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Taken in 1963, it shows the Bendigo Baptist Church Intermediate Christian Endeavour group of that time with li'l ol' me smack dab in the centre of the front row! It also shows my brother Geoff and my best friend Harry Wilkinson, amongst many other friends I had in the group. This was part of an article written by the paper about the upcoming 150th Anniversary of the church, when I hope to be attending some of the celebrations.
My recent weeks have been uneventful, apart from when I went to see a movie at the cinema for the first time in many moons. It was Gran Turana... a film I would highly recommend, starring Clint Eastwood.
My Easter was virtually a non-event as the pressure spots under my legs had become infected and were bleeding, thus I spent most of the time in bed in an attempt to relieve them. This will continue for some time, so I will be spending less time on my beloved computer!
The night before Good Friday was rather traumatic for me. My support worker who was due to do her shift putting me to bed at 9 p.m. phoned two hours earlier (just after I arrived home from my dialysis treatment) to say she was stranded out of town with a car that wouldn't start, so "sorry, but can you get someone else to do my shift"?
Phone calls to everyone in my team, plus the hospital, on call nurse and the after hours number of my service provider all met with negative results. By this time it was 10 p.m. and my legs were screaming for relief. I had broken out in a cold sweat and, in desperation, I checked the phone numbers on my computer of my past carers, phoning the only three that had not moved from their original addresses. The first two were also out of town and the third didn't answer!
I then rang another local service provider who said they couldn't help me because "our staff have not been trained to work with you". As I was speaking to them and telling them what I thought of them, the third of my past carers (Jan) rang to check who had called her earlier and told me that, after downing a quick cup of coffee, she would come around and put me to bed. I settled down to sleep at 11.30 p.m.
Needless to say I was also a trifle upset when the answering service of my service provider (Independence Australia, originally known as ParaQuad), said that their emergency calls were handled in the order of urgency, so I left a message saying my situation had become desperate and I needed to get to bed as quickly as possible.
I then waited for their expected return call... which came at 4 p.m. the following afternoon!!! They asked had I managed to get to bed yet, to which I mischieviously responded "no"... so they offered to send someone round to assist me! I then confessed that I HAD managed to get assistance, so they wished me a Happy Easter before hanging up... a great SERVICE provider!
I'm afraid the word "service" doesn't have the same meaning these days.
