Seventeen years ago today, a cab driver failed to stop at a stop sign…

August 28th 1991… Happy fucking Anniversary to me 🙁

Last week [info]shu_shu_sleeps from down south posted about having back pain.  Which I totally understand I left a wee comment of genuine (yet ultimately useless…. sorry) sympathy.  She asked me how I’ve managed to not become an axe murderer by now.  I don’t know about an axe murderer… but ‘heinous bitch’ is probably right on target  🙁 

Pain is usually your body telling you something is wrong.
Pain often makes us realize we need to slow down.
Pain is distracting because your body  hurts.
Pain can cause you to be irritable over little things.
Pain has most people reach for analgesics for a while.

But what happens when you go to your doctor and he does what he can… sends you to the specialist and then another specialist and another specialist.  And he prescribes suitable drugs and then more drugs and more drugs… but your pain doesn’t go away???  Well then you have chronic pain and chronic pain is another kettle of fish entirely…

Chronic pain is exhausting.
Chronic pain makes you try everything no matter how ludicrous.
Chronic pain drives your friends away because you have zero patience.
Chronic pain robs you of your sense of humour.
Chronic pain stops you from sleeping properly.
Chronic pain fucks with your concentration.
Chronic pain makes you less sympathetic to the temporary pains of others.
Chronic pain stops you doing things you used to love.
Chronic pain is inescapable.
Chronic pain makes you question how much more you can take.
Really bad and unrelenting chronic pain day in and day out might even find you absentmindedly researching on the internets for biologically friendly ways of opting out of your miserable existence that would leave your organs intact for some other poor bastard…

but mostly chronic pain makes you into someone you don’t want to be and you find yourself living a life you never wanted to have.
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Oh ferfucksake… leave me alone!

I had an appointment with the Pain Management Clinic today to see how I was progressing with the program they set out for me and (predictably) I didn’t want to go.   Not because I was avoiding the Pain Management people in fact I was looking forward to getting some feedback but rather because i didn’t want to drive across to Auchenflower for a 10am appointment.  So I conned Yale into taking me.

We went to town without incident and the drive was fine, I had purposefully grabbed my mail on the way out the door so I would have something to read and maybe keep my mind off the traffic etc.  The appointment went well, Mel (the Physio) was pretty pleased with that my flexibilty and strength program was working quite well at keeping me mobile and limber but the ‘crunching’ in my neck was still an issue.  We spoke about the recumbent exercise bike I was considering purchasing if I could squeeze it ino my budget  (Workcover are unlikely to assist with that cost I think) and she felt that it might be a lower impact way to get the aerobically beneficial exercise I needed without exacerbating the ‘crunching’ thing.   So it was ok.

However on the way home around lunch time (which is normally a pretty quite time of day to be getting on the Riverside Expressway) we were entering the flow of traffic and a little stupid kid in a Pizza Hut delivery car came across two lanes of traffic and pulled in front of us really fast.  If Yale hadn’t braked exactly when he did – the dickhead would have slammed right into the passenger side of our car… right where I was sitting.  I mean we managed to avoid the accident by about 2 feet, and only because Yale was fast on the reflexes.  And it started up all over again, I was scared shitless.  I couldn’t breathe.  I started to cry and cover my face and mouth.  It was just a split second that I panicked and thought he was going to hit us and I just lost the plot.  I was crying uncontrollably (in an unhappily animated and vociferous fashion) and muttering about how I felt like someone, someone was trying to kill me in an MVA, how I was so sick of this shit happening and why does it seem to happen all the fucking time.  Just felt so immediatly anxious and scared… urgh… awful, awful feeling that makes me sick to my stomach.

We followed the little moron (at a safe distance) for a while as we headed for home and as both his vehicle and ours took the Stanley Road exit we ended up stopped side by side at the set of lights at the Gabba.  I was staring daggers at the kid driving the car and I said I felt like screaming at the stupid kid.  Yale said ‘Go on then… it might make you feel better.’  So I wound down the window and gave the kid both barrels.

I was still visibly crying and spoke in a barely controlled and obviously angry tone as I asked him if he even noticed what he’d done back when we merged onto the expressway.  The kid was oblivious and was saying ‘What? What are you on about?’  He never even saw us.  I told him that he was completely incompetent on the road, abused him for not indicating, for crossing two lanes of traffic without giving way to oncoming traffic and for obviously not shoulder checking as he merged.  I told him that he’d nearly run us off the road and that if my driver hadn’t taken effective evasive action he’d be explaining to his employer right now about how he’d written off their work vehicle with his gross negligence.  The more I said, the less tearful and more indignant I became and I was pointing at him telling told him that if he wasn’t going to obey the rules laid out for the safety of all road users then he ought not have a license at all and had no right operating a motorvehicle and I suggested he go back to square one and learn how to drive properly. 

Eventually got home in one piece and once I calmed down I wondered for a while if the absolute tongue lashing lecture I doled out to the pimply faced kid was disproportionate to the offense but honestly… he scared the living shit out of me and I felt even worse when I realised he hadn’t seen us at all !!!  That makes me feel positively nauseated… he didn’t look and he didn’t see us and we could have gotten all smooshed cos he wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing.   🙁

Yale was right about one thing… I felt a little better after venting at the stupid idiot.
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It’s mine! Mine! All Mine!

Finally got my new car.  I’ve been so dependent on everyone else around here to ferry me around and help me out with running the Small Child to and from school that I’m sure everyone else is glad to see me take delivery of it too. 

It’s a very cute zippy little car and quite a lot of fun to drive.  Mr K has bets on that my expensive new toy will end up stuck in the garage within six months as he thinks I’ll lose my license for speeding!  Somehow I doubt that…  I’ve been quite the Granny-driver since the last accident and am still getting agitated on the road thinking I just can’t trust every other bastard on the road to do what they’re supposed to…..


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Car salesmen are people too…. yeah right.

Have spent most of the morning on the phone dealing with the dealers and dealing with the people who are dealing with the dealers.

Car dealers that is.  I think you must have to commit some pretty heinous crimes in your past life to end up being a car salesmen.  Who on earth grows up saying they want to be a car salesman?  a real estate agent?  It’s like prostitution, no little girl grows up wanting to be a prostitute (or if there was we’d be seriously looking at her home environment!)  So I can’t imagine anyone who would willingly go into a career that makes them even more universally despised and distrusted than ATO (IRS) agents.

Actually come to think of it car salesmen and real estate agents do have one thing in common – they have a unique knack of totally sucking every last iota of fun out of buying a new car or a new house.  I don’t think it’s unrealistic to hope for some moderate portion of enjoyment from acquiring a new home or a new car.  One should be excited about these things – you work/save hard for it so it should be enjoyable.  But having to deal with the agents?  Trying to make sure you don’t get totally reamed up the arse without the small consideration of lube or at the very least, make sure they don’t have the sandy lube handy… well, that just ain’t my idea of fun. 

So I did the only thing a sensible girl could do under the circumstances…. pointed at the vehicle of choice and said ‘Mr K, I want that one.  I know it’s an enormous imposition, but if you could bring yourself to be sullied and possibly anally raped by said car salespeople in my stead… then I’d be forever in your debt’.  

Et voila!  Thanks to Mr K the dishes were done dude!  And I didn’t even have to put on my Betty White face 🙂 

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