Audiophile

When I was 15-16, I had a boyfriend whose father was what I'd call an audiophile and a true music lover. He had long hair and a scruffy beard, worshipped Grateful Dead, the Allman Brothers band and all things called southern rock, had an entire wall covered in shelves with vinyl and a rather huge hi-fi stereo that probably cost more than everything I own put together. I loved the guy, and called him Papa Bear, and I think he liked me, mainly because I bought him a psychedelig poster of Jerry Garcia that promptly ended up on the wall of his little music corner. And he introduced me to the world of audiophiles - those who has to have the best sound equipment, the best sound quality, and absolute, positively HAS to have everything on vinyl. Know the type?

Now, music has plays a huge part in my life (no pun intended), more so in mine than in many others I suspect, but I've never really been into the whole sound quiality thing. As long as both the left and right headphone is working, and I can hear the music, it's usually fine by me. But lately, something has changed. It all started with a mate (oh how I love to blame this mate) who got a hold of some FLAC-files. I've never even thought about the difference between FLAC's and MP3s, but thought I'd give it a go. But then I realised I had crappy headphones, and had to buy a new pair of those, too. As I've described before, the difference is huge, and the other night as I couldn't sleep due to my previously explained health problem, I listened to lots of Depeche (of course, what else) FLAC-files, with the headphones, and sounds came at me from places I've never even noticed before. That's when I turned over to the dark side and became one of them. The Audiophiles. The very minority that which I've ignored, scoffed at, even laughed.

And the result of all this? I've bought a turntable. And a cable with gold plated RCA connectors (not as expensive as it sounds, I might add.) This doesn't exactly make me a hardcore audiophile, I bought a cheap turntable (about 70 quid), and my headphones are also rather cheap (about 45-50 quid), but for me they're serious upgrades. And I've rifled through some of the vinyl I knew was hidden downstars, not touching the holy grail which is my sisters MJ collection, but I did find a few other things I am going to nick; some old Elvis records, and one of Edith Piaf! And, of course, I went ahead and bought a few online - and I won't give you a penny for guessing what it is. That's how I start my vinyl collection - Elvis, Edith Piaf and 11 albums of Depeche Mode. Now to find the nearest vintage/vinyl store... It was about I took this music addiction of mine sort of seriously, no?

Shake the disease

Earlier this morning I came back from a night at the hospital. And no, not that cancer hospital, but a normal one, and I wasn't there for anyone else, but for myself. Why? Well, I had a spot of surgery.

Well, it's a rather unpleasant story. I managed to get something called bartholinitis. If you have a morbid curiosity, go look it up, but I take no responsibility for what you may see or read if you do so. In short it's an inflammation of a gland in my.. uhm, private area, va-jay-jay, call it what you like, and normally these things take care of themselves. But of course not so in my case - last weekend pain and swelling ensued, and I got a doctors appointment, thinking I'd get some antibiotics and it's all go away. But no. The doctor sent me to the hospital to see another doctor, and she promptly told me that I had an inflammation abscess and they had to open it up and get the inflammation out. "Fine," I thought and envisioned some local anaesthetic, maybe a scalpel and an unpleasant but minor procedure in my not too distant future. "We'll do the surgery later tonight, and you'll be under mild anaesthesia, you'll be asleep." Whatnow? Surgery? Asleep?! Oh, brilliant. After about 6 rather long hours they slapped an IV cannula and a hospital gown on me, and took me down to surgery. I remember thinking something along the lines of

"how do I always end up in situations like these?"

Attack of the ninja squad
Being wheeled in to the surgery room was like being ambushed by a highly trained squad of ninja nurses, they were all over me like ants in an anthill, attaching monitoring equipment, adjusting the operating table, measuring my blood pressure, holding my oxygen mask, asking questions, calling the doctor. Points for effectiveness, I'll give them that! Then I was given some "powerful painkiller" or other, the effects of which I got to enjoy for about 5 seconds ("weeeeeee"), because after 4 deep breaths I was out like a light. I can't even remember slipping into sleep - one second I was focusing on breathing, the next second I was out cold.

They crudely woke me up about 30 minutes later, the surgery was over, all went well, but they suggested I might stay the night at the hospital. By this this time it was almost midnight, and I was kind of woozy after being in a mild coma for a few minutes, so I stayed, and was wheeled into a room where a sweet old lady which I'd met earlier that night, lay in her bed. Of course, as per usual, this woman had to be a professional snorer, and I went through 8 rather looooong hours of trying to block out the snoring and the increasing pain. If it hadn't been for my new headphones and the iPod I'd probably torn out the IV and marched out of there after an hour or two.

And now I'm here, in my comfy chair, eating painkillers and two types of antibiotics I've never even heard of, taking antibacterial baths twice a day and generally feel a bit sorry for myself. It all felt somewhat dramatic for what I initially thought was a minor thing, but the doctor told me that if I hadn't come to see her, the infection abscess might've punctured and it could've spread to all sorts of places, I think I even heard the word "infertility" among the possible worst case scenarios but I'd blocked her out by then. As my aunt just said: "That's just you. Only you could manage to get something like this". Yes, you're absolutely right, and I am very painfully aware of it.