Yuletide Felicitations!

Announced Margo Leadbetter in "The Good Life", her clipped and refined accent cold as a prawn on ice about to be served up in a cocktail, 70's style. With all the warmth and sincerity of an MP on the campaign trail, Margo turned the traditional Merry Christmas salutation into a statement of class and social climbing. Pomposity personified, oozing iconic disdain for all except her social circle. An inspiration to shop assistants the world over.

So when I started this blog, it was to be a record of my life on dialysis and the various administrative changes that my local health board were about to implement. Over time it has evolved into a transplant and recovery diary, which has displayed itself frequently to be the work of a deranged lunatic, with random impulses to veer off topic.

Who can forget the ridiculous Miss Marple entry in September, and the odd murmurings from Tudor England in August? 

Hopefully you have been both informed and entertained along the way, and I thank you all for diving into the unknown and bravely exposing yourselves to my sense of humour.

The blog began with a barely negligible readership, even more minute then our new adorable kitten, Gorbachev (Dec 18 entry), 

but down through the mists of time, more readers have been attracted to the site, from a diverse diaspora covering all four corners of the globe
(how can a circular object have corners? Over to the spacial mathematicians to discuss...)

 Returning once more to Margo's sentiments, but hopefully with a tad more warmth, I would like to wish all my dear blogreaders the compliments of the season, in their own languages...

so Happy Christmas to the UK, NZ, Australia, Canada and of course the USA

Feliz Navidad to Spain

Marau na Kerisimasi to Fiji

God Jul Och Gott Nytt År to Sweden

聖誕節快樂 sing-tan-tseh khoai-lok to Taiwan

 Fröhliche Weihnachten und ein gutes neues Jahr to Germany

С Рождеством Христовым S Roždestvom Khristovym to Russia

 Wesołych świąt i szczęśliwego Nowego Roku to Poland

 Merī kurisumasu to Japan

Merī kurisumasu to Malaysia

Joyeux Noël to France

 

and finally 聖誕節同新年快樂 singdaanjit tùhng sànnìhn faailohk  to Hong Kong!

 

Thank you for reading my blog wherever you are in this global village (i'm hanging out near the off licence!), and I hope you've all been good boys and girls so Santa can reward you all (spacial mathematicians again, how does he visit every good child in the world in one night?)

Ending this brief update with a Christmas Carol, about the message of Christmas. No doubt this would have horrified Margo and Mrs Dooms-Patterson of the  Surbiton Choral Society..

Nowhere to park, isnt this jolly?

Falalalalalalalala

Queue for hours with your overstuffed trolley

Falalalalalalalala

Five pounds fifty to see Santa

Falalalalalalalala

False white beard and its a yanker

Falalalalalalalala

Bing Crosby is on the telly

Falalalalalalalala

Baby's been sick, who gave him jelly?

Falalalalalalalala

Band Aid repeats on the radio

Falalalalalalalala

Enough bad food to cause a cardio

Falalalalalalalala

Another Christmas done at last,

Falalalalalalalala

Start next year's in August......

Falalalalalalalala

 

Roman Holiday?

"My name is Gluteus Maximus Viscus Pancreas,  commander of the Armies of the Girth, General of the Renal Regions, loyal servant to the true emperor, Bagpuss Aurelius. Father to a diseased kidney, husband to a supportive partner. And I will have my transplant, in this life or the next.

So I orated last year, as my life continued on its Via Appia hindered by the senate of diabetes and renal failure. Every day was a battle against the goth hordes of sugar control and the vandals of kidney dialysis with its daily impact upon my vitae, especially when planning travel arrangements.

Last December (yes December is a Roman word), my familiae were planning the usual Saturnalian getaway, which the new Chritian sect is calling Christmas. They had made plans to rest at a villa by the coast, not unlike Pompeii or Herculaneum. the vacationem was to last 2 weeks, or septimanae.

Being somewhat limited, indeed as restricted as a slave, I was due to dialyse every three days, which meant travel to any distance was impossible, as practical as building a wall across the whole northernmost territory of Britannia!

So arrangements were made to dialyse on the morning of travel, Friday, and travel down via speedy chariot to the sea or maris. I would enjoy some quality tempus, soaking up the sun like a statue of Zeus, enjoying games

and feasting on traditional favourites like dormice, grapes, and olives.

After three nights with my family, I would then hasten back to the metropolis (yes I know thats Greek) in order to dialyse at the hospitium once more.

As onerous and exhausting as building the Circus Maximus! Quite an annis horribilis!

However this year is different. We had made arrangements to stay at another villa on the Insula Quid Livor (why hickey = Waiheke Island), which sits in the harbour overlooked by the great metropolis. It is an easy ferry ride into town, like crossing the Styx on board Charon's ferry. Of course I would have to pay the ferryman and would have my gold coins ready. I sometimes have more Sestertii than sense.

This could be repeated ad nauseam, for the three visits needed for dialysis. So thus prepared were we, ready to join the legions of holiday makers worshipping Bacchus, Pan and Dionysius, those gods of wine and merriment.


Meanwhile unbeknownst to us events were simmering beneath the surface which would erupt in the month of Julius...

Of course the transplant has changed everything, and like a former slave given his liberti, I am emancipated, set free from the previous daily chores of dialysis.

As I still attend the weekly renal forum once a week, it was anticipated that I would still need to use the ferry to cross over Neptune's domain and enter into the city. So when I was told by the nurses that I only had to take a blood test whilst on the island, I was as gleeful as the Emperor Nero fiddling amongst the flames of Rome.

So instead of having to undertake a long and arduous trek like Hannibal, I shall instead be reclining in my sun drenched villa, able to enjoy the rich mosaic of holiday experiences.
Dont ask me to concentrate on anything other than relaxation for I shall be quite Zeusless, but we shall see how things Pan out.

I shall instead concentrate on the first real holiday in what seems like a century, and help the ever continuing process towards complete recovery, one step at a time, for after all Rome wasn't built in a day.

P-p-p-p-pokerface?

Was I lucky enough to snap Lady Gaga as she gyrated on stage, surrounded by her lithe dancers, dressed outrageously in her latest creation as she attempted to shock us? Was I perhaps fortunate enough to be behind the scenes at the Royal Wedding as Philip Treacy prepared his majestic Royal headgear? No dear blogwatchers, tis a most peculiar cat toy.

A cat toy I hear you murmur aghast, surely Minke is at least 6 and has noved on from her kitten days?

Indeed, but we have  new addition to the menagerie.....

 No Not her.....

                                           Mew! Mew! Mew!

We have a new pet store in Whangaparaoa, called Luvable Pets (sic), and yesterday I got the call from my other half to come down at once to a secret address. Not knowing what was located there, I drove post haste to see what was there, thinking maybe a jewellers, a cake shop, or even an antique shop. 

When I saw a new pet shop, I got all excited and dared to hope that Santa was going to bring me a new pet. After all I have been a most exceptionally good boy in every way, shape and form. I have met all of the traditional KPI's  as demanded by our Nordic gift bearer....

I was introduced to the new owner and she let it be known that we were about to get a new cat who they had named Smudge. Completely snowy white, he has a a small smudge of grey on top of his head

He is an adorable, fluffy bundle of kittenish excitement, cute in a sort of "I'm a marshmallow, eat me" sort of way, and he was going to be our new pet.

So we are now trialling  names. We have discounted the usual cliches, white references and snow is a no go. Something dark and foreboding would be fun, like Darth Vader, Lord Voldemort, Simon Cowell even Winston Peters. But these have all been discounted. He cant be Blackie, as that fine nom de plume resides adjacent to us next door, and you can imagine confusion reigning with different owners calling for their respective Blackie.

A late favourite has been Blofeld, but although fun, it is does not quite trip off the tongue and is slightly cumbersome. 

So we are focusing on the smudge on his cotton wool head, as his current pet shop name reflects this mark. 

Who does he remind me of? Smudge on his head? White hair? Gentle and yet the ability to kill with one small flex of his hand/paw?

So let me introduce..............Gorbachev!  

   

or General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union for short....

You can P-p-p-p-Perestroika all over our Eastern Bloc, Gorby.

Walk like an Egyptian......

 

We were encouraged by The Bangles in their hit single of 1986 to emulate the sand dance, though I feel the dance craze failed to catch on, certainly not in her Majesty’s Most Britannic Realms. The verses were clichéd and stereotypical whilst removing all references to anything vaguely historically accurate Egyptwise. No mention was made of Anwar Sadat, the Aswan Dam, Karnak or even Cairo, but rather we hear about cops hanging out in the donut shop way –oh way oh, the sand dance and the party boys in the Kremlin. Not very representative of one of the most ancient civilizations in history, whose magnificent monuments have lasted five thousand years to inspire, intrigue and impress. Despite the title there was a paucity of knowledge about the gait of the ancients and we are left none the wiser, unless walking oddly like a erect stork with hands extended meets the brief.

No doubt taking their “inspiration” from the graphic depictions of Egyptian Language and beliefs, the hieroglyphs, flat one dimensional representation of poses and gestures in flat relief. It must have come as a relief (!) when scholars deciphered the Rosetta Stone and were finally able to crack the ancient code of Egypt, which had long remained as unintelligible to modern man as text talk is to contemporary adults.
                                                          

                                        By hook or by crook, I’ll be first in this tomb. 

                                        The Hallelujah Horus

                                     By Osiris’ beard, Time for my afternoon dialysis.

As part of the preparations for mummification embalmers were certainly aware of the internal organs of the human body, and placed in canopic jars. Perversely, given their importance today and certainly to me, the kidneys were often ignored as harmless, like a blunt dolphin, a pointless porpoise.

I spy with Ra’s red eye a super absorbent cat, now with wings.

 Inspired by things felidae, the miaowing muse has ascended to my cyber afterworld. Cats were venerated and often worshipped, which is no surprise as they are still our adorable and godlike masters of affection. Indeed an often used phrase in todays modern parlance directly references the ancient cat God: 

                                                           A little Bastet

So what does an adoration of cats and the exploration of the human organs auger for this blog update?

Well, I attended the vets this week, not for me, obviously, though with all the health professionals I have seen since the transplant, a vet wouldn’t seem that odd.

As the little papillons were prodded and poked, tabletted and anally attacked with thermometers I spied, with my little eye something beginning with gigantic cat poster. And what was on this suddenly absorbing poster? 

 

 Fancy that, cats with renal failure! Now I have truly met my ideal soul mate. The dearly missed Bagpuss was old and grumpy, much like me, ate voraciously, much like me, and was in very good health, unlike me. Certainly he had no renal failure, so I marginally pulled ahead in the quirky characteristics race.

What horrors would these renally impaired felines have to endure, what manner of hideous medical torture would be used to prolong their lives? Was there somewhere a deranged felis catus scientist holding a clowder of cats hostage to medical experiments?

 Were there banks of mini dialysis machines laid out in a cattery somewhere with contented pets snoozing and snoring, reading and surfing the web on their Miaowpads? I was intrigued.

Naturally I enquired of my vet about how they treat feline kidney failure, and was astounded to learn that in some countries they actually perform cat kidney transplants! Morally there are some doubts in some countries, but not in the USA or Australia, where some states allow the transplantation of organs as long as the donor cat stays with the recipient cat's family, or the donor cat is feral or injured.

Humans obviously can consent to most medical procedures, but the language of the cat eludes us, hence the moral dilemma of non consent. Even I had to sign a form agreeing to my transplant, just in case......

In New Zealand tablets to treat renal dysfunction usually suffice, and if the disease turns terminal then the cat is put to S-L-E-E-P ( can’t say that out loud as it upsets Minke).

After the procedure the feline patient would have to endure long periods of inactivity, dozing, being kept warm and comfortable, being fed, and to have a companion to look after it's every need as it recovers from the operation.

 Such are the lengths that we go to for the modern day cat. The advances in both veterinary and human medical science have been significant since the days of the ancient Egyptians. From rudimentary anatomical studies to full organ transplants, from deification of the cat to its elevated status of today.

Indeed such are the lengths we strive for towards our pets, we too find ourselves worshipping at the claws of Bastet, lighting the Eternal Flame to brighten up a hazy shade of winter, making our ever busy lives less stressful, so that even Mondays can appear less manic.

Purrfect.