the sanctuary:
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Clinical trials
Hello, still alive.
Here's a phrase you never want to hear from your doctor "I do not like the look of this." Excellent, doc. Really? What's up with it?
About a week and a half ago, when my daughter was just over a week old, I noticed a rash under my arm. Itchy, and a bit painful. Like feeling tired, but more intense. Being a complete idiot, I looked it up on NHS Direct. The site said - shingles. That freaked me out a bit - what if it's shingles? What about the baby? Should I quarantine myself?? I made an appointment with my GP the next day.
I got there and saw a student doctor, who looked at it and, considering my history, was all ready to sign it off as a fungal infection. Which is, you know, not nice but at least it's not shingles. He said shingles was way down on his list. However, he wasn't 100% certain what it was so he called the actual doctor in, who took a look at it, asked about my symptoms and said the words above. Shingles, he pronounced. Yup, NHS Direct was right. Damn and blast. Still, he said I was okay to be with baby and that was all I wanted to know.
We're currently suffering from colic. You might think that she, my daughter, is suffering alone, but that is to fundamentally misunderstand colic. When a baby suffers, a baby does not suffer in silence. When this policy of declarative discomfort is edging into your nights and fraying your days... well, at least *I* get to go to work.
Fatherhood
Hello. On the 31st of May, a little baby girl, red faced and screaming, was handed to me. She was my daughter. She was so red, her skin so soft, her head so neat and round, she looked like an angry radish. Within seconds, I had a nickname for her. Within a few more seconds, I realised that I loved her more intensely than anyone in the world bar her mother.
Surprise of the day - and this was a day full of surprises, was her hair. First of all - lots of it. Second of all - red. Neither of us have red hair. My beard is a bit auburn but still. An amazing, unexpected, glorious colour. Coupled with her gorgeous face - and I know I'm biased, but she does have a gorgeous face - she may be the most perfectly beautiful creature in the world.
Five days later, I'm utterly besotted and find it hard to imagine a world without her. Just now she was crying for something - nappy? food? cuddles - and I got her to calm down by just holding her. She looked up at me, her deep blue eyes finding my face and her expression broke my heart. The helplessness, the vulnerability, the knowledge contained in the face that I will be able to help... Impossible to disappoint her. How could I?
She sleeps now. And when she's awake.. I'll be here.
More genius, less moping
There's a trailer for a documentary on, I dunno, maybe Discovery or something, about constructing a giant airship which was also an aircraft carrier. Anyway, there's a clip from the show with an old guy talking to camera. He says, in all seriousness, "Einstein was the brains of the group".
Well, yes. How fucking smart does a group have to be before Einstein is the muscle?
On genius
I thought about it quite hard last night. Is it okay to not be a genius? I mean, here am I wanting to write, always feeling that it is something I should do, and I am pretty sure I'm no genius. I'm just someone who wants to write stupid stories about things I like. I don't have any purpose when I write, no deeper meaning. Is it okay to be okay? I'm not a genius, I'm an administrator in a medical indemnity company. right now I'm writing a masterpiece - a report on new dental claims in the first four months of 2009.
I'm just me.
We can't all, obviously, be Milton, or Orwell, or Austen or any of the other genius writers out there. Someone has to write the books which fill the shelves in Waterstones to no great purpose. But what kind of ambition is that? To fill shelves, all I'd need to do is work in a supermarket.
Piccies
Filmsy
I have a film sitting at the chemist, waiting to be developed. Very exciting. I haven't had a film developed since 1999, although I did own a Polaroid and that did sort of develop film. On its own. LIKE MAGIC.
This, and I think I've mentioned this before, comes from my SLR. It's a roll of experimental photographs, where I've played with aperture width and shutter speed and that sort of thing. I don't know if it'll help or not, but there should be, somewhere, some really fucking cool photos in there.
Maybe.
Or maybe every single one will be a useless blur. Who knows? It's possible. This is the uncertain joy of photography. Digital cameras have taken it from us. Pictures are, as a wise advertising slogan once declared, back.
Not following up
Since the Hib (Haemophilus influenzae type b) vaccine was introduced in 1992, cases of this disease, which can cause meningitis, have dropped by 99 per cent from about 800 cases a year to a record low of 12 cases last year in children under five. Since the Meningitis C vaccine was introduced in 1999, deaths from the disease have fallen from as many as 79 to an average of less than one death a year. In the two years since the pneumococcal vaccine was introduced, it is estimated that over 900 serious cases have been prevented.
We're winning that one, and there's (hopefully) more good news to come with another vaccine.
Sorry, this is all a bit serious. Stuff about coffee cups next week, promise!
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