Stress fractures

Head Rambles Posted on by 2

I mentioned in passing that I had a dose of the lurgy.

One of the side effects was that I didn’t get out and about at all. No little rambles up the valley or around the village. No exercise at all at all.

On Monday night, for some unknown reason I couldn’t sleep. I read through to the not so small hours and eventually dropped off at around five or so.

So, come Tuesday I was somewhat knackered. The day had started around nine when Herself needed some assistance so I had about four hours sleep under the belt. I felt like shit warmed up. I tried dozing during the day, but no go. As the day wore on I got progressively stressed and tired.

Tuesday night there was a bit of an emergency with Herself. It was very late so there was no chance of asking for any help. I had to cope on my own. As a result I pulled a muscle in my back. So now I was tired, stressed and in pain.

Wednesday morning I managed to oversleep and woke much later than intended. And I had an appointment up in Dublin for my stress test! So there was no time for a mug of tea or anything. Stress was up to around 6 on the Richter Scale.

Traffic going up to Dublin was a fucking nightmare. This was the middle of the day so I don’t know where they came from or where they were going but the traffic was very heavy. It was getting close to my appointment time, so stress was now up to around 8.

I arrived at the hospital to find massive queues for the car park. And once I got into the multi-story I had to drive around and around looking for a space. I was now at 10 on the Richter.

Naturally I got lost in the hospital – I think I mentioned before somewhere that the hospital has an amazing signage system that somehow displays every single department except for the one I’m looking for. Richter up to 12.

I found the place and booked in. I had to wait for twenty minutes or so, as my stress levels rose even further. I was eventually called in.

The test consisted of wiring me up to computers and then going for a walk on a treadmill. It gradually increased in speed and also increased its slope so soon I was doing a very quick walk up a steep hill.

I had enough.

There is only so much a bloke can take. I was tired, sore, stressed and now my legs felt like they were falling off.

I told the nurse.

She stopped the torture and removed the cat’s cradle of cables and then sent me on my way. She wouldn’t comment on the test but mentioned that I would get a call for an appointment with the specialist. More fucking traffic!

I don’t care what the specialist has to say. He can nag me all he likes about my diet, my lack of exercise, my way of life and most likely my pipe. It will go in one ear and out the other.

I am beyond caring.

Puberty

Head Rambles Posted on by 8

It crossed my mind the other day that I missed out on a bit of an occasion.

Last October was this site’s 13th birthday.

Crazy!

I never imagined in my wildest dreams that it would last this long and to be completely honest, if I had known I probably never would have started.

But here it is, three quarters of a million readers and well over three million page views later and still going strong. Well, still going weak would be more appropriate?

Thirteen years?

Fuck!

It’s nearly old enough to have sex with Prince Andrew.

From the scriptorium

Head Rambles Posted on by 11

I wrote a letter to a friend last night.

Well, it wasn’t exactly a letter as my handwriting has deteriorated to the point where I would be expelled from primary school for sloppiness. Even I can’t read it any more. So I actually wrote an email.

Writing emails comes with its own problems as my keyboard still has a habit of skipping letters for no apparent reason and I have to go back through every sentence and every word replacing all the missing letters.

All that aside, one of the things I mentioned in my missive was that every day was pretty much equal to the previous day and in fact to every other day. At this point the only thing that distinguishes one day from another is whatever is on television that evening.

But the problem there is that there is only an endless stream of crap on every channel every night. The only programme I look forward to is The Apprentice. I don’t know why I like it. Maybe it is the sheer ignorance and lack of education of the contestants? Last year an English contestant didn’t know where Dover was [and was amazed that it was on the south coast] while this year not one contestant knew when the Second World War happened [was it 1916?].

Anyways, The Apprentice isn’t on tonight so I know today isn’t Wednesday. I now use my watch far more to check the day or the week than I do for the time of day. The latter is irrelevant unless I have an appointment somewhere and my phone usually reminds me of an important time.

Even the daily news is slow to change from day to day. These last few days have been dominated here by the return of Lisa Smith – an Irish woman who went off to join ISIS and now wants to return. Personally I am utterly disinterested. If I were pressed for an opinion, I’d probably say that she should be told to stick with her insane buddies back in the desert as it was her choice to go there in the first place. Stupid cunt.

But then no one is interested in my opinions.

Here is today’s news

Head Rambles Posted on by 5

There was a strange “report” during the week.

Irish coverage of climate change low by EU standards, study says

I am having a problem understanding quite what they’re on about here.

Research funded by the Environmental Protection Agency said climate science was generally not contested to any great extent in reporting by Irish media.

Personally I ave found that climate science is never contested by the Irish media. In particular, RTE never misses an opportunity to wheel out George Lee so he can put on his worrying scowl and regale us with portents of doom and gloom. It only takes a puddle at the side of the road and off he goes, rabbiting on about climate catastrophes.

Overall climate change accounted for between 2 per cent and 4 per cent of all news in main national titles.

Well, it would be. News is generally taken up with Brexit, elections, the latest gangland murder or the latest insane law that Shane Ross is proposing. News is news and you can’t be waffling on about the climate all the time. The latest scandal here [apart from gubmint printers] is about childcare facilities. Are we to blame the lack of such facilities on climate change? Indeed, is the gubmint printer fiasco down to Warble Gloaming?

So what exactly are they on about? Should every news item, regardless of topic, contain reference to the climate? Are we supposed to have endless editorials warning us that our time is nearly up?

I’m delighted though that this humble little site gets a passing mention –

It also said the presence of citizen-led and organised scepticism was also notable and it found a high volume of content linking to the US-based Heartland Institute which the report said indicated the capacity of “fake news” and misinformation to infiltrate online platforms.

I don’t remember ever linking to the Heartland Institute so I don’t know where they got that from but I’m grateful to them for the suggestion.

It sounds like a rich source of honesty?

Printing money

Head Rambles Posted on by 7

Someone in our gubmint bought a printer.

The cost was €800, which seems a bit steep considering PCWorld are offering printers for under €25?

Woops!

My mistake.

The cost was €800,000. An easy slip of the pen when it’s someone else’s money?

So they spent €800,000 on a printer, but alas that wasn’t the end of the story.

You see, someone fucked up the measurements and it transpired that having bought the printer, they discovered that the room that was to house it wasn’t big enough. Again, a simple mistake but hey, it’s not their money so who cares? So they put the printer into storage [at a couple of grand a month] while they rebuilt the room at a cost of €236,000. That seems a bit steep as you could damn near build a whole house for that, but once more it isn’t their money.

It now transpires that while they were buying this printer they decided to get a few little accessories to go with it. There was a Plate Making Device, whatever the fuck that is [and a snip at €105,000], a Folding Machine [only €100,000], a Guillotine [€63,500] and a Pile Turner [€37,000].

All in all this printer has now cost the tax payer €1.8 million. And they haven’t even started training people to use the fucking thing which will probably force the overall cost over the €2 million mark.

Two million yoyos for a fucking printer?

Is it any wonder I do my damndest to avoid and evade paying taxes when they just piss that money against the wall?