Month: March 2007

How to Vote

In Melbourne, but I am pretty sure this applies in other sates too…

From the Anonymous Lefty.

“If you are a religious conservative who wants Australia run according to the dictates of the leaders of the Assemblies of God (because you reckon Jesus cared more about the things he didn’t actually ever talk about – gays, abortion etc – than the things he did repeatedly – helping the poor etc), please vote for Fundamentalists First. (“Bring Australia into the 14th Century!”, as they say.)”

I think he is a tiny bit mean to the poor Democrats, the Dem candidate for Ryde got into the papers after he was accosted at a train station by one of the Rev. Fred’s mob, brandishing a leaflet proposing to keep Muslims out of Australia.  Our Dem was on his way to a Harmony rally, and didn’t take it well.  Made the local papers :).

And he neglects to mention the Shooters/Outdoor Recreation Party, too – vote for them if you want to turn our national parks into dirtbike trails, shoot anything that moves in the state forests, and eat all the sensitive fish species from our oceans and rivers.

Continuous Positive Airway Pressure

Apparently, sleep is important. And apparently, over 800,000 Australians have some kind of sleep disorder. The majority of these have Sleep Disordered Breathing (SDB), most commonly sleep Apnoea (or apnea if you’re a septic). Apnoea comes in two flavours, Central Apnoea, or Obstructive Apnoea.

Still following? Well, central Apnoea is the scary (scarier?) type, with the brain not sending signals for breathing to occur. This appears to be a leading cause of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, but since I can’t sell a machine to help the problem, I didn’t learn a lot about it. Obstructive apnoea is caused by (der..) an obstruction of the airway. Most prevalent in overweight men, its incidence is not only massively under diagnosed, it is also on the rise.

So, my point is, if you apply a mask connected to a pressure device (like the opposite of a vacuum cleaner), the obstruction is forced open, and breathing can occur “normally”.

Doesn’t sound very exciting until you see someone stop breathing for more than 10 seconds at a time. The airway closes, but the chest continues to try to suck in air. The heart races, and the patient is “aroused” (and that isn’t a good thing when you talk about sleep).

Sleep comprises of Non-REM and REM sleep. All sleep is good for us, but REM sleep is really important. And arousals limit REM sleep – every time we are aroused (whether we wake or not), and put us back to the earlier stages – resetting the cycle. What this means is that patients never get enough REM sleep, and wake up feeling like they have been run over by a truck. Very often these people also snore, so their sleep partners often don’t sleep well either. The consequences range from low performance and irritability, to psychosis and death. Sleep deprivation due to SDB is thought to be responsible for about 5% of fatal motor vehicle accidents.

So if you or someone you love don’t sleep well, or score high on the Epworth Sleepiness Scale, talk to your GP about having a sleep study – it might change your life. Or save it.

Here endeth the lesson.

See – I did learn something today, despite REALLY wanting to fall asleep during the presentation. Oh, and one really interesting thing. Apparently, obesity is an indicator of SDB – the extra tissue around the airway complicates things. But, SDB can also contribute to obesity. A lack of sleep messes with your endocrine system, and disrupts secretion of leptin/grehlin. It also keeps you tired and without enough energy to maintain a good activity level. Two more days of cramming facts into my poor complaining brain, and then one day of normal work before I jet off to the land of the long white cloud. And I got to knit. I asked the presenter if he minded. Luckily he was an American, and he had read the study about keeping hands active during learning. I am now more more than half way through the main body, and well on my way to scary border town.

And the picture? Just a small thank you to the Chaser team, for bringing the budgie smugglers back into politics.

Saturday, Sunday, some knitting, some relaxing, some stress

Haremold

Blue Mountains trip – no pictures except this chocolate mould at the Paragon Cafe. Unfortunately there were no hare chocolates on sale.

The yarn shop was lovely, the owner was gorgeous, and the Tofu, Lettuce and Tomato sandwich from Niche Nosh down the road was superb. Worth the trip on its own. Yum!

Since I’ll be in NZ for the election, I took the opportunity to vote in Katoomba. We ran into Lee Rhiannnon, and I introduced the knitters to her. I was impressed by the voting system, the officials had a palm with the electoral roll on it and they were able to check my enrolment and give me the right voting card. Unfortunately, I made a mistake with my vote. In the upper house, I marked 1 above the line, knowing that my preferences would be distributed. I assumed that the system worked the same way in the in the lower house, but not so. Apparenlty, you have to mark every box in the lower house for your preferences to be distibuted (in the NSW state election that is). If you don’t number each box, and your first choice doesn’t get in (like mine won’t), then your vote expires. Bah.

We arrived late at the meeting, and missed all the “business” part of the meeting, but as soon as I walked in, Kate handed me a small envelope with the words “Limited Edition” printed on the front. Inside was something so intensely amazingly thoughtful and cute, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Pictures to come – and words can’t describe….

We had dinner with my friends Jane and Jim. Jane is from Brazil, and despite being here for over ten years, she is still waiting for an opportunity to become a citizen. She would have been eligible in April (it took her AGES to get permanent residency – I wonder if that has anything to do with the fact that English isn’t her first language?), but last month the rules changed and now she won’t be eligible for another two years. Poop.

I’ve spent far too much time this weekend doing a brochure for next weeks NZ trip (which has to be at the printers in NZ by 9am tomorrow), and I’ve been turning myself inside out with stress. Not much fun to be around on sunday. I even snapped at someone just for suggesting that shooting rabbits was a good idea. Imagine!

Had dinner with the parents at Adam & Sarah’s today. Saw TBA, who is doing brilliantly.

And today I found out that I can get extra bits for the Knit Picks Options from here. Hooray!

A little bit of joy in my day

First, there is this, which reminded me of why it is that I love to take photographs, and also inspired me to take more. I wish I could believe in myself enough to do more about it. But I am getting there.

And then, I found this. Someone who blogs about freakin’ awesome street art around the world. You know that mural of the cat in the hat, that always makes you smile on a grey day? Or the portrait of Martin Luther King that lifts your spirits when you feel like giving up? Or best graffiti I ever saw – “unemployment is not working”.

Which leads me to my next point. Today, one of the owners of the company Mark has been working for as a contractor, msg’d him to ask if he’d be interested in a full time job. Ummmmm, YES! (If the price is right, of course)

If you can’t be a good example…

…be a horrible warning.

I have big feet.  Long and fairly narrow for a person of my, erm, stature.  I take a size 10 in most shoes, 11 if it’s a small make.  In Crocs, I take a 10.  I checked before I ordered the black MJ’s to be sure I ordered the same size, and still the black ones are a little snug.  Despite having a big “10” stamped on the bottom.  But I have worn them all day today without pain, and I am sure they will be ok once they are worn in.

I just got back to the office to find a delivery on my desk – the Primas had arrived already!  I tried them on straight away, and was horrified to find that they are way too small.  Like pinched toes, almost can’t squeeze my feet in small.

I would have thought that it is a reasonable assumption to make that within a brand of shoes, sizing would be consistent across the different ranges?

Apparently not.  Order online at your peril.

Well, peril might be too strong a word, because they promise to get a new pair out to me asap, but I probably won’t have them for my NZ trip 😦

So, on to work news.  I got business cards yesterday (they still don’t have my official* title on them, but I am working on it), and today I delivered an expensive bit of medical kit that I sold all on my lonesome.  I also gave some user training, which is damn impressive considering that I thought my synapses were going to melt and leak out through my ears while I was trying to learn about this system.



*My “official” title is Queen of the G+dd@m^ Mother Fscking Universe.  But you can call me Lara.

Croc Saga Update

Apparently there are TWO official Australian Crocs online stores.  The one I orderd from last week was www.crocs.com.au, and after emailing them to ask where my order was, I clicked a link in the Customer Service signature file, and was taken to www.crocsshoes.com.au.

My order from crocs.com.au was delivered today (ordered on the 9th of March), let’s see how long it takes to get my Primas….

Hopefully I’ll have two pairs of respectable shoes to take to New Zealand – since getting my boot off I have discovered that I just can’t wear conventional shoes.  Maybe it’s the lump of bone sticking out of the side of my foot?

*Update! Mary Janes are the same size as the red ones, but a little tight on the left foot. Ack. Still going to be better than “real” shoes though….

Man bites dog

or something like that….

Yesterday, I saw on the news that a whale attacked and killed a Japanese fisherman.  It’s pretty upsetting – the video is here – but it is a handy piece of irony.

Last week, a friend of mine told me about a radio program that had talkback discussing how people had caught and trapped animals in the past.  One moron rang in and told of how he had laid a glue trap in a fairy penguin colony.  My friend rang in to ask that they change the subject, that animal cruelty is not amusing, and not a suitable subject for discussion in this “lighthearted” way.  She, and another friend were repeatedly patronised and hung up on by the person taking the calls, so she rang the RSPCA, got put straight through to a media liaison person who immediately turned on the radio, and was so incensed by what she heard that she had an RSPCA inspector ring in to the show.

After the inspector said exactly what my friend had been trying to say, the callback was stopped, and an on air apology was given.  Afterwards, a statement was issued on the ABC website, and my friend and the presenter have been having an ongoing dialogue about animal cruelty, and the pervasive acceptance in our society.  A small win, and hopefully one that has opened a few eyes to the suffering of non human animals  – and that our acceptance of this suffering only serves to perpetuate it.  I earnestly hope that this jolly acceptance of animal cruelty will go the same way as our acceptance of slavery, and the oppression of people of colour, women, and homosexuals.  And witches, of course.

Another heartening moment – this morning Tony Eastley read a story about healthy Tasmanian Devils being captured and injected with dead cells from the tumour which is killing Tasmanian Devils in droves.  Scientists hope to develop a vaccine, and are using these wild devils as guinea pigs.  Though I am generally against animal testing, this seems like a goal that is related directly to the health (and survival) of the species they are testing on.  At the end of the report, Mr Eastley thanked the devils for their “co-operation”.  Classy.

In work news, I have just spent three days learning about polysomnography data analysis software.  And yes, I did want to eat my own head, thank you for asking.  Next week I tackle “Continuous Positive Airway Pressure” devices, which sounds trivial by comparison.  But I passed the “exam”, and hopefully didn’t look like a moron, and I did actually learn something.  And I was finally given a laptop today!

And the icing on the vegan cake is that I am definitely going to New Zealand.  I have to give them my passport number tomorrow so they can book flights, and hopefully I will get to see Jussi between sucking up to thoracic specialists.  I can hardly wait.

Picture is of a kookaburra telling my mother to feed him, and be quick about it.

Correction.  No pictures because our webhosts are fsckers, and haven’t realised that we need more bandwidth due to the increasing traffic on the blog – and haven’t bothered to charge our credit card DESPITE BEING ASKED THREE TIMES.

Pictures as soon as Aussiehosts get a clue.