Category Archives: France

Friday 27th October 2023 – THE PREVIOUS DAYS’ …

… completely entries are now all on line.

That’s because I have now found a decent internet connection – yes, I’m back home.

And getting back home was an adventure all of its own as you will find out as you read on.

Last night I’d gone to bed early ready for my early 05:30 start but as usual, I couldn’t sleep. I awoke at 12!50 with a start. I had the radio on and was still listening to it. Somehow the dictaphone that was by the side of the bed fell on the floor. I couldn’t find out where the noise that I was listening to was coming from. I searched round the bedroom for a minute or two until I suddenly regained my senses and found that it was my radio. I took off the headphones ready to go back into this dream and carry on.

And so I dictated into my little machine.

At some point I must have gone back to sleep but I awoke again at 03:00 and that was really that. By 04:30 I’d given up any attempt to sleep and ended up listening to the old-time radio programmes.

At 05:40 someone came round to take my blood pressure and then I had the breakfast that I was promised.

After everyone had gone I had a really good wash and then carried on with selecting the music for the next series of radio programmes. Nurses came and went of course but I battled on and I’m now up to 29th November 2024, with several holes in between such as my Isle of Wight Festival and my Hawkfest programmes for which I’ve yet to decide on the music.

The Hawkfest should be exciting though. There have been a whole variety of Spacerock groups from all over the world who have performed at the various Hawkfests and I managed to talk to a few of them at some point or another. I’ll probably end up with a couple of hours of music and there will still be a lot that I’d have to leave out.

At 11:50 I was whisked off to the IRM unit (in a wheelchair – how the mighty have fallen) where they injected me with a radioactive substance and left me to simmer for an hour, and then they stuck me in another Stargate where I went back and to for 20 minutes.

Back at my unit I was eventually allowed to eat my lunch – several hours later – and the doctor came to see me.

She told me much of what I already knew – about how the cancer is spreading through my kidneys, my heart and into my nervous system via a few other parts of my body.

She thinks, as I have been told elsewhere, that I wouldn’t be able to survive a heart transplant in my state of health so that’s out of the question. As a result she advised me not to buy any long-playing records.

However, she wants me to have an IRM done of my heart, and that can be done locally. It may be that some tweaking can be done to it to keep it going.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that right back at the beginning of all of this in 2015 I was told that I had a coeur de champion – the “heart of a champion” and that’s what will keep me going, but if ever my heart begins to give out, it’s the downhill slope.

And so her comments weren’t any surprise.

She did have some good news. She’s talked to the Haematology department and they may well be willing to take me on instead of my having to go all the way to Leuven. I’m entitled to transport to any hospital within 500kms of home. Paris is 334 kms and Leuven is 650 kms, so continue to go to Leuven means going by train and really, I just can’t do it any longer.

And that’s a disappointment. I had quite enjoyed my spell at Leuven because firstly it’s a beautiful city secondly, I get to see Alison, and thirdly it awoke all of the Flemish that I’d picked up when I lived in Brussels.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I first met Alison at that weird American company where I worked for almost a year after I left General Electric.

The doctor took my telephone and spent the next hour or so reading all of my reports from Leuven and translating them from Flemish to French. She’ll take them to the Haematologist and have a chat.

Presumably they’ll look into the other things that are going wrong with me.

The car pulled up for me just over an hour late and then we set off into the traffic.

Paris and its outskirts were nose-to-tail all the way, and we crawled slowly out of the city. Once we hit the countryside we could put our foot down and began to make good time, only to be pulled over in a Gendarme control.

It’ s obviously near the end of the month and the Gendarmes don’t have enough victims so they went over the car with a toothcomb until they found something for which they could write out a ticket.

It was 21:00 when we finally arrived here and my cleaner was waiting for me. She and the taxi driver helped me up the stairs into my apartment for which I was grateful. It was an agonising climb.

Once I’d recovered I made myself baked potato, baked beans and vegan sausage and that was that.

Now I’ve written my notes I’m off to bed. There’s no alarm in the morning and I’m going to have a lie-in – if I can. There’s usually always someone who comes along to interrupt me.

0

Thursday 26th October 2023 – THE GOOD NEWS …

… is that I can go home tomorrow. The car to pick me up has been arranged for 14:30 but if the last time that I was here is anything to go by, it’ll be long after midnight before I arrive back home.

My cleaner contacted me too. As I won’t be back until late, would I like her to fetch my Friday shopping for me?

As I have said before, the solidarity amongst the residents of my building is something that I’ve never ever encountered before.

The bad news is that it has not been confirmed that it is indeed the carcinogenic protein that has entered my nervous system.

That means that unfortunately the end is nigh because it will slowly creep through my body, including what’s left of my brain. And they did warn me right at the beginning of all of this that the end will not be very pleasant.

To be on the safe side, I gave my doctor a bit of lip this afternoon. In fact, she cut out a sample of the nerves in my lip to examine it – to see how far the cancer is advancing. If it’s that far up my body it won’t be long.

And I have made an executive decision – and as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, an executive decision is a decision where if the person making the decision makes the wrong decision, he is executed.

And the decision is that seeing as I can now barely walk, and I’m entitled to transport to any hospital up to 500 kms from my home, I have decided regrettably to end my association with Leuven and transfer my papers here. I really can’t struggle around on the train any more these days

In all honesty I don’t think that I’m very far off having to have a carer. It’s a shame that Percy Penguin can’t drive. 30 years of working in an Old People’s Home will have prepared her for whatever she might encounter with me but it’s no good if she can’t take me to the shops.

Meanwhile back at the ran … errr … hospital I had a bad night last night. It took me an age to go off to sleep, for a reason that I really don’t know

At least there was no blood test at 05:20 this morning but they did awaken me at 07:10 for something and again at 08:50 when they brought breakfast. So once more I had breakfast in bed.

After having a really good wash I sat down and listened to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. There was something about changing one of my appointments around because of this therapy thing. I managed to do it absolutely fine. It wasn’t until the Tuesday when we were talking about my Welsh lesson that I realised that I’d promised to go on behalf of the class to some kind of meeting or conference on the Tuesday afternoon. Of course, that was now out of the question. I began to think about what I was going to do about it and how I was going to solve this problem.

There was something else too about being round at a girl’s bungalow. It was a girl whom I knew from school and a few of her friends. It involved going up a ladder onto the roof and doing certain things. I noticed while they were up there that part of the roof hadn’t been slated properly. There was someone else with me so I sent him up the ladder and gave him instructions as to how to do the roofing. In the end all the girls came down except the one whom I knew. She was still up there so I threw her a small pot of white paint and a brush and she painted some kind of slogan on the roof. She ended up with more paint on her than on the roof but never mind. When she came down, she reached as far as the edge of the roof and realised that her bra had come undone. She was having to fiddle around with it and fasten herself back in etc and hope that no-one else would notice before she came down the ladder. I noticed that her bra was a red tartan one. Eventually she managed to put it n beneath her clothes. As she came down she turned to me to ask if I’d sorted out the roof for her. I told her that someone had been up to realign the slates. She said that it didn’t look correct. I replied “no it doesn’t but that’s probably because you have the wrong slates. It’s certainly all properly realigned now”. She then began to talk about a few other jobs she needed doing like putting an electric junction box in the wall etc.

When we were living in Shavington there was a path that led to Willaston that went over the railway. The kids around there had all kinds of fun scrawling incorrect messages on the zebra so the controllers of the zebra decided that they would no longer stop there. It had already messed up all of my timetables before and it was going to do it again. One of the boys and I had this plan that we’d tackle this mess of graffiti by me climbing into the back of the truck and asking a pile of questions while this cat was crawling up my leg onto my lap. It took a long time to arrange this kind of meeting and it was as if she knew what most of it was about. She’d been talking for about 0.7 days even though I couldn’t walk and the cats were stuck in and the doctor had said so much about it and the kids couldn’t concentrate on doing their homework without thinking about the mill.

Usually, although I’m dictating while I’m asleep, when I come to transcribe the notes I can recall little bits of what’s been going on that ring a bell with me from the night. However for that one, I have absolutely no recollection whatsoever of that one and it makes absolutely no sense whatsoever – not that many of my nocturnal travels actually do.

So back into the night and we’d all gone round to someone’s house in our family to watch a football match, Arsenal against some European side. We were all there watching this game in the living room. Just then my father pulled up in a van. We heard that he might be coming but he hadn’t been there at the start. As we watched, he just parked up outside. I opened the door and asked him “why don’t you reverse the van up the drive?”. He made some remark about how he couldn’t reverse like many other people. Then he opened the door and my mother and 6 or 7 other people swarmed out. We all said that it was totally stupid bringing that many people in this little van. They all came into the house and we had to explain to them how the wiring system works because we had special plugs for the television. While we were looking at the TV plugs we noticed that the wallpaper on one of the walls was becoming really damp. We all settled down – or at least, they settled down taking everyone else’s chair. When we came back in there was nowhere really for us to sit. There was just one seat so I said to one of the girls “you’d better sit in that seat because you’ll be comfortable there” because her seat had been occupied by my father’s sister’s husband. He had a reputation for chasing after the girls. She felt extremely uncomfortable when she saw him sitting in her seat.

When the nurse awoke me I was talking about gardening. We had all kinds of fruit trees, plants and so on and we’d been transplanting them. The girl with me had taken a couple of apple trees and planted them outside. A few hours later she brought one of them in to plant inside the house again, saying that it wasn’t doing very well outside and had caught some kind of disease or something. I was looking at one of the flowering plants in a pot. It hadn’t done very much for a couple of years but I noticed that now it had about half a dozen flowers on it and a couple more were forming. I told her about them but she was too busy at that moment to come to have a look.

For much of the day I was left on my own and was able to pile on with selecting the music for future radio programmes. In fact I’m now at 25th October 2024 but there are several gaps in there. I have to think about what music I’m going to play for my Hawkfest and to commemorate the first Isle of Wight Festival.

There were the usual nurses coming to and from and I had the usual gaggle of doctors come to see me, and that was when they told me the bad news. But they tell me that there are all kinds of follow-up action to come, some to be undertaken here and some that can be undertaken closer to home.

And so I’m going to be very busy in the near future, and the local ambulance service is going to be making a lot of money out of my health insurance providers. In case you don’t know, here in France they have what they call VSLs – Voitures Sanitaires Légères – that are like taxis but equipped to take people who aren’t mobile to their hospital appointments etc.

This afternoon the doctor came back with a friend. They wanted to take a sample of my lip tissue with a piece of my nervous system. So they injected my lip with a local anaesthetic and then attacked it with a scalpel. It took three attempts before they actually ended up with a nerve.

They did tell me that if I didn’t want the lip thing they could take a sample of grease from somewhere else but that would involve a surgical intervention. But sod that for a game of soldiers.

Importantly, while they were doing that I missed my coffee so I had to go out and hunt it down. They didn’t want to give it to me because of what I’d just been through but I insisted.

After tea I began to write my notes but a nurse came to see me to tell me that I must be à jeun tomorrow morning as I’m having something done to me at 12:00 for which I have to have an empty stomach.

But that fasting starts at 06:00 so as she’s coming to put a needle in me at 05:30 I persuaded her to bring me some bread jam and coffee. I’m not going without a meal.

So right now I’d better go to bed and make myself ready for tomorrow morning. I’m not looking forward to the needle, I’m not looking forward to whatever it it that they are going to do to me, but it will be nice to be back home.

0

Wednesday 25th October 2023 – I’VE HAD SOME …

… good news today, and some bad news.

The good news is that the Social Services have agreed to pay for my transport. That’s a great weight off my mind for sure.

The bad news is that it seems from the blood test results recently that not only is my red blood count dropping rapidly now that I’m no longer taking the Aranesp, but that the count of my platelets is dropping rapidly too.

12 months ago it was at about 275 units. Today it’s 115. The critical limit is 100 units.

The doctor from Belgium came to see me and to give me the bad news. In her opinion the carcinogenic protein is now attacking the platelets. It’s obviously not satisfied with attacking my red blood cells, heart, kidneys and nervous system

She’s no haematologist but at least, being from Brussels she can read Flemish so she’s much more of an idea as to what is going on at Leuven without me having to do my best to interpret, so tomorrow she’s going to see the haematologist to “have a chat” about me.

Whatever that means, we’ll soon find out.

This morning I was awoken by a nurse who came to take a blood sample – at 05:20. That was the last thing that I wanted. But to my surprise she did it first go. And that’s just as well because my arms are covered in Sticking plaster.

After that I couldn’t go back to sleep so in the end I gave it up. Mind you, I still had breakfast in bed. The food here is somewhat … errr … indifferent but two bread rolls, a pile of jam and a big bowl of hot black coffee is a good way to start the day.

First thing that I did was to transcribe the dictaphone notes. I was involved in some kind of project with the radio and the programmes. The Social Services etc wondered why they were played when they did. Someone explained that that was when they had a good audience. The plan was that after my death they intended to continue to broadcast the programmes just to keep things going over and to prolong the radio station;

Later on Nerina and I had an appointment with a local bank manager at 12:00. We set off on foot and on our way round we picked up a few bits and pieces of shopping and carried on to the bank’s office. When we arrived we rang the bell but no-one answered the door so we rang again. Eventually someone came and wanted to know what we were doing; We explained that we had an appointment so we were ushered in and kept to one side. A few minutes later someone came back and said “yes, you can go upstairs. Go into that room there, slide the ladder up and you can climb up to the next floor. We went in there and there was one of the strangest arrangements that I’ve ever seen. There was indeed a ladder there and four steps hanging down from the ceiling. The ladder was extensible and you would push it up to join up with these steps. It was narrow, rickety and looked completely unsafe to me. I held it steady while Nerina tried to climb but she couldn’t get up. I knew full well that I wasn’t going to get up. After several tries Nerina decided that she couldn’t go up there. I agreed with her because this was the biggest Health and Safety violation that I’ve ever seen. We went back to where this secretary person was. She was busy typing. We explained that we couldn’t go up the ladder. She sighed and went off to try to find someone else again. We had a good look round and found several interesting papers about different things that had been prepared in duplicate or in multiple copies. There were piles of these documents lying around. One was about a certain man whom I knew from North America who had died. He was said to have been the biggest promoter of Rugby League in the UK and of summer sport. It bewildered me why this stuff was here. Eventually a man came back with a couple of items that he must have taken from our shopping bag. He asked us if we recognised these items. We explained that we’d bought them on the way to the bank. He asked which shops we’d gone to to buy them. We explained and that obviously satisfied him because then he invited us into the office and up some proper stairs onto a landing where there was a corridor that led outside but without a roof and then up another set of stairs in another building until we finally reached his office.

Finally I was in my yellow Cortina last night driving through Shavington. I suddenly realised that I had the wrong numberplate on the front of the car. I’d bought the correct numberplate to fit on but I hadn’t done it at that moment so I pulled up at the side of the road, lifted up the car so the automatic jack clicked in and then went to fetch the numberplate out of the back. But then I noticed that screwed to the rear was a numberplate from New Zealand0… "South Africa actually" – ed … and I suddenly realised that I’d had this car registered in New Zealand so the front numberplate that I was going to fit on wouldn’t be any good. I’d have to have another one made. I went round to the front and a postman pulled up on one of these little Mobylettes, had a good look tat what I was doing and then rode off into his drive. I then picked up the front of the car and dropped it off the jack onto the ground and it just rolled off on its own, backwards across the road, did a spectacular spin round and shot off down the pavement. People just stood there looking at it and no-one made an effort to stop it. It ran into the back of someone’s car. I had to go round and apologise, and explain everything. They all found it hard to believe but that was certainly the case of what happened. I had to apologise for the accident.

With no tests or examinations scheduled today I planned on having a shower – and I don’t ‘arf need it.

However each time I prepared myself to go, someone came to delay or interrupt me. It wasn’t until 15:45 that I staggered into the shower.

Luckily, here it’s a walk-in wet room so I was quite at my ease and I really enjoyed myself. It made such a change to actually be in a shower.

While I was at it, I made a few phone calls. Firstly to tell the taxi company that my transport has been approved and secondly to book the vehicles to take me to the sessions at the Centre de Re-Education.

And then I had to telephone the ergotherapist to cancel our appointment next Thursday afternoon. He thinks that there’ an ergotherapist at the Centre de Re-Education and maybe they could help me. If not, I should recontact him for another appointment.

In between everything I’ve been attacking the radio programmes. I’ve chosen the music for another three of them. I’m trying to make the best use possible of my time while I’m here to give me a running start.

It also seems that I’ve been in great demand today. Rosemary rang me up and we had another one of our mega-discussions. And then I’ve had discussions on the internet with half a dozen people, or maybe even more. I lost count at a certain moment.

So now that I’ve had my tea and written my notes I’m off to bed. I’d like to have a running start with that too if they are going to wake me up at 05:20 for another blood test.

But what will be the outcome of this meeting tomorrow? One or two people have told me that I should be looking at it with trepidation but actually I’m not. I’m under no illusions whatsoever about the inevitable outcome of this illness and I’m fully prepared for it.

However it shows signs of optimism. They have found something, and they are intending to do something about it. You can’t wish for any more than that.

0

Tuesday 24th October 2023 – THEY STILL HAVEN’T …

… fitted this needle into me. I think that they really have abandoned all hope of giving me this infusion.

Instead, this morning they gave me another lumbar puncture and that has been that.

Last night I had one of the best night’s sleeps that I’ve had for a considerable length of time. I was in bed at 20:00 because it was that cold and, underneath the blankets I listened to the old-time radio

It was about midnight when I awoke to find the radio still going so I switched it off and went back to sleep. And that was that until about 07:50 when a nurse awoke me to take my temperature and blood pressure

When breakfast came I was still in bed and I really can’t remember the last time that I had breakfast in bed. It made a lovely change from the usual.

While I was washing a nurse came in and stuck a couple of freezing patches on my back. That of course can only mean on thing – a lumbar puncture. They are totally horrible things and so I wasn’t looking forward to that.

First task while I was waiting for things to happen was to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. I was in the UK at some point. It was round about the time of the death of my aunt. We were making a lot of preparation for various things. We met the family of her late husband Michael. We spoke to them about various things. They were involved in some kind of career where to have a psychiatrist or an analyst was compulsory. We had a really good chat about that. They happened to mention that they had a son who lived near Warrington. Of course, that’s my neck of the woods so before I come back to Europe I decided that I’d go to see this guy. I set out but stopped to listen to the 09:00 news. I noticed that the clock in the car was wrong. After the news I set out to drive but couldn’t think for a moment of how to go to Warrington. I had to scratch my head to think of which back roads and country lanes would be the best and I ended up going round the back of Haslington. I couldn’t help thinking that I wasn’t dressed for the occasion. I was in some kind of grey fleecy trousers, sports trousers or something. We eventually met. He was a guy in his 40s, a very big, strong type of person with a wife and a few kids. We began to talk. He was really mocking his relative about the idea of having a psychoanalyst. He thought that it was a stupid arrangement, perpetuated by North American trend-setters and totally unnecessary these days.

And then I was out with a former friend of mine, somewhere and were coming down the motorway. Something happened to the car. I think that it wanted some fuel. It was a strange kind of car so we called in and had to find the fuel filler. It was in the engine behind the right-hand headlight. We had to pull the headlight forward to reach the fuel filler. It was an extremely complicated affair. My friend fuelled up while I went for a wander around. I ended up at the hire car depots. In a waste bin there was a pile of stuff that obviously people had bought and thrown away, one of which was a 25-litre fuel carrier. I went over to my friend to ask if it was of any use to him. He replied “yes” so I went to fetch it but there was a hole in it so I put it back. In the meantime some guy from the service area came over to me to ask if I was a mechanic. I replied “yes” so he went over to my friend. They ended up having an argument because apparently only licensed mechanics are allowed to work on cars on this site. Of course my friend was having none of this and told the guy exactly what he thought. In the end the guy slunk off with a flea in his ear.

There was also something about a house that Nerina and I went to see. It was a bungalow that had some kind of front garden, a drive all the way down the side of the house and then a back garden. There was a sign up at the parking space at the side of the house that said “scrap cars here”. I noticed that there were a couple of old car axles lying around so I thought that this would be a great place to buy because if he’d been scrapping cars here there would be some kind of inherited rights. I could quite happily mess around in the drive, put up a car port and a fence between me and the neighbour, and Nerina would have a nice tidy garden at the back anyway. We went to look at it. IN the back in the garden he had a whole pile of axles. There was a load of asbestos brake dust. Somehow he’d rigged up two kinds of hubs as pulleys and he explained how he removed brake shoes with them. This was beginning to interest me more and more. I was hoping that Nerina would be interested in the bungalow itself and impressed enough to want to buy it.

I ended up going back into that dream about Michael’s family. It was a Sunday morning, we were all there and having a lie-in in bed. Round about 10:00 a film came up on the screen, one of these films line “American Grafitti” or similar. I watched it but must have fallen asleep again because I awoke with a start a short while later. In the meantime Nerina came into my room panicking. “Have you seen the time?”. I thought that with the film starting at 10:00 it was probably about 10:10 or 10:15 but in fact it was 12:35 and we’d slept all the way through the morning. There was so much work to do and we were supposed to be visiting somewhere else but Nerina and I didn’t have time and we’d have to leave but there was all this panic going on about getting things ready, going here and going there and having left the bed so late so late this morning

And when the nurse awoke me this morning Nerina and I were doing something with kittens but it all went completely out of my head as soon as I sat up.

Actually, there’s quite a story about kittens. When Tuppence was getting old we decided that we’d have another cat to keep her company, but it was definitely “no kittens”.

Anyway, the cat of someone whom I knew had just given birth and out of politeness I went to see the offspring. This tiny all-grey kitten crawled up my leg and curled up on my lap while I was drinking a cup of tea, and of course, that was that. You don’t choose a cat – the cat chooses you.

So having explained things to Nerina, I finally persuaded her to go to look at it to see what she thought of it. When she came back she told me “there was this tiny all-ginger kitten that climbed up my leg and sat on my lap …”

And that was how Sooty and Sweep came to live with us.

But I’ll tell you something for nothing, and that is that the world is far too small for my liking. The doctor who came to perform my lumbar puncture told me that she came from Belgium. She was born in Mons but came to live in Brussels as a child.

She told me the school that she attended, and it was the one just down the road from where I used to live in Jette She actually knew the complex of buildings where I lived.

So while I was lying down recovering from the lumbar puncture my neighbour who is still in Paris came to see me and it was quite awkward talking while I was lying down.

After lunch and a coffee (that I had to ask for three times before I received it) I was visited by the chief doctor and a whole pile of interns. She asked me loads of questions about all kinds of things.

The doctor from Belgium was with them and she understood Flemish so she was able to read all of the reports that I’d had from Leuven. Luckily the hospital has computerised all of its records for its patients, and you are able to access all of yours by inserting a special code. So I gave her my phone and told her to get on with it.

That was all of the official visits that I had today. There was the usual stream of nurses and the like coming and going but when I wasn’t asleep I managed to choose the music for the next couple of radio programmes, and I’ll be using the rest of the time here selecting more and more.

There were also several phone calls to deal with. The first was from the Mayor of Virlet. There’s some tidying up that needs to be done at my property and was I in any fit state to do it?

Of course I’m not and that was what he thought. So would I be willing to pay someone for half a day’s work to do it on my behalf?

Actually it’s far cheaper for me to do that than spend money travelling down there when I can’t even drive right now, so of course it was the obvious answer. I told him that next time there’s anything to do down there, not to hesitate to engage someone to do it again.

And then there was the Centre de Re-Education in Granville. That’s where handicapped people go in order to learn how to cope with everyday life taking into account their disabilities. Would I like 20 consecutive half-day afternoons starting on Tuesday next week?

Do bears go to the toilet in the woods?

Tea was the usual kind of industrial institutionalised factory food but I have to eat it because there’s nothing else. Luckily my neighbour brought me some bananas which was very nice of her.

So I’m going to go to bed now. It’s quite early but there’s nothing else to do and I can be quite comfortable under the blankets listening to the old-time radio.

And I wonder what they have in store for me tomorrow.

0

Monday 23rd October 2023- I MADE IT …

… in Paris, and I have to say that if I in a cowslip’s bell were to lie I’d probably be more comfortable because there’s no heat in the room.

There was no heat in my apartment this morning either – I’ve not switched it on as yet – but with solid granite walls 1m20 thick, it’s not as important as it would be in some of this jerry-built modern stuff.

And as usual, even though I’d set the alarm for 05:20, I was up and about by 05:00. I always have a bad night when I have to be up early and last night was no exception. I hardly slept at all.

There was some stuff on the dictaphone however. I was in the witness box in Court for some reason, and the subject of Percy Penguin came up. I found it very hard to convince everyone that it was just something to relax and to sit there in the quiet, the reason why I wanted to see Percy Penguin. I had to do everything that I possibly could to try to avoid being rearrested or imprisoned etc while at the same time being frank and open to the Judge. I wasn’t sure how to go about doing it.

Later on we’d been to Nantwich shopping and decided that for once in our lives we’d take a taxi home. Someone in a Ford Cortina estate came to pick us up so we piled in. When we reached where Smiths was in Nantwich by the church the driver stopped to fuel up. Two shots rang out. We don’t know where the first one went but the second one went through the roof of the taxi and hit my mother in the head. The ricochet hit my youngest sister. Immediately, a crowd gathered. I was absolutely appalled so I left the car and shouted at the people “for God’s sake have some dignity and let my mother die in peace”. When the ambulance arrived I took my sister out of the car and tried to clean the blood off her etc. She was crying and really upset. I felt absolutely helpless because I hadn’t any idea at all what to do or what I was going to do.

When I awoke I had another one of those thirsts that you could photograph. I ended up drinking two large mugs of my patent blackcurrant, honey and lemon drink. You can tell that we are approaching winter if I’m back on that.

Next task was to make some sandwiches and to finish the packing. I had planned to have a shower but I didn’t fancy trying to climb in and out of the bath while I’m trying to keep to a tight schedule.

Instead, I had a good strip-down wash and was ready when the car came for me.

On the face of it, it was a good idea to have a car to take me to Paris, because I really couldn’t do it on the train. Not at all. Whether it will be a good idea if I have to end up paying for it is another thing entirely

But the downside was that the car was a SEAT and it had done my back in before we even reached Caen.

The journey went quite well with just one or two hold-ups, and we stopped for 15 minutes for a coffee and pit stop

At the hospital I was shown to my room without even having to check in. And then we had the usual pantomime about trying to fit a catheter in my arm. 2 nurses had a total of 5 goes and it’s still not done.

Next task was to be shoved through one of these Stargate time tunnel things. I had to walk much of the way there and back, which upset me, and then they had to have three goes at passing me though the machine as apparently I was moving my head too much.

Back here again and another nurse had 3 goes at my arm before she could finally take a blood sample.

A couple of doctors have been to see me and discuss my treatment plan, and they have confirmed that my health is deteriorating. They don’t think that I could withstand another series of perfusions and in fact they suspect that that’s why the hospital in Leuven has stopped doing them and has been relying on Aranesp injections

The food is rubbish as usual so my neighbour, who is in Paris this week and popped her head in to see me, says that she will bring me some bananas

So now that everything is finished and the computer is backed up with the latest copies of the files, I’m going to bed. I’m tired after my exertions today and I’ve already crashed out twice, but it’s more to do with the fact that it’s the only way that I can think of right now to keep warm.

0

Sunday 22nd October 2023 – I WASN’T ACTUALLY …

… far wrong with what I said yesterday. Much of the morning was taken up with a very lengthy exchange of correspondence with someone about a task that needs to be undertaken in the near future.

It’s a task that might involve me spending a lot of money, but it’s not something that I can do myself and the sooner it’s done the better. And in view of the travelling involved that I won’t have to do, I will probably end up saving money in the long run too.

And so it’s very important that the issue is very clear and unequivocal – hence the lengthy discussion.

Meanwhile, back at the ran … errr … apartment I dictated the notes for the final radio programme in this backlog, had a listen to them, binned them and then started again.

As a result, I was in bed later than I intended.

Nevertheless, by 09:30 I was up and about and sorting out issues here and there. And then I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. There was some kind of race going on last night. It involved me dressing up in some kind of clothing as if for Halloween… "it’s called drag racing" – ed. I was being chased down some stairs by a little girl. When I reached the bottom, I’d run round the corner and then back up the stairs, reach the top, run around the corner and then back down again and so on. I was in front of the girl and she raced after me. This went on for a couple of minutes when suddenly she stopped running. I hadn’t noticed until I suddenly appeared on the landing at the same moment that she was there. That was the end of the game. I was convinced that she had cheated. It was really quite an uncomfortable moment. The conversation carried on about something else. It ended up being some kind of prize-giving for novels. Some guy had written a novel that was quite in-depth technically and longer and even changed into fifth gear but the one that won was another that was not so complicated and only had four gears. This was something else that caused a great deal of controversy during the night about why the winner was not so technically advanced as the one that came second.

There was also another kind of fancy-dress competition. It involved dressing up in clothes that we already had and then some kind of parade around where they would choose the winner. For some reason or other, even though I had a complicated outfit that it took a while to fit into and looked really good it didn’t come as high as another dressing-up outfit that wasn’t as good as mine and had been done much quicker. Of course, as you can imagine, I was extremely disappointed that my work wasn’t worth any more than the teacher had given me.

later on I was on Crewe railway station waiting for my train, an old 2-coach multiple unit. Someone was complaining about something and I couldn’t understand it at first. It suddenly clicked for me that there had been a change of the time of the train. The usual train that we caught to go to work was leaving 5 minutes earlier. I had to scramble around the station and onto the correct platform. Instead of going to sit in my usual place on the train I sat right at the front. When I boarded the train there it was actually quite crowded and there were very few seats left. One seat was next to some kind of woman whom I recognised so I went to sit there. I was hemmed in by this woman and three other people. They were all speaking Welsh and began to talk in Welsh. They were actually doing their Welsh homework ready for the lesson. Much as I didn’t like at all where I was sitting, I reckoned that a presence like this, doing the same kind of course that I was and willing to discuss it like this, these people have to be worth knowing. Maybe I ought to do my best to catch this train again.

And then I’d been doing something down in south-west England. On my way round I’d passed a small fishing village in a little cove on the border between Devon and Cornwall. Checking my plans for the return, I saw that I’d have to wait for a day or two before coming back but there was a bus that left that village that would bring me home. I thought that it sounded like a really good plan. I made arrangements to book myself on this coach back. I went to hire a car for the weekend, which seemed to work fine with no problems. I went to pick it up. On the way out I talked to the guy in the movement control at the door, saying “I now have this car for 48 hours. See you when I return”. He replied “no – you had this car booked for yesterday and today”. I replied “that can’t possibly be the case – I’ve only just booked it”. This led to quite an argument. In the end he agreed that I could leave with the car. I wasn’t happy about leaving because I had the idea in my mind that once my back was turned he’d forget about altering the booking and I’d end up having to pay a hefty excess charge for not bringing the vehicle back during the day on the Sunday

Finally, I’d gone to Algeciras for something and was standing on a high cliff. I could see all down the African coast in the mist. I could see the mountains of Africa in the distance and all the boats coming through the Straits of Gibraltar. There was one of these high-speed catamaran ferries coming up. We reckoned that it had come from Morocco heading into port. There were loads of ships too. The people with me decided to walk back into town but I was so mesmerised by what I’d seen that I just stayed there and watched the view.

And so compared to last night it was quite quiet.

After that I’ve been sending off requests for brochures. We’re talking about a chairlift in this building to go up the stairs to where the lift begins and my cleaner had collected a few adverts from various companies. My task was to arrange for some brochures to be delivered.

Later on after lunch I attacked the radio notes and eventually ended up with a completed radio programme. That’s taken me up to 10th May next year and now I can crack on with some more.

You’re probably wondering why I’m so far ahead with the programmes. The answer is that I’m never sure when I’m no longer going to be able to prepare any more, for obvious reasons.

And then of course, we could always have a repeat of last year when I spent 13 weeks in hospital without any possibility of preparing any more while I’m away.

On the subject of hospital, I packed my bags for tomorrow morning and wrote a few letters. Finally, I backed up the computer onto the portable USB stick that I take with me on my travels

Tea was another delicious pizza, and now I’m off to bed.

Tomorrow morning I have to be up at 05:20 at the latest and I’m not looking forward to that. And then I’ll be having a week of being torn apart.

As for when I’ll be back, I have no idea. I have been told to “set aside a week” but that could be anything from “back home the same night” to another three-month stay.

But I shall just be glad of a rest. It’s been a long time since I’ve had any.

0

Saturday 21st October 2023 – I HAVE SET …

… a new record today.

When I checked the dictaphone today I found no fewer than THIRTEEN sound files. It must have been an extremely mobile night last night.

What’s surprising though is that I haven’t crashed out at all, despite all of that. This could well be the cue for a decent night’s uninterrupted sleep, but you know how well my prophesies unfold in this respect.

leaving the bed was the usual struggle, and then I had a good wash and scrub up. After the medication I had a few things to do and then the nurse came round for my blood test.

He didn’t have much luck today. It took him three goes to find some blood and once again I’m feeling like a dartboard after all that.

It took a while to recover from that and then I attacked the dictaphone notes. There was something going on last night about members of my family but I can’t remember anything at all about it except that I was having to identify who was who on the basis of their ankles and lower calves. That was really quite difficult.

Later on I was doing something about the railway stations in Paris, the advantages and disadvantages of going to the Gare St Lazare instead of Montparnasse. No matter which way I looked at it, it didn’t seem to make any difference because both involved a lot of walking between various taxi pickups and so on in any case. It was just becoming more and more complicated all the time

Later still there had been some kind of attack on several cities by kamikaze pilots flying aircraft and crashing them deliberately into different things as the Japanese did in World War II. It caused an enormous tidal wave which began to engulf the low-lying areas. There was a lot of film report about it much of which looked as if it had come from the San Francisco earthquake but where we were, we were blocked by a rising lake that was threatening to cut off our escape. In the end we had to retreat higher and higher. I was in my van so I was told that I had to retreat the furthest away and park at the side of the road. Even then the water began to lap around the bottom of Caliburn and slowly rise higher. The people who had watched me move thought that it was quite funny that I was suffering like this but but gradually it began to affect them too. Strangely enough the city that had been most affected by all of these attacks was Bombay because a great many others had managed to have been shot down or otherwise dealt with before they crashed.

We were on board ship at some point and the water level was rising higher and higher. In the end we were forced to abandon the ship and we ended up in a sort of lifeboat. The water was rising quite rapidly and eventually we were cut off, floating in this boat. I was singing a few sea shanties until people told me to keep quiet. Gradually we were higher in the sea as the water rose. This began to be extremely serious and it didn’t look as if we were going to touch down properly and have a relaxing arrival. We’d all be completely at the mercy of the van that was following us and the people in it.

This one concerned a ginger cat called Rusty who lived in a supermarket somewhere. This was something else that was affected by the rising water levels etc. I could see that although people had built some kind of wall of produce to keep it out it had managed to jump through and knock over a lot of these items and had ended up in difficulties. I really can’t remember the rest of this.

We were then on board a bus and the water level was rising. Several of the passengers were panicking. One of them had sent a text to his mother to ask her what he should do. She replied that she had seen some straps hanging from the ceiling, the type that standing commuters take hold when the bus is swaying around. She told him to take hold of one of those. At least he’d be steady and upright while the waters continue to rise.

I was back in these floods watching an English football referee called Stanley Baxter swim around refereeing a football match becoming slowly more and more engulfed in the water until he eventually sank in it.

There was an island off the Arctic coast of Canada where there was a Canadian politician who used to attack people and tear at their clothes and generally thrash about at them. The fact was that he had to be airlifted in and out of this island like a baby.

There were parts of the UK mainland where you could have your injections for free. There are people there who had been injected who were living until they were 103

Later on I flew out of Brussels and ended up in the Falkland Islands although it was nothing like the Falkland Islands that I ever knew. I was walking around there looking for somewhere to eat. The more I walked, the further I seemed to go out into the country. It wasn’t until I’d been walking for a mile or so that I realised that I didn’t have my crutches. I was walking normally. After a little while I noticed that there was a major road in the distance. I thought that if I were to take this road back it might lead me back in town again. There was a detached house with a garage. It seemed to be the public footpath and everyone was passing through it to reach that road. I followed a few people and there was a family in there playing. As I went out of the back door of the garage there was a young girl there with a big fluffy white cat. I bent down to stroke it. It immediately began to rub itself against me purring really loudly. The people looked at me and seemed to be extremely pleased about the cat being so friendly. The woman asked me if I was allowed to have a cat where I am. I replied that cats are certainly allowed wherever I am. The little girl then asked “were you on the flight from Brussels out to here on Monday?”. I replied “yes”. Se replied “so were we. I thought that I recognised you. We were sitting at the back talking to the stewardess and a woman with a baby”.

Later on I was back in that dream again. I rang up the house and spoke to the girl. She said that she was very sorry about her sister because apparently I made her cry. I said that I couldn’t understand how I could possibly have made her cry. If I did, it certainly wasn’t my intention. After we’d talked for a while I asked “by the way, would you like to come out to a milk bar or something with me one day?”. She replied “I don’t know if my parents would like it”. I replied “they don’t really need to know, do they?”. She had a little laugh about that.

There was a British woman working down on the border between Switzerland and Germany during the war. 2 tourists came along to have a look around the area for some skiing. They gradually worked their way into the confidence of this woman. She gave one of them some information that was important. After several adventures these 2 men flew away. Just at that moment the German police turned up to arrest them. They took hold of this woman and tried to drag her away but she wanted them to wait for a moment. Then the plane with these 2 men flew over, waggled its wings at her and then flew off presumably back to the UK. Later on the was imprisoned. her cellmate was talking to her about the event. She said “did you think that these British people managed to get away? Do you think that the British Government got what it wanted?”. The cellmate looked at her and said “the British Government might have done but I don’t think that you and your friend did”.

And finally I was back in a family last night. although it wasn’t mine – it was a happy family. There was talk about relocating to Iceland and becoming Icelandic nationals. This meant applying for all kinds of documents etc. We set about collecting the documents for them. The most important document was the police statement, that we hadn’t been involved in any nefarious activities. I seem to remember that at the time that gave me a lot of hope and optimism and cheered me up, although there were several questions in my mind about other issues that might cause a problem with the Icelandic authorities. Nevertheless it was still another one of these very happy dreams

I really don’t know what to say about all of that.

Later on I attacked in a rather desultory fashion the radio notes that I’d dictated before going to bed. That programme is now completed and there’s just one more of the backlog to do. That’s tomorrow’s project.

Tea was one of those strange veggie burgers with salad and chips. It was actually quite nice too. I don’t know what I’m going to do when the supplies from Noz runs out.

Later on I chopped up a few more sound-tracks and once I’ve dictated the radio notes for the final programme I’ll be going to bed.

After last night I deserve it too.

But before I go, there was something that I forgot to mention about yesterday.

When I was round at Rosemary’s three years ago there was a feral cat roaming around outside.

When I was around there last year it was “keep the door shut – I don’t want that cat to go inside the house”

Last night it was “I’ll have to get out of my chair to fetch that. Just let me take Myrtille off my lap”.

No-one I ever knew won a fight with a cat.

0

Friday 20th october 2023 – I’M ABSOLUTELY CONVINCED …

… that some people have been put on this earth for no other reason than to cause as much inconvenience, chaos and disruption to people’s lives as they possibly can.

This saga about these documents that I have to send off for my hospital visit is rumbling on and on and on.

When I returned from the shops this morning I found an e-mail that had been sent to me with a request for a whole pile of documents. It ended up being a pile of 19 documents that they wanted, several of which had already been sent.

Having collected the ones that I had and scanned in the rest I sent them off, only to receive a reply asking for more and more.

And so it went on during the day until 16:47, 13 minutes before the Assurance Office closed, asking me
1) why am I going to the hospital? What are they planning on doing to me
and
2) why am I going to a hospital so far away.

And so I replied
1) "On page 5 of document 2 it clearly states ‘we propose a further stay in hospital to supplement the investigation ….’" (and then a whole list of tests that they propose).
and
2) "If your doctors would be so kind as to look at page 2 of document 2 they will see that I have ALREADY been to a local hospital who were unable to identify the problem and the condition has since deteriorated. Therefore there needs to be a further investigation in depth"

By the time that my reply was ready the Assurance Office had closed – which means that they won’t now reply with a decision until after I’ve left – and so, being in a totally foul mood, I added a few other bells and whistles to my letter and finished it off with a "if there is anything else by which I can waste even more of my time by repeating to you information that is already in your possession, please don’t hesitate to let me know".

Many years ago, I was totally and utterly stressed out and would lose my temper at the slightest provocation. You’ve no idea what used to go through my mind back in those horrible days and it took an enormous effort to get a grip of things.

Living in splendid isolation in the mountains of Central France miles away from all kinds of interaction with people worked wonders and although things would occasionally crop up, I’d just fly to Canada, hire a car and go and sit in the wilderness and the peri-arctic tundra until sanity returned.

Back in 2019 I was walking along the old Emigrant Trail through South Pass in the Rockies, thinking just how peaceful and calm things are around here, and how I ought to spend more time in places like this. But unfortunately, these days, I can no longer run away and hide

Meanwhile, back at the ra … errr … apartment …

Last night was a slightly better night. There was still plenty going on but I managed to ignore a lot of it.

It was still a struggle to raise myself from the dead, and after I’d had my medication and checked my mails and messages I had a listen to the dictaphone. I’d talked to a few people about how I was going to change the kitchen round in my house. One of my friends began to talk to me about the kitchen that I had, what it was like etc so I explained. I explained that I’d probably be wanting to dispose of it completely, even down to the pipes etc. he said that he would like to have it. I said that that was fine by me. He asked if he could come to pick it up the next day. I burst out laughing and said “I haven’t even organised anything yet or ordered anything, let alone had it delivered etc”. He replied “your niece’s daughter is going to be rather upset because she’s planning on taking a day off tomorrow and coming to help me do it”.

And later I was going through the collection of solo poses for my 3D characters, picking out the individual poses and making some kind of giant collage with them all superimposed. I’d done three and was on the way to finishing off a fourth when someone came to the door. They asked me what I was doing so I explained. They thought that it was a pretty pointless task because I wouldn’t have the benefit from doing it. I’d be long gone before this project was particularly finished

Finally I’d been out drinking (so that was obviously a dream) with a couple of people from Crewe and we were on our way home. We called at a pub on the way back and outside the pub next door was a guy whom we all knew. We had a chat with him. I asked my two companions what was happening this weekend. They didn’t really come out with much. I needed to use the bathroom so I went to find it. It was in a terrible mess with toilet paper everywhere etc. I tidied it up as best as I could. I found that the door wouldn’t close. There was no bolt so in the end I teased a nail out of the wall and slipped it in where the bolt should be. That managed to close it. The next step was to sit down but the toilet seat fell off. In the end I thought that I’d abandon it as a bad job and just go home.

Deciding last week to go to the shops at St Nicolas was a really good decision. The bus whisked me off and dropped me off on the raised kerb, and then I had a slow wander around the Carrefour just picking up one or two things that I need quite quickly, like tomatoes, lettuce and mushrooms.

With plenty of time before the bus came back for me I had a nice hot coffee and then sat and watched the world go by.

As I said before, I think that I’m moving a little easier after the exercise so I can’t wait for this rehabilitation course, that should have started last week, to begin.

After my bread and soup we had this totally shambolic afternoon of dealing with all of this paperwork and fielding probably about a dozen phone calls for one reason or another.

The only one that was really welcome was Rosemary, and we had a good chat for a while.

Last night I’d dictated the notes for one of the radio programmes but when I listened to them I decided that they weren’t up to much so I re-dictated them. They are no edited and in the process of being assembled.

If I’m lucky, I might finish it tonight and even dictate the notes for the next programme in the list.

Tea was a baked potato, salad and one of those breaded quorn fillets that I like so much.

So when I’ve finished what I need to do, I’ll go to bed. I have my blood test tomorrow and then I crack on with the notes that I’ll dictate in a minute.

Many years ago, “Bomber” Harris used to greet members of the Air Ministry whenever he met them with “and what have you done to impede the War effort today?”. I had so much to do, some of which was quite important, but I’ve not done any of it, what with one thing and another.

So who’s going to come along and impede my efforts tomorrow?

0

Thursday 19th October 2023 – IT GOES WITHOUT …

… saying that last night was just as bad as the others that I’ve been having just recently. Having a nightmare at about 03:00 didn’t help matters any.

Anyway, as a result it was another difficult crawl out of bed when the alarm went off

What surprised me though is that I seem to be moving rather better than I was a couple of days ago – to such an extent that I actually managed to walk 14 paces without grabbing hold of any support, and that’s an improvement over the last few weeks.

So I made it into the living room and had my medication. Then I came back in here and checked my mails and messages. There wasn’t anything exciting in the mail this morning – no letters or messages from any Health Insurance people. Time is running out.

Once I’d come round into the Land of the Living I transcribed the dictaphone notes. There was a review of what needed to be done in the garden, tasks performed, items bought, etc to prepare it. From there we went on to a football match which Morton won 4-0 which was to the disadvantage of Oldham Athletic. Someone was saying that it’s a shame that Morton’s new manager didn’t score a goal. Someone pointed out that he did in fact score a penalty earlier on in the match. When we had a look to see who it was I saw that it was one of the existing players but I couldn’t remember now who it was.

So later on, back to where we were before. One of the Morton players had pushed this guy who was his manager, pushed him around in a wheelchair during part of the match, pushing him around to show him off to the team or vice versa, something like that.

I was in a dream later with Nerina. She was going off to do a taxi job and I was preparing the cars ready to go out. One of the estates didn’t have an MoT on it. We’d let it expire while we’d been away. We had to go to check it over to make sure that it was OK. I was taking out the radios etc ready. I decided that I’d go through the diary, check on all the big jobs that we usually do and go through for when they were ready for renewal to see if that would give me a clue about how I could manage the car MoTs better. Nerina was going out to do a couple of jobs so she was confused about what was going to be happening to the radio in the office if I was outside fixing all the cars.

There was also something else, as I mentioned earlier, but you don’t really want to know about that.

This morning I’ve been sorting out paperwork and making another assault on a different target. They actually replied too, telling me that I had the wrong address. But at least they posted the correct one so I could redirect my correspondence.

They also provided a phone number that I could ring, so if no-one has contacted me by mid-morning tomorrow I’ll phone them.

There’s also a personal profile that I need to create for the French Government’s healthcare site so I spent some time doing that. It might be too late for that to be of any use but you never know.

All in all, it took me an age to do everything this morning.

This afternoon I finished off pairing the music for the third radio programme in this batch that I’ve just done and then I wrote out all the notes.

Before I go to bed later I’ll dictate the notes for the first one. I did four one after the other last time and I was exhausted by the end so I’ll do one at a time over the next few days.

My neighbour gave me the phone number of her ergotherapist. She told me that she was very impressed with the one who came to see her so I may as well try to have an appointment with the same one. He wasn’t in but his secretary took a message.

My cleaner came by too to bring me a letter. It’s good news from the Belgian Social Security – I’ve had a pay-rise for my pension. Whatever am I going to do with this extra €1:02 a month?

Tea tonight was an attack on the European Burger Mountain in my fridge, with pasta and veg and the rest of that vegan pesto from the other day. Pretty basic, but pretty nice.

So when I’ve dictated the radio notes, I’m off to bed. Tomorrow I’ll be shopping and then I imagine that I’ll be panicking about this trip on Monday, making a raft of phone calls and eventually, I imagine, making a phone call to book a train.

It’ll be a blooming miracle if this taxi thing comes off.

0

Wednesday 18th October 2023 – THESE NIGHTS ARE …

… not getting any better. It was another dismal night of being awake for hour after hour after hour.

And then being flat out asleep, dead to the world, when the alarm went off.

And so with having slept for probably about half an hour it was a very weary me that staggered to my feet when the alarm went off.

After the medication and checking the mails and messages I had some correspondence that needed my attention. I’ve sold yet another photo from my adventures around Labrador and you’ve no idea just how many hoops you have to jump through for $200.

Not that I’m complaining of course. I’ve sold a fair few of my p =hotos but this is the most that I’ve ever received for one.

There was then the information that I needed to collect, which I mentioned yesterday. That took a good while and then I could send it all off by internet. A phone call won’t be sufficient because they will need to see the information that I have.

While I was at it, I decided to contact my former employers. They have a Social Services and Welfare department so I may as well try to involve them in whatever problems I have going on. The more the merrier, I reckon.

At that point, I drifted off into the Arms of Morpheus for a good half-hour. And then I sent off a couple of radio programmes to be broadcast this weekend and next weekend.

Climbing into the bath, even using a wooden box as a step, was almost impossible. I had a real struggle to fight my way in, and finding my way out again wasn’t all that much easier. This is starting to become rather grim.

While the cleaner was here I attacked the notes for the radio programmes and not only did I whizz through one from start to finish, I did some of the next one too. If I’m lucky and don’t have too many distractions I’ll be able to finish that one tomorrow.

After the cleaner left I had my hot chocolate and then attacked the washing. That’s everything now done for the moment.

But have you any idea how difficult it is for me to move a basket full of moist washing into the bay where I keep the clothes airer? It’s this kind of simple thing that is causing me all kinds of anguish right now.

There was (surprisingly) some stuff on the dictaphone. I was doing something with a rock group last night. Things weren’t working out too well so at some point I went round to the place where we kept all our things and began to take everything away that was mine. I noticed that some of them had actually got together with one or two other people and were in the process of trying to create something but I didn’t want them to use my things. I was in an extremely bad temper, even down to things like my telephone answering machine so I took it away. They had changed the message on it so many times that it was now absolutely useless anyway. I ended up with seven or eight bags that I dragged off as best as I could, came back to my bedroom at home and dumped the lot on the floor while I sat and thought about my next move.

It was then our students’ union annual conference taking place at some hotel in Manchester. Things were so up-in-the-air and so confused that I set out from home with absolutely nothing except the clothes that I was wearing. I boarded the tram that whisked me off. When I arrived in Manchester I eventually found the venue. It was a very small hotel with several floors but no matter where I went I couldn’t find anyone in charge of the organising. No-one would give me any papers or any timetable, I didn’t know anything about having food etc. There was a meeting taking place on the Sunday to which I’d been invited but there was nothing at all like that. The guy running that particular meeting grabbed hold of me and asked me why I hadn’t done a few things. I explained that I needed paperwork so he wandered off. I spent all that Friday evening wandering around this hotel trying to find someone to give me some information to tell me what on earth was actually going on and what I was expected to do.

Not of course that it makes no difference because I don’t ever know what I’m doing. That was always the advantage of living in a small village – if you didn’t have a clue what you were doing, everyone else knew.

Tea tonight was a chili sin carné using the leftover stuffing lengthened with a large handful of peanuts. What with all of the bulghour that was already in there, there’s enough protein in that lot to sink a ship.

But right now, I’m off to bed. I wonder how much good the mails and letters that I’ve written today will bring. Probably not a lot, but if you ask, you might receive, or you might not so there’s a 50/50 chance. If you don’t ask, you won’t receive at all.

But we’ll find out soon enough. But if no-one actually does anything, I can see myself walking to Paris on Monday morning.

0

Tuesday 17th October 2023 – THIS TRIP TO PARIS …

…is becoming more and more complicated as each day passes.

My cleaner took the paper to the Health Insurance people for stamping. However, because it’s more than a certain amount it needs to be pre-approved by their head office.

"You should have your reply in 15 days" said the clerk to my cleaner.

And I travel on Monday.

But be that as it may, I ended up having another miserable night. What with a raging thirst and the stabbing pains back in the sole of my right foot, I was pretty much fed up of how the night went.

However even though I saw 06:40 come round, I was flat out asleep when the alarm went off at 07:00. And as you might expect, it wasn’t exactly easy to leave my stinking pit.

Anyway, there I was. And after I’d had my medication and checked my mails and messages, I transcribed the dictaphone notes. I’d been to a Remembrance Day parade. There were whole choirs of people including soldiers and civilians singing the Eric Bogle song NO MAN’S LAND two or three or four times consecutively, one after the other. I’ve no idea why because there’s nothing else that I remember

And then Nerina and I had been on holiday and had just come home. We’d slowly started to unpack. I couldn’t find half the things that I’d taken with me, CDs, that kind of thing and I was going round in circles. Nerina decided that she’d go to bed and I suddenly got it in my head that I’d go home. I left our house and began to walk on my crutches down West Street in Crewe. A train pulled up but it pulled up further down the platform than it usually would and a tram came in right behind it. By the time I reached the train to board it, it pulled away and left me standing there. Then I looked at my ticket and found that it was for travelling in the opposite direction, not out towards Nantwich. I stopped for a think and decided that I’d head back into the town centre. It was a wet evening but somehow very nice. I walked into the town centre, which became part of the old Brussels town centre. I couldn’t find a chip shop that was open. There were all these wonderful smells from barbecues, food stands and the brewery was creating quite an odour as it was working. I was aimlessly wandering around taking it all in. Then I wondered why it was that I was thinking that I was heading home because I was actually living with Nerina. My home was there. I thought that I’d set out back and wander back towards home. I noticed that by now I wasn’t using my crutches. I was going slowly but I seemed to be walking much better and didn’t need them. I was totally at a loss as to what was happening. I was going down these stone steps at the back of the town centre etc. Although my right leg was hurting it was still keeping me upright. I remember thinking that it’s a beautiful evening out here in the town centre just wandering around, looking around, taking in all the smells and sights. Maybe the two of us ought to come out and do this kind of thing more often

Later on I was with Nerina again. We were wandering around a shopping street somewhere in a tourist area in a city like Bruges. For some reason we became separated and I was on my own. There was something like a tiny kiddy’s tricycle that you’d sit on and push along with your feet. Someone disabled was using it. I found another, sat on it and began to push myself along the street on it. It was really interesting because there was a whole new perspective of views that you could imagine that a small child would have when it was being hustled along by its parents. I was taking it all in and slowly going down the street. Suddenly I heard her call in the distance, wondering where I’d got to. I thought “never mind. She’s heading in the right direction. She’ll catch me up quite quickly. I just carried on pushing myself along through the crowds on this kiddy’s scooter.

Having done that, I had to fight off a huge wave of sleep and then sit down and prepare for my Welsh lesson.

And to my surprise, the Welsh lesson went really well and I actually enjoyed it. That makes quite a change, the way things have been just recently.

Once the lesson was over, I had to wait for the doctor’s office to open and then I could telephone him. I spoke to his secretary and explained the issue with the Health Insurance. She promised that she would tackle them herself and let me know how things develop.

Next issue was to see about a vehicle to take me. My idea is that if I wait until I have confirmation that the cost is taken in charge, there will probably be no vehicle available. If I book one now and, if the cost won’t be reimbursed, I can always cancel it.

And cancelled it will be, if it’s not reimbursed. I only wanted to borrow the vehicle for half a day, not to buy it.

But there is another plan going through my head about this trip, and it will involve the collection of a mass of paperwork and a phone call to Italy.

More of this anon.

For what remained of the afternoon I chose some more music for the next couple of radio programmes and paired off the music for one of them.

After tea, which was a taco roll with rice and veg, there was football. Y Barri v Pontypridd

This was a typical lower-table derby match – at least, during the first half – with a few moments that could best be described as “warm”.

In the second half the game came to life and there were actually some moments of sublime skill. Y Barri’s opening goal, scored by Harrison Bright, was one of the best that I’ve seen for a while.

In the end Y Barri won 2-0 and if it hadn’t been for Wales under-21 goalkeeper George Ratcliffe in the Ponty goal, they could have had a hatful.

Y Barri’s centre-forward Kayne McLaggon is one of the best attackers that I’ve seen in Wales and he would have been able to take on the best if he ever had had some decent service. He’s been carrying their attack for years – up until this season.

A few years ago I saw a few games in the WPL where a young centre-forward called Ollie Hulbert played on loan for Cardiff Metro from Bristol Rovers and he impressed me very much. Y Barri signed him this summer and I reckon that once he and McLaggon work themselves out, and when they finally have some luck, they’ll be an unstoppable force up front.

So later than usual, I’m off to bed. I have a lot to do tomorrow so I need to be on form. I hope that I have a better night than last night.

0

Monday 16th October 2023 – MEANWHILE, ON THE …

… telephone –
Our Hero "I have to travel to the hospital in Paris and the doctor has given me an authorisation for transport"
Health Assurance Official "you need to bring the form in here so that we can stamp it"
Our Hero "if I were able to bring the authorisation into your office, I wouldn’t be needing the authorisation"

You can’t make up stories like that.

And so it’s been another day when I’ve done almost nothing at all.

There was plenty of stuff on the dictaphone from the night too and strangely, I don’t remember some of it. Although I’m asleep when I’m dictating the notes, when I’m transcribing them there’s some kind of lightbulb that goes on in my head about most of them.

But last night there were a few that meant nothing at all to me when I came to listen to them.

When the alarm went off this morning I staggered out of bed and went off to take my medication. And then I came back here.

It took a while for me to come round into some kind of working mode, but my relaxation had been interrupted by the doorbell. The nurse had come to see my neighbour but she didn’t open the front door for him so I was obliged to stagger to the door in here to press the switch.

When I finally felt more like it, I had a listen to the dictaphone. Nerina had gone to the hospital to have an operation to have an operation on a cancer or something. Everyone else had disappeared and I was at home on my own. I’d been in Canada, dealing with the fall-out of a ferry that had sunk in one of the big rivers there. There was a great deal of talk about conspiracy theories regarding it, how it was time-expired and couldn’t find insurance for it etc. Whoever it was who was also with us then came back and handed me an envelope. I’d asked them to bring me £1000 cash back from the bank so they brought it back for me. It was all wrapped up in a little packet and they thought “why has the bank gone to this length with this money?”. I asked about Nerina and explained that there was a phone call that she needed to make but I’d left the details back downstairs. Then this person began to talk to me about a British aircraft carrier, “Eagle” that had also sunk in mysterious circumstances. That person seemed to think too that there was a problem with insurance etc, how it was a faulty build etc, how sinking was probably the best answer for it as far as the Navy was concerned. This conversation went on at some length. I explained that there was talk of this ferry, that suddenly the insurance offer had increased from several hundred thousands to¨£3,000,000. The person said that the same thing had happened with “Eagle” but that was done under the counter in a pub or café. I began to ask about Nerina and her operation, how she was doing.

In fact Nerina did once go into hospital back all those years ago and I did go to see her – but not for long. I have a horror of operations, tubes, pipes and all that kind of thing and if I had stuck around I’d have found myself in the next bed.

What I’m going through when I go to hospital is my worst nightmare. They are all well aware that the staff isn’t allowed to discuss operations with me and when I went two years ago to have the carcinogenic bit cut out of my kidneys no-one said anything. They came, pushed me out of my room to downstairs and stuck a gas mask over my face and that was all I knew about the entire proceedings

It’s one of the reasons why I never wanted children – because I’d be expected to be in the delivery room and there would be no way on this earth that that would ever happen. Of course, it’s always possible to be excused attendance but it’s the kind of thing that would be thrown back at you in any kind of dispute. And quite frankly, there are enough reasons to moan at me and complain about me without actually going looking for them.

Later on there was a group of us doing some things around the Crewe area. One was my brother and the other was a girl whom I knew when I lived in Chester. We had to go to some shops for some medication from the chemist and something else. We climbed into my car and drove. At a certain moment going up the street a woman appeared on a bike on the wrong side of the road. I didn’t see her until the last moment. I swerved to miss her. I hit the tyre on the kerb and burst it. I went for a slow limp to somewhere where I could change it but then another tyre burst. I thought “this is no good”. There was some stuff that we needed in the car so I was trying to group it all together in a bag. It was extremely difficult. My brother was making his usual remarks so in the end I gave him the bag and said “here, you carry it”. We set off but they began to wander off in the wrong direction. I said “if we go to the chemist’s in Bedford Street we’re only a couple of hundred yards away from Nantwich Road. If that chemist doesn’t have everything there are 2 or 3 chemists there. The other thing we need can also be bought from a shop there too”. We set off to walk down Bedford Street. I was talking to this girl about the area where she lived in Chester. I told her that I thought that the pub “The Beehive” had now become something else but she didn’t know. I asked where she lived, if she still lived in Chester. She said no, that she lived in Scapa Flow. We ended up taking a short cut through a building. I said to my brother “how do you fancy a nice cheap flat in Edinburgh,” because it was very cheap and it wasn’t really all that bad for the money. We went through this flat and out of the front door into the street.

And then a few of us were talking about my sister’s van. She had a Morris 1000 van and was having a few transformations done to it. When it was finished it looked like a pest on wheels. She would go round the shops with it until one night we stole it and hid it. One night we were down at a pub and she was out in a car. She came past and tried to attract our attention. We thought that we’d better disperse. We scattered and a couple of us ended up in Queen’s Drive in Nantwich where we were being overtaken by a film – a ship thing had passed which was this Morris 1000 van covered in brambles and weeds etc. There was something too about asking my sister the old question of days, the 21st, 24th and a couple of other occasions in that month. She found out the dates wrote them down on a piece of paper and stick them against the bridge behind my headboard in the dark.

Finally I had to go to Whitchurch to see a member of my father’s family. A letter had been delivered to my house for one of them. It was now 04:00 and we were finishing off the taxi work so I set off to deliver it. When I arrived at where I thought they lived I couldn’t identify the house. I saw something that might have been it and began to prowl around. In one of the outbuildings I found the bodyshell of an ancient 1950s Standard Vanguard Vignale … "actually a Phase I" – ed. There was also a set of number-plates on the floor written in Latin alphabet and then in Arabic. I wondered what they’d been doing with the number-plates off a Turkish lorry at one time. As I walked out of the barn I bumped straight into the guy. I came up with some kind of feeble excuse and handed him a letter. He seemed to be extremely delighted. I suddenly realised that it was his taxi wages that I was giving him. We had quite a chat. He asked me if we’d been busy on the taxis. I replied “very busy. I’ve not had my tea yet” and dawn was breaking the following morning”. Then I set out for home. As I was trying to put the key into the ignition some car tried to squeeze through the gap where I was parked. I told her to be a little patient but she snapped at me. When I set off I was driving on the wrong side of the road for a while. When I ended up in Whitchurch I was now on a bike. There was a cyclist in front of me moaning and complaining that I wasn’t in the correct lane, I was too close to him, all that kind of nonsense. He and I had a few words then I carried on heading for home.

Later on, the doctor came round to see how I was doing.

He gave me the famous bon de transport to go to Paris, another one for when these sessions at the Centre de Réeducation begin. Then there’s a prescription for something to help me in and out of the bath (not a student nurse, unfortunately) and finally, a prescription for an ergo-therapist.

An ergotherapist is one of those people who come to study your lifestyle and habits, and suggests ways and items that might improve your quality of life.

If he examines my lifestyle and habits he’ll have a hell of a shock.

Next step was to arrange the purchase of this IMac. I’ve decided that I’m going to buy it because at the very least it’ll replace the laptop that I’m using in the dining room to watch DVDs when I’m having my tea.

There was another visitor too. My cleaner came to see me and brought me my post. She’d heard about my story with the transport authorisation and as she’s going to the veg market tomorrow morning at Yquelon she can drop my form off as she’s passing, and also pick up my bathroom thing.

We went through a pile of stuff too about these chairlifts and tomorrow I’ll be ordering brochures.

Tea was later than usual – stuffed pepper and pasta. Just as nice as usual. So now I’m going to bed.

But I’m sickening for something again. This evening I’ve developed a really raging thirst and that’s always a sign that something is going on in my body. A collapse in health usually follows and what’s sad is that there isn’t much health left to collapse.

But if the Health Assurance people do agree to pay for my trip in a taxi to the hospital, that will be an enormous weight of my mind. I’m not looking forward to the trip if I have to go by train.

0

Sunday 15th October 2023 – CONSIDERING THAT IT’S …

… a Sunday today, and usually a Day of Rest, I’ve been extremely busy. And that’s not a usual phenomenon at all, is it?

What’s even more surprising is that despite not going to bed until about 02:30 this morning, I was actually up and about at 09:30 this morning. And that’s even more unusual.

Mind you, impressive as it might sound, later in in the morning I was totally out of my tree and for at least an hour too. I don’t think that I’ve ever had such a deep sleep and I felt dreadful when I awoke. It took me quite a while to come round to my senses – well, such as they are.

One of the first things that I did was to transcribe the dictaphone notes, because it had been quite a mobile night. I had been preparing a radio programme and including in it various dedications etc for people whose birthday it was on that particular day. I’d arranged a little surprise for everyone because it was my birthday so I’d arranged for singer Art Garfunkel to come to the studio and say hello to everyone and introduce one of his songs. He came in and I explained what I was doing. He played along and began to introduce one of his songs that I could play which also had some kind of anniversary today – whether it was the day that it was written or published etc. There was much more to it than this but all the rest has now disappeared.

And then as the countdown came to my birthday the plane took off to one of these songs and I was walking under the eaves checking various things when suddenly all the equilibrium was lost. It was a 260 engine from the 1940s and 50s that was pulling it and it couldn’t keep in a straight line etc. We had a close look and found that the back of the house had broken where something in the sky had fallen down, landed across the tracks and broken them. We could make no sense of anyone who might have been there or who might have had a car parked there that Thursday morning. We had to appeal to everyone to look to see what they could see on their own security camera footing.

Finally, we’d been for a walk around the city and were on our way back to the castle to meet up. As I was climbing up the steep hill towards the walls I could see down below two of my friends pushing a broken bicycle. I asked them if they too were on their way back and they replied “yes”. We had quite a little chant. They then carried on as they had a long way to go around the zigzags before they caught up with me. I walked slowly up towards the door where I could wait and catch them. For some reason I had a telephone directory in my hand that someone had given me – a redundant one that had been thrown out that they’d saved ready for me. Someone had asked me about it and I said that I’d see later on whether I’ll need it or not. Then my friend from Shropshire and her friend turned up. They were on their way back too. They saw me with the telephone directory and she said “oh that’s handy! I could use that!” and snatched it from my hand. She began to write things down in her diary. She said “I can do this a couple of days afterwards” etc. I thought “the guy who wanted that directory just now has had it. It was rather rude just to have it ripped from my hand like that without even asking a question or asking about it. My friend asked me what my plans were. I was rather peeved so I said that I’d been hoping to finish off my house but I have to spend a week somewhere then a week in hospital, a week somewhere else then probably another week so at the rate that things are being done I don’t think that this house will ever be finished.

Once I’d awoken later on I spent a good while talking for a friend about a few things here and there, and thanks for the message, Grahame. It was appreciated.

Next task was to write all of the notes for my next radio programme. That will be completed tomorrow and then I’ll start on the next batch of programmes.

But what has taken up most of my time this afternoon was baking a huge pile of biscuits.

We started off with the usual basic biscuit recipe of flour, vegan butter and sugar in the ratio of 10/8/4.

To that I added a few handfuls of oats, some chopped almonds, nutmeg, cinnamon, mixed spice, ginger, desiccated coconut, raisins, vanilla essence, orange essence and several tablespoons of honey. There are probably a few other things too that I’ve forgotten.

Everything was all mixed in and some more vegan butter was added because the mixture was too dry. And then after it had been left to cool on the fridge it was rolled out, cut into rounds and eventually baked.

There were a few scraps of pastry left over so I made a wafer and cooked it in the air fryer to see how it would taste. And they really are good, if a little overpowering.

But the tragedy now is that I’ve run out of mixed spice and I doubt that I’ll be able to find any more here. And although I probably could make some, I can’t find all of the individual ingredients.

While all of this was going on I was thawing out a lump of pizza dough for my Sunday evening pizza. With a red-hot oven, it cooked really well too and tasted just as delicious as always.

But right no I’m off to bed. I have plenty of things to do tomorrow, as well as sorting out the forms that I want the doctor to sign for me. And I mustn’t forget to contact the bank. I need a certificate from them too.

And then there’s the radio stuff to do too. I’m going to have my work cut out next week before I head for the hills in Paris in 8 days time.

0

Saturday 14th October 2023 – BETTER LATE THAN …

… never. And it doesn’t get much later than this.

As I begin to type out these notes it’s 01:48 tomorrow – if you see what I mean. And there is no reason whatever for this lateness because, as far as work goes, I’ve done nothing at all. I didn’t even begin to type out the dictaphone notes until about 00:30, and I’ve not had any food this evening either.

The day started off as it meant to go on, with a desperate stagger out of bed in an attempt to beat the second alarm. I managed it too, but not by a lot.

After the medication I checked the mails and messages, to find that I’d been invited out for a coffee this afternoon so I’d better have a good wash and a shave etc

Later on, I finished off the soup that I’d opened yesterday. With no bread here today (except in the freezer) I had a go at baking some of this precooked bread in the air fryer.

It worked better than I expected, so when I bake the second one tomorrow I’ll turn down the heat a bit and cook if for a shorter time. But it opens up the door to all kinds of possibilities.

What I have been doing is to resolve a problem with the computer. It performed an upgrade during the night and from then on, I couldn’t log into a site that I use. I had to leap through all kinds of hoops to finally make it fire up properly

Something else I’ve been doing is to do a little research. One of my friends is selling a dual-screen IMac set-up. It’s an old piece of equipment but it seems to be fairly powerful – even with a 1TB SSD

They are reputed to be much better than a PC for working in graphics and one of the screens in the set-up is a whopping 27-inch and that looks interesting, so I’ve been going through the list of programs on it to see what it has and see whether, if I decide to buy it, it will do what I want.

It’s not as if I’m expecting much for my money, but I’m not paying much money for it. I’ve seen the list of known defects in these machines and there’s nothing on there that worries me.

Later on I went upstairs to chat with my neighbour and her daughter who is visiting. We were there for several hours chatting about all kinds of things.

One of the plans, for which I did some research later, was to find out about one of these chairlifts to go up the flight of steps to where the lift is. There are several disabled people in the building and we are all struggling to climb these 12 steps.

On the way up, I was detained by one of the other neighbours, and then a different neighbour detained me on the way down. I seem to be quite popular these days.

No tea tonight because I wasn’t hungry, but it’s not as if I had anything more important to do.

And later on I had the dictaphone notes. I was writing out some notes for some radio programmes last night. I’d come across a song going back to the late 60s recorded by a boy and girl couple. I added it onto the playlist and began to look for some information about them. I came across a whole series of photos taken quite quickly one after the other, one of which was the boy carrying the girl. The caption was something along the lines of “this is how to cherish your pet when it begins to rain”. It turned out that these photos were taken of 2 kids, one of whom was 15 and the other was celebrating her 14th birthday. They had sung together at school and gone on to make records. I couldn’t find out what had become of them, whether they’d married, broken apart or just drifted out of the scene. It was really strange because all the information that I could find about these people stopped at this birthday party

A little further on in the same dream I was doing my Welsh homework and answering a few questions but there were several that had me stumped. I read one of them out loud but I couldn’t think of the verb. The teacher turned to me and asked “do you think that (such a verb) is good to use in that place?”. I replied “I’m sorry, I can’t hear you” so he asked again but I still couldn’t hear. He probably said the sentence to me 4 or 5 times but I still couldn’t make out exactly what he was saying, almost as if I was having some kind of blank spell of deafness while he was asking me the questions. I couldn’t understand anything he was saying. It was just a blurred kind of burble when he talked to me.

Then there was something back in the dream a third time about (something) beer and bowling makes a great afternoon out. I thought to myself that I should be doing quite well at this sport but it’s not the slightest bit of use whatsoever if you can’t hear anything that someone is saying to you.

We also had a competition between people. I don’t know what competition it was now but my name was pulled out of the hat to be paired with Hercule Poirot. I said “oh no! Not you again!” in a rather exasperated tone of voice

Then a large white cross appeared in the middle of a programme that was going on and I was recording, about your elderly ones being on TV etc. I was hoping that the person whom I was looking after had a great deal to say so I was interested in having her try to go on this programme but I wasn’t doing very well at all.

Finally, I was back in Crewe and had been working on Caliburn. There was a lot of work that needed doing and I’d done most of it. Some of the stuff was quite heavy and I needed some things. My father said that he’d be home at lunchtime and we’d finish it off in the afternoon. So roll round 17:00, 18:00 and I’d been standing there for 5 or 5 hours. There was no sign of him, which was nothing new. I was beginning to think about the wasted holiday. I’d just come over here to see everyone and all I’ve ended up doing is standing in this drive waiting. A few girls whom I knew came round. They were going out to drop some things off on some people. They asked me if I’d like to go so we piled into their car and set off. We stopped at one of the streets off Nantwich Road to drop off something at someone who had a poodle. The girls were making some remarks about these people and this poodle. We all ended up walking along Nantwich Road. I was miles away with my head in the clouds as usual. I noticed that these girls were crossing the road so I shouted and ran after them. They all laughed. We wandered along the road looking at the things in the shops. They seemed to be having a good time but I was still feeling extremely depressed about everything that I’d planned to do, everyone whom I’d hoped to see etc but there I was, just waiting around for things to happen, which seemed to be the usual state of affairs.

So now I’m off to bed to sleep until I wake up. And I’ll have a little think about this computer. The last time that I used an Apple was in 1992 so it will be fun to have a play around with this IMac for as long as it lasts. It won’t last all that long but then again neither will I.

0

Friday 13th October 2023 – THAT WAS A …

… really good decision that I made for this morning.

As I have mentioned before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I can no longer climb into the bus at the Port because there’s no pavement at the bus stop so I’m having to climb in from street level.

Consequently, if I want to go out (and I ought to go out at least once per week) I have to think again.

Right out on the edge of town off the beaten track is the quartier of St Nicolas.

It was formerly a village in its own right but was absorbed into Granville during the regrouping of communes some time ago, and so it has all of its own services which, to most people’s surprise, have remained intact.

There’s one of these typical small 1960s-type of shopping centres which is only 100 metres from a bus stop on the bus route that starts and finishes outside my front door. When I was out there on Monday, I checked the bus stops and to my delight, the pavements at both are raised to exactly the correct height.

There’s a chemists and a Post Office right next door to each other and then there’s the Carrefour supermarket. Much bigger than the one in town with a greater variety of produce.

There is a downside to it, in that the time between the bus dropping me off, completing its run, turning round and coming back is only 12 minutes, and that’s not enough.

However, that’s not a problem because there’s a bakery in the supermarket that bakes fresh bread and sells coffee. So I had a lovely rest with a nice hot coffee while I waited for the next bus.

There’s a lot going on there with a lot of people about and they all seem quite friendly too, so it was a really good idea to go there and I’ll be doing it more often.

Yesterday evening I’d psyched myself up for it by going to bed early but it made no difference because it took ages to go off to sleep. At least the night wasn’t as restless as some have been just recently.

When the alarm went off I was in the middle of a dream about someone who had quite a few cats. For some reason he’d locked them up into one particular room, gone away and left them. The cats succeeded in breaking down one of the things that he’d erected to block off the fireplace. By means of the chimney they were then able to move around the entire house. There was much more to it than that but that was all that I can remember when the alarm went off.

It’s been a while since we’ve had a dream about cats, hasn’t it?

After the medication I had to finish off the letters from yesterday and print off some paperwork to go with them, and then I hit the streets.

The bus was already here outside so I staggered on board and we set off for our journey. At St Nicolas I went to the Post Office to post the letters and then off to the supermarket for the shopping, followed by a nice hot coffee while I waited for the bus.

Climbing back on board was much easier, for which I was extremely grateful, and the climb back up the stairs seemed to be a little less difficult. In fact, I think that i’m moving about a little bit easier that I was before I set out. Mind you, that’s not saying too much because things have been difficult just recently.

For a very late breakfast I eschewed the cheese on toast and had some soup with the crusty bread that I had bought. It really was delicious, and I’ll have some more of that.

Back in here, I crashed out – quite definitively too, and for at least an hour. That’s no surprise at all.

Once I’d recovered I sat down and bashed out another radio programme. That’s the last one of the four that I dictated last Saturday night. Tomorrow I’ll carry on with the next one in the pipeline. I’m going to try to do two next week as I’m in hospital the week after.

There was stuff on the dictaphone from last night too. I’ve been packing up a room where I’d been staying for a few days ready to go off on an expedition. I’m going to have to go through all of the stuff because I’m going to be limited on what I can take. When I looked through the stuff I was surprised at all of the things that were there, all kinds of stuff that I’d been dragging around with me that I must have emptied out of a vehicle – glass bottles, jars, tons of papers etc. I had to be really severe about disposing of it all. Some of it is quite valuable in an intrinsic or sentimental way but the fact is that I simply can’t carry it so I’ll have to dispose of it and just take what I need for the journey and maybe one or two other things that would come in handy for the journey that I could use again. If it won’t be handy for the journey I’d have to throw it away whether I like it or not and that is filling me full of depression. Not that that’s any surprise because I have a hard time throwing things away.

There was something going on about a house party with a lot of people there, a few who were disabled. While I can’t remember very much about this dream I remember that some kind of cards were distributed among the people – you took your chance and took a card. The receipt of a disability card entitled you to certain things. The first person who pulled out a disability card was someone who was extremely able-bodied and active. That caused quite a gasp around the place as they tried to work out what it would mean for this extremely active person to have a disability card.

So now I’m dreaming about disabilities and handicapped people. That’s a pretty sad state of affairs for me to be in. Realisation sinks in slowly, but it sinks in deep.

Tea tonight was chips and salad with some falafel. Nothing special but nevertheless quite nice. Tomorrow I have one of those breadcrumbed quorn fillets, and I’ll probably go for a baked potato with that.

So now I’m off to bed, flushed with success about having made a good decision for my shopping. It’s not all that often that things that I plan seem to come off so I shall bask in the glory of that until I probably fall out of the bus next weekend.

By the way, you did all listen to my radio programme on Friday night, didn’t you? If not, you can hear it on Saturday evening.

0