Wednesday, February 15, 2012
I don't have a broken heart, but just a bruised one. Seriously, I have zebra intercostals and was told to come back in five years.Conclusions
Normal
Although that is based on the following values:
Systolic Dimension 29 mm (normal range 20-40 mm)
Biplane Ejection Fraction 58% (normal range 59% +/-7%)
Height 0.0 cm (normal range varies by country)
Weight 0.0 kg (normal range varies by country)
I'm not sure he ticked the box to say I'm alive either.
Blast. I was going to scan the results so I could show you pretty pictures of my heart, except they're quite small, the fold runs through half of them, and I can install the driver for the scanner and the software and then it asks me to select the source from a list of nil.
Reading through the blurb and its thousand-and-one initials (IVSd anyone? Give you a clue, the d is for the state, and the V is something to do with a heart, but not the other V to do with a heart, which normally comes after the other letters, but before the state indicator) there are some worrying numbers in there.
My aortic diameter is 3 mm less than that of my left atrium, which given somewhere on the web says the ratio is meant to be under 1, which... er hang on, so the ideal is to have a tube bigger than the chamber feeding it? In terms of avoiding pressure drop over the system fine, but the flow rates are going to be a bit pants. Stupid internet.
Ooh, now if I ever feel heavy hearted I can know just how heavy: LVd Mass 91.61g. Presumably that's blood only, rather than surrounding tissue, and it's only one side. The same ventricle shrinks 20 mm during each heartbeat.
And the fastest my blood runs (during a resting state, so trying not to fall asleep in a darkened room, with Classic FM on, which is often what I have when I am trying to fall asleep) is 1.36 ms^-1. Which thanks to the marvels of the internet (and fluke) means the blood running through my aortic valve should never die (what do you mean it doesn't work like that?).
Oh and it's Intraventricular Septum, diastolic. So the bit in the middle of your heart, splitting it in two, during diastole, so the period of relaxation as the heart fills with blood again, thus at the time when it is thinnest. Mine is 0.6 cm. Or 6 mm in a world that doesn't use yucky units. This seems very thin, and yet, as anyone who has ever tried to bone raw meat should know, 6 mm can also be quite resilient.
You understand all that right? If not, I'm not impressed, just as I am not impressed by someone I know who chose not to be astounded by negative green and the manipulation of the world our brains make to produce it, because he assumed he wouldn't understand, so didn't try, giving the excuse that he's just an accountant.
Incidentally my heart rate while lying in the dark with a man's arm round my chest and his stomach resting against my back (he half rolled me over to get better access, thereby meaning that for the rest of the exam I had to keep still when he typed as one end of the keyboard was lodged on my shoulder) was 69. I'm not sure what that implies.
And in other news I'm still not brave enough to suggest doing Tomorrow Belongs To Me on the German trip. But after the vetoing of the proms medley (um, they know it's absurd, we know it's absurd—the only waves we rule are on the Serpentine—and throwing someone's hard work back in their face isn't the best way to greet our hosts [though apparently they mooted us doing a single fifteen minute set with their orchestra then the rest of concert being the orchestra alone, which given the dual billing, and the coming quite a long way for it, um, yes, negotiations are ongoing, by which I mean they haven't yet replied to an alternative suggestion) we have to do something...
Oh, that was a handy point to leave it on. We are now doing a German song to go with the Sesotho (and French). Was ist "coals to Newcastle" auf Deustche?
Neu wort (isch): kitschig
Oh dear, I seem to have tumbled down the Kaninchenloch. German folk music is really all a-drinking and a-hunting we will go. This stuff makes schlager seem sane.
Oh, and there's someone new (well, ignoring the other new guy who didn't come back), who actually talked to me. He's the farmer's boy (I didn't know he was the farmer; I also don't know the farmer's name) and he wears green glasses and was convinced he knew me from somewhere, which, while possible, seems unlikely, because he is about a whole school younger than me, and we went to different schools (except college, but the overlap wasn't there).
And um, that's about it. Excitement round here runs to the final lack of snow and relaid tarmac (I remember that pavement now crumbled being resurfaced the last time round, and then the gas main being replaced half a year later, breaking the perfect surface we used as we dumped three-houses' momentum swinging up the lawn).
Anyhoo,
"Don't I know you from somewhere?"
He really said that to you?! People actually use that line?!
Play along - see where it goes. Green glasses are cute.
He really said that to you?! People actually use that line?!
Play along - see where it goes. Green glasses are cute.
Yes, so apparently so.
I'm not aware enough to play along (you think he was coming on to me? People come on to me? Well, except for those who do). Perhaps next week.
I'm not aware enough to play along (you think he was coming on to me? People come on to me? Well, except for those who do). Perhaps next week.
Your posts are astounding, as stounding as a stounding brass. Well that's what occurred to me because mostly I was stumped, impressed, but stumped. Do you play cricket? I can't think what other line to take. An enormous spider is coming across the desk towards me. It's just crossed the peg doll and has paused in the beautiful eggshell blue pot (present from Tintagel) that I bought because I was convinced the seagull on it looked like the work of Mary Fedden. It's a Barnstaple Pottery pot and there is no evidence that she ever worked for them :( I love Mary Fedden.
That seems to be it. Not sure it amounts to an opinion. The spider's got held up. Love, Alec xx
That seems to be it. Not sure it amounts to an opinion. The spider's got held up. Love, Alec xx
# posted by 
: February 17, 2012 12:29 am
: February 17, 2012 12:29 am
I think it's possible. Choirs are hotbeds of passion I've heard. Check for steam on his glasses next week - that'll be the giveaway.
Astounding, Alec? That'll be all the clanging symbolism. That or the inherited tendency to assume the world knows what I know and thinks in the same way I do.
No, I don't play cricket (were you trying to work out the bruising? I had an ultrasound to see if I had the same heart condition my father died off, which we didn't know he had, hence all the odd stats, and I of course am a precious flower, thus bruise readily).
Who cares if it's Fedden, you thought it beautiful.
I'm intrigued by the peg doll. Did you make it?
Ben, tempted to huff in his face before doing the glasses test.
No, I don't play cricket (were you trying to work out the bruising? I had an ultrasound to see if I had the same heart condition my father died off, which we didn't know he had, hence all the odd stats, and I of course am a precious flower, thus bruise readily).
Who cares if it's Fedden, you thought it beautiful.
I'm intrigued by the peg doll. Did you make it?
Ben, tempted to huff in his face before doing the glasses test.
I hope you don't have any heart condition, apart from a normal one. I really hope that. I bruise easily too, apparently without cause. I find them on myself sometimes and they are parti-coloured implying they came up some time ago, but I didn't know I'd got it.
My mother made peg dolls. It's a wildly uncharacteristic thing for her to have done. They're found occasionally still in boxes in attics, or Dad finds them in drawers in his room. I found some in the garden shed once. The one on my desk is dressed in the period of William IV, with lace on her print dress, pantaloons showing below the hem, and her painted hair in loops round her ears. She's unfinished and has no mouth. She just reminds me of Mum.
Of course you're right about Fedden, and I do love the little pot and think it beautiful. x
My mother made peg dolls. It's a wildly uncharacteristic thing for her to have done. They're found occasionally still in boxes in attics, or Dad finds them in drawers in his room. I found some in the garden shed once. The one on my desk is dressed in the period of William IV, with lace on her print dress, pantaloons showing below the hem, and her painted hair in loops round her ears. She's unfinished and has no mouth. She just reminds me of Mum.
Of course you're right about Fedden, and I do love the little pot and think it beautiful. x
# posted by : February 17, 2012 7:45 pm
: February 17, 2012 7:45 pm
Thank you. They couldn't find anything wrong with my heart, but it was possibly a hereditary feature so had to be checked.
How long ago did your mother die? Although I'm not surprised about things still turning up; my parents' (I suppose I ought say mothers' now) has boxes that probably haven't been fully unpacked for a generation or two. And they always have keys in, although I can't really blame people, still having my car keys without the car (and apparently the old front door key, and ex-locker keys, and possibly still current boat padlock keys, and keys to a flat my brother moved out of years ago, because, well, they might come in useful).
Post a Comment
How long ago did your mother die? Although I'm not surprised about things still turning up; my parents' (I suppose I ought say mothers' now) has boxes that probably haven't been fully unpacked for a generation or two. And they always have keys in, although I can't really blame people, still having my car keys without the car (and apparently the old front door key, and ex-locker keys, and possibly still current boat padlock keys, and keys to a flat my brother moved out of years ago, because, well, they might come in useful).
<< Home
