So many possibilities, probably only one outcome…

Now that I’ve got my book review-cum-obsessive waffle out the way, here’s a ‘proper’ blog post. If there is such a thing. And yet again, it’s been longer than intended since my last one. I really want to be a regular blogger, truly I do. It seems like it would be fun. Problem is, my life just isn’t interesting enough. What would my posts be filled with? Ranting about how poorly I feel, how much doctors annoy me, how much people in general annoy me. And that would get tiresome after a while, tiresome to read and probably even tiresome to write (considering I’d be writing much the same thing, constantly).

So, that leaves me two choices. Persevere, or give up. The latter is probably the best option. But, as quite often is the case for me, I’m not going to  take it. I’m going to persevere, either in hope of finding more interesting things to write about, or no longer caring whether or not there’s even the slightest bit of interesting content and just doing it. Again, probably the latter.

We’ll see how it goes. The case will more than likely prove to be that I never write here again, or at least not for a few months, and then I’ll come on and write all this again.

So until then, I suppose I shall bid you…adieu.

Obsessed, me?

What immediately springs to mind when you think of Stephen King? Horror, in some form or other, I’m guessing. Maybe the creepy-as-shit clown in It or vengeful psychic Carrie. Certainly it was that sort of terror that first came to me, and, being the terrible squeamish wimp I am, resolved that I would never touch Stephen King, not with a hundred foot barge pole.

I realise now I was missing out. There is so much more to King’s repertoire than chills and screams. Perhaps his greatest work –certainly in my mind it is – is The Dark Tower series, an epic tale of the struggle to save reality itself – alongside deep questions of what reality is that you’ll be left pondering for weeks to come.

I struggle to define what The Dark Tower is exactly; what genre does it fit into? Fantasy, perhaps; there’s plenty of magic and sorcery and evil creatures that aren’t quite human. Sci-fi maybe; multiple worlds, metaphysical questions about the nature of reality. Horror? There are certainly aspects of it (the Doorkeeper from The Wastelands possibly my favourite example of horror in TDT). Arguments could even be made for western. And yet it doesn’t quite fit into any of these categories. It’s something so unique, so totally different to anything else, that it almost creates and fits into a genre entirely of its own.

I can’t pontificate and gush enough about the merits of these books. I can’t summarise them for you; they are beyond summary. I can’t explain them; they’re beyond explanation. Read them. If you’re not hooked after the first one (it had me wriggling on the end of the ling after the first sentence!) then…I don’t know, I can’t imagine that happening enough to think of what would happen then. The Dark Tower is waiting for you, go to it.

The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

Well that didn't last long...

So much for keeping up the blogging eh. I'd say I'm going to try to blog more, but we all know I won't stick to it, so I'll keep schtum. Late nights (4:32 am, no sleep as of yet) leave me wanting to share thoughts, so we've all got something to be annoyed at late nights for eh?

A comment first on the NHS: how can it's staff be so different?! Early Sunday morning, for long-winded reasons, an ambulance was called for me, and oh the paramedics! Not exactly the cheeky but compassionate people you see on Casualty. The bloke went snooping round the flat, looking at my boyfriend's uni timetable, not showing a great deal of interest in the patient, while his colleague treated me like I was a nuisance! Not one nice word of reassurance did she give me, simply an air of "Fine, let's get you to the hospital so we can get rid of you." It was a nasty feeling, and didn't exactly make me feel any better considering the amount of pain I was in.

But this stands in starkest contrast to the staff at the hospital, the majority of which were lovely. The nurses and doctor I saw in A&E were kind, considerate and seemed to actually want to help me, even if they were rather clueless about what was wrong with me (a doctor I saw late in the observation ward even had to go and ask the nurses what ME was!). Clueless, but they had plenty of pain relief to give me, and at least acted as though they cared.

I suppose some understanding can be had for the paramedics; it was early Sunday morning (around 6), so they'd probably had hours of drunkenness and hudlums and time-wasters. But in their attitude I found a distinct lack of professionalism; surely as someone dealing with the sick, ill and injured, a caring nature is part of the job?