… how much I enjoyed the shower that I had this morning.

It’s the first shower that I’ve had in the four weeks that I’ve been here and it was wonderful to be underneath the hot water instead of rubbing myself with a flannel.

The only issue was that had the cute little student nurse who came to check on me come 5 minutes earlier, she could have scrubbed my back.

Last night I was asleep in bed by 21:00 and I slept all the way right through until .. errr … 00:45 when I had to leave my bed for reasons that any man of my age will tell you.

And then we had a disaster. It’s Wednesday evening and I’ve just had a nightmare. I fell asleep and dreamed that I was at some kind of party where one of the nurses was feeding me with pills etc, force-feeding me. I rang the emergency bell and it was the nurse whom I thought was trying to poison me who came along to see what was happening. I told her that I must have had a nightmare and there was no real cause for alarm etc. I was sorry that I’d called her.

It took ages to go back to sleep again but when I did I was off on my travels. I was on a coach trip. I had a Leyland Duple Laser. I’d taken these people from Stoke on Trent down to a cricket match. They’d stayed there the day, watched the match and then I’d brought them home. They had a whip-round on the coach for me that brought in about £2:20. It wasn’t all that much but surprisingly one of the girls I actually worked with but she didn’t recognise me or let on that she knew me and neither did I. After I’d parked up the coach on the way back I had to come back on Nerina’s bicycle but a tyre on it was flat so I had to ride around until I found a street light with a kerb edge where I could prop up the bike to pump it up. There was a big grid just there. I thought that if I dropped my keys or something they’d be gone completely down the hole but I had to find a place in the light to pump up the tyre so I could cycle all the way home from this Motorway service area where I’d left the coach.

And later I’d been for a walk across a park or golf course etc. There was an area where people could walk their dogs but they couldn’t walk them everywhere. When I reached the end a car came. It was driven by someone whom I knew. There were quite a few of us there, Jean-Marc and some others. Eventually we all crammed into this car, 6 of us. We thought that the car was overcrowded. We made jokes about sardines etc. We set off, and I had a map so I could see roughly where we were going. Another guy in the car, an old guy, made some kind of remark like “are we going anywhere near (such-and-such) street?”. As far as I could tell we were going down a street with a similar name but not that exact street. he said “it’s near a park” which this street certainly was. He needed to stop at a “Super L” supermarket in the street to pick up something. I couldn’t find a “Super L” supermarket. I didn’t even think that it existed. There was a “Super U” somewhere in this street on the corner. I wondered if he was confusing himself about where he wanted to go and what he wanted to do and the name of the supermarket, which was easily done.

The alarm went off at 06:30 as usual to awaken me but I do have vague memories of all kinds of nurses and the like coming to do something or other to me.

During the early part of the morning I was poked and prodded about by various nurses but eventually a doctor appeared.

She told me that there is an infection in my bloodstream that looks as if it’s come from my catheter port in my chest. Consequently it can no longer be used.

M response was to wish good luck to whoever gets the job of finding a vein in which to insert a catheter.

After she went I saw the physiotherapist who gave me a few exercises and I actually lost my balance at one point although the physiotherapist caught me before I hit the ground. He told me as he was leaving that I ought to walk more.

And so when the nurse offered me a shower I declined the wheelchair that she had brought and said that I’d walk there holding onto my portable patient thing. I had to stop for breath several times but I made it in the end. The nurse showed me the controls and left me to my own devices.

And it was wonderful.

The cute little student nurse who came to check on me found me trying to tidy everything up so she took my stuff back to my room and then came back to accompany me there.

As on the outward trip I had to stop a few times to catch my breath but it was successful in that I didn’t fall over and I was quite pleased. It was a long way.

A little later the nurse said that she had to fix a catheter in my arm, which was why I suspect that they wanted to me to take a shower first.

The little student was there so I asked her how many catheters she had fitted. “Not many’ was the response so I gave her my arm and told her to get on with it.

The nurse gave her a little talk first and then she went and did it – found a vein and fitted the catheter with her first go. She was ever so impressed and I was ever so relieved. It could have been much worse. I don’t mind the students practising on my but I do have my limits.

Anyway they have now been able to give me antibiotics throughout the day

A doctor came to see me too. She didn’t have much to say so I asked her why they had cancelled the raft of appointments that were booked for yesterday and today. She replied that they were all breathing-test exercises and according to her I was in no fit state to take them.

Once again I expressed my dismay at what was happening. Here was an ideal opportunity for everyone to work together to find out what’s going on with my breathing but they are just delaying and delaying the issue.

And I don’t have the time for delays, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall.

So having had a really busy morning, the afternoon was a disappointment. Apart from the nurses coming to give me these antibiotics, nothing happened at all. No-one else came by and I was left to my own devices yet again. I listened to all of a 3.5 hours of a Paul Temple radio programme.

But right now I’ve had enough and I’m going to bed. I expect that I’ll be awoken at some point during the night with a nurse trying to take my blood pressure or something. I may as well sleep while I can.