Well, we participated

Categories: uncategorized

Date: 05 May 2007 06:30:15

We voted on Thursday - it was confusing, though I didn't consider taking a golf club to the ballot boxes. It remains to be seen, I guess, what having the SNP as the largest party in Holyrood will actually mean.

Thursday was also the day that I took daughter to the Sick Kids for an MRI. She'd been taken by her mother on Tuesday for an injection (which she gets every 10 weeks). Wife had mentioned to the nurses that daughter has been having headaches and being sick for a while; the doctors were sufficiently concerned to arrange for an almost immediate MRI scan. I'm really impressed. It was also good that one of daughter's doctors was there, and was able to reassure us that whatever was causing the headaches, it wasn't the kind of thing that would show up on a scan. I actually wonder if daughter is showing signs of stress.

Both her parents are seriously stressed. Wife has been off for 3 days this week; the underlying problem is almost certainly stress - though not work-related, I hasten to add. On the other hand, my stress certainly has its epicentre at work, though it's compounded by having to face difficulties at other times. Wife's mother is in hospital; unfortunately, it isn't then a simple case of daughterly concern. Wife's mother, we have been told, refuses to co-operate with the social worker trying to help her. She then berates her daughter for not helping her - but how can my wife get involved when her mother has made sure that there is nobody else helping?

Great excitement yesterday evening, though. We'd asked for a home safety visit from the fire service - and they brought the fire engine! I would have included a photo, but I was too embarrassed to take one. Daughter and son have had visits to the school from the fire service, and have expressed anxiety about what to do if there was a fire. In the event, the opportunity to see the fire engine trumped their anxiety, so it was just wife and I who talked with the firemen on our house. They kindly replaced our two smoke alarms, and fitted a third. And they gave us some good advice. I even switched the computer off last night.