With apologies to silvennia.

At the ER lab where I am currently stationed:

From the Cancer Center, I receive an average of 10 samples a day for blood tests.
These 10 are usually repeat patients.
From the oncology clinics, I receive an average of 5 patients a day to take blood from.
These are never repeat patients.
5 x 6 days in a week = 30 *new* patients a week.
30 x 4 patients a month = 120 new patients a month.

So if an estimated 120 people acquire some form of cancer in a month at one hospital...

...Imagine how many people are getting cancer across the country.

The lady was a snatch theft victim.

Her head hurt - internal haemorrhage. They said "do the bleeding test for her". I pricked her ear, and counted. And waited. And it didn't stop bleeding.

2 minutes was normal.
4 minutes was prolonged.
6 minutes was the point of self-doubt.
8 minutes was the longest 8 minutes ever.

She kept reaching for the back of her head. She kept wincing and the nurse had to keep her hand waving me away. We had to push her hair from her ears. She kept mumbling how it hurt.

But I can't stop until the bleeding stops. The bleeding can't stop until the doctor stops it. The doctor can't stop it until the bleeding stops and I get a result and they can arrange the blood so that her bleeding stops.

Please, please, stop bleeding.

****

My colleague broke down. Came to my room and sat. The psychiatrist is on leave, but she needs her pills.

She needs to sleep and rest.
She needs the sleep for the pain to go away.
She needs the pills so she won't feel so lonely.
She needs to not feel lonely so she can face the world.
She needs to face the world because her kids need her.

Her kids had a kid argument and she snapped. Thrashed one, threw them out of the room. Shut their crying away. Why mummy why she do this what's wrong with mummy mummy don't be angry, they wail.

Why mummy why she do this to me what's wrong with me mummy speak to me, she's crying.
Her parents think she's a joke,
her colleagues think it's a joke,
if she takes the kids and die, it'll also be a joke, she says.

But it's not. It's not a joke. She doesn't have drive. She doesn't see solutions. She wants to die. And she's crying like I've never seen her cry. She can't work - she can't think straight enough to work. No, you can't push her to work the shift, he said. Get someone else. I'm serious, she can't work. Activate the standby system, he said.

Then the doctor called her in, and she faded off into the weekend.

****

Armchair activism is a big fat crock of lies.
We tweet hotlines and information endlessly to everyone we know.
We press the join button for every Facebook cause people send us.
What does it do besides tell people you support something?
You wear a ribbon and run around in it - does it say anything besides you're wearing a ribbon?
When real people around you collapse, when they're defeated, will you be there?
How will you be around when you're sitting in front of your screen while someone behind you sinks and fades away?
I sat there and I saw her. I tried to listen, tried to help.
It was all I could do, and it wasn't enough. It'll never be.
Do you think you can take all the information you have and put it to good use?
Seriously?
Start doing.
Save her life. Prove me wrong.
I'll stand here with a pillow and a laugh when you're finally tired.

"You mentioned she probably never fell in love - why did you marry her then? Did you love her?"
He lit his pipe, the tobacco turning an orange-red hue.
"Usually you think love can come after marriage - you'll work it out together, you figure. But it doesn't work that way. And it was time to get married anyway, and she was pretty and everyone said she was pretty this pretty that; but beauty's skin deep. No point being pretty if you're like that," the smoke from his pipe zigzagged up the wall.
"But you were dating before marriage; didn't you say you stayed together for a while?"
"A month isn't exactly a long period."
He walked to the bathroom and sat at the step dividing orange bathroom tiles and wooden parquet, his back facing me.
"I was working in Ipoh back then, so it's not like we spent a lot of time together anyway. You couldn't find a phone back then, now you've got webcams and phones everywhere, you can see each other every day if you wanted to! Now there's highways, no more 2-hour drives!"
"So you'd drive to and from Ipoh every weekend to see her?"
"Well that's I did."
"So you drove every weekend, took her on dates, spent time at her house...what did she do for you then?"
He got up and flushed the embers down the toilet.
"Absolutely nothing!" he spat.
"And if she did absolutely jack and didn't love you to boot, why didn't you break up?"
He walked back to his chair, picking up the controller.
"Because the entire town knew. Her parents knew, her sisters knew, her cousins knew, her colleagues knew, and we couldn't break up. She'd lose face."
His voice faded, eyes fixed on his game.
"You know your mum. She never wants to lose face."
It hurt to hear the defeat in his voice. So I left.

By some grotesque twist of fate, I had to go to Kuantan again after a mere 8 months!

( Longer, photo-intensiv-er, but still cut )

Looking back at the trip, I think I need one more round in Kuantan - the reason being my handphone ran out of memory and my camera batteries kept DYING on me. I need to take a few more shots of:

- The town bus depot. There's the big depot that gets buses from out of state, and there's the buses that goes around town. There's NONE btw. THERE ARE NO TOWN BUSES IN KUANTAN. NO TAXIS EITHER.
- The only Hindu temple I saw, and the FIRST Indian couple I saw in Kuantan!! 8D
- Kuantan town in general, because immanuel_aj asked me what it looked like.
- The last standing Petmal petrol station (if it's still there next time).
- McCorner!!
- Kg. New Zealand, found somewhere on the highway. Apparently Lyndon B. Johnson visited one Felda settlement and they named the village after him too.
- Mentakab. Twice to Kuantan and none to my birthplace. Something is wrong.

Road trip anyone? We'll eat curry porridge too!

Today's night call was nothing short of frustrating due to really retarded nurses/doctors. I DAMN WELL hope it's work fatigue because there's no other excuse for it.

#1:
Nurse: I want to check if there's enough serum for this patient to do a crossmatch.
Me: *checks* Yup we've got enough. Send up the form.
Nurse: ...Form?
Me: ...The....request...form?
Nurse: ....For?
Me: ....your crossmatch?
Nurse: .....ouu.


#2:
Nurse: Hi, the doctor seems to have ordered one "RBC" but I don't know whether he wants packed cells or whole blood! Do YOU know? :D


#3:
Nurse: This patient needs 2 pints of blood - how come you've only matched one?
Me: We're having a blood shortage, so unless the patient urgently needs it we won't be matching the 2nd bag.
Nurse: *goes on this STONKING LONG grandmother story about what procedure patient doing tomorrow at what time blah blah blah etc*
Me: So do you need the blood tomorrow?
Nurse: *repeats STONKING LONG GRANDMOTHER STORY*
Me: I just want to know do you need the blood first thing tomorrow morning, YES OR NO?
Nurse: *repeats STONKING LONG GRANDMOTHER STORY*
Me: *gives up*

(And no, we never matched the 2nd bag)


#4 is the winner though - after issuing a pint of blood, I got a call from the nurse:
Nurse: The expiry dates on the bag and the form don't match up! The blood bag says 2009 while the form says 2010! >< I'm sending back the bag!

(So she does, and I check it and I should've taken a pic - On the form someone wrote the expiry date as 30/10 while the blood bag has the full date stamped on it. So I called her back)

Me: The form's expiry date reads as 30th October, they forgot the year. The expiry date tallies.
Nurse: ....?
Me: The 30/10 in the form, the 10 is October...
Nurse: ...??
Me: Like...the 10th month....?
Nurse: .....???

(She never understood what I was trying to say, so I just added the /09 to the date and sent it back)

#5 happened to my colleague and she nearly threw the phone...
Nurse: We need you to come to the ward and take blood for this patient at 5AM for a bunch of lab tests.
Partner: Is there a reason why it's at 5AM?
Nurse: Dunno, Doctor said take only at 5AM.
Partner: Would it make a difference if I came earlier? Like right now (12 AM)?
Nurse: Doctor said 5AM or die.
Partner: For no reason?
Nurse: Well he didn't say anything.
Partner: $Y@Y$)Q@&YR)*Q&YRQ

Let's twist this up:

Leave me a comment saying "Contagious, Yoda's grammar is". I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can get to know you better. Update your journal with the answers to the questions. Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions.

Ask me five questions so I don't have to trawl LJs finding questions to answer and I'll put them in my reply to your comment. Update your journal, include this explanation in the post and offer to answer other people's questions about you.

( And now, with only ONE! )

I kinda sorta remembered last year I joined a Manga Shakespeare compeition with _deru and I mentioned I could make a huge animated gif with the progress shots.

We got Honourable Mention, btw. The actual published manga is tons crappier than what Deru put out.

Today I made the GIF.

( I hope your connection is OK tonight, or you might never see it. )


Enjoy!

Me: Why is there a scratch on your nose?
KL: Catfight.
Me: You're not a cat.
KL: Bitchfight.
Me: You're not a bitch.
KL: Son of a bitchfight.
Me: That's more like it.
KL: YOU INSULTED MY MOTHER HOW DARE J00 DDDDDD8

H1N1 is...stressing me out for the wrong reasons.

For the 50 gazillion people who haven't heard from me lately, I've been putting in extra hours at work due to the pandemic. My department (Microbiology/Serology) handles a type of screening test for respiratory viruses (we call it the RSV test), of which currently me and my colleague are the only two people who know how to run this test because it is entirely manual (except for a nifty fluorescent microscope). Since it's done in-house and detects Influenza A (but NOT H1N1), doctors have been using it as an alternative (more expensive too!) to throat swabs sent to IMR for H1N1 detection. So from what used to be maybe 5-6 samples a week, we're getting 20-30 samples a DAY.

( Cut for LONG ASSED RANT ABOUT THE STATE OF MEDICAL THINGS IN OUR COUNTRY )

So all that said, what's my point?

- I'm trying to say that while the percentage of H1N1 is low, it's also no fun to have everyone coughing into your face and having your sleeve grabbed and being asked if you're going to die every single minute of the day. Sure being healthy reduces your chances of dying because it's not the Spanish flu, but that's like saying being healthy protects you from cholera. Currently people aren't dying because their immunity can take it or the virus isn't that strong. But when you have reports of Tamiflu-resistant H1N1 emerging, figuring when the 2nd wave will come is like a time bomb. If we're all sodded, the mutation will probably be resistant to everything and kill able-bodied people like the Spanish flu did. When that time comes, you won't even be bitching whether you can make it for GACC because you'll be too busy trying to stay alive.

- While you might be strong enough to combat H1N1, there are people who aren't. There'll be small kids at GACC, definitely. Say you had mild symptoms. You accidentally cough in the vicinity of a child. That child gets H1N1, but you'll never know because there'll be thousands in the hall and anyone could've given the kid the flu. Masks help, but eventually face and breath moisture will render the masks useless and you'll need to change it often since the virus spreads through fluids. It's not so much as protecting yourself from the flu as it is protecting others from it.

- People complaining about the lack of Tamiflu is also not legit. Antivirals are expensive and in limited supply (we're not Australia who has enough to vaccinate EVERYBODY. Yes. Even flat_foot. And aitakute. And especially hooli. Hooli~! T_T), and there's the normal flu going around to boot. The chances of you having H1N1 is 1 in 20 people (just sayin'), and if we give out Tamiflu like raffle tickets we won't have enough for the ONE unfortunate bugger who HAS H1N1. Like hisashi_glay. You better not be taking our Tamiflu supply, bloody hoarder.

- H1N1 samples require a throat swab. Having taken a throat swab a few weeks back and gagged like a MOFO in ER, this is the ONLY reason I don't want to catch it. >_____<

- I'm not going to GACC. You shouldn't too. It's a social responsibility.



OH CRAP I'M LATE. Here, read this while you wait! ><



PS: Maximum distance of transmission for H1N1 virus: 1 meter.

It was a very long dream but highlights included elderg giving music lessons to some really ugly nun and then I was at some toy store looking at stuff and Elder went LOOK AT THIS MP3 PLAYER LOOK AT IT and ran off while I was still holding his earphones which then ripped even though they stretched pretty far when Elder was running from whereever he was to the pedestal where the player was and then I had to read some microbiology plates and put one under the microscope to take a look where my colleague who had a DSLR for some reason was trying to take a picture of the culture plate and my senior popped up and said "you should do a gram stain first" and I felt really silly I was trying to look at the plate under the microscope and then Arisugawa Juri left her dorm room and there was a ScREAM but nobody was in the room and she'd disappeared but there had been some homo attacker (whut) whom the ugly nun deduced would only attack on the 6th working week and had weird calculations (immanuel_aj was around) to figure out when the attacker would hit next but I never got it and instead ugly nun asked if I could give her music lessons even though I said I was bloody not GOOD at music lessons and Elder goes "this is what you get for disrupting my plans bwa ha ha >D" and I could tell it was Elder because it was Elder's VOICE wtf and all the while I was calculating how convenient it was for Elder to send Mintos home because something something Subang and she was in my dad's bathroom for I dunno what reason and in front of the music class door there was an owl clock (with pendulum eyes!) and the music class rates that said "RM11 up" and that wasn't including the difficult class and some words were scratched out and written something else on top of them but then ugly nun pulled me off for her music class and I was like "NOOOOO" in my heart because the dread had been there since ugly nun made me her music teacher and then I woke up because my alarm rang and now I feel really sleepy and tired. @__@

See those wisps, floating away.

That delicate white ring ripped apart - oh look it's broken. Rise higher. Dragged up kicking and screaming. Has it stopped struggling? I think it has. A drowned corpse bloated with air, it rises to the surface of the sky.

Fingers oustretched, trying to touch it. It looks opaque, solid - grab it. It slips through the cracks. Don't go, I want to say. Catch it, swallow it. Chew it, savour it. Linger not in the stars or in the clouds outside, but in the cracks and corners within me.

Bye-bye, I never knew you.

Isn't she a beauty? 8D

A pair of good jeans is akin to frolicking naked and never noticing, if Sedna's testimony is anything to go by.

Before his arrival at The Vaticanny Place, Sedna had never worn nor heard of jeans in his life; he simply assumed it was some brand of combat gear with increased defense or agility, and that it was prudent to buy a pair if he was going to protect his master well. 500000 credits and 5 adamantiums poorer, seven trips round the universe and 5 world-saving missions later (one involving a galaxy), the only thing more consistent than his hair colour was his trusty pair of soot-grey narrow straight-cut Dee-Mais 404. Despite the amount of danger he'd been put through, he only suffered one loose thread at the hem - the company had certainly lived up to their mission statement of making supernova-resistant jeans. If anybody approached Sedna to be their spokesperson, he'd do it for free, no joke. Indeed, denim jeans were the greatest creation of lesser creatures.

Too bad Finnegan never wore jeans.

It often puzzled Sedna why his master refused to buy jeans, let alone keep a pair in his wardrobe "just in case". Finengan gave all manner of excuses to avoid buying - they didn't carry rainbow black, the material was too hard/soft/both/neither, they never made in in his size, or he just said "No" and continued working. Seemed strange for a God comfortable in tattered hobo shorts to refuse the luxury of soft denim wrapped tightly around his pale slender legs the way a good condom should - not that Sedna knew what that last one felt like.

Sedna pictured Finnegan facing down a fearsome monster - that large bipedal fire-breathing lizard he once saw, perhaps - decked in his trademark maroon silk shirt, a black skinny tie, and black skinny jeans. From afar one would never tell they were denim, and his sillhouette would be worth admiring for hours while he summoned forth mighty spirits to aid him in bringing down his enemy. Standing triumphant over the smoking remains of the reptile, the jeans would create nary an unsightly ripple as it billowed it in the wind (billowing loose silk shirts and skinny ties however was perfectly acceptable).

Or perhaps Finnegan could confront a tough negotiation with glib-tongued foes; hanging on his every word, waiting to ensnare him in their trap and force him to mouth words of surrender. Master Finnegan would lean back on his chair, legs crossed, smug grin, the glare of the lone lightbulb casting no light on those matte black jeans where any inferior pants would have created a cheap lens flare effect. How could anybody take his master seriously if his pants glowed? Jeans would never do that.

Maybe Finnegan lying on the couch after a hard days' work. One hand shielding his face from Sedna, as if refusing to reveal his fatigue. A low mumble, something that went along the lines of "take off my jeans". Sedna would say "Yes, my lord", and trace a finger down Finnegan's shirt buttons, careful not to press too hard on his bellybutton. A fingertip would stop at the tarnished silver button, the grand barrier between Sedna and Finnegan fully personified. In a pinch and a snap, the button would wiggle from under its stitched tunnel, emerging at the other end; a pop and clink. The pull tab was the final gateway - Sedna would look for a sign, and see a glimpse of an approval at the corners of Finnegan's luscious pink lips. Another pinch, a soft, slow, rip, and...

WHOMP!

A loud whipping sound accompanied the immediate crash of Sedna's forehead and the hardwood floor he sat on. Peering from the corner of his eye, he saw Finnegan's annoyance (complete with twitching eyebrow) complementing the very large, very plastic, very red, and very full laundry basket he carried.

"Wipe that grin off your retarded face and give me your jeans, I'm going to do the laundry," he said, heading to the washing machine.

A pang of disappointment hit Sedna - the dream had felt so close, so real. Now it was gone, washed away into the suds like his jeans were about to be.

...The jeans he happened to be wearing, that is.

Immediately, he leapt to his feet and pranced off, singing, "Here Master Finnegan, let me take them off right in front of you!"

"What? No, go to your roo-AUUUGH! BACK! GERROF! WHAT THE- STOP SHAKING YOUR HIPS! WHAT THE HELL-"

Sedna always loved his jeans. Why Master Finnegan never liked them, he never knew.


-Fin

Next week, our lab is being audited by external assessors (from various government hospitals), so everyone's on their toes updating the records and making sure everyone knows their stuff.

At work today, 5 people are on medical leave until next Monday - the day before the audit.

- One had a recurrent stroke.
- One had a cracked retina that rendered him pretty much blind.
- One was going for some operation...something to do with gout.
- One probably had some pregnancy-related illness.
- One had diarrhoea.
- One was on MC last week after a visit to the psychiatrist.

H1N1? What is this debilitating flu pandemic you speak of?

I want a journal.

Either hardcover or softcover, so it can fit into my bag. I wouldn't mind carrying a bag forever if I got attached to it.
Either a nice solid black or with some patterns, but nothing that says JOURNAL on the cover. That's just too obvious.
Something with lines so I can write orderly, but perhaps no lines are good so I can cram more on the pages. Or doodle stuff I see on the spot.
Something thick, so that it'll last me some time.
Something that doesn't have dates like the daily diary I use, so that I won't feel compelled to write ONLY on a particular date and leave the other pages blank.

Yeah, a journal would be good.

STEP 1: My parents will notify the following people (in no particular order) first - after the relatives and my boss (who'll then tell my colleagues who'll go OH SNAP NOW WHO WILL RUN THE SEROLOGY TESTS), and the 5 ex-schoolmates I bothered to keep in touch with. Oh, and Kelly. If she's not too busy.

- kimlim
- flat_foot
- evo7gal
- kemuridono

Any one of these people will be within 6 degrees of every other contact I know. They will also get first dibs on EVERYTHING I own, provided my parents don't keep it for themselves first. This is including (but not limited):

- The diaries of my entire life. Guaranteed thicker than Anne Frank's.
- Jewellery & clothing
- My anime/manga/doujin/artbook/gashapon stash
- My gaming consoles (PS2, PS2 slim, PSP, DS)
- My plushies.

The only exception will be the computer; My dad decides on those.


STEP 2: Out of the 4 contact people, one will retrieve my blogging/facebook/deviantart accounts (two of them are IT people - I don't think I need to give detailed instructions) and copypaste the following:

Oh bugger, I accidentally died. LOL. Thanks for everything!

Use the Milly Ashford icon for LJ, btw.


STEP 3: I have a pair of black pants with a black pinstripe shirt...lined coat...thingy. I'll wear those with black socks and my Rockports. You know how they did the makeup for the bodies in Departures and how they looked so subtly beautiful and alive? I want that. Yes. That. Tell my parents that. Give them pictures if necessary. I mean it. If I wanted to look like a clown, I'd cosplay more often. Monty Python's "Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life" is rather overdone, but if everyone sings along to it then by all means play it.


STEP 3.5: Take pictures with me. Put it on *MY* Facebook. Name album "My Funeral".


STEP 4: I am confident I will have RM12k to turn my ashes into diamonds. Algordanza is located in North Point, Mid Valley City. Make a nice pair of earrings. The rest of the ashes will be divided and given to whoever else wants them. As usual, my parents and the 4 executors get first dibs.


THE END!


Now I can't say I'm not marginally prepared!

If you're a fan of Joe Hisaishi or you REALLY REALLY loved the music in Departures and you haven't ganked the OST yet...

Here you go.

Five minutes FLAT. It's a new record! \m/.