Category Archives: Connections

Friday 28th June 2019 – NOW HERE’S A THING

I had my blood test at the hospital, and there has been a dramatic change in the situation.

Last month (albeit almost 6 weeks ago) the blood count was about 9.1. I’ve had it checked at Granville twice just recently, and it was at 9.4. But today, it’s plummetted down to near-critical 8.4

And that’s a total surprise to me because that just doesn’t seem to be right at all. Something is wrong somewhere. And I do have to say that right now I’m feeling better than I have felt for a while, which is a good thing.

Last night was a rather depressing night. I wasn’t sure to leave the air-conditioning on and have a bad night’s sleep because of the noise, or else turn off the air-conditioning and have a bad night’s sleep due to the heat.

In the end, I chose the former. And despite turning off the film that I was watching because I was tired, and rocked and rolled throughout the night.

Nevertheless there was plenty of time to go for a series of nocturnal rambles.

We started off last night at the OUSA conference in somewhere overlooking the town square and all that was taking place.I had a poem to read later on that day that I had organsied the previous day with someone. It took me ages tofind my notes and I was panicking like I usually do when I can’t find something, until in the end I came across them. We were going through the start of the day’s procedure. We turned up with an old red Vauxhall VX4/90 (the Virctor shape from about 1962-64) pulling a caravan. It was the President, and she got out and told us that she had been away last night in her car and had had a problem with a tyre on the caravan. This had to be fixed but since she had the tyre fixed it’s been causing her more problems, going flat, air leaking out and so on, until in the end somewhere in Yorkshire they found a garage open and he found that the tyre had been fitted incorrectly so he fitted it correctly. But it seemed that there was a fault in the price for the fitting, so he rectified that, much to her dismay.She was telling us all problems about the car.I couldn’t help noticing that everytime she started up the car it was struggling to get goign, struggling to run, put your foot down on the accelerator and it immediately flooded and we had to wait for a minute for it to clear.I was convinced thatthe car wasrunning so rich that that was causing a lot of problems. I was going to tellher to have the mixture looked at but I never had the opportunity, so I was going toinclude it somewhere in my poem, and wondering how I was going to work that in.
Later I was with a large group of civilians and our town was being invaded. We were blanketed in shells and you could see one shell sticking out of the sand and it hadn’t gone off. Later I was invited to some kind of TV panel game, and there in the courtyard was another tank of the invaders buried right up to the neck. I thought that the invaders hadn’t had a very good time here, had they? I had togive a chat and write a short poem about the enemy being here. I said for those there, there’s any number of those – any number. but for the ordinary visitors, none whatsoever. At one point we were saying, look at that enemy tank, buried up to its neck in rocks and bricks, and on the other hand 5 minutes later we would be extremely scared in case a tank picked out our house as one of the ones tobe destroyed.
Later still I was with my brother last night and we were in London. We were on one side of the road and we had to cross to another, dodging in and out of the traffic. And I found that I could run. I wasso amazed that I could run, and I told him. The car we were dodging was a D reg white Cortina Mk I kitted out as a minicab. But instead of having the paper licence in the back window like they do in London it had the name and phone no written on broad white masking tape stuckin the rear door windows. The driver did a U-turn butit was strange because he was on the correct side of the road but did a U-turn “inside” rather than “outside” across the road, so he was facing the wrong way. Then he crossed the road on foot to knock on a door or did he have a key to open it? I can’t remember. It was completely strange. Anyway I went into this corner pub at the side entrance because I was trying to find a passenger for a taxi. It was a very posh Burtonwood pub but I couldn’t see anyone in there at all. I went out of the front door and there was a girl sitting on the pavement, wearing a kind of light-coloured kilt thing, a big burly girl. I asked if she was waiting for a cab, and she replied “yes” so I apologised for coming to the wrong door of the pub, and took her back through the pub and out to my car. At that point she lit a cigarette, and I was just about to tell her that smoking was not allowed in my cab, and I awoke.
Finally I’d been out with a group of people. We had some big ships, or there was a big ship. There was about 40,000 cups of tea served on this ship, something ridiculous. It had some connection with refugees and the ship would go out and fetch refugees. I was with someone who was very much in the background, and there were another two people, a man and a woman. he woman was born in 1952 so she told me and so was the guy. They were really in charge of this operation.They would keep on going off to bring back these refugees. Whoever it was thatI was with – it might have been Nerina, something like that, she went off and that left me alone in my house, so I spent all the timepicking up rubbish and rying to get the place look tidy as there was rubbish everywhere. No matter how much I picked up, it only made a slight difference so you couldn’t see just how dramatic the improvement was. We ended up back on the beach again. I was with this other girl and the guy came back. He’d been off to get some newspapers or something, and handed me three, the Daily Express, the daily mail and the Chorley Weekly Advertiser or whatever the Chorley local paper was because he came from that area. When I looked at the Daily Mail and the Daily Express I said “thank you very much but I’ve already been to the toilet this morning” which didn’t get the laugh that I was expecting. Justthen I looked further down the coast and this ship was setting out. I thought that that was the ferry going to one of the islands -we were in the South of France, that area, and it might have been the one going to Corsica or Sardinia or whatever. I gave the ship the name “Cote d’Azur”, I’ve no idea why.As I went to grab my camera, three really high-speed ferries shot from the south towards the north, towards the coast. I went to quickly grab a photo, but for some reason the shutter was on a very long aperture and shutter speed and I wasn’t able to get a photo because by the time I had adjusted the camera to take the one of the ship going out, the shutter was still open. So I ried to take a photo of this ship sailing out, which had now become three ships sailing out – there must have been another 2 creeping behind it while I’d been distracted by these three ships coming in.

It didn’t take me long to leave my stinking pit and after the medication and a coffee I had a shower and washed my clothes. I like to keep on top of my washing.

Down at the railway station I bought some raisin buns for lunch and hen we had all of the confusion about the trains. There was a signal failure at the Gare Centrale so the trains were all in confusion. I eventually found one to take me to Leuven.

We arrived at the station at 08:30 and by 09:25 I was in the hospital. Despite the heat and the distance, I had a good walk all the way there with my knee hardly hurting.

They didn’t have my medication due to me having changed the day, so they had to hunt around for some stuff. They eventually found me a pile of sample stuff so my mobile stand looked like a Christmas tree.

The nurse there wanted to practise her French with me so we did all of or stuff in French. She knew Granville very well, having spent several holidays there.

It took ages for a doctor to see me, and when she did she was disappointed about my results. She was even more disappointed when I said that I wasn’t going to be back until 9th October. She was impressed with Granville too and looked at some photos of the town.

Rosemary rang too and we had a little chat.

The doctor still hadn’t come back by the time that I was finished. I had to hunt her down. She gave me prescriptions for three months (which she wrote out wrong, asI was to find out) and a lecture from the Professor.

In the end, she agreed that I could have a three-month holiday from medical attention, but probably more because she could see I she was determined.

Another healthy stride out into town and a travel arrangement where I spent over an hour trying to sort out something or other, and then off to meet Alison, going via the ice cream place for a sorbet in the heatwave.

We had a chat, and then to Greenway for a burger and Kloosters for a drink. After another lengthy chat, she drove me back here.

Now I’m off to bed. I have an early start in the morning.

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Thursday 8th May 2014 – I HAD THE BEST …

… night’s sleep that I have ever had in Caliburn, to be sure. I was late dozing off – round about midnight I reckon, but I remember nothing else until the alarm went off at 07:30. Even the morning’s heavy traffic didn’t wake me up. I’ll remember this spec – down at Boisfort on the road out towards the motorway and tucked behind a hedge on the road at the side – for another time.

So once I was organised, I went to park Caliburn on the hypermarket car park and I was off on the Metro once I found the entrance to the station.

First stop was the Troc. All of Marianne’s possessions have been sold, so it seems, and her account cleared. Similar news at the Bank too – the notaire has done the necessary there.

gravestone marianne orban cimetierre ixelles bruxelles belgiqueOne of the things that I needed to do was to make my annual report to Marianne and check on her grave now that her gravestone has been installed.

The gravestone contains several errors that need to be corrected and so I’ll have to get on to that pretty smart-ish. But at least an all-over stone means that no work is required to maintain her grave. That was always going to be my biggest headache.

Anyway, it’s hard to believe that a year has gone past since she went to meet her maker, and I hope that she is happy wherever she might be.

After that, I turned my attention to happier things and WHA…HEY! I’ve booked my annual journey to Canada. Leaving 28 August and returning 8th October (actually 9th October as it’s a night flight). And with booking so far in advance and not travelling at a weekend the flight works out even cheaper than my previous two flights there, which is excellent news. Just €580 including taxes (which are more than the base price of the flight, would you believe?)

That’s not the best of it either. Had I wanted to go via Air Transat it would have cost me €50 less, if that were possible, but I’m flying Air Canada – a flagship airline too at that price – direct on the outbound flight and via Brussels on the return. I’m quite pleased with that deal, as you might guess, and I’m pleased that Connections, my travel agents, came up with the goods.

I’ve booked 4 nights at that hotel at the Cote de Liesse on the edge of Montreal where I stayed last year. That gives me plenty of opportunity to continue my exploration of the city so I need to make a list of things that I would like to see. I need to focus myself much more positively this year.

I’ve booked another big Dodge too and I do hope that I get one – I’ve heard a nasty rumour that Avis are planning to change over to Fords and the Ford Flex isn’t half as versatile as a Grand Caravan. That was a good deal too, better than last year.

The plan is to explore Montreal, then do the Richelieu Valley in the reverse direction (I hope that they have good mirrors on the car) then go to the Maine State Fair and tractor pull at Clinton. From there to the Harvest Jazz and Blues Festival at Fredericton and then I’ll be off to Cape Breton, Newfoundland and then back to Labrador ro complete my visit of Highway 138 and then retrace my steps along the Trans-Labrador Highway.

Such is the plan but as we all know, “the best-laid plans of mice and men” etc etc.

One final task before I leave Brussels. They’ve fitted new brake shoes at the rear of Caliburn but I clearly interrupted them when I arrived to pick him up yesterday, for they had of course slackened off the handbrake cable to remove the brake pads but in the confusion they forgot to tighten it up so I had no rear brakes and no handbrake to speak of when I left the garage.

Now we are all happy again.

Leaving Brussels in a rainstorm, with traffic queues and roadworks all the way beyond Charleroi and I’m now in a lay-by with a couple of lorries in the foothills of the Ardennes near Couvin. Still not out of Belgium, but as my adventure starts at the frontier just up the road, I don’t want to do it in the rain and the gloom of the evening. Who knows? It might brighten up in the morning.

But I won’t have the sleep that I had last night anyway – the rain is bouncing off Caliburn’s roof and it sounds like a drum in the back.

-2

Tuesday 20th August 2013 – I’M WHACKED

Cécile and I have just finished loading Caliburn and he’s now parked up back in his little spec down the road. Julie’s bookcase is in there, and so are Clare’s wicker objects and Cécile’s dismantled desk. There are piles of boxes too, some for Liz.

I had another dream last night. I don’t remember much about it but I was in a scrapyard looking for a car battery and they had a white battery that they were using to check out all of the electrical equipment. For some reason it was that battery that interested me more than any other and so I insisted on having it. They were obliged to check it and test it in front of me before I paid them the money.

Anyway this morning I went and reserved my voyage to Canada and then to Greece. I bitterly regret that the branch of my travel agents that used to be up at IKEA has closed down – instead, I went to the one just around the corner and that was a mistake. Up there, they were always competent but here they don’t have the same esprit and during one attempt to do my booking, the girl had me arriving back at Paris on 7th October in order to take a aeroplane out to Greece on the previous day. And then, of course, the computer system crashed, didn’t it? That just was’t my morning. Unfortuately I’m having to fly Air Transat – the equivalent of long-distance Ryanair – and that is something that I vowed that I would ever do again after my voyage of 2011 but havig left my booking so late and having lost the benefit of my half-price voucher (it expired when I was here helping Marianne), flying by Air France was not an option (and I’ve just realised that I haven’t ordered my special meal).

Back here in the afternoon we sorted out all of the books and took four boxes to the second-hand bookshop. He chose about 25 out of them, and gave me €45 for those. Now I wasn’t half impressed with that – if I had received that for all of them I would have been well-impressed – and so with no further ado, the rest went to Oxfam.

And back here, we packed up and loaded.

It’s much more empty now and we can move around. But there’s still far too much stuff here for my liking and the sooner it all goes, the better.

-10

Friday 24th September 2010 – PHEW! I’M EXHAUSTED!

And it’s hardly surprising too after what I’ve been doing today!

In order of appearance –
1) I went in person to the Connections office and I’ve booked my flights and car hire. I leave Paris Charles de Gaulle at 11:00 on Wednesday and fly to Zurich where I pick up another flight to Toronto.

Then I have my car for 6 weeks, and then fly back. Total cost, all included, was €2100 which, all things considered, isn’t too bad at all.

Flying from Paris Charles de Gaulle means that I pay maybe €60 more, but I don’t have to go to Brussels, which would probably cost me that much on the train.

The downside is though that I have to hang around through the night on a railway station somewhere in provincial France.

At the moment, Nevers looks a good bet. I can get a train from Riom at 19:36 that gets me there at about 21:00 and there’s a train from there to Paris at 05:00.

Nevers is a draughty railway station but there are cafes and restaurants just over the road where I can loiter for a while and the train starts from there so it is usually backed into the station by the night shift at about 03:30 so I can curl up in a corner.

It arrives in Paris at about 07:30 so there’s plenty of time to get over to Charles de Gaulle.

I was tempted by flying to Charles de Gaulle from Clermont Ferrand on the 07:00 flight but the price €280 has put me off. I could travel there the night before and stay in the Hilton and still have change from that.

2) I visited the IKEA and had some luck too. As you know, with the composting toilet I’m using an aluminium plant pot but it really needs to be something in stainless steel.

And I found some superb waste-bin cum plant-pots there – 25 litre capacity and in stainless steel, for just €14.95. Exactly what I want and so I bought two of those.

3) But the most important thing concerned my property empire.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that when I first moved to Brussels in 1993 I bought a little studio apartment about 20 minutes walk from work.

A few years later I met Laurence and as she had a little daughter (Roxanne) my studio was too small for us so I rented it out and we rented a larger apartment. When Laurence and I split up and she moved away, I bought the big apartment at Jette.

The little studio remained rented out – the old couple who rented it moved out and they passed it on to their grandson. When he moved away he passed it on to a girl he knew.

And to cut a long story short … "hooray" – ed … a few months ago, she sent me a mail to say that she reckoned that she ought to move out and find a place of her own to buy instead of renting.

But as she was happy in my place, she wondered on the off-chance whether I had ever thought of selling it.

The property market isn’t as good as it used to be and finding willing buyers is not all that easy. You need estate agents, plenty of time and patience, a good deal of hassle.

And of course there are all these laws now that you need homeowners files, surveys, thermal inspections and everything else and so on.

So someone ready willing and able to proceed is something that should not be discarded lightly, especially as the price that was offered was – well – I could have got more for it, but then I would have had to pay estate agents, etc etc.

And so I am now 1 property lighter in my portfolio.

But what I have lost in rental income has been more than made up by the fact that I have now reimbursed the outstanding mortgage on the apartment at Jette and the difference between the two figures means that I have more than doubled my disposable income.

There’s also a lump sum left over of an amount not to be sniffed at, and Terry, Simon and I are going to be having a little chat about how this lump sum can be made to work.

I know that if I just leave it lying around it will slowly melt away into nothing.

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