Irish Greetings

5 Feb’11

Good day to all, family and friends!
Birthdays!!!!!
Today 5th
Nine in Kokanje! Happy Birthday and may the year be full of wonderful experiences and surprises!
8th Feb
Belinda in Roodepoort!
Happy Birthday to you! We pray that your year will be magnificent!
Kathleen in England
...and a Happy Birthday to you! Hope you will have a joyful year with little Isabelle and Tim as company!
Philip Josling 12th
Rachelle please convey our best wishes to Philip!
Brenda in England 13th!
Josie, please convey our best wishes to your Mom!
Weather!!!!!
I have got a felling that somewhere the clockwork of nature has had a hiccup!!!!
Chicago is under the snow! Australia had the floods and now the Hurricane, South Africa had good rains and floods!
And off course we must not forget Ireland that can have all 4 seasons in one day!
Temperatures during the last week went up to 12-13, no sun thou but plenty , ooooo, plenty of wind! And rain as accompaniment! Storm-like winds, trees down, and a woman was killed by a freak accident when she walked along the pavement and a tree fell on her and killed her! This is a warm wind but not pleasant to be in!
The garden is transforming into yellow and purple crocuses and looks lovely! The daffodils and tulips are about 4” above the ground! The birds are singing in the trees and it is so beautiful, the robins, the thrushes, and the black birds it is like a symphony outside! Barry still supplements them with peanuts and oats! I will have to prune next week if it stops raining as all the rose trees are pushing out there little buds!
The severe cold killed 2 of my orchids they just became like jelly, the old one is so faithful and still have 6 flowers on since October it had 32 flowers on 3 stems!
The baskets will be dealt with early March!
On the political front the country experience voting fever as the Dail (parliament) was dissolved on Tuesday 1st.
We can only hope and pray that who-ever come into power that the corruption and enormous salaries will come to an end Our Prime Minister earned more than Barak Obama and his pension will be of great comfort to him for the rest of his life!
In the mean time we the working class are struggling to make ends meet since the new USC payment has come into effect! The first politician has called at the door and she can be glad I was asleep as she would have had a difficult time with me! Barry was very polite but put his point over with conviction!
At the hospital things are moving fast! Mr Mark Gordon, with his Northern accent seems to be a very able financier and the CT scanner as well as the MRI scanner will be installed next week!!!!! That is surely one of the greatest assets that the hospital will have as the nearest one is a good 50-75 km away!
The new Emergency Department is already being created with inner walls taken out and cubicles being installed- The admission ward is in progress and the future will bring a 125 bed Nursing home single rooms with en suite and all possible facilities for the elderly! To be finished in 4 years time!
The new theatres are being constructed and will be in use before July. The hospital being built in the early 60’s does not have piped Oxygen and that is being installed in the High care Units at present!
We still push O2 cylinders around to where they are needed!
They also caught me for a sucker again when they left me and a carer with 13 patients one night of which 3 came out of theatre after 7pm 8 medical cases of which 2 were confused and needed constant observation and to round the lot off a re-admission of an Autistic child who had a tonsillectomy and went home and never ate or drank anything, dehydrated and in a collapsed state we had to infuse this impossible child with fluids and IV antibiotics, I claim that pain management in a child is of the utmost importance but ......... we coped and that is my problem , we always cope till one night and then there will be no- one helping us in court if something goes wrong and we did not cope! I there-for have now an appointment with the new boss to discuss our problems at night and to show him my letter of concerns written last Oct and the managers answer to it as well as my report regarding the unsafe patients: nurse ratio at night!
I might have no job there-after but I feel I have to do it!
The AGM at church has agreed to the purchasing of an organ and now it is so exiting and we can’t wait for its arrival and installation! It is not big but a real church organ (digital) but with pipe organ sounds!. Tomorrow is as always the best day of my week and after a difficult week of work behind me I cannot wait for the soul food we receive from a very gifted preacher!
The children and Lukas were here last Sunday and that was also wonderful, the little man is too cute and has this little finger that inspects everything and picks up everything he lays his eyes on!
He has no problem with grey matter and has his parents running rings around him!
That brings me to the end of this week’s letter and hope that you are all well!
Thank you so much for all of you that send letters during the week it is always so lovely to read about you all! We are awaiting the link to the wedding photographs of Sam and Emma!
Watch every step you take, leave no place for carelessness and may it go well with you all!
Warm regards from us in Cranleymore!
Barry and Christina