Tuesday, February 20, 2007
You Tube has become a stage for world to display their most creative hidden talents. BockandChewy is a You Tuber who does just that. This member has an extensive collection of homemade videos displaying the fictional antics of the Californian rock band AFI, in the forms of paper puppets.
Hunter’s Revenge on Jade, is the latest of BockandChewy’s creations. Hunter Revenge is the name of Hunter’s (AFI’s bassist) side project. This piece tells the story of Hunter discovering from two of his band mates, that Jade their guitarist is having a dinner party and he wasn’t invited. Hunter sees red and sets out to get his revenge on Jade.
This short piece, like BockandChewy’s other films, to AFI fans, is extremely funny, with the way it plays on the personalities of the band members, and makes fun out of real life events and stories. To those who haven’t heard of AFI or aren’t to familiar with their music, this piece may be mildly amusing, but it’s more than likely you just wouldn’t ‘get it’.
Friday, February 16, 2007
Friday, February 9, 2007
Let's all jump on the "We hate the NHS" Bandwagon!
We see it on TV, we read about it in the papers, we hear people talking about it on the bus, and we ourselves can’t deny having moaned about it at some point in our lives.
The NHS is quite possibly the nations favourite subject to moan about.
All right, so it’s fair to say there is a bed shortage in hospitals, we know this and the hospitals admit this. Although it has been suggested the NHS are using the excuse of a Flu epidemic to explain the shortage in hospital beds. It’s constantly in the news and if you haven’t been affected by it, then chances are someone you know will have been. I am pleased to say I have never had the misfortune of being admitted to hospital; therefore I have never experienced the problems with bed shortages first hand.
The second point I’d like to raise is the so-called nursing staff shortage in our hospitals. It’s being talked about constantly, and seems to be a real problem. But an article from the BBC says the NHS has employed 40,000 new nurses since 1997. So why is there still a shortage. I think it’s exactly the same reason there aren’t enough beds. There isn’t enough money to pay nurses.
I have a friend from the Cheque Republic who moved to England a fully trained nurse. But she can’t get any work over here, because there are no vacancies for nurses in Hospitals at the moment. She is now working in a restaurant and improving her English. But it seems sad that someone with the right training cannot get a job in their field, especially when it seems to be a field where there is an alarming shortage.
Hospital hygiene might be what the population complains about the most. Five years ago when my Nan went into hospital for an operation on her arm, I remember being disgusted at the state of the ward she was staying on. There was a bloodstain on the bed sheets, and everything was grubby. I have, of course visited people in hospitals since then. Most recently last October in the very same hospital, and conditions had improved dramatically. Figures released by the department of health say that 60% of hospitals had good levels of hygiene. It would be better is it was nearer to 100% it is a hospital. But it is an improvement on the 44% in 2001. So what is everyone still moaning about?
Many people complain about the level of care they receive from nursing staff during their stay. When I went to college I caught the same bus as the one that went to the hospital as it was next door to the college. I lost count of the amount of times I sat behind a couple of elderly women who were moaning about the poor care they experienced when they were last in hospital. But a recent survey by the Healthcare Commission revealed that 92% of patients were happy with the care they received. But I think more than 8% of patients are still moaning about it. Are people just jumping on the bandwagon? Have these people who moan at the bus stop even been admitted to hospital in the last year?
My sister has been in and out of hospital all her life. Along with this I have paid many hospital visits. Not once have I found anything to complain about. A lot of the time my mum has been left to do her general medication, but she does that at home anyway. Four months ago my sister was once again admitted. During this time her condition deteriorated and a few weeks before Christmas things were at an all time low. As you can imagine it was a hard time for the whole family. But the people who made it easier were the nursing staff. They took over full care and for once let my Mum be a Mother not a carer. This took so much strain off the family and it was still an upsetting time, but the support we received was well above my expectations.
As far as standards of care go in hospitals, I think our nursing staff is constantly improving and people who complain have quite obviously never been in a situation where high levels of care and support are needed. At a time when a family needed support the most, the staff at Evelina Children’s hospital at St. Thomas’s was exceptional.
The general public of Britain need to get off their high horse and start taking note of the positive things, and stop searching for the negatives. Because walking into any NHS hospital these days, you will have to look very hard to find something to complain about.
The NHS is quite possibly the nations favourite subject to moan about.
All right, so it’s fair to say there is a bed shortage in hospitals, we know this and the hospitals admit this. Although it has been suggested the NHS are using the excuse of a Flu epidemic to explain the shortage in hospital beds. It’s constantly in the news and if you haven’t been affected by it, then chances are someone you know will have been. I am pleased to say I have never had the misfortune of being admitted to hospital; therefore I have never experienced the problems with bed shortages first hand.
The second point I’d like to raise is the so-called nursing staff shortage in our hospitals. It’s being talked about constantly, and seems to be a real problem. But an article from the BBC says the NHS has employed 40,000 new nurses since 1997. So why is there still a shortage. I think it’s exactly the same reason there aren’t enough beds. There isn’t enough money to pay nurses.
I have a friend from the Cheque Republic who moved to England a fully trained nurse. But she can’t get any work over here, because there are no vacancies for nurses in Hospitals at the moment. She is now working in a restaurant and improving her English. But it seems sad that someone with the right training cannot get a job in their field, especially when it seems to be a field where there is an alarming shortage.
Hospital hygiene might be what the population complains about the most. Five years ago when my Nan went into hospital for an operation on her arm, I remember being disgusted at the state of the ward she was staying on. There was a bloodstain on the bed sheets, and everything was grubby. I have, of course visited people in hospitals since then. Most recently last October in the very same hospital, and conditions had improved dramatically. Figures released by the department of health say that 60% of hospitals had good levels of hygiene. It would be better is it was nearer to 100% it is a hospital. But it is an improvement on the 44% in 2001. So what is everyone still moaning about?
Many people complain about the level of care they receive from nursing staff during their stay. When I went to college I caught the same bus as the one that went to the hospital as it was next door to the college. I lost count of the amount of times I sat behind a couple of elderly women who were moaning about the poor care they experienced when they were last in hospital. But a recent survey by the Healthcare Commission revealed that 92% of patients were happy with the care they received. But I think more than 8% of patients are still moaning about it. Are people just jumping on the bandwagon? Have these people who moan at the bus stop even been admitted to hospital in the last year?
My sister has been in and out of hospital all her life. Along with this I have paid many hospital visits. Not once have I found anything to complain about. A lot of the time my mum has been left to do her general medication, but she does that at home anyway. Four months ago my sister was once again admitted. During this time her condition deteriorated and a few weeks before Christmas things were at an all time low. As you can imagine it was a hard time for the whole family. But the people who made it easier were the nursing staff. They took over full care and for once let my Mum be a Mother not a carer. This took so much strain off the family and it was still an upsetting time, but the support we received was well above my expectations.
As far as standards of care go in hospitals, I think our nursing staff is constantly improving and people who complain have quite obviously never been in a situation where high levels of care and support are needed. At a time when a family needed support the most, the staff at Evelina Children’s hospital at St. Thomas’s was exceptional.
The general public of Britain need to get off their high horse and start taking note of the positive things, and stop searching for the negatives. Because walking into any NHS hospital these days, you will have to look very hard to find something to complain about.
Monday, February 5, 2007
Back to Iraq - Dispatches from the Middle East
Back to Iraq is a blog created by Christopher Allbritton, a former AP and New York Daily News reporter. He created this blog to raise funds so he go to Iraq and write reports independently. He became the webs first fully reader-funded journalist blogger.
Christopher Allbritton uses the blog to post reports from Iraq, which not only account the news, but also his experience out there.
I think the posts on this blog do count as news, because they report what is happening in Iraq and are quite detailed. I also think the reader can trust these accounts more so than similar blogs like Baghdad burning, because the reports are coming from an already known/ trusted journalist.
Allbritton has since moved onto Beirut and also reports for a variety of publications, including Time Magazine.
Christopher Allbritton uses the blog to post reports from Iraq, which not only account the news, but also his experience out there.
I think the posts on this blog do count as news, because they report what is happening in Iraq and are quite detailed. I also think the reader can trust these accounts more so than similar blogs like Baghdad burning, because the reports are coming from an already known/ trusted journalist.
Allbritton has since moved onto Beirut and also reports for a variety of publications, including Time Magazine.
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