Did we save a life?

One of Rob’s colleagues is ill and as he is in charge of the time table she left him messages at 5.30 and 6.30 this morning (he puts his phone on silence at night these days – can’t think why!).

At breakfast he phoned her up to let her know that she wasn’t working today anyway and to ask how she was. It seems she has flu and was dosing herself up with paracetamol and a cold/flu cure which is popular here, it also contains paracatemol, as well as another medicine we don’t know. As soon as he put the phone down he realized what she had said and sent her a message telling her she was double dosing on paracetamol. She didn’t know it was dangerous at all and thanked him.

We then forwarded the number to the anti-poison center (first page of telephone directory in France), so that she could check whether she was okay. She contacted us a few minutes later to say that they had instructed her not to take anymore paracetamol for at least 15 hours. She lives alone, had she continued to dose herself up every four hours goodness knows what would have happened.

 In France you have to go to the pharmacy to buy all medicines. If you buy paracetamol and the cold cure together they always advise you not to take them at the same time. I hope that everyone knows how dangerous paracetamol can be.

From Wikipedia:

 “The onset of analgesia is approximately 11 minutes after oral administration of paracetamol, and its half-life is 1–4 hours. While generally safe for use at recommended doses (1,000 mg per single dose and up to 4,000 mg per day for adults), acute overdoses of paracetamol can cause potentially fatal kidney, brain and liver damage and, in rare individuals, a normal dose can do the same. The risk may be heightened by chronic alcohol abuse. Paracetamol toxicity is the foremost cause of acute liver failure in the Western world, and accounts for most drug overdoses in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand”

Heads and Shoulders, Knees and Toes

What a lot has happened since I last wrote. When Olivier packed up his things I asked him to take his bag of weights downstairs. He left the bag on the landing. I decided to move it so that Rob wouldn’t forget to take it down. I was being so careful about my knees it never occurred to me that I would finish with a trapped nerve which has left me with stabbing pains in my left shoulder blade and loss of feeling in my left armpit ( and you don’t realize how important that could be until you haven’t got it).

Dom and J-M came and we had a good weekend. Dom cooked me a birthday meal and made carrot cake which we all enjoyed very much. Rob was working on Sunday so she could make us a curry for lunch (Rob has threatened me with divorce if I ever try to feed him curry). It was sad when they left, as I had to take Olivier to his friend’s house to leave for Bordeaux. I came back to a really empty house

We drove to Bordeaux on the Tuesday morning with the remainder of Olivier’s things. It took two hours to get to Bordeaux and the same to travel the 10 or so kilometers off the ring-road and to Olivier’s apartment. We also had to check the place with the agency, drop of his things and then Olivier and Rob went to collect the rest of his furniture from his friend. Going home took just as long for as well as the evening rush hour traffic, the weather was bad and there was patchy fog. We were exhausted.

Wednesday was my birthday, but I didn’t feel too birthdayish because I was worn out and my shoulder was painful. We went out for a cup of coffee to celebrate and I mustered the energy to make scrambled eggs on toast for my birthday meal.

 Thursday I had lessons.

 We left the house on Friday at 5 am. to catch the train to Bordeaux for an auction. I slept almost all the way, it’s unusual for me to be able to sleep outside my bed. We did have a good day, the weather was good and we found a nice restaurant for lunch and ate in the sunshine. The auction is hard work. There is an hour and a half to view 400 lots and then the concentration during the auction itself. We did come away with some good postcards and kept to our budget. By this time I was dosing myself with paracetamol pretty regularly.

 I went to see the Doctor on Monday and actually thought that it was feeling a little better. The Doctor’s examination put paid to that. I was in agony last night despite pain killers. Tomorrow I’m going for an X-ray.

One good thing; I started my winter session of injections for the veins in my legs this afternoon. The pain killers helped there too.

Was it the 13th yesterday?

Yesterday started well enough. A normal day just like any other - until Rob phoned me mid-morning to say that he’d fallen off his bike and that he was coming home at lunch time. 12 years ago he did the same and broke his elbow which meant 3 months off work.

As Rob was cycling to work a motorist stopped suddenly to avoid a pedestrian and Rob swerved to avoid hitting the car. Unfortunately his heavy rucksack kept going and pulled him over, so that he lost his balance.

I could see which arm he had damaged when I went to pick him up from the bus stop. He hadn’t been to the emergency department at the hospital as he didn’t think it was serious enough. He went to the Doctor later who told him to go to hospital straight away.

It didn’t appear to be too busy in the emergency department as we were checked in and ushered to a waiting room. There were only two people in front of us… The waiting room filled up quite quickly and it was three hours later that we finally got to see a doctor. Rob was examined and X-rayed and it seems that nothing is broken, but as there was so much swelling a fracture could be hidden. He has to go back in 10 days. His arm is now strapped up and he has pretty strong painkillers to take.

We arrived home just after midnight.

He’s well enough to criticize my driving.

Son time

When Oliver was home a couple of weeks ago, he set me up with two computer screens. At first I felt quite giddy and kept on ‘losing the mouse’. Now I’ve settled down to this new technological breakthrough (for me at least) and wouldn’t be without it. I have to do quite a bit of research when describing some of the postcards I have for sale. It’s so useful to be able to see two lots of information at a time.

He phoned me up yesterday morning. I always know when there is a problem because of the pause before he asks me how I am. While he was playing football (soccer) he injured his toe and needs an X-ray. The X-ray isn’t the problem. What about the insurance? – Will he be expected to pay up front and how much will it cost? We have a very good back up insurance. I never have to pay for blood tests and X-rays because I always have my papers on me. I don’t know how much they cost. If he can find his papers he should be fine, if not he will pay and then be refunded later.

The best part of his toe injury is that he has been signed off work for a few days as he can’t walk very far. No KFC for a little while

How things break and that link

Aha! I’m putting the link at the bottom so that you’ll read my post first…

This morning I broke my beloved Pyrex ® bowl. it’s the largest of a set of three and was so useful for salads, mixing things and making porridge in the microwave. This morning I made porridge in the microwave and the bowl slipped out of my hands as I was washing it. It shattered, which was quite a shock; Fortunately I had my glasses on, as it was a bit of an explosion.

Yesterday we received two large albums of postcards through the post. They were sent by an auction house a long way away and were well packed inside a box, each one in a large, extra strong, bubble pack bag. Wrapped one inside the other, the bags were perfect for containing the pieces broken bowl. Strange how things tie up.

* The link, it came from a Linky and Dinky newsletter. Hope that your name is on the right list!

 
(* For once this was something I could see better on AOL)

Cold and...

It’s still very cold today but not as cold as some places. Rob went off to work on his bike this morning. I’m having the car so that I can take Olivier to his lift back to Poitiers. I’ll be on well used main roads, most roads are dry now with a bit of ice in quiet places where the sun doesn’t warm. Rob left this morning asking me to keep him informed setting off, arriving home etc…

When he set off he had on his shiny top, flashing red light and flashing front light, he was going to stay on the main roads as they are clear in that direction. The other day a car pulled up by him at the lights and the driver congratulated him on being so visible. Around nine thirty I sent him a message asking if he’d arrived safely (just so that he knows how annoying it is). Apparently, this morning a band of youngsters in a white car hit him on the head as they drove past. This was quite close to the 24/24 MacDonald’s so we must assume that they were still drunk from last night. Rob was a little shaken, but unharmed. He told me that one of his colleagues has broken some fingers. He went to help some people in a car that had skidded into some water and got his hand stuck. Nice start to the day… not.

In which I dress myself

When my cholesterol levels were high 7 years ago, rather than give me tablets, which are dangerous in the long term, my doctor sent me to the nutritionist. One of the things she advised me to do was to make my own salad dressing in a cocktail shaker. The cocktail shaker was getting on a bit and the rubber seal came off. Last Wednesday evening I was shaking up a batch of vinaigrette when the lid flew off. As my hand became covered in oil the shaker flew out of my hand and I was covered in dressing and shattered glass. One of the worst messes I’ve cleaned up must be oil, vinegar and glass. In the past week I’ve broken three small plates, a cocktail shaker and finished this evening with a glass bowl which shattered into an enormous amount of pretty yellow glass.

Yesterday was not a good day for me.

In some of the exams the students are allowed to have what we call an ‘anti seche’. This is a piece of paper of designated size where they can note information they feel that they might need during the examination. They choose the smallest writing possible, the tiniest margins and cover the paper all over. This is often for an exam on business law like yesterday. My job was to check everyone's paper, which I did. Then I came across a young man with paper which seemed rather thick. He had two papers! As the exam had not started I asked him to put the paper away and take his bag to the end of the room as usual. I still felt uneasy about this paper and kept an eye on him all through the exam. Towards the end of the exam I could see that he did indeed have the second paper under his note paper. He swore he didn’t use it and I don’t think he did but we had to make out a report. Checking his answers he hadn’t cheated. He barely answered any of the questions. I felt really rotten, but it’s important for the reputation of the school that there is no cheating in exams.

Rob and I went for our evening walk, there was a beautiful sunset reflected on the water which was really calm. When we got to the cliff we could see that something was wrong. Further down there was a car on the rocks. Our cliffs aren’t that high really, if you decided to jump you’d probably break your ankle and suffer a few bruises. A young man had decided to try to kill himself by driving off the top of the cliff. The emergency services arrived soon after we did. The tide was coming in and it was getting dark. We were stood with a few other people near to a camping car which was parked up for the night (illegally) and when a woman arrived (from the scene of the accident) another woman asked if she knew if her husband was okay. The newly arrived woman was really stroppy with her and walked off. The woman started to cry and explained that her husband had gone to help (remember the tide was coming in). I comforted her the best I could and we watched the rescuers running around trying to sort out how to get the equipment onto the beach round by the cliff. We sent the woman into her camping car and watched for a while. The husband returned and was soaked. He told us that the man had wounded his neck and was still alive. Not long after that a helicopter flew over towards the fire station (there is a helicopter pad in front of it). We walked home and I went to bed.

Olivier was on the beach at the time it happened, heard the car rev up and saw the car go over the cliff and roll over a few times. The young man had taken off his seatbelt and finished up in the back seat. Olivier told me that as the car was an Audi the body wasn’t damaged much. The helicopter came back with equipment was used to help remove the roof and then lift the man to the top. The car was pulled up from the beach this evening damaging the already fragile cliff. The rumours have started, some say the man was dead when they got him up from the car. Olivier doesn’t think so because they fit him up with a drip.

I didn’t sleep very well and it suddenly occurred to me in the small hours that my young man who was cheating could have been the man in the car. Not true of course.

Ouch!

Olivier came in yesterday with the story that the mayor’s wife has lost some fingers. She was closing the shutters in the wind and the shutter blew back onto her hand. I did something similar when we were living in La Rochelle. The shutter flipped back onto my fingers. It took a while for me to pluck up enough courage to look. Our shutters are old, wooden and ill fitting after the years of damp winters and very hot summers, so hopefully I don’t have to worry too much.

In which I try flying

On Saturday morning we were off early with the computer and I went through the front door trying to put my phone into the little pocket made for it in my bag. I landed flat on my face because I missed the step. Rob insisted we went off straight away so I didn’t have time to soak my ankle in cold water. It didn’t hurt too much but swelled up like a tennis ball. In the evening I discovered grazed knees and elbow and I still ache all over today.

The last time I tried flying from the same step I was 8 months pregnant with Olivier, I somehow managed to flip my body over and landed on my back that time