justbloggin

Sometimes I wonder why I never seem to have any time. I always think 'ah next week will be quiet and I can catch up then' trouble is next week is never quiet, and I never do everything I intend to do. The ironing is so far down my list of priorities it is amazing that anyone in the family ever looks human, let alone groomed.

So last week kicked off with one resignation and one period of notice being proferred, thus reducing staff numbers from 6 to 4 in one fell swoop. The informal team is more informal than ever, and I am fairly guilty of being informal myself, ie. hardy ever there in person. Which means that I have now hassled everyone to get their Skype phones and email sorted out as I haven't managed to master long distance telepathy yet.

The kids kicked off the holidays with an assortment of kids club events including karate and squash, trips to the cinema, trampolining and arts and crafts. Elinor headed off to a sleepover and a day out. George did Yogabugs and more karate. He has also developed a very strong interest in snooker thanks to our 10 year old neighbour and some men he met in a pub while Elinor was at a birthday party...yes he is only 6...yes he was in the bar playing snooker for an hour!

My mum went off for her regular heart checkup and has been advised to get a pacemaker. This would be fine if they hadn't had a disaster the last time they tried to give her a pacemaker. Last time it turned out the scar tissue from her original valve surgery (back in 1963) prevented them from getting the wires in. You might think a bit of prior investigation would be sensible on someone that had a history of early open heart surgery...or is that me...oh well. Anyway the solution then was to implant two new artificial heart valves and to postpone the pacemaker. The valves have been ticking happily ever since but the pacing problem hasn't gone away. With the usual gung ho attitude of those not having surgery the medics are claiming that the whole thing can be done in a lunch time and all will be hunky dory. Sadly my mum isn't so sure, especially after last time. I'm not sure what the stress is doing to her, but it can't be good.

Still this Thursday is the pre-op checkup so with any luck they will manage to calm her down. I don't think she knows what type of pacemaker she is getting, two wires vs one. I'm assuming it might be two.

All the internet info I've looked at is very positive, apart from the references to 'twiddler syndrome' which is the rather unfortunate side-effect whereby sufferers develop a tendency to do a nazi salute if the wires get attached to the wrong thing. I won't be mentioning this AT ALL.



justbloggin