HSA stood for Hospital Savings Association and is part of Simplyhealth now. I remember the HSA because my grandparents were members.I used to 'pay in' monthly to the HSA - Healthcare Saving Association (I think). Best investment I had, since it help pay for regular private dental care (when I couldn't get NHS) and gave me a regular weekly payment while I was in hospital, regardless of my being in NHS treatment.
Can't find it around these days.
Have to say, after finding a few lumps 'ere and there I'm always going to consider taking a second opinion.My scariest moment was at age 29 when a GP told me the lump in my boob was definitely hormonal and would go down by itself...spoiler alert - it did not
Thank the gods for private health insurance!
That's no way to talk about Techy.I'm prone to fatty cysts
My brother calls me that.That's no way to talk about Techy.
Mines a work perk, definitely had my moneys worth out of it with over £100k in chemo and surgery!I used to 'pay in' monthly to the HSA - Healthcare Saving Association (I think). Best investment I had, since it help pay for regular private dental care (when I couldn't get NHS) and gave me a regular weekly payment while I was in hospital, regardless of my being in NHS treatment.
Can't find it around these days.
Jesus Christ. That's mental. .. I'd have legged it as well.One of my scariest moments to date:
When I was in my early twenties my partner and I shared a house that we had just moved into on a long lane opposite an old off-licence. It was one of those type of places where nothing ever happened. My partner worked and I was studying at that point, but we both arrived home at a similar time early each evening.
One Friday eve he went up to grab a quick shower whilst I nipped over to the shop to buy a few bottles of something. As I stepped inside (and this all happened very, very quickly) two enormous men wearing all black with woolly tights over their heads shouted at me to stay exactly where I was and not move. I was half way inside the door.
Both of them held guns, one pointing at the head of the shop keeper who was kneeling on the floor. Two other customers were inside - a woman to my left and an older man to the rear of the shop. As one of the masked men yelled at me to keep still, he pointed the gun (it was large-ish and long, no idea what type it was) straight at me, and in a fraction of a second I bolted back out of the door and ran like hell across the road to our house and scrambled to get my key in the lock. It seemed to take forever to get that door open, although I am certain now that it was probably a matter of seconds. During this time I was fully expecting to get shot in the back.
I never turned to look, and once inside bolted up the stairs to find my partner who was still in the shower. He never tired of relating this scene for years afterwards; the pounding of my feet on the stairs, hurtling into the bathroom trying to catch my breath, my heart pounding, unable to articulate anything apart from "They had guns!". He thought I was having him on.
I was so convinced that they had seen where we lived, which was directly opposite the shop, that we moved out a few weeks later. Thankfully they were apprehended in the next town the following day. Although the shop keeper sustained some fairly nasty injuries, nobody else was hurt. God knows if the weapons were real.
Looking back it seems like a strange dream. I had led a rather pampered, middle class life up to this point so my reaction may have been a little bit wackadoo, but I really didn't want to continue living there, even if rationally I was fully aware that we were in no real danger. I couldn't sleep for a week and we went to stay with my parents. I remember trying to write it all down in a journal, which I probably still have, somewhere. We spent an hour or so with a detective that evening who told us that my 'inexplicable' reaction had caused them to take off without having taken any money. The shopkeeper gave me a very large amount of free booze for intervening at the right time .
When I looked back on this, and even shortly afterwards, I could NOT explain why I ran. If I approach my actions consciously I would not have even budged. I would never have dared to move a single inch. I certainly learned that we can never predict what we might do in a crisis.
I'd agree with that but it sounds like you actually did the right thing! So well done for that!I certainly learned that we can never predict what we might do in a crisis.
I didn't enjoy it Sollywos so I won't be writing a book about it. I'm just very unlucky sometimes. Thank you for being happy I'm surviving. Everyone who knows me has told me the same thing, it's not even down to bad decision making ... I found an enamel badge today on the floor that was marking the coronation of King Charles the 3rd, I thought 'sweet!' then I noticed it was a badge given to girl guides because of the logo on it and I'm a 50 year old man. I even said to the Mrs "You know how much bad luck I get .. I suppose some girl guide's been murdered and this badge will be traced back to me somehow.". It would be funny if it was funny.I've read your account of this before @Swifty and as before I'm amazed about your adventurous life and what you've done to survive. It seems to me that your inbuilt instinct to help others has led you into an awful lot of scrapes. Stay safe my Fortean friend and write that book!!!!
Not sure if you meant me, but no, we moved into a lovely new house a few weeks later and it felt like a distant dream. The first week was tough though. As far as I know the shopkeeper is still going, along with his business, all these yrs later!Things can change within a second.
Do you suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder ?
I'm trying very hard not to imagine two people covered in watermelon, wondering what just happened. Classic.Maybe not the scariest moment, but maybe the most messy moment.
The wife bringing home a watermelon, not knowing that sometimes bacteria can get inside a watermelon causing fermentation, when we stuck a knife into it, the watermelon exploded like a bomb causing the biggest mess.
It took a few days to clean up.
Missed this comment earlier! Well I for one do, real and electronic. Oh the joy of being able to buy books for my kindle in the middle of the night!Who still buys books these days?.
I have a whole load of books I haven't read yet. I guess when I retire, I'll have plenty to read.Missed this comment earlier! Well I for one do, real and electronic. Oh the joy of being able to buy books for my kindle in the middle of the night!
I do still find myself preferring to go into a bookshop rather than shop for clothes and stuff. I feel insecure if I haven't got a big pile of real books, and at least 50 novels and dozens of factual (including fortean) books waiting on my kindle! From what I've gleaned on here I'm far from the only member that feels like this. Didn't we have a thread of people posting photos of their book cases a while back?
To conclude a real scarey thing would be realising I'd run out of new books to read ... doesn't bear thinking about ... shudder.
Maybe it's because Internet retailers have now taken the biggest market share?To change the idea, the only book store left in our area has books, a play area for children, and most important a fancy coffee inside, and they still seem to struggle with sales.
Me!Who still buys books these days?.