Have a vent

[crissdee]

I wouldn't mind them as a diabetes-friendly alternative to "real" sweeties...

[tetsabb]

Not a vent as such.
I have an uneasy feeling about terrorism and the Olympics.
I hope I am wrong, though I see reports of disruption on the French rail system this morning, due to arson attacks.

[amanda]

There have also been a couple of robberies, and the Aussie woman not connected with the team at all, assaulted last weekend. Unfortunately the crime gangs are going to take full advantage of all the tourists and others.

[amanda]

Another sleepless Saturday night due to constant thumping music somewhere nearby. Not sure if it's from a venue - doubtful though as I'd hear it each week if that was the case, I suspect it's more like a hoon driver (heard several of them driving laps around the suburb) or someone parked somewhere with their personal nightclub car.

Made harder by having to get up early this morning and leave by 7.45 am. Yesterday it took me an hour from leaving home to getting on the train at the station halfway up the line from the bus trip.

[amanda]

Tonight I leave to stay in the city motel since the replacement buses would mean a possible departure tomorrow morning at 5.30am, and my body decided to give me the 'time of the month' again, when I am a week off it, based on the pills I am taking.

The twelve hour train trip tomorrow will be uncomfortable, when I struggle with the small on-board toilet anyway and having to manage other things will be difficult.
Also made harder will be the cramp which makes standing up difficult, which I had planned to do to ease my back pain. So that'll also be set off.

And the whole process sets off my IBS.

Ain't being female just great? (part of this complaint was why my doctors wouldn't give me anything for years, as it now fell under the 'gender complaint' department)

[RLDavies]

I did something to my elbow last night that I shouldn't have. Holy Moses, it hurts. I can neither completely straighten nor completely bend the arm.

I fully intend to take it to A&E, but wouldn't you know, today's the day when I'm getting groceries delivered. So I've got to hang about until the food gets here.

[jenny]

Ouch indeed!I hope the medics can sort it out RLD

[RLDavies]

Well! About five minutes before the groceries arrived, something went click in the elbow, and it was suddenly much improved. Not 100%, but considerably less painful and more mobile.

After putting the food away, I was more desperate for sleep than anything else, since I only had something like four hours last night. So I've just finished a nice long nap. The elbow seems to have benefited too -- it's almost fully mobile and mostly useable. It wanted some Deep Heat rub, which it is currently enjoying along with a rest on a little cushion. I'll take some more ibuprofen this evening, and slap on some piroxicam gel at bedtime, and we'll see how it goes tomorrow.

[eeyoresmum]

If it weren't so hot today I would give myself a good kicking:
two weeks ago, I suddenly remembered a book that I loved as a young kid, and of course ordered it again:  'Henrietta's House' by Elizabeth Goudge.
Postie dumped it on my doormat just now, I ripped off the plastic envelope, and read, "Henriettas Haus".
Bleeding enfer!  Of course, I could read it in German, but that's not part of my memories. 
Grrrrr. Off to the local 2nd hand bookshop it goes. 
Must pay more attention next time!

[crissdee]

I applied for Universal Credit last month, so my first payment will be tomorrow. They indicated that I would be getting a shade under £400 a month which, while not exactly solving all my problems, would certainly make my life a lot easier. With that figure in mind, I took an advance to cover my immediate needs, agreeing to repay it at £25 a month for eight months, as I reckoned I could afford that cut in my monthly payment. I now find that what they didn't tell me, was that my pension would be deducted from the first figure, so my actual payment is just over £100 a month. I can understand why they make the deduction, but I wish they had told me about it before.

Just been to the Jobcentre.  

I have spent rather more time in such places than I would like over the years, and I cannot help but notice that they are getting progressively more useless as time goes on.  Back in the day, if Andy Capp cartoons, and black and white movies are to be believed, the Labour Exchange would actively suggest jobs for you and urge you to apply, if not actually compel you to do so.  By the time I was visiting them, they had cards displayed with vacancies for you to select, and they would act as middlemen in brokering an interview.  Later on, they just had electronic screens which you could use to search for jobs, and print off slips of paper with all the info, so you could send in an application at your leisure.  Some years after that, they would just suggest websites you could search on, and offer use of computer, which in my case never seemed to work.  Today, I went in, and while waiting, I saw a job advertised on a noticeboard.  When I mentioned it to my job coach (as they now style themselves), HE WASN'T ALLOWED TO LOOK IT UP!!!  The best he could do was hunt up the company website, which I already have bookmarked as it is a company I have bought things from in the past.  So this is a JOB Centre, and my JOB coach, cannot call up a JOB vacancy.  WTAF?

[jenny]

Oh what a pain, crissdee! My son in the UK has finally managed to land a job, but it took him a while. He got it in the end by relentlessly applying for everything that came up that was vaguely in his wheelhouse.

[RLDavies]

Elbow is still v v bad. I can find certain positions where it's comfortable, meaning down to a dull ache, but then when I try to move it beyond a few degrees, YEOWCH. It's worst at night, partly because of the difficulties of moving around in bed, but also the elbow seems to dislike lying down in general. It's a bit happier when I'm upright.

It's not my writing arm, thank goodness, but the pain interferes with work because of course it takes both hands to handle a sheaf of papers. It's severely interfering with some housework that badly needs doing. I don't want to try messing with laundry or dishes. I've spilt some cereal dust on the kitchen floor, but can't contemplate using the vacuum cleaner.

Ibuprofen and piroxicam gel don't touch it much. The pain was so bad last night, and I had to work, so I gave in and took some codeine that I had left in the medicine cabinet. It might have just taken the edge off, but no more than that.

At the time, I was pretty desperate, and made up my mind to take it to A&E first thing today. But overnight I managed to find a position to sleep reasonably comfortably for a few hours, and after some decent kip and now that I'm up, it's settled down a bit. So now I'm thinking I can cope.

[jenny]

Why not still go to A&E? Can you find a "less crowded than normal" time? Or maybe just go to the doctor and see if you need referring to a physio?

[RLDavies]

Mainly I've got work to do! Deadlines are looming. I don't want to end up spending half a day hanging around on metal chairs in the waiting room (and £10 in taxi fare) just to be told there's not much to be done about it.

If it doesn't start improving, or gets worse, I'll have to end up there. But maybe after the weekend. At least then I can say it's been a week and getting no better.

[crissdee]

I've applied for three jobs, two carpentry related, and one behind the counter of a tool supply place, but that is only a temporary position.

[Bondee]

It's refreshing to know that the Job Centre hasn't improved in the 20-something years since I was last in one.

[RLDavies]

Happy news -- something went click again in the elbow and it's just about back to normal. The elbow is still VERY tender, and the muscles all down the forearm are desperately sore after being under strain this whole time. Basically it feels like somebody's been beating my arm with a stick.

BUT I can move it around, and use it! I was finally able to have a good night's sleep without it waking me. Straightening the arm is no problem at all, and I can pick things up. And with some considerable effort and pain I can just about manage to touch my head/face. By this evening it might be loosened up enough so I can have an actual shower and wash my hair at last! (Wouldn't you know it, the sweatiest week we've had this summer has been the week when I couldn't wash properly.)

[jenny]

Well that's good news RLD - perhaps you accidentally dislocated it somehow and now it's fully gone back to its proper position?

[crissdee]

Trying to claim a council tax rebate online. They asked for my National Insurance number, which I typed in accurately. They do not accept it, as they say it must be 9 characters long, and characters 3 to 8 must be numeric, WHICH IS EXACTLY WHAT I HAVE TYPED!!!!

[celebaelin]

I'm bloody covered in insect bites.

The night before last I left the window open because of the heat and woke up with two bites on my right arm and one on my right leg.  Well, it happens sometimes - but this morning having again left the window open I've picked up another four, two on the right side of my trunk, one on the left and one on my left arm.  All seven are itching like crazy and I'm trying to think of a way I can keep cool and remove myself from the insect equivalent of the good food guide.

As Sam Gamgee once said "What do these things eat when they can't get hobbit?"

[pdr]

Aug 2, 2024 11:42:35 GMT celebaelin said:

I'm bloody covered in insect bites.

The night before last I left the window open because of the heat and woke up with two bites on my right arm and one on my right leg.  Well, it happens sometimes - but this morning having again left the window open I've picked up another four, two on the right side of my trunk, one on the left and one on my left arm.  All seven are itching like crazy and I'm trying to think of a way I can keep cool and remove myself from the insect equivalent of the good food guide.

As Sam Gamgee once said "What do these things eat when they can't get hobbit?"

When someone finds a good place to eat out they generally tell their friends. There's probably an insect website with a section saying "People who tried Celebaelin also tried..."

PDR

[Bondee]

FedEx can get to feck!

Package delivered? Was it fuck?!

It WaS DeLiVeReD bEcAuSe It WaS sIgNeD FoR bY N. CaRdEw.

Who the fuck is N. Cardew?! It's no one in this house!

[RLDavies]

Aug 1, 2024 16:00:33 GMT jenny said:

Well that's good news RLD - perhaps you accidentally dislocated it somehow and now it's fully gone back to its proper position?

It didn't feel dislocated -- and it's bloody hard to dislocate an elbow without serious trauma like a car accident -- but obviously there must have been a ligament trapped out of position. Anyway, it has indeed settled down, the forearm muscles have relaxed, and although it's still tender I have full range of motion and usefulness again.

I had a shower this morning! I washed my hair! And dried it! And am about to brush it! I can stand to be around myself again.

And having had a shower and got all clean, I'm already literally dripping sweat off my face. Makes me think it was hardly worth it.

[jenny]

Aug 2, 2024 10:56:40 GMT crissdee said:

Trying to claim a council tax rebate online. They asked for my National Insurance number, which I typed in accurately. They do not accept it, as they say it must be 9 characters long, and characters 3 to 8 must be numeric, WHICH IS EXACTLY WHAT I HAVE TYPED!!!!

Did you leave any spaces in it? On some forms that might cause a problem.

[crissdee]

I can't remember now if I put the spaces in myself, or the form did it automatically, but I will try that. On every official form (P60s etc.) it is printed with the spaces, so I assumed that they were required...

[amanda]

Just alighted from the overnight interstate train and there was a ruckus at midnight at a town three hours out of Sydney.

A woman became hysterical, shouting that her cousin will die. That's all I heard. Train staff intervened and eventually made the call to remove the woman but had to wait for the local town police to arrive.

[ali]

I keep checking to see if there's anything new on the QI site. Must be about 20 times today. Idiot.

[barbados]

Aug 2, 2024 21:11:40 GMT crissdee said:

I can't remember now if I put the spaces in myself, or the form did it automatically, but I will try that. On every official form (P60s etc.) it is printed with the spaces, so I assumed that they were required...

Generally speaking in an online form spaces confuse things. The application sees it almost as a terminator in the string so doesn’t know where the rest of the characters are, or it will only read the first x characters (because spaces are now considered special characters now)
The habit to get into is miss out the spaces then replace them if that doesn’t work - which it will more often than not.

[amanda]

With logging in on my Australian Government site for the combined welfare/tax/medicare stuff, I have to be careful to not put an automatic space after my password/secret answer as that's not accepted, as I didn't do it with setting it up.

[Dix]

The space removal isn't guaranteed to work though, but it's a good idea to try.
Husband did battle with the UK post office web site to buy some e-stamps or whatever they call them nowadays. Didn't succeed. Switched to a different browser. Still no luck.
I had a look, could see nothing wrong. He called their customer service, they couldn't help either. It just didnt ******* work.