Thursday, July 1, 2010

Wakka wakka

Gosh, my last posts have been shockin depressing. Not like me, but optimism and the enduring positivity of thoughts on the bright side aren't impervious to other forces.

Even when you're caught up with an illness, there are the normal battles of a twenty-something-year-old on other fronts. They serve as distractions sometimes, most of the time they just make the war itself more difficult.

But I did have one funny thought in all the recent long days and that was that after over a year of trying to describe the noise Brendan makes, I have finally been granted a useful aid for demonstrative purposes.

The vuvuzela.

That monotone drone? That's what I get from Brendan for eight hours every night. It's interrupted by a bit of banging and hissing about once every hour when it drains my tummy and starts filling me for the next 50-minute cycle. But for the most part, that hum that's reminiscent of a swarm of bees trapped inside a fridge, that irritating buzzing that TV viewers of the World Cup will have endured for the love of the game in the last couple of weeks - that's Brendan.

If I had known this tribal horn was going to be such a feature of South Africa and that the sensitive ears of extremely valuable bodies would be affected, I could have offered Brendan to some of the boys in advance to acclimatise them.

Or suggested we organise a symphony of Brendans...seat them around a small stadium somewhere and invited the players to come and practice in such a setting. Maybe even got Adidas or Pepsi to film one of their ads where players just happen to all walk out of alleyways and start doing their tricks with some street urchins and Oliver types.

Too late for that now, but all is not lost. In recent weeks it was announced that the 2010 World Transplant Games will also take place in South Africa. I'll hopefully have had a successful transplant by then and Brendan will have left me, so returning to that noise will be something of an auditory homecoming.

6 comments:

  1. I wonder if Flann O'Brien's theory regarding atoms transferring between a man and his bicycle might apply to yourself and Brendan.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Holemaster - It's been so long since I read The Third Policeman, I'd totally forgotten the atom transfer theory. The thought that I may soon morph into half human/half dialysis machine requires much thought;-)

    ReplyDelete
  3. I have a bitch called brenda, she's hissing and puffing here at the moment and it feels like she's actually going to suck my intestines out. A little tip for you when he's finished his cycle ( make sure your heater bag has filled ) and goes into drone drone drone drone mode just hit the red button and then hit the green button-silence for at least an hour but you get to sleep and it doesnt interupt your dwell or cycle. So its red the green. Works I promise. Ok there is still a small noise but minimal. I actually have no idea why it has to make that noise for two hours, it does nothing.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymouse - I discovered that little trick early on too, but I find that some nights it works, other nights it doesn't. I don't know why. My other problem is I have organised my room so that Brendan is as far away as possible and any fiddling with him requires me to get out of the bed. I find I always have pain for a few minutes after draining and filling is complete and moving in any way hurts. I have no idea why they need to make noise when they're dwelling either. The day they invent a silent dialysis machine will be the second greatest day, the actual greatest being the day we get called for transplant. Good luck x

    ReplyDelete
  5. why dont u email the makers (yes seriously!)and ask them to install music apps to mask the noise...the tokoyo dart (dont know what its called tart ?!) - has a different jingle for each stop..and its pleasant and a good idea...so u can recongise ur stop by its jingle before the doors open..maybe something similiar for a dialysis machine would work nicely and remove one of the annoyances...its the type of thing not usually thought of at the design stage where theres little user feedback input into the design..
    string

    ReplyDelete
  6. String - Ideally it would play Wet, Wet Wet's 'Love is all Around' on the pan pipes. Or possibly some kind of continuous elevator music, the sort that sends you into a trance

    ReplyDelete