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Just off the main drive of North Manchester General Hospital there is a staff car park controlled by an automatic barrier. To warn pedestrians that the barrier is about to operate a recorded voice message loudly declaims:
"Caution automatic barrier, stand well clear!"
The voice is strong and clear with a manly northern accent and I am convinced it is the performance poet and broadcaster Ian McMillan. I wonder whether there are other such examples of artistes who, perhaps having fallen temporarily upon hard times, have taken up the offer of voice-over work. Or perhaps there are hundreds of voices belonging to undiscovered talents who might be the next Johnny Depp or Jane Horrocks (I'm sure I heard her in a lift recently warning me that the doors were closing).
I think I'll start recording and saving these apparently innocuous voices and for when these people are famous - they could be worth a fortune. I mean look at those Paris Hilton tapes: they certainly made someone a lot of money didn't they?
On the other hand there might well be a market among the better Blue Chip companies for this type of voice over. I mean, can you imagine the Kudos when Eddie Stobart, talking to one of his rich transport peers over cocktails says:
"Yes, it was quite a coup getting Tom Baker to do 'Caution Vehicle Reversing' he is so good you know; so authoritative, people just jump out of the way of the wagons"
Or imagine being alone with Joanna Lumley's voice in a lift; you'd never leave!
Who would you have to do your voice overs?...while you think about it I'm off to start a new company with my new stunningly good idea. Next time you are in a lift and hear a famous voice think of me: I'll be living somewhere posh on the fruits of my new idea.
Those of you who are parents will remember how, as small children, your sons and daughters made new discoveries: eyes wide as saucers as they learnt how Lego could produce whatever shapes they wanted; or the joy of discovering how numbers worked, as they added and subtracted (one that passed me by). As adults though, we seem to lose that joy sometime around late middle age, so it was great to watch our aged hospital-incarcerated relative open their birthday present - the MP3 player and combined DAB radio.
There is a lesson about old dogs and new tricks here: if the trick is of sufficient benefit the old dog will gladly adapt to it, just so long as there is a younger dog to thrust headphones over their ears oblivious to their protests. So, after the first gruff rebuff at being faced with this foreign gadget his expression changed as he heard Black Dyke Mills in crystal digital quality; and the years fell away and, with re-found enthusiasm, he was suddenly eager to learn the secrets of MP3 and DAB; especially when he realised that he would be able to listen to live football commentary on Radio 5 instead of being forced to listen to the extortionate crap hospital service. Though I hesitate to call it a service, blatant profiteering more like.
Finally, you may have noticed a slight reduction in my usual rate of blog posts. This is not unrelated to hospital visiting and I will do my best to maintain a skeleton service during our time of nightly trails to the grim Victorian edifice that is North Manchester General Hospital.
And finally, finally, I borrowed the picture of the dog from Lisa, check out her excellent Flickr site where there are loads more. This dog isn't particularly old but is scared of new things.
I guess when I received my MP3 player as a gift this Christmas I was a little behind the rest of you in that it is my first ever player of this type. Formerly I had been wedded to my Mini Disc player never to be parted but men are fickle and I have spurned my trusty disc player for my new musical best friend.
The best bit for me has been blowing the dust from some CDs I've not played for ages, picking the best bits and loading them on to the player. With the rate at which new music is published it is easy to forget how good some of the stuff you already have is. But then the fun really starts when you push the shuffle button: it's like having your own radio station when you know that whatever comes on next you will like but you don't know what it will be. And how weird is it when you get strange coincidences that link tracks together. For instance walking the dog this morning I set off and one of Daniel Barenboin's fabulous pieces from Bach's Well Tempered Clavier Book 1 came on, it was interspersed by much else and then the last track as I stepped through the door was an organ piece by Dieterich Buxtehude the 17th century composer who Bach loved so much he walked a vast distance just to hear him play.
One of the CDs I blew the dust off was Alanis Morissette's Jagged Little Pill. What a stunningly good album that is; and if you (this is for the men) were ever wavering on the verge of unfaithfulness, having Alanis creep up and mug you from your MP3 player is more than enough to put you back on the straight and narrow - who needs Fatal Attraction!
An ageing relative of ours is having an MP3 player for his birthday to help while away hours in hospital. He doesn't have a computer so it will be Mrs C and I who load it with his favourites that include Black Dyke Mills brass band, Nana Mouskouri and Jim Reeves. It might perk him up a bit if I pepper it with the odd track from Alanis or Billy Bragg perhaps. On second thoughts Billy Bragg might send a Daily Mail reader like him into apoplexy - best not eh?.
I promised when I did the post 'Seven Things...' that I would explain how I once allowed a man to shit in the palm of my hand. It seems a good time to write about this sort of thing because it is pretty much the first anniversary of my blog and this sort of subject is pretty much where I started. I started writing my blog when I had time on my hands, having been in hospital for a while. One of my most popular early posts, The Fug and the Time had a particularly faecal theme.
Twenty six years ago I was a callow Student Nurse learning the rudiments of care: bed making with hospital corners, cleanliness, bed bathing and other basics. These were the days of starched sheets and patients who had to look tidy, I remember the protests of patients who liked to lounge in their beds, sheets askew, only to be told by Sister that they could not possibly be comfortable sat like that and made, at her insistence, to sit up straight.
Whilst bed bathing a man who had recently had both of his legs removed, we were in the process of changing his sheets. This was achieved by rolling him over to one side of the bed, changing the sheet on the other, bunching up the remainder of the clean sheet in the middle then rolling him over the lump onto the clean side whilst the other nurse changed the other half. We had just rolled him on to the clean side and I was smoothing the wrinkles out of the clean sheet when the movement must have taken its toll on his insides, "Nurse, I've got to go to the toilet...NOW". Before my colleague had returned at high speed with a commode he added with some urgency, "There's some coming..." and sure enough the evidence presented itself.
Here is where it becomes apparent to what extent the sanctity of clean sheets and orderliness had been impressed into us, because I instinctively grabbed a clean wipe from the trolley and, as if diving for the catch that would save the Ashes, allowed the offending item to land in my hand. Wanting to be sure that there was no more to come before we transferred him to the bedside commode, I asked "Have you done?..."
His reply indicated that he had misinterpreted my question and actually thought I was offering an even higher degree of service than that to which he had become accustomed:
"Ah, thanks lad, there's more where that came from, nnnnnnnhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh", and with that deposited a load that any man would have been proud of into my waiting hand.
So there you have it, a man shat in my hand. I often wonder whether his misunderstanding caused any future embarrassing moments for him or my colleagues during bed baths as he marvelled at the quality of service that allowed a man to shit without having to leave his pit.
Happy Birthday to my blog!
Try telling anyone, as they are liberally splashing Hugo Boss over their manly chest or donning a posh frock (not necessarily the same person you understand) that New Year is a stupid celebration and they look at you like you have just told them you are off to join a commune of some strange religious sect. Now that it's all over I will explain why I have never quite understood the need to draw an arbitrary line in the sand of time and call it a new year. For that is all it is: an administrative necessity to have a beginning and an end of the so called year. I understand why it is convenient to have one but why celebrate it?.. nothing changes.
At least Christmas, Eid or Divali have some sort of symbolism, even if you don't believe the in the spirituality that goes with them; but new year is a nothing. If we are going to celebrate it we might as well celebrate it in April when at least the accountants have something to be pleased about.
For many people this idea of taking stock of the previous twelve months and looking forward to the next is anathema. The time to take stock is when it is right for you. That is why so many new year resolutions fail: people are forced into resolving when their hearts are not in it. When you really want to do something do it; make a plan, find your motivation for achieving it and go for it. Away with this clap trap.
And by way of a cheery note on which to end; did you know that the early hours of new year morning are the most common time for suicide. Surprised? You shouldn't be when thousands of people who have had a shit year and another shit one to come are forced to reflect on the fact.
Happy New Year!
