Blue skies ahead…

I think my brain may have been borrowed and left somewhere to gather dust. It didn’t occur to me that updating a post wouldn’t update the date. I then deleted the post. Come back brain!

My new website is up and running as of this last week and my stress level has fallen which is just as well as I ended up going to the doctors this morning as I’ve had a fever and some unpleasant pain over the weekend. I was right, I have an infection. The antibiotics ought to start working  and I’ll soon be more alive than death warmed over so I can write or at least lie in bed and daydream (a very important part of the writing process).

I don’t go to the doctors unless I think I might actually die if I don’t. I wouldn’t say I have a phobia of the medical profession, but visiting them usually makes me feel like someone’s put my head in a vice and tried to make brain juice. My long suffering Goblin normally comes with me, but today…I went on my own. It’s just as well I left “early”. I had to walk over to the surgery which thankfully isn’t far, but the community hospital and a supermarket are between me and the surgery and there are no short cuts through unless you go through the hospital or around the supermarket which means dodging delivery trucks. At least you used to be able to go through the hospital. I got to the door and found an ’employees only’ sign on the front door. This is the traditional front door of a Victorian building. I was tempted to use it anyway, but I had a feeling I’d get half way and some helpful jobsworth would make me backtrack (it’s like a maze) and I’d miss my appointment so I went around the long way feeling hard done by in my misery.

I made it with about five minutes to spare. The doctor was very nice and thorough (thank you doctor!) so the only unpleasant part of the visit was the waiting room. It would be difficult to decide which was more irritating; the softly played radio channel with nerve shattering music or the other patrons discussing baby names. This wouldn’t have been a problem except the names being discussed were awful (yes baby names are subjective and yes my unborn children are probably hoping to stay that way to avoid my choice of names). I barely restrained myself from turning and pointing out that given names are actually important to an individual’s mental and emotional development and to spare the poor unborn child a moniker sure to stamp ‘bully me’ or ‘My Mummy has a low IQ’ on their forehead. Someone did research on teachers in England and found that the teachers would read the names of the children on their class lists and even before meeting the children, certain names would conjure ‘low IQ’ ‘trouble maker’ or ‘disruptor’ and the teachers would unconsciously treat the children accordingly. Human beings make mental shortcuts to save time…meet a large number of annoying people named X and you automatically start thinking all X’s are annoying. It works both way of course; I bet those kids will never like people with the name of their teachers who treated them like idiots because they had stupid names.

So it’s been a good day…slept most it…but sleep is good. Yesterday I read an excellent book on line (it’s more of a long essay) King John in Fact and Fiction by Ruth Wallerstein. I think I’m beginning to unravel him. If you’re wondering what King John has to do with anything…that will have to be another post! Knock head on wood tomorrow I’ll be well enough to do some work. Blue skies ahead!

P.S. Speaking of bad names for children…King John was christened Johann Sans Terre…ie his given name was John Without Land or as it translated across the continent long before he became King, “John the Looser”. What the heck was Henry II thinking? Did he suspect the babe wasn’t his? Anyway…the point is…if John had, had a decent name like “Johann Sebastian” would he have lost France? Maybe…maybe not! There’s a lot of power in a name! On his coins he used his father’s name in Latin…Henricus…and as for his children, of the names we know; there isn’t a “Looser” name among them. See, he wasn’t all bad!