Christmas day was a huge waste of time. We had a call to one guy who'd been ill for 3 weeks not seen a gp and decided to call an ambulance. Someone who called an ambulance because their baby's poo looked funny. A hoax call. And a load of other shite.
The day just dragged on and on!
Boxing day on the other hand was a complete contrast. Every last person needed an ambulance and every last person needed to in to hospital. From breathing diffs to a stroke the people were genuinely ill.
The day ended with a late job which i didn't mind one bit. A bloke had collapsed at home due to a pre-existing medical condition and put his head through some toughened glass. He had a 3 inch laceration to his head and had severed an artery. As you can imagine there was a fair bit of claret!
I applied as much pressure to the wound as i could all the way to hospital and once there i helped the doctor address the wound. There were 2 bits of glass still in the wound, one of which was jammed into a second artery... Cue alot more claret and resumed pressure from me!
I could only release pressure once both arteries were tied off, by which time my arms were full of lactic acid and shaking uncontrollably. Then i had to do the paper work!
I didn't mind that this made me late off because the bloke was really nice and i basically saved his life!
Saturday, 27 December 2008
Sunday, 21 December 2008
Prague - the review
well I've just got back from a week in Prague and i have to say i was a little disappointedly.
on arrival it was snowing, but that was very short lived, just slush in the city and even that was gone by the next day.
i was still feeling a bit rough from my man flu so that may have marred my enjoyment a bit, but still i found it overly commercialized and the people rude.
i was expecting an old city full of old stuff, what i found was a modern European city with a Starbucks on every corner and a MacDonald's or KFC on every street... Wenceslas Square where i was staying was mostly covered in road works and had a Marks and Spencer, Debenhams, H&M, and many other shops you can find right here.
there were loads of souvenir shops, all selling exactly the same shite and lots of up market jewellery shops selling watches costing more than my annual salary.
apart from one afternoon for about 3 hours, the weather was overcast and miserable, but fortunately the rain held off for the most part.
there were some highlights though, the food being one.
i had an excellent steak (or in Czech - "steaky"...) in a restaurant called Hot on Wenceslas Square (clicky) - although it was served with oven chips...
and all the food in U Zlaté konvice (clicky) - an underground restaurant on the Old Town Square which serves meat, and lots of it! complete with oompah band it was great. a large beer there is a litre served in a giant glass tankard and if you've got a spare £200 they even do whole roast suckling pig!!
prices of food and drink are about the same as the UK and if you're not careful the lovely waiters will rip you off left right and centre, rounding up prices to the next hundred Koruna.
we also had a day trip out to Kutna Hora and saw the famous Sedlec Ossuary (clicky) which is macabre yet fascinating. being in a room with 40,000 skeletons is one thing but to have many of them arranged into artworks is very strange.
St. Barbara Church (clicky) was another stop on the tour and was largely covered in scaffolding. it's a UNESCO world heritage site, so naturally the tour only stopped there for 15 minutes...
then we went to the old royal mint and spent about 2 hours there. in those 2 hours we worked out that the only original features are 3 archways, 1 tower and a lump of wood. the rest is a modern reconstruction.
oh and our guide was borderline suicidal and hadn't washed in weeks.
the Christmas markets were a bit poo too. there was about 3 or 4 different stalls and about 20 of each. so every other stall was selling the same mass produced rubbish. there was traditional food in the markets - hot dogs, these bread things we called trundelos because we couldn't pronounce their real name, deep fried potato cakes, something with cinnamon in that i had a close call with and deep fried doughnut-like garlic pizza things.
I'm glad I've been to Prague, even though it didn't live up to expectations. i can see why stag parties go there, there's plenty of bars, nightclubs, cabaret and strip clups, but if you're not looking for that, you just want culture then you might as well stay in good old Blighty - the shops are the same, the people are more polite and are less likely to rip you off...
i'll pop some photos up on flickr soon as a reminder of all the scaffolding - it was bloody everywhere.
on arrival it was snowing, but that was very short lived, just slush in the city and even that was gone by the next day.
i was still feeling a bit rough from my man flu so that may have marred my enjoyment a bit, but still i found it overly commercialized and the people rude.
i was expecting an old city full of old stuff, what i found was a modern European city with a Starbucks on every corner and a MacDonald's or KFC on every street... Wenceslas Square where i was staying was mostly covered in road works and had a Marks and Spencer, Debenhams, H&M, and many other shops you can find right here.
there were loads of souvenir shops, all selling exactly the same shite and lots of up market jewellery shops selling watches costing more than my annual salary.
apart from one afternoon for about 3 hours, the weather was overcast and miserable, but fortunately the rain held off for the most part.
there were some highlights though, the food being one.
i had an excellent steak (or in Czech - "steaky"...) in a restaurant called Hot on Wenceslas Square (clicky) - although it was served with oven chips...
and all the food in U Zlaté konvice (clicky) - an underground restaurant on the Old Town Square which serves meat, and lots of it! complete with oompah band it was great. a large beer there is a litre served in a giant glass tankard and if you've got a spare £200 they even do whole roast suckling pig!!
prices of food and drink are about the same as the UK and if you're not careful the lovely waiters will rip you off left right and centre, rounding up prices to the next hundred Koruna.
we also had a day trip out to Kutna Hora and saw the famous Sedlec Ossuary (clicky) which is macabre yet fascinating. being in a room with 40,000 skeletons is one thing but to have many of them arranged into artworks is very strange.
St. Barbara Church (clicky) was another stop on the tour and was largely covered in scaffolding. it's a UNESCO world heritage site, so naturally the tour only stopped there for 15 minutes...
then we went to the old royal mint and spent about 2 hours there. in those 2 hours we worked out that the only original features are 3 archways, 1 tower and a lump of wood. the rest is a modern reconstruction.
oh and our guide was borderline suicidal and hadn't washed in weeks.
the Christmas markets were a bit poo too. there was about 3 or 4 different stalls and about 20 of each. so every other stall was selling the same mass produced rubbish. there was traditional food in the markets - hot dogs, these bread things we called trundelos because we couldn't pronounce their real name, deep fried potato cakes, something with cinnamon in that i had a close call with and deep fried doughnut-like garlic pizza things.
I'm glad I've been to Prague, even though it didn't live up to expectations. i can see why stag parties go there, there's plenty of bars, nightclubs, cabaret and strip clups, but if you're not looking for that, you just want culture then you might as well stay in good old Blighty - the shops are the same, the people are more polite and are less likely to rip you off...
i'll pop some photos up on flickr soon as a reminder of all the scaffolding - it was bloody everywhere.
Wednesday, 10 December 2008
Prague
| Friday | Saturday | Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday |
| 12 December | 13 December | 14 December | 15 December | 16 December | 17 December | 18 December | 19 December |
Forecast  Rain / Snow High 2°C Low -1°C Chance of Precip. 60 % | Forecast Rain / Snow High 2°C Low -1°C Chance of Precip. 60 % | Forecast  AM Fog / PM Clouds High 4°C Low 0°C Chance of Precip. 10 % | Forecast AM Fog / PM Clouds High 5°C Low 0°C Chance of Precip. 10 % | Forecast  Light Rain High 5°C Low -1°C Chance of Precip. 60 % | Forecast AM Fog / PM Clouds High 3°C Low -1°C Chance of Precip. 10 % | Forecast  Light Snow High 4°C Low -1°C Chance of Precip. 60 % | Forecast AM Fog / PM Clouds High 3°C Low -1°C Chance of Precip. 10 % |
Monday, 8 December 2008
bike insurance
i thought that insurance for a first time rider with 3 points on his license for speeding (back in 2005) on a big bike was going to be astronomical...
i just got a quote from Bennetts (one of the biggest bike insurers) for a 1999 Suzuki GSF 600 Bandit worth £1000 and the quote for third party fire and theft for social and commuting use came to just £85...
i just got a quote from Bennetts (one of the biggest bike insurers) for a 1999 Suzuki GSF 600 Bandit worth £1000 and the quote for third party fire and theft for social and commuting use came to just £85...
Sunday, 7 December 2008
private ambulances
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7760798.stm
our area has several different private ambulance companies... they cover the fact that at any one time we either don't have enough staff or enough roadworthy vehicles
recently a private crew attended a hypo, but due to training could give nothing but oral glucose. when our crew arrived an hour later (when the private crew eventually got round to calling for backup) the patient still had a mouth full of hypostop (oral glucose with the consistency of wallpaper paste) and a GCS of 7 (clicky)... it's by luck the patient didn't choke or drown!
from what i've seen, the training and skills in the private ambulance sector just don't compare to the NHS, which is strange as most i've come across claim to be ex-NHS... but then often there's a reason they might be ex-NHS and it's not down to the money.
i hear roumer that one area spends in the region of £6000 a day on private ambulances!!
but i suppose that if the trusts did away with the NHS ambulance service, it might not cost more to go private. the trust would no longer have to buy vehicles at £130,000 each, maintain them, pay staff, fuel, equipment, training, pensions, run ambulance stations, etc. all they'd have to pay is the tender to the private company - which will be the lowest tender...
in other news,
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/west_yorkshire/7769953.stm
http://www.neenaw.co.uk/index.php/ambulances/269/fru-assaulted/
i hope those involved in both are fit and well soon.
Friday, 5 December 2008
best blog ever?
well it is if you like to see the ineptitude of so called 'professionals' in the field of graphic design and desk top publishing...
i present to you http://photoshopdisasters.blogspot.com/
see if you can spot what's wrong with some of these?
i present to you http://photoshopdisasters.blogspot.com/
see if you can spot what's wrong with some of these?
Man flu
I have man flu. It was going to happen given the number of people i've been out to recently with it.
If i was in a normal job, then i'd probably struggle in to work, but emergency driving is right out.
All i want to do is curl up under my duvet and watch tv, but i can't even do that. the electric's off so they can work on the power lines!
How bored am i?!
If i was in a normal job, then i'd probably struggle in to work, but emergency driving is right out.
All i want to do is curl up under my duvet and watch tv, but i can't even do that. the electric's off so they can work on the power lines!
How bored am i?!
Wednesday, 3 December 2008
screwed again
according to current international exchange rates, there should be 30 Czech Koruna to the pound... you try getting that on the high street though!
my bank offer 27.65 to the pound. the post office 27 to the pound...
the best deal i've found is tesco and they'll post the money to you for £5. the rate of 29.12 to the pound isn't too bad.
my bank offer 27.65 to the pound. the post office 27 to the pound...
the best deal i've found is tesco and they'll post the money to you for £5. the rate of 29.12 to the pound isn't too bad.
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