Optical Illusions

I feel it's time to, at least, trace a line under my ill health. I'm sure that I'll revisit it soon enough.

The appointment with the consultant went surprisingly well considering I have to have keyhole surgery on my shoulder on July 31st and am going under a general anaesthetic. I have this impingement, which is really aggravating the shoulder joint and causing the bone to rub against already inflamed muscle. See! I said there was something wrong with me!!!

As a result, it looks like I might not get my wish. Boredom has been a key factor in me thinking I'm going out of my mind and my consultant informed me that he doesn't think I should be driving still and that the more rest I give my shoulder the less pain I will suffer; and to be fair, he's been right about that. I have done very little conventional work using my left arm and subsequently it has felt better. However, if I use it, I suffer the next day. Take the appointment on Tuesday; I opted to drive myself over to Kettering in my own car (yay!); if I could manage that okay then I could at least go back to work for the month before the op.

My shoulder was screaming abuse at me by the time I got to the Holcot roundabout on the way home and all day Wednesday it just sat there and called me all the cunts under the sun. The sad truth is it's fucked and this operation will hopefully solve the majority of the problem.

So, I'm off to see my GP in the morning and the odds are is that he will agree with the consultant and sign me off for quite possibly the next 6 weeks with the proviso to visit him again two weeks after the operation to see how much progress I've been making; but the consultant said two to four weeks recovery; so I might be looking at going back to work after August Bank Holiday...

Jesus Christ on stilts, I need a new hobby! One that doesn't involve using my arms preferably (or my back).

Of course, the heat hasn't made things better. I might have a Mediterranean sun tan and look healthy, but this heat, while fantastic, has made it very difficult to do anything. I spent half an hour yesterday picking strawberries (we have a glut of them this year), wearing only a pair of shorts and boxers; I had to change when I finished because the sweat had soaked everything. I don't sleep very well at the best of times, so sleep has been hard to come by and because I'm bored, the heat makes me restless. There has been very little positive to come out of the last 4 weeks, but I'm grateful for what has been, all the same.

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JJ Abrams appears to be the new Spielberg; most everything he touches at the moment turns to gold. I'm a bit of a fan, as much as I hate admitting it, but he does seem to produce stuff that pushes the right buttons with me. That's not to say I don't find a lot of faults with his stuff, but I find faults in most things if hard pressed.

This year I've had two visual treats: The Star Trek film, while leaving me a little dissatisfied was still one of the highlights of the year so far and Lost has developed into quite possibly the maddest, most fucked up bit of television in existence and I no longer care what happens, I'm just blown away by the way the series has just never gone the way you think it will.

But recently, me and the wife sat down and watched Fringe, over the space of 3 weeks rather than 20. I think it's quite an extraordinary series that suffers from a little stiffness in some of the characters, but so did the cast of Lost when they first appeared. Over the space of 20 episodes, the plot has moved forward much further than the X Files managed in almost its entire series. In fact it's gone from being a bit of a shiny 21st century Mulder and Scully + granddad to being just as fucked up as Lost.

For those of you who haven't been tempted; there are some genuinely naff episodes, but John Noble - Walter Bishop - can make shit shine and as the series gathers pace, you realise that this eccentric slightly mad scientist is one of the most complex and likable characters to appear on television in years. Fringe starts with an FBI agent, Olivia Dunham, being recruited to the Fringe Science Dept, funded by Homeland Security, which looks into a series of totally unexplained incidents that have been taking place all over the world. In turn she recruits the fore-father of Fringe science, Walter Bishop, but he'll only work with them if his son is there. His son, Peter, is basically a freelancer - he can do many things and had shown no interest in settling down. Walter is totally bonkers and the only way the FBI can have him is for his son to be with him.

This is essentially the team, they are joined by Broyles, who is the boss, in a very much Mitch Pillegi style; Astrid Farnsworth, who is Agent Dunham's assistant and Charlie Francis, who is a former partner of Olivia and a close friend who acts as liaison between the Fringe team and the rest of the FBI. There is an organisation called Massive Dynamics, which has links to Walter Bishop; a bald man in a suit called The Observer and lots of weird shit, which gets weirder towards the end of season 1 when we learn all manner of interesting teasers.

Depending on whether they can keep the momentum going, I can see Fringe being a big success for Fox, who, of course, were responsible for the X Files. I get the impression the producers took a look at Charlie Jade and thought 'we can do that better!'.

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Some other things have not gone according to plan this week, but mustn't grumble, eh?