Sunday, March 25, 2007

The 300

Xerxes: what a tool. My credentials as a historian may not be quite as respectable as David Starkey's (also a tool), but I still feel justified in making that bald, unsupported and general statement. I mean really, if you've got anywhere between 500,000 and 2,000,000 soldiers, why would you send them against 300 soldiers in relatively small waves, with plenty of time in between for the opposition to clean up, have an apple and take a wee snooze? No, you'd send them *all at once* and then all they'd have to do is squash the Spartans.

Anyway, I'm glad Xerxes was a tool, because the Spartans rocked, and deserved to take out around 50,000 Persian soldiers in 2 days with only 300 soldiers with spears, swords and shields - wooo! Gooooooooooo Spartans!

The film itself was fantastic - beautiful cinematography and easily identifiable as having been inspired by a graphic novel. At first I wasn't sure whether I'd enjoy it, as it did seem like it was going to be a little bit OTT, but I was wrong, very wrong. Any qualms I had were squashed when the 300 soldiers appeared over the brow of a hill, wearing nothing more than a pair of pants, boots and a cloak each - I felt like Columbus, laying eyes upon a beautiful New World for the first time...I felt like applauding. Six-packs like those take dedication - 300 beautiful six-packs, that's 1800 abdominal muscles, carved and cut to perfection...

Anyway, that is obviously not what the film is about (shame ;p). Don't be fooled by the monsters in Xerxes's army - the descriptions were taken from actual descriptions of the battle, the monsters aren't added for fun. However, this doesn't mean that the rest of the information about the battle is unreliable - historians and archeologists have uncovered the remains from the battle and proved that there were indeed only around 300 spartan soldiers, and anything from 500,000 Persians upwards, so it is an epic story.

It was beautiful to look at, enjoyable to watch and left me with a lasting interest in the Spartans and the battle which inspired the film. I've even got a book and everything (my dad would be so proud), which Paul got me after the following conversation:

Paul: I'm in Waterstones trying to get you that book about the Spartans, there's one here about the Persians though, the same battle.
Me: But I don't like the Persians
Paul:......well....it's the same battle though, it ends the same
Me:But....Xerxes was a tool
Paul: Yes. Xerxes was a tool. He loses in this book as well, though.
Me: Well.....so long as he loses, I guess that's ok
Paul: Yeah. He loses.
Me: Cos he was a tool.
Paul: Yes, honey, he was a tool. Shhhhhhhh.........

Go watch the film. Because Xerxes was a tool :)

Monday, March 19, 2007

Cellulitis: as icky as it sounds

Soooooo, on Friday morning I woke up at 6am, and went....."Owwww - my leg hurts", but there wasn't anything to see, so I took some Ibuprofen and zonked out again until noon. At noon, I woke up and went "Shit! I was supposed to meet Kal to try out Buddhist meditation!" (which seemingly wasn't that much of a loss for me) , closely followed by "owwwww, my leg hurts still". This time, there was a little something to see - just a little red welt about the size of 2 thumbs together, but very hot and very sore.

Anyway, it was an interesting day: I went to meet Kal and we looked around the Pixar exhibition, which was excellent. Go there, find the xoetrope, which is a fabulous spinning thing (which is waaaaaay too complicated for me to understand, let alone explain) and watch it at least twice, preferably three times - twice to go "WOW! How the hell.....?" and once to look at the expressions on the faces of everyone else as they go "Wooooooaah! How the hell......?", which is good fun :)

We had yummy sandwiches, naughty flapjacks, saw the exhibition, and then went back to Kal's for a bit. By this time, I felt officially like crap - I was thinking "oh, lord, what luck: I've probably got DVT (Deep Vein Thrombosis) and will die, *and* I've got the flu. Harsh. So we went to Kal's: he played videogames, I watched Peepshow and drank vast quanities of tea, occasionally going "Owwww", *goan*, *whimper* and generally was quite pathetic. I didn't want to go home, because Paul, the husband, was supposed to be away for the weekend, and fearing a gruesome death or, worse, having no-one to make me tea, I was not keen to go anywhere, but all good things must come to an end, so I headed home about 6pm. Fortunately for me, Paul wasn't able to go away, which just worked out dandy in the end, but did kind of involve him being defrauded out of £100, so I am *pretty* selfish for thinking that's good (don't worry, he got it back - I'll tell you about it another time). As the evening wore on, my shin got bigger...and bigger..... and bigger and began stabbing me and throbbing, so about 9.15pm I gave in and rang NHS24 for advice. They were, eventually, and against all the odds, very helpful and got me an appointment within 45 minutes at the out of hours, drop-in centre at the hospital... but only after *this* conversation:

Me: Hi, yeah, my shin is really sore and swollen - very angry and painful
Nurse: Ok, has anything happened (etc etc, fill this bit in yourself)
Me: No, I just woke up this morning and it was sore, and it's just been getting worse all day
Nurse: Right, does your foot hurt all the time, or just when you move it?
Me: Well, it's my shin that hurts, but yes it hurts more when I move in general
Nurse: Ok, so the foot has been sore since 6, and is just getting more swollen?
Me: No.... no, my *shin* is swollen and sore, sore at 6am, now very swollen and red and sore
Nurse: So it's not your foot?
Me: No. It has nothing to do with my foot. It's my shin.....
... and so on and so on, until the message sunk in.

So, I jumped in a taxi (for jumped read; limped, was half carried, stumbled and lurched, with many exclamations of pain and distress) and was at the hosital for 10.20, with my appointment due in 10 minutes. But.... they saw me straight away, I saw a lovely, friendly "practitioner" (what does this mean?) who diagnosed cellulitis straight away, gave me useful information and free medication and sent me on my way. We were back in the taxi by 10.30 and on our way home, with the advice that should the swelling progress above the line on my leg (which the practitioner drew in biro) or if my fever got worse, my glands were to swell, or I began vomiting, then it was straight back to hospital for me for IV antibiotics.

So long LONG story short, Saturday was awful. I felt like crap, was running a sweaty, smelly temperature, looked like a zombie, couldn't stand or walk alone, had to be taken to the loo by paul, didn't want to eat, and was regularly in so much pain that I was crying like a wee girl. Sucks. To. Be. Me. I wanted to go to hospital, except that the thought of trying to get dressed, get downstairs, get bumped around in a taxi and actually try to *tell* someone what was wrong was just not on, so I stayed home, and I'm glad, because by Sunday things were much improved. I could hold a conversation, watch telly, read and, get this... go to the loo alone! How much do I rock!

Today finds me still largely incapacitated - I can hobble about without Paul (which is good since he's at work!), I've eaten, and my temperature is much more regular, even though I have a nastily insipid cough that stops me from breathing deeply. My leg looks *revolting*, I wont bore you with the details, or even a close-up picture :p

But in spite of the ickyness and the pain and all the rest of it, there have been a few shiny, comedic moments:

The discovery that if I wear fluffy socks Paul can push me around the house like a trolly instead of having to carry me, and it is *damned* hard to steer with only one foot on the ground.

The classic moment last night when Paul, after a long day of helpfulness, went to fetch my laptop so I could email uni, and dropped the battery pack for the laptop directly on my sore shin, resulting in a few minutes of near-hysterical tears of pain and shock, closely followed by a few minutes of actually hysterical tears of laughter as he desperately apologised. Bless him :)

So, here's hoping that soon, very soon, I will be able to get the FUCK off this sofa and do something. Anything!

Thursday, March 15, 2007

The Number 23

I went to see The Number 23 today with my lovely friend Kal and I must say, it was absolutely spine chilling. Call me suggestible, call me impressionable, call me credulous and I'll call you a cynic but I'm sorry, there's something just.......wrong about that number:

"Oh, oh my God! Look at the date - it's the 15th of March, 2007! 15.3.07....15 plus 3.....18. Add 7......25.....erm......25....that's 2+5, so that's 7, take that away again, which is 18 again, but 1+8 is 9 and 18 add 9 is 27 and then multiply that by 5, which is the number of letters in the word "MARCH", which is....135. Now, 13+5, that's 18 again.....*shit*.... No! Wait! 18 + 5 (which we already established was the number of letters in the word "March") is 23!! OH MY GOD!!! It all fits......."

Spooky.

Tuesday, March 13, 2007

Teaching Reading Comprehension

This (see above) is what I am supposed to be giving a presentation on at uni on Thursday morning. Oh Lord. As you can probably tell, by the fact that I'm here rather than working on my presentation, I am not exactly filled with excitement and joy at this prospect. "Clueless" would be one way to describe me on this subject. Another way would be "hopeless". Without hope, even. So, given that I am "without hope", you'd think it'd be a good idea to be working my butt off to try and get on top of this task......

You'd be wrong. The best thing to do is ignore it and hope it goes away, somewhat like a big spider, or a monster. Perhaps if I stick my fingers in my ears and go "lalalalalalalalalalaaaaaaa" with my eyes closed, when I re-open them it will be Friday, the presentation will be over and I will have blown everyone away with my perspicacity. What does that mean...? I dunno. But it sounds good - an ideal example of obfuscation ;p (look it up).

So, in a pretty flawless example of how to procrastinate (and use long words so that updating your blog takes even longer, another good way of procrastinating) here is a link to the funniest thing I've seen all week (if anyone knows how to embed video links and could tell me, that'd be great):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zvul3DC4l4E

Now back to my presentation....... Lalalalalalalalalalalalalalaaa..........aaaargh!
Go away big, scary, spider-monster!

Sunday, March 11, 2007

A period of inactivity

Following my recent and sustained period of blogging inactivity, I've decided to start writing more regularly because now, ladies and gents......I've been matched for a fight! This means that although I will have plenty to talk about, it will probably all be about bruises, weight, more bruises and my all consuming fear.

Being matched for a fight is an interesting process because there are alot of factors which need to be taken into consideration and which can throw you off course.

Weight, for one. You have to be the same weight as your opponent, so you agree a fighting weight before-hand and then both do whatever you have to do to make sure you're that weight on the day. Now, on the 1st of January I weighed 73.7kgs (which is 11 stone 8.2 for those of you still on imperial, like me), and I'm fighting on the 27th May at 63kg, (which is 9 stone 12.6). Now, whichever way you look at it, that is alot of weight to lose. ALOT.
So this is Issue number one: Being the right weight. If you are not this, you will probably not fight. Today, inexplicably I am 10 stone 8, even though on Friday I was 10 stone 5. Bastards.

Assuming, then, that you're doing OK on the soul-crushing calorie-controlled diet, there's no guarantee that your opponent is as well...

Issue number 2: Pull-outs
Pull-outs happen all the time especially, for some reason, in female fights. I've been matched once before and she pulled out, apparently due to weight, and my friend Ann has now been matched 3 times for the same fight, which has failed to happen twice for various reasons, so there's no point getting too excited until a bit nearer the time.

Of course, not getting excited doesn't mean not training like a crazy-lady, you have to do that anyway, but that's another thing which can go wrong...

Issue number 3: Injury
I get injured alot. Often, even. With monotonous regularity. All over. I've only had to miss training twice because of injury, and only because I physically couldn't train, but nevertheless, a broken hand or foot, a dyslocation, something along those lines would be bad news. So far I've torn the ligaments in my ankle twice, hyperextended my elbow, trapped a nerve in my back, had a sacro-illiac strain and broken a toe, and haven't even fought yet. Also, I bruise like a peach. So much so that I look more like I enjoy baiting Neds on a Friday night before helpfully handing them a baseball bat each than that I practice martial arts in a safe, controlled, consenting environment.

Last, but certainly not least:

Issue number 4: Getting the screaming heebie-jeebies.
This is not a medical term. I've never fought before, so whilst I *think* I want to, I don't *know* that yet, never having done it. Most of the time I'm like "Yeah, bitch, bring it on!" and other, not very Edinburgh-sounding phrases. However, occasionally I get an utter pasting at sparring class, can't lie on my side for a week because of poorly placed bruises and I do wonder to myself if it's really such a good idea. Yesterday being a prime example of this "utter pasting" I mentioned above. I graduated up to the Fighters Class for the first time yesterday (this, as the name suggests is a sparring class for people who are fighting soon, so it's harder work, harder contact, harder in general) and whilst I was pretty apprehensive and pretty much expecting to take a beating, I did somewhat under-estimate the situation. Think "baptism of fire", think going with the chief instructor's incredible brilliant wife for the first round and having her go heavy so they can see what happens.

Well, this is absolutely fair enough, and I'm glad to say I reacted like any hard-as-nails female Thai boxer should....

....that's a complete lie. I cried like a girl.

Nevertheless, I'm glad I went, and I'm glad they did that, because you've got to learn sometime. Nobody had ever hit me that hard before, and it hurt like a motherfucker, and I've got bruises (little ones) on my face and bruises (giant ones) all over my legs and hips, but I'd much rather I got used to that in the privacy of the gym rather than got completely taken my surprise for the first time in the ring and made a total arse out of myself.

At the very least, by May 27th I'll be able to take a punch, even if I do look like Rocky.