Personal Blogs

Hi all,

My back recovery started turning a corner yesterday when I managed my first day on less than maximum allowed dosage of painkillers, and last night I didn't need to come downstairs in the middle of the night for painkillers - hurrah with brass knobs on!!! 🥳. I will admit to being more than a little concerned about how bad my back had become whilst in hospital; apart from the initial ambulance trip and the first 12 hours, virtually all the morphine and IV paracetamol I had was for my back pain. However, it feels much closer to pre-admission levels where I only needed one or two doses a day to keep it under control.

I forgot to mention that Wifey brought my Faraday Y2 electronic recorder instrument in for the 2nd or 3rd night and it was fantastic. It really helped de-stress and distract me when pain or hospital noise woke me up in the wee hours, rather than just being awake and thinking about not being able to sleep. It has so invigorated my musical side that I ordered a new musical keyboard that should arrive tomorrow. The 'LinnStrument' has firm, square, silicone keys layed out in a grid with the notes increasing by semitones left to right and by a customisable increment (5 semitones by default) going up the rows, so similar to a guitar. The 'C's are backlit blue and the other whole notes green, with the sharps and flats unlit. this means the finger pattern to create a particular chord is the same anywhere on the keyboard. The most exciting thing, though, is that it is very expressive, registering downwards force (usually volume), left-to-right force (usually tone change, such as vibrato), and forwards-backwards force (often used for timbre change, such as bow position).

That's all for now, folks.
All the best,
Chris