My head is fried!

 

I'm trying to organise my dear Mums funeral, what a hassle everything is. It took the doctor 5 days to sign the death certificate, and I'm still waiting to get it.  Most things cant be done without it.

I've got my phone ringing more or less constantly, solictors, funeral directors (they dont like being called undertakers) medical examiners, council tax, council, the hospital, insurance the list goes on.

Theres a million people to be notified, telling her friends was my job, I've had to break bad news enough times now to know the script, indeed when I phoned my Mums brother (ex chief super of police) when I started he said "it's ok Wayne I'm home and I know the script, shes gone hasnt she?" it's never easy though.

Today it's the registrar of deaths (spoke to them on phone too) and tomorrow the solictor and funeral director to drop my mums false teeth in, and get will sorted.

Mum R.I.P.

 My dear old Mum passed away yesterday at the grand old age of 89, after being ill for a number of years and being in a lot of pain for many of those.

 To say she was a fighter is an understatment!, she survived being machine gunned by a German aircraft in WW2, and 9 falls in recent years.  In this last spell in hospital, she fought for 11 days, 7 of those days with no fluids, not even a drip, so tough the hospital staff nicknamed her the terminator (she just will not stop)  We think shes part Chuck Norris.

 God bless mum. No more pain. No more worries, you are loved and will be missed.

 Photo 0ct 2022

Four hours sleep! Wow!

 I've just slept solid for four hours, wow!.   Now your thinking WTF is Wayne on about?  Most people sleep for four hours.  And thats true, but not me.... recently.

In the last nine days, four hours is the longest sleep I've had... In a day!  Most days I've averaged around two hours, once it was twenty minutes before being called.  By courious coincidence, thats around the same amount of time I've spent home too!

 You seee for the last nine days I've lived in hospital.  Oh it's not because of my health, my mother was taken in again, this time shes serious.  Long term it's not going to have a happy ending, so we have lived, ate, and sat at her bedside for nine days.

 For all the NHS's failings (and it's a bloody shambles) the actual front line staff are mostly great, certainly the various ambulance crews I've spent time with and the staff of ward ten (yes I remember emergency ward ten on telly) have been brilliant.

 Having spent twenty ish hours a day on a ward for over a week you see what they have to do, I couldn't do it, I'd be on a murder charge.  "NURSE NURSE!!!"  "can you pass me my phone"  Not so much as question as an instruction!

That for hour after hour, day after day!  Not for me mate, not now, not ever.  But thank you to those who do do it with a smile, and a laugh, to make patients and family feel better.  Three deaths out of six on a ward in one night, people you got to know a bit, washed, given them their dinner.  Must be hard.

 As for the laughs, the man who brings the dinners around, he really should be on stage, "this fish is fresh it was swiming in the (name of local river) this morning!"  "put an ECG on it and we'll probably get a trace" or " I wouldnt recomend the omelette, you might end up in hospital"  This to a ward full of people.  Unprofessional?  Maybe, do the patients and families like it  YES!  Everybody loves him, he make us smile, at a time we need it.

 So thats my lot today, I'm off back to a small, curtained off area for maybe another 20 ish hours, as well as watching and worrying about Mum, I'll chat to the other patients and staff, some on first name terms.

NHS still a shambles.

 

 Yet again I had the fun of an ambulance ride to a hospital, and the shambles that passes for the Welsh NHS.  Oh joy!

 Well this time the ambulance only took a few hours to arrive, unlike the 12 hours or so it took last time.  To be totally fair the crews are not the problem, they are just as pissed off as the casualty.

 The ambulance came and took my mother to hospital (again) this time I spent part of the trip applying pressure to stop a minor bleed.  It wasnt major or life threating, the crew would have sorted that but seening me apply pressue the paramedic asked if I was ok dealing with it, I explained I was good and better placed to get at her during the run.  It stopped after a few minutes pressure.

 The problem really start after arriving at casualty, it's a shambles, crew take her in, then she sits of their trolly... for hours.  Nobody knows whats happening, crew sit there like spare parts looking after my mother, as it seems the no nurses or beds to do the job.

 Yet again 6 ambulances sit outside a casualty department and decent size hospital as they cant make room for a bed.  yet during covid, my local health area had over 2 thousand for the mass covid casualties, and only a few were used.  Time to set these up again if you ask me.

 Eventually after the patient, the crew and my family festered, they found a bed... this by sending a woman with a spinal compression (fairly serious injury) off in the ambulance we came in.. to Cardiff.  Bloody miles away.  Hope she was alright.

 So while our bumbling politicians, waffle and dream up new stupid ways of making our lives harder and more expensive, and of course fiddling their expensise and getting their moats cleaned on the taxpayers cash.  

 While they are rushed to hospital and waiting doctors on Bupa.  We lay in the road for 16 hours in the rain wondering where the fuck the ambulance is.  

 It's here sitting outside what jokingly passes for a hospital with no beds, so the patient has to either wait in the ambulance, or more stupidly.  Wait in the hospital on the ambulance trolly with the crew lookibg after the patient... in the fucking hospital.  So it's off the road doing bugger all while we lay there in pain.

 If only a few minsters had to wait like that, then the system would be fixed.

5 of the six ambulances that sat outside Bridgend hospital ALL EVENING!!

Lumintop tool AA vs Sofirm SP10

 

 As I've had these two torches a few months I thought I'd do a side by side comparrison.  And tell you which I think is best.

 The Lumintop tool AA and Sofirm SP10 are near enough the same size and weight (minor variations) Both can use the AA or 14500 battery, both put out a lot of light for is really a small pocket, bigish keyring torch.

 On paper the Sofirm blows the Lumintop away, more output and longer runs time.  But I'm taking real world use here.

 The Sofirm has a much warmer colour, ok on it's own you'd probably not notice it, but when you compare it to other torches, it's quite warm.  The Sofirm also has a much more complicated interface, programable in fact to suit yourself in many ways.

 The Lumintop is a much simpler, almost old fashioned by todays standards, a nice white light and a tail clicky button (it will still tail stand) It also comes with a diffuser to use it as a lantern.

 Power, The lumintop pushes out 650lm on full power with a 14500 batter, comapred to 900lm from the Sofirm.  No contest you say, well it's not that simple.  In the real world in the pitch dark, I cant see much difference, although the Sofirm has more power, the more focused "hotspot" on the Lumintop kind of even it up on distance, spill wise theres bugger all to choose.

 It's battery life the Sofirm excels, with full power on AA 350lm claimed 1 hour and 9 minues, compared to the Lumintops 220lm for just 21 minues.  Now I've not tested either of these on run times, but more output for longer sounds wrong to my logical mind, especially that much longer.  That said the Sofirm has a more complex chip set.

 So which is my favorite.... .  The Lumintop oddly enough.   I find the tail clicky switch miles better than the side monuted switch on the Sofirm, add in the Sofirm needs to be "locked out" to stop it turning on in your pocket, which the Lumintop doesn't need.  I can live with the Lumintops shorter run times, batteries are cheep enough, having to press a switch 4 times to unlock a torch every time I need a light is a PITA Sofirm!

 Oh and the Lumintop sits better on the peak of a ball cap too, if you want it as a headlight