Scuby

A graphic tile that says Breaking news 17,00 Policy, Advisory, Knowledge & Specialist health workers to strike on Thursday October 23. The Stand Together For Health and PSA logos are in the corners.

📢 1,700 Policy, Advisory, Knowledge and Specialist health workers have voted to join strike action on 23 October. The strike follows the failure of Health NZ Te Whatu Ora to provide an offer during bargaining that fairly reflects their value to the public health system.

Regardless I’m lying here at 2am eyes like dinner plates, Adrenalin up the wazoo, no chance of 90 mins more sleep before we get up.
Front desk apologised.
We realised I had double locked the door and John didn’t realise I had done it and unlocked it trying to do the same before bed

Tonight I learned that @johnnyredlives.bsky.social is very brave and I am not. Two men let themselves into our hotel room because the front desk gave us the wrong room and both the key (WTF). I lay there terrified and John was shooing them out the door quick as. It’s all a safe misunderstanding. But

Today we decided to get over the jet lag alone in Istanbul while the others went ahead, and my sister meets us tomorrow from Amsterdam. It’s quite nice to not worry about others and just snooze! Our big exciting thing to notice about our suburb in Istanbul is that there are kittens everywhere!

Because this trip isn’t just John and I. It’s my parents, brother and sister, and our chosen partners. We have been scheming this since 2023, and saving since pre COVID!
The trip of a life time around Türkiye as a whanau

A label reading first placed loser is written onto a post it note stuck to the inside of my passport

We stayed awake until mid afternoon and then conked out guilt free because our next flight is at 630am we are back up with the birds tomorrow so we may as well sleep as much as we can, and worry about sleep patterns tomorrow. Travelling with my brother brings some very childish behaviour…

Well our first biggest travel leg is DONE. We left our regional home on Saturday morning NZ time, and arrived at our hotel in Istanbul at 11:30pm Sunday NZ time. Same clothes and shoes. Exhausted, but remarkably still feeling well and alert-ish.

It my delicious after work snack stop that lures me into the garden each summer day

Ooh me too! The blueberry / strawberry bed is ready to go!

"If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality."

- Desmond Tutu

This only happens to you once

'free speech absolutists' my fucking arse!

What do you do when the man who said you should have "the living shit beaten out of you" keeps sitting in the front row of candidate events?

You make him meet your eye.

You make him listen to the gasps of outrage when you say his words outloud.

You make him listen to the applause you get.

Honestly it was such a great laugh and a spark of joy when he was like “YOU AGAIN” and I was like “oh noooo!” And he was like “oh yes, this is the THING now”
😂
Just what my day needed- a bit of a laugh

But it gets BETTER. I call back an hour later and he recognises the number and the Bit is ON.
Now we just finish all the calls with I love you and I love you too, this is a thing we do now.
Sorry not sorry.
😂😂😂
It’s been a terrible day but the team or weirdos across the services are so lovely!

And I said “it’s ok, this is still redeemable as long as I don’t also ring off with “I love you”, and he laughed and rang off with “I love you too”
😂😂😂

Needed to make a few calls through hospital switch today and the guy said to me”have a great holiday” and I said “you too” and then was like oh noooo
Because it was autopilot and he wasn’t going on holiday. He laughed and I laughed.. and then…

I get that the news cycle is packed right now, but I just heard from a colleague at the Smithsonian that this is fully a GIANT SQUID BEING EATEN BY A SPERM WHALE and it’s possibly the first ever confirmed video according to a friend at NOAA

10 YEAR OLD ME IS LOSING HER MIND (a thread 🧵)

Health Minister promises 75,000 more procedures under $65m plan Simeon Brown says the money comes from savings in other areas and a pool set aside by the government.

NZ Minister of Health announces escalation of throwing public money to private healthcare in effort to destroy public healthcare.

Not even hiding it now.
#nzpol
www.rnz.co.nz/news/politic...

If you are coming to a clinic and plan to tell little fibs about your lifestyle, come alone. Your husband/child/friend sitting next to you clearly wasn’t briefed as required to keep a straight face when you say you don’t drink and you only eat healthy.
Also, I’m not judging! 😂😂😂

The abuse being thrown at women is horrific and needs to stop. Hopefully our votes will keep the worst out of councils, but menfolk, esp those of you in leadership roles, you need to step up, call this out and stop it.

Travel prep tasks completed this week; bags waterproofed. Hiking shoes cleaned ready for water proofing.
Packing laid out ready to go in bags.
Batteries into devices that need them, and last min order of the ones I’ve forgotten made. Passport and essential cards placed in obvious spot not “safe”

Simeon Brown is funding private equity telehealth companies up to ~4.5 times ($65/appt) more than community GPs. These same companies e.g. Tend Health are then charging Kiwis $80-100 for a call. #kiwi

Doctors strike today after a year of frontline hiring freezes, budget cuts and the multi-million dollar grift to private healthcare investors. Simeon has also cut 1/3 of ICU beds in some areas & closed suicide centres. The doctors' messages are bang on
#nzpol #kiwi

So Simeon Brown just announced $20m "investment" in ED frontline staff, immediately after it was revealed Christchurch hospital is in code red every single day.

But it turns out it's just OLD money from the 2025 budget & already allocated. Brown strikes again #nzpol #Kiwi

Drs (and nurses, teachers too) only ever strike as an absolute last resort - and because they care about YOU and the service they can provide to you. Unsafe staffing impacts you. Exhausted Drs impacts you. Underpaid Drs means they LEAVE.

I stand with our Drs today, and always.

#nzpol

here's my organising 101

find a local thing that needs fixing

plan how to fix it

ask if anyone wants to help

fix the thing

repeat

we need it to be this simple to start with because in NZ our civic frameworks continue to be hollowed out. Connect in your communities, bond over jobs done well

The censorship and the violations of freedom of the press by this regime are unprecedented in our modern history.

Every games night should come with a compulsory crumb cleaner-waggy pal.