#13 UNLUCKY FOR SOME

THERE WILL BE BLOOD                                            (WARNING:  18 certificate)

Why are people afraid of blood? It's the stuff of life, and we are lost without it. Presumably it's because of the association with harm, injury and death, or major operations, for we only see it in any quantity in those scenarios. Perhaps quantity is the key: generally people are not too bothered by the sight of a paper-cut, a nosebleed or a blood test – except that many look away when it is being done. Needlephobia may be something different, though. I’ve had a lot of blood-tests in the last few years so they are very routine for me, but I always look at other patients in the room and it is clear that some of them are highly anxious. The truth of the matter is that blood tests are seldom painful; but there is a truth within that truth, which is that they are much more likely to be painful in your GP surgery than the blood test department of a hospital. No offence to GP Practice nurses who may be very experienced, but the fact is that they will do a few a day at the very most. The blood test department does hundreds every day and they simply have a higher level of skill. At the two extremes, I had a blood test at the Royal Free where I was genuinely unsure whether the needle had actually gone in or not – all I had felt was something like an itch.  On my next visit to the GP a practice nurse just couldn’t find a blood vessel in my arm to hit, with the result that what should take 3 minutes took 15 and left an arm that looked like a junkie’s.

Blood in quantity, blood flowing, blood from serious and clearly painful injury are a different matter, I think. This is much more likely to be traumatic and the reaction of recoil and disgust tap into some really primeval emotions and instinctive patterns of behaviour which are very persuasive and hard to resist. Flight, that is, leaving the scene, is one of them. There is a whole field of Social Psychology known as ‘bystander intervention’ or 'bystander apathy' which looks at the factors which influence whether people help or ‘look the other way’ in emergency situations. Broadly this suggests that there are more factors which inhibit helping behaviour than encourage it – though of course many people will overcome these constraints and offer help.

Sometimes you can’t, because you are prevented from doing so. When I was 9 we went to North Wales on holiday. On the A5 beyond Shrewsbury we encountered a slow-moving tailback which after a couple of miles passed a serious accident: a truck had hit a minibus head-on. It was absolute carnage with several badly injured or dead people lying on the ground. My father told us not to look, but I did. He was right: it was an indelible image. It was raw because the paramedics had not yet arrived, though the police had and were waving traffic past as quickly as possible. Theoretically my father could have helped, having some medical knowledge, but he wasn’t allowed to do so by the police, just waved on. Looking back on it, in his shoes I would have been inclined to offer help, and been privately relieved not to have to. It was an absolute horror show and you wouldn’t have a clue where to start (not having the necessary knowledge or skills is one of the biggest inhibitors of helping behaviour).

Three years later, one afternoon in the summer holidays, I went to Grovelands Park, Southgate, with some mates from school. We wanted to have a couple of rounds of pitch and putt. Two guys, in their 20s, got to the office just before us and so they went off first. It was about 2 in the afternoon, and it looked like they may have spent some time in the pub first. One of them set up his ball on the tee, had done a few practice swings. The other was standing diagonally behind him at what he thought was a safe distance. The first one brought his club back, brought it down and smacked the ball very hard, and on the follow through with the club over his shoulder, hit his friend full in the mouth with the club head. The guy grabbed his face, screamed with pain and instantly poured blood and spat out teeth, then fell over backwards. There was actually very little we could do – so we just looked after him and tried to comfort him while his mate went to call for an ambulance. It occurs to me now, although this was not a fatal injury, how many lives have been saved by the advent of the mobile phone? 
I was involved in a further emergency situation much more recently, one that involved a scenario which would be everybody’s nightmare. I had finished lecturing for the day and made my way to the Bakerloo Line northbound platform at Oxford Circus tube station. I was reading the Standard, minding my own business, as they say, when the train came in. If you are of a squeamish disposition it would be better to stop reading this point. I was trying to finish what I was reading as the train was slowing to a halt, but I became aware of a disturbance of the crowd on the platform, the sound of gasps, whimpers, low-level screams and of people drawing back from the platform edge, the crowd parting to reveal that the train was a dragging a man along the platform, with one leg caught underneath it. That was bad enough, but as the train stopped the man was able to pull himself away, further onto the platform, and revealed the really horrendous sight of a bloody leg which had been severed a few inches below the knee. It looked just like a leg of lamb in a butcher’s window, only with shattered bones not neatly cut ones.

At this point there was some hysteria. A lot of people left the scene as quickly as they could, in fact most people did that. I couldn’t, for two reasons (or I probably would have, the situation was so overwhelmingly difficult and horrible).   Firstly, with supreme irony, I had just been lecturing to my second year students on Bystander Intervention in emergencies – or lack of it. Secondly. The train had not just dumped him on the platform, it had dumped him literally at my feet; I was by far the nearest person to him. It was almost as though God, to punish me for my years of atheism, had said “Right mate, you tell your students what they should do in emergencies, let’s see what you do, so sort it out! Yes you”

What to do? Haven’t a f*cking clue. Panic and freeze. Get the idea of using the station intercom to get help. Damn. Someone’s doing it already. Stare, transfixed, at the man’s leg, see he’s still losing a lot of blood, can’t see what I could use as a tourniquet, nor how to get one on him, given his overcoat, trousers etc. Suddenly remember A-level Zoology (so have only waited 40 years for it to come in useful in any way at all) – isn’t there a big ‘femoral artery’ which is fairly near the surface near the groin? Get toe of boot in there fairly hard. Almost as soon as I had, the cavalry arrived, and the paramedics unceremoniously bundled me off the victim and upstairs. They have closed off Oxford St and Regent St to bring down the Virgin Air Ambulance which has paralysed the whole of the West End in the rush hour, so it promptly takes off again without him. Priorities. Ambulance takes him to St. George's (Middlesex Hospital 300m away no longer has A&E...). He survived but lost the rest of that leg. All my subsequent lectures on bystander intervention were rather more vivid and heartfelt than before.

THE SUNDAY MASH

                          (with acknowledgements to our sister publication The Daily Mash)

                                                                                                  

 

Recent  research has shown that some                                               

advertisements may not be true

Others may be a slight exaggeration                                    

Why does this picture remind us of lemmings prepared to throw themselves off a cliff? Nothing to do with that fine little car which has given so many District Nurses sterling service, obviously.

HIGNFY

On Have I Got News for You on Friday night it was reported that, as claimed, David Cameron's Mum had indeed given him a gift of £200,000, but it was important to stress that this was for both Birthday AND Christmas...

FIRST CLASS POSTS

BERNIE IN.....?

What a beautiful image: the throng of people trying to get in to Washington Square Park, which is already packed tight, to hear Bernie Sanders speak; and the glorious colour that the sun gives the buildings as it heads off for the night.

IF GATES HAD SPELLCHECK.....

#12 TWELVE GOOD MEN AND TRUE (seems unlikely, but...)

Twelve just men, twelve angry men, twelve apostles, twelve months in a year, twelve pence in a shilling, twelve days of Christmas, twelve drummers drumming, 12 midnight, 12 noon, baker's dozen, ten to the dozen...The Twelfth of Never

TWELVE GOOD MEN AND TRUE

A jury consists of twelve persons chosen to decide who has the better lawyer. (Robert Frost)

If you had to face a jury trial on a serious charge, who would you want on your jury? These are my twelve good people and true. This is not a top 6, of each gender. It is a list of people who, in addition to being more or less famous, have an extra helping of ‘goodness’ and have used their fame to enhance particular causes, or just through their self-evidently warm and generous personalities, inspired other people to be good. Plus a few words of description for the less well-known; or some of their own.

MUHAMMAD ALI

You lose nothing when fighting for a cause ...

In my mind the losers are those who don't have

a cause they care about.

I am America. I am the part you won't recognize. 
But get used to me. Black, confident, cocky; my name, 
not yours; my religion, not yours; my goals, my own; 
get used to me. 

GEORGE HARRISON

  
 As long as you hate, there will be people to hate.

The nicest thing is to open the newspapers and not find yourself in them.                              

Gossip is the Devil's radio

IAN McKELLEN                                                                         

Every anti-gay remark from the Church gives the thug a license to be cruel.   


Splendid architecture, the love of your life, an old friend...

they can all go drifting by unseen if you're not careful..

GARY MABUTT

  Not just a magnificent player for Tottenham, a true fair-playing sportsman who didn't dive or dissemble, was never sent off, was a dynamo despite his diabetes, stayed loyal to his club, talked to his fans, and continues to give back to the game, as well as being a Tottenham and UN ambassador. Also a tireless worker for Diabetes charities, and an all-round good man: I know, I met him. He was prepared to interrupt a family outing to Paradise Island to chat for 20 minutes to an old Spurs fan.     

I have become a sort of Marjorie Proops of the diabetic world and I used to get kids and their parents writing to me with their problems. The message has always been that no matter what you want to do in life diabetes will not stop you. Do not live your life round diabetes; let it live round you. 

NELSON MANDELA

I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but 

the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does 

not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.

In my country we go to prison first and then 

become President.

There is little to be said about him that has not been said. Despite having more reason than anyone to lead an armed rebellion against White South Africa, having been wrongfully imprisoned for 27 years, instead he had the humanity and wisdom to argue for peace, reconciliation and forgiveness. 

EDDIE IZZARD

He is a brave and tenacious man who goes the distance and is prepared to endure extreme suffering for the benefit of others.

If there is a God, his plan is very similar to someone not having a plan.

There was no religion in my life growing up. Did God invent us or did we invent God?

MARY SEACOLE

A nursing heroine of the Crimean War, rather obscured by the celebrity of Florence Nightingale. Danger, disease, racism, sexism, all were tolerated for the greater goal of helping the dead and dying in appalling conditions over a long period. A true black hero and feminist icon whose humanity and sense of right and wrong would grace any jury.

AUNG SAN SUU KYI

Burmese stateswoman, human rights
activist, detainee, dedicated to bringing
democracy to Myanmar.                                                                                   

It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.

The only real prison is fear, and the only real freedom is freedom from fear.

 ROSA PARKS

                                                                                          

                                      
The spark that lit the Civil Rights movement in the US. She simply decided that she would no longer sit in the back of the bus in Montgomery, Alabama, but sat in the whites-only section, and refused to give up her seat to a white man when asked. The rest is history.
                 
There are many inspiring quotes attributed to her, though probably the most important one was simply the word ‘no’.    






MARTINA NAVRATILOVA                                                                                

  

Professional, tough, principled, ballsy,

articulate, honest, determined, outspoken,

compassionate.

                                                                

 Labels are for filing. Labels are for clothing. Labels are not for people

The difference between involvement and commitment is like ham and eggs. The chicken is involved; the pig is committed.

                                                                               

      

ELLEN DeGENERES

                                                                            

Not entirely sure why I have chosen her: I just have the feeling that she is a warm, empathic, non-judgemental person, who would be fair, responsible and generous. That's enough.

I learned compassion from being discriminated against. 

             People always ask me, 'Were you funny as a child?' Well, no, I was an accountant. 

   

                                                                                                                     JUDI DENCH

Have you ever heard anyone say a bad word about her? Theoretically it is possible, but very unlikely in reality. That is what you want on your jury, good people, honest people, fair people, people who are intelligent and sensitive, emotionally aware enough to empathise with your predicament and put themselves in your place, to imagine what caused you to behave as you did, guilty or innocent. Step up Dame Judi, you have all those qualifications.

The only real failure is the failure to try.

We get up in the morning. We do our best. Nothing else matters.

PANAMARAMA

Panama has probably received more column inches and TV

news minutes in the last week than in the whole 102  years since the Canal was opened, something which delights the residents but has horrified the 'resident' companies and offshore trusts 'based' there. I would like the contract for producing the company nameplates, currently numbering an average of 50 per door/ bus shelter/public toilet. (I made that up, but it may be more).  The Now Show yesterday produced a just and novel solution to the main moral issue posed by these tax-shy corporations, companies and individuals, which I've extended:

If these people don't wish to pay tax in the UK, that's OK but then they should not have access to the public services our taxes provide: health, education, roads and public transport and so on.  Obviously, when seriously ill or on fire, they must call the emergency services in Lichtenstein, Grand Cayman, or Panama City, who will doubtless dispatch an ambulance/fire truck as soon as possible.

As for Cameron's performance this week, the mash up of half-truths, and slow drip-drip of facts does not befit the masterly PR man he has been.   Interesting that 'avoidance' and 'evasion' characterise his regard for the truth as well as his tax affairs. While there is schadenfreudian satisfaction in seeing him squirming and squealing like a stuck pig (he just can't park the pork issue, can he) there is a more serious consequence. The effective leader of the Remain campaign has damaged his own integrity and the campaign with it. Even the best construction placed on his behaviour  - 'poor judgement' - is not something which should be associated with the man espousing the only sane way forward for this country.

STRICTLY CURRENT DANCING                                                                                                         

I owe my sister Jacky a debt of gratitude for inducting me into The Jive. It was a difficult dance: fast, energetic and requiring great co-ordination with your partner – much of the time not in contact with her – so difficult to pull off. We practised endlessly, in the dining room, with the Everlys on the Trixette record player, ("Bye bye love, Bye bye happiness, Hello loneliness, I think I'm a gonna cry-y"); and we got to be good. I remember very clearly a School Dance in which we pretty much cleared the floor (that is, the two or three couples who had dared to brave the anxious hostility of the boys and girls massed on either side of the room) and we blithely twirled until there was actually some grudging applause

OK, so dancing with your older sister is a bit naff, but it enabled me to show off my moves – moves which nobody would have dreamt the skinny little boy from Year 2 would have had up his sleeve. Much more importantly, it avoided the long lonely walk across No Man’s Land from the ranks of the boys to the fortified honeypot of the girls’ side to ask someone to dance (and the much lonelier walk back, empty-handed.)  Girls quickly hiding behind each other or staring fixedly at the ceiling as you approached was an indicator of probable failure. Another was the sight of them jumping on chairs, grabbing their school ties, pulling them round the back of their neck, yanking them upwards and hissing “Kick away the chair, kick away the chair” to their friends. So unnecessarily dramatic, when a polite “piss off you spotty little creep, I’d rather swallow bleach” would have sufficed. Anyway, I enjoyed being good at something in public – I think it was a first – and it went some way to erase the memory of coming 12^th out of 12 – by a distance -  in the previous year’s 440 on Sports Day, and spotting my sister in the crowd suddenly finding an almost invisible aeroplane really interesting, as I crossed the line.

Then came The Twist. Once I’d mastered it I liked it a lot. I think of it as the hula-hoop of dances, wonderfully simple once you had learned it, but maddening to master in the first place. So many limbs going in different directions at the same time, or so it seemed. But very good exercise, warming (see FESS #55:The Night on the Train) and best of all, deeply irritating to one’s parents, who scoffed and chortled at this dance they simple didn’t understand. There was something terribly asymmetric about this. 

They would go off to their dinner dances in fancy dress, she the perfumed princess in ball-gown, he the oleaginous penguin in hi-shine glossy patent shoes (who’d want to copy them?), doing dances which are beyond comic. Have you seen the Quickstep? I agree it’s an accomplishment, but only Cristiano Ronaldo would see a purpose in the mobile Riverdance bit. And then there was that weird faraway look in the eyes they affected as they danced, like 30s movie stars. But they had the nerve to laugh at teenage dances, which used up far less of the world’s Brylcreem and hairspray resources.

Of course there were other dances around which had their brief moment in the sun: the Locomotion, The Shake etc which died away, mostly because they were gimmicky, inherently unattractive, or just stupid. The major sea-change came in around 1964, with a revolutionary new attitude: why bother to have anything to do with your dance partner at all, when it just got so complicated trying to hook up, and it was more fun on your own anyway? That plus the emergence of the Rolling Stones with a lead singer (whose name I forget) whose moves became a template for male dancing, well into the 23^rd century. It wasn’t just the recognisable moves: it was the fact that they somehow gave you permission to do absolutely anything you liked without people thinking you were a knob. Freestyle had arrived and held the floor even unto the present day. That’s not to say that development stopped, that there have not been countless recognisable new styles, and along with the policemen getting younger, your perception of younger people doing different things on the dance floor is a very reliable indicator of ageing.

How did you cope with this evolution? First you joined SEMJI (David Robson’s Society of Elderly Mick Jagger Impersonators), and that allowed you some latitude to be Retro for a few more years. But then (work, kids, mortgages) you simply stop going to places where dancing happens, so you lose all purchase on how to do it in any way that doesn’t make you look as though you should be back at the care home. Feel the anguish: what to do? You are on the horns of a dilemma (though I have to say that even after many years of going to the Burwarton (Agricultural) Show, I have yet to see a horned dilemma plodding round. The choices are starkly simple:

      1) Decide you don’t care, dance the way you always have and look like a dinosaur
     2) Decide you’ll try to dance the way the young people are, and look like a knob

It's a no-win situation; or perhaps a choice of humiliation situation. And you know what, I feel that there’s been more than sufficient humiliation or embarrassment in my life, without bringing it into this situation where you are supposed to be enjoying yourself. The only answer is: don’t dance.

Or maybe there’s an alternative: what I’m thinking is this: have we perhaps reached the point when the kids don’t remember Jagger in his prime, and his early moves because they weren’t alive, so we could revive them without derision? Isn’t it time to dust off the Guards jacket, covered in epaulettes and braid and frogging, sort out the tight jeans with the sewn-in 9 inch length of hosepipe, and take to the floor again, a Terracotta Army of mini-Micks, dancing like they used to, their own Last Waltz, getting satisfaction again?

I fear not quite; maybe it’ll come, but not until the old boy’s pouted his last pout. Meanwhile, until senility intervenes, when you just don’t care any more, here are a few tried and tested excuses to use when you are encouraged to dance but don’t wish to.

I)               I will when there’s a slow one. Massive stage wink; lecherous leer.

II)              I think that’s my phone, excuse me………..”A fire, you say?  I’ll be right there”

III)            Sadly, madam, my dance card is full. Queue over there.

IV)            I have a load of Jerry shrapnel in my legs. Bastards.

V)              Just don’t kick my electronic tag, or the whole place will be crawling with police

VI)            Bitte? Sprachen sie Deutsch?

VII)           If you mean you want to have sex with me, just say so: don’t be shy, now!

Of course, you can’t legislate for when someone is really determined to get you on the floor, yanks your arm and whispers about serious damage to your scrotum if you refuse. You can, however, pretend a faint or a heart attack and pray she’s not a nurse from a transplant team. The broken toes or the well-aimed kick to the varicose vein can also be effective. There is always a way: you don’t have to face the music and dance.

THE GALLERY

very moody shot from the lens of Leah Milner, artist, photographer
and prize winning financial journalist; also meine liebchen#1

Iceland, but a bit short on oven chips and party food 

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SWEET TWEET: "Currently I'm helping my son search for his chocolate, which I ate last night"

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IMAGES OF THE WEEK

BRUVVAFROM ANUVVAMUVVA

According to Joanna Swan these are images of George Osborne and The Childcatcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang - but for the life of me I can't........

What does this mean?

As the Quizmaster General, it never occurred to me set this as a question. Too easy, it was patently an acronym for Impossible Kit to Ever Assemble. But no, apparently not. Our Swedish visitors informed us that this was not the case (and who are we to contradict kosher Swedes?).  It goes like this:

Ingvar

Kamprad   (the founder)

Elmtaryd   (the farm where he was brought up

Agunnaryd (the area of Småland, Southern Sweden)

'Name and address of the founder' would get 1 point, or one for each element. 
So now you know where to write with complaints about your flat-packs. Alternatively, 
you could just write to The Richest Person in Europe (according to Bloomberg).