Barbara

Babs/Barbs/Bobra was a friend of mine. I first saw her on my very first admission to St Vincent's hospital back at Christmastime 2005. I walked past her dark room and saw a girl so ill she couldn't sleep in bed, but had to sit in a big chair and lean forward. The whole thing freaked me out; I'd never seen anyone that sick. Every time I walked past that room I witnessed very upset people walking in and out, red eyed and tired, sometimes talking with doctors, other times just popping out to make a phone call. I actually couldn't even see Barbs. I spoke to a friend who had transferred over to the adult hospital with me and we both agreed that she was extremely ill.

While I was going about my business, making my own short term recovery it seemed miraculously, she was making a turn too. I don't remember much about the time in between but I remember seeing her Mom packing. Christmas was itchingly close and then I saw her being wheeled out, waving goodbye with a massive bag with all her clutter in it. It was crazy. She had been teetering on the edge, balancing on her baby toe just weeks before and now she was leaving. Going home. Even before I was!

Christmas Eve, I had my own bags packed and was shuffling around impatiently (no change there then!) and I saw her coming back in. With another bag. Not knowing her I didn't want to stare or appear too nosey but it seemed she was back in for another stall. I smiled meekly at her and her mom with sympathy as I got my 'get out of jail' card from the docs.

Some time after I returned into hospital, I was shifted bedrooms and ended up sharing a six bedded with Barbs. Barbs wore glasses, which for some reason I took to mean she probably held a PhD in mechanical engineering or something (talk about stereotyping!). She laughed when I asked her was that true. She didn't hold a PhD but of all the people I have spoken to before, and indeed since, she was probably one of the most mature, intelligent, accepting (of everything), nicest people. She was very funny, and her Louth accent made everything she said make me laugh. She didn't beat around the bush, she had no time for falseness or fakeness and a lot of the time, me! She was direct and said it plainly as it was.

I have so many fond memories of Barbs. One such one was when she was sitting down, with her oxygen on her face, when her Mom jumped up to help the crazy lady in the bed beside her. In doing so, her Mom managed to trip over the Oxygen wire and pull it from Barbs' face. Her Mom was in such a flurry to get over to the crazy loon she didn't have time to see what she had done. I personally found it hilarious as a disgruntled Barbs tutted and readjusted the oxygen. We eventually laughed at it afterwards along with our laughing at the other patients most of whom we considered oddballs.

Barbs had a rough time though. She was waiting for a transplant too, having gone on the list about two months after me. I learned that she had had a pretty bad pneumothorax (collapsed lung) among other things that December I first met saw her. Unfortunately when her lung reflated it decided it didn't much like it that way so deflated again. And again. And again. Eventually she was given a mini chest drain so she could go home and after a LOOOOONG time she had that removed. In between ALL of this she had chest infections and more chest infections and grew 'bad' bugs as well.

I've been transplanted about 18months now, with a lung function of nearly 100%. In those 18months of getting a full blast of air in with every single breath, Barbs has had to struggle. She was on oxygen 24 hours a day and really didn't have the energy to walk at all, apart from when absolutely necessary or when being tortured by Physioterrorsits.

It's a miracle that her body held on for so long nearly two whole years after I saw someone who in my mind wasn't going to make it to Christmas 2005. Yesterday morning, having being admitted a few weeks ago, her body finally needed to just rest. She was only 24. I can't post a picture of her because quite frankly I think she'd kill me. Or haunt me in a really spooky way by throwing spoons at my head or something bizarre.

In the words of Barbara "Every LIFE is worth another. Two words people: Organ Donation".

Rest In Peace.

Non Stop Fuuun

Yesterday I went to the races courtesy of G-raze. It was Lady's Day there so there was a lot of fabulous style, spectacular glamour and over all amazingness..... and the other people looked nice too(!). I jest. I'd never been to the races before so it was a rather exciting affair for me. Thanks to G-raze's Dad we had the luxury of sitting in the bar too, which was set up with a big screen, the Tote people who walked around as well as...well a bar, whooop!

Financially I went to the ATM and money came out, so that was a huge success for me! I broke even at the end of the day so again, success. That was probably helped by the fact that I didn't do much betting. At all. Ahem. My brother had a good day though and I'm a very sharing person so that was great!

I had a bit of a weird moment the night before when I got a text saying that we were going at about 11.30am. For some reason I instinctively panicked about where I would find room/time to do my afternoon IV antibiotics. I don't know WHERE that came from, but the instant realisation that that wasn't actually a problem made me smile.

It was non-stop when we got home as we all (the family) had a secret party to go to. My other brother is moving Daaan Unda (that would be Oz) for a while so we had to say Bye-Bye by way of a surprise party. That was fun too. He didn't suspect a thing and he had a good night so all in all it was terrific.

Interestingly there were a few medical people-to-be there so it was fun/funny talking to them. One of them is now at 'intern' stage. The interns always made me shudder, although fortunately they were mostly all nice in my hospital. But still. There was that ONE fella who could never be wrong. And talking to me like that is never good. He even once mixed me up with another patient and never apologised. UGH. Anyway I managed to keep this bitterness from the intern I was chatting to last night.

I chatted to another doc-to-be who's studying in England and who I knew from school/ through a friend/ through random encounters involving market research. As it happens she has just done (or is doing?) a stretch on a cardio-respiratory ward. We discussed clubbing and little scars and other symptoms and we talked about my experiences with little medical students and my past life as a guinea pig for them. I believe I'm a party piece in myself these days.

Anyway the party was a huge success and it was lovely to see so many people who I haven't seen in yonks (ahem KM and Cli) and to just generally boogie. Life is fun.

I Added A New Photo Of My Little Sanda --->

Christmas

This is the third time I've sat down to write something here, so here goes again. The first time I wrote an entry about my very first stay in hell Vincent's Hospital which was Christmas two years ago. I got let out on the eve of Christmas eve, someone else did my shopping for me, I was on home IVs and was under instruction to return on the 27th for a nice long stay.

The second time I wrote about what a lovely Christmas we had here this year, although most of the content was a bit materialistic so I finished it with "I'm just relieved to be here and well".

The third entry was about how my Granny (who passed away 3 years ago) used to put on my socks (when I was much younger of course) in a 'magic' way. She used to turn them inside-out and then put them on, and then, like magic, they'd be on the right way. I even remember YEARS ago her trying to put them on me, and the spoilt brat in me pulled my foot away and said 'noooo Granny...do it the MAGIC way" - poor woman.

Anyway I was hoping when I wrote this FOURTH post (ignore mistake above) all my thoughts would come togther and I'd be able to write an earth moving blog post that would make people go, "wow, that girl deserves a crown made of diamonds so much that I'm going to go around and find out if such a crown can be found", but alas it's not coming. The post, not the crown - although if someone CAN find me one of those, I'd be very pleased.

So Christmas this year was amazing, we are nothing without our health, and there's always another way to do things. Tomorrow I'm going to the races and that is about it. I hope everyone had a nice Christmas and that you have a nice...day/weekend/season/break.

Merry Christmas!

That's me. With a Santa hat on. Wishing you ALL a very merry Christmas. I hope that the enjoyment of the day surpasses any stress you may have experienced in the last couple of days!

Hope you all had a wonderful day =)

HUH

About a week ago I went shopping with my brother. My brother is the one who writes things for a joke in my Guestbook but only a few people would realise he is in fact joking, to the rest it looks like he's a freak. Which wouldn't be a million miles away from the truth. That is why I need to moderate my guestbook.

Anyway we went to the same shop so naturally what we bought went into the same bag. All's grand. About 5 days later he asks me where the bag is. I thought HE had it, HE thought I had it. I accepted responsibility because he was just so convincing.

I looked *everywhere* for it, I tidied my room, emptied my room searched the whole house and it was nowhere. I felt terrible as one of the presents he bought was in there. So feeling so bad, I went down to the shop to replace the presents. I figured if the originals showed up I could give them to someone else.

Problem: The thing I bought cost me €7. When I went to buy it again the price came up as €35.00!!! I was flabbergasted. I went up and explained that I had purchased it for €7 the week before. Their reply was "And you want to buy it again??". Kind of missing the point...Anyway they let me have it at €7. Persistence ;-)

So I get back and tell my brother that I had replaced the presents. His tone suddenly was no longer as confident that *I* had lost the presents as it had been. But alas it didn't matter. He had insisted it was my fault so who cares.

And then. Today. What turns up?? The original presents. Where? In a bag, with my brother's scarf! Huh.

But conveniently my brother is nowhere to be found because he had scarpered down the country for the night. Lucky him. I had a frying pan ready to whack him with.

Christmas Laughs 2

You know when you do something SOOOO embarrassing that even years on you can't even think about without shuddering because it's SOOOO cringeworthy? I'm not talking about tripping over your shoelace when nobody's around, I mean like the kind of things where YOU may chose to bury them in your past, but SOOO many witnesses can always remind you. Yikes.

Well, maybe you can reduce your chances of that happening by not becoming a national anthem singer, and not going on the ice if you can't skate:

Enjoy!

Christmas Laughs

Well I like to laugh. So for the 5 days leading up to Christmas ( I should have planned this a bit better) I'm going to post clips that make me laugh. I'll be honest, they're pretty much only funny because of someone else's pain...but cést la vie!

This is good. The second fall. Whoah--Whooah-Whaaaaaaaaah-...And she's down!!! The laughs are also pretty chucklesome. Enjoy!

Billy: You are right. But the reason WHY I missed the deadline was because I rang my home girl, the one who's keepin' it real, Miss Tyra Banks. It was only meant to be a 5minute phone call but then I mentioned my transplant (did you know I had a transplant?) and she was SOOOOOOOO interested that she told me she knew *exactly* how I felt because one day....she...TYRA....swam with dolphins. So even though I never got to tell my story, that's ok, because Tyra's was just as important, and she says exactly what we're thinking.

I saw this. I like it. Especially when the pizza sings. G-raze I'm sorry that I couldn't get this for you. Forgive me.

Who Do You Think?

"Who do you think is most worthy of winning America's Next Top Model?" is a question that the host Tyra Banks always asks the desperate model wannabes and then she analyses their answers. Way back in Season 1 of the series, all the models said

"Oh I think 'X' because she is such a wonderful person".

*WRONG!*

Miss Tyra then pointed out that none of them said themselves.

So from Season 2 onwards ALL the contestants now say themselves because "I'm willing to learn, I've been on such a journey and this has been my dream...blah blah". Usually there'll be one contestant who was clearly washing their hair the night those episodes get aired so she'll trip up and say someone else.

Now let's be honest, if you were asked to stand up in class and say who was the best are you honestly going to say yourself?? "Well of the WHOLE class, I think *I'm* the best, because I'm so brilliant".

So anyway, I thought this was a Tyra Banks, Americans full of confidence thing

*WRONG*

I was reading the web news and saw that the shortlist had been published for the Digital Media awards. The Digital Media awards are awards which aim to raise awareness of the emerging digital media sector. In nearly ALL the categories people had nominated themselves, and in the "Best Blogging" category (which I consider different as usually it's not a company or organisation looking for publicity), four out the five competitors for the had nominated themselves!!! I mean I think it's ok when someone says 'oh I really like that film you made, here I'm putting you up for this prize', but to say 'Oh my film was great, yeah I'll put my name down for THAT prize'. *yoink* That prize must be something nice! Hmmmm.

Modesty anyone?

Christmas

I used my first three days of my break to get some shopping done. Usually I'm much more frantic by this time of year which prompts me into thinking that I've forgotten something. Which will probably be confirmed come Christmas morning as we are sat around the tree. At which point my eyes will pop out of my head, I'll excuse myself for a few minutes and all that will be heard is my car screeching away...*gulp*...

I'm not a HUGE Christmas fan, probably because I'm a grown up now(!) and it seems to have lost its magic. I still like the fact that we all gather around the table and eat and stuff. But as with most things and occasions, Christmas is a reminder of how lucky I am and that every occasion has extra magic in it anyway albeit for different reasons. So although a childhood Christmas is different from the ones nowadays, they still are such momentous experiences which I will forever cherish.

Christmas

There's like 8 days left. How is that even possible? *Yikes*

I don't even know where to begin in explaining what's wrong with this!

Vulgar, Vulgar and Vulgar

I have a memory of being in primary school and we used to try and make our faces go red. There was this one boy who could do it really well, but out of the whole class the pair of us were pretty even. You kind of hold your breath and shake your head and the veins in the sides of your head nearly begin to show. I'm sure someone knows what I'm talking about.

So we watched this video in class a while back about liars and spotting liars (which I might add, I can do very well- I hardly ever point out to someone that I know they're lying, but trust me 8 out of 10 times I know) and things like that. The guy on the video whose job it was to run that lie detector test machine said that one day he figured out how to beat it. All he had to do was clench his bum and the thing would go crazy. This is because it's in your bottom that there's a resevoir where all your blood things meet, so if you clench them then your blood pressure goes crazy. At least that's what I gathered from watching the video.

So on Tuesday I wanted to try this technique out when I was having my blood pressure tested to see what would happen. But the short of the long is, I totally forgot.

So then when I was back on Friday I rememberd. So I mentioned my thoery about the blood pressure to my nurse who I think misunderstood me. She called it "laying down" or "pressing down" or something "down" and said that could stop your heart! Now what I was referring to was "clenching" but she was thinking of that thing that we used to do in primary school. So just to clarify I said

"Wait, I'm talking about lifting your bum. What are you talking about??"

She replied, "You know, like constipation type thing..."

Which MEANS (if this is true) that if you have constipation, you could stop your heart!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And then I was thinking, what a terrible way to die!! Talk about unfinished business!!

Vampires (try to) Attack!

I don't have great veins. It's a fact. Whether that's due to people butchering me down the years or whether it's because I'm naturally very tight with my blood is debatable. This morning, the first day of my Christmas holidays, I went out to the hospital to have my blood taken, as despite three attempts on Tuesday, they got zero. Zilch.

This morning was no better. After two attempts we (I) gave up. I said that they could put on my chart that I refused any further attempts and was happy to come back in January. I was on my way out when the nurse called me back because they'd found another victim person who could attempt.

I'll be honest, she was wearing a lab coat which screamed 'doctor' at me, so I was very reluctant. I do NOT like doctors taking my blood. At all. BUT, fair play, she found the vein which so many professionals scoff about being useless and *bingo* she struck gold. Sixth time lucky it is! This means I don't need to return until Feburary.

I just hope I didn't take double my dose of tablets last night. I'm 99% certain I didn't but I can't be 100% sure. Eeeek. I'm sure I'll find out soon enough though! =)

Getting Old....

Well my head is fine today, it's a bit tender to touch but I don't think there's much of a bump, as it was the lower base of my head that got hit. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing, but I'll say "so that's good" anyway.

Following my *bounce* on my behind though, I'm a little tender when it comes to sitting down, laughing, coughing or standing back up again. Luckily I'm able to feign a 'ha, ha I'm fine' look while I grit my teeth. I could really do with a cane/walking stick though.

Tomorrow is our last day of college before the holidays. As with everything else this week I'm expecting nothing more then a table quiz and food. Then I'll come home and shop and then go out to our Christmas ball. Whoooop!

Forms

This evening I had my third snowboarding lesson. It was....not good. I don't take to a board very well...at all. Apart from maths, I don't like not being good at something, and this is one of those things in life where I just don't ever see us gelling. I am certainly lacking the enthusiasm that I had for skiing anyway.

But tonight I had a slight accident...which may or may not have resulted in a mild concussion. Well I DO like to do things in style! Basically the stupid lift dragged me and I ended up with my head crunching into a wooden post and falling asleep for a few seconds. And to the lady with the glasses on the skis who just stood there, mouth open, doing *nothing*, thanks! And if you blame 'shock' for your reason for not doing *anything* to help, think about the person you were looking at!

People came and helped me (including one person who helpfully said "that's why I wear a helmet!!"), I heard someone ask about a pulse(!), but I am actually fine. I didn't move for about a minute but I think I was more in shock.

I went on to snowboard on....and then I bounced fell on my ass and the ass pad must have moved because *that* was painful!!

Anyway I'm not going back. And no, I'm not giving up, the next lesson was the 'get one free' one so I'm just not taking it. Skiing is my calling.

I also had my two monthly transplant clinic today. All's well, lung function about the same, weight up by 2kg, but no blood today. I'll go back on Friday or next week and we'll try again. I don't have to go back until February!!

I'm off to nurse my headache now!

For whoever it was who came to my blog looking for a picture of Cassie from Home and Away, I do not dissappoint. Here you go!

Oh wait, whooops! HERE you go!!

For anyone who doesn't watch Home and Away, Cassie is one of the many runaway kids who ends up living in Pippa's Sally's drop in home, ignoring any legal laws that prevents people just spontaniously fostering someone.

She's the same drop in who dated another Drop In, Ric, for a while. And yes, this is the same Ric who now dates yet another drop in Maddie (orphan this time, at least she has an excuse!).

Cassie can now be seen regularly putting herself in the most dubious and stupid situations including, most recently, dating a 40 something, lady beater dude called Henk, who she's now going to move in. No, no this isn't the same lady beater as Macca, who she moved in with last year despite everyone warning her. OK, so those 'warners' were right the last time, but THIS new guy is different.

Just one of the many mentally balanced and drama free residents of Summerbay!

I had to laugh

This is an article which was linked to on a Cystic Fibrosis message board I visit. I've copied and pasted it. It doesn't really have anything to do with anything but I must learn to take a leaf out of this journo's drama book!

Robot runs riot at California hospital
Drug dealing dalek driven to distraction

Published Wednesday 15th June 2005 13:45 GMT

Staff and patients at San Francisco’s UCSF Medical Center were left fearful and shaken last week, when a robotic nurse threw off its shackles and went on the rampage.

“Waldo”, a robot used to dispense pills and potions to medical stations at the top notch medical facility, refused to return to the pharmacy to pick up a fresh stash at the end of his rounds, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Instead, the crazed automaton – reportedly the size of a good-sized TV, which in California means it must be at least the size of the average British garden shed - careened past the drug depository before barging into a room in the hospital’s radiation oncology department where an examination was in progress.

The psychotic pill pusher reportedly refused to leave, sending both doctor and patient fleeing for their lives.

"This is the first time anything like this has happened," a hospital spokesman told the paper. "Our technology folks are going to have to take a look."

Yeah, if they can find him. The ‘bot’s clearly gone bad, and is probably even as we speak cruising the city’s Tenderloin district pushing purloined prescription pain killers, paying off dirty cops and menacing lost tourists.

Even more worryingly, the spokesman said nothing about shutting down Waldo’s two colleagues, dubbed Elvis and Lisa Marie. A terrible accident waiting to happen? We think so. ®

Doing our bit!

We've all been told of the "Power of One" - the one change you can make to tackle global warming.

In our house we have a total of SIX sets of Christmas lights up! I'm guessing the whole bit for the environment thing will be our resolution this year. And then we'll come up trumps as we'll just take them all down!

Something REALLY impressive though and nobody's going to believe me but it IS true. One of our sets of lights are these ancient things that we used to put on our tree when I was growing up were the SAME lights my MUM had when she was younger!!! Now, I know, you're questioning how they still work (sorry Mum..you're not that old we know!) and to be honest I don't know. Like obviously quite a few of the bulbs have since passed away but they still work! Beat that!

Insignificance

Yesterday I posted about my Gosh-Awful day, but time is a healer and I'm feeling much better - despite the fact that all my college work has been deleted and I have to start from scratch. I also got the date for my driving test so I'll keep that letter in my car in case any more pesky Gardai decide to suspect me of being a danger on the roads.

Anyway, all of this is insignificant as I heard the news that Katy French (24) passed away this evening. She was a model come socialite of minor celebrity status. She appeared in the low budget RTE equivalent of "I'm a Celebrity...", among other things. She seemed to be one of these who wanted the world of Showbiz. I'd never really heard of her until she took ill last week.

There's speculation as to what happened as the circumstances seem a bit hazy, but that doesn't really matter, as she's another life gone and it makes me sad. It says she had passed away peacefully in the arms of her sister Jill and alongside her Mum and Dad. She had been in ICU since last week, having suffered multiple heart attacks, from what nobody knows. Well, we don't know.

I think that's the part that gives me the heeby jeebys, the ICU. I think it's so sad that she went in and just never woke up. Those awful beeping monitors and sounds and smells - yuck. And then the silence of it all.

This whole thing makes me sound like I knew the girl; I didn't. As I said I didn't really know who she was until last week, but I think it's the fact that she was so young and had so much to live for. It puts files being deleted from a memory stick into significance. :(

An Apology...

To the Gardaí. I'm sorry for not mentioning you guys in a while, but really that is NO reason to pull ME over!! ME!! I'm supposed to blog about you! UGH.

That should have set off alarm bells that today was NOT going to be a good day. At all. Let's call today Wednesday-the-day-that-should-have-never-been-why-can't-I-start-over!!!

Seriously. I don't even know where to start. So I won't. I'll tell all tomorrow. UGH.

Plod, Plod, Plod

I handed in two assignments today. I also had a Research & Statistics exam, yuck. My sugars have been high these last few days which I finally clocked was because of the stressful week. It's funny because that's never happened before...clearly I don't get stressed that often. During my hour long exam however, I managed to register a hypo. It was awful, because I got all confused. I had to keep focusing on the paper and try to ignore the low sugar. Typically I had no sugar source with me at ALL so had to just bare it out as leaving the class was NOT acceptable. Apart from the nuisance of it all, I don't think it affected my exam at all luckily. Sure I'll know for next time!

I also managed to run out of my anti-rejection tablets for the SECOND time. I'll have to get some tomorrow morning, so I won't miss a dose (took the last one tonight) - I'll just have to go into college a little late. No matter.

I'm off to set my two alarms and then to bed. My phone sometimes isn't annoying enough to wake me up so recently I've set my ipod on speakers to rise me. Ironically this morning it blasted out Boomtown Rat's "I don't like Mondays". I know it's Tuesday but that song fitted my mood perfectly! So at least I woke up with a smile!

Genetics et al

I've always been thoroughly interested in the area of genetics. One of our assignments due tomorrow is that of the nature versus nurture debate, which basically looks to see what influence genes have on us, and to what extent the environment affects us. We are looking at it from a psychological trait point of view. So we had to research a whole load of twin studies as identical twins share the same genes so they are invaluable when it comes to research. Hmmmm.

Luckily the group I'm in are like work horses so we already have ours finished. But despite this I still have four other Continual Assessments due in. Arggggg! Which means I really shouldn't be here typing...what can I say, I'm a procrastinator at heart.

Interestingly we get 10% of our final grade for attendance and considering that I have missed a total of TWO days this term due to illness (pesky cold!) it would look set that I can actually get me some of that! That's certainly a first, considering that since I was about 14 I've missed approximately a third or more (in sixth year, a HALF) of every school year (2nd year I missed 13 weeks!). I was almost going to question that since my body isn't used to being so busy, will it get tired out because it usually expects a break every two weeks. But then that's silly I think....because there's nothing wrong with my body...I don't think.

..Ahhhhh assignments! If you missed Saturday's post on cameras and you know a thing or two, please take a look and then drop me a line! Thanks!

What I Want For Christmas (1)

Well since it's the first of December, I'm allowed to talk about Christmas... a little bit. When I worked in the pharmacy for a time I was paid in cash. Then someone who likes to do things according to the 'law' said she could organise it so it went straight into my account. Sounded great until I realised it would never all go there thanks to a three word known as TAX. Dang.

Anyway for a few months I got money into my hands and I used to bring it home (obviously!). I'd always stick the fifty notes aside in a little box for a rainy day. If they were in my purse, they'd get broken within a few days for something stupid like a packet of sweets and then before I knew it, it'd all be gone.

So my little box of fifties grew and grew and at one point I had a considerable sum in there. I decided that I really wanted to buy a SLR digital camera. The opposite of a Digital SLR cameras are the "point and shoot" cameras, which are the normal compact cameras that you'd bring on a night out and if you're anyone I know, you'd lose them. "Point-and-Shoot" basically means you simply turn on the camera and push a button to take a picture, as opposed to a Digital SLR camera, where you choose the lens you want to use.

So I kept an eye out for a nice camera. Occasionally I'd see one but then I'd wait again. They are rather expensive and big things to own so I wanted to make sure I was getting the right one. I figured since I was spending so much money, I'd splash and get something great like a Nikon something-or-other (D70 or the likes). I looked at a few Canons. Then I saw the Fuji Finepix S9600 which although wasn't actually a SLR, it was nice, but I sorta of wanted the SLR and I sorta wanted a reliable Nikon.

Anyway as I was making my mind up, someone who likes to do things according to the 'safetyness' discovered I had a rather chubby sum of money hiding somewhere and became rather alarmed. She suggested I put in the bank. Sounded great until I realised it would never all go there thanks to a two words known as ATM card and CREDIT card. *Sigh*

So my ideal Christmas present would be a nice deadly SLR digital camera. I'm the only one in my family who has half a clue about these things so unfortunately there's little hope of getting one as a surprise. If anyone knows anything about cameras, I'd be delighted if you could let me know your opinions (don't have to be on the cameras I've mentioned, just 'go in that direction' advice really!).