politicians pretending they eat there. Greggs is survival rations for poor people and the homeless. Greggs is a major factor in working-class obesity. Twenty per cent VAT on its hot pies is not enough. It should be taxed to death for the sake of the NHS, which ploughs £5 billion a year into obesity-related illness.
I accept that as long as Greggs thrives, ignorant fat people will eat there three times a day, but it is cruel to put them in the spotlight as Labour has done. Some destitute people live on dog food, but do you want to see the Labour front bench kneeling over a bowl marked “Fido”, chowing on Pedigree Chum? Because they’d do it, you know. They’d do it like a shot.
I suppose it’s just the thought of eating a pie, that makes me want to get ready for the reaction my body would take.
If you haven’t bought your Saturday paper, it looks like Giles piece is well worth the cover price.
The Toddler On The Bus
I went into Islington on the bus yesterday to get my supper and the bus was rather empty on the lower deck, except for a guy sitting in front of me, who had a little girl about two, sitting in a buggy in front of him.
He was eating some sort of odious processed meat pie and feeding small scraps of it to the child. I thought of telling him off, but then I restrained myself, as I didn’t want a fist in my face.
No wonder children are getting unhealthier and more obese.
By the time I got off the bus, I’d just about had enpough of the smell of that pie. So let’s tax them to the hilt for the sake of all our health!
Own Up! Which Of You Is Responsible?
I am now taking four extra drugs.
My Four Extra Pills
But my diarrhoea has all but stopped! So which one has caused that? Clockwise from the top left, they are furosemide, spironolactone, Cardicor and Ramipril.
But still I’m glad to get rid of it after two years. Does it show what a chancy business taking drugs is?
Is It The Stroke Or The Old Injury?
At school, a bully broke my humerus. He was twisting the arm upside down and hitting the tricep muscle repeatedly. I tried to turn round to hit him back after about twenty minutes or so of this torture and I overbalanced and all the extra pressure on my arm broke it. It sounded like the noise you get, when you snap a raw carrot. I have only ever had it X-rayed once and that was at the old Highlands Hospital in Winchmore Hil, just after the break. I had seen pictures of green-stick fractures and it looked like that, with bits of bone everywhere.
Over the years it has sometimes been very painful. Once about ten years ago, I went to see a doctor and he got a CTScan done on the shoulder, as he thought, that was where the problem was. Since my stroke it sometimes has decided to annoy me. It did quite a bit in Hong Kong, but it couldn’t have been too bad when I was out of hospital, as I was able to drive cars around the yard at the stud. When I first moved to London it couldn’t have been too bad, as I was able to do some interesting metalwork. But it has been very bad over the last couple of weeks and that includes hospital. But you cope and I’ve now found a computer, that will allow me to type easier right handed.
I should say that the hand is generally pretty good and I can use it to help me get up and down stairs on a bus. Last night for instance, whilst standing on the New Bus for London, I was using my left hand.
On the other hand, there have been lengthy periods in my life, when I used to wear my heavy watch on the right hand and I have always slept on my right side or face down, with no weight on my left arm. I even did that as a child before the arm was broken, due to the layout of my first bedroom.
So is the pain in my left are due to this old injury or down to the stroke?
The Anonymous Widower 