Bonjela

I’ve realised this evening as I was scrabbling around for something to numb the pain in my gum (don’t ask) that I’ve incredibly strong associations with Bonjela; and sadly the most recent one has tainted it somehow. http://instagram.com/p/sN3rnJATfJ/ As children my parents desperately tried to keep us healthy. There was no junk food in our […]

Impersonal correspondence: 10-15 #nhssm

Once I’ve started something I always try my hardest to finish it, so having deconstructed and analysed paragraphs 1-9 of a letter from Katrina Percy to Sara Ryan, this post attempts to finish the rest of it. If you’d like to catch up before reading this, you can read the analysis of paras 1-3 here, then paras […]

Impersonal correspondence: paras 7-9 #nhssm

I continue, huge respect to anyone with the stamina to keep coming back to this issue, but as the conversation on twitter suggests it needs unpacking. You can read the analysis of paras 1-3 here and paras 4-6 here. Sara’s original letter is here and Katrina Percy’s response here. If you’re sitting comfortably, cuppa, chocolate, […]

Impersonal correspondence: paras 4-6 #nhssm

This post continues on from Impersonal correspondence: paras 1-3, all the context is there. This post continues to deconstruct the letter, starting at paragraph 4: ‘Like every single organisation and individual in the world, we are not perfect and on a rare number of occasions we get things wrong, sometimes with deeply distressing consequences. On […]

Impersonal correspondence: paras 1-3 #nhssm

I’ve been involved with the JusticeforLB campaign now for over six months, a number of people who work in communications roles, especially in the NHS, have been in touch in that time to say how useful this campaign has been for their learning, indeed one person described Southern Health’s behaviour as the ugly, of the good, […]

For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won, The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting, While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;                          But O heart! heart! heart!           […]

On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

Going to keep this one short, there is enough written about the limitations of fighting metaphors to last a lifetime (however long that is). Susan Sontag wrote Illness as a Metaphor back in 1978, since then many, many others have visited this territory. I was reminded today of Jay Rayners obituary for John Diamond (hat tip to […]

The blackest of Wednesdays

It was five years ago today, yet I remember nearly every bit of it as though it was yesterday. I can recall his name, his walk or rather his strut, his voice and his manner, perhaps one blessing in disguise is that I can’t remember his face. It’s odd that but I often wonder whether […]

My 60 thousandth tweet

I appear to be developing a bit of a habit of marking the round numbers of thousands of tweets with a blog post, not sure why really other than it seems good to mark the symmetry in some way, and perhaps also to take an opportunity to highlight a few things. My 35kth tweet was marked by […]