Dr. Thomas Gillan @alarmedsurgeon-blog - Tumblr Blog

Tom’s gaze shifted to the young man who answered, rather enthusiastically. Here we go. Another fresh recruit with stars in his eyes who was in for a rude awakening. He’d gone through countless medical students who had crumbled under the pressure of battlefield medicine. His assimilation into the Army had not been easy, but he had experience as a trauma surgeon beforehand. In hindsight, the year at Southern General in Glasgow had been the perfect training ground for the war, as he had adjusted much more easily than some of his colleagues. Many of the recruits he had dealt with had to rush out of the operating tent to retch as he performed surgery.

He hoped this man—or boy, rather, they were getting younger by the day— would be different, but he wasn’t getting his hopes up. He positively ran over to him and snapped off a smart salute, which Tom returned with considerably less vigor. “At ease, Mandawuy. Welcome to Boulogne. Come on, I’ll show you around.” He gestured to the dirt path leading to the cluster of tents up ahead. “You’re from Australia, I take it?”

#mediciinal #verse: the great experiment;#sorry this is so late! college has been a pain

juststuffwithbits

#alarmed since the moment you arrived;#photographs;

He hadn’t been expecting her to push back. In his admittedly biased experience with members of the social elite, Tom had always found that they would engage him in conversation politely, but usually about trivialities he never would have known a thing about—‘that race at Ascot’ or ‘that chap we knew at Eton’. They were always so aloof, but he knew that they were trying to belittle him, whether overtly or not. It didn’t bother him—it was annoying, certainly, but he found that the best response to such things was to appear as unaffected as they were, and it usually worked. But it didn’t seem like that was what she was trying to do, which was surprising. He half wondered if she too was trying to avoid speaking to the others.

“I don’t believe that the world is that clear cut, ma’am.” he rejoined carefully. “There are hard facts, of course, in matters of science, for example, but even then, there are some elements where one can’t come to an absolute conclusion either way, which is why we call them theories. To say that the human race is bound by absolutes would be doing it a great disservice—I think it was Nietzsche that said ‘morality is neither rational nor absolute nor natural.’ My Presbyterian mother wouldn’t approve, but I think he had a point.”

#ofnxbility #verse: binding the wounds of war;

It was one of those rare days when he wasn’t busy, and Miles was catching up on sleep, so he finally had the chance to hear himself think. He sat in his tent, paging through the latest British Medical Journal (or at least the latest that he could get from France, it was three months old by the time he’d received it). He had been reading it ever since university, fascinated by the modern ideas that the journal championed, and under Colonel Brett’s supervision had gotten the chance to test some of them on his patients, in order to improve their prognosis and quality of life. The Army had given him far more responsibility than he’d had in Glasgow, and although the regimentation of it all could be stifling at times, at least he could say that his skills were being put to good use. He could never have picked up a rifle, as his brothers had. It was sobering to know firsthand what one could do to destroy one’s fellow man.

“Sir, the new recruits are here.”

Tom looked up at the lieutenant in confusion before nodding. “That’s right, they were due to arrive today, weren’t they? Thanks, Franklin.” He set aside his magazine and stood up, grabbing his uniform jacket and shrugging it on as he exited the tent. Brett had mentioned that they were getting a few field medics from reserve, and he had asked him to train one of them personally.

The Scotsman made his way through the encampment to the truck that had just pulled in, and waited as the men started to unload the cargo. “Which one of you blokes is Mandawuy?”

@mediciinal

#mediciinal #verse: the great experiment;#let me know if this works!

ofnxbility

❛ Everything in life is either black and white — there’s no grey.

♚▐ ▏@alarmedsurgeon

alarmedsurgeon-blog

He would have been far happier at a research hospital, perhaps one attached to a university—London, preferably. But he knew better than to think that a stint in the RAMC would have distinguished him from the public school prats he would have had to contend with for any shred of recognition. He had spent time treating refugees and war orphans in France before finally deciding upon a village hospital that had been in need of an assistant physician, hoping that the size of the hospital would make its board more receptive to his ideas. Of course the board was dominated by the same sort of people he would have fought with tooth and nail in London, and his boss, a fellow Scotsman, Clarkson, had compelled him to make the case to its patrons—an aristocratic family—over dinner. He had had to purchase tails for heaven’s sake, which he had neither owned nor expected to own in his life. And, to make matters worse, a near shouting match had erupted between the only member of the clan he knew since she frequented the hospital, Mrs. Crawley, and its president, the elder Lady Grantham. After an awkward round of drinks with the earl and his Irish son-in-law, he had retreated to the drawing room with the others and tried to concoct an escape route as he nursed a glass of wine. He was certain that the good doctor had only sent him in his stead because he didn’t want to deal with the matter himself.

His eyes shifted to the woman as she addressed him, racking his brains for her name as he contemplated what she had said. “Not everything.” He shook his head in disagreement, before adding shortly, “But this is, certainly—either my patients deserve the best care or they don’t. It’s that simple.”

#ofnxbility #verse: binding the wounds of war;#he's antisocial forgive him

whatifthisstormends

#photographs;#alarmed since the moment you arrived;

thomasgillan

#photographs;#same tho

jackdonaghy

Richard Rankin in Silent Witness Falling Angel previews

fuckyeahrichardrankin

Richard plays DI Luke Nelson, a “highly intelligent and sensitive man”, a “high flyer” in two episodes of Silent Witness airing 12 & 13 January 2015. Seriously. The fuchsia suit lining.

fuckyeahrichardrankin

Yes dorkout his jacket has a brightly coloured lining! The back of his weskit will too. See trailer here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3kkBx0kE5jo

#photographs;