"Hüte dich, fürchte dich"

Many years ago, I used to work for the University of London, at a rambling old suite of buildings that had a very old and reliable-yet-temperamental boiler. Because the administration was of the old-school, we still had people like Porters and so on and we also had a Fitter and a Fitter's Mate, who were responsible for keeping 'the old girl' (as they called her) going. Through the winter, they were outside the boiler-room in the darkness at 0600h drinking their tea and smoking their cigarettes and preparing to get the 'old girl' going for the day. I'm not entirely convinced they were even paid to come in that early but did so out of loyalty to not just the staff and students but 'the old girl' herself - they took an enormous sense of pride in getting her going every day, including every few months, the Fitter's Mate used to vanish through the floorboards of the Hall and would spend hours crawling about messing with valves that had to basically be adjusted with the seasons. I went down there once myself for a nose and it was much as I imagine the steering flat of the Titanic must've looked!

My body has a Fitter's Mate too, who keeps me upright, moving and able to do my job and have a life no matter what the weather. He's my physiotherapist, J. Last night I saw him and he released a lot of muscle tension and pain around my left shoulder which is now at the stage at which it dislocates in my sleep and quite often several times during the day. It's frustrating and frustratingly painful. Thankfully, I have someone capable of just keeping me going, no matter what the weather or what life throws at me. Besides, it's oddly cathartic having someone to talk about absolute nonsense to every few weeks - everything from which flavour of Calpol tastes better through to baby sloths hugging kittens.

It's also quite cathartic writing this blabber every day. Why do I do it? Well, the original reason was that I wanted to start food-blogging - which is kind of now more important since I've decided to try the whole "eat stuff from a different country for a week" a few times a month...but now I'm enjoying just writing any old crap to be honest. Why not, after all?!