It’s Thursday, but it’s been raining nonetheless (we’re in Manchester, after all). I sorted my headache out by interviewing my own GP about migraine management, and the last thing I needed to do was to collect some voxpops from those Mancunians who’d wish to chat to me about their migraine and headache experience.
Some people didn’t want to talk. Most of those who did never experienced either migraine or a severe headache (is that ever possible?) One young man who kindly decided to asnwer my question told me he didn’t suffer from any sort of migraine, but that he suffered from asthma instead. Unfortunately, we already covered asthma before.
Finally I saw this lady in a black-and-white stripy jumper walking towards me.
– How do you feel when you have a headache? – I asked.
She stopped and looked at me in amazement. She asked what it was for, then said that she’s currently suffering from a severe headache, which feels like a knife is being stuck in her head.
At the end of all this, when we still stood together in the street with me saving the file, my anonymous interviewee said:
– You know I’ve actually got this terrible migraine right now, and when you came up and asked me, I thought: how does she know? is she a psychic?
Morale: voxpops may not be representative, but they’re invaluable for getting an odd story or comment.