Personal Blogs

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[14 minute read]

Part Two

 Mental Health issues

All I wanted was a pair of glasses, but I got a whole series of tests beforehand.

I actually know more about my eyes than the optician.

I have a tiny, tiny hole in one of my retinas. It is so small that it is extremely difficult to detect; an ophthalmologist will not see it. A consultant ophthalmologist, on the other hand, might find it, might. My local hospital / eye clinic is a very good one. It is not relying on poorly educated or harried staff to make quick judgements with quick examinations of patients. I have glaucoma and have bi-annual checks that everyone else might get at their UK opticians. However, my checks are a little more intense in the hospital; I get tipped in the chair so I am horizontal and my eyes are minutely scrutinised. A typical examination takes about forty minutes to an hour. 

Unfortunately, I am used as a guinea-pig for ophthalmologists to learn how to spot irregularities in eyes. A consultant ophthalmologist can very quickly see the extent of damage in my eye when they are aware of it from my medical record. The hospital ophthalmologists simply cannot and need to be instructed by the consultant on what to look for. What hope can a high-street ophthalmologist have of finding an anomaly in the short time they have to examine a customer? The amount of time looking left, right, up, and down with a light shining in both eyes and the high street ophthalmologist looking for monsters is about one twentieth of the time that is spent looking in just one of my eyes during my examination every six months at my local hospital.

‘Your eyes are fine. I cannot detect anything wrong.’ (other than a slight myopia and astigmatisms).

I happen to know that I have damage to the optical nerve in one eye and a small hole in the retina in the other eye. This is why when I wanted new glasses/spectacles I mentioned that I just need the sight test. I already know the pressure in my eyes and there are recent photographs of the beautiful interior of my eyes.

I just need something simple but they take my agency away and give me something needlessly complicated, time-consuming and inadequate for requirements. I don’t even need vision correction to legally drive on the road.

Go online for a very quick search or wait for the computer to stop hogging the WiFi bandwidth and download speed?

Sometimes I want to just Google something, but my computer is subjugated by the operating system and its time is taken up dealing with the boorish and over-bearing demands to process instructions. Essentially, commands are given to the CPU, calculations are done and information comes out which gets used to make up new commands for it to process. We could liken this to a small child relentlessly asking a parent, ‘Why?’ except there is a good reason to educate a child.

The operating system on my computer wants to update all the programs, software, or apps, every time the computer goes online. I don’t want updates; not even security updates. The more processes that are running the less agile is the system. The larger the software is, the longer it takes to run. I don’t store files on my computer. This is for two reasons; both of which are based on digital security. Ironically, the purpose of updating software, particularly security software, is to supposedly, make personal information that is stored on internet-ready devices more secure. For me, it actually makes my personal data less secure. Let me tell you why.

If I want to upload a Tutor-marked assignment, I typically will not have been connected to the internet while I am finalising the TMA. Before I upload the TMA it must be saved to a flash drive or memory stick with the appropriate metadata such as my name and identity number. Now that we can inadvertently download AI software that wants to help us (no thanks) I cannot leave any trace on the device that is about to connect to the internet so I often MOVE the file to the memory stick instead of copying, pasting and deleting, which does leave a trace. It used to be that if we deleted something the file still existed, and only the first letter of the filename would be deleted; in effect, making the file still recoverable yet at the same time invisible to the user and the computer, so it would be written over with new files. So, if you wanted to remove traces from your system you should move it. The data file stored on the computer would have an entry that the file has moved and is no longer accessible. Today, AI, inadvertently downloaded as a system update, makes recovery of the contents of a moved file recoverable but without the original formatting. What this means to me is that, I need to completely reformat my Hard Drive and reinstall the operating system every now and again so AI cannot generate an accurate profile of me to upload to a database for marketers, spies, hackers, and miserable and lonely people to dissect and make my digital life an abject misery for me.

Needless to say, there are no files on any of my devices that have my name, address, telephone number or identifying details on them. There are never photographs of people I know on my internet-ready devices. There are, of course, photographs of film stars because AI searches for photographs of people in order to build a network of people known to each other. I suspect that klaxons go off in government departments if a computer that is known to be for private use has no detectable traces of human contact. Of course, AI knows who is an actor and who isn’t, because everyone has told the world about themselves. Thanks a bunch!  ‘Awake ye drunkards and weep.’

I use a separate computer to put my name on a file to be uploaded, which gets placed on a memory stick that goes into a different computer, that I shall connect to the internet so I can upload the file. I do not want to wait while the computer connects to the internet and checks for updates; remember I absolutely do not want updates. I must wait until the numbers at the bottom of the screen show no internet action before I can insert the memory stick (which not very strangely initiates internet activity). I then need to upload the file as fast as I can before the whole contents of the memory stick is uploaded to a cloud somewhere, and then quickly remove the memory stick. Obviously, the memory stick does not have only a few files on it, because they would be almost instantly uploaded within a second. Instead, the memory stick is almost entirely full with rubbish as well as the important file. Typically, the memory sticks I use have at least 4GB storage and the upload speed is insufficient to upload all the files before I disconnect from the internet.

All I really want to do is write files on a computer and safely upload them whenever I want without all the other files being interrogated and uploaded somewhere else. I have no agency over my own digital security without lengthy and complicated procedures that are necessary because I cannot control my computer’s operating system. If you listen carefully, you can hear me repeating, just under my breath, ‘Just do as I tell you, and stop making decisions on my behalf.’ My computer doesn’t listen; for all its wonderful computing power, it is still stupid enough to allow itself to be enslaved by someone else’s (not my) idea of what is relevant or desirable.

By the way, my computers have manual analogue switches that prevent inadvertent connection to WiFi. They absolutely do not have digital switches that send a current through a circuit board to a transistor to switch the power on or switch off. Imagine a toggle-type light switch and you get the idea. Why do I insist on these switches? Because, like mobile phones, computers can be remotely switched on while we are asleep. If a computer, or phone, has automatic connection to the internet all the files stored on it will probably be uploaded to a data storage centre. Don’t worry though, it has already happened during the day, anyway, when you knew your phone was on. That photograph of you on holiday in The Maldives will get you targeted for the marketing of holidays in Tunisia, and The Seychelles.

Get lots of water quickly at low pressure or have a small volume of water at high pressure so the bath fills slowly?

I like to not use more water than is necessary. This means that I might, rather than fill a bowl at the kitchen sink with warm water and washing liquid, run a plate, cutlery, saucepan, etc, under a cold tap after having applied water and a smidgen of detergent with a sponge to the items. I want to rinse the suds off. If I turn my tap on water spurts onto the items and sprays across my worktops. Turn the water pressure down, you might suggest. It is not the water pressure that needs adjusting; it is that little device in the tap that restricts the flow of water to supposedly reduce the volume of water in favour of increasing the pressure, to what? Resemble a pressure-washer? Don’t be daft! Whoever, thought that the tiny spurt would force debris off a plate and de-grease it at the same time is clearly in cloud cuckoo-land. If they had thought for a moment they would have recognised that detergent must be applied, and in the application, scrubbing will ensue to shift reluctant and recalcitrant food debris. Isn’t that what those little green things are for? Those flat mats of mild abrasion?

So, now I have to flavour the dishes, pans and cutlery with detergent, scrub a little, and dip them into a bowl of cold water twice, with a refill of the bowl for the second rinse. This is so I do not spray water across my kitchen and need to mop up my floor afterwards.

All I want to do is save water, but the water-saving widget prevents me from doing that. I want low pressure water with a high volume, not the other way around. Why? Because, although I rarely take a bath, I want the level of water in the bath to reach a preferred level quite quickly. Specifically, within a short period so I do not have to sit and watch the pitiful, but excited, flow pretend to be the best for the job. Bless it, it tries, but it really is practically useless.

Yesterday, I used a hose-pipe attached to the same bathroom tap and the water came out at a low pressure but with the same volume. Thank Heavens for laminar flow and chaos. Imagine the water closest to the material of the hose pipe being slowed down by friction, and the most central part of the flow in the hosepipe being only slowed by the friction with the slower water surrounding it. You can probably imagine that turbulence and vortices are created in the hosepipe. This is what I must do to have agency over whether I need to mop water off my worktops and floor when I wash a dish in the kitchen.

Finally, when I apply for a job, these days I must first impress a recruitment agency who have only their own reputation and profit as their goal. Then, once I have been deemed acceptable to their client, I have to cause the potential employer that to believe that using a third-party is a good use of their finances. About half of the jobs I apply for are re-posted three months later when the successful applicant either leaves or the probation period had expired. Just hire me, I don’t apply for jobs I can’t do. In fact, I have to dumb myself down for most of the jobs. But you know what? If I want to work until the project is complete I am considered to not be suitable because the UK, with all twenty or more paid holidays each year, has adopted a policy of requiring a good work/life balance from the USA who get far less days off. I go to work to work, not plan to take days and time off. I have no agency over my work-life these days because I enjoy work. Thanks recruitment agencies, I don’t think! If people are concerned about having days off to recuperate they are in the wrong job. Don’t get me wrong – most people have to work because they chose a path that they thought would give them pleasure or gave them a suggestion that they would be free from too much suffering. But, I also think we gave up our agency over our lives to strive to meet a fantasy. My happiness today, is hugely marred by agents I never wanted, nor hired.

Here is the irony: if you have a degree and so can demonstrate focus, a drive to succeed, and convergent thinking that evinces a mission to achieve the formulation of a specific outcome, we will consider you for a job with us. However, if you put that you are ‘goal-oriented’ on your CV, we will not give you the job because you need to show divergent thinking that is evinced by emotion and mental fallibility.

Long ago, job application forms used to ask the applicants what their hobbies are. Job application forms do not ask that these days. Just saying!