Tour De Farce 06

Another year has gone by and another Tour De France. And the question has to be asked, why did they even bother. After a doping scandal forced numerous teams to drop out of the tour not to mention the implication of the biggest tour hopeful Jan Ullrich in aforementioned doping scandal you really dont need to wonder why cycling as a sport has such a poor reputation.

The athletes that take part in the tour are the absolute top of their game men in the sport, they would not be there otherwise. but with so many top performing athletes concentrated in one competition and on a singular sport you have to wonder where they can find the edge they need to win. And there-in lies the real trouble.

The UCI (the cycling sports ruling body) has a number of technical restrictions on the bicycles that are allowed to compete in races everything from the weight of the fully constructed machine to the geometry of the frame. This has a benefit in that ultimately the strongest rider will prevail. The downside is that ultimately the strongest rider will prevail and if a technical edge cant be found maybe another somewhat more illegal way will suffice.

Perhaps if the UCI loosened their restrictions on some of the rules governing the machines, the riders could find a technical edge that can help them push the boundaries of the sport once more without pushing chemicals.

In the meantime I hope that Floyd Landis of the Phonak team can hold on to his yellow jersey and tour title, as he too has been implicated in a doping scandal involving a high testosterone count. Ultimately I feel that the ball is in UCI’s court, it may be an idea to put it to the riders to find out what the real reasons for the doping are; especially from those who have done it.

A note on the prolific posting.

I just thought I’d drop a quick note in here while I had the chance. You see, I used to have a blog up on Blogger.com, and needless to say I happen to think that blogger is next to useless.

I have seen the error of my ways and transferred all my posts to wordpress. Unfortunately the one thing I could not preserve were the dates, however going forward everything should be peachy.

Thanks for stopping by, I’m a bit ranty but I dont really aim to inflame, I aim to create a dialogue. So bear with the rants and delve into some of the other posts cos I think there’s some good stuff in there.

Cheers and welcome to my blog now hosted on WordPress.

Tales delivered by insomnia: Part 2

Well, as I said in my post yesterday, it has been a long time since I have posted, and now I’m going to hit you all with a double whammy. My posts can be a bit angry at times and sometimes I get very frustrated with the way things are going I just have to vent somewhere. So this post is about something else.

Obesity.

Obesity (and its associated diseases and ailments) is rapidly becoming the number one killer in the western hemisphere. It’s a terrible affliction that is also spirit crushing for those who suffer as a result of it.

I did some research on this topic a few weeks ago trying to find out a few facts. And the only conclusion that I can reach is that while there is a single cause for obesity (simply over-eating) there are often deeper root causes for this over-indulgence.

Before I left my home country and arrived in Australia I weighed myself and was shocked to see that I was 94.5Kg and my waist size had increased dramatically from a slight 34-36 inches in the space of 6-7 months. Don’t get me wrong I understand that there are people out there who are worse than I was at this stage.But what is interesting is what happened when I factored in what was going on in my life at that point in time, job going badly, packing for a big move and being stuck in an office solidly from 8:30AM to 17:00, it was no real surprise that I was generally unhappy at the way things were going. And I was eating to compensate for my general un-happiness.

I actually felt pretty crappy too. I had a lot of stomach pain amongst various other gruesome problems and when I went to the Doctor he diagnosed me with IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome). IBS is more of a loose term for describing a collection of digestive/stomach related allergies than a per se condition as such. With the commonality between those allergies being discomfort for the sufferer.

I felt that I had two ways things could go, worse or better. I opted for better. I figured that my health issues had not gotten so far out of hand that I could not do anything about them, however I knew that if I did nothing about them I would rapidly get worse.

Tipping-Point.

You see I figure that the Human body like any other reasonably built functional device operates well within the parameters it had evloved to cope with. Adjust those parameters slightly and the body can cope, adjust them dramatically and the body will not cope because the species has not had time to evolve to adjust to a severe change. Like walking out of 20 degrees and into 240 degrees.

I call the point at which the body starts to fail the tipping point. a little bit more over the edge and it looses control.

Oh and one of the worst things that people who suffer from obesity do, is they simply stop eating. This is probably the worst thing to do as the body can’t cope with the sudden shock. You must always continue to eat but you need to gently ween yourself of food, not dramatically stop. This is especially important if you tend to consume a lot of fizzy sweet soda drinks. Your body will produce massive quantities of insulin to cope with the influx of sugar, however if you simply stop, your body will carry on producing that same level of insulin in anticipation of the regular dose of sugars. You must ween yourself off slowly.

Decision Time.

At 94.5Kg I decided that I wanted my health to be better because I was unhappy with it. I was unhappy at work but then again that’s work, and I was feeling more conscious about my body shape as it was really starting to go a bit appley. Apparently on males the apple shape is extremely unhealthy unfortunately unlike females the male body doesn’t cope with excess fat in the same way a female body does. Gentlemen accrue it initially around the abdomen, and chest and this creates a number of fairly dangerous complications. Women on the other hand accrue it on thighs, and buttocks initially.

I decided that really what I needed to do was get back into a sport. It had to be a sport because it has to be regular, done at regular times, but had to be physically controllable. Most people make the mistake of choosing a sport that is too strenuous for them or that they are not likely to maintain due to a lack of facilities. My choice was cycling and I’ll tell you why.

1. Running

Running is great aerobic and cardiovascular exercise, but is also relatively high-impact. This means that your feet impacting on the ground applies pressure to the knee joint which in turn causes rapid fatigue and could also translate to issues in later life. I know many runners who have had to have re-constructive surgery in their later years. I know this doesn’t apply to all runners. If you haven’t ran you will be disappointed at the pathetic distance you will cover the first few times. This will improve over time but don’t think you’ll be a marathon man in no time, and if you are too heavy don’t even consider it.

2. Swimming

Swimming is excellent. It combines the aerobic and cardiovascular exercise of the above with a sport that is also low impact (you’re in water). You exercise every limb and all the major muscle groups and burn a lot of energy. This sport gets top marks except for a few niggles. You need regular access to a pool. And providing you have easy access to a pool the next issue is how you feel in a swimsuit. They are revealing, but if you get over that you’ll find that swimming works very effectively. As always if you haven’t done this you will need to learn properly, and this can be embarrassing. If you haven’t swam for a long time or are new to the sport you may be disheartened by the lack of progress initially, but as you’ll see later it only takes a little often to get somewhere.

3. Cycling

Cycling is excellent for all the reasons listed above except that you do not burn quite the same amount of energy. when you are travelling through water it is important to realise that water is many times more denser than air (400 I think). Cycling also utilises all the muscle groups but to a lesser extent the ankles and the arms. The next thing you have to consider is the bike and the clothing. If you have a bike that’s been in the shed for 8 years my only advice is to bin it and get a new one. It probably wont fit you and it definitely wont be road worthy. As far as clothing is concerned there is not really much choice, you should always wear cycling clothing because saddle sores hurt and the build up of damage can cause disfiguration and impotence. But the clothing doesn’t have to be revealing lycra if you don’t like a close fit. There are plenty of other varieties out there I’ll put a link up in a day or so.

Cycling was an easy choice for me, and basically I got back into it again by firstly taking my new bike (at that time a 1600 quid Specialized Allez Comp bike) to the park and re-learning how to ride…. Wobbly at first but within a day or two reasonably competently. On day one I could not make it around the whole park, but by the end of the week I could. I was hooked. The only real issue for most people when cycling comes up as an option is that it is expensive, kit and shoes cost money and for good machines the sky’s the limit, and believe me you do not get a good machine for anything under $800 unless its sale time. So if this is what you want to do make certain you are prepared to do it so you can get something out of that investment.

Eventually what I was able to do was to start substituting journeys that would be made by a car in most cases with my bike. A trip to the shops became a bike journey, if I’m going to work I’ll ride my bike. In fact it was this that made me realise that you don’t need to do a lot quickly, a little regularly is exactly what’s required. It’s taken me a couple of years but I’m now very fit, I weigh around 80Kg and go for rides that are around the 100k mark now. It took two years to get there but in the end I’m better for it, and my IBS has settled down too my waistline is 34″ and my little bod is getting tighter and more toned each time I go out!

And I must say that sport by itself is not enough. You need to get into a diet that’s balanced and healthy. And my wife is a demon cook as well as a demon purveyor of night time activities, and she knows all about balanced. We both like our nachos like the next guy but we might have a garlic chicken salad the next night. You can visit her site from one of the links to the right (she’s the otterkat.net one by the way). If you ask her kindly she’ll put up a recipe or two, But I’ll put up a post on my wife’s yummy cooking at some point soon.

A Christian sense of giving.

It’s been a long time since I’ve actually put something up here and I guess I had to be ill before I got the chance. There are many things I find interesting in the world in these modern times.

1. The expansion of conflict in the Middle East with Israel’s assault on Hezbollah in the Lebanon.

2. The continually increasing rise in the price of oil with a possibility that oil may reach as high as $125 a barrel.

3. The ever increasing numbers of troops being sent to Baghdad because the war is going so well over there (apparently). Why according to some its the safest place there is… I’m wondering when Disney World is coming to town. It may very well be what’s required; don’t send in the troops send in Mickey instead!!

4. In Las Vegas they have banned feeding the homeless in parks and other public places. As a matter of fact to do so could land you with a $1,000 fine and a 6 month prison term. You are hereby guilty of being charitable….. How do you plea?

Still it could be worse, the US has lots of political allies in the middle east with its ever so popular war in Iraq and of course the US is talking to Syria and Iran who co-sponsor the Hezbollah, well at least every other month….. Except on wash days… Not on pork chop night…. Before the president has his mug of cocoa and his bed time story… Too bad the US has as much political influence in the Middle east as an old incontinent cat suffering from uncontrollable flatulence.

The danger is that the conflict between Israel and Lebanon could escalate dangerously, and drag the entire region into a state of war. A three day ceasefire for aid will not help, and certainly won’t help the fragile democratically elected government there which could crumble and send the country into civil war AGAIN.

But that’s not important. What is important is the war on the homeless. That’s why I have constructed the homelessness re-distribution plan, or (since we like to give things names that make them look innocent like Patriot Act) The Charter for the Poor. I think I could solve quite a lot of the US’s problems by applying a little cold hearted logic to a number of embarrassing social issues.

The plan is simple. Stop recruiting fine healthy Americans with homes and jobs and families and start rounding up the homeless instead. Pay them minimum wage and train them up to be marines. Send them over to Baghdad, hell you could use them in the Lebanon as peace keepers. At least that way they are off your front lawn and lets face it, in this war ravaged world where people starve to death on the streets of the richest country on earth that’s what really counts. And all the Right Wing conservative (see religious) politicains out there can feel good about themselve’s for doing something for the poeple.

It’s a win, win situation.

Devils Day (Or you people are stupid.)

You know, I was happily sitting in front of my computer on the 6th of June this year (2006) happily browsing through a number of news sites when one particular theme that seemed to be common to all of them became apparent.

Christians are absolute dumbasses. Thats right if you are a christian (especially a devout one) you are probably certifiable, how many times must we go through the same shit. For those of you who do not know or are clever enough to know some good old horse shit when you smell it; yesterday the 06/06/06 was refered to as Devils Day, because once you extract the 0’s and the /’s it rather spookily makes the number 666. Around the world christians went all-out with 24hr praying to fight the forces of evil.

The only thing they were fighting in the end were probably some serious cases of lock-jaw. We had it at the turn of the millenium, we had it on the 6th of January 2006 (for those of us who live in the rest of the world) we had it on June 1st 2006 for those of you who live in the US. Why? Because apparently 666 may not be the right number and 616 might, either way if you believe this dribble you are a dumbass.

Far be it for me to point out that we have apparently faced annihilation due to the alleged coming of the rapture on more occasions than I have fingers toes and other assorted body parts to count. We have mad people in the US who want to create the conditions in the middle east to bring about the rapture, well I’ve got news for them… They’re dumbasses. Even their holy book stipulates that it will be preceeded by 40 years of peace, and I hate to point it out but at any point in time since and even before World War II there were more than 20 wars underway, hell there are around 70 on-going at this point in time. Just because the US isn’t involved (which I doubt) directly in them doesn’t mean that we’ve had 40 years of peace. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

Just because some bloody christian nutter can make 666 out of a date every once in a while shouldn’t mean that they automatically earn the right to prove to the world they are dumb by broadcasting the fact via international news outlets. Instead of being dumbasses why not accept the simple fact that ultimately you are little more than presently walking, talking worm food and fertiliser and that the universe will go on existing in its infinite wonderment and glory despite your bloody stupid ramblings about dates until it can no longer exist.

Say, thats a nice bike.

I got my new bicycle about two weeks ago now, and boy is it sweet. The frame is extremely narrow and the fully built bike weighs around 8.5Kg (it’s lighter without the water bottle cage). It’s a solid black carbon fibre beauty called an Equinox 11 and I have been enjoying leaving people behind in my dust trails. Needless to say I’ve been a bit lax in my postings recently.

The rider positioning is more time-trial than triathlon as the bike itself uses a frame that was designed to participate in UCI road racing events and tri bikes don’t conform to the strict standards (so I’m told) which I think is ridiculous. But I digress.

The only changes I have made to it are the saddle height the saddle is a great San Marco gel saddle, and it’s very comfy. I also added a pair of Time RSX pedals to the bike and adjusted the tension of the cleat locking mechanism. I also made minor adjustments to the aero bars and changed the tyre casings to winter weight as we’re heading for winter in this part of the world right now (well what passes for winter at any rate). The bike is fitted as standard with Bontrager wheels which are light weight and a delight to ride on (surprisingly easy to clean the rims where the brake pads contact them too). I added a carbon bottle cage to it and just for the look of the thing, I topped it all of with a new pair of jaggad black and white bib shorts and a black and white jaggad jersey.

You can find jaggad on the links to the right, they are a fine purveyour of comfortable cycling and tri-athlon kit. The bike is a head turner and is a great ride I can barely squeeze a credit card between the seat tube and the rear tyre. I’m off to stroke my bike now….

Sex

One of the most interesting things about modern society that I have noted is that it has forgotten one simple and inescapable fact; People are animals. and like many other animals we eat other animals, we need to rest, exercise, eat and carry out the genetic imperative just like every other species.

Reproduction is what the human animal is first and foremost designed to do. Why sex is a taboo subject is beyond me, sex is like cooking your dinner or taking your dog out for a walk, its one of those things that everybody is going to do at some point in their lives and the best part of it is there is nothing, NOTHING anyone can do to stop it from happening.

Let’s not kid ourselves here, sex is not something that people should just rush out and do, because like most other activities there are risks and consequences associated with sex. These consequences are both moral and health related, and by moral I’m not placing any bias on any particular orientation. My own personal thoughts on the moral & health related issues surrounding sex are best summed up in six simple points.

1. Is the person I want to have sex with ready for this?

This sounds simple but believe me the only way to know for sure is to know the person, if they aren’t ready and you are forcing it on them then you and the other person are in the wrong relationship. There is no pressure to loose your virginity when you are not comfortable with the idea or the person you are going to loose it to. This is not a religious thing; its common sense. You really should only engage in this when you are both ready.

2. Do I want to have sex with this person?

If I’m being pressured into it or if I like the person in a way different to how they perceive the relationship then I’m not going to jump into their pants. Just because someone wants to have sex with you doesn’t mean they are even right for you, it just means they feel they are ready. If you aren’t there yet talk to the other person about it maybe you’ll find you like them in that way and are ready, maybe you wont, the choice is yours. You shouldn’t have sex with someone you dont want to have sex with it can leave you feeling cold and possibly psychologically scarred and it will change your relationship with that person and any family memebers of that person you maintain a relationship with.

3. Do you trust this person and do they trust you.

If you have doubts in this perhaps they are the wrong person or perhaps you live dangerously. Relationships built on trust help promote the safety that you’ll need to feel when you are sharing an intimate moment with someone else. If you cant or dont trust this person then that safety barrier may not be there.

4. Extending from trust is health.

Be certain of how healthy the person is before getting intimate, either use condoms or simply dont get into bed with them if you are unsure. This is your health you are responsible for the consequences of your actions and diseases like Herpes will be with you forever and in the case of AIDS for what little remainder of your life you will have left. Exercising social responsibility is not something for religion to dictate to you, it is your personal choice and you will pay for it if you make the wrong one. If you suffer from anything transmissible then you should ensure that you are protected for the sake of your partner and vice-versa.

5. No means NO!

If your partner says no to something you are doing then stop doing it. if the situations were reversed and someone was doing something to you you didn’t like you would tell them to stop. No means no and there is no debating it until you stop. Once stopped it is important to discuss the reasons why, was the position uncomfortable was it hurting do you need a rest. It’s important to find out but not to press your partner to far the reasons maybe deeper than that and bad experiences can come back to haunt us all.

6. The importance of (ahem) ‘Lube’.

‘To lube or not to lube, there is no question’ Sex is painful and uncomfortable for all involved if you or your partner are not lubricated naturally. Lets be honest about this sometimes women can not produce enough natural fluids to perform this task and in these scenarios a lubricant is highly recommended. I prefer lube by a company called Pjur. Some people use KY Jelly, but this is not very effective being horrendously thick, tacky and messy. Pjur meets body temperature quickly and works as a massage oil too, yummy for ‘afterwards’

Sex in many animals happens at certain times of the year for example dogs go into ‘heat’. Humans do not; we can have sex at any point in time and gain a great deal of enjoyment from it. Sex is not entirely re-productive in humans and enjoyment of sex is there to be explored by you and your partner in a safe environment.

My advice to parents is simply this, your kids are going to have sex and you can not stop them. they are going to do it with whomever they are attracted to and vice-versa, you can not stop it. The very best that any parent can do is to ensure that a safe environment is provided for your kids to do whatever they are going to do where they will be comfortable.

Bush!

The man, the legend George W. Bush, a man who never fails to inspire a pit of depression in me everytime Dick Cheney yanks his strings, has done it again by proclaiming that the war on terror is in fact World War III. Well you cant blame a man for trying. Unfortunately for Bush what he started as a garden party in Afghanistan and extended to Iraq to suit a personal vendetta, does not in fact constitute a world war.

The US set a dangerous precedent along with UK, when both countries opted for unilateral action against the sovereign country of Iraq. The war on terror has absolutely no evidence at all to support its presence there. You are kidding yourself if you think any differently as a matter of fact you are ignorant if you think any different.

Let’s have a look at it like this. World War II, so named becase of the sheer number of countries involved centred around Germany but involved not only Germany, United Kingdom, United States, Japan, China, USSR, Poland, France, Italy, Belgium, Siam, Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Croatia, South America, Denmark, Ethiopia, Lokot Republic, Luxembourg, Manchuria, Australia, etc. As a matter of fact the list of countries that did not participate in World War II is shorter than the list that did. This was a terrible war and the casualties were huge and lets not forget that only one country has used a nuclear weapon in conflict ever, and that country was the United States at the end of World War II. There were real compelling reasons for fighting World War II they are reasons no one should forget, the atrocities carried out by Nazi Germany the genocide and ethnic cleansing and most importantly of all we were fighting for our freedom from a tyranny not seen since. Saddam lacked ANY capacity to strike the west, let alone provide a smoking gun ‘in the form of a mushroom cloud’. It’s funny being lectured by the US on mushroom clouds isn’t it?

The alleged coalition of the willing described by Donald Rumsfeld (or as I like to call him ‘Ronald Dumbsfeld’) as “the mother of all coalitions” leaves a lot to be desired, only a handful of countries supported it and the United Kingdom was the only country that knew before going in how dangerously flawed the battle plan was. ‘They’ll be greeted as liberators’ we were told not just by the White House but by media cronies. I hate to point this out but Iraq was not occupied France. There is no way the evidence can be painted or presented to make it look anything different from what it was, a sovereign nation with no WMD. But we went in and we went in anyway.

We went in with no plan for the aftermath, with no plan for completion, with no idea of what the environment will present us, with no idea of what little support for the action there was, without appropriate armour, without appropriate supplies of fuel, with no idea of how badly the rapidly deteriorating situations would turn, but boy did it deliver good ratings on the TV with all of those embedded tv crews and media people, hell I’m sure those TV stations were more than able to sell premium advertising air-time during the intervals. Was it worth it?

We went in and we couldn’t even properly secure the oil fields, we havent delivered electricity, we havent delivered functioning goverment, we havent delivered a police force, we havent delivered a functioning army, but damn we are really good at taking up some of Saddam’s old hobbies like torture. We fought against the Germans for this, did we only do it so that one day we could torture people ourselves? Torture is alright as long as I’m doing it, is this the mentality?

Wake UP and smell your freedoms burn.

Tales delivered by insomnia: Part 1

I used to be a terrible insomniac, case in point as I write this it’s 2:40AM, I’m clothed sitting up in front of my computer. I did a little tidying up around the place before settling in front of my computer.I used to go to sleep at 3:30AM and get up at 6:30AM and go to work. I’m much better these days but occasionally I have one of those nights, and tonight is one such example. So I’ve decided to sit up and spend a bit of time with you, the reader.

My blog does not have a readership as such beyond a few casual glances it is small enough to be ignored and since it has no real direction other than being a location to paste some thoughts and ramblings from my miss-firing synapses. as a result this blog is difficult to classify. But that doesn’t mean that it’s not interesting. Within this blog you’ll find rants about politicians, sex, tv rants, gaming and some cycling stuff too. The posts may not happen terribly frequently but I’m very lazy and when I’m not lazy I’m busy. There are no pictures yet but I’m going to work on that over time, besides the world isn’t quite ready for me to be ‘unleashed’ as it were.

So I’ve decided that each night when I’m having a sleepless evening I’d spend some time writing up something to post here. And tonight I’m going to write about something that’s close to my heart and that subject is my wife. Every married male’s wife is special, but I think mine is more special than most. She has to put up with a lot.

Geek.

Believe me I’m a serious computer geek, I have 6 computers at home 2 servers and 4 desktop/laptop client machines including a Mac. the 2 servers are on permanently, I have a wireless Access Point to service the laptop and the aforementioned PSP (Playstation Portable). I also have a 24 port Cisco 2924 Switch and a Cisco Router. Lets just say I’m not technologically challenged.

I am also a cycling geek as you can probably gather from some of my other posts but for those of you who have either just joined or just haven’t bothered looking I own a beautiful Trek Equinox 11 which is a Tri-bike of unparalleled performance and value. a carbon fibre masterpiece that not only gets eyed up when it’s out on the road but is an absolute joy to ride, before this I had a Specialized Allez Comp 18 which I recently sold, but I digress.

I love music and although I haven’t wielded an ‘axe’ for a long time I used to play Bass Guitar (and my playing involved rather more than just playing the G chord over and over), our CD collection is around 600-700 at present all of which are original CD’s. I love movies and have a vast collection of DVD titles now numbering around 200 give or take a few. In addition to this lot there are two window rattling Dolby 5.1 THX certified speaker systems. all this and more is crammed into a relatively small two bedroom apartment located somewhere in the Australian city of Perth. There is also enough room in this apartment for two cats and two people, just as long as you don’t swing either of the cats. We just about managed to squeeze a 7 burner barbeque out under the veranda.

As you can tell from the above that’s a lot of stuff. What does my wife have to put up with? Well let me start by saying firstly that I love computer games (big surprise there eh?) that means explosions and gunfire in glorious Dolby 5.1 Surround Sound. It means extended movie sequences and big explosive soundtracks (I have a number of playlists compiled for the purpose of listening to while gaming) for quite a few of those titles. She has to put up with bits of bike kit lying all over the place and DVD’s and gaming discs lying all over the place. She has to put up with my mates coming over for either multi-player gaming (which involves my mates bringing their computers over and hooking into my network), with beer, swearing and generally high degrees of laughter. Occasionally she has to put up with my mates coming over at 6:30 in the morning for a cycle and that is quite noisy too.

How she puts up with this cacophony I have no idea but she does with gentle humour and rarely with a mumble of discontent unless the gaming has gone on for too long.

Health

But there is one thing she has to put up with that very few other people’s wives have to. My wife is unwell. She suffers from a rare genetic disorder called Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. This is a condition that affects collagen and since collagen is used to build all your soft and connective tissue a problem in collagen affects everything throughout your entire body. The Type of EDS that my wife suffers from is type 3, or Hypermobile with a prolapsed mitral valve. The hypermobile type of EDS is so-called because the tissues that bind the muscles (and the muscles ligaments and tendons themselves) to the skeleton are very soft and do not have the internal structural rigidity that an average person would. In short all her joints are effectively loose and are highly unstable, they are prone to sub-luxation and more seriously can be dislocated almost at will.

The most terrible aspect of Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome is crippling chronic pain. Pain so bad that your skin feels like its crawling as your body literally wages war on itself. This pain is constant, unforgiving and never stops. It totally and completely dominates my wife’s life and the very worst part of all is there is absolutely nothing anyone can do for it. If you have a headache you might take some Nurofen or Advil, but for my wife that would be like pissing in the ocean, but only in fact if the ocean covered the entire surface of this planet. There is only one prescription pain killer that takes a slice out of the pain levels, and that is Morphine. Let me tell you Morphine is not pretty and tolerance to it builds very rapidly.

That’s not all, the risk of a pro-lapsed Mitral Valve is the on-going increased risk of infections such as endocarditis, this is life threatening and as such my wife needs to go on a course of anti-biotics before going to the dentist.

My wife’s health varies from good to bad at seemingly random points in time. When its good we can do pretty much everything a normal couple can do, but when its bad we generally don’t do anything and my wife gets tucked up in bed (sometimes by me if I’m not working) so she can rest. The unpredictable nature of the illness is such that it makes it impossible for her to work, and I get no financial support from anyone so the pressure is on me to deliver and keep delivering because if I can’t, well lets not go there. When my wife’s condition is really, really bad I’ll take a day off work to care for her and make sure she gets plenty of water and food.

In my opinion my wife is the bravest person I know, she puts up with all that and me and though her illness gets her down she keeps going. She doesn’t stop and she doesn’t give in. In short she’s an inspiration (she’ll be embarrassed when she reads this but I don’t care because its true).

In order to support us at home I try to do quite a bit of the house cleaning, hoovering, dish washing and clothes washing. My wife does a huge whack of this stuff too but I like to try to do as much as I can to alleviate the amount of cleaning/tidying that’s left behind. Having said that she scrubs floors and tiled surfaces and does it on all fours, I do this rarely and I’d be kidding myself if I thought any differently, as she does this stuff the most. I want to get a home help or maybe a once a week cleaner to do these things but we need to investigate those options a little more thoroughly.

My wife is a delicate beautiful lady who loves me and I love her in return, I’d do everything in my power to make her life more comfortable and easier and in return she puts up with me along with the health issues attributed to her illness and keeps on going irrespective, my missus is very special, brilliant, talented, an angel in the kitchen and a ‘non-unionised services provider’ in the bedroom (TMI anyone?). Shes an intelligent lady and a constant companion. She’s my special lady and you only get one of those in a lifetime.

I’m feeling a little tired now its 3:50AM and I’ve gotta spell check this before I post it (you can’t say I’m not dedicated). Enjoy.

Holiday

I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned it already or not, but I’ve just finished a rather awesome two week holiday doing….. As little as humanly possible except for rendering myself functional in the morning and going for a cycle the rest of my time was spent consuming alcohol, good food, servicing my wife, spending money, barbequing stuff and generally having a bloody good time.

But unfortunately as someone once said ‘all good things come to an end’ and alas my holiday is over. It left me feeling that I really should have had three weeks instead of two. It made me think about holidays and people who ‘go away’ for theirs. How is it possible to truly relax and unwind when you ‘go away’ for your holiday you have all the stress of trying to pack everything you need, getting pets looked after and struggling to get to the plane on time. Once you have successfully negotiated the traffic and realised you forgot your passport, gone home picked it up re-negotiated the traffic and arrived at the airport its time to get into the holiday spirit and relax……. Like fuck it is.

‘Have a nice day’

You’re either leaving the day you left work which means you are really, really tired already or you’ve got up at 4:30 AM to get to the airport on time. And then you face the joy of check-in. Standing like a rhesus monkey in a queue of other rhesus monkeys bored out of your head until you finally reach the counter and are asked awesome questions like ‘Did you pack this yourself sir?’ Well DUH! No! In fact I employed a small albino ferret and a crack squad of talking insects to do the job for me, what do you think? Then comes the revelation that not only are you overloaded with hand luggage, but they want to bill you for the excess weight contained in your baggage. ‘Have a nice day’ say the ladies at the check-in as you storm off in the direction of excess baggage.

‘Excess baggage’

Your girlfriend is looking at you as if to say ‘you’re not very good at this are you?’ You look back to give her the helpful but somewhat indiscreet look of ‘I’m doing my bloody best alright?’ but instead you just exchange a glance and line up again at the excess baggage counter. Time to join yet another group and stand around until eventually you reach the end of the queue. You hand over the bags they get weighed and tagged and the ever so helpful staff tell you ‘you are carrying too much hand luggage sir’ so you hand some of that over too and it gets tagged you pay an extra $200 and complain biterly whilst doing so, so that you look and feel like an asshole and your girl has disowned you and wonders whether that wedding next spring is really going to work. After you pay the nice ladies they allow you to pass through.

‘Nerve calming’

So you start to make your way through the airport to try and find somewhere that sells some form of alcoholic beverage. You find somewhere and buy a drink just as the voice over the tannoy announces that ‘Flight 749 is now boarding at gate 3′ You spit the drink out all over your girl, the table and the bar staff and start hooking your hand luggage over your shoulders and arms swinging it wildly as you run down the aisle knocking people over and possibly delivering some nasty bruises to yourself as you go. You arrive at the gate just before they close and you are ushered through to your seats.

‘I asked for a window!’

You are ushered to your seat and your girl is ushered to seat 27 which is at the other end of the plane. ‘But I asked for a window seat so that my girl could sit with me in the seat next to that and swap through the flight’ (though if you’re honest you know you weren’t going to swap over). The steward says ‘You should have been here on time then shouldn’t you?’ Choking back the aneurysm you accept your fate and sit down buckling up the belt.

‘Maintenance crew’

‘Ladies and gentlemen this is the captain speaking, due to a malfunction in the hydraulic wheel gear this flight has been delayed, airhead express airways wish to apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.’ Taking that as its queue, some baby on the flight starts screaming its head off and you forgot to charge your iPod.

While all that happened I was in bed performing recreational services with a glass of champagne to one side and my unplugged alarm clock with various items of clothing thrown over it for good measure to the other… Holidays are great when you take a break.