Some lessons learned from recent events:
General Stanley McChrystal - no matter how good you are and how lauded you are, don't forget you are not the boss!
Kevin Rudd - what works at the beginning doesn't work forever. Don't get so caught up in your own momentum you don't notice things changing around you.
Also, stay friendly with your colleagues.
Malcolm Turnbull - Doesn't matter how successful you are at everything else you've done, you can't beat politicians at the politics. It's nothing to do with being smart or right.
Melbourne Storm - There are good reasons for all those annoying rules. Always do the right thing, even if you're swimming in a culture that doesn't. Eventually, it will - and then things will not be pretty.
Goldman Sachs / Lehman Brothers - See above.
Previous Greek governments - Don't ignore that too-hard basket. See above.
BP - thanks for pointing out the truth about business continuity plans!
But seriously, when copy-pasting BCP templates from region to region, remember to delete the walruses.
Christine Nixon - Tough luck. During normal business you're a star if you delegate and have a strong team underneath you. But when a crisis hits, you're expected to don the hard hat and direct detailed operations down the mineshaft. Never mind the two modes of working are not compatible within the one person. A factory foreman can't run a multinational and a CEO can't run the factory floor - but the CEO is expected to be able to do both.
Hence the real reason for the astronomical CEO salaries these days. Yes they are entirely out of proportion with what the individual is worth or brings to the company. But they are a direct result of the expectations people have of company leaders these days. No one can meet these forever - getting blamed and getting fired has become a certainty in business and in politics. The more senior you are the more you need that paypacket, because it is basically an insurance policy against the inevitable.
So many paths to ruin, but not many templates for success!
Jul 16, 2010
Jul 15, 2010
Ambition or Pride or whatever else gets in the way
I don't think of myself as ambitious. I've never wanted to be the CEO, or even a very senior manager. But whatever job I'm doing, I always want to do well. More than well. I want to be impressive and have others look to me with awe and respect and gratitude for the wonderful work that I do. I want to be sought out for opinions and correct process, esteemed for my knowlege and liked and respected for my ability with staff and customers and projects and getting things done. I can't help it. I can't switch it off. And I don't know whether it's pride or ambition or work eithic or just plain fear and insecurity (hello again you two...).
I hate the thought that someone at work might be less than pleased with the way I have handled something; get anxious when I feel things turning out less than ideally through a combination of rush, resourcing shortcuts, systemic complexity, corporate bureaucratic madness or some other not-my-fault insanity. It's important to me to do a job well and to be seen to do a job well.
So lucky me - I don't have enough of whatever-this-is to propel me into senior jobs with more money - just enough to keep me anxious and competitive and hamstring my efforts to scale back and achieve some modicum of "work life balance".
Exhibit A. Since I started at my company, my workload has been insane. Since making "Vice President" (whoo-hoo) my workload has been insane AND bonus! carries ten times the responsibility and visibility along with it (and thank you GFC, no real increase in salary). So recently this all came to a head with my boss and I having something of a showdown which was not only cathartic but beneficial - because in the following days, she re-arranged workloads, scaled back demands and created a restructure to balance the work more fairly across the management team. All this is good right? And it's what I wanted and needed. AND YET! As she's talking through all this and going out of her way to involve me and ensure I'm OK with it, some words start coming out of my mouth. I'm concerned what this means for my position, my staff numbers are smaller than the other managers, am I still responsible for the same areas, blah blah blah blah what?! Even as I'm talking, I am listening to myself and thinking, What are you doing?! shut up you idiot!
Is this normal or stupid or both?!
I hate the thought that someone at work might be less than pleased with the way I have handled something; get anxious when I feel things turning out less than ideally through a combination of rush, resourcing shortcuts, systemic complexity, corporate bureaucratic madness or some other not-my-fault insanity. It's important to me to do a job well and to be seen to do a job well.
So lucky me - I don't have enough of whatever-this-is to propel me into senior jobs with more money - just enough to keep me anxious and competitive and hamstring my efforts to scale back and achieve some modicum of "work life balance".
Exhibit A. Since I started at my company, my workload has been insane. Since making "Vice President" (whoo-hoo) my workload has been insane AND bonus! carries ten times the responsibility and visibility along with it (and thank you GFC, no real increase in salary). So recently this all came to a head with my boss and I having something of a showdown which was not only cathartic but beneficial - because in the following days, she re-arranged workloads, scaled back demands and created a restructure to balance the work more fairly across the management team. All this is good right? And it's what I wanted and needed. AND YET! As she's talking through all this and going out of her way to involve me and ensure I'm OK with it, some words start coming out of my mouth. I'm concerned what this means for my position, my staff numbers are smaller than the other managers, am I still responsible for the same areas, blah blah blah blah what?! Even as I'm talking, I am listening to myself and thinking, What are you doing?! shut up you idiot!
Is this normal or stupid or both?!
Consolations of Working in the City
Walking in from Richmond Station on a cold winter morning.
The approach to Batman avenue over William Barak Bridge.
Simultaneously listening to the World Cup result over my radio headphones and the operatic music drifting up from the speakers over Flinders Street Station below (to ward off violence!)
Unfortunately while lugging my backpack full of work shoes, work clothes, work makeup and water bottle, I pulled a muscle in my neck and have been popping pain killers all week since. Other than that, it was a nice way to start the week.
Jun 15, 2010
The Sticker Experiment: Success is Claimed
Today marks a turning point in our family life. For the first - and I mean FIRST - time in oh, three and a half years, our twin girls stayed in their beds and obeyed my command to go to sleep. ON THEIR OWN. WITHOUT ME LYING ON THE FLOOR OR IN ONE OF THEIR BEDS. And...here's the piece de resistance: by 8.30 pm! O frabjous day! O night of wonders whose time I never thought would come!!
Now I don't want to give the - completely false - impression, that we have never been able to manage our children's sleep routine. Oh contraire! There was definitely an eight-month period there, between about 9 months and one-and-a-half, where we happily trotted our two babies off to their cots each night at 7.30 and they fell asleep and stayed there until breakfast time. But before that... and after that... it's been tricky to put it mildly.
I imagine we are similar to many "working families" (our government's current favourite phrase. still trying to work out what it means. think they are trying to round up everyone in that): in general, our biggest issues are TIME and SLEEP. Both have been the consistent running thread in our lives since the kids were born, always to some degree colouring everything else.
From the very earliest days, our babies were night-owls, and they have always gone to bed just that little bit (or sometimes lots) later than whatever time all other children in the country seem to be going to bed. (We never did manage the fabled "7 o'clock"). I have to say that, after those initial fairly hideous 10 weeks, they did tend to be pretty good overnight, generally only waking once and easily settled after the night feed.
But the bad time has always been the evening. When they were babies it would start around 5pm and continue until 9 or 10 at night. Nothing seemed to work initially. Eventually we found our saviours, of sorts: sleep school (thank you, thank you, thank you, kind nurses of South Eastern Private Hospital!), reflux diagnosis (thank you again, sleep school nurses - diagnosis made first night of sleep school after I had asked our GP, pediatrician and health nurse about my baby seeming to be in discomfort and told by all it was nothing) and a battery-operated swing. That swing was a lifesaver. Though I know it wasn't the case every night, all my memories of those times are that I was alone in the evenings (husband working) and with the swing was finally able to settle two babies simultaneously. We used that swing until M was 6 months old and it was creaking and barely moving under her weight. Wonderful thing it was.
We did do controlled crying at different stages, but could not always manage it because A would get hysterically upset and vomit everywhere within a couple of minutes. That kid could go from zero to nutcase in less time than you would think it was possible! No, it wasn't just us - I had others witness this!
All this leads into one of my "favourite" motifs: that of the firm and loving parent applying sensible routines, controlled crying and mental discipline and producing a beautifully sleeping baby. I know that has happened. I have friends and family who have achieved it. But here is the thing - they haven't ALL achieved it with ALL of their children, ALL the time.
I used to hate hearing this from people who would be talking admiringly about a mother they knew who was calm and firm and had a well-trained baby: "Calm mother equals calm baby". Grrrrr. How about this for the real truth: "Calm baby equals calm mother"!
I think I did everything right, I really do. And I know this much about the sleep and stress battle that we had with our babies: they started it!!
It was my mother who offered the wisest words: "Lots of things work, but nothing works all the time."
So true. You can't program babies - they're not machines. Things work - but not forever either.
We have tried our best to apply consistent routines. But there is no doubt, it is very hard when both parents work full-time. There is not much out there about managing this stuff when everyone's working. The cultural ideal, and most of the literature (pop culture, books, articles, advice, etc) is of the mum who stays home for the first one or two years, and then works part-time (three days at most) and is home with the kids by late afternoon. (Of course we know why this is: all the full-time-workers are too busy to write any articles!)
I can tell you from experience, having worked part-time and full-time over the years, that there is a HUGE difference between getting home at 4.30 and getting home at 6.30, and between working 3 days and working 5. Not that part-timers don't have it tough - they definitely do. So does everyone. But I have always blamed the fact I work full-time and that 3 or 4 days of the week the girls are at daycare until 6pm, for our sleep issues.
I completely understand why women who are able to, even with tremendous personal and financial sacrifice, give up work while their kids are little. It is just so hard!
Anyway, back to the present. A and M are now four and a half. For a week now they have been going to bed at 8pm every night. And tonight, for the first time, I said good-night and left the room and they stayed there and fell asleep.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!???????????!!!!!!!!
How did we do it?
The obvious way I suppose - that modern classic, the sticker reward chart.
I would never have thought this would be so effective so quickly - chiefly because I have been in the habit of giving my kids whole sheets of stickers for fun and diversion from an early age (devaluing the currency, a wise father told me once). But lo - set up a reward chart, explain how it works, and dole out one sticker of choice every morning following a successful 8pm bedtime, and it has worked a treat.
Two little sets of shining eyes are firmly on the prize: a new DVD of choice for each of them after sticking to this for 8 days.
(Alvin and the Chipmunks and one of the [eugh!] Barbie movies, at this stage).
But as always with kids, there is no such thing as a controlled experiment. A possible contributing factor to today's success: two 3-km walks today with their dad to drop off and pick up the car for urgent repairs at the garage.
Nah, it's gotta be the reward chart.... And my calm, kind but firm manner of course.
Now I don't want to give the - completely false - impression, that we have never been able to manage our children's sleep routine. Oh contraire! There was definitely an eight-month period there, between about 9 months and one-and-a-half, where we happily trotted our two babies off to their cots each night at 7.30 and they fell asleep and stayed there until breakfast time. But before that... and after that... it's been tricky to put it mildly.
I imagine we are similar to many "working families" (our government's current favourite phrase. still trying to work out what it means. think they are trying to round up everyone in that): in general, our biggest issues are TIME and SLEEP. Both have been the consistent running thread in our lives since the kids were born, always to some degree colouring everything else.
From the very earliest days, our babies were night-owls, and they have always gone to bed just that little bit (or sometimes lots) later than whatever time all other children in the country seem to be going to bed. (We never did manage the fabled "7 o'clock"). I have to say that, after those initial fairly hideous 10 weeks, they did tend to be pretty good overnight, generally only waking once and easily settled after the night feed.
But the bad time has always been the evening. When they were babies it would start around 5pm and continue until 9 or 10 at night. Nothing seemed to work initially. Eventually we found our saviours, of sorts: sleep school (thank you, thank you, thank you, kind nurses of South Eastern Private Hospital!), reflux diagnosis (thank you again, sleep school nurses - diagnosis made first night of sleep school after I had asked our GP, pediatrician and health nurse about my baby seeming to be in discomfort and told by all it was nothing) and a battery-operated swing. That swing was a lifesaver. Though I know it wasn't the case every night, all my memories of those times are that I was alone in the evenings (husband working) and with the swing was finally able to settle two babies simultaneously. We used that swing until M was 6 months old and it was creaking and barely moving under her weight. Wonderful thing it was.
We did do controlled crying at different stages, but could not always manage it because A would get hysterically upset and vomit everywhere within a couple of minutes. That kid could go from zero to nutcase in less time than you would think it was possible! No, it wasn't just us - I had others witness this!
All this leads into one of my "favourite" motifs: that of the firm and loving parent applying sensible routines, controlled crying and mental discipline and producing a beautifully sleeping baby. I know that has happened. I have friends and family who have achieved it. But here is the thing - they haven't ALL achieved it with ALL of their children, ALL the time.
I used to hate hearing this from people who would be talking admiringly about a mother they knew who was calm and firm and had a well-trained baby: "Calm mother equals calm baby". Grrrrr. How about this for the real truth: "Calm baby equals calm mother"!
I think I did everything right, I really do. And I know this much about the sleep and stress battle that we had with our babies: they started it!!
It was my mother who offered the wisest words: "Lots of things work, but nothing works all the time."
So true. You can't program babies - they're not machines. Things work - but not forever either.
We have tried our best to apply consistent routines. But there is no doubt, it is very hard when both parents work full-time. There is not much out there about managing this stuff when everyone's working. The cultural ideal, and most of the literature (pop culture, books, articles, advice, etc) is of the mum who stays home for the first one or two years, and then works part-time (three days at most) and is home with the kids by late afternoon. (Of course we know why this is: all the full-time-workers are too busy to write any articles!)
I can tell you from experience, having worked part-time and full-time over the years, that there is a HUGE difference between getting home at 4.30 and getting home at 6.30, and between working 3 days and working 5. Not that part-timers don't have it tough - they definitely do. So does everyone. But I have always blamed the fact I work full-time and that 3 or 4 days of the week the girls are at daycare until 6pm, for our sleep issues.
I completely understand why women who are able to, even with tremendous personal and financial sacrifice, give up work while their kids are little. It is just so hard!
Anyway, back to the present. A and M are now four and a half. For a week now they have been going to bed at 8pm every night. And tonight, for the first time, I said good-night and left the room and they stayed there and fell asleep.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!???????????!!!!!!!!
How did we do it?
The obvious way I suppose - that modern classic, the sticker reward chart.
I would never have thought this would be so effective so quickly - chiefly because I have been in the habit of giving my kids whole sheets of stickers for fun and diversion from an early age (devaluing the currency, a wise father told me once). But lo - set up a reward chart, explain how it works, and dole out one sticker of choice every morning following a successful 8pm bedtime, and it has worked a treat.
Two little sets of shining eyes are firmly on the prize: a new DVD of choice for each of them after sticking to this for 8 days.
(Alvin and the Chipmunks and one of the [eugh!] Barbie movies, at this stage).
But as always with kids, there is no such thing as a controlled experiment. A possible contributing factor to today's success: two 3-km walks today with their dad to drop off and pick up the car for urgent repairs at the garage.
Nah, it's gotta be the reward chart.... And my calm, kind but firm manner of course.
Jun 6, 2010
Happiness and Disappointment
Some quick thoughts on a topic that I have been ruminating on for a long time.
We are animals. Life is a struggle. We are not "meant" to be happy. We are meant to BE. That's it. If we are happy, that's a bonus. Happiness, actually, is wonderful and stands out because it is fleeting, rare or in the past. You have moments in time where you know you feel happy; you have times in your life where you are aware things are pretty good and you are on the whole happy; or you look back on times past and realise (or believe) you were happy.
Someone I know once said "If you look back in your life at the times you were happy, it's usually when you were busy." I think this is true.
I also think our minds exist to get us through the day and pass on our genes, and just cause us wonder and grief and anguish as a neat little side-trick.
I've posted a link below to an article I absolutely love, by someone who said all this much better than me. Catherine Deveny, in her former column in The Age newspaper published on 16 Feb 2010, took my breath away with this article. It's one of the best things I have ever read and I thank my sister who passed it on to me.
Favourite quote: "Life's not fair, but it is great. You don't get what you deserve, you get what you get."
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/nobodys-perfect-thankfully-20100216-o91v.html
We are animals. Life is a struggle. We are not "meant" to be happy. We are meant to BE. That's it. If we are happy, that's a bonus. Happiness, actually, is wonderful and stands out because it is fleeting, rare or in the past. You have moments in time where you know you feel happy; you have times in your life where you are aware things are pretty good and you are on the whole happy; or you look back on times past and realise (or believe) you were happy.
Someone I know once said "If you look back in your life at the times you were happy, it's usually when you were busy." I think this is true.
I also think our minds exist to get us through the day and pass on our genes, and just cause us wonder and grief and anguish as a neat little side-trick.
I've posted a link below to an article I absolutely love, by someone who said all this much better than me. Catherine Deveny, in her former column in The Age newspaper published on 16 Feb 2010, took my breath away with this article. It's one of the best things I have ever read and I thank my sister who passed it on to me.
Favourite quote: "Life's not fair, but it is great. You don't get what you deserve, you get what you get."
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/nobodys-perfect-thankfully-20100216-o91v.html
I am really not a member of the Flat Earth Society
Don't you hate feeling like a flat-earther? You know that uncomfortable feeling that you may be out of step with intelligent and rational society, when you're not wholly on-side with prevailing beliefs. (Hello, global warming...I do believe - sort of - with some aspects - but the stridency of the movement and the labelling of any dissent as from "climate change deniers" does not sit well with me). Anyway, this is about vaccines.
Now, I am pro-vaccines. No question. I get impatient with people who forget about the horrible sicknesses children used to get and the numbers that died from these diseases in the past, in an age (fairly recent!) when the spectre of losing a child from illness was very real. It is wonderful that we live in an age where our worrying minds can relax about child mortality and can use those worry-neurons for fretting about social, educational and parenting issues instead. Once upon a time these aspects were neglected because people's focus was more solidly on keeping their children alive. So yes, there IS such a thing as progress. (I loved my Popper philosophy at uni, and it is useful not to be blinded by an overly-credible belief in forward progress at all times....but still).
Anyway, about the flu vaccine. I am not going to talk much about swine flu, because despite reading a lot about it and giving it some thought, I just am not sure. Who knows?? (Answer: no one, until some more time passes).
Something happened in Australia in recent months which is very worrying. A number of little children who had had the seasonal flu vaccine got bad fevers and convulsions, and a two-year-old died. This was a shock. I have to admit without giving it any thought I had believed the seasonal flu vaccine to be completely safe and proven so over many years. Though I haven't done it, I would not have been too worried getting my kids vaccinated against seasonal flu.
Following more adverse reactions in multiple states, it has now been recommended the seasonal flu vaccine not be given to children younger than 5, until the cause of the problem can be proven and the vaccine changed if warranted.
So that was one thing. Another worrying thing happened a couple of weeks ago. I heard a medical expert on a radio news program talking about this, and he said that when they looked more closely at the data of the children with adverse reactions, they found that these reactions were in fact not unusual. The problem it seems, is with the tracking of results after clinical vaccination trials. Here is something I didn't know: in a vaccine trial, the participants are not tracked for adverse reactions. Instead, adverse reactions are measured from statistics as people present at hospitals. This was news to me and I was shocked!
Then I did some more reading. The reason is due to the sample size of the test population. As adverse reactions are very rare, there are never enough people participating in a trial to properly measure adverse reactions, or to seperate problems from things due to other causes from those due to the vaccine. So they also cannot categorise all the adverse reactions and their probability. These things are only truly known once the vaccine is rolled out to millions of people.
This is explained on the website of the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention which you can read here:
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/Vaccine_Monitoring/Index.html
It also explains something else I could not understand.
Even after all these horrifying reactions among children to the "normal", "safe" seasonal flu vaccine, governments and doctors insisted the new swine flu vaccine was safe for children under 5.
How could this be? The cause of the problems with the seasonal flu vaccine is still not known. The seasonal flu vaccine has been used for years; the swine flu vaccine is about a year old and still not widely taken up. Didn't make sense.
Here are the elements of the answer as far as I can make out:
- the swine flu vaccine is known to be safe for children under 5, because there were extensive trials done testing dosages on children under 5 (I remember when this was going on - I was interested that people participated in these trials. I love and believe in science but unless there were rabid pigs breaking down my door and the people being quarantined with swine flu had symptoms worse than the sniffles they seemed to have, don't think I would enter my kids in tests for a new vaccine against a new disease. On the other hand I knew this was probably ignorant).
- something else I didn't know. The seasonal flu vaccine is not exactly a vaccine that has been in use for years because every year it is different! because flu strains differ every year. Didn't quite know this I don't think!
- however, the seasonal flu vaccine "base" is well tested and known to be safe (though all vaccines will have small numbers of people react adversely).
So you put all that together and conclude that most probably the swine flu vaccine is perfectly safe (for most) and the seasonal flu vaccine usually is too but possibly not ever safe for children under 5, OR there may be something more likely to cause adverse reactions in little kids in this year's batch.
Another point in passing -
I had wondered before how it could be possible that a vaccine was developed for swine flu so quickly and still be safe - but I have read something that explained that; to simplify it lots, basically they have had a lot of practice developing vaccines over the years and these days can roll out new ones very quickly as they just have to add the new ingredient to the base recipe.
I still have a slight question though, if adverse reactions are not individually tracked during trials, and if this batch of seasonal flu vaccine caught everyone by surprise with the child reactions but later data analysis has found the pattern "not unusual", then how can they be REALLY sure the swine flu vaccine is safe for little kids? Were the trials done differently?
Some quick comments lest anyone actually read this and think any of it irresponsible. First, I do NOT believe there is any kind of conspiracy by government and Big Pharma to roll out unsafe vaccines. I do not think there is a conspiracy by the Australian government to offload its swine flu vaccine stockpiles to get their money back or save face over the criticism it was over the top with its swine flu pandemic response plan. (No wait - actually I do kind of believe this one! Simple economics mean it must at least be a TINY bit of a factor... ;-) ! )
I believe the swine flu vaccine is (most probably) safe. I definitely believe in vaccinations for children, and I don't believe that vaccines cause autism.
But I do think - to my shock and disappointment - there have probably always been risks for children under 5 from the flu vaccine, which we have not been educated enough about. It's heartbreaking, the trust that all the parents had, who routinely vaccinated their kids with the flu shot this year. And it's a real shame, if this spurs on more parents to decide not to vaccinate their kids against the other stuff.
Now, I am pro-vaccines. No question. I get impatient with people who forget about the horrible sicknesses children used to get and the numbers that died from these diseases in the past, in an age (fairly recent!) when the spectre of losing a child from illness was very real. It is wonderful that we live in an age where our worrying minds can relax about child mortality and can use those worry-neurons for fretting about social, educational and parenting issues instead. Once upon a time these aspects were neglected because people's focus was more solidly on keeping their children alive. So yes, there IS such a thing as progress. (I loved my Popper philosophy at uni, and it is useful not to be blinded by an overly-credible belief in forward progress at all times....but still).
Anyway, about the flu vaccine. I am not going to talk much about swine flu, because despite reading a lot about it and giving it some thought, I just am not sure. Who knows?? (Answer: no one, until some more time passes).
Something happened in Australia in recent months which is very worrying. A number of little children who had had the seasonal flu vaccine got bad fevers and convulsions, and a two-year-old died. This was a shock. I have to admit without giving it any thought I had believed the seasonal flu vaccine to be completely safe and proven so over many years. Though I haven't done it, I would not have been too worried getting my kids vaccinated against seasonal flu.
Following more adverse reactions in multiple states, it has now been recommended the seasonal flu vaccine not be given to children younger than 5, until the cause of the problem can be proven and the vaccine changed if warranted.
So that was one thing. Another worrying thing happened a couple of weeks ago. I heard a medical expert on a radio news program talking about this, and he said that when they looked more closely at the data of the children with adverse reactions, they found that these reactions were in fact not unusual. The problem it seems, is with the tracking of results after clinical vaccination trials. Here is something I didn't know: in a vaccine trial, the participants are not tracked for adverse reactions. Instead, adverse reactions are measured from statistics as people present at hospitals. This was news to me and I was shocked!
Then I did some more reading. The reason is due to the sample size of the test population. As adverse reactions are very rare, there are never enough people participating in a trial to properly measure adverse reactions, or to seperate problems from things due to other causes from those due to the vaccine. So they also cannot categorise all the adverse reactions and their probability. These things are only truly known once the vaccine is rolled out to millions of people.
This is explained on the website of the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention which you can read here:
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/Vaccine_Monitoring/Index.html
It also explains something else I could not understand.
Even after all these horrifying reactions among children to the "normal", "safe" seasonal flu vaccine, governments and doctors insisted the new swine flu vaccine was safe for children under 5.
How could this be? The cause of the problems with the seasonal flu vaccine is still not known. The seasonal flu vaccine has been used for years; the swine flu vaccine is about a year old and still not widely taken up. Didn't make sense.
Here are the elements of the answer as far as I can make out:
- the swine flu vaccine is known to be safe for children under 5, because there were extensive trials done testing dosages on children under 5 (I remember when this was going on - I was interested that people participated in these trials. I love and believe in science but unless there were rabid pigs breaking down my door and the people being quarantined with swine flu had symptoms worse than the sniffles they seemed to have, don't think I would enter my kids in tests for a new vaccine against a new disease. On the other hand I knew this was probably ignorant).
- something else I didn't know. The seasonal flu vaccine is not exactly a vaccine that has been in use for years because every year it is different! because flu strains differ every year. Didn't quite know this I don't think!
- however, the seasonal flu vaccine "base" is well tested and known to be safe (though all vaccines will have small numbers of people react adversely).
So you put all that together and conclude that most probably the swine flu vaccine is perfectly safe (for most) and the seasonal flu vaccine usually is too but possibly not ever safe for children under 5, OR there may be something more likely to cause adverse reactions in little kids in this year's batch.
Another point in passing -
I had wondered before how it could be possible that a vaccine was developed for swine flu so quickly and still be safe - but I have read something that explained that; to simplify it lots, basically they have had a lot of practice developing vaccines over the years and these days can roll out new ones very quickly as they just have to add the new ingredient to the base recipe.
I still have a slight question though, if adverse reactions are not individually tracked during trials, and if this batch of seasonal flu vaccine caught everyone by surprise with the child reactions but later data analysis has found the pattern "not unusual", then how can they be REALLY sure the swine flu vaccine is safe for little kids? Were the trials done differently?
Some quick comments lest anyone actually read this and think any of it irresponsible. First, I do NOT believe there is any kind of conspiracy by government and Big Pharma to roll out unsafe vaccines. I do not think there is a conspiracy by the Australian government to offload its swine flu vaccine stockpiles to get their money back or save face over the criticism it was over the top with its swine flu pandemic response plan. (No wait - actually I do kind of believe this one! Simple economics mean it must at least be a TINY bit of a factor... ;-) ! )
I believe the swine flu vaccine is (most probably) safe. I definitely believe in vaccinations for children, and I don't believe that vaccines cause autism.
But I do think - to my shock and disappointment - there have probably always been risks for children under 5 from the flu vaccine, which we have not been educated enough about. It's heartbreaking, the trust that all the parents had, who routinely vaccinated their kids with the flu shot this year. And it's a real shame, if this spurs on more parents to decide not to vaccinate their kids against the other stuff.
May 12, 2010
March of the dinosaurs
As George Bush apparently said once, "They misunderestimated me."
Never under-estimate your kids. Something I do all the time. I don't seem to learn!
These pictures are actually very old - something I've been meaning to post for some time, and time, time, time, time, TIME is the leading theme always. It just gets away.
Anyway, this was a few months ago, when the girls had just turned 4.
Now I love my kids and they amaze me every day (blah blah blah), but I know I don't have an Aelita Andree on my hands! (or maybe I do - there I go with the underestimating again). So at this stage, around 3 and a half, they were drawing occasional recognisable shapes but nothing regular. A spider here, a ladder there, some crazy squiggles most of the time.
Then on this day out of the blue M came up with this - first picture above right.
What...?!! NO hint that this was coming, you understand. Just a few wobbly flowers (still her favourite motif 4 months later), and no actual other lizardy-dinosaur pictures before or since. Where did this come from?!
Wide-eyed with awe, voice full of admiration, A cried "Mummy! Look what M did - a dinosaur!"
Then, her competitive button pushed, A promptly produced her own - the second picture above right.
Same story - nothing similar before or since.
Weird! Great but weird!
Lucky I took these shots too because by the end of the day they had both cut up their pictures and they now exist only as paper fossils somewhere in the recycling system.
Feb 22, 2010
What kind of science?
Anything. But my comments are going to be most likely few and sparse, because I work. Full time. And have kids. Did I mention these two things already?
Some things I am interested in and would like to follow up -
The Man Who Lives With Wolves (wolves? really?)
Freakonomics - great first time round, not sure about the second
Emissions Trading Schemes - just trading schemes??
GFC
Organic food
Natural childbirth - why??
Human animals: culture is nature.
Medicine around the world
Efficiency at work
I no longer believe in telepathy but how do you explain that thing where if you stare at someone they look up?
Some things I am interested in and would like to follow up -
The Man Who Lives With Wolves (wolves? really?)
Freakonomics - great first time round, not sure about the second
Emissions Trading Schemes - just trading schemes??
GFC
Organic food
Natural childbirth - why??
Human animals: culture is nature.
Medicine around the world
Efficiency at work
I no longer believe in telepathy but how do you explain that thing where if you stare at someone they look up?
Time-Saving Tips - Huh
Ah, time-saving tips. Supposedly a godsend for frazzled working parents, and a feature of every women's magazine, newspaper lifestyle supplement and any published pamphlet, leaflet, article, book, magazine, website or written word of any kind produced for parents.
Time-saving tips remind me in general of the following: when my girls were babies and I was on my own with them and both were crying at the same time, I was convinced there must be some special sort of trick out there that people use with twins and triplets. There had to be things people had learned, to manage more than one distressed babe on those occasions when both (or three - shudder) were equally in need of some comfort - if ONLY I could JUST find out what they were! I called my 'new parent' contact at our twins club and asked her "What are some things you can do when both are crying at once?" She said "Well, I just used to always make sure I had someone else around at all times." Okay then!
Now as it happens as you go along you do manage to find some little ways to juggle two screaming babies – and these things will actually work sometimes. But not all the time. It took me awhile to accept the truth: there is no trick. You can rock both in their rockers or pop one in a swing while you cuddle the other, or you can lie on the floor and cuddle them both (sort of works), but there are some times where the only option is to comfort one and let the other cry. Heartbreaking, stressful and sad at the time – but sometimes just can’t be helped.
So back to time-saving tips. They can remind me of the advice in the little history above, because they are either of little use, are unrealistic, or if not they are things you’re already doing, or are unsuitable for your own situation.
There are the tips that sound good but aren’t:
“Cook double quantities of meals so you have some to put in the freezer”.
Yes, that works well with my special double-sized mixing bowls and double-sized pots and pans. I do do this on occasion but also never quite escape the feeling that it hasn’t actually saved me a huge amount of time.
“Get up 15 minutes earlier”. What, earlier than 5.30??
“Only check and respond to email twice a day”. Hmm, what company do these writers work for? Not mine! I seriously wonder how many people can get away with this one.
There are the frankly unrealistic:
“Make a list of staple foods to keep in your cupboard to help save time on weekly shopping”. Um, yes, I will definitely find time to do that.
Then there are those that seem to be there in order to make the list of tips a decent size, but are nothing you are not already doing:
“Chop up vegetables while the pasta is cooking” Good idea! Otherwise I would have just stood around while the pasta was cooking!
“Turn on your oven half an hour before you need to use it, to ensure it is hot” Yes this is called pre-heating and is already mentioned in my recipe thanks very much.
“Double up on appointments where you can”. Excuse me, does anyone who has to take time off work to get kids to a specialist and a cat to the vet actually need to be told this? Or maybe it’s like, the first thing that comes into my head when I am planning my appointments!
The rest are good ideas but are just not achievable all the time. All those suggestions to lay out clothes and prepare bags in the evening, plan family meals a week ahead, do your grocery shopping online, make and freeze a week’s worth of sandwiches – you can have a nice little routine going doing these for awhile until some Unforeseen but Inevitable Event occurs which means you don’t do it one night and then you’re thrown out of whack for the rest of the week. Or month. Or six month stretch!
The truth? It is impossible. You cannot save yourself lots of time. You can’t cheat the universe and be that organised. Working and child-rearing and the hundreds of household and administrative tasks that go along with them are time-consuming and constant. You will be tired and falling behind and will never have enough time. And that is called… Life!
Time-saving tips remind me in general of the following: when my girls were babies and I was on my own with them and both were crying at the same time, I was convinced there must be some special sort of trick out there that people use with twins and triplets. There had to be things people had learned, to manage more than one distressed babe on those occasions when both (or three - shudder) were equally in need of some comfort - if ONLY I could JUST find out what they were! I called my 'new parent' contact at our twins club and asked her "What are some things you can do when both are crying at once?" She said "Well, I just used to always make sure I had someone else around at all times." Okay then!
Now as it happens as you go along you do manage to find some little ways to juggle two screaming babies – and these things will actually work sometimes. But not all the time. It took me awhile to accept the truth: there is no trick. You can rock both in their rockers or pop one in a swing while you cuddle the other, or you can lie on the floor and cuddle them both (sort of works), but there are some times where the only option is to comfort one and let the other cry. Heartbreaking, stressful and sad at the time – but sometimes just can’t be helped.
So back to time-saving tips. They can remind me of the advice in the little history above, because they are either of little use, are unrealistic, or if not they are things you’re already doing, or are unsuitable for your own situation.
There are the tips that sound good but aren’t:
“Cook double quantities of meals so you have some to put in the freezer”.
Yes, that works well with my special double-sized mixing bowls and double-sized pots and pans. I do do this on occasion but also never quite escape the feeling that it hasn’t actually saved me a huge amount of time.
“Get up 15 minutes earlier”. What, earlier than 5.30??
“Only check and respond to email twice a day”. Hmm, what company do these writers work for? Not mine! I seriously wonder how many people can get away with this one.
There are the frankly unrealistic:
“Make a list of staple foods to keep in your cupboard to help save time on weekly shopping”. Um, yes, I will definitely find time to do that.
Then there are those that seem to be there in order to make the list of tips a decent size, but are nothing you are not already doing:
“Chop up vegetables while the pasta is cooking” Good idea! Otherwise I would have just stood around while the pasta was cooking!
“Turn on your oven half an hour before you need to use it, to ensure it is hot” Yes this is called pre-heating and is already mentioned in my recipe thanks very much.
“Double up on appointments where you can”. Excuse me, does anyone who has to take time off work to get kids to a specialist and a cat to the vet actually need to be told this? Or maybe it’s like, the first thing that comes into my head when I am planning my appointments!
The rest are good ideas but are just not achievable all the time. All those suggestions to lay out clothes and prepare bags in the evening, plan family meals a week ahead, do your grocery shopping online, make and freeze a week’s worth of sandwiches – you can have a nice little routine going doing these for awhile until some Unforeseen but Inevitable Event occurs which means you don’t do it one night and then you’re thrown out of whack for the rest of the week. Or month. Or six month stretch!
The truth? It is impossible. You cannot save yourself lots of time. You can’t cheat the universe and be that organised. Working and child-rearing and the hundreds of household and administrative tasks that go along with them are time-consuming and constant. You will be tired and falling behind and will never have enough time. And that is called… Life!
Jan 3, 2010
Exercise
We all know that little-but-regular exercise is better than heavy-but-infrequent work-outs so to that end I have decided to try and do a little of something every day. After today’s effort I ask myself: can 10 minutes of solo totem tennis in the backyard be considered exercise? And given it is 10 minutes more than anything that I have been doing in recent memory, I respond: yes it can.
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