Still Here, Just Busy & Uninspired - Part 1 | 6:07pm, Sunday July 14th, 2019

Haven't posted since late April. Work has been busy and I've felt less inclined to get on the computer to write something in long-form after spending all day in front of a computer.

Anyway, here I be and it's been a busy couple of months. Quick recap, and I'll intersperse a few pics of the watches that I wore. 'Cos that's how I roll;

It was time to begin selling some stuff on eBay. First cab off the rank was the Seiko 7002. It sold, but the winning bidder soon contacted me to say that a personal emergency had come up and he/she wouldn't be able to pay for the item. No problem. I offered it to the next highest bidder, but got no reply from them. So, back up for auction it went. It ended up selling for about twenty bucks less than the original sale, but that didn't matter. I wasn't planning on retiring on the funds from this sale. I just wanted to sell the watch. So, that's one down.

Went to the doctor for a routine blood test last month. I got tested a few years ago and was found to have a low white blood-cell count. Was referred to a haematologist who told me that I probably had nothing to worry about, as he received four or five patients a week with low white cell counts and it was nothing to concern myself with. Apparently, it's common with people of African descent.

Was there something that my Mother never told me?

He took a sample and told me that I'd get a call a few days later if any abnormalities were found.

I never got the call.

This time around, the cell count was not the issue, but my cholesterol level was at 4.8, which I was told is considered towards the higher end of the spectrum.

"No fried food, no processed meats, that means not salami, prosciutto, eat less meat, no cheese, do you eat a lot of cheese?", the doctor asked me. She was a new one that I hadn't dealt with before. Had an accent that was a mix of French and Spanish. Turns our her Mother was Spanish and her Father was Brazilian.

"Oh, and cut out salt and sugar", she added.

Christ, what does that leave me to eat, I wondered. Celery!?

She took my blood pressure. One-twenty over seventy. Nothing to worry about there. Then she checked my height; five-ten and a half.

"You're the same height as I am", she stated.

I looked down at her feet.

"Yeah, but I'm not wearing my heels today", I answered.

I wore the Omega Speedmaster sometime in May. That's a Nique jacket in the photo. My wife is always on the lookout for clothes for me whenever she visits a thrift store. I never tend to have the same kind of luck whenever I visit the thrifts.* This one's a grey wool with surgeon's cuffs (the buttons can be undone) and it's a nice warm jacket to wear in the office when the air conditioning - an ongoing saga - tends to cool the room down a little too aggressively on colder days. I think the thermostat has a mind of its own and is trying to freeze us all to death.

The doctor then arranged for me to have an ECG test. Man, I just wanted to get my blood test results. And a 'flu shot, if possible. Five minutes later, I'm in the Pathology room next door to her office. I remove my shirt and the doctor walks in and quickly gives me a 'flu shut before I lie down on the examination table and the nurse shaves little squares of hair off my chest. 

Man, I hope this is part of the procedure, I thought to myself. Well, I didn't really, but it plays better that way.

The nurse attached the adhesives to my chest and under my left ribs and then hooked up the electrodes, or whatever the kids are calling those things these days.
I lay there for a few minutes, wondering how late for work I was gonna be. I told them that I had the blood test and would be coming in about half an hour later than usual, but this ECG test would throw a small spanner into the works. No major drama.
The ECG test over, I put my shirt back on, and a few minutes later, the doctor came in and took a look over the print-out of the ECG results.
A slight heart murmur showed on the print-out at one point. But it's not anything major. She told me to make another blood test appointment for a month later, to see if my cholesterol level drops.
All good. I thanked her for her time, headed out to reception, paid for the (long) consultation and then got into my car and headed to work.

I got myself a new hat in May. This one is an Akubra 'Hampton' in what they call 'Carbon Grey'. It's a trilby design, which means it has a narrower brim. This one measures 48mm. My other two fedoras have 64mm brims which, coupled with my narrow shoulders, give the slight impression of them being oversized for my build. Although, that's never really bothered me. This new trilby has more of a 'circa 1960/ Mad Men / Blues Brothers' kind of vibe, and it has come in very handy on rainy days this winter so far. I wore the Omega Railmaster quite a bit throughout May and June.

Work has been very busy in recent months. So much so that the watchmaker has gone in on a couple of weekends here and there to deal with the backlog of repairs. As such, this has meant that I got busier when it came to finalising these completed repairs and booking them out, updating the database, taking photos, processing invoices and shipping them out. No problem, as long as I wasn't distracted by other stuff going on in the office.

Been on a slight buying spree on eBay lately. Having sold a couple of my lower-end watches, I figured I could spend some of the earnings on other stuff. Things like watch straps, short charging cables for my phone, etc.

One extravagance, though, was this Nikon EM 35mm SLR camera. Some of you may recall that I already had one of these a while ago, but ended up selling it for some reason. I think it was shortly after I got myself an Olympus OM2n and felt that I'd be using that camera more than this one.
However, there's something appealing about using an automatic camera and so, I began reading a few reviews of the EM and then I hit eBay. Picked up the body of this one for around thirty-seven bucks - which I thought was a steal - and then a 50mm prime lens a week later for just under eighty dollars. I also got some of these decorative fairy lights that you thread into an empty bottle to make a soft lamp.
I loaded up the camera with some 125 ASA Ilford black & white film and I'm gonna try to become a better photographer. I plan to jot down shutter speed and aperture info prior to taking a photo, in an effort to get a better grip on taking decent pictures. Modern batteries no longer use mercury oxide in them and these old film cameras can tend to give a slightly incorrect shutter speed reading as a result. From what I've read - and please correct me if I'm wrong - you need to compensate for this by altering the shutter speed or aperture setting prior to taking the shot.
Anyway, only one true way for me to find out. Unless I Google the information, that is.

I wore the circa 1996 Oris Big Crown Pointer Date Small Seconds in May. I love how the dial has four different textures on it. Along with the date numerals along the outer edge, the sub-seconds dial, and the hour numerals, there's a lot going on with this dial and yet it's clearly legible. 

Okay, y'all, that's the first catch-up installment done.  I'll work on another one this coming week.
I hope you've all been well, and thanks for reading!