Not swearing for lent...how hard could it be?

This year i thought to myself...do i want to give anything up for lent? Nah i can't be bothered, there is no point. This was until i was talking to someone about what they were giving up for lent and they said they were going to give up swearing for lent and they would put 5p in a pot every time they swore. Then at the end of the 40 days and nights they would give the money to charity which i thought was a good idea. I said that they would really struggle with that...but then they said they were only doing it in their flat. I felt this was a cop out...which in a way it is.

So to prove a point about how much of a cop out it was, i said i will give up swearing for lent and will put 5p into a pot every time i swear but it will be anywhere and everywhere. I thought i would regret this decision because i swear far more than i should and it is part of my vocabulary which is not the best thing in the world but it is a hard habit to drop. It is coming to the end of my first day of not swearing and my pot is already rattling quite a bit. After a quick count of the money i have 80p in the pot which means i have sworn 16 times today and that is after trying to swear.

I have a feeling this could end up being quite expensive.

Mumps. bloody mumps

Right ok last monday i was in the shower and i had a blocked ear and when that cleared, my jaw started hurting starting from just below my ear and then my jaw swelled up very quickly. Being a bit stubborn i ignored the advice to go to the doctors straight away and decided to leave it for a bit...that was until i was talking to my mum and told her about the pain and she forced me to visit the health centre. So following my mum's advice i took a visit to the doctor's expecting at the very worst an ear infection which they could give me antibiotics for and everything would be fine. I go at about quarter past 12 as i had a lecture at 1 and i thought i had enough time to fit everything in. That was until i got to the reception and she said i couldnt see a doctor as they were fully booked and i had to sit and wait for the nurse to be free. So i sat and i waited...i was still sat in the waiting room at 12.50 regretting my confidence about my previous time schedule. In the end it didnt matter that i was going to be late for the lecture because once i was finally seen by the nurse and examined she concluded that she suspected i had the mumps. She was not fully confident so she dragged a passing doctor into the treatment room who poked at my swollen sore face constantly for about 2 minutes agreeing with the nurse. Even though he was confident that it was mumps, he still continued to poke the most sensitive bit...bastard. Then the nurse told me the worst news possible...it was not that i would be in a bit of pain...it was not that there was a very small chance that i could be infertile (however that was very high up there)...no the worst news was that i was extremely contagious which meant i had to go into quarentine basically. Quarentine means not being able to see many people which means being extremely bored. I was not wrong in the slightest, i went home for a couple of days as this was "the best place for me" apparently. I do and dont agree with this statement, i agree with it because i was able to go home, relax and not do much for a few days. I disagree because when i am at home during the day there is absolutely nothing to do especially as i was highly contagious and not allowed to leave the house. This was incesantly (i am not overly sure as to the correct spelling of this word) boring and so i returned to infect the general public at the earliest oppurtunity. So if there is a mass epidemic of mumps then i am sorry but i got too bored. So i have returned back to the public domain and i was starting to feel that my condition was receding slightly. I was starting to boast about how easily i had got over the mumps...big mistake! On saturday my face swelled more viciously than ever before and the swelling got worse on the sunday. It was excruciating to eat and swallow and i was not having a very fun time at all. However as quickly as my face swelled up, it shrunk back to normal...ish size again. My jaw has stopped hurting when i eat and swallow as a result of the mumps which is always a good sign however the illness is still in my system so until it is fully clear of my system i will always be on the edge. I will update when i am completely healthy again...hopefully it will be soon...

Starting up

Well this is my first ever blog and i am slightly unsure as to what i am supposed to say. I think i am going to explain my choice of title. I chose the words 'Starting up' quite deliberately because they can be used to mean quite a few things and they can represent a good outlook on life. If you are have done anything successful in the past or if you do anything successful in the future then more often than not you will start it by looking up. And i do not mean literally looking up into the sky however, that has probably worked for a few people, i mean metaphorically looking up. Looking on the bright side of life, going into things with a positive outlook. This applies to anything you do, no matter how big it is or how small it is. Basically if you have a positive outlook on life then you will generally come out of life on top or very near to the top anyway. As this is my first blog and i dont really have a subject to talk about i think i will finish this entry now. However i hope that i have clarified why i have used the title 'Starting up'. The cynical amongst you will assume that it was a mistake i made and i used to be one of those cynical ones but now i am starting to come round to the ideas i have put across in this blog.