I’m already planning fringe 2022. It seems like what Edinburgh is most famous for, it really is a bomb of culture. I have a lot of friends all around the world, but this seems to be a great meet-up opportunity. All my friends will get to experience this brilliant city, experience the cultural & see me of course.
One of my past posts was about “falling in love again”, but now I’m being able to fall in love with this city again. I’m doing all the touristy things, like the museum & the art galleries. Well why do all the tourists come to Edinburgh? To see the fringe. It’ll be very surreal experiencing the fringe as an adult, especially not remembering the initial time I expected it. The one thing that sticks with me is getting hairbrais, now I won’t do that this time.
When the British empire exhibition opened, Prince Albert, dukes of York was meant to address a speech to the crowd. He’s so proud of this job with the great exhibition but he has a strong stutter, so this film is about his journey to overcome his stammer. His wife finds a speach therapist called Lionel Logue who is not medically trained but it’s interesting that someone in such a powerful position like a king, doesn’t settle for the best. Logue calls the prince “Bertie” to make it feel less formal.
In the beginning of Lionel’s treatment, he records Bertie reading a book from hamlet, while his ears are covered by the classical music, the earphones drown out other sounds. Lionel gives Bertie the recording as a memento.
King George predicts that the wireless technology will play a significant part in the role of the royal family, I guess kind of like how religion, then technology, the internet has changed our lives.
He tries to read the Christmas message himself, but his attempt was a failure. Later that night he listens to the recording Logue gave him. He’s amazed at the lack of stammer there was in the recording. After hearing how Lionel’s treatment worked, he organises daily treatments. Berties dad dies, & his son recently known as King Edward VIII is next in line to be king. But Bertie is seeking a woman (Wallis Simpson) who has had 2 divorces,& as king, he can’t marry her. Even though Lionel’s methods worked, Bertie still struggles when he is talking to his brother. It looks familiar because I have been in the room, on the sofa where he gets his therapy.
One of my friends when I lived in London lived there, & they called it Portland Place.
Lionel says that Bertie could make a good king, but Bertie considered what he said as treason. Bertie’s brother decides to abdicate, so he can marry Wallis Simpson.
The Archbishop of Canterbury says that Bertie never asked for the churches advice to overcome his problem. Lionel explains to Bertie that he has no physical problems, that it was a mental problem & there were no qualifications that could change his defect, it would just take time & practice.
With war impending, a lot of soldiers were shell shocked. So, more people were going through the same problem that king George was going through, there was more focus on treatment for speech impediments.
On the coronation, Lionel is summoned to Buckingham palace to prepare Bertie for his speech.
Eventually, Lionel is awarded royal Victorian Order because he was always there, instructing King George VI, particularly for his services to helping the king in his speeches during the war. This wasn’t included in the film, just a side note, but Lionel & King George VI remanded friends till the kings death from cancer in 1952.
So this relates to me because I’ve been in the room in my old life, but the new me has 2 carers with speech impediments, one of which has helped me so much in this, so here’s a big shout out to him.
I just had a conversation which led me to this epiphany. I need to find my USP (unique selling point). It’s very nice that I’m so committed to my blog & try to promote it all the time but what am I trying to achieve?
Well I ask myself this so I guess I’ll answer.
Firstly, it keeps me busy & I do it almost every day.
I think my personality is quite interesting. I have more to say than just “hi”.
It is a good way to meet me digitally.
For people who’re studying psychologically, I consider myself as a nice and interesting use case.
I have some friends who I think care about my well-being, & I want them to show that I care about them too.
I hope that others who are in my situation (who have suffered a brain injury) can empathise, use me as a symbol of hope.
I, myself, am not religious. I am very anti religion but I heard this great analogy about the church:
The church is like a swimming pool. All the noise is at the shallow end.
The closest thing to a relationship is that I’m an agnostic. I don’t want to count too many chickens before they’ve hatch. I really don’t see the difference between a religion & a cult.
Religion is far too political for me, a can of worms I don’t want to open.
We spend as much money to take smell off us as we do putting smells on us, eg perfume. The word “pharamones” is relatively new, it’s only 50 years old.
Nobody has systematically gone through all the molecules that we give off to find out which combinations are most attractive. They just chose a few combinations & experimented to see which works best.
‘Pheromone’ is a chemical transmitted between individuals of the same species.
Smell is very important to our souls.
We discovered that the pheromone was how male dogs could smell (or certainly can sense) when female dogs were on heat. The chemical that was given off by females was synthesised & when the synthesised chemical was given to the opposite sex dog it drives them mad, the artificial pheromone for the dog was discovered. That, however, hasn’t been found in humans.
It’s particularly about what we learn as we age. When we are toddlers we just find smelly things as interesting. As we grow we form an identity.
We all have our own unique smell, like a identity smell. The nose is directly linked to the brain, it is directly beneath it. The nose has different receptors for different molecules. Just to get very specific, humans have about 400 receptors.
The molecules are odourless when they come out from the glands. It is only the bacteria our culture may produce which makes the molecules that leaves our bodies smell.
With the COVID epidemic the fashion industry has taken a huge blow. It seems like everyone is just buying everything online, and this includes fashion.
Fashion is the perfect mixture of skill & psychologically however fashion is very difficult to do digitally.
Fashion just doesn’t work if you can’t physically try to on. Psychologically certain garments don’t suit some people.
Fashion is why us, as animals, differ from other animals.
Because we need to shop online we have to think how we can use technology to overcome this problem.
But we have to be innovative with this problem where fashion doesn’t work well without trying on clothes online, but being inventive with technology & how we’ll use technology to help us overcome this.
So let’s set ourselves away from other species & use this pandemic as a problem to overcome. We can do that through innovation. Come on, let’s evolve.
As much as I complain about it, it’s the best place for me, where I’m recovering from my brain injury. I guess a nicer way to put it is that I’m in rehab. Re-discovering my old self.
This place is called Leonard Cheshire, & I found out some pretty cool facts about it which I’ll share with you now.
Leonard Cheshire, who founded the charity was an RAF pilot during WW2.
They’ve got lots of care homes, around the world. In particular UK & Baghdad.
What they’re trying to do is it’s aiming to help disabled people learn independency
I have my own separate house which gives me more independence.
From when it started, it evolved, so some are more up to date.
The Leonard Cheshire in Scotland (where I am) is pretty modern, for example it has WIFI & all my carers are pretty technologically normal.
One of the facts I found in my notebook; triage is a french word (surprise surprise) which means to “sort”. It’s pretty obvious that it comes from a french word, though. It does sound very french.
Originally it was used as sorting though coffee beans. So I guess my real interest is in the etymology of words, it evolved to meaning to sort through things to find the greater good.
In the 1790s it was first used in emergency rooms on Napolian’s battlefield.
