Fatties and MRI scans

So recently enough I had to get an MRI scan on my back, an occupational risk that tends to come with generally being pretty gammy. It was quite a strange experience. Ages ago I had to have one on my knee but that only meant I had to go into the machine as far as my knee. This time I had to go fully in. In case you’re not as familiar with these things as I am, the machine just kind of looks like a giant white donut with a kind of platform poking out from the centre.

Anyway, I arrived at the clinic at 8am, as was my appointment and went through to the reception. I told the far too perky looking receptionist who I was and she handed me a clipboard and told me to sit. I sat and looked doubtfully at what she’d given me. It was a list of questions, I’m not going to lie they were pretty random; one asked me if I was ever a metal grinder. A logical question, because as you know, metal grinding is a common occupation for 20 year old girls. So after I filled out the questions and assured them that I was not in fact pregnant and didn’t have any bits and pieces of metal embedded in myself as a result of welding or things like that, they sent me through. The nurse/doctor guy (I’m not entirely sure what to call him) made sure I had no clips in my hair because, and I quote, “if you don’t take them out the machine will”. Always reassuring. Luckily I was too tired to actually care all that much so I just laughed. He got me to lie down on the platform and handed me a rubber ball attached to a wire for “just in case”. I lay there on my back with my hands on my chest and tried to keep really still so that they wouldn’t end up with a series of blurry pictures and force me back.

I was in there for a grand total of half an hour. As I lay there, feeling slowly fading from my fingers. My mind started to wonder. I noticed that there really wasn’t that much room to either side of me, and I’m not very big at all, quite scrawny in fact. So that got me thinking, what would happen if a really big person had to go in for a scan on anything? As I stared at the grey paint on the inside of the machine, all I could picture was a huge, whale of a human, being slowly squashed to fit into the machine. Kind of like how meat in sausages is squeezed into the skin. The machine carried on whirring away, but I really was transfixed on this thought. How would they fit? If they did fit, but took up the entire centre of the machine, what would the pictures come out like? I doubted that they would be great really.

It wasn’t until much later on mentioning this thought to Mark, the ever patient boyfriend, that a fairly reasonable answer was given. They take them to the zoo. At least they did in Scrubs and talked about it on Grey’s Anatomy. So that got me wondering again, how awkward would that be? To be told that you’re too big to fit into medical equipment that was made to fit a lot of people? If I’m honest I’d take it as a sign that it’s probably time to lose a bit of weight really. If they have to take you to the zoo on a flatbed truck just to get a decent scan of your leg or whatever it’s probably about time to hop on the old treadmill. That is to say that you can walk. If not I guess maybe those arm cycle things they have on half ton hospital. Not that I have anything against big people. It must be kind of nice not to have to wear 5 hoodies at a time in winter, but there you go, having a fast metabolism has a price too. I think though, if I was ever told I had to share my medical equipment with Hilda the hippo and Betsy our friendly local buffalo, I would actually die of mortification. All they blood would go to my face and my head would explode with the pressure of my embarrassment.

So I guess I’ve found the root of my recent decision to go to the gym more. Even if only to try to stave off the inevitable metabolic crash that comes with getting older. Although that being said, I would hope that if I ever got to the point where I couldn’t actually get out of bed due to my extreme dedication to eating, that people would in fact stop feeding me.

It seems I've been neglectful...

It's been a while since I've posted anything, and what's a better time than a Saturday night being the only person in the world at home, and sober. This blows. >.<

Anyhoo, away from self-loathing and all that. Time to blog! Whoop! This is actually kind of difficult, because Dexter (ickle kitten) is sitting in front of my closed door crying quite loudly. Why you might ask, because he wants to eat Snuki's (other cat, all grown up) food. Don't worry, he's already been fed. He's just silly and thinks he's always hungry.

So, I've no reason to why I haven't been blogging lately. I haven't been busy, away, abroad, working. Nothing. Guess I'm just lazy is all. Though, I have started on my Iron Maiden shirt! xD. It's gonna be epic! Well will be once I actually get the courage to paint on the actual shirt. So far I've just done practice runs on scraps of material. But you never know, tonight might just be the night =).

The other night I realised how much of a wuss and girl I really am. A friend of mine learned the song Promise by Akira Yamaoka (Me thinks). It's from the soundtrack of Silent Hill. This made me really want to play the game. I've been around these games since I was about 8, and have had this weird liking for them, even though they scared the bejeebus outta me. I used to watch my aunt, and my other aunt's boyfriend play them, and later on my younger brother. Before the other night I had only attempted to play once before, and got so freaked out by a shadow I turned the game off, unplugged the console and refused to enter the room until daylight approached. So, back to the other night; I got about 20 minutes into it. I seem to play quite slowly because I only got as far as killing the first bad guy and getting my stick with a nail in. Yes, that it your first weapon, a stick with a nail in it. Delightful. You're expected to bash these mutated things brains in with a stick with a nail sticking out. You can just imagine how safe I felt knowing this is what is going to save me from a painful death. I killed him though, one hit (I was playing on beginner) and pow! Down he went. And freaked out Kayla got. Ran back to the save point, saved the game. I didn't want to go through that again. And turned it off. I knew this time I couldn't leave the room, as I was in my bedroom, so I was stuck. Frightened and alone, at 1am. Good thing I have fish eh? They kept me safe all night. See they don't sleep, and would obviously alert me of any dangers, like Pyramid Head (See picture) coming to eat my face off!

There we have it. I'm a girl and a giant wuss. I can never look at myself the same way again. On a plus side, at least I've gotten through half of Resi 2 without curling up into a ball and crying. =). Some day I'll return to Silent Hill, and finish it. But only when there's other people around, who will stay the night, quite close by, ready with lots of hugs and reasurring words when I wake from my gaming unduced nightmares, but for now, I'll just stick with Kingdom Hearts. =)

Sittin' In The Hub

More observations from the world around me. This time it's a cafe, but not just any cafe. This is the Hub. What makes the Hub so special?
Well at the moment there's some damn nice thumping electronica playing right outside the door. Could well be some amatuer dj session with the amount of people all trying to play their music at the same time, but they manage to achieve some strange sort of harmony amongst themselves, while probably annoying the shite out of anyone over the age of 30. Fucking WIN if I do say so myself.
Another thing that makes this place great...decent food and drink (caffeine and sugar are the only drugs we've found)! Relatively cheap too...tis great :D
I've started making a point of having at least a hot chocolate every time I visit.
This concludes this brief mention of the wonderfullness of the Hub for the moment, more may one day follow!

Point number two for today: we got a trampoline!!!
13ft, solid frame, and damned springy!
It takes up the majority of our back garden, but its soooo worth it!
More will probably follow on this as I discover alternatives to just bouncing up and down :)

I want to open my window but I can't because i'm worried crane flies will get in.

So it’s that time of year again I guess, weather’s getting warm and all the lovely creepy crawlies are emerging from wherever they like to hide in the winter. Generally, I have no problem with bugs here because I know that none of them would actually be able to do anything to me. All this being said though, I hate crane flies. I can’t stand them. Again, it’s not that I have an irrational fear that one is going to crawl into my ear and eat my brain or anything; they’re pretty pointless as things go really. I mean they exist as larva called leatherjackets for the first few months of their lives, and munch on stuff like dead leaves and roots. They can cause problems by eating grass but generally they don’t really achieve much. After a while they metamorphose into their adult form which only lasts for one or two days, they lay eggs and then die.

The crane flies just repulse me. They’re like flying spider zombies. Can you imagine one trying to fly in a heavy wind or something like that? Its legs would probably all fall off. But still, somehow they manage to get into my room whenever I open my window. If they do manage to get into a room I can generally ignore them once it’s not my room or the bathroom. Over the past month I’ve had some epic battles with crane flies. The first one this year happened not so long ago. I went into my room and noticed two huge crane flies in the top right hand corner of my room. Needless to say I froze and immediately looked for some sort of weapon with which to smoosh them. The only real problem though, was that my parents were asleep next door so any killing had to be done with as little noise as possible. So I found a towel and tried the old “twirl it round and flick it like a whip” trick. Unfortunately I didn’t have the power to splat them both and they just sort of fluttered away to separate parts of my room. So I grabbed my book and stalked the smaller of the two. I followed it around my room trying to get it in a spot where I could reach it without making too much noise. Eventually it settled on my wall and I got it. However when I looked up I realised that the other was gone! I searched and searched and couldn’t find it. I decided to get into bed and read until it resurfaced. However the creature was crafty and didn’t appear again so I fell asleep.

The next morning when I woke up there was still no sign of it. So I got up and started to get dressed. As I was putting on my pants it flew out from under my bed. I got such I fright I got all tangled up in my trousers and nearly fell over. The problem was that I was late for work and I didn’t have time to kill it. I had to just leave it in the hopes it would just go away. Needless to say it didn’t. I think it was biding its time in the hopes it could get its revenge for the untimely death of its comrade. So when I came home it was back in the same corner where I had first found it. This time I got my shoe. He didn’t last long this time. I picked him up and flushed him down the loo. Erin - 2, crane flies – 0. However they soon came back...

I went into the bathroom a few days later and BAM! There it was. Another crane fly, clearly come back to see what happened to the other two, but got a bit lost. Now, I can’t shower if I know that there’s one in the room. I just can’t. So I decided once again to wage war. He was sitting up on the ceiling, watching me. So I grabbed my towel and decided I would mush him against the ceiling with it. So I climbed up on the edge of the shower so that I could reach him and pushed the towel up against it. The only problem was that I just wasn’t tall enough to actually make him go crunch, so I was really only holding him against the ceiling with my towel. I had a choice to make, either find some way to get up higher and finish him off, or get down and just hope he was dead. I went with the second option. As I got down he escaped from his towel prison and flew straight at my face. I screamed and fell backwards flailing madly. I burst through the door and ran down stairs. I decided to wait and come back up in a few minutes. When I came back up he was gone. I never did find where he went. So as it stands the score is me – 2, them – 1. He’ll be back though and we’ll finish our epic battle some day, but until then I’ll just keep my windows closed and my shoe at the ready.

Sitting and general procrastination

So sitting, it’s not really anything you appreciate until you can’t. I really realised how great it can be to just sit and, well, nothing this summer. My general aim seems to be “become one with the sofa”. I think this is mainly because where I work you don’t get to sit down. The only things resembling chairs in the shop are those weird benches people use to try on shoes. Not that I don’t love working, but running up and down stairs to fetch shoes for the lovely pikeys of Douglas can be tiring. Especially when you work 5 hours with only a 15 minute break.

So needless to say once I get home all good intentions of doing something productive go out the window. I just sit. The best sitting often happens when procrastinating I find. I think the knowledge that one has to get up and do something makes sinking into the soft leather all the more inviting. Take yesterday for example I got asked to wash up the dishes after dinner. Not a very difficult task but as usual I procrastinated. So I made a cup of tea and sat down.

Our chairs are massive leather recliners. I don’t tend to go all the way into full lounge position the way my dad does when we have guests over, in a way that makes me die a little inside, I just put up the footrest. Doing this makes you sink back even further back into its leathery arms of comfyness but not so much that you’ll spill tea on your face when you try to drink it. Once the footrest goes up though, there’s just no escape. All the aches of the day go away. I find my feet don’t feel like they’re going to explode anymore and I tend to get sleepy, really sleepy. I usually zone out and become a vegetable. A drooling zombie unable to respond to simple questions like, “how was your day?” or “what’s your name?”

When this happens I also forget whatever it was I sat down to avoid, and it’s usually only when I realise I have to pee that I stand any chance of escaping. That’s what happened yesterday. After 3 hours of solid sitting, nature called, and try as I might to avoid having to go upstairs and sort things out, the documentary on waterfalls pretty much sealed the deal. It was then I remembered the washing up. Let me just say leaving things to congeal on the stove for three hours is not a great idea, it took me nearly as long to coax the crud off the bottom of the pans, but that’s the beauty of sitting. The knowledge that you have to get up and do something mundane and annoying in a minute makes the fact that you’re not doing it now and that the chair is really comfy, even better. You put off getting up for just five minutes more and you seem to be even more aware of just how spongy the armrests are, and if you could put your head down and rest it for just a second everything would be perfect...

Up Yours Monday!

Today I decided to record just what I spend most of my day doing at work...quite a bit happened, none of which will impact on the universe in any meaningful way thankfully :)

8.28 - wake up. First thought: "holy shit I need more time". I did, however, manage to get up shave, eat a banana and watch some video Aaron (middle brother, 14, ginger halfbreed - expect further mentions!) had dredged up about using something from Star Wars to replace a dog. Honestly I don't remember all too much of it, I was still running on auto-pilot.

8.57 - leave for work. Short walk, and no crowds of schoolgirls this time of year...which is probably a good thing to be honest.

9.01 - arrive at work. I arrived a minute late...thankfully time is relative, and I'm convinced that the shop is actually stuck in its own eternal timezone...so somehow that works in my favour.

9.05 - start sweeping. This fills in a bit of time, cleans the place up a bit without incurring too much effort, and its probably a bit like some sort of therapy too.

9.15 - its raining and overcast, can't see the sun at all...so why oh why is it so damned hot!?

9.22 - carpets and lino to cut. Fun fun fun. Thankfully I know what I'm doing here, so nobody died this time.

9.34 - I was sent to investigate a missing handle on a wardrobe! It transpired that one of two handles is definitely missing. No doubts at all.

9.37 - I've concluded that the handle needs to be replaced. Of course we wouldn't have a spare to match that kind of pine...so now I think the wardrobe is off-set nicely by two brighter handles!

9.40 - while I'm down the back of the shop, I might as well relax a bit. No doubt theres some terrible duty that nobody else wants awaiting my return to the front of the shop.

9.50 - my right leg is going dead, I think I'm relaxing a bit much. I probably should move, but this chair is comfy!

9.51 - why can I hear bells!?

9.54 - I can hear movement in other parts of the shop, so either some pieces of furniture have become sentient...or customers are about!

9.55 - my leg is dead from the knee down. Might as well be wooden for all the feeling I have in it at the moment. Kayla will approve of this wooden leg incident.

10.00 - squeaky bicycle just went past! Twas really loud...feck its boring.

10.02 - second customer of the day. Insert typical Irish conversation concerning the weather. Riveting that was alright...

10.18 - I didn't think anything near this much stuff would occur to me...its become a bit daunting.

10.22 - there's a piece of wood shoved into one of the fuses here. I should be worried, but I'm just used to it at this stage. And whats more, its a square piece in a circular hole *sigh*.

10.28 - time for some music! Sadly my ipod probably wont last very long...what with it having very little power and all...

10.41 - despite its lack of power, my ipod keeps picking songs I want to listen to out of the 2900 possibilities :)

10.50 - went to the shop next door. I'd decided that I wanted Dr Pepper, but someone other than me must be buying it because they didn't have any! Instead I had to settle for the mind-altering chemicals of BPM...oh well.

11.01 - the postman showed up. I think that man has several personalities, he alternates between giving out to me for existing and praising all the work I apparently do...

11.16 - big truck just pulled up. Wish me luck not getting crushed in an avalanche of pointy-boxed-furniture-death when we open it...

11.50 - Paddy heads away to his lunch, and suddenly people walk in! Its like they were waiting for him to leave or something. Plenty of potential to sell something or at least get the groundwork done that might mean they'll buy something in the future!

12.15 - Aaron arrives to hang around and maybe help me out a bit since I'd be on my own otherwise during lunch.

12.17 - Aaron is put to work. Poor kid needs to work on ye olde social skills, but he is improving! He was able to speak to people and follow orders this time.

12.50 - Paddy returns. Nothing was sold, but then again nothing caught fire. Win.

1.00 - off to lunch with Aaron. JD's as usual, chicken tikka roll as usual, delicious as usual.

1.10 - talk of various things with Aaron, many of them concerning Transformers or anything at all that can be classed as Sci-Fi.

2.00 - arrive back at work, and its dead quiet. Its like the customers were working together to try to swarm the shop while only Aaron and I were there. Cunning devils!

2.14 - yep, definitely quiet. No doubt about it.

2.34 - and there goes the last of the BPM. Water would've lasted longer, but I felt as though I'd need the sugar and other lovely chemicals today :)

3.02 - thirsty again! Curses!

3.17 - another van, except this time I get to load it. My life is crazy like that.

3.38 - I should take up meditation or something. Finding a free half hour doesn't seem to be too difficult when I'm trying to keep busy...

3.56 - one or two people wander in every so often, other than that its all quiet on the Western Front.

4.12 - I've moved on from popping bubble-wrap. Conquered that addiction. Now I stab it with the stylus of my phone :)

4.35 - its reasonably busy again! But most people are just in for a chat and to see when Paddy is retiring...the end of the month isn't far away. Wish I could retire...like...tomorrow...but we all know that ain't happening!

4.50 - yerp more lino to cut. The fun goes on! At least this is something that requires my attention...

5.13 - relaxment down by the tables and chairs. Nobody seems to be buying these lately, so I'm rarely disturbed in here.

5.18 - I wanna go home! Almost there I guess...

5.21 - two fire engines went past, followed by that big water tanker one...most excitement we've had around here all day.

5.38 - freedom at long last! Away home I go :)

Sheesh, Dave, catch up here xP.

Just a quick one for now.

I was talking about Lego a while back with some friends. I was fortunate to get some for Christmas from Galway Dave (Hey Galway Dave, if you ever read this...). Lego has got to be the best thing in the world! So good, that James May (You might know him from Top Gear, he's the slow one, as in speed, not mentality) made an entire house out of it! AN ENTIRE HOUSE! It also had fully functioning taps, toilet and hot shower! And a lego cat and mouse. Amazing!

Unfortunately the house was demolished after Lego Land decided they no longer wanted it, as it would have been too expensive to transport. *sadface* Poor house.

That is what I wanted to share with you, and shall now proceed in doing so. =D.