Another Day!!

Poor old, or should I say young, nubile, athletic…is that enough creeping???, Penelope Pitstop returned from her foreign frolics to be faced with her worst nightmare, ME!!!!!!!! Ha ha ha.  She popped her head through the door first thing in the morning to say Hi and let me know that she had been reading my blog before she came in so was thankfully aware of the problems I have had the last couple of weeks.  I’m surprised she came in actually as I would have probably phoned in sick until I had gone home.  The woman’s made of sterner stuff than me obviously.  

After the Heath Towers Express blasted through with its usual reckless abandonment I set about trying to get a few minutes sleep but alas it is just never going to be possible here is it?  I’m going to sleep for a fortnight when I get home to catch up so I’m pre warning you all my phone will be off and I won’t be blogging for 2 weeks when I get out..

Ah yes Penelope… where do we start then???  We had a good long natter about things like the Slop stirrers leaving the dishes and missing the cuppas and also things like serving Lasagne with Swede and Gravy!!!!!!!!!!  Please I ask you….my taste buds have been cleverly honed over the years due to my culinary expertise and I come in here for 2 weeks and their knackered by the pig swill they try and serve up as humanly edible.  Take yesterday for example. The fact that they have to wear masks when they come in my room means that they leave me till last to be fed.  By the time they got to me the choice was, Boiled Ham which is actually that processed stuff made of all the nasty bits shaped into neat round circles or Baked Potato, which is boiled then put in the oven for 5 mins making it nice and juicy or should I say Runny inside.  I could have either of these with the obligatory Swede, Mash and Gravy.  Mamma that sounds nice, Baked Potato, Swede, Mash and Gravy Yummy Yummy!!!!  I hasten to add I declined the generous offer fairly quickly and thanked god that I had asked my mum to bring me in a nice warm pie just a little bit earlier so that filled the gap along with a flask full of gorgeous roasted Veg she had made as a surprise.  She spoils me I know but I would think it would be quite hard not to spoil such an angel like me!!!!

We also chatted about the dirt shifters and the nurse who believes she is more knowledgeable than the doctors and decides herself when to give dressings and medications etc.  also things like refusing to have my bed made and she did explain that they had had a complaint regarding the making of beds recently so in a way the nurse was right that it needs to be recorded but not in the manner it was written and maybe declined would be more appropriate than refused which I agree.  I think her poor head must have been banging when she left to try and sort out all the other problems we had discussed.  

Later she returned saying that she had talked to the slop stirrer supervisor and had made my point quite clearly that the service was unacceptable in fact my words were “IT WAS CRAP!!!!”  I think her version might have been a bit more diplomatic though.  They have promised to look into the problems and try and resolve the things they can like arranging the staff rota’s more effectively so that there is always a regular slop stirrer on and not all new comers and see what they can do with the food situation.  I can tell them what to do with their food!!!!!  

All in all Penelope did a great job as usual and ensured me she will continue to try and stop all things happening in the future not just to me but to all patients.  Let’s just hope I don’t have another couple of them Red Carpet days as I don’t think I will be able to cope.

Health wise….. The physio’s paid me a visit as usual early afternoon and decided after listening to my rattly chest that it would be a good idea to do some chest percussions which involves me lying on one side then the other and the physio using cupped hand and through a towel beating up and down my rib cage at the back quite hard.  The idea is the resonance from the beating releases any phlegm that may be lurking in my lungs.  It does work at times although sometimes I find if its way down in the bottom of my lungs it just won’t come up.  Also I find it often comes up a bit later on when I have relaxed a bit.  The whole process makes you feel quite wheezy and knackered afterwards for quite a while.  I suppose they have disturbed whatever secretions there were there and they are sort of loose throughout the tubes.  They also have changed my regular nebuliser that I have taken for what must be nearly 2 years or so now as it might not be as effective as it once was, not that it was ever that effective anyhow as I still used to come in with pseudomonas infections as you all know and that was the only bug that this was supposed to protect me from.  This new one called Tobramycin is very similar apart from the fact it is almost 4 times the amount I used to take so takes around 45 mins to go through and it so far has made me very wheezy after taking it.  It’s a bit of a pain to make up too as they only have small vials 80mg’s and just to be awkward I have to take 300 mg’s and not the easy thing like taking 320 mg’s to use up all the last vial. In saying that though I will have to put up with it for another 10 minutes or so if they do so 300 mg’s is fine by me.  They have done another scan of my heart and a chest x-ray just to see if things have changed but it seems not although I am waiting now for the Merlin’s daily entourage to arrive bang on lunch time as usual so will maybe let you know more tomorrow.

I have decided too that am going to start to charge for my Advice Helpline from now on as it seems that yesterday there was a constant queue outside my door waiting to either pick my culinary brains or my computer knowledge.  No one really interested I how I am just things like “how do you make a nice shepherds pie and how to slow cook Beef shins quicker”.  Then things like “what’s the best to buy a laptop or a home pc” etc etc etc

See Ya!!