Pain as an object

I’m currently in pain (Which is incidentally why I’m still awake) so I thought Id write about it for a bit.

Pain can be an object. Let me explain: I have arthritis in my sacroiliac joints. Just so you know, your sacroiliac joints are tiny little things, with almost no movement, that kind of join your spine to your hips. What movement they do have is generally concerned with when you tilt your pelvis back and forward without involving your spine too much (Imagine how a guy thrusts his hips backward and forward when he’s on the job).

So these joints. Mine ache most of the time. Not exactly writhe about on the floor ache, but more like a kind of hot toothache. Just nibbling away. It means that its not easy to find any position where you don’t cause the pain to increase (and when you do find a position you stick with it until it starts to hurt, no matter how stupid you might look!).

But sometimes they hurt. For example when I’m walking (Not that I get to do much of that any more). It starts almost pleasantly, with a heat that sort of builds up suddenly, but the heat keeps getting hotter until its not heat anymore, its a kind of grinding pain that explodes every time you take a step.

The tendency is to stop. It hurts okay? Stopping is the only thing that will make the pain subside, preferably laying down, but not always. But of you stop, the pain wins. Again. So you don’t. You think ‘Fuck it‘, and you press on, gritting your teeth and clenching your fists.

But the pain is not beaten that easily. Mere will power is not enough.

But you keep going and the pain keeps building. In my case I find that I’m walking in a state of tension. Everything is clenched against the pain, and since its center is inside right at the top of, and underneath my butt cheeks, I tend to kind of limp along at this stage.

If any of you have ever carried a really fucking heavy object you will have some idea of how my body feels; everything that can tense against the pain (the weight) is tensed.

But the pain grows. It doesn’t spread, but the tension shuts things down. There is only a pinpoint of you in your mind and that’s the bit that keeps you moving, your body is one single lump of tense. There is nothing. You cant see, hear or feel anything. The only thing that you are aware of is the pain.

And then suddenly something happens. The only way I can describe it is as a cool breeze that suddenly blows across me.

The pain is still there, worse that ever usually, but now its like I’m carrying something really heavy. My mind clears and I am able to think and function. The pain is there but  somehow it doesn’t matter because now I’m carrying it. Like an object.

When I get to this state (and its been a while) I have around ten minutes. I honestly dont know what would happen after that, because I stop within ten minutes and simply collapse. I have to take pain killers and I have to stay pretty still. Any movement is agony.

Anyway, now I’m pretty tired, pain or not, so I’m going to sleep.

Myalgic Encephalomyelitis is a bitch

Not been  great lately. Tired, so bloody tired, and no matter how deeply or how long I sleep I wake up feeling just the same. Kind of wears you down one second at a time, and the problem is that its insidious; you don’t notice. You chug along, ticking over, taking one day at a time, one hour, one minute. And then suddenly you realise just how fucked up you really are.

It comes as a surprise too, and none of us like nasty surprises. What is it, three or four years now; shit, I cant even remember, but those years are gone. Forever. Ill never get that time back. Years, however many bloody years, spent in a mental fog, so tired most of the time that even standing up is a major drain on my remaining energy. Its like bleeding to death from a gnat bite. One tiny drip at a time, and no matter what you do, no matter how hard you try, you can never stop the flow or get any of your lost blood back again.

I hear lots of descriptions of M.E, but while many are descriptively accurate few have the courage to be truthful. Yes, it is like running on empty, you do feel like you’re thinking and living in fog. But that’s not enough. Accurate, but avoiding the truth? Who knows, but what I feel right now is that I’m dying one second at a time.

Dying? One second at a time? So we all you think, and you’re right. But the difference is that you can actively participate in your second by second death, and enjoy stuff as it comes along. You get to exist in a natural place, sleeping at night, working, playing, going out for a meal or a drink, going to a football match, a concert. I don’t. I live in a thick fog running on empty, remember?

One day Ill wake up dead. I suppose the main consolation in this is that I wont be tired anymore. I hope. Shit can you imagine that? Eternally shattered!

Have you ever heard the saying: “Life’s a bitch…“? Well here’s another version of it: (Although admittedly it doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue!)

Myalgic Encephalomyelitis is a bitch and at the end of it you die. What a result.

Long time no post

Well, at least I have an excuse!

Iv been rather ill, and while its true that Iv not exactly given up using the computer, Iv not had the energy or inclination to chase up a Blog.

Perhaps that’s about to change.

Ill make a little start here, just to kick things off – if there is a follow up then great, if not….

As usual I have a gripe about the government, although this time its a little more serious.

Gordon Brown – Did you vote for him to be Prime Minister?

No, of course you didn’t, because Brown has never been voted for because he has never run for the position of PM.

Which leaves us with something of a dilemma. You see, since Brown has not been voted into office by the people, according to democratic law, he is not the prime minister, which means that everything he has done since unlawfully taking office is in fact illegal.

Naturally no-one with any kind of influence will say this because the Labour regime will leave no stone unturned in an effort to vilify and discredit them, while wriggling like worms to avoid the real issue, which is that the current UK government is illegal.

Oh well, what do we really expect? After, we don’t live in a democracy at all and I cant actually remember a time when we did, its just a little surprising that we have moved from a pretend democracy to dictatorship (or something similar) without anyone actually noticing.

Eyes wide open indeed!

Which leads me nicely on to another contentious subject. If you spend any time reading here you will know my feelings on the stupidity surrounding the ridiculous human involvement in global warming, however, a new item has emerged to try and keep us all terrified out of our whits, and that’s Swine Flu.

We hear on the news some horrific sounding numbers about the potential infection rate, but what we don’t hear is the fact that these numbers are repeated, albeit more quietly, every single year with the usual outbreaks of flu that hit us.

What we don’t hear is the fact that Swine flu is just another flu, not as nasty as some and worse than others.

In other words its only flu, just like we have every year.

So I have to wonder what is the hidden agenda in keeping us all in a state of terror over one thing or another? If its not Bird flu its Swine flu, or global warming, or further recession. Think about the last ten years. How often have we been without something in the headlines that seems designed to make people afraid?

Kind of makes you wonder about a lot of things, hmm?

So then, is Scientology a ‘cult’ or not?

Talk about being a bit stupid over definitions! I read today that a teenager is to face prosecution because he had a placard at a peaceful demonstration outside the Scientology HQ in London, that said the word “Cult”. Apparently Scientology is not a cult and so they plan to prosecute him. (LINK)

So here is a little message for the (not) Cult leader in London:

Grow the hell up! If you don’t want to be called a cult don’t act like one. Behave in a more dignified manner. Everyone, including you, has the right to their own opinions. Prosecuting them because you don’t agree with their opinions about you, and because they made those opinions public near to you is the height of stupidity, and does your own cause (That of showing that you are not a cult) no good at all.

Its not as if the kid was making trouble in any way. It was a peaceful demonstration, and if you don’t like people demonstrating about you, it might be a good idea to keep a lower profile than you do. Coming on all heavy handed and prosecuting people is not going to make you look better in anyones eyes, and, more to the point, is likely to provoke further demonstration.

I’m forced to wonder at the leadership shown by some of these people. I’m not at all familiar with Scientology beyond the few articles that Iv read about them, and I cant see any real reason to demonstrate against them, but whatever reason the demonstrators had, seems to me that by prosecuting someone for such a trivial thing, they are making themselves look guilty of whatever it was the demonstrators were so worked up about.

Perhaps from a leaders point of view this could have been thought out a little better? Here I am, knowing nothing much at all about Scientology, and yet, because of this report, I would now suspect that at least something behind the demonstration is true. Otherwise why react in such a heavy handed way?

And as for the Police saying that the word could not be used because it is “Abusive and Insulting”, well, as far as I can see the biggest insult is in making that statement. More political correctness stupidity again.

In all fairness you cant blame the average copper. They get these moronic rules handed to them and then they have to uphold them, no matter how stupid it might be. But if the leaders of Scientology cant handle such a basic criticism (and thats all it is really) then maybe they are in the wrong job.

A Windows Nightmare

I’m generally a pretty laid back person; I shout and scream here and there, but nothing too dramatic, and Iv always found it rather … odd perhaps, that some people felt the need to trawl the internet finding places to post complaints about Windows while they praise their own choice of OS.

Having been a Windows user since the good old days of DOS and Windows 3.1 I would call myself a pretty experienced Windows user (I spent 15+ years working commercially as a Developer on Windows) and since I always rather liked Windows I have always found it a trifle annoying that people simply slate the OS in an effort to show their own choice of OS to be better.

I still do.

But….

I moved from Windows to Ubuntu in January and I have enjoyed the change. Today something highlighted a reason for this enjoyment:

I have a Windows XP machine. Its a game machine and pretty high spec, used by the kids (Mostly) but under quite strict rules. There was no spyware and no viruses on the machine but as Windows tends to do after a while, it started to slow down, and some games would not work (For no readily apparent reason), so I figured it was time to re-install.

Iv only just recently had a nasty experience re-installing Windows, but this time is should have been a lot different: The machine was brought from a company and included PC Angel. For those who don’t know, PC Angel is a great little program that creates a hidden partition that contains the full install of Windows. To perform a re-install is a simple matter of pressing a few buttons and leaving things alone. One reboot later and you are back to where you started when you first powered up the machine.

That particular part of this procedure went very well indeed and I followed up by entering the OEM mode of Windows so that I could remove the default anti virus software, which is otherwise hard to remove.

As a little aside here, just so you know:

If you boot Windows XP for the first time you reach the intro screen, just before the desktop, and you are required to enter your name etc. On that first screen, if you press CTRL + SHIFT + F3 you will enter OEM mode, which allows you to setup the machine, ostensibly for the end use. It also means you can remove those annoying programs that are otherwise trouble to remove because their entry in the Add/Remove programs section is deliberately missing (As far as the end use is concerned anyway!)

This went well (Iv done this quite a few times), and pretty soon I had my own anti virus software installed. I rebooted, went through the introduction and I had a working Windows XP once more. It took about 25 minutes all in all.

But thats where the trouble began.

I had to install my own firewall (Windows firewall is rubbish): REBOOT
I had to install some anti spyware software: REBOOT
Windows updates needed to run for 35 minutes: REBOOT X 2
I had to install the latest GFX drivers again: REBOOT
I had to install the latest sound drivers: REBOOT
My anti virus needed to be updated: REBOOT
I had to install DirectX with the first game: REBOOT

Seriously, it took me almost 4 hours today to set Windows XP back up with 5 games, and I’m not including the time taken actually waiting for the games to install! This is not on wholly unacceptable, its also quite shocking! Until I experienced Ubuntu I had been doing this for years and thinking that it was normal!

I don’t like to just gripe about Windows, I think that in general it does a pretty good job, but after all those years using it (And possibly wasting over half of that time waiting for it!) I feel I have the right to complain.

How it should be

One of the things that really aggravates me (and most of the rest of the law abiding population of the UK) is the way in which the Human Rights act has been butchered and bastardized to work in favor of criminals: If I find a burglar in my home and he attacks me, and I then fight back and in any way injure him, I am the one going to court for assault, never mind that he was in my home illegally at night and tried to attack me.

So it is a breath of fresh air to read an article from the US which shows exactly how things should be done: LINK

A breif overview is as follows:

A man with a gun (It turned out to be a BB gun but that is entirely beside the point) tried to rob a Donut store in the early hours of the morning. Hearing the noise a neighbor of the shop, a 54 year old, raced to help his neighbor and in the process shot the robber and killed him.

The shooter is unlikely to go to court because the man he shot was clearly breaking the law and appeared to be armed while he was doing it.

Bloody right as well! If you take away the guns we need this kind of attitude in the UK, and then perhaps the crime rate (Which the Police seem powerless to influence) will drop in reality, and not just in numbers manipulated by the government.

Another daft idea or another stealth tax?

This morning on the news I saw some more criticism concerning one of the governments so called systems, to deter identity fraud in the passport office. They have decided, against advice from every quarter it seems, that the best way to deal with this is to bring in compulsory interviews for everyone who applies for a passport.

The first time you hear that it sounds almost like a good idea, but upon even the smallest of reflections you can see the flaws. Criminals who want passports will simply pay for them on the black market, which means the interviews are doing only two things: Firstly they are inconveniencing honest citizens who want a passport, and secondly they are adding a fair amount of money to the cost of a passport, and, bearing in mind that this is only going to catch the most stupid of fraudsters, that means that this extra cost is essentially just another stealth tax.

Iv always been of the opinion that the governments we have in the UK are a useless bunch, out to line their own pockets at the expense of the people, but usually they have the sense to at least try to cover up what they are doing with some smoke and mirrors. Perhaps this means they are becoming careless. I hope so. Just so that the majority of people in the country have a chance to catch up and realise whats going on.

I don’t know what, if anything, would happen, should the people of this country suddenly see for the first time what a bunch of shysters they have elected, but I know one thing: I want a ring side seat.

Did Global Warming suck up all the money?

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for a long time you must have noticed how the cost of everything seems to have taken an upward turn. A steep one. We have a financial crisis looming on almost every front with mortgage rates rising and the cost of borrowing going up with them.

So I have to wonder at the cause of it all. Not the cause cited by the big banks and the government; as we all know by now, governments tell you what they want you to hear, which is not necessarily the truth. The problem is that if you break it all down there is only one real reason behind it all.

For sure, the global warming insanity probably has something to do with it, but global warming is all smoke and mirrors that will hopefully keep everyone blinded while the real reason goes un-noticed. As it stands global warming is working on a two pronged attack; Firstly it keeps everyone from realising the real reason for the monetary problems, and secondly it helps us cut down on our use of oil.

Yep, I’m back to oil again. Take a look at the charts Inflation Data and you should get an idea what I’m talking about.

In 1998 a barrel of oil cost $15.35. At the end of 2007 it had risen to $64.92.

The simple fact is that oil is starting to run out. We are not producing as much as in previous years, and yet the demand is rising quickly as China and India ‘Come on Line’. But the governments don’t want to alarm you. Oh no. They don’t want to tell you about the chaos that will ensue when the oil actually runs out.

Human kind has a one shot chance of survival on this planet and global warming doesn’t enter into the equation: No Oil equals No advanced civilizations, and to make that worse, No Oil also equals No chance of finding an alternative.

Highlighting the difference.

As Iv mentioned before, I changed from Windows to Ubuntu in January (08), and Iv not looked back since. Iv done the usual newbie stuff and had to reinstall a few times, and I finally migrated my entire Ubuntu installation to a larger hard disk, removing the now redundant Windows XP in the process. Iv enjoyed myself becoming familiar with the new way of doing things. Iv not missed Windows at all, but Iv had nothing particularly bad to say about it.

And then there was today.

Today I had to reinstall Windows 2000 on my cousins computer. In general I think I handle stress quite well. I often curse under my breath in times of trouble, but thats about it. Today however, I found myself screaming at the poor computer as I struggled to go through the old familiar installation, confounded by the spectacularly stupid way in which everything seems to be done!

I never realised that it was like this. I never even knew. Things just seemed to be ass about face all the time, from setting up the network halfway through the installation, to the mindlessly slow procedure of allowing MS to install an item of software to prove that your Windows is actually genuine, all so that I could wait for another insane period of time to download and install the relevant service pack, only so that I could install all of the updates required. All punctuated by a constant requirement to reboot the machine each time anything was done.

For a start I was most unimpressed with the check to make sure that Windows was genuine. In essence MS has decided that EVERYONE who is running Windows and wants to use the updates is a thief, and that the only way to prove otherwise is to allow this test software to be downloaded. Entering the CD key was apparently not proof enough, which begs the question: Why have any kind of CD key at all?

To make matters more frustrating (By this time I was almost at the hair pulling stage), Windows also failed to install any kind of intelligent GFX driver, which left me doing all of this in some hideous screen resolution. To further this, when I finally got a GFX driver it would not install until I had upgraded to DirectX 8 – Question: Why in the name of all technical Gods did Windows update not download this and install it for me when it was required?

And then of course there was the security. I had to download and install a firewall, and a virus checker, and some form of spyware protection. Once this was all done the machine (Its not a great one but its easily a fair one) took so long to boot up to a usable desktop that I could boot Ubuntu, restart it, and boot back to the desktop again quicker!

Suffice to say that had it been my machine it would now be running Ubuntu. However, its not my machine and I dont have to use it, so Windows is what its good. Poor thing.

Scaling Down the Operation

Up until January (08) I was a Windows user, and to be honest I was fairly happy. Id experimented with Linux as a first OS before and rejected it for a number of reasons. Today I was thinking about one of those reasons when I realised for the first time that it hadn’t been at all valid.

Let me explain. I like software. I like writing it and I like finding little freeware gems. As a Windows user I had built up a huge range of little utilities and programs and one of my main problems with Linux as a main OS was that most of these little programs (and a few larger ones) dont exist on the Linux platform.

But that was just a case of smoke and mirrors! Thinking back just four months, I had a system stuffed with little programs that were great, but which I would use once and forget. I didn’t need to have them all installed, and yet this was a major point of contention with Linux; It didn’t have ports of all those little programs that I never used!

My current Ubuntu system has exactly the software that I need to use. Nothing else. There are not folders full of excellent but basically superfluous applications. I don’t have a folder stuffed with collections of programs that Iv downloaded and not yet found the time to try out. For sure Iv downloaded and tried various programs in Ubuntu, but Synaptic makes it so much easier to download, install, and remove programs that if I don’t like something I can remove it while I’m installing something else.

But there is something else too. Some underlying mentality that was missing from Windows. Because its so easy to install programs, I can do it anytime, and generally I don’t bother unless the program does something that I specifically need. I don’t know what this ’something’ really is, but it seems to me to be a good thing.

The operation has been scaled down, and it seems to be far more productive that it was before.