Many professional writers offer advice on the importance of persistence and I can see why it could be important for the feckless personality (meaning myself here!) that would want to be a writer.  Unfortunately, sometimes nature steps into things and she will not be denied.  On the night of the 14th my previous ill health made a brief reappearance and while it wasn’t anything serious, it was enough to cause some concern and a sleepless night.  This meant that yesterdays post did not appear as I spent most of the day recovering from the events of the previous night.

As I may not have control over when I post, what I will do instead, is post another two today, as well as this one.  Thus honoring persistence even if I cannot honor my planned scheduling.

A good thing about writing articles for the web is that WordPress has the ability to schedule blog post releases.  I guess I should write more articles in advance.  Lesson learned.

Dave Felton

Admittedly when I started this blog I had some reservations.  I am basically a private person and find it hard to believe that anyone would be interested in my personal experiences and opinions etc.  At the same time, as a writer, any exposure that enables me to become better known is a good thing and a blog is a reasonable method of self advertisement.

While I was dithering, trying to reconcile these two opposing attitudes, I had a Pulmonary Embolism (P.E.) and was admitted to hospital.  This admission let to some complications and so, several weeks after the initial event I find myself still recovering.  I hope that a 20+” embolism in my leg, a PE along with several varieties of pneumonia can be accepted as a good reason for not posting more!

(Apparently not posting regularly is a major sin in the blogging community, but as a blogging newbie I hope to be forgiven…)

It is my hope that in the future I will be able to post about the events surrounding my hospitalisation, but I cannot at present for legal reasons.  Suffice it to say that my impression of the National Health Service has changed radically. I am suing the local hospital in an effort to get chief executives to change policy within the hospital and thereby hope to save a few lives, having nearly lost my own due to a stupid bureaucratic situation. Wish me luck.

Watch this space as they say, but certainly don’t hold your breath as legal cases tend to take quite some time in my experience and I cannot see a malpractice suit being any faster.

One thing that has changed due to all this turmoil in my life is my attitude to blogging.  Previously my intention was to keep this blog tightly focussed around writing. This idea comes from the “web guru’s” that tell you to “keep your posts focussed” etc.  Well, I am a human being and clearly life has some interesting plans in store for me – what better material than to share this stuff and in so doing hopefully help others in similar situations?

Another aspect that I think I will now include to a greater degree is my personal interest in things political. Some aspects of modern government leave me cold. A wiser man than I once said “All that is necessary for evil to prosper is for good men to do nothing”.  I don’t intend to do nothing.

The reason of course to avoid politics is obvious; it causes division. A writer is trying to sell his work and so annoying half your audience is seen as a bad thing. My counter to this at the present time is: Yes, but the topics I intend to broach are humanitarian ones – if broaching these topics sends the heartless away, so be it.

Maybe my current attitude is due to looking at my own mortality over the last few months, or maybe it is just the medication! (Yes, I am still medicated as the pneumonia has still not cleared) Whatever the truth of the matter the world seems in need of some more straight talking instead of endless “spin” – maybe I am just stupid enough to speak it…

Best wishes as ever.