Rosberg rulez ok

In the handful of races so far this season Mercedes have been seen to qualify well only for their race pace to drop off during the Grand Prix. Monaco, with it's tight, twisty circuit that's notoriously difficult to overtake on, provided the team with a chance to score their first win of 2013. At least, this was my prediction. Just call me Nostradamus.




Pole sitter, Nico Rosberg, controlled the race perfectly from start to finish and it was only the intervention of a safety car period, one of two, that ruined team mate, Lewis Hamilton's, chances of a 1-2 finish. In the end, the remaining podium positions were claimed by the Red Bull drivers, Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber, who finished 2nd and 3rd respectively.




The chances of Mercedes winning another Grand Prix this season is fairly slim. With the exception of the Singapore GP, the rest of the races will be held on traditional circuits with plenty of overtaking opportunities and run off areas thereby negating Mercedes' advantage from qualifying. That said, however, I would personally like to see either Nico or Lewis on the top step on the podium again. Next stop... Canada.




Footnote: Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikonen turned up for the race with inappropriate helmets. One driver was allowed to wear his. Can you guess which one?

Day 201: Conversations and role play

It has been a couple of months since a last posted anything about my trips to the psychologist. Mostly because I felt that there wasn't any real progress and partly because I was feeling a little guilty for not doing my homework. By homework, I mean the mood chart. I was to choose an emotion (anxiety, stress, etc) and for each hour of the day, mark out of ten, how I felt, 1 being not depressed, 10 bordering on suicidal. For some reason I just couldn't bring myself to complete even one day of the chart, let alone one week.

The lack of progress centred around the fact that all our conversations appeared very one way, with my psychologist asking relatively short questions followed by me giving long, detailed answers. Quite often I would reach what I thought was the end of my answer only to find my psychologist looking at me expectantly, waiting to see what else I have to say.




It's quite an unusual position to find myself in considering that most people I talk to have always got something to say. Having someone actually listen to me without them thinking about what they're going to say next isn't something that happens every day. For me it occurs for one hour, once a week, excluding bank holidays, sickness and acts of God.

Speaking of acting, the point of this post was to reveal how something different had happened during our most recent session together. We did some role play. The purpose of this was to put me in a situation where I might find myself getting angry. It worked quite well in that even though I didn't lose my temper, I did begin to feel uncomfortable. My psychologist had asked me to let her know if I started getting worked up during the exercise. I guess she didn't want me losing my rag and trashing her office. Can't say I blame her, I wouldn't be too keen either.

Towel day

Have you got your own towel? That's all your going to need on the 25th of May because it's Towel Day! You may not have heard of it, I only learned about it earlier this year but have decided to get actively involved.




What is Towel Day, you may ask yourself? Well, allow me to explain as best I can. Many years ago the late, great Douglas Adams wrote The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy. It started as a radio play before going to print, then it became a popular TV series and recently made it onto the silver screen. In essence, the story follows Arthur Dent's misadventures around the galaxy after the Earth is demolished (for reasons that would take too long to explain here).




One of the supporting characters, while being quite unsupportive and insensitive to poor Arthur's plight, is Ford Prefect, a writer for The Guide, and it is he that introduces Arthur to the requirement of the intergalactic Hitchhiker; always carry a towel (again, the reasons are many so you'll have to read it for yourself, something I suggest all free thinking sentient lifeforms do at least once in their lifetimes).




Anyway, at some point somebody or somebodies decided to honour Mr Adams by starting Towel Day and since then many of his fans have carried a towel around with them for one day of the year. If you're a fan of the radio/book/TV series or film then please join me on the 25th of May and carry your towel with pride.

http://www.towelday.org/

I'd like to report a murder

I've always thought this was an odd turn of phrase. I'm sure nobody really "likes" to report a murder, or any crime, come to think if it. But anyway, I'm already getting off the subject and I haven't even begun yet.

What I'd like to talk about is venery. You may not have heard the word* but I'm sure you've heard its use. I am referring to collective nouns. For example, a "flock" of birds or a "pride" of lions. These are fairly common so we don't really think about them very much but I was searching online for confirmation of a term I'd heard many years ago, a "murder" of crows.




I was pleased to find it was correct. However, I came across a number of other terms I'd never heard before, some of which had me laughing at the mental image that accompanied them. For your pleasure, I'd like to share a number of them here. Enjoy.

A parcel of birds
A blush of boys
A rabble of butterflies
A drunkenship of cobblers
A hastiness of cooks
A kettle of hawks
A siege of herons
An observance of hermits
A smack of jellyfish
A cartload of monkeys
A scourge of mosquitoes
A superfluity of nuns
A parliament of owls
A bouquet of pheasants
A poverty of pipers
An unkindness of ravens
A rout of snails
A clutter of spiders
An ambush of tigers
A gang of turkeys


*Bird is the word.

Good deeds

I have something to say that I find hard to put into words but it's important so I'm going to try. And I'm deliberately leaving it vague because it's not my place to name names, etc.

As I'm currently suffering from depression I know the value of an arm around the shoulder, a comforting word or a friendly smile. The other day it was my turn to offer those same things to someone that looked like s/he needed it. We were at a toddler group and during the singing/dancing part of the session s/he came and sat at the back, away from the noise. A few minutes later s/he was approached by a helper regarding his/her child's unruly behaviour but s/he remained where s/he sat until the music was over.
Then came time for the children and their parents/carers to have some refreshments and play with the toys provided by the group. It was here that I witnessed for myself his/her child misbehaving and his/her own reluctance to intervene, instead relying on other parents/carers to step in and take action when necessary.

By this time just about every parent/carer was making the same judgement about him/her that you yourself must be coming to as s/he was on the receiving end of many disapproving looks. Which is a shame because they didn't have all the facts. They took the situation at face value as most of us do, myself included. However, on this occasion I had one piece of information that explained, in part at least, his/her reluctance to enter the fray.

When s/he had first removed him/herself from the first part of the session s/he had told another helper and myself the reason for doing so. S/he has Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. What caused this, I didn't ask. So when I saw him/her sitting away from the noise (and let's be honest here, children make a lot of noise) I took the time to see if s/he was ok. And when I could see that his/her child was becoming boisterous again I gave him/her a nudge and offered to go with him/her into the thick of it. S/he was able to cope a little better with someone beside him/her, someone who had reached out a helping hand when she to needed it. True, his/her child still acted up a little but with both of us there to step in, at least the other parents/carers didn't have to worry about their own children being hurt or upset by his/her child's actions. I didn't see them leave or get a chance to say goodbye but I hope the experience hasn't put him/her off from coming again.

If there's a moral to the tale I'm sure you can work it out for yourself.

Actually, if there's a moral to this tale then you have my mother to thank for teaching me that it's up to those that can to stand/speak up for those that can't.

The wrong signals

I was letting my mind wander recently and it occurred to me how easily people misunderstand each other. For example, many words in the English language have more than one meaning, or simply mishearing what has been said can cause confusion. Mispronouncing a word or phrase in a foreign language is easily done because it isn't the speakers mother tongue. This can create situations where two people have real difficulty understanding one another.

Now imagine being unable to hear anything at all. Deaf people use sign language to communicate but how often do they misread what everyone else is saying as we gesticulate with our hands. Some signs speak for themselves, such as hello and book.

 

But what happens when someone makes a sign without realising what they're doing, such as wiping something from the side of their mouth?

Or rubbing their nose?

This got me thinking, how often do we make signs that can be read in an entirely different way by deaf people? And what are we unintentionally saying? Personally, I have fun imagining that hundreds of metal fans, all making the horned fist, are mistakenly signing the word for reindeer or something equally inappropriate to the situation.

Well, it makes me laugh. Ho ho ho.