Another Pair Of Eyes

EMW

…or Early Morning Waking. It’s actually a symptom of depression, but in my case it’s a symptom of psychiatry attachment. I like being up before everyone else – the house is quiet and the world is quiet and you feel like you have all the time in the world. I can flit silently about the house and prepare everything before I’ve even sat down at my desk to watch the sky turn to flame. On that note, whoever decided that building houses on the other side of the road was clearly a moron, because they do somewhat interrupt my view of the sunrise. Better city planning needed, says I.

Anyway, I’ve got a free hour to do some work in now, so I’m going to get on and do some in the early morning light.

Taken from my desk in the early minutes of sunrise.

Tinkerer

So I have received various bits over the last week and spent about an hour or so changing things, acquiring tools, or similar, and my bike now looks rather better; see below.

Unfortunately, in changing the tyres I realised that the wheels weren’t exactly what one might call ‘straight’ so I reckon they too are going to need replacement eventually. Lameness, because a set of half-decent wheels is upwards of £120, for which I could buy a bike.

STILL that’s no hurry, and I am absolutely loving the tinkering and fiddling and resetting the brakes and gears to make the whole machine flow better. It is downright satisfying, somehow, to get your hands dirty, to take something which isn’t really all that great and make it better yourself, not just have someone else do it for you. It lets you actually understand what makes up your bike/computer/scarf or whatever it is you are modifying or making. I think it’s a combination of that, my dislike of wasting bits, and the feeling that this bike/computer/scarf you are creating is unique. It’s yours, nobody has one like it anywhere, and so be it. All you knitting/sewing people will understand, I’m sure.

So there.

Progress is progress.

WordPress Application

Hmmm, it would appear that Dickie is not the only one whose iPhone wordpress app has randomly started working – I am writing this on our second symposium of third year, entitled ‘Preparation for 4th Year’.

Yup, I thought it was a bit early too, but whatever. The school of medicine is infinitely wise, so ONE MUST NOT QUESTION THEM.

I should probably pay some attention. They are talking about being grown up and working hard, so I am clearly already failing. The irony.

Radio

I don’t ever really listen to the radio. I don’t even own a radio, and I certainly never listen to radio plays. That is, until yesterday, when we were sat down, force fed some biscuits, given a piece of paper and 40 minutes of a radio play: “Do’s and Don’ts for the Mentally Interesting”.

And it is interesting. And brilliant. And elegantly done. And it really, really, really gets the point across.

“You’ll laugh. You’ll cry. And you’ll probably do both if you’re a manic depressive, like me.”

It’s 40 minutes (although it doesn’t feel that long) so make sure you’ve got some time, and then listen.

Layabout

I can’t help but feel a bit of a slob on psych. While my fellow medics slave on the geriatric wards, stand for hours in surgery, or are yelled at by SpRs as they fail to cannulate people and spray blood everywhere, I am sitting about on comfy chairs being effectively force fed flapjacks and chocolate while listening to radio plays and occasionally talking about schizophrenia. It’s not exactly unpleasant, but I hardly feel like I’m learning much medicine or indeed much at all. It is, I will admit, a little frustrating, and I aim to remedy this frustration on friday afternoon by arming myself with my ID, my stethoscope, my pen torch and a few spare hours and roaming the wards in search of patients to talk to/examine. Get back into the medicine part of it all, because with the exception of my visit to a certain psychiatric facility, it’s all been rather unexciting. Interesting, fascinating, intriguing – yes. But exciting, no. I need practical skills, theory I can learn from books.

In other news, I have a headache. I got out the ol’ ibuprofen (if I go to sleep with a headache, I wake up with what feels like a smashed-in skull at about 3 in the morning) and took a couple of the pills out of the packet and lo! and behold! they are Beautiful Pills:

Unfortunately, the camera does not truly capture their beauty. However, I was reminded of this:

Night all!

Tinker

Last year my not-actually-all-that-good bike was stolen, and I was displeased. I bought, being short of money, a very cheap bike off the web. Unsurprisingly, it’s turned out to be pretty shit and it seems to suffer from what I can only describe as the bike version of premature aging. Creaks and niggles and a clicking pedal, slightly dodgy gear transmission, all that jazz.

The only thing which is in a good state is the frame. It’s not light, but it is pretty solid and would probably outlast me given the chance. With this in mind,* and with my budget also in mind, I’ve come up with my new pet project – transform this shoddy creaking heap of almost-unbearable-transport into something which is a pleasure to ride and still is relatively theftproof due to it’s crap looks. Challenge? Maybe, we’ll see. Anyway, quick list of problems and a photo, and we’ll see how I get on in the year:

• Tyres are constantly deflating, but there are no punctures. Cheap valves on the inner tubes are responsible
• Big mountain bike tyres make it slower on the road.
• Right pedal clicks every time it goes round, and sometimes locks in position.
• Pedals are well slippy like, especially in anything damper than light mist.
• Cranks are made of plastic, and won’t last long.
• Plastic cranks connected to shitty front cogs. Whole lot will need changing. Probably the most expensive part of this enterprise.
• Handlebars are too short for my hands with the gripshift gears.
• Gripshift gears are a pain.**
• Endless mud thrown up my backside is boring when in smart clothes.
• I can’t carry much on it – I am limited to whatever is in my backpack. It needs a rack, it does.
• It generally takes twice as much effort for me to cycle anywhere as it should.

So I put in my first order to a cycle shop for some parts and spent £40 on a complete set of new slick tyres, new presta valve inner tubes, and new pedals. They should arrive this week at some point, and I’ll get started then and see what happens! Knowing me I’ll end up spending a lot more on this over time than I would have spent on a new bike, especially once you consider the time constraints, but I reckon the satisfaction and the distraction offered by tinkering will be worth it. Plus, it’s another handy skill – I’d quite like to be able to service my own bike in its entirety and save some money at the bike shop in future than be stuck relying on them forever.

So we shall see, yes?

Currently, the bike looks like this:

It’s like an advert, in reverse. I like this.

EDIT: I have since changed one of the inner tubes on my wheel, and have discovered that the wheels aren’t exactly what one would call straight. And the front brake is a little shifty now. Tick tock…

*and the fact that I hate to waste things, so wasting a perfectly adequate frame seems perverse.

**This will probably, I’ll admit, be the last thing to change. The idea of completely replacing the gearing system and then adjusting it for the chainset makes me slightly nervous still.

Awk

Awkward, the feeling of possessing awk, whatever that once was. Today, I feel awkward.

This is due to a social situation which only peripherally involves me, but which is currently ongoing in my house. I have locked myself in my room for now. It’s nothing too major, but it does make me feel just slightly uncomfortable.

Ah well. I’ll get used to it.

In other news, how can the Americans still see this as justice? This is disgusting.