The AH Coffee Shop and Reading Room 07

[oggbashan]

The origins of Boxing Day:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxing_Day

We give cash to those who provide to us - the newspaper delivery man, the postman, the Delivery courier, the refuse collectors etc - but before Christmas day because all except the newspaper delivery man, do not work on Boxing Day, or since Boxing Day is a Sunday this year, the Bank holiday immediately following.

I hope you'all had a pleasant Christmas. Ours was very quiet - only a phone call from our youngest, because we had a granddaughter's birthday on Christmas Eve, and the family gathering, Covid permitting, is on New Year's Day.

Now for more coffee...

 

[Handley_Page]

My Christmas Day featured phone calls from friends and Boxing Day featured a visit from my son. And I suffered a real painful injury to my toe; walking is not easy or pain-free.
I really need a coffee.

 

[TxRad]

My Christmas Day featured phone calls from friends and Boxing Day featured a visit from my son. And I suffered a real painful injury to my toe; walking is not easy or pain-free.
I really need a coffee.

HP, either your aim is really good or your luck is really bed. Yeah, those ten pound tins of dragon food can be dangerous on toes.

Had to run a few errands. Trash, coffee water, cokes, milk. Minor stuff but still vital. A beautiful day for the end of December. 81 degrees for a high, partially cloudy, a slight breeze. A root beer kind of afternoon.

 

[Handley_Page]

HP, either your aim is really good or your luck is really bed. Yeah, those ten pound tins of dragon food can be dangerous on toes.
.

Painful enough to prevent a night's sleep, anyway.
But I found some pills and had a very relaxed afternoon on my sofa.

But I really do need a mug of good Tea.

 

[TxRad]

Supper was early so I guess the evening coffee will be also.

Uh, it looks like the lease on this thread will be up before the new year. Hopefully, I can renew the lease. If so then the cleanup will be easy, a fire hose and some new paint.

I've thought about swapping the place over to a bar but drunks are worse than over caffeinated people. I could do both but then I'd have to put up with wide awake drunks.

 

[Lori_the_Hoosier]

Late evening Boxing Day in Singapore where we are for 10 days. Hot and humid as usual but the city is immaculate as always. The covid travel regulations are a bit of a pain, but so efficiently carried out that it is not too much bother. Hope you all had a good 25th .

Over here December 26th, St. Stephen's Day, is traditionally the party day; it's even a public holiday in most parts of France, but strangely not here in the Var, Vaucluse, or Alpes Maritimes. That doesn't stop them, though...

Will and I are working opposite shifts today, most of our teams only worked a half-shift today (to make up for having to work full shifts Christmas Day) so they could go and party and at least have some kind of Christmas. Will and I have a skeleton crew on our shifts, one assistant surgeon and two each nurse-practitioners acting as triage nurses, and we're only dealing with ER-type requirements.

Anything requiring any kind of invasive surgery is being bundled up to the main hospitals in Nice and Cannes, they have sufficient staff capacity to cover all shift eventualities. We've got the EMT's despatcher rerouting emergency callouts to the main hospitals instead of rolling them straight into us, as normally happens, because we just don't have the capability right now to prep for any kind of trauma management; triage is the best we can do with our currently limited resources.

 

[Javahead]

Over here December 26th, St. Stephen's Day, is traditionally the party day; it's even a public holiday in most parts of France, but strangely not here in the Var, Vaucluse, or Alpes Maritimes. That doesn't stop them, though...

Will and I are working opposite shifts today, most of our teams only worked a half-shift today (to make up for having to work full shifts Christmas Day) so they could go and party and at least have some kind of Christmas. Will and I have a skeleton crew on our shifts, one assistant surgeon and two each nurse-practitioners acting as triage nurses, and we're only dealing with ER-type requirements.

Anything requiring any kind of invasive surgery is being bundled up to the main hospitals in Nice and Cannes, they have sufficient staff capacity to cover all shift eventualities. We've got the EMT's despatcher rerouting emergency callouts to the main hospitals instead of rolling them straight into us, as normally happens, because we just don't have the capability right now to prep for any kind of trauma management; triage is the best we can do with our currently limited resources.

Do they ever cut you a break? From your comments over the years it sounds as if you’re chronically short staffed and overworked.

 

[Lori_the_Hoosier]

Do they ever cut you a break? From your comments over the years it sounds as if you’re chronically short staffed and overworked.

We're actually fully staffed, the problem is that we have to allow for state and local holidays, allowed working hours under the EU Working Time Directive, and legally mandated rest/layoff periods to prevent employers flogging their medical staff into unrealistically long shift-patterns and unreasonable working hours. At the end of the day, it's about patient safeguarding; an exhausted surgeon is liable to make mistakes, so legislation that we have to adhere to exists to theoretically prevent endangering situations from arising.

Periodically it all comes to a head, mostly because of the crushing bureaucracy of the French civil service and their inability to do joined-up thinking; they set us targets then cut staffing budgets, then bitch and moan when we can't meet their arbitrary targets and penalize us for not meeting targets we're not sufficiently funded to achieve.

Our staffing problems are historical, and mostly down to the fact the private sector, and in this part of France the private sector means cosmetic surgery, pays more, expects less, and isn't driven by government-set targets. We train people, we turn out what I think are superbly equipped surgeons, only to see them follow the money and leave us floundering to plug skills gaps that shouldn't exist.

COVID also has a large part to play in this; ordinarily I could advertise for a consultant anesthesiologist and have 300 spanking good resumes clogging my inbox by the time I've drunk my coffee; the reality now is that with limited internal and cross-border movement, lockdowns, and now the creeping threat of Omicron, all those talented individuals in Paris and Lyon might as well be on the dark side of the moon, because I can't haul any of them down here.

Two years ago we were fielding applications literally from around the world, because everyone wanted to live and work in the glitz and glamor of the French Riviera, now all I can do is look at some of those incredibly well qualified people and wish for 'if only'.

We're a microcosm of what's happening in the mega-hospitals dotted up and down the Med coast as well; they have exactly the same problem as we do, an immense and uncontrollable staffing churn, and a constant drop off in available skills as disillusioned skilled practitioners leave for pastures new or quit the profession entirely because of the workloads.

We're lucky in that our staff seem to feel a sense of loyalty and position within the profession, they have a certain cachet working here, and they have a strong and vibrant work ethic, but all that can't counter the moronic rule changes the bureaucrats periodically and arbitrarily throw up that seem designed to impede and hamstring our work as much as possible.

 

[AloneTooLong]

yes and another week of 80s for high 60s for low; but enduring our summer heat and humidity isn't something they probably want to deal with

 

[Handley_Page]

yes and another week of 80s for high 60s for low; but enduring our summer heat and humidity isn't something they probably want to deal with

If you'd care to 'export' some of that heat to UK, I'd be grateful.
Time, I think, for some coffee.

 

[TxRad]

The morning coffee is hot and black. Have at it.

I'm having waffles with apple butter for breakfast.

Then I'm going to take a nap.

 

[Lori_the_Hoosier]

Will and I are having our first breakfast together in what seems like forever, Eggs Florentine, Chelsea buns, gingerbread flavored with Cointreau, and cinnamon cookies dusted with allspice, and a carafe of the Kenyan coffee Will gets periodically from his friend in Nairobi. It's kind of late for breakfast, I was on-shift all night and I just got up, so it's probably brunch.

 

[PoisonPen33]

"I read all fifteen chapters and your story never got better. I won't be reading the last one when you post it."

I guess my story was at least interesting enough to hold them for fifteen chapters?

 

[sirhugs]

If you'd care to 'export' some of that heat to UK, I'd be grateful.
Time, I think, for some coffee.

I have snow for export...

 

[Handley_Page]

I have snow for export...

Not here, but somewhere on the deserted moors might look good.

Meanwhile, I'd like a mug of good Tea please.
Tx, is this one of any use?

 

[TxRad]

The evening coffee is ready.

Supper was beef stroganoff. (I can never spell that right.)

 

[NotWise]

The three-month-old grandson is here. He's sitting on his mom's lap and staring at the Christmas tree while we all wait for dinner.

 

[Javahead]

The three-month-old grandson is here. He's sitting on his mom's lap and staring at the Christmas tree while we all wait for dinner.

Congrats!

We did much the same, but ours is just two months old. M'lady and I just got back from Thing2's house - she didn't feel up to several hours of travel with baby in tow. Thing2's place is roughly midway between our place and where Thing1 lives, so we converged there instead.

It's amazing how much an infant changes in a month, and how obsessed with him we all were - he had mom, dad, both sets of grandparents, and a couple of aunts all focussed on him. We've made arrangements with Thing2 to borrow him from time to time when he's a little older, though I had to promise that if necessary I'd physically restrain M'lady when the time comes to return him.

I'm still trying to figure out where the time went - it doesn't seem possible we're old enough to have adult children, much less grandchildren. And M'lady, at least, doesn't look it.

 

[Lori_the_Hoosier]

Congrats!

We did much the same, but ours is just two months old. M'lady and I just got back from Thing2's house - she didn't feel up to several hours of travel with baby in tow. Thing2's place is roughly midway between our place and where Thing1 lives, so we converged there instead.

It's amazing how much an infant changes in a month, and how obsessed with him we all were - he had mom, dad, both sets of grandparents, and a couple of aunts all focussed on him. We've made arrangements with Thing2 to borrow him from time to time when he's a little older, though I had to promise that if necessary I'd physically restrain M'lady when the time comes to return him.

I'm still trying to figure out where the time went - it doesn't seem possible we're old enough to have adult children, much less grandchildren. And M'lady, at least, doesn't look it.

s
Know what you mean; Will keeps insisting he's not old enough to be a grown-up yet, let alone be a grandfather; he keeps threatenng to send all future birthday and Christmas cards to the little guy signed 'Happy xxx from your grandmother and the man who lives with her...'

 

[AahhWhattheHell]

I bought a tablet, never used, in a sealed box from a charity shop on eBay.
...
It can't have an updated operating system. It couldn't cope.

So back it goes into its box and might be donated to another charity shop...

Time for coffee.

I use mine as a clock in my bathroom. supposedly you can use them as a mirror as well

 

[TxRad]

Lori, growing older is mandatory. Growing up is optional.

The midnight coffee is ready. All else is optional.

 

[sirhugs]

Lori, growing older is mandatory. Growing up is optional.

The midnight coffee is ready. All else is optional.

I have the optional whiskey...

 

[Handley_Page]

Congrats!

We did much the same, but ours is just two months old. M'lady and I just got back from Thing2's house - she didn't feel up to several hours of travel with baby in tow. Thing2's place is roughly midway between our place and where Thing1 lives, so we converged there instead.

It's amazing how much an infant changes in a month, and how obsessed with him we all were - he had mom, dad, both sets of grandparents, and a couple of aunts all focussed on him. We've made arrangements with Thing2 to borrow him from time to time when he's a little older, though I had to promise that if necessary I'd physically restrain M'lady when the time comes to return him.

I'm still trying to figure out where the time went - it doesn't seem possible we're old enough to have adult children, much less grandchildren. And M'lady, at least, doesn't look it.

Your thing puts me in mind of Sirella, of the house of Martok).
And I agree with him; she is magnificent. . . .

Any coffee left please ?

 

[TxRad]

The morning coffee is straight and black.

SH, I think you missed the bar next door by one.

I should be in bed so....

 

[TarnishedPenny]

"I read all fifteen chapters and your story never got better. I won't be reading the last one when you post it."

Shakes head.