Sometime ago (possibly years, but who’s counting) I had a blog on 501 Words. I’d fallen out of the habit of writing and thought writing 501 words a day on whatever random word they threw at me might be a good way to not only get back my mojo but improve the quality and quantity of stuff I pen. The fact that my writing on here remains sporadic at best and of questionable quality would indicate just how well that worked out. Anyway, I discovered a month or so ago those 501 words blogs weren’t really working out for anyone and the owner shut it down.
Without warning.
Now, since the dawn of the interwebs, I’ve been told to be careful about what I put out there because once you put something on the internet
IT’S THERE FOREVER! With this in mind, I didn’t bother to back it up or keep copies of my written pieces. There was no need.
:-/
It seems that not everything you put on the Internet is actually there forever. Pictures of the time you were caught dancing on a tabletop, drunk, with your boobs hanging out at Aunty Silvia’s 50th and ranty tweets about the dodgy real estate agent you rent through are there forever but blogs, meh, they’re not important. Deleted.
I think I’d written about 50 or so vignettes, I was able to recover about seven from Google’s cached pages. Seven. I’m pretty sure nothing I wrote over at 501 was a master… (wait, they’re gone forever so you’ll never know if they were the next War and Peace) … I’ve been robbed of a Nobel Prize.
Yeah ok, let's not get carried away. So what’s the lesson here? Back shit up? Quite possibly should be although a better question might be: What will I actually take away from this? Shit doesn't stay online forever go ahead and post whatever you want? Probably. (FYI: I wouldn't hold your breath waiting on those aforementioned pics, I don't have an Aunt Silvia).
because I just KNOW you’re desperate to read a sample of my 501 brilliance. Here’s one of the recovered pieces. The word of the day was Articulate.
06 May 2010
Recently I was witness to the most infuriating “who’s on first” type conversation between my mother and one of her nurses. My mother was admitted to hospital where she underwent an angiogram, among other tests. Following the angiogram, she had to lie still for 7 hours so the area where they cut into the artery would clot properly and heal over. If you move too soon afterwards, you run the risk of blowing the clot and bleeding out.
For whatever reason, this hadn’t been explained clearly to my mum.
Unfortunately, they had allowed my mum to eat her lunch and drink a cup of tea during this 7 hour wait. She had to lie flat on her back, so how she managed to eat an entire meal and drink a hot cup of tea I’m not entirely clear on, but she did. I arrived about an hour after she’d finished her lunch, when, as you might imagine, nature was calling. My mother called a nurse so that she could… well go. The nurse smiled and nodded as my mother explained that she had to go. The nurse looked puzzled and informed her that she couldn’t go, she was staying overnight.
“No. I need to go.” My mum said.
“Uh-huh. You have to stay.” The Nurse replied politely.
“I’m not talking about leaving.” My mum answered.
“Oh good. Why do you want to go?” The nurse asked kind of puzzled.
“Because of the tea.” My mum stated.
“You can have tea here.” The nurse smiled.
“I’ve had tea. That’s why I need to go.” At this point my mother was pulling the blankets off her, preparing to get up.
“I think they bring the tea around in the evening.” The nurse said, checking her watch and then promptly pulling the blankets back up over my mum.
“No, just before.” My mum had on her irritated voice now. As her daughter, I knew it well.
“It’s still a little while off.” The nurse said, checking her watch again.
“What is?” Mum had stopped struggling with the blankets.
“Afternoon tea.” The nurse smiled triumphantly.
“I’ve already had tea.” the words were coming out slowly and purposefully, as though she were talking to a child.
“Ok then, so you’re all set.” If the nurse was aware of my mother’s growing irritation, she did not show it.
“No, I need to go.”
My brother arrived at some point during this exchange and he, like myself, stood by in a kind of stunned silence and mild amusement. My mother and the nurse went on like this for another 10 or so minutes, when a male nurse poked his head in, presumably to see what all the commotion was about.
“For Christ sake, get out of the bloody way.” My mum said through clenched teeth. “I need to go now”
“Oh no, ma’am” he said with great concern. “You can’t leave.” He nodded in agreement with the first nurse. It was at this point I realised that if I didn’t intervene they might actually come to blows. I was able to resolve the whole misunderstanding by saying she needs to go to the toilet. If only Abbot had just said “The guys name is Who.”
xoxo
