It’s just after three in the morning, and this is usually the time when I start the slow process of winding down. I’ve been working on my letter-writing project all night, and I thought I’d take a break to write this.
This is the time of night I don’t really like — when there’s no one awake, and no one around. It’s not lonely exactly, because I usually absorb myself in something, but it would be nice to have someone to bounce things off.
Ordinarily, I do have someone to talk to — my best friend, Maiki. But for the last couple of days, the network between Australia and Tanzania hasn’t been working properly, so we haven’t been able to chat.
When I say I’ve been working on my letter-writing project, I know I explained in my last post about the letters I wrote years ago, back when I was completely overwhelmed with creative ideas. Well, I’m sort of doing the same thing now. Back then, I started writing to chief justices around the world, asking for a copy of the oath they use in their courtrooms — and I’ll be doing that again soon.
But my first project this time is to write to all the heads of government in the world and ask for a copy of the oath they took when they came into office. It took a very long time to gather the addresses — I had to dance between AI and Google to come up with the most plausible contact details for each leader — but eventually, I found one for every member and observer state of the United Nations.
I wasn’t sure at first about writing to countries like Afghanistan, North Korea, and Russia, but I’ve decided to write to every country on the UN list. You have to take the good with the bad, and I think it’ll give a really interesting cross-section of oaths — depending, of course, on who replies.
I can’t wait to get these letters out into the universe and then wait for people to reply. When I did this before, that was the most exciting part — checking the mailbox and opening something from the other side of the world.
Yesterday, I went to the doctor to have my boobs checked. I literally cannot examine them myself — it gives me the spooks. I’d just received a letter from BreastScreen SA saying my screening is due, but I thought I’d go for a manual examination first before booking it.
My usual doctor, who is the most beautiful, caring person, is very hard to get into, so I just picked one of the other doctors listed on the website. In person, she looked about 22 years old. I know she must be older than that, but she looked very young, and she was someone I had no faith in whatsoever. Next time, I’ll go to literally anyone else but her.
She was abrupt and rude. I told her I was experiencing a burning sensation in one of my boobs, and she checked them both, told me I had lumpy breasts, but said she didn’t feel anything concerning. Then she said she was in a predicament because, while she didn’t feel anything, I’d described symptoms, which technically meant she should send me for imaging.
Then she said she would be “guided by me.” That made me really angry — putting it back on me. She should have just said, “You’re fine,” or, “I’m sending you for imaging.” So I told her I’d just go to BreastScreen SA, and she said, “Don’t tell them you’re experiencing symptoms.” Technically, that isn’t a lie, because it’s nothing new — I’ve had the burning sensation for a while.
There are so many cancers you can get, but honestly, examining my breasts and mammograms scare me the most. Anyway, I left the doctor’s office very unimpressed. To be honest, I don’t mind having a young doctor — sometimes they’re full of ideas and keen to help — but this woman was just really bad. Her lack of experience showed.
The beautiful, caring doctor I usually see, I’ve only been seeing for about two years, and I think I’ve seen her maybe three times. Before her, I had a doctor I’d been seeing on and off since I was born, and he was great. I viewed him as a bit of an elitist doctor — I think he treated the Governor, because his name would sometimes pop up in the paper — but he was nice and he helped me with a lot over the years.
It’s funny, he always seemed so strict and authoritative, but then I found out he surfs with his sons — and probably with other surfie doctors too. When he retired a few years ago, I told him not to and to “work until you drop” — but I think he just wanted to go surfing.
He was very friendly with my parents, and he even gave them his home and mobile number. When my dad went into a nursing home, he happened to be that home’s GP, so he had a lot to do with them over the years. I trusted him with my health completely, and the lovely new lady doctor is slowly earning my trust too.
The one I saw yesterday, though, will never have it. She just couldn’t have cared less, and she passed the buck to me — just like a public servant.
Something I’ve been thinking about tonight is how the sun is 400 times bigger than the moon — and yet, the sun is also 400 times farther away from Earth than the moon is. Because of this perfect coincidence, the sun and the moon appear to be exactly the same size in the sky.
It also means the moon can completely cover the sun during a total solar eclipse. That is some coincidence. The moon is spiralling away from the Earth, though, so in millions of years, it won’t be that way anymore. But for now — and for what must be all of human history — that perfect alignment has been ours to witness.
I thought about this a lot last year, when the total solar eclipse was visible from Exmouth, WA, and I’m honestly surprised people don’t make more of a thing about it.
All I know is that I want to see a total solar eclipse in my lifetime. I’d love to be an eclipse chaser, following them around the world — but I doubt I’ll ever make enough money to satisfy that kind of habit.
I’m not sure if the day was arranged by an organisation or by two radio announcers — it was hard to tell — but they organised the police helicopter to pick him up, and he spent the day doing all sorts of activities. He even got to “arrest” fake criminals and put them into fake jail cells — one of them was Guy Sebastian, and I think one was a Crows player. There were police horses, and the Police Commissioner — who I absolutely love — was heavily involved.
The only other thing of interest that happened yesterday was that I watched the Federal Budget with Mum. She’s really into that kind of thing, and while I thought some of the spending announcements were good, the only time my ears really pricked up was when I heard about $566 million over 10 years for Geoscience Australia to create detailed maps of critical minerals under Australia’s soil and seabed.
For a moment, I imagined this grand expedition-style adventure with scientists mapping unknown minerals buried beneath us — but after doing a little reading, I’ve realised it’s not quite as exciting as I thought.
