One hand clapping

This may be the oddest of my blips yet, but I am back on self imposed horizontal resting, after the exertions of the week left me aching and longing to lie down!

This iPad picture was surprisingly difficult: I had to hold the iPad with my right hand (not the stronger of the two) in order to blip my left hand, which meant pressing the shutter with my right thumb while trying to steady the iPad with just my fingers. It's a thermal imaging shot with an additional filter to make it more purple and defined.

Hands are so vital! I once gave my permission for my photo to be taken while I was doing Indian head massage at a health fair at the non-local authority college, It turned out I had unintentionally given the equivalent of a verbal model release, for my hands later turned up in a brochure advertising a head massage course to be run by someone else! I did complain, and was told, "but it's just hands..."

Having worked in the permissions department of a publishing company, and as a non-fashion model, I know there is no such thing as "just hands"!

The pinkie of my left hand is broken: briefly, in 1996, a colleague who was using my parking space, rang my doorbell to say there was a dead cat in the space. I went out to inspect, then back to the flat to get a box. Standing at the top of the stairs, wearing my glasses, not contacts, I experienced a telescoping visual sensation and suddenly found myself at the bottom, with a broken finger! Luckily a friend was passing and accompanied me, and stayed, during the long boring wait in Casualty. I have to point out that it was a bad week for dead cats: the same friend and I had already buried one that week! It was also a bad time for massage, because I could not do any after that for several months. Fortunately it was not my sole source of income.

The day before I'd been out with a friend, and discussed how Michael Flatley, then starring in Riverdance (or Lord of the Dance) had had his legs insured for £2 million. Why would you insure a body part, I had asked naively.

Did anyone else see the programme on Tv about a hand transplant, about ten days ago? It is now possible, at Leeds infirmary, to transplant a hand so that it is fully functional on the recipient's body. One of the main drawbacks is that it will not look like the original. How would it be to receive the hand of a person of the opposite gender, or a different skin colour, or age? I am not vain; hands are for working with, but it's an interesting question.