Dear folks,
Settling into this New Zealand living business, though now getting to miss English foods - English juice and tea and hot chocolate and cheesecake and muffins and bacon. Sad, sad me. Though this morning I had a delicious soft boiled egg with soldiers (the ultimate way to start your day). I made the perfect soft boiled egg, thanks to my Egg Perfect Egg Timer, which I want you all to buy because it has literally transformed my life (no exaggeration possible.) New Zealand eggs are strangely much better than English ones, very tasty and delicious and richer in every way.
The reason I mention the Egg Perfect Egg Timer, btw, is because I read today the most pretentious article to date in the Guardian, which is a pretty steep statement, but it is TRUE. In fact it was so pretentious I was actually offended and spent a good 5 minutes imagining punching the author in the face and then forcing him to live in rural Afghanistan for the rest of his life and eat poorly boiled eggs for all eternity and BE THANKFUL FOR IT. Strangely unsatisfying. Anyway I share this article with you so you can also feel your soul curdling at the idea you've read such rubbish. I like to have my soul curdle with others. More sociable.
Speaking of the Guardian, here are some more things I have been reading today. This is SO gross that I had to share - imagine sticking your fork through a dessicated frog in your salad. I count that as psychological trauma, and 10 pounds of Tesco vouchers is not going to cut it.
NB I am typing this on Tim's new laptop which doesn't have a pound sign! It's a NEW ZEALAND LAPTOP.
Also, this, which fills me with joy and nostalgia. Waitrose! How I love you. Also, now I have shopped in New Zealand, Waitrose prices seem ridiculously cheap and wonderful. The best shop here is New World, I suppose, which is more like Sainsbury's, which I consider overpriced and shitty, unlike the glorious godlike wonderfulness of the Waitrose deli section, which is almost like dying and going to heaven. No exaggeration possible. I've interviewed people who've had near-death experiences, and they assure me I am correct. They know.
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This is going to be a very random post of all the thoughts that have gone through my head today, in case you haven't realised that yet, in which case, poor you, already halfway through and totally confused.
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Yesterday the Consultant came round and did his ward round. My consultant is a wonderful surgical consultant, very old school and wonderful and reassuring and wears the suits and ties, you know, and rarely (never) rolls up his sleeves. Actually no one does in New Zealand. We chatted for a long time about the Monarch butterfly in theatre the last time I went down: to be precise, the exact specs he used to photo them ("Just take it down another f-stop and you'll be there. I love them - they're called Happy Wanderers, you know. I once considered taking 2 weeks of annual leave just to watch them break out of the chrysalis in butterfly season. I thought about calling in sick.") Anyway, he is brilliant and a mine of random knowledge, which he quizzes us on during the round. At the end of a particularly excruciating round on bilirubin metabolism, all of which all of us had clearly forgotten forever as soon as we left med school, as he left the ward, he stopped by a large flower display and turned to one of the Regs:
Mr W: "(Reg A), what is this flower called?"
Reg A: "Er...."
Mr W: "No one?"
Reg B: "A daffodil?'
Mr W: "A daffodil! A daffodil?? No, not a daffodil. A daffodil! (Reg B). I'm ashamed."
Reg B: "I'm ashamed too."
Mr W: "Well, what about this one?"
Med student: "Er...is it a foxglove?:
Mr W: "A foxglove! Oh dear! Oh dear! We have a lot of work to do. We have a lot of work to do."
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Today I went swimming and was disconcerted when a very small child tried to enter my cubicle, which didn't have a lock. Instead of a lock, there was just a sad hole where the lock used to be. This clearly fascinated small child, who pushed the door quite hard and then said, "OOOOOOOOOOOOOH" when I pushed it back.
There then ensued a pushing contest between me and the small child, one which I won fairly easily only to see the child's eye peek straight through the sad lockless hole and a small voice say, "OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!" again. For your peace of mind I will reveal I was wearing underwear at this point. Fighting back the urge to lie on the floor laughing I said very sternly, "there is someone in here so please stop pushing the door, and it is rude to look through holes!" to which the small child responded, "Jane, Jane, look through the hole! It's a PERSON!"
Clearly Jane was a no-fun tattletale because the next thing I heard was mum come into the changing room.
Mum: "Have you been pushing people's doors open again?"
Child: (in most innocent aggrieved voice imaginable) "Noooooooooooo?"
Mum: "Jane tells me you've been looking in at people changing. I TOLD YOU about this the last time."
Child: "Noooo I HAVEN'T! I haven't I haven't I HAVEN'T!"
Comedy swimming in New Zealand.
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Yesterday Tim and I met up with a couple of UK vets. Vets are a fascinating people, aren't they? They are to me, anyway. Embarrassingly, rather than socialise and be pleasant and interesting people, Tim and I just spent the entire evening quizzing them about the different anaesthetic drugs they use, how to cannulate a horse, and how to intubate a rabbit (I literally cannot even imagine this. Their mouths are SO TINY.) Vet 1: "Yeah once you've intubated a rabbit you can intubate anything." Vet 2: "You can't see anything so you just have to stick the tube in and listen for air." Me: "Do...do they frequently get hypoxic brain damage???" Vet 1: "Hmm. Not really." Me: "Wow." This went on all evening.
Anyway, Tim and I had fun, and the vets were clearly too polite to try and change the topic (actually this is a lie: one of them did try and change the topic, to which Tim replied, "I had no idea dogs were routinely vaccinated for leptospirosis in the UK", which I think is probably the best non-sequitur I've ever heard.)
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Time for dinner! Have to go :-)
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