Today I really will not rant, though this is something else about which I am passionate.
I've written about organ donation on here before, but one of the great things to happen (relative to your views on the issue of course, but in my opinion it is great) since that time is that the UK parliament has passed a law to introduce an "opt-out" system for organ donation. Naturally, as is customary of our time, I shared the article on my Facebook page with words of celebration for the lives that this will save.
A friend has pointed out that very few people die on the waiting list in comparison to the number of people this new law will affect, so I Googled. These stats are from the Guardian in September 2017, so are slightly out of date by now, but they were the best I could find:
As well as the 457 people who died last year while on the transplant waiting list, a further 875 were taken off it, mainly because of ill health, with many dying shortly afterwards. As of last week there were 6,414 people in need of a new organ on the UK transplant waiting list.4 Sep 2017
To me, that is too many, though to me 1 person dying when we have the resource to stop it would be too many quite frankly, though it could be worse. In America one person dies approximately every 20 minutes waiting for an organ, so small mercies I guess.
Like with blood donation, my very logical side likes to ask "Would you be happy to receive it?" If the answer is yes, which it is, then I don't see why my answer to giving that donation should be any different. I tried to explain this to my mother, who you would assume would be used to me by now, as just an extension of my recycling obsession. My kidneys are going to do *nothing* that is good for anyone if I'm in the ground or otherwise, so why would I not want whoever my next of kin was to say to the doctors, if someone can use it, take it. I'd much rather the doctor be in a position to say, well that's a kind offer _____, but there's no one on the waiting list than have 457 people die in a year because no one wanted to think about signing up to the register.
This is my big sticking point: very often people either don't want to think about it or they don't care. That's not to say that they don't care about the 6'414 people on the waiting list it's that they don't care. They have no issue with donating their organs, but they don't feel strongly enough about it to go out of their way to sign up to the register. It drives me up the wall.
I get that it's a horrendous conversation. I recently got a pension statement which stated that I hadn't designated my next of kin who would receive the money if I died before getting it (really depressing though) so had to speak to my mum about putting her down as my person. And what I wanted her to do with the money. It was not a great conversation and I didn't even get into the whole living will thing of please don't leave me on a ventilator if there are no signs of brain activity, but my mother is the type to call it Blackpool illuminations if there are lights on in rooms you aren't in, so I'm not too worried about that one (Mum, if you read this, I am joking, but seriously, off switch, please). I don't know if it's a society thing or a humanity thing that talking about living wills and everything is just branded as morbid and we shy away from it, but really I would prefer to make that the legal stipulation, rather than a blanket opt out system.
If we all had to answer questions regarding our care at the end of our life, since that can happen so quickly with an accident, then our upset relatives wouldn't have to make those decisions in what can already be the most upsetting period of their lives.
Since that's not going to happen though, I'm going to celebrate this as a bit of a win.
27 Feb 2018
26 Feb 2018
I Will Not Vent, I Will Not Vent, I Will Not,
Screw it, I'm not even going to finish that sentence because I know that I can't stick to it... Let's just get this over with.
I am fed up. I am MASSIVELY fed up, and I am annoyed that when I try and vent my fed-up-ness it gets put down to rant-y women or rant-y vegetarians or event just rant-y environmentalists. Yeah, aren't all of the above people such butt holes for wanting to make the world a less crappy place? Anyway, this is not about that, this is about:
REALLY STARBUCKS, REALLY???
Okay, so forget for two minutes that Starbucks is expensive. Forget for a minute that a lot of people cannot afford to buy food, let alone the luxury that is take out coffee (because I can only keep a lid on the lava of my personality if I only have a Venti Mocha Chocolate Rant about one thing at once. Single shots, people. (I'm sorry. I'm funny in my own head!)
Taking all of the above off the table and any other issues you have with Starbucks (be it tax avoidance or them charging London Fire Brigade staff for water during the July bombings, because I know that was also pretty unforgivable) and having a clean slate: why is it my problem as a consumer to carry around a reuseable cup to use in your cafe? Okay, it's a five pence charge and actually that makes most of your drinks cost an even whatever instead of me getting five pence pieces in my change (I don't, because I live in London and never really carry cash, but just go with it for a second) but Starbucks, why is this my issue?
I know, you've tried to make it easy for me by making a reuseable cup with your "legendary" design, it's only a pound and there is normally a basket of them sitting somewhere where I can conveniently grab one in the store. You're even so nice as to offer me a 25 pence "discount" if I reuse this or any other reusable cup, but actually, it's five pence. I'm probably only going to give a monkey's left proverbial because you haven't previously charged me for this and we all hate price hikes. And Starbucks, I know it's not just you. Pret do the same damn thing (actually, in some ways they are worse, because they provide biodegradable cutlery only in their Veggie stores and not across the whole brand and still called it a trial on Facebook the other day despite the fact that veggie Pret has been open for a significant period of time (not completely sure if it's one or two years on the original place now, but still - how long is this blooming trial???
My big issue is, it's a token effort. I hate token effort.
Suppliers of biodegradable and compostable cups and lids and cutlery all exist. Instead of encouraging a behaviour change in your consumers which is unlikely to have a big enough effect to prevent whales from starving to death with stomach's full of plastic bags of us using a ridiculous amount of landfill to essentially bury and forget about our sins, why not just make the change yourselves? Okay, so not every cup is going to go into a compost pile, there might still be a significant number ending up in the ocean, but at least it's not made of something that is likely to outlast the sun. At least it is far less damaging than what we currently have.
Or how about, do both?
How about you switch to these kind of cups and lids and cutlery and other packaging and then say, we screwed up. We as humanity screwed up when we started to rely on plastic, because it was easy. And to pay for our screw ups, we are going to donate money from every drink sold to research into sustainable resources, or ocean clean up projects. Hell, we're even going to get rid of our plastic gift cards and find something more sustainable there, too?
I'm quite lucky that I can get this out of my system. I read an article over the weekend that fish even at a very deep sea level have ingested micro beads and plastic, and they can't get it out of their systems. I know I mentioned this earlier but a whale died because it had 30 plastic bags in its stomach last year and it was assumed that it starved to death. This is madness. This is utter madness. I don't give a flying **** (I can't replace that word right now, I'm livid) about token effort right now!!
I feel the same way about the plastic bag charge as well and straws - don't even get me started on straws...
(taking deep breathes for a second)
I know we have some level of choice in these issues, because we can use reusable cups and just make the effort, same with bags, and we use them for their lifetime and it's LESS plastic (because ultimately as lot of the alternative bags for life and reusable cups are also plastic) but there are alternatives. Companies could choose to make a real difference and inevitably I don't feel that they put in enough effort.
I know that they're not going to read this, but I just had to get it off my chest. #rantover
I am fed up. I am MASSIVELY fed up, and I am annoyed that when I try and vent my fed-up-ness it gets put down to rant-y women or rant-y vegetarians or event just rant-y environmentalists. Yeah, aren't all of the above people such butt holes for wanting to make the world a less crappy place? Anyway, this is not about that, this is about:
REALLY STARBUCKS, REALLY???
Okay, so forget for two minutes that Starbucks is expensive. Forget for a minute that a lot of people cannot afford to buy food, let alone the luxury that is take out coffee (because I can only keep a lid on the lava of my personality if I only have a Venti Mocha Chocolate Rant about one thing at once. Single shots, people. (I'm sorry. I'm funny in my own head!)
Taking all of the above off the table and any other issues you have with Starbucks (be it tax avoidance or them charging London Fire Brigade staff for water during the July bombings, because I know that was also pretty unforgivable) and having a clean slate: why is it my problem as a consumer to carry around a reuseable cup to use in your cafe? Okay, it's a five pence charge and actually that makes most of your drinks cost an even whatever instead of me getting five pence pieces in my change (I don't, because I live in London and never really carry cash, but just go with it for a second) but Starbucks, why is this my issue?
I know, you've tried to make it easy for me by making a reuseable cup with your "legendary" design, it's only a pound and there is normally a basket of them sitting somewhere where I can conveniently grab one in the store. You're even so nice as to offer me a 25 pence "discount" if I reuse this or any other reusable cup, but actually, it's five pence. I'm probably only going to give a monkey's left proverbial because you haven't previously charged me for this and we all hate price hikes. And Starbucks, I know it's not just you. Pret do the same damn thing (actually, in some ways they are worse, because they provide biodegradable cutlery only in their Veggie stores and not across the whole brand and still called it a trial on Facebook the other day despite the fact that veggie Pret has been open for a significant period of time (not completely sure if it's one or two years on the original place now, but still - how long is this blooming trial???
My big issue is, it's a token effort. I hate token effort.
Suppliers of biodegradable and compostable cups and lids and cutlery all exist. Instead of encouraging a behaviour change in your consumers which is unlikely to have a big enough effect to prevent whales from starving to death with stomach's full of plastic bags of us using a ridiculous amount of landfill to essentially bury and forget about our sins, why not just make the change yourselves? Okay, so not every cup is going to go into a compost pile, there might still be a significant number ending up in the ocean, but at least it's not made of something that is likely to outlast the sun. At least it is far less damaging than what we currently have.
Or how about, do both?
How about you switch to these kind of cups and lids and cutlery and other packaging and then say, we screwed up. We as humanity screwed up when we started to rely on plastic, because it was easy. And to pay for our screw ups, we are going to donate money from every drink sold to research into sustainable resources, or ocean clean up projects. Hell, we're even going to get rid of our plastic gift cards and find something more sustainable there, too?
I'm quite lucky that I can get this out of my system. I read an article over the weekend that fish even at a very deep sea level have ingested micro beads and plastic, and they can't get it out of their systems. I know I mentioned this earlier but a whale died because it had 30 plastic bags in its stomach last year and it was assumed that it starved to death. This is madness. This is utter madness. I don't give a flying **** (I can't replace that word right now, I'm livid) about token effort right now!!
I feel the same way about the plastic bag charge as well and straws - don't even get me started on straws...
(taking deep breathes for a second)
I know we have some level of choice in these issues, because we can use reusable cups and just make the effort, same with bags, and we use them for their lifetime and it's LESS plastic (because ultimately as lot of the alternative bags for life and reusable cups are also plastic) but there are alternatives. Companies could choose to make a real difference and inevitably I don't feel that they put in enough effort.
I know that they're not going to read this, but I just had to get it off my chest. #rantover
4 Feb 2018
Okay, I'm an A Hole
Part of me hates how every day has to be the "World Day for ____".
Personally, I would like to think that we didn't need Time to Talk Day on Thursday to make it acceptable to talk about mental health. I would love it if we had no need of that. That's not me being all naive and idealistic and wishing that mental health problems didn't exist (time spent on that exercise would be fruitless at best) but instead I would like to see a world where we don't have to be reminded that people have their own issues, they have their own demons that they are fighting with and actually just being nice to other people can make a difference. When I say being nice, I do mean actively being nice, but it's not that hard. Most of us think that we're being nice when we don't tell Sally at the office (name chosen at random: not an actual person I work with) that the new dress that she loves so much makes her butt look humongous and not in a good way. That's not nice, that's just having a filter. Nice would be telling Sally that her hair looks great (if it does: lying does not count as being nice).
Anyway, that was a bit of a tangent. I'm not confessing to being an A-hole because I told hypothetical Sally that the dress looks AWESOME on her and she should totally wear it when she goes out with Bill from Finance (yes, I have worked in a place where there was a Bill who worked in Finance, but no, this is not him, and yes, I did find Bill working in Finance hilarious).
The reason I am confessing to being an A-hole is that I kind of forgot that it was world cancer day today and I was originally going to write something about that, and again, I forgot.
I'm not sure if I have ever mentioned it on here before (probably have: I never pass up an opportunity to save something about it!!) but one of my biggest achievements last year was getting over my fear of needles enough to be able to go and give blood. Three times.
On the walls of the Manchester donor center are comments from donors about why we do what we do. There is also an anonymous wall where people can add stories of those who have received life-saving blood transfusions and a lot have thanks from that person and their family since, without the people to go into that donor center and give their blood and their platelets, doctors would lose so many tools from their arsenal to fight for every single life.
One of the other things I did was join the DKMS register and updated my details with the organ donor register.
Now, I'm not saying this to be all bragging rights or whatever. The only reason I'm saying it now, and every time I open my mouth to say it, is because I want to emphasise that you don't need to run a marathon, you don't need to set up a direct debit to all the charities you want to support (I would be completely broke if I did that!) With these charities or causes, you just put your name on the list. Okay, so you might need to do a cheek swab or spit into a test tub thing for them to gather the DNA data that they need from you, you might need to have a needle placed gently (trust me, blood donor nurses are the most gentle vampires you have ever met) into your arm for about ten minutes, but every time I get a text to say that my blood has been dispatched to a hospital I am proud.
I don't know if it's going to the new mum having to have a crash C-section to save her and her baby, to someone with severe anemia or if it's going to a cancer patient who can't make their own red blood cells because of their disease. In a way, it doesn't matter because they need it.
Charities like DKMS and Anthony Nolan may never need to contact you after you joined their register. They may never actually need to ask you for anything, but they also might. I know that if one of my family members needed someone from one of those charities (or the multitude of others out there) they would be ready to do everything that they could; they do it day in day out. These charities are amazing, so if I know that I would want them to do everything that they could for me and mine, I feel like I have to at least state my willingness to do the same for someone else.
Blood, stem cells, bone marrow; these are all things that money cannot buy, so whilst I know that it is important to make sure that Cancer Research UK (and other charities) can keep ploughing as much money as possible into finding a cure for one of the most devastating diseases on the planet, remember that you don't need to have the money to be able to help.
Just think about it - that is all I ask.
Personally, I would like to think that we didn't need Time to Talk Day on Thursday to make it acceptable to talk about mental health. I would love it if we had no need of that. That's not me being all naive and idealistic and wishing that mental health problems didn't exist (time spent on that exercise would be fruitless at best) but instead I would like to see a world where we don't have to be reminded that people have their own issues, they have their own demons that they are fighting with and actually just being nice to other people can make a difference. When I say being nice, I do mean actively being nice, but it's not that hard. Most of us think that we're being nice when we don't tell Sally at the office (name chosen at random: not an actual person I work with) that the new dress that she loves so much makes her butt look humongous and not in a good way. That's not nice, that's just having a filter. Nice would be telling Sally that her hair looks great (if it does: lying does not count as being nice).
Anyway, that was a bit of a tangent. I'm not confessing to being an A-hole because I told hypothetical Sally that the dress looks AWESOME on her and she should totally wear it when she goes out with Bill from Finance (yes, I have worked in a place where there was a Bill who worked in Finance, but no, this is not him, and yes, I did find Bill working in Finance hilarious).
The reason I am confessing to being an A-hole is that I kind of forgot that it was world cancer day today and I was originally going to write something about that, and again, I forgot.
I'm not sure if I have ever mentioned it on here before (probably have: I never pass up an opportunity to save something about it!!) but one of my biggest achievements last year was getting over my fear of needles enough to be able to go and give blood. Three times.
On the walls of the Manchester donor center are comments from donors about why we do what we do. There is also an anonymous wall where people can add stories of those who have received life-saving blood transfusions and a lot have thanks from that person and their family since, without the people to go into that donor center and give their blood and their platelets, doctors would lose so many tools from their arsenal to fight for every single life.
One of the other things I did was join the DKMS register and updated my details with the organ donor register.
Now, I'm not saying this to be all bragging rights or whatever. The only reason I'm saying it now, and every time I open my mouth to say it, is because I want to emphasise that you don't need to run a marathon, you don't need to set up a direct debit to all the charities you want to support (I would be completely broke if I did that!) With these charities or causes, you just put your name on the list. Okay, so you might need to do a cheek swab or spit into a test tub thing for them to gather the DNA data that they need from you, you might need to have a needle placed gently (trust me, blood donor nurses are the most gentle vampires you have ever met) into your arm for about ten minutes, but every time I get a text to say that my blood has been dispatched to a hospital I am proud.
I don't know if it's going to the new mum having to have a crash C-section to save her and her baby, to someone with severe anemia or if it's going to a cancer patient who can't make their own red blood cells because of their disease. In a way, it doesn't matter because they need it.
Charities like DKMS and Anthony Nolan may never need to contact you after you joined their register. They may never actually need to ask you for anything, but they also might. I know that if one of my family members needed someone from one of those charities (or the multitude of others out there) they would be ready to do everything that they could; they do it day in day out. These charities are amazing, so if I know that I would want them to do everything that they could for me and mine, I feel like I have to at least state my willingness to do the same for someone else.
Blood, stem cells, bone marrow; these are all things that money cannot buy, so whilst I know that it is important to make sure that Cancer Research UK (and other charities) can keep ploughing as much money as possible into finding a cure for one of the most devastating diseases on the planet, remember that you don't need to have the money to be able to help.
Just think about it - that is all I ask.
God, I Want to Throw a Strop Right Now,
As most of you know, I don't really play the whole 'New Year, New Me' game, but something I did promise myself was that when I moved into the new flat certain things were going to be different.
Now, some things are different. I've managed to cut my morning commute dramatically. What used to take an hour and a half - depending on trains, so sometimes more than that - now takes me twenty minutes. I have more space and the kitchen is my own, so it is always how I left it (not always a great thing, but such is the joy of living alone) so I cook more. I also gave having a pet a whirl, although that didn't go so well since I'm not here all the time so Dave is going to be rehomed.
The problem is, those were not the things I promised myself would be different.
I made a promise to myself that I would make a really big effort to keeping the place tidy; I would be lying if I said I had stuck to that. I haven't put enough effort into that. It looks a damn site better than when I first moved in since there was stuff everywhere and not much furniture for a long time, but it's still not quite there. Actually, probably not by a long stretch thinking about how I would like it to be, though I know that that is on me.
I promised myself that this would be the weekend where I got a lot more sorted, and the truth is that that didn't really happen either, but...
Whereas most people get to February and their NY resolutions go straight out of the window as though they never really existed, I'm at the stage where I am reminding myself that Rome was not built in a day, so I shouldn't expect to cajole all of my chaos into order in the same space of time. If I'm making progress slowly, well that is still progress.
The same goes for the novel. Despite my somewhat foolish addiction to NaNoWriMo, I don't need to try and write everything I ever write at the same pace. I'd burn out within a couple of weeks for one thing, and for another, I would have even less of a social life.
I am accepting my weaknesses and limitations. I am setting it as a long-term goal to have the flat exactly as I want it. I am fine with the fact that this thing I am working on is going to take closer to a year than a month to write. Whilst I will not let go of and forget the novel I was writing for NaNo, I have accepted that now is not the time to re-write it and there is no more time at all to dwell on it. And so, onwards.
Though even when trying to accept all of that, I want to throw my toys out of the pram because one of my biggest weaknesses is impatience.
Catch you later.
Now, some things are different. I've managed to cut my morning commute dramatically. What used to take an hour and a half - depending on trains, so sometimes more than that - now takes me twenty minutes. I have more space and the kitchen is my own, so it is always how I left it (not always a great thing, but such is the joy of living alone) so I cook more. I also gave having a pet a whirl, although that didn't go so well since I'm not here all the time so Dave is going to be rehomed.
The problem is, those were not the things I promised myself would be different.
I made a promise to myself that I would make a really big effort to keeping the place tidy; I would be lying if I said I had stuck to that. I haven't put enough effort into that. It looks a damn site better than when I first moved in since there was stuff everywhere and not much furniture for a long time, but it's still not quite there. Actually, probably not by a long stretch thinking about how I would like it to be, though I know that that is on me.
I promised myself that this would be the weekend where I got a lot more sorted, and the truth is that that didn't really happen either, but...
Whereas most people get to February and their NY resolutions go straight out of the window as though they never really existed, I'm at the stage where I am reminding myself that Rome was not built in a day, so I shouldn't expect to cajole all of my chaos into order in the same space of time. If I'm making progress slowly, well that is still progress.
The same goes for the novel. Despite my somewhat foolish addiction to NaNoWriMo, I don't need to try and write everything I ever write at the same pace. I'd burn out within a couple of weeks for one thing, and for another, I would have even less of a social life.
I am accepting my weaknesses and limitations. I am setting it as a long-term goal to have the flat exactly as I want it. I am fine with the fact that this thing I am working on is going to take closer to a year than a month to write. Whilst I will not let go of and forget the novel I was writing for NaNo, I have accepted that now is not the time to re-write it and there is no more time at all to dwell on it. And so, onwards.
Though even when trying to accept all of that, I want to throw my toys out of the pram because one of my biggest weaknesses is impatience.
Catch you later.
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