Thursday 23 November 2017

Scarred for life.......


Thankfully I'm here to write "scarred for life", it could so easily have been different!

Although I've never really been content with my shape (perhaps one day I'll grow to 7ft 10in and be the ideal weight) I do try to see the permanent marks as signs of my history....my body blog I guess.

You'll be relieved to know there's no photos hahaha.

I'm not sure if I was pre-school age or infants but remember being quite small when out with my sisters I ran straight into a lamppost, they all laughed as apparently I just sat back stunned like a clown while blood poured down my face. It was nothing serious but I do still have a small scar on my forehead. I must have chipped the bone because in later years I grew a bit of a lump which I was told was bone that had been over enthusiastic when repairing itself. It's high and on the side so always covered by my fringe. Now had it been in the middle I'd have shown it off, unicorns are magical right?

There's a scar across my right knee, barely visible now really.  When I was still in junior school we were playing the game where one person turns round and round while we all run to catch their hand and the next runner latched onto number two, next to three etc, well I was never a fast runner so often joined the line when it was already long so having to run very fast or be dragged round. This day I slipped and was dragged and ended up with lots of gravel in my knee and remember the sight of a doctor with long forceps poking around to get the bits out. Ouch!

No outside scar from having my tonsils and adenoids removed when I was 10, but just before that hospital stay and in that same year my appendix burst and an urgent removal caused a scar but saved me from being poisoned to death.

Our two beautiful babies were both born by Caesarean Section when I was 26 and 28. One scar over the other that will actually twinge even now if my children are hurting in any way!

On the back of my left hand I've a couple of hot glue gun scars when going back to work part time at a factory to fit in with school hours. I was early 30s.

I seem to easily develop lumps after nasty insect bites have gone, they are scar tissue. There are three on my legs that I can mostly ignore, however there was a large lump on the back of my left upper arm which always looked red and angry so it was removed by my GP in the surgery and (as warned) it has left a reasonable size scar but it's also stopped me worrying about it. Very rarely I don't seem to have kept my own record of this so can't tell you how old I was.

Around my 60th birthday a very large tumour was discovered having taken up residence in my right kidney. Thankfully it was completely contained and removal of the tumour wrapped in my kidney was enough to cure me of cancer. A major op done by keyhole surgery so I'm left with three puncture and one small incision scars.

Now at 64 I've just removed the dressing a week after yet another major surgical procedure, this time to remove a small tumour from my lonely left kidney. The surgeon couldn't do this keyhole as open surgery meant they could be quicker and more accurately remove the whole tumour while leaving me with as much live kidney as possible. So another five inch scar. Hopefully I'll feel fully recovered soon.

So yes I'm proud to be able to write about them all, because the alternative could have given you very little to read about.
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Sunday 12 November 2017

Theatre: Wait Until Dark.....


The Original Theatre Company in association with Eastbourne Theatres present

     From the hand of Frederick Knott, author of Dial M Murder, and the producers behind Night Must Fall and Birdsong, comes a major revival of the classic, edge of your seat, thriller Wait Until Dark.
     Set amidst the social turbulence of 60’s London the play follows the story of Suzy, a blind woman who left alone in her apartment becomes embroiled with a group of conmen hatching an elaborate scam. As the tension notches up, Suzy is left to fend for herself but with the phone line cut dead and the house plunged into darkness, can Suzy outwit the murderous visitors?
     Wait Until Dark, made into a film starring Audrey Hepburn in 1967, is often ranked as one of the top 100 scariest films of all time and this exciting new production reclaims it for the stage.

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Not sure how I should review this. 

It wasn't awful like my theatre companions vehemently complained but it wasn't good either. It's a classic thriller but done badly. Even in the theatre advert above it says "phone line cut dead" which it wasn't so misleading. It also says the film was "often ranked as one of the top 100 scariest" however what should have been the scariest bits were done so badly they were almost laugh-out-loud worthy.

The set had a long strip of neon light around the living room ceiling which kept coming on for no apparent reason. I can only assume it was meant to be so bright that it would temporarily dazzle the audience so the lights-out sequences would seem even darker.....but that didn't really work either! 

But just to balance this out I have to say...
Karina Jones played the blind Suzy and is actually the first blind actress to play a blind lead character, and she was very good.
Shannon Rewcroft also played her stroppy young girl Gloria really well. 

So not one I'd necessarily recommend.
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