Health update
Wednesday, May 28, 2008 ~ 6 comments so far
Just a quick one as I’m back from the doctors where my blood pressure (after 4 weeks of increasing amounts of an ACE inhibitor) is now 144/86.
The upper number (systolic) is easily changed, run up a flight of stairs and it’ll rise. Sit still for 20 minutes and it will fall. The lower number (diatolic) is harder to change so that’s the one I was focusing on, so I was delighted to see it well below 100.
Considering the readings that started all this were 196/122 then it’s fair to say that the downward trend is favourable.
Phew.
Indiana Jones and the sunny weekend
Tuesday, May 27, 2008 ~ 1 comment so far
Ahhhh what a nice Bank Holiday weekend that was.
Visited my Mum for lunch, then popped into to see my Gran for a while before heading home before the rush started (catching the end of the Scottish Cup Final). Saturday evening and we were out with friends for dinner and a screening of the latest Indiana Jones movie. I don’t want to spoil it for anyone, but suffice to say that having read several reviews I should’ve expected what I saw.
Yes, Harrison Ford is older but I thought he carried it well and the first 40 minutes or so skipped along just fine, with the usual romping, fighting, nonsense all in place. But after that it started going downhill. Fight scenes were obviously CGI’d, the plot got more and more ridiculous and next time I hear that George Lucas is writing a film script I’m going to track him down and shoot him (in his writing hand).
I was quite willing to suspend disbelief for this movie, give it the benefit of the doubt, and the first part of the movie helped me do that but it just got so bad towards the middle that I had no choice but to get dumped back to reality. THAT is the sign of a bad movie, one where I’m made painfully aware that I’m sitting in a cinema and my left buttock has gone numb. I’m quite glad I already own the first 3 Indiana Jones movies on DVD, I certainly won’t be adding this one to my collection!
Sunday found us in the garden, weeding and tidying up (mainly weeding), and yesterday we had my sister-in-law, a niece and a nephew over for a BBQ. It was a good day to do not much, a little prep, a little cooking and LOTS of food!
And best of all, the weather is back to grey nothingness today. Just in time for everyone going back to work.
Getting old?
Saturday, May 24, 2008 ~ 5 comments so far
I’m one of the older people in our office. This is a new thing for me but I’m quite enjoying it. Don’t get me wrong I’m not surrounded by graduates but it’s fair to say that I’m part of the minority both age and experience wise.
And I’m loving it for the most part.
However the downside rears it’s head frequently, typically during a conversation about TV or music, or any other item that is now referred to as ‘pop culture’. Frankly I’m getting a little fed up of the blank looks and general bemusement that ensues whenever I start talking about things that happened only 10 years ago!!
Like most people who are older than 24, I still feel 24 (feel free to substitute your own “I’m not XX years old, I’m still 20-something” number) but I’m being made increasingly aware of the difference in age. I’m not overly bothered, in fact whilst I write this I realise that the only part of me that cares is that small bit of vanity that I try and avoid.
As for all that tosh about young people helping to keep you young, well perhaps it is true for those really OLD people, you know the ones over 40, but certainly not for a spring chicken like myself.
Hmmm, I seem to be undoing myself here.
Perhaps the word “old” is misleading. I’m certainly more mature and considered (sometimes), and have more experience so perhaps that is the key difference. If nothing else I’ve certainly learned from past mistakes so that has to count for something, right?
Age is a funny thing, particularly when you find yourself in a situation similar to mine where you are seen as “older” in the eyes of many, yet still consider yourself “younger” than others. A middle ground of middle-agedness which, I’m finding, isn’t as bad as it’s made out to be.
Roll on 35!
Random notes of no importance
Friday, May 23, 2008 ~ 4 comments so far
Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!
Is it wrong that I’d really rather Ollie killed the mice rather than bring them into the house to play? It’s one thing picking up a dead mouse, quite another to spend 20 minutes chasing a live one round the living room at 3 am.
Melody Gardot & R.E.M.
After catching her appearance on Jools Holland (and as a side pondering, does anyone refer to it as “Later… with Jools Holland”? No, it’s just “Jools Holland” innit) I listened to some samples from her album and promptly purchased it.
Listening to it I can picture her onstage persona, sultry jazz singer, and I wonder if that impacts how I engage with her music?
It was the same after I saw R.E.M. a couple of years ago, their last couple of albums had largely escaped my notice (to the point that, for example, I’m still not entirely sure on which album the track “Lotus” can be found), and I was a bit non-plussed… until I heard the tracks live.
Yet after the gig, re-listening to those same tracks now is a different experience.
Yeah I know, nothing startling but it’s been on my mind.
That and the fact that R.E.M.’s new album, Accelerate is rather stonkingly good.
Power out
All of a sudden the screen went blank, the music fell silent, and the power LEDs faded. We’d had a powercut.
“Bugger” he exclaimed in annoyance.
Actually he said “ohh fucksticks” because he was rather cheesed off having spent 30 minutes carefully crafting a newsletter entry. Then hope made an appearance for he had used Google Docs and Google Docs autosaves every now and then and maybe, just maybe, he hadn’t just lost all of his work.
And then the glimmer of hope widened, the websites he’d been using for research were opened in Firefox tabs, perhaps it will have saved them as well.
Lo and behold it was true. Google Docs HAD saved all of his changes, Firefox DID remember which tabs he had open.
Ahh the joy of the righteous, I KNEW I used web apps for a reason.
Mind you, it still amazes me that GOOGLE Docs don’t allow you to send the documents by email… I’m sure they have an email client as well… right?
Financial Ponderingmentness
Between oil prices rising, and the credit crunch … er… crunching, I’ve been taking stock of our financial situation. It’s not that bad, although the looming remortgage will impact it in one way or another.
I’m tempted to go through the remortgage process myself, following the Moneysavingexpert’s guide of course, but wondered if anyone else had done the same?
Good Customer Service
Wednesday, May 21, 2008 ~ 8 comments so far
Regular readers will be aware that we’ve recently had a new kitchen installed, and that we had some delays in that process. We sent off a letter of complaint asking for compensation for having spent over 4 weeks without a kitchen (the room was completely bare, back to floorboards and brick).
Last night we received a response.
A pint a day…
Tuesday, May 20, 2008 ~ 5 comments so far
…is good for you, but only if it’s Guinness.
As a seasoned Guinness drinker this news finally backs up my own, far less scientific, research. From now on, whilst knocking back my umpteenth pint of smooth, dark, velvety goodness, I’ll be ignore all counter-claims that fly in the face of this research.
Guinness is good for you, that’s all I wanna hear!
And for those of you that will, no doubt, suggest that all research is flawed I have only one thing to say to you.
*sticks fingers in ears*
I CAN’T HEAR YOU!
Do children still play in the street?
Monday, May 19, 2008 ~ 8 comments so far
Excuse this burst of nostalgia, but whilst tidying up this weekend I happened across some old school diaries and various notes and letters to my Mum, scrawled in my own fine hand aged between 7 and 10 or 11 (roughly). One thing that struck me was just how much I used to do when I was younger. Excluding the piano lessons and practice, the Boys Brigade and visits to see my Gran I used do a lot.
Memories came flooding back, times of mammoth Monopoly games that would span weeks at a time, bombing round the street on my bike, playing tag with a spud gun, and that one where you tied some poor sod to a lamppost and everyone ran off to hide. Tennis in the street when Wimbledon was on, cricket on the big patch of grass round the back when the Tests were on, and football at every other turn because, after Action Man, that’s what boys did back then.
I had a pretty damn good childhood, until my sister came along to spoilt it (KIDDING!! Or am I?), and I realise this may just be down to the fact that I’m getting older but kids don’t seem to do as much these days? Don’t get me wrong it’s not that I don’t see kids outside playing, it’s just that I don’t see as many as I (think I) could.
Of course I can’t really comment on this, not being a parent.
Still it was nice to flick through the old notes and diaries of my childhood. Remembering the red trainers, visiting my Mum in hospital, and even the time I had to put cream on my “wili” (see, even back then I was a blogger in the making, no holds barred!!), There were even some slightly more up-to-date photos, including one of my sister and Louise, hey it might even make for a good caption competition.
Right, enough of that, I’d better say goodbye because she’ll kill me when she sees I’ve posted that photo!! Was nice knowing you all!