LIVE: Monday 19th October 2026 –
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LIVE: Sunday 18th October 2026 – I HAVE JUST …
… seen a most extraordinary incident in a football match – the kind that will be played back on these “blooper” videos on social networking channels for years and years to come. And it won’t be any surprise because I had to look at it twice and still find it hard to believe, and so did the commentator and everyone in the crowd too.
But more of that anon. Let’s start at the very beginning, a very good place to start.
Last night, by the time that I’d finished everything that needed doing and was about to crawl into bed, it was long after midnight, and I’d been letting it all hang out until 00:30, I suppose. And that kind of time for going to bed is doing me no favours at all.
However, with no alarm clock and being awoken in bed by the nurse, at whatever time he comes on a Sunday, that’s much more positive.
Always assuming that I sleep right the way through, which in these days is highly unlikely, of course. And so it proved last night. It was about 04:30 or so when I awoke, and after that, it was one of those early mornings when I’m drifting in and out of sleep without anything being definitive. I was awake at 06:20, which I know because I looked at the time, and the next thing I remember was the nurse coming into the apartment round about 08:30.
He sorted out my legs and feet while I was still in bed, and then he cleared off until tomorrow. But I couldn’t go back to sleep, so a short time later, I threw off the covers, and when I eventually summoned up the courage and energy to stand up, I headed into the bathroom to sort myself out for the morning.
When I’d finished dressing, I went into the kitchen to make breakfast. It was only 09:15 too, so it wasn’t actually all that late compared to a weekday.
Breakfast was quite good today. There was the usual porridge, juice and cafe, and two more of my home-made croissants filled with apricot jam. Yes, they were really delicious. There was no book today, though. The travelling laptop is still in my bag, as it will be going with me tomorrow to the day hospital before dialysis. The time has come round for the second instalment of this product that stimulates my white blood cells. And if it gives me the same kind of boost as the first one did four weeks ago, it will be pretty good.
And when it’s all over, across the road I go, off to the dialysis centre without a break and, more importantly, without breakfast. And that will hurt the most. That is, unless, once more, the nurse who looks after me goes for lunch, forgetting that she has to put the anaesthetic on my arm. That will hurt much more when I go to dialysis and they come to plug me in.
After breakfast, I came back in here to carry on with yesterday’s notes, and you may well have noticed that they are now on line, almost two thousand four hundred words of them. That meant that I could now transcribe the dictaphone notes to find out where I’d been during the night.
I was round at my niece’s house last night, and it was the usual chaotic place with all of their families and friends there. I was having to leave that evening as I was somewhere near Stranraer. My niece’s husband was talking to me about an oak that he’d been growing since it was an acorn, and now it was ready to be cut down, and he told me that I could have it. He explained that he’d been curing it with mushrooms and everything like that. I kept on asking for him to tell me where it was, but for some reason, he was very reticent. Then they all decided to go to someone’s party up in town, but I was planning to leave that night and I had a lot of things to do. One of the things that I’d promised to do was to take all the scaffolding and piping that was by the front door and put it somewhere, so I’d already put it in my van. My elder sister, she should have been helping me as she promised, but she went to this party too. Now that the van was all ready, apart from the piping that I’d put in it – this tubing that I’d put into it – and I didn’t have the address of this tree and had stuck all these tubes in my van, so in the end, I went down to where this party was and took hold of my sister. I said “are you still going to help me move these things?” She replied “oh yes, I’ll help you tomorrow”. I answered “you know I’m leaving tonight” so she reluctantly came out of the party. I asked my niece’s husband if he had the keys to these two garages that he had across the yard at the bottom under the trees, and he gave them to me. They were two half-keys that you had to fit together in order to open the door. So I picked those up and then went outside. I saw my sister walking around the street, so I drove over to pick her up. She came over extremely reluctantly as if she had no interest whatsoever in giving me a hand to move these tubes and piping in the van, even though they were for her daughter’s husband.
There have been quite a few dreams in the comparatively recent past about being at my niece’s house, all of which have put the house in an unreal situation, somewhere a long way from its actual position in real life, and all of them recounting stories that have absolutely no basis in fact.
But the significance of Stranraer is easy to explain, seeing as I watch Stranraer FC’s matches almost every weekend and sometimes when they are playing in midweek too. We’ve also been going to parties on a regular basis through the night just recently too.
The oak tree is significant too, seeing as I’m reading a chapter on special trees in Herefordshire in my morning book right now, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall. However, I bet that the oak in this dream wasn’t ready to be cut down quite yet either. They need a few hundred years to mature first. And the mushrooms relate to that chapter on parasitic mushrooms that we read too.
The scaffolding and tubing is interesting as well. Regular readers of this rubbish in a previous version will recall, I own quite a bit of scaffolding that I bought from that huge painting project in Liverpool City Centre when I was in the UK once, and I also bought some heavy duty tubing from Stoke on Trent to use as wind turbine masts and so on. My van was full of the stuff when I came back from the UK that time.
And, of course, there’s the usual visit of someone from the rest of my family. They always seem to pop up when they aren’t required
This took me up to today’s football – Afan Lido, tenth in the second tier v Penybont, third in the first tier.
It’s been a while since I’ve seen Afan Lido’s ground. They haven’t been in the first tier and televised matches since they were relegated at the end of season 2013/2014, and although it’s a fairly new ground, it was looking rather tired and neglected back in those days. However, it looks as if it’s had a refurbishment and a few good coats of paint and looks much nicer.
As for the match, I don’t think that there was ever a doubt about who was going to win it. Penybont was by far the better team and had, I reckon, about two thirds of the play. At times, Afan Lido were struggling to get out of their own penalty area. However, they held on for a good forty-odd minutes before Penybont scored their first goal, a header by a Penybont defender from a corner.
And then we had a calamity!
The very same defender who had scored the goal, about thirty seconds later intercepted a loose ball down by his own goal line. His keeper was up near the penalty spot, so we all expected a pass to the keeper. Instead, the defender, calmly and nonchalantly, kicked the ball into his own net to give Afan Lido an equaliser, and no-one watching the game could believe what they had just seen.
Whatever Penybont’s manager, Rhys Griffiths, had put in his team’s half-time cuppa, I’d like a drink of that myself because within three minutes into the second half, Penybont had scored two more goals to go 3-1 up. However, Afan Lido woke up quite quickly and managed to keep the Penybont attackers out for the rest of the game, albeit with some desperate defending at times.
Afan Lido had some good moments of their own too, and with a few minutes to go, they won a corner. The ball pinged around inside Penybont’s six yard area for a few seconds, then hit a Lido player and went into the net. I don’t think that he knew anything about it – he was just in the way – but it was a goal for his team and they were now just one goal behind.
As the game came up to the final whistle, the Lido won yet another corner. This led to a game of head tennis, and the same player as just now put the ball in the net. But while he and his team were dancing around to celebrate, the linesman had his flag up for offside.
So Penybont won the game 3-2, meaning that Afan Lido were just so close, but on the balance of play, the result did rather flatter Afan Lido.
There was yet more football after that. The first match was Stranraer away at Spartans. And the Stranraer juggernaut rolls on with yet another win, this time 2-0. Still top of the table, on goal difference from Clyde, and those two have opened up a five-point gap to third place. The next few months will be interesting.
There was another 2-0 scoreline too, this time in the game between Greenock Morton and Queen’s Park. And since having sacked their manager a couple of weeks ago, Morton have become a different team. The players have finally gained some confidence and are looking as if they are enjoying themselves, and they had more shots on target in this match than they had in all of the matches under Ian Murray. They fully deserved their victory this afternoon. Here’s hoping that they can keep it up.
Two other important tasks remained to be done. The first one was to freeze the remains of my shepherd’s pie. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that several days ago I had invited comments from my readers. Most of the suggestions that I received had nothing to do with the shepherd’s pie, and they were physically impossible anyway, but Seàn sent me a couple of ideas, for which I was grateful.
However, in the end, I found some small ice cream containers that Marianne had had. They were 900 mg instead of 1 litre, and the portions of shepherd’s pie were just about the right size to fit in. They are now in the freezer, freezing away.
The final job was my Welsh homework, seeing as I’m not here tomorrow morning. That’s all done now, and I’ll review it on Tuesday morning before I send it off to be marked.
So now my notes are also finished, so I’ll just finish off everything else before I go to bed. Hospital tomorrow morning, and I don’t really want to go. Here’s hoping that the effects of the perfusion make it worthwhile.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about pies … "well, one of us has" – ed … a well-known cook from one of these celebrity TV programmes went to Australia, and while he was there, in front of an invited audience, he made a lemon meringue pie, and all of the audience cheered.
He stood there, scratching his head in bewilderment.
"What’s the matter?" asked the producer.
"Everyone cheered" he replied. "I don’t understand it."
"Why’s that?"
"Because back in the UK, I was told that Australians like to boo meringue."
LIVE: Saturday 17th October 2026 – AND ONCE AGAIN …
… we had yet more problems at dialysis. And just to prove how polyvalent everyone is at dialysis, they were a completely different set of problems than the usual ones. It seems that my whole life is going to be spent encountering these dialysis issues, and when one is solved, we can simply pass on to the next one.
But I don’t understand at all why I seem to have so many problems at places like that. It’s almost as if someone thinks that I don’t have enough of my own at home, like sleeping, for example. It seems that I can sleep perfectly well when I don’t want to, like in the middle of the day, but when I want to, like at night, I don’t seem to be able to manage it.
Last night was a perfect example of that. I was writing my notes up after the football, admittedly at some kind of very late hour, and suddenly, I could feel myself starting to drop off. That was the cue to abandon the notes, post online what I’d done, and go to bed. And then, not be able to go to sleep for ages.
Eventually, I managed to drop off and go to sleep, but it wasn’t for long. I’ve no idea what time it was when I awoke, but it was definitely in the small hours. I know that I was still awake at 04:59 because I checked the time and debated with myself whether I should get up at that point, but the next thing that I remember was the ‘phone going off at 06:29.
Once more, it took a real effort to haul myself out of bed and off into the living room to unlock the front door ready for when the nurse comes, and then go into the bathroom to sort myself out for the morning. I even had a good scrub up and a shave in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant at dialysis this afternoon.
Back in here, I attacked the notes from last night, and I’d almost finished when the early arrival of the nurse confounded me.
While he was sorting out my legs and feet, we chatted about the weather. Apparently the temperature is going to drop dramatically over the next few days, and a proper autumn will be upon us quite rapidly.
After he left, I made my breakfast, and while I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
Our author is still waxing lyrical about some of these trees, and I don’t suppose that he’ll ever stop. But interestingly, he talks about some fine young chestnut trees in the grounds of one of these stately homes in Herefordshire, and when I went to look it up on the internet to see how things are today, the hall is now in possession of the National Trust, who make some very favourable comments about the chestnut trees that are now one hundred and seventy years old.
Back in here after breakfast, I finished off the notes from yesterday and they are now on line, as you have probably noticed. And then I went to transcribe the dictaphone notes.
I was at a football match last night when the two teams playing, each one having a substitute who played in a reserve league who had never come into the first team. So the first team had their new player in defence and the other team had their player in attack, and the attack players and the defence players of the different teams had to be involved in finding space and waiting to be passed the ball and so on, and then be taught how to control it once they had already received it, because far too many balls were bouncing off them and going out of play and that sort of thing.
This dream about players finding space relates to a certain training session for a certain hockey team somewhere, but that’s yet another story that the World is not yet ready to hear.
In fact, the part about the reserve players coming into the team also relates to the same story. But as that story is something reasonably current, it’s no surprise that it’s coming up now in a dream.
There was some Eastern European guy whom I knew – he might have been Polish or something like that – and he worked as a bacon slicer in a meat factory somewhere or other in the area. He was telling me about his aim to become a motor mechanic. He had this yellow Mk IV Cortina which looked fairly nice but there were a few things that needed doing to it, and he told me that he’d done them. He took the car for its MOT. There was also someone who was going to fetch my injections for me. I was supposed to have two injections, one on a Monday and one on a Friday. I’d had the first two, but for some reason I’d forgotten to collect the next two, so some woman or other, an elderly woman, she had a bottle of the stuff that the first injection used, and she filled the syringe with it and injected me with that. Then I had to take the prescription down to the doctor to explain what had happened and get him to write a new one for the product on the Friday and for subsequent ones. I put them in a brown envelope and gave them to this Polish guy. I went down to the MoT station afterwards, and his yellow Cortina was there, and it had failed on four or five things, nothing very complicated, but I heard that this guy had handed in his notice at work and was going to start being a motor mechanic, working underneath cars in the street, that kind of thing. But seeing the work that he’d done on this Mk IV Cortina and it hadn’t worked, I could see his next adventure ending in tears at some point.
Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I used to have a fleet of yellow MkIII and MkIV Cortinas in the past, although I didn’t know anyone Polish like that at the time. And the garage certainly didn’t resemble the garage at the salt mine where my father used to work, so where it was, I don’t know.
The story about the injections is interesting too because regular readers of this rubbish will recall that quite a few years ago, I had to have a series of injections a couple of times each week and had to fetch them from the chemists regularly. That’s how I first encountered these nurses who come to visit me every morning.
I forgot to mention the confusion when I went down to that garage. I’d given all the paperwork for these injections to this Polish guy and put them in a brown envelope. I walked into the garage where his car was being MoTd – at the back of Bedford Street near the old police station. I pulled out and told someone “here’s the envelope”. They picked it up, and it was the wrong one. The second one was the wrong one. The third one was hanging up by a magnetic attachment thing on the workplace by where this Polish guy was working. He brought it over to me and this other guy. We had a look at the paperwork together.
If this is confusing you, don’t worry. It’s confusing me too.
That was all that I had time to do this morning, although I might have had more time had I not crashed out between 10:20 and 11:00.
When the alarm went off, I headed into the kitchen to have my midday medication and my disgusting drink, and then to start to pack the travelling laptop ready for dialysis. My faithful cleaner came down to apply the anaesthetic on my arm too.
After she left, I adopted the usual position of slumping across the table with my head resting on my arms so that I could have a little doze, but that wasn’t for long either as the taxi turned up at, would you believe, 12:40. Not that I’m complaining, of course, because, as I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … the earlier I arrive at dialysis, the earlier I’ll be home, and that suits me just fine.
However, the best-laid plans of mice and men and all that, we first had to go to Champeaux to pick up someone there to take to dialysis, and then at the autoroute interchange at Marcey-les-Grèves, we ran into a barrage of gilets jaunes. And what annoyed me about that was that there was a warning sign in the centre of the village, just by where there’s a turning that goes through a village called Saint-Jean-de-la-Haize, and from there via a couple of narrow lanes, you end up just four hundred yards from the hospital.
Now if I know that, why didn’t our driver, who has been working for the taxi company for thirty years?
So after using all our powers of persuasion, we eventually arrived at dialysis ten minutes early. And this is where the fun began.
If you want to know whether I had a new nurse or an experienced one today, you only need to look at the plasters that she put on my arm when she took out the needles at the end of the session, and that will tell you all that you need to know. I don’t think that I’ve ever seen such a dog’s dinner in all my life.
But the fun began when she was trying to plug me in. The first needle, in the lower part of my forearm, went in fine. The second needle, in the upper part of my arm, well, not so fine. She ended up having two tries at it and they both failed. In the end, she had to call for the senior nurse and it was a case of “third time lucky” when she did it. But I now know exactly how a dartboard feels.
Further bad news is that my internet subscription at the dialysis centre has expired. It’s only good for a year and then I have to renew it. And of course, with it being Saturday, there’s no-one on duty at the tech department of the hospital. So, without the internet, I read a paper on Lack of Moral Fibre in the Royal Air Force in World War II.
Apart from that, there were no other interruptions. Not even from Emilie the Cute Consultant, who came into the ward and went to chat to almost every other patient in here, except me, of course. She clearly doesn’t love me any more.
But seeing as we have been talking about the other patients … "well, one of us has" – ed … my favourite patient who is usually in the bed beside mine was brought in this afternoon on a stretcher. Apparently she had developed a breathing problem and, even with a cylinder of oxygen, was having difficulty breathing. I do hope that she’s going to be OK.
Today, the nurse let the session run to the full time, which makes a change, but when the session finally finished, she spent ten minutes cleaning the machine first before she dealt with me, and that was disappointing too. I wanted to be away.
When I was finally free and the wounds compressed and sealed (with the plasters stuck on any old how), I went to weigh myself. And I was actually bang on my dry weight, which is where I should have been those three times before. And the driver was waiting for me – the same one who had brought me – and I was the only person in the taxi too, so I was home at about 18:30.
My faithful cleaner was waiting for me, and she helped me into the apartment where she stuck a disgusting drink into my sweaty little mitt. And after she left, I made some food – a baked potato, peas and carrots and a burger on a bap. It’s been quite a while since I’d had that for a Saturday tea, and it shows that, bit by bit, my appetite is returning.
Football was next, another match in the Welsh Cup, this time between Y Fflint and Caernarfon, a repeat of the cup final a couple of months ago.
As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … Y Fflint play some nice, tidy football and don’t deserve to be as low down the table as they are, so it was no surprise to anyone when they scored the opening goal after just five minutes.
However, Caernarfon scored an equaliser almost straight from the restart and gradually went on to impose themselves on the game. By the final whistle, it was all on-way traffic towards the Y Fflint goal, with Caernarfon winning 3-1.
So tomorrow early afternoon, we have the final match of our Welsh Cup trilogy when Penybont, third in the Cymru Premier League, leave Bridgend to travel down to the beach at Port Talbot to take on Afan Lido, tenth in the second tier.
When the football was over, I attacked the dictaphone notes, but I really didn’t realise just how late it was. When the waves of fatigue began to sweep over me, it was almost midnight and I didn’t want to be letting it all hang out much later, so I posted on line what I’d written so far, added a “to be continued” sticker and went to bed. I’ll finish off the rest of my magnum opus tomorrow morning.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about bacon slicers … "well, one of us has" – ed … one of my friends told me about the woman from Crewe who went into her local butcher’s and sat on the bacon slicer.
"What happened?" I asked.
"The butcher was most annoyed" she said. "he ended up getting behind in his orders."
LIVE: Friday 16th October 2026 – I HAD NOTHING ON …
… the dictaphone this morning, which is something of a disappointment. Not that it’s any surprise, of course, because if you don’t go to sleep, you can’t dream, can you? Well, I can, as events in the recent past have proved, but not many other people can manage it.
And it’s also looking very much like I’ll have nothing on tonight either, because Bane of Britain … "fool that he is" – ed … dropped both sets of his night attire into the washing machine this morning without thinking.
It’s also gone very cold in here now. I’ve put on a sweater today for the first time this end of the year. The temperature is definitely dropping, even as we speak. It looks like I’ll be wearing goose pimples through the night tonight rather than anything else.
So let’s go back to last night, when all of this seemed to start.
Last night, I fell asleep in my chair again while I was writing out my notes. I was out for a good hour, if not more, and when I awoke, I had to edit out all of the nonsense that I’d typed while I was asleep. However, I missed a line, and I bet it gave you all quite a laugh when you read it.
But when I did wake up, I was doing no good at all, so I posted on line what I had written, added a “To be Continued” sticker and went to bed.
Incidentally, you may find a “To be Continued” on this posting too, but that’s for another reason entirely. I’ve been watching a Welsh Cup match on the internet until quite late this evening.
However, as I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … it’s a waste of time going to bed early, because all that it means is that you wake up correspondingly early the following morning. And that was definitely the case this morning.
Whatever time it was that I awoke, I have no idea. It was still dark, that’s for sure, and it stayed dark for ages. And when I was totally and utterly fed up with just lying there trying to go to sleep and failing, I checked the clock. It was 06:00, so I thought that I may as well claim an early start for once.
So, by the time that the alarm should have gone off, I’d organised myself … "as best as he could" – ed … in the bathroom, unlocked the front door for the nurse when he arrives, and was back in here having started work.
The first task was, of course, to finish off the notes from yesterday. There were piles to do, as you probably noticed, and I hadn’t quite finished when the nurse arrived, quite early again.
While he was sorting out my legs and feet, we had a chat about the weather and how it was going to cool down now over the next few days as we move closer to winter. And I have a feeling that it’s going to be a bad one this year.
After he left, I could make my breakfast and read some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
Our author is still talking about the famous trees of Herefordshire and, as far as I can tell, steering well clear of controversy for the moment. But not to worry, I’ll catch him out again one of these days.
When breakfast had finished, I went one better than David Crosby, probably because I’d had the ‘flu for Christmas and wasn’t feeling up to par. Consequently, I didn’t give in an inch to fear and went on the attack.
And “attack” it was, too. You have to go back to 6th July since the last time I was similarly engaged.
With that being out of the way, I turned my attention to the washing. Would you believe that I’m on my last pair of trousers – well, decent trousers anyway? So I collected up all of the dirty washing and put it in the machine to wash. These days, I can’t hang up the washing myself to dry, so if I do it on a Friday morning, my faithful cleaner hangs it up for me when she comes in the afternoon, and that helps me a lot.
Back in here afterwards, I had yesterday’s notes to finish, and now they are on line, all two thousand-odd words of them.
It’s a good job in a way that there was nothing on the dictaphone, otherwise I’d probably still be there now transcribing them. However, there were a few other things to do too, and by the time that they were all out of the way, it was time for my midday medication and disgusting drink.
There were the radio notes to start when I came back in here. I’d made a start the other day but I’d barely scratched the surface. And with several new groups and artists featuring in the programme. It would usually take much longer to research them than it does for artists who have featured before. That’s why I was rather apprehensive about whether I’d ever finish it or not.
So, if I don’t ever start, I won’t ever finish, so I made myself comfortable and then I began. And with some kind of superhuman effort, I’d actually finished a good while before the end of the afternoon, despite the interruption from the cleaner when she came in. Yes, I keep on forgetting about the power of artificial intelligence and my friendly neighbourhood chatbot who these days does most of my research for me.
There was even time for the two of us to come up with a list of albums released, musicians who were born and musicians who have died on the day that the following programme will be first broadcast. My “births, deaths and releases” file is pretty comprehensive, but my chatbot can dig deeper than I can.
However, that programme is going to be complicated because I usually play eleven records, but I have thirteen candidates for inclusion on that day.
Tea tonight was my usual Friday night tea – sausage, beans with cheese and black pepper, and air-fried chips. That’s a meal that I could eat even when I was right off my food. I seem to remember that I was living for a couple of months on porridge, toast and the aforementioned.
One thing that I still can’t manage, and I don’t know why, is my Sunday pizza. But who knows? That might make its reintroduction to the menu one of these weekends.
After the washing-up, I managed to make it back in here just in time for the kick-off off tonight’s football.
It’s the Welsh Cup Round Two this weekend, and tonight, the televised match is Llansawel v Afan United, a very lopsided first-tier v fourth tier game.
It beats me why this game was chosen to be televised when most people could already predict the result and when there are several much more competitive games being played elsewhere throughout the country. The least that can be said for it, I suppose, was that Afan United didn’t lie down and die.
In fact, they had a game plan and they stuck pretty much to it, even if the Llansawel goalkeeper didn’t have much to do. And I was also impressed by the speed of Afan United’s two forwards, even if they were far too lightweight for this level of competition.
And a word must be said for Afan United’s goalkeeper, Liam Sheehy. He might have been a bit shaky at the start, and his team did concede five goals, but as the game went on and his nerves settled, he had an outstanding game, made several crucial saves and even saved a penalty.
So he and the rest of his teammates can walk off the field with their heads held high, especially as this is probably the first time they’ve ever played in front of a large four-figure crowd.
Tonight’s match should be much more competitive, and played on a better pitch too. It’s a repeat of last season’s cup final between Y Fflint and Caernarfon. Caernarfon’s form has been somewhat erratic of late, and Y Fflint, who always play nice football, have a new manager who has already ushered them to two victories.
Although the match didn’t finish until 22:45, I attacked today’s notes. However, I only made it so far before fatigue caught up with me. I didn’t crash out, despite the very short night’s sleep last night, but it was on its way, so I posted up as far as I had gone and went to bed. I could finish off the rest of it tomorrow morning.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about having nothing on … "well, one of us has" – ed … the local nudists in South Cheshire used to (I don’t know if they still do) hire one of the local night clubs in Nantwich one evening to walk around, dance, socialise and generally display their wares.
One night, I was driving my taxi around Nantwich when a girl, as naked as the day she was born, stepped out of the shadows and flagged me down. "Take me to Crewe" she said.
So there I was, sitting there, and not being able to take my eyes off her, even for a moment.
"What’s the matter with you?" she asked. "Surely you’ve seen a naked woman before!"
"It’s not that" I replied. "I’m just wondering where you’re keeping the money to pay me."
LIVE: Thursday 15th October 2026 – TODAY WAS THE …
… first time at this end of the year that I arrived home in the dark after dialysis.
To tell the truth, it wasn’t really dark, but you could see the headlights of our car shining on the road, all of the streetlights were on, and the moon, a very nice, slender crescent, was shining beautifully.
And not only that, but I was running much later than usual, but that’s because, once again, we had yet more excitement at the dialysis centre this afternoon. However, more of that anon.
First, though, we have last night to discuss – or, rather, this morning – because, once again, it was after midnight and I was still letting it all hang out. It was more like 00:30 when I finally crawled into bed.
That’s not so bad in itself, I suppose, especially when you are asleep quite quickly, as I was, but when you awaken at 04:25 and can’t go back to sleep, then it isn’t. I was tossing and turning around all night, and still tossing and turning when the alarm went off at 06:29.
As you might expect, it took me a while to be able to gather up my wits, not that I have many to gather up these days, and stand up ready to move, but once I was up, I went to unlock the door ready for the nurse when he arrives a little later, and then I went to the bathroom to sort myself out ready for dialysis, even to the extent of having a shave in case Emilie the Cute Consultant is on duty this afternoon.
Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.
I was back working in an office yet again. I was going to be transferred to a different office, so I put in a great, enormous pile of effort to clear all of the outstanding files lying around my desk, and I left it quite tidy. In the new office, I had a room to myself and I was determined that I was going to start from Day One to keep up to date and do everything on the day that it arrived, but there were plenty of distractions in this office – people had these little catapults, and they were sending messages to each other by catapult and so on. I thought that this was going to be a challenging working environment. Someone asked me for a piece of post, so I went back into my room to fetch it. In the meantime, the post had been delivered. There was an enormous amount of files and post and everything all over my desk. I had to sit and think about how I was going to deal with it all. But one thing out of this was that this was in Rotherham, and I can’t remember what I was going to say now.
Apart from the fact that I have no idea what I would be doing in Rotherham, here I am at work yet again. And I’m on the point of leaving – not retiring, but being transferred to a new office. That certainly puts a new twist on things.
However, the “distractions” in the office are nothing new. And as you can see, my best plans about dealing with work on the day that it’s been received and so on appear to count for nothing at all. Things just happen like that so thay they can spite me. I shall have to employ someone to keep my place tidy.
The nurse was early today, which was good news. I wanted to be in advance. The bad news that he brought was that the big data centre place in Africa somewhere where they are experimenting with robots had crashed, so has the internet in a couple of cycle races. I hope that it will be back on for this afternoon.
And I’ve no idea what that sentence above was all about. When I reviewed it in the morning, the only thing that I could suggest was that it was another load of rubbish that I had written when I fell asleep, and later on, I forgot to edit it out, as I usually do with stuff like this.
Anyway, after he left, I made my breakfast, and while I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
However, it made for rather disappointing reading, rather like Stanley Holloway’s recital of Marriott Edgar’s famous –
"NO SHIPWRECKS AND NOBODY DROWNDED.
IN FACT, NOTHING TO LAUGH AT AT ALL."
The kitchen was something of a mess after all of the washing up that I’d done over the last couple of days, so I had an exciting ten or fifteen minutes finding a home for everything that was lying about, and then I came in here to start work.
There was the radio programme to deal with. It’s going to be late this week after the chaos of the first couple of days, si I can’t afford to be idle. Some more music needed to be chosen, and that’s all done now. It’s now all been reformatted, re-edited, remixed, paired and segued. I even began to write the notes for it, but the alarm intervened before I’d gone too far.
The alarm is the signal for me to go into the kitchen and begin to prepare for going to dialysis. You might think that it’s rather sad or silly to have an alarm to remind me, but seeing how often I’ve drifted away into sleep sitting in my chair, with no warning at all, it’s something of a necessity.
So I had my midday medication and my disgusting drink and then began to pack away the travelling laptop to take with me. My faithful cleaner came along and sorted out the anaesthetic for my arm as well.
After she left, there were still one or two things to do in the kitchen, and then I assumed my usual position of being slumped over the dining table, head resting on my arms.
And there I was, miles away with the fairies, although not in any manner that would excite comment from the editor of Aunt Judy’s Magazine, when the doorbell rang, and I awoke with a terrific start.
As I suspected, it was the chauffeur to take me to dialysis. She was a few minutes late today, but as well as that, we had to go to Kairon-Plage to pick up someone else and then to the aqua-gym at St Pair sur Mer to pick up my usual Thursday passenger.
However, my chauffeur today was another candidate to replace my favourite chauffeur when she retires next year. This one drove like the wind and I actually arrived just one minute late. And she was the second driver to take me on the diversion via St Pierre Langers and not the usual way by Lezeaux le Carrière.
Here, we had a disaster. Today, according to the scales, my body contained the most liquid that I have ever had, and that depressed me enormously. I really don’t know what’s going on with my body right now or where all of this liquid is coming from.
The nurse calculated that I had to stay for four hours – four hours at maximum force – so my response was “well, the sooner we start, the sooner we finish”.
It was 14:35 when I was finally up and running and I could settle down and watch the football.
The first game was the rest of Penybont v Y Barri. It was 1-1 when I left it, but as the game progressed, Penybont took control and it finished 3-1. Y Barri had none of their recognised strikers playing in this game, and the players whom they had on the field were unable to break down Penybont’s resolute defence.
In any case, Penybont’s play was technically much better. I really don’t know what has happened to Y Barri since they were top of the league for several weeks at the start of the season.
The following game was Llansawel against Connah’s Quay Nomads. And let’s be honest, no-one can play technical or skilled football on the Old Road pitch.
The game was pretty much a lottery. Llansawel missed a penalty early in the game but managed to score later in the first half. The Nomads came back into the game and scored two goals, but the match finished with Llansawel laying siege to the Nomads’ goal, throwing everything, including the kitchen sink, at it, but with no success.
The doctor interrupted me in mid-game – the new doctor who has only just started there. And we had an interesting conversation –
Our Hero – "I’m surprised that you never came back to ask me how the antibiotics that you prescribed for me a couple of months ago – the ones that I told you that they had tried before and didn’t work – worked to cure my cough."
Doctor – "was it me who prescribed them to you?" – that’s the kind of remark that inspires confidence in a new doctor.
Our Hero – "yes, it was."
Doctor – "so how did they go?"
Our Hero – "just as I told you that they would before you prescribed them. They didn’t work."
And then we had the usual disaster. My nurse today, the same one whom I had last Saturday, the one who does just enough work to get by – came along and said “I’m going to cut short the session today …”
“No you aren’t” I replied. “There’s an order from Doctor X saying that I have to stay until I’m down to my dry weight, even if I have to stay all night”.
This led to an argument that even involved the above doctor, but in the end, my persistence and stubbornness won the day. However, I’m convinced that between them, the doctor and the nurse hatched a cunning plan because when I weighed myself later, I was two hundred grammes above my dry weight, so somewhere along the line, the intensity of the machine had been turned down.
You might wonder why I’m so insistent about this, but the simple answer is that if I leave here “overweight”, the amount of overweight will accumulate, session by session, until the amount is unmanageable and then they’ll have to resort to drastic measures. And I’ve had enough drastic measures at a hospital to last me a lifetime, and plenty more besides, thank you.
So we were hours late when it was all over, but luckily, my taxi was waiting so I could go straight home, and it was 19:40, the latest that I have ever been, when I arrived back here, hence the streetlights and the moon.
My cleaner helped me back into the apartment as she usually does, and when I was sitting comfortably, stuck a disgusting drink into my sweaty little mitt.
There was no posibility of me making tea at this time of evening, so I grabbed some crackers, some of that nice vegan cheese spread and an orange and took them into my room while I checked the computer for messages, etc.
When I was finished, I began to attack the notes for today, but as I said earlier, I fell asleep before I finished them. And for a while too. When I awoke, I was fit for nothing … "nothing new there" – ed … and so I went to bed. I’ll finish my notes off in the morning.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about doctors and prescriptions … "well, one of us has" – ed … it was this new doctor, fresh out of medical school, who had this confrontation with one of the hospital’s patients.
He came in and said "doctor, when I came in here two days ago and you examined me, you wrote out a prescription to say that I had to take one of those pills every day for the rest of my life."
"That’s right" said the doctor. "Is there a problem?"
"I’ll say!" he said. "The chemist has only given me six!"
LIVE: Wednesday 14th October 2026 – I HAVE JUST …
… woken up after finding myself asleep on the porcelain horse.
And judging by the time, I’d been asleep for almost an hour too. And had it not been for a phantom doorbell ringing at what I thought was the front door but was probably somewhere in the back of my head, I’d probably still be asleep now.
What was worse was that I didn’t remember anything at all about feeling tired, and so waking up like that took me completely by surprise. I had no idea where I was … "nothing new there" – ed … and for a moment I thought that I was in bed and it was time to get up. And then I didn’t remember hearing the alarm to wake me up, so I wondered what time it was. That’s how much I was disorientated by everything.
So now, I’m going to start to type up my notes, and we’ll see how far we get before I crash out again.
All I can say is that it’s a good job that I’m no longer driving. Imagine the outcome if I’d been behind a steering wheel.
Anyway, retournons à mos moutons as they say around here.
For a start, I’m in a much better humour than I was after my outburst last night, which is good news, even if today has been a disappointment as far as work and everything else goes. It wasn’t helped, what with one thing and another, by going to bed at 00:30 this morning, and even less so by being awake at 02:19 (I checked the time).
Whether I went back to sleep afterwards or not, I really don’t know, but it can’t have been for long and I was definitely awake when the alarm went off at 06:29.
As you might expect, it took even longer for me to find my way to my feet this morning, and it really was a weary me who dragged himself to the front door to unlock it ready for the nurse when he comes. But then I realised that he wasn’t going to come this morning because I had my early morning appointment at the hospital and the taxi will be here before he will.
And so I dragged myself into the bathroom to sort myself out for the day, and then came back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.
There had been some kind of party and we had been to it with the children from our family and a few of our friends. We managed to have some kind of CD player working for the songs. When it came to pack up, there was an awful mess everywhere. We had so many things out, and all wires, cables and cassettes, CDs and all kinds of stuff that was lying around. I looked at it and I was in despair when I saw how much there was to do, but we made a start anyway. The first thing was to separate people’s belongings from other people’s belongings. We did that, and then there was this huge pile of stuff that was from Stoke-on-Trent somewhere, and we didn’t know where to begin with this. In the end, a couple of the girls brought it out, and I was surprised to see that they had brought almost all of it out. The first thing was to sort through the documents, paperwork, the dominos and things like that, and throw away what we didn’t want and keep what we wanted. We began to do that. This enabled us to separate a lot of the stuff that was all tangled up and knotted up. Having seen what this place was like before we tackled this pile of stuff, I was feeling a little bit more optimistic, although there were still several other piles of stuff to go through as well.
Whatever was going on in that dream, I can’t see any relevance to anything that has happened just recently. The reference to the two girls could be a reference to Alison and Jackie, who helped me move down here last August, and the huge tangle of wires would easily relate to the pile of wires and cables that I have lying around here.
And for some reason, when I recall this dream, an image of that apartment over the shop in Nantwich Road where an old schoolfriend and I lodged for a short while in the mid-seventies springs immediately to view in the back of my mind, but that’s about it.
Round about 08:00 I went to sit in the kitchen while I waited for the taxi, and it turned up bang on time at 08:15. The driver drove me to the hospital, and when we arrived, she went to find a wheelchair for me. I know that I said that I won’t ever go in a wheelchair and that my autonomy is important to me, but the scanners are miles down the corridor and at that time of the morning, the drivers are usually very busy and don’t have the time to wait for me to walk there.
When I arrived at the scan department, I had to wait a few minutes, and then they put me through the machine. It was one of those Austin Powers time tunnel things made by one of my former employers, General Electric, and you have to breathe in, hold your breath and breathe out in accordance with the voice in the machine. And what they did seemed to be exactly the same as they had done a couple of months ago, so I’m not sure why they did it this time.
When it was finished, I had to wait fifteen minutes for the taxi. I suppose that I’ll have the results in due course. It was the same girl who had driven me. Back here, my faithful cleaner was out on her rounds dealing with some of her other elderly and infirm clients, so the driver helped me back to the apartment, which was nice of her.
Back in here, I could at last make my breakfast, albeit about an hour later than usual, and while I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
Today, our author is talking about the Pulpit Oak at Upton, and he refers to the collection of poems known as “Hesperides”, written by Robert Herrick and published in 1648. He quotes a line from one of Herrick’s … gulp … 1200 or so poems which says –
"—Dearest, bury me
Under that holy oke, or Gospel tree;
Where, though thou see’st not, thou may’st think upon
Me, when thou yeerly go’st Procession."
And reminds us that "But surely such a request could only have been properly asked of some gay young member of that office which has descended from remote antiquity—the parish beadle."
All of the author’s recent writing makes me wonder what on earth is going on in Herefordshire in 1870 and 1871.
No sooner had I finished breakfast when there was a knock on the door. One of my neighbours had come along for a chat. We spent about an hour chatting about nothing specific – just the events in the building and in the locality over the summer. It’s not like me to be sociable, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, but I do have to make an effort, especially as everyone in this building is so friendly.
After he left, it was the turn of my faithful cleaner to stick her head in the door to make sure that I was back safely, so I reassured her.
Round about now, it was the time for my disgusting drink and midday medication, so I sorted that out and then came back in here to start work – at long last.
However, there was football on the internet. Last night, Stranraer had been playing Kilmarnock’s B team in the Scottish League Cup.
The result was 3-3, which meant, when the results of the previous rounds were taken into consideration, Stranraer were eliminated.
My interest was, however, in Kilmarnock’s centre forward, Ieuan Owen. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that last season, he was playing for Y Barri in the Welsh Premier League where he and Ollie Hulbert were tearing the opposition defences to shreds with their lightning pace. I was interested to see how he was getting on at Kilmarnock, and there he was, still producing these devastating runs that outpace just about everyone, and he scored Killie’s first goal last night.
With all of that out of the way, I could now get on with work, but by the end of the afternoon, I hadn’t done anything like as much as I had wanted. I was hoping to have all of the music chosen, reformatted, re-edited, paired and segued by this evening so I could start to write up the notes tomorrow, but to date, there are only about nine out of the ten chosen as yet, and none of them are paired and segued.
As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … these last few days have just been one big disappointment.
So eventually, the clock came round to 19:00 and I stopped to make tea. Tonight, it was a taco roll filled with the other pack of that spicy tomato and kidney bean sauce stuff that I found in the freezer a week or two back. And it was just as delightful as the other pack was when I tried that. I wish that I could remember what was in it, or maybe it was something that my friend made when he was here just now.
And afterwards, I had some pineapple chunks with some home-made chocolate ice cream that I’d made a few months back and had forgotten about. That was nice too.
Tomorrow, I might try one of the curries that I made a couple of weeks ago. That should be nice too.
What else that seems to be nice is that I’m back eating regularly again, at long last. Still no lunch, though, but a cooked meal at night is as important as my breakfast, even if I can’t find much to tempt me.
But all of that is tomorrow. After tea, that was when I seem to think that I went for a ride on the porcelain horse and fell asleep. But honestly, I really can’t remember. But now, late as it is, I’m off to bed when I’ve finished what needs to be done. It’s dialysis tomorrow, so don’t expect much sense out of me tomorrow night.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about curry … "well, one of us has" – ed … someone walked through the doorway of a building and asked "can I have a chicken tikka masala with rice, please?"
The woman behind the counter replies "but this is a library, sir."
"I’m terribly sorry. Can I have a chicken tikka masala with rice, please?" he whispers.
LIVE: Tuesday 13th October 2026 – I HAVE JUST …
… had one of the worst days of my life.
But I’m not talking medically, because I’m actually feeling quite good right now … "makes a change" – ed … but I mean as far as work goes. I’ve done nothing, finished nothing, accomplished nothing, and all in all I have totally wasted a complete day.
To give you some idea of what I mean, I was still writing up the dictaphone notes (something that I usually do before breakfast) at 21:05 tonight. That’s how far I am behind. I really am going to have to stop being so nice to people in the hope that they stop taking advantage of my good nature.
Nature seemed to take advantage of my good nature last night. I was in bed round about 22:45, not too much later than my ideal curfew time of 22:30, and I was looking for a really good sleep so that I’d be refreshed for my Welsh class later this morning, but it was not to be … "no surprise there" – ed …
Even though I’d gone to sleep quite quickly, thanks to that little mantra that I used to recite a few years ago, round about 03:50 or something, I awoke, and that was the end of any ideas of sleep that I might have had. I tried my best to go back to sleep but that was impossible.
When the alarm went off, it took a few minutes for me to pull myself up and sit on the edge of the bed, and then about ten minutes for me to rise to my feet. Once I was up and about, I went to unlock the front door, ready for the nurse when he arrives later this morning, and then I went to the bathroom to sort myself out.
Once I was looking and feeling a little more reasonable, I came back in here, where my first job would be to finish off the notes from last night that I had abandoned when sleep overwhelmed me rather dramatically.
Whatever it was that held me up, I really don’t know because I hadn’t made much progress when the nurse arrived. While he was dealing with my legs and my feet, we were chatting about his week off, and he was asking me questions about what I’d been up to, not that any of it really mattered.
After he left, I made my breakfast of porridge, coffee, toast and juice, and the morning medication that I need to take, which is probably enough for a meal on its own. I should have been reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870 except that I was hopelessly side-tracked.
The party of Woolhope Naturalists are descending from Croft Ambrey camp to Croft Castle, lower down below the camp. I read about the history of the castle, and that started off on an adventure that led me, for some weird twist of fate, as far as the German “Albatros C1”, to which I’ve just arrived. I shall have to try to get back to the book tomorrow.
Back in here after breakfast, I had to prepare for my Welsh lesson and send off this week’s homework. I’d done the homework yesterday so it simply involved checking it over, converting it to a *.pdf and then sending it off.
The revision passed really well today. It was comparatively straightforward without any complications, so I attended the lesson in an air of optimism. And the preparation had done its job because for the questions that we had to do in the middle of the lesson, I got almost all of them right.
There was a stop in midstream for a paned, or “cuppa”, when I had my disgusting drink and midday medication, and by the time the lesson was over later, I was feeling that I’d actually made a useful contribution to the lesson rather than being a passenger.
Then there were the blog notes to finish off and bring that entry to a conclusion, however, I didn’t get far – not that I was expecting to – because my faithful cleaner turned up to do her stuff and to chase me under the shower. And a really nice shower it was too. I really feel like a nice, clean boy now, although where I’m going to find a nice, clean boy at this time of night, I really don’t know.
That led to finishing off … "yet another attempt" – ed … the notes from last night. That, however, was a task that took much longer than it ought to have done, and in the end, when it was finished, I rejoiced somewhat, and as the waves of fatigue were already washing over me, I called for an energy drink instead of another disgusting drink.
Right now, I could turn my attention to the dictaphone notes at last.
There had been some kind of festival taking place, and as the crowds were leaving, my brother and I were cleaning everything up. We had a pile of it and set it on fire. The more things we found, the more we added to the flames, and at one stage it was burning quite well. But there was something happening with my health, and I reached the point where I wasn’t able to really do much more. My brother was teasing me about that kind of thing but I noticed that he had stopped adding things to the fire too, so we had to shovel the fire around to make sure that it burnt everything that was in the fire and didn’t leave anything unburnt or simply charred. But that was another big, difficult thing to do as well for me and I wasn’t quite sure what was happening.
This actually sounds like the very first Glastonbury Festival. At Woodstock, they simply dug a big hole and bulldozed all the waste into the hole, whereas at the first Glastonbury Festival, they did go along and pick it all up to burn. Rumour has it that three or four festival-goers, still asleep in their sleeping bags, were thrown into the fire, but then again, they said that at Woodstock with them being bulldozed into the hole.
But the story about my health giving out has a very sound base to it. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that back in 2015, I was with a friend and we were cutting down a big tree. Or, rather, he was cutting down a big tree and I was removing the wood in a wheelbarrow. When I was halfway through, I began to lose my breath, and later on, it all went completely. I could no longer work and no longer breathe, and I didn’t have the breath to climb the stairs at home. That was when I went to see the local doctor, and that was when they discovered that I was seriously ill and all of this lot began.
The next interruption was from someone who wanted a chat, so I was there until 18:30, thinking as the discussion came to a close that I’d have thirty minutes to finish the dictaphone notes and then I could go for tea.
But that didn’t work out because Rosemary wanted to talk to me. She was having problems doing a scan, and she’d also lost a Word file that she’d just saved. Could I help as it was urgent?
So how long do you think that I spent helping her? Five minutes? Ten minutes? Not a bit of it. I was there on line with her for one hour and fifty minutes, we didn’t find the files and I’m still at a loss as to what she’s doing and where her files are going. We tried everything to find them, even down to creating some more and savng them into a known directory, but when you are trying remotely to help someone four hundred and fifty kilometres away and you can’t see their screen, you’re relying completely on what they are telling you. And what she was telling me made no sense at all.
In the end, I’m glad that her ‘phone rang, otherwise I’d still be there now, I suppose.
But the answer to all of this is simple. I’m going to have to stop being so nice to people and somehow stop them bothering me like this. I can’t do anything, I can’t get anything started, never mind finished. I have so much to do and I’m living on borrowed time. Dialysis is taking up far too much of my time and I need everything that’s left so that I can push on with my own life, but all of this is driving me up the wall.
And that includes the food. For once in my life, I was actually feeling hungry, but look what happened to my mealtime. Instead, there I was at 20:30, when I should have been doing other things, putting half a dozen falafel balls into the air fryer, a diced potato in the microwave and adding them all to the rest of that nice potato salad that I made last week. What a meal that wasn’t.
Once I’d finished eating, there was the rest of the dictaphone notes.
There were three guys who were having a lesson in my apartment with a particular woman teacher. This lesson turned out somehow to be a rather nasty lesson and this woman left in quite a bad temper. Anyway, these three guys decided to set out and go after her. I tried to dissuade them but they just went out anyway. I made sure that the house was tidy and went out a little later on. saw these three boys going back, but they were each somehow sitting at a table and chair with wheels on it. They had a coffee or something, and they were pushing themselves along with their feet to go back to my place, so I avoided them and headed to the corner where my friends were due to meet me. They were all there, even the kids, and even this woman was there and she was most upset. There had been some kind of confrontation. Anyway, we all agreed to go back to my house, and when we arrived, there were these three tables and chair things parked in a car parking space in the street. It was the day of a strike or something, and someone was trying to pay for a parking fee without success, so we told him that there was no parking fee today. Anyway, we went into my apartment and I could hear music coming from one of the bedrooms, so I went, and these three guys were in there. One of them was in my bed and the other two were lounging around on it, so I told them that they would have to go now as I was having company, so they simply packed up, went downstairs and left. Then the people began to come in. One woman was smoking, so I told her that smoking was not allowed in my apartment but she made some kind of gesture and carried on, so I thought that I would deal with her in a minute. Everyone came in, including one actor-type guy. He was being his usual expansive self and he asked “what’s going to happen now?”. I said “you can always help in the kitchen making us some food”. He looked at me and said “no”. Then he went to find this woman and said “do you know what that man said to me? He said that I had to work in the kitchen, so I told him ‘no I’m not'”. She said something like “it’s OK” and then she said to me “well, don’t worry. He never helps anywhere”. I thought “well, if he doesn’t help anywhere, I can’t see him being allowed back to my apartment again”.
Believe it or not, I do actually know a thespian (or who thinks that he’s a thespian, anyway) who thinks like this. “I’m exceptional” and “I’m special”. And, in fact, he won’t be coming around here any time soon (not that he would anyway because he doesn’t live around here). My friend are lovely people, and we all chip in to do the work that’s necessary wherever we are.
It’s the same with the cigarette smoker. I know people like that too, and they won’t be coming to visit me either. There’s this thing called “respect”.
As for the rest of the dream, it doesn’t mean much to me, although the woman teacher could be my old friend Marianne who died in 2013. And I’ve been in an apartment like this before in a dream too, where there were loads of children hanging about. But that’s about it, I suppose.
There was something in that dream about a girl who had a Chrysler V8 sewn onto her jeans. I said that if I wanted to do that, I’d get one off my niece’s husband’s truck. She asked what he had and I replied that it was a big Dodge 5.8 diesel pickup and so we were talking for a while about these big American pick-ups after that.
My niece’s husband in Canada does have a V8 diesel, but it’s in a Chevrolet lorry, the one that I drove down to New Hampshire in the USA to drop off that racing engine that had shot a con-rod through the side during a tractor-pulling event. And I don’t recall it having a badge like the one on this girl’s jeans, but what does that matter.
Anyway, now that I’m starting to calm down and cool down after my outburst just now, and my notes are finished, I’ll finish off whatever needs fnishing and then go to bed. I have a hospital appointment in the morning and I have never felt less like going to it, but I supose that I must, although I’m not sure why.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about thespians … "well, one of us has" – ed … I’m reminded of the famous pathologist Dr Keith Simpson, performing an autopsy in front of a class of university students.
"In real life," he said "this man was an actor …"
And someone shouted up from the back of the class "well, if he’s acting now, he’s bloody good!"
LIVE: Monday 12th October 2026 – MY COTTAGE PIE …
… is delicious, even if it isn’t made with real cottages. That was an excellent recipe that my chatbot found for me, and if he knows any others as good as this one, I shall pick his brains again.
However, no matter how nice it was, I hope that it makes me sleep better than last night. I ended up in bed much later than I had intended, and although I was asleep quite quickly, it wasn’t for long enough. I awoke quite early on – I’ve no idea of the time because I didn’t look – and after that, despite everything that I tried, I couldn’t go back to sleep again.
When the alarm went off at 06:29, I was still awake, but even so, it still took me a good few minutes to leave the bed and stand up.
The first port of call was at the front door to unlock it ready for when Isabelle the Nurse arrives, and after that, I went into the bathroom to sort myself out and to have a good scrub up. And even a shave too, in case Emilie the Cute Consultant comes to see me at dialysis this afternoon.
Back in here, I checked the dictaphone to see what was on there, but there was nothing much, so I found a few other things to do until Isabelle the Nurse breezed in.
Today, we talked about my cottage pie, or Hachis Parmontier as they say around here, and a few other things too before she parted off on her week’s break, where planning the installation of her Halloween decorations seems to be Priority Number One.
After she left, I made my breakfast, and as I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
The commissioner is talking today about the Bower Oak close to Croft Ambrey. He tells us that "It should be called ”The Lovers’ Oak,” from the romantic scenes that have occurred there. Few trees have left more indelible impressions on young memories."
It beats me how he knows about “the romantic scenes that have occurred there”. Surely he hasn’t been spying on what goes on there in a dirty raincoat and binoculars? Perish the thought, hey?
After I’d finished my breakfast, I came in here to carry on working for a while.
The first task was to review the radio programme that will be broadcast this weekend and make sure that it’s good. And it is, too. There are one or two new groups and musicians featuring in it this week to give it an air of something different.
And that reminds me. If you don’t know how to listen to my programme, it’s broadcast HERE ON FRIDAYS AND SATURDAYS at 21:00 CET (20:00 UK Time and 15:00 in Montréal and Toronto). And if you miss the broadcasts, there are PODCASTS HERE
After the radio, it was the Welsh homework. We had to write an essay about the plans of a new supermarket to be built in a small rural town, write about the background, the arguments for, the arguments against and what we think. And as usual, whenever I have to write an essay, I fall foul of the word count before I’ve really got going. That has been my bane ever since primary school and, let’s be honest, I’m not likely to change now at my age.
This all took me up to midday when it was time to drop everything and head into the kitchen for my disgusting drink and my midday medication, after which I began to prepare for going to dialysis. My faithful cleaner turned up too, to apply the anaesthetic to my arm, not that it does much good really.
After she’d left to go and have her butties before going back out to work, I took the cottage pie out of the oven … "something that our hero had forgotten to do this morning" – ed … covered it with clingfilm and made some space for it in the fridge. It smelt just as nice and delicious as it did while it was cooking.
Yes, tonight I’ll give it a try and see what it’s like, but I’m going to have to work out a way of freezing some of it because there’s far too much to eat in one or two meals. You can’t just slop it into a plastic bag like you can do with a curry or a chilli. Answers on a postcard to …
While I was waiting for the taxi, I adopted the usual position of folding up over the table with my head resting on my arms, but I was rudely interrupted by the doorbell announcing the arrival of the taxi, ten minutes early. And it was “rudely” too. It took me a minute or two to work out where I was and what was going on.
Once I was in the taxi, we had to go to Sartilly for someone else. With the road closed at La Havaudière, we usually go down the road between St. Pair sur Mer and Champeaux, and turn off at Lezeaux Le Carrière to rejoin the main road. However, this driver took me along the coast as far as Carolles and then cut across country to Sartilly. It’s a much nicer road than the Champeaux road, that’s for sure, but it’s a much longer way around, and as a result, I was late for dialysis.
Arriving after 14:00 is one thing, but my nurse, the new young girl with the pet rabbit, was already waiting. There was a lot of preparatory work to do at first, but I was up and running by 14:30, and there are times when it’s been later than that when I’ve arrived early.
And bizarrely, the first puncture hurt a little, but the second didn’t hurt at all, and that’s the one that usually causes all the problems.
Once I was up and running, I had a footfest again. I watched the rest of the Hwlffordd v Caernarfon game, spending most of the time wondering what had happened to the technical skills of both teams as they slugged it out in a midfield maul.
However, I do know why Hwlffordd are stuck low down the table even if they have one of the meanest defences in the league. Whereas TNS have scored 44 goals, Caernarfon 37 and even Trefynnon, propping up the table by a mile, have scored 12, Hwlffordd have scored just 8 and that is simply not good enough.
Mind you, they added one goal to the total at the weekend against Caernarfon, but Caernarfon scored two and that was that, although the penalty awarded for the first goal was … errr … rather dubious, even though it was verified on VAR.
Afterwards, we had Penybont v Y Barri down at Bridgend in front of a big four-figure crowd, the sixth biggest of the season. However, I didn’t finish it all, and so you’ll have to wait for Thursday night for a report on that.
But it’s really strange. Five, ten, fifteen and more years ago, the league was struggling to have one four-figure crowd per season. These days, it’s having at least one four-figure crowd per week somewhere – usually at Caernarfon, Colwyn Bay and Penybont – and it’s rumoured that Connah’s Quay Nomads are pushing the boat out to drag in a four-figure crowd for the local derby at Y Fflint shortly.
And Bangor City in the second division have had two crowds of over four figures, and there was a third at Holyhead when Bangor were the visitors. Things are definitely looking up.
My foot fest was interrupted by the arrival of a doctor – not, unfortunately, Emilie the Cute Consultant. He asked me how I was feeling and I replied moyen, or “average”, so he asked me what I meant, so I replied “not good but not bad”. So he asked me “is there anything else I can do for you?” but I replied “no”. That was the depth of his examination.
As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … he doesn’t seem to be interested in his job, and I often get the impression that he’d much rather be elsewhere.
The snacks have changed at dialysis today too. I no longer have my coffee and orange juice. The coffee is still there, but the only other thing that I can have is a fruit purée. I suppose that I’ll have to make the best of that. Still, it’s all free, so I have no grounds to complain or to moan about it.
When the session was ended, which made a change to arrive at this point and not have the session cut short, the young nurse with the rabbit unplugged me quite quickly, but I had to wait for the taxi driver. But it didn’t matter. It was one of my favourite drivers and she’s taken me to Paris a few times. Travelling with her is “exciting” to say the least, so I know that we wouldn’t take long to be home.
There were two other people from another place nearby who needed collecting, and start as we mean to go on – at the roundabout at the end of the road, she shot round it, cutting up another couple of cars while she was at it, and I was home by 18:40, which makes a nice change.
My faithful cleaner helped me back into the apartment and stuck a disgusting drink into my hand when I sat down. After she left, I helped myself to a small plateful of my cottage pie, made with real cottages, and it really is delicious. There’s no doubt at all about that. I shall definitely make a permanent note of that recipe.
Back in here, I came to write out the notes for today, but before I’d made much progress, I’d fallen asleep. When I awoke, I took myself off the bed after I’d posted on line what I’d written, and I’ll finish the rest tomorrow. What kind of failure am I?
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about word counts for essays … "well, one of us has" – ed … it reminds me of a very old limerick that had done the rounds long before I every heard it –
"There was a young man from Japan
Who could never make limericks scan.
He said ‘my old bean
I know just what you mean
But I always try to fit as many words into the last line as I possibly can."
LIVE: Sunday 11th October 2026 – AT LONG LAST …
… Microsoft has enabled the toolbar at the bottom of your screen in Windows 11 to be moved, as was the case with most other previous versions of Windows. Now I can move mine to the right of the screen where it belongs, and I can press on and work properly.
And having done that, I can push on … "and push off too" – ed … and deal with today’s notes, which I hope that I can complete before fatigue overwhelms me.
But the latter is the most likely, because although Sunday is supposed to be a Day of Rest, I haven’t stopped all day today, not even for a minute, despite this “Day of Rest” thing.
Last night, I was in bed at some silly time of night. As I said yesterday, although I intended to be in bed early, I ended up crashing out while riding the porcelain horse, and that set me back quite a while.
However, once in bed, I managed to go to sleep fairly quickly, and although I awoke a couple of times during the night, it wasn’t for very long.
It was Isabelle the Nurse who awoke me, steaming into the bedroom to deal with my feet and legs. She admired my “space” quilt and pillow covers and asked me if I was celebrating the return of the French female astronaut to earth the other day.
After she left, I tried to go back to sleep, but it was quite pointless, so by 09:30 I was fully dressed and in the kitchen. The first task was to make some croissants, so I set to work. And I found some apricot jam, so before I folded the pastry over, I put a spoonful of apricot jam in each.
While I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
Our author is still talking about the famous trees of Herefordshire, and he quotes a letter written by Sir Edward Harley, owner of Brampton Bryan Park in Herefordshire, written on 3rd September 1658, in the middle of one of the strongest storms to ever ravage the country, and round about the time that Oliver Cromwell died.
He tells us that "I wish the devil had taken him any other way than through my Park, for, not content with doing me all the mischief he could while alive, he has knocked over some of my finest trees in his progress downwards."
As well as that, in the book this unnamed “commissioner” writes about the hillfort called Croft Ambrey near Aymestrey. He credits it as being the site built by “King Ambrosius”, but if “King Ambrosius really did exist at all, apart from in the imagination of Gildas, he existed round about 450 – 550 AD, which was the crucial period of the defence of the Marcher areas of Cymru against the Anglo-Saxons.
However, later excavations on Croft Ambrey show that the hillfort was built about 1000 years earlier, round about 600 BC. It was quite a common Victorian misconception to think that hillforts date from the time of the Anglo-Saxon versus Britons period, and we have encountered this idea before in one of the other books that we read a while back.
Back in here later, I carried on with the notes from yesterday, and it was long after 13:00 when they finally went on line. Where on earth has the time gone? Things weren’t helped, I have to say, by my falling asleep for a while as I was typing.
The next job was to transcribe the dictaphone notes to find out where I’d been during the night.
I was with a girl last night. I don’t know who she was, but we’d been going out with each other for a short while. We’d heard some news about a friend of ours who worked in some kind of block of flats who was falling behind on his course because he wasn’t being given the ability to study where he was living. There was too much noise and too many people, and someone who already lived in that building was removed from the university not so long ago. We were being a bit careful about what we did, obviously, but we were trying to think of a way to solve this guy’s problems. Then there came the news at midday that a well-known college in Jersey, where many people go to study, had closed its doors, which was quite a surprise. There were all these students stranded on the island with no money and no way to go home. I, for one, started a fund, raising money on the internet to bring these people home, but we were having great fun imagining the situation in Jersey at the moment – all these people just having come would just have to go again, the roads would quieten down and the towns would quieten down. Someone had taken a few photos of the area, including my apartment, so that in due course, they could do some computer mock-ups and seats, and some kind of superimposed figures to make jokes. I tried to give my girlfriend a hug, but she was not in the hug-giving mood because her friends, who were in danger of losing their position to study, and I could understand exactly what they meant. It meant everyone calming down and diffusing to these kinds of organisations to make a start themselves.
Well, we start off with having a girlfriend, and that’s a novelty, to be sure. However, she won’t let me hug her at the end, and that’s much more like how things end up with me. Interestingly, my family doesn’t turn up to drop a spanner into the works, as they usually do at times like this. That’s some kind of good news, at least.
As for the rest of the dream, when we were at university, we had many people write to us and complain about the inability to study due to too many other distractions, and we proposed a raft of different solutions – working in the public library, going to bed early and then getting up early to work, before everyone else in the house gets up.
And the college collapsing, leaving hundreds if not thousands of people stranded a long way from home, reminds me of something, but I can’t think what it is.
I’ve just dreamt that the alarm went off and I got out of bed and went for a good wash and dressed myself. When I was sitting at the desk with the computer wondering what to do I found that I’d just woken up in bed, still in my nightclothes, so I don’t know what happened there.
This second dream was really so realistic that it did actually feel as if I had woken up and gone to change my clothes, etc. I really didn’t understand at first how come I was still in bed with my night attire. It certainly wasn’t a “phantom alarm” because whatever alarm it was didn’t manage to awaken the real “me”.
After that, we had football. And what a day it must have been for my two Scottish clubs.
Firstly, Greenock Morton were away at Arbroath. And being at the bottom of the table with just one draw and no wins, no-one expected very much. Nevertheless, Morton actually scored two goals, the first time that they’ve scored more than one this season. And although the Red Lichties pulled one back later in the game, Morton hung on to record their first win this season, and away from home too.
Then to Annan, where Stranraer were away to Annan Athletic. And for everyone who is claiming that Stranraer’s position at the top of the table is false, they were silenced when the score of this game was flashed up on the screen – Annan Athletic 1, Stranraer 6. And Stranraer were worth it too because they played some really good attacking football, something that has been missing from the club for the last few seasons. It really was a good match.
Later on, I had the homemade bread to make, but earlier, my chatbot had found a really good vegan cottage pie recipe, made with real cottages, so while I was waiting for the dough to rise and all of that, I made the cottage pie, and it went into the oven after the bread had cooked.
But latterly, I had Rosemary on the internet. She was stuck with her computer and wanted me to help her. So in between dealing with stuff in the oven, I was helping her. But I was running back and to between the kitchen and here, and I was absolutely exhausted.
As well as that, I was also talking to two of my friends on line.
But now that all of that is finished, I can turn my attention to my notes, and they are now finished too. With just a few more things to check, and then I’m going to bed, ready for dialysis tomorrow … "I don’t think" – ed …
One of my friends above is a retired doctor, and so, before I go, seeing as we have been talking about doctors … "well, one of us has" – ed … he was telling me that he had one of his patients come into his surgery with a lovely “shiner”, or black eye.
"How did this happen?" my friend asked.
"My wife had given me a slice of shepherd’s pie for tea last night."
"But how did this black eye happen?"
"Well, when the shepherd came in and saw me eating a slice of his pie, he wasn’t very happy."
LIVE: Saturday 10th October 2026 – I REALLY MUST …
… pull out of these dramatic sleeps that I seem to be having. They really can’t keep going on like this because they are devastating my life right now and I don’t seem to be able to snap out of them. It wouldn’t be so bad if I were having them in bed where I can enjoy them, but that seems to be the only place where I don’t have them.
The other night, for example, falling asleep while riding the porcelain horse – that really is the nadir of all of this, isn’t it?
Anyway, I eventually went to sleep last night, not straight away like I was hoping. And once I’d fallen asleep, I didn’t stay that way for long. I was soon awake, although I have no idea at what time. It seemed as if I was tossing and turning for hours. I went through the Welsh course question book in my head while trying to go back to sleep, hoping that I could answer the verbal questions from Head Office when they arrive, but no-one at all contacted me with the questions … "and that sounds like a dream too" – ed ….
When the alarm went off, I had to struggle to leave the bed as usual, but once I was up, I dragged myself to the front door to unlock it for when Isabelle the Nurse arrives.
The next stop was the bathroom for a good wash and scrub up, and even a shave in case Emilie the Cute Consultant comes to see me today at dialysis.
Back in here, I carried on with writing up the notes from yesterday, and although I made good and rapid progress … "which makes a change" – ed … I hadn’t quite finished when Isabelle the Nurse put in an appearance. We had a little chat about nothing in particular, and after she left, I could make my breakfast.
While I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
“Famous Trees” is still the topic of conversation today, but there’s nothing of any special interest in there, although the author of the report is trying to identify historical storm damage to some of the oldest trees. He seems to be quite confident in identifying damage as far back as the early-mid seventeenth century and has suspicions of damage even further back than that. But, of course, nothing is proven.
Back in here after breakfast, I finished the notes from yesterday and they went on line. Now I was free to attack the dictaphone notes.
I dreamed that I was walking again without crutches. I had some kind of dramatic improvement over one evening. I’d stayed behind at school one evening to see a few Shakespeare plays being rehearsed. I walked out of there and walked downtown. By now, it was morning, and I really fancied some croissants but I carried on walking and I crossed the river into the town centre. I saw two people eating croissants that made me jealous, that kind of thing, and I can’t remember now. I can’t remember now – it’s just gone. Yes – that’s right – we were in a DIY shop, and I was looking at the greenhouses with the plants in them and tried to price up the greenhouses when one of the servers came up to me and said “you’re our squash expert, aren’t you?”. “Well,” I replied. “Not really”, so he sent a man over to me carrying a small racket, with the strings being replaced by a wooden lattice-type of work. He asked me if this would be any good for playing squash. I replied “no” and pointed him to where the squash rackets were. Then it came down to when we came to the entrance to that shop and we walked past a plate with free croissants on it for the morning, so I helped myself to one and so did someone else, then a third person, and we chatted about that, but I can’t remember now what happened after that.
There’s no doubt in this dream that when I was walking away from the Shakespeare plays and across the river into the town centre that I was in Nantwich, so it must have been my old grammar school where the rehearsals were taking place.
And it’s a big surprise to me that I was watching the play rehearsals. It’s hard enough to persuade me to go to watch a real play, never mind some rehearsals. The theatre – or plays, at least – is simply not my thing at all.
And at one time, I used to play a lot of squash and was even on a squash ladder … "but not very high up" – ed … in a local club in Crewe, but I certainly wouldn’t call myself an expert. When I was living in a van, it used to be how I’d manage to shower regularly. But finding me in a DIY shop was an everyday situation, and there even was one in Montlucon, “Brico Depot”, that used to open at 07:30, and they did have free coffee and croissants for the early arrivals.
The next task was to have a quick look at my e-mails. And I do mean “quick” because there wasn’t very much time. I was amazed at how long it actually took to finish everything off.
And there was an e-mail from Grahame, who had seen my notes yesterday on the two oak trees, “Adam” and “Eve”. Eve was the famous hollow oak at Moreton-on-Lugg, Herefordshire. Struck by lightning in 1839, its shattered upper trunk was later thatched and fitted with a door and stove, serving as the railway station’s booking and stationmaster’s office.
Grahame sent me a photo of “Eve” in its role as station master’s office and booking office at the railway station, where you can clearly see the storm damage and how it has been converted.
If you click on the image, you’ll see a larger … "although not very much larger" – ed … image where you can probably see things in better detail, including the chimney at the rear which is connected to the stove inside the tree trunk, and also the thatched roof that covers the part where the upper part of the tree broke off.
So thank you very much for that, Grahame. And a quick note to all the other regular readers of this rubbish – I’m always pleased to interact with my audience, and “comments” on this blog are now enabled if you have something to say. And if you don’t want to “go public”, there should be a “contact me” feature in the bottom right corner of the screen. Don’t hesitate to use it.
And if you can’t see the “contact me” feature, SEND ME AN EMAIL
Meanwhile, back at the ran … errr … office, the alarm rang to let me know that it was time to head for the kitchen for my disgusting drink and midday medication. Once I’d done that, I began to sort myself and my things out for dialysis.
My faithful cleaner turned up too to apply the anaesthetic to my arm and to have a little chat about nothing in particular, and after she left, I had my usual crash-out over the table in the dining area while I awaited the taxi.
Properly crashed out, I was beginning to have a lovely dream when the doorbell rang, and the dream evaporated immediately. I thought “blimey, that’s early” and it was too – at 12:50, but it seemed that I’d only been there a minute, not almost thirty minutes.
Today, I was the only passenger, so we arrived early at dialysis. However, so had everyone else, so it was still 14:25, almost fifty minutes after my arrival, when I was finally coupled up. And woe is me! I had one of the two nurses who have been there for centuries but do the barest minimum of work to comply with the regulations rather than going very far out of their way.
Once everything had settled down, I started to have a footfest, something that went right on until bedtime, would you believe?
The first on the agenda was to watch the rest of Llansawel v Colwyn Bay from a week ago. It was 1-0 to Llansawel when I left it, and surprisingly, that’s how it finished up. Despite Colwyn Bay’s superior skill and tactics and their lethal strike force of “perm any three from Jack Kenny, Adam Davies, Jordan Davies and Louis Robles”, they were simply unable to break down the resolute Llansawel defence and their goalkeeper, Will Fuller, even though Llansawel were reduced to ten men after an hour.
That’s definitely three points thrown away by Colwyn Bay as they drop to fifth in the table and Llansawel climb further away from the bottom and are now in eleventh out of sixteen places.
The next match, which I saw in its entirety, was Cardiff Metropolitan v Trefelin. Trefelin, second bottom in the table with no wins and just three draws, and the Met, seventh with six wins and three draws from twelve matches, looked like the kind of game where we would be expecting one-way traffic towards just one goal. However, it was rather different than that.
Whatever Trefelin manager Andy Hill had put in his team’s pre-match cuppa, I’ll have a drink of that myself because it seemed to work wonders. Trefelin came out of the blocks at an alarming rate and took the match straight to the Met.
And after eleven minutes, we had a really controversial moment. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that yesterday, I discussed the idea of “let’s play it out from the back, lads” and how I reckoned that it was nothing but nonsense. And we had a lovely example of this today.
The Met were awarded a goal kick, so former Port Vale keeper Arron Davies took it quickly and passed it to one of his defenders who was in the goal area with him. The defender, not realising that his keeper had played the ball, picked it up to find a suitable spot to take the kick. Obviously, a penalty was awarded, from which Trefelin scored.
They scored a second later on, and although the Met pulled one back, Trefelin scored a third with ten minutes to go to make the game secure. And that was a surprising result, to be sure.
The third match was Hwlffordd v Caernarfon, but I didn’t finish that, so I’ll tell you all about it on Monday evening.
Having seen and noted the instruction about “letting him leave at his dry weight”, the nurse, despite my insistence, stopped the procedure ten minutes before the end, and for why I have no idea. Consequently, I left yet again at 200 grammes over my dry weight, and I’m getting totally fed up of this.
It’s as if, at the dialysis clinic, I’m talking to the wall instead of to a doctor and a group of nurses. It’s high time that I did something about it, and I know what I’ll do, but let’s see what happens on Monday.
The taxi arrived as I was making my way to the door and as I was the only passenger, we were here for 18:20. There was that much wind that the driver dropped me off at the back door – he can park alongside that so I only have to take three paces and I’m inside, instead of the twenty-five metres round the front.
My cleaner was waiting and she helped me inside and to my apartment, where once I was sitting down, she stuck a disgusting drink into my sweaty little mitt.
After she left, I found some of those square toasted biscuit things and took a packet – the last one – into my office along with some of that vegan spreading cheese and an orange. I made myself comfortable and watched the live game of Y Fflint v Colwyn Bay. I’d missed the kick-off by half an hour, but there’s a function “start from the beginning” on the streaming site.
It actually was quite a good game, and as I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I don’t know why Y Fflint are only third from bottom because they do play some very nice, tidy football and Jack Flint, their goalkeeper, is one of the best in the league.
They conceded a goal in the twenty-sixth minute but that was the extent of the scoring. Colwyn Bay could and should have had a few more, except for Jack Flint, but Y Fflint couldn’t get a shot over the goal line. A really good and lively striker would make a world of difference to this team.
By now, I was thoroughly exhausted as a result of my dialysis session, and although I made my best effort in writing my notes, I’d written about 300 words before sleep finally overwhelmed me. When I awoke, I posted on line what I’d written so far and went to prepare myself for bed. And what should have been an early night turned out not to be so after I’d fallen asleep yet again while riding the porcelain horse.
When I eventually fell into bed, I didn’t even have time to make myself comfortable before I fell asleep, and that was that.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about trees … "well, one of us has" – ed … someone once asked me if I knew how many trees I’d cut down in the forest on my farm in Virlet.
"One thousand three hundred and forty-seven" I replied
"How do you know that kind of figure exactly?" he asked.
"It’s easy" I replied. "I keep a log."
LIVE: Friday 9th October 2026 – YET ANOTHER DAY …
… where time seems to have flown by and I’ve hardly accomplished anything of what I wanted to do. I seem to be wasting far more time than is good for me right now.
Last night was rather unfortunate when I fell asleep in the comfy chair and ended up going to bed rather later than intended, with the notes for the day being well-unfinished.
And seeing as we have been talking about unfinished notes before bedtime … "well, one of us has" – ed … these notes will probably be unfinished too, but that’s because there’s a football match on – Cambrian United v Rhydaman – and it doesn’t finish until late.
Meanwhile, back at the ran … err … office, I was in bed later than I wanted to be. and I awoke earlier than I intended. However, there was a good reason for that. I must have been lying on my right shoulder in the wrong place, and I had the most horrible ache in my upper arm. It was really painful.
The pain was such that I couldn’t go back to sleep, and so I lay there, tossing and turning and suffering. After a few hours of that, I reckoned that I may as well rise up and do some work. However, the alarm at 06:29 beat me to it.
When I awoke, I was absolutely exhausted, and it took me even longer to raise myself from the bed than normal. And somehow, when I was trying to stand up, I must have stubbed my toe on the comfy office chair that I use as an aid to getting up, because when I came back in here later, there was a trail of blood leading out to the front door where I had gone to unlock it and a trail back into the bathroom where I’d gone to sort myself out afterwards.
However, now that I was back in here, the first thing that I did was to attack the notes that I’d left unfinished last night. And I’d almost finished when Isabelle the Nurse came along.
While she sorted out my legs and feet, I talked about the mess at dialysis yesterday, but she didn’t seem to be interested, which was a shame.
After she left, I made my breakfast, and as I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
We’ve now moved on to the interesting trees of Herefordshire, and the speaker, described as “A Commissioner From The Woolhope Club”, talks about the outstanding trees to be found in the county.
He talks about two very large oak trees, known as “Adam” and “Eve” at Moreton-on-Lugg. “Adam” blew down on 7th January 1839, and “Eve”, although she was still standing, lost all of her branches. All that remained was her trunk, completely rotten and hollow inside. And when the Shrewsbury and Hereford Railway was built in 1853, they put a thatched roof on her and a stove inside her, and she was used as a lodging and office for a while by the stationmaster of Moreton-on-Lugg Railway Station.
Back in here, I finished off the notes for yesterday and posted them on line. However, that took much longer than it ought to have done because I kept on drifting off to sleep while I was writing. And not only that but I was back to having these hallucinations again, and when I “came round” and looked at what I’d been writing, I had to wipe it out and start again.
These hallucinations are really interesting, though. They are so real that when I do “come round”, I’m actually looking for whatever it was that was going on. It’s something so weird that it’s difficult to explain.
In the end, I finally managed to finish, and then I attacked the dictaphone notes from the night.
We had some new neighbours – Mr and Mre Murphy they were – and we were at Gainsborough Road. And the first thing – through their letters – we noticed that they were “Mr and Mrs Murphy” and underneath, they put “Religion – In The Coming of Christ”. I thought “what kind of people are these going to be?”. So we didn’t really have a great deal to do with them, but the guy came round once or twice and asked for a little bit of advice about this and that, and I used to give him a thing about it. Then one day, another one of our friends turned up … fell asleep here … but this guy Murphy used to go on about how he was a well-respected member of the community and there was no-one chasing him for debts or anything. Then another one of my friends, who works in the same kind of business, came and told us that he was being chased by several video companies for the quality of the work that he had done and returning the deposits that they had given him, that kind of thing. And then we had a bit of evidence about that because he was doing some electrical work at his house and there was an explosion. He ended up with wires sticking in his heel.
Nothing in this dream seems to relate to anything in real life … "except the falling asleep" – ed … but I did have a chat yesterday with the friend who figured in this dream… "who is not an electrician" – ed … and part of our discussion did concern Gainsborough Road.
Nothing else fits anywhere.
There was also something as well about a friend and me. We were in the underground garage at my place in Belgium. There was a car in there that had been in there for years, covered up in a tarpaulin, but the tarpaulin had come off, and it was an “X” registered Volkswagen Passat underneath there, dark red and all covered in dust. But we’d gone down there to see my latest car, which was some kind of sports car like a Porsche, but not as good as that. It was bright yellow, and I’d paid €350:00 for it. But he was talking to me about parking in Brussels, saying that it’s becoming more and more difficult. Now you need to have an app where you book your parking place ten minutes before you arrive, and then, automatically, it’s paid. I thought that that’s going to be complicated because someone could be taking your place in that time. He told me that you’re better off buying a card to do this outside the city, but once you have it, you can do your shopping inside the city.
This is the same friend from earlier, and he does have a thing about interesting and old cars.
But parking in Brussels has always been impossible, even before apps and all of that. When I was coming in to Brussels after I’d stopped living there, I’d park at one of the shopping centres on the edge of town and take the tram, metro or train (depending upon where I was) into the city.
There was certainly no car, wrapped in a tarpaulin or not, that had been parked in our underground car park for any length of time. But interestingly, I can still see it now, and it had British plates on it.
By now, believe it or not, it was after my disgusting drink and midday medication time, so I went off to fetch them. Then, after a little break, I carried on.
This afternoon, I’ve been researching the music for the radio programme that I’ll be preparing next week. My chatbot has been helping me as usual because, once more, there will be loads of obscure groups and artists featuring, and asking my chatbot to do the research saves me hours of work.
We now have a good collection of music, much of which I’ve already downloaded and reformatted. And while I was at it, I asked the chatbot to review what I’ve written for the one that I’d prepared yesterday, and he made loads of suggestions and corrections.
In the middle of all of this, Rosemary telephoned me for a chat. I’ve no idea how long the chat was because, shame as it is to say it, I fell asleep while I was talking to her and I didn’t awaken until 17:30, by which time she’d become fed up of waiting and had ended the call. And I can’t say that I blame her.
Back in the Land of the Living, I carried on working until teatime, when I went into the kitchen to make my usual sausage, beans with cheese and black pepper with air-fried chips. And, as usual, it was totally delicious, especially when followed by a peach soya yoghurt and a plum.
The time was such that I had to hurry, but I made it back into here just in time for the kick-off of tonight’s football.
The match that I’d chosen was another one between two newly promoted teams, Cambrian United and Rhydaman. The Cam Army are doing reasonably well for a newly promoted team and are currently in lower mid-table, But Rhydaman have been struggling, and we had to wait until they played Trefynnon just now for their first win.
Rhydaman opened the scoring in dramatic fashion. I’ve been urging teams to stop this nonsense of “playing it out from the back” and go for the direct route, causing chaos in the opposition defence, and tonight, Rhydaman’s keeper launched a long kick downfield, the centre-half missed it, his mate in the centre of defence couldn’t quite get his foot on it, and a Rhydaman player ran on to the loose ball and beat the Cambrian keeper.
After that, the game settled down. Rhydaman opted for the “kick and run” tactics, but Cambrian played some really nice, technical football. Nevertheless, they could still be playing this time next year, and they would never break down Rhydaman’s defence, which was outstanding, even after they had their centre-half sent off. Nothing on earth would ever get past that defence, which is surprising seeing how low Rhydaman are in the table.
Anyway, Rhydaman hung on for their second victory, and with that three points, they are catching up with the pack in the lower mid table, something that was looking most unlikely three weeks ago.
When the football finished, I sat down to write out today’s notes, and I was halfway through when I was suddenly overwhelmed by fatigue. I couldn’t go on from there, so I posted on line what I had written so far, but a “to be continued” sticker on it and prepared for bed.
However, when I was sorting myself out for bed, I fell asleep while … errr. riding the porcelain horse, and how embarrassed is that? That will explain how come I was so late going to bed. But here I am, hoping for a good, really long sleep like the other night … "ha ha" – ed …
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about Belgium … "well, one of us has" – ed … a Belgian policemen once stopped a car with five Dutch men in it.
"What kind of car is that?" asks the policeman.
"It’s a Renault Four" replied one of the Dutchmen.
"Exactly" replied the policeman. "One of you will have to get out."
"But the ‘Four’ is the model, not the carrying capacity" says one of the Dutchmen. "Check with your boss!"
The policeman calls up his boss and receives a reply
"Don’t bother me now. I have these three Italians in this Fiat Uno …"
LIVE: Thursday 8th October 2026 – WE HAVE HAD …
… another day of disputes down at the dialysis centre, as some people totally fail to understand exactly what “stay connected up until he’s down to the dry weight” really means, and want to shut down the procedure with ten minutes and one hundred and fifty grammes still to go.
“Is it me?” I wonder, or are there really some people who just can’t understand a plain and simple instruction?
My body is a bit like that sometimes. It can’t understand a plain and simple instruction either. All I wanted it to do was to act like the previous night and let me have a really good sleep until the alarm goes off, but no such luck. I was in bed quite late last night and it took me an age to go to sleep as well, but I awoke, probably with the wind, as we had a gale blowing outside, at whatever time it was – I don’t know, but whenever it was, I couldn’t go back to sleep. I just lay there, tossing and turning, until the alarm went off at 06:29.
For once in my life, I was actually up and about quite quickly because I had a lot of things to do. I went to the front door and unlocked it, and then I went into the bathroom to organise myself and have a good scrub up. I even had a shave in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant this afternoon at dialysis.
Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to see where I’d gone to during the night. Unfortunately, I hadn’t gone very far.
Last night, we were doing something with a couple of teams in the Cymru Premier League or the Cymru North League. I remember that Drenewydd was one of them. What we were doing was trying to work out some kind of either a handicap for the scores or some kind of adjustment in respect of their league positions. But Drenewydd, who were currently third in the table, were not very happy about this, and their manager had all kinds of things to say to us about the situation while we were doing it.
As it happens, Drenewydd are lying third in the Cymru North table. But this dream is, I reckon, all about the forthcoming match on Friday night between Trefynnon, adrift at the foot of the table with the unenviable record of just one point and conceding the most goals so far this season, and TNS, way out front at the top and who have been scoring goals for fun just recently. Their 9-0 thrashing of mid-table Cambrian United the other week must make gruesome reading for Trefynnon.
We’ve had a 9-1 result just recently too, and then there’s this campaign by a “journalist” who wants to open up all of the results that have been censored by some of the leagues due to the extremely heavy defeats that some clubs lower down the pyramid have suffered, despite his “article” six months or so ago deploring the heavy thrashings that some clubs have had and how demoralising and embarrassing it must be, etc., etc.
Isabelle the Nurse worked her way in later and dealt with my legs and feet. I told her about my bad night again and she wasn’t all that much help in helping me find a solution. Maybe there isn’t one. I dunno.
After she left, I made my breakfast, and while I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
Today, we’re still carrying on with all of the papers that have been read before the club in the year 1870. There have been all sorts of subjects addressed, but right now, we’re reading a speech by an eminent mushroom expert called Elias Magnus Fries from Sweden, one of the people who were mainly responsible for the differentiation and classification of mushroom types.
None of it is controversial, however, and in any case, I don’t know enough about mushrooms to argue.
When I’d finished breakfast, I stayed sitting at the table because I had some important work to do. My chatbot and I started work on a brand new project the other day, but when I tried to open the relevant file yesterday, I couldn’t find it, despite looking and looking.
It turned out that I’d downloaded an upgrade of ChatGPT onto the big desktop machine, and the installation had installed without deleting or overwriting the old installation, and yesterday, I was trying to open the older version. And files made with the new version are not, surprisingly, backwards compatible with the old version, so the old version won’t show them.
So to cut a long story short, when I opened the new version, the file was sitting there as it should be, and so are the old files too, which are forward-compatible with the new version.
Thus yesterday, feeling full of confidence and reassurance … "the fool" – ed … I went to upgrade ChatGPT on the travelling laptop. That was no problem. I made sure that my Windows shortcut was pointing at the new version, which it was, and then clicked to open it.
And guess what? That’s right. The file wasn’t there. And copying the URL link from the chat that was open on the desktop computer into the laptop’s chat window address bar simply produced an error message.
Consequently, Chatbot and I spent two hours trying different things to make it appear, but nothing worked. Not even rubbing this brass lamp that I have in here.
When the alarm went off, I had to stop and prepare myself for dialysis, sort out a disgusting drink and my midday medication. Once I’d done that, I had to prepare the travelling laptop to take with me. My faithful cleaner came along too in order to deal with putting the anaesthetic on my arm.
After she left, I took up my usual position of “slumped over the table with my head resting on my arms” and slowly drifted away into a nice peaceful sleep for what seemed like all of thirty seconds when the doorbell awoke me.
“It can’t be the taxi already, surely?” I thought, but it was. And when I checked the time with the clock on the microwave, it was 12:58. I’d been asleep for over half an hour.
At first, I was the only passenger, but we stopped to pick up our usual Thursday voyager from the Aqua Gym at St. Pair to take to the other side of Avranches. We had a nice drive in the lovely weather … "it’s still summer here" – ed … down to Avranches, where I arrived five minutes early. Nevertheless, it wasn’t until 14:20 that I was plugged in.
When I weighed myself on entry, there was another huge spike in my weight. My calculations were that if I were to stay for four hours with the machine on maximum, it would clear it. The nurses tried to dissuade me, even though they had the doctor’s authority to do it, and in any case I insisted. So we had the “on your own head be it” and they eventually did as I instructed.
There was an injection that I had to have today to boost my immunity system, so my cleaner had fetched it from the chemist the other day, and I took it to the clinic with me. When I saw the doctor (not, unfortunately, Emilie the Cute Consultant), I told her “here’s a little present for you, doctor”. She wasn’t sure whether or not I was being serious, but when she saw the injection, she took it and put it in the fridge.
Once everything was up and running, I settled down to watch a football match from the weekend – Hwlffordd v Y Fflint.
Even though these teams are near the bottom of the table, they usually play some classy, stylish football. However, that certainly wasn’t the case in this match. Y Fflint certainly tried, but their midfield was overrun by the Hwlfforth midfield. Hwlffordd certainly had the better of the play, and even though they had a player sent off three quarters through the game, they still appeared to have too much in the tank for Y Fflint.
That’s how it seemed, anyway, until the ninetieth minute when Y Fflint’s Joe Malkin glanced a header into the Hwlffordd net. Y Fflint hung on until the end of the game to give them a most unexpected victory.
With staying on for four hours, I could see most of a second match, so I chose Llansawel v Colwyn Bay.
This should have been an “away banker”, but it didn’t turn out like that at all. However, I’ll tell you about the game after I’ve finished watching it.
With about ten minutes and one hundred and fifty grammes to go, the nurse came to unplug me. “Why?” I asked.
“We can see that this black line, which shows us how much fluid there is to collect, has grounded out. So now, all we’ll be doing is taking out your normal body fluids”.
“You heard what the doctor said,” I replied. “I can’t leave until I’m down to my dry weight”.
And then we had a big argument about it all. In the end, they telephoned a doctor who basically said “let him do what he wants,” so I stayed.
Even so, I was still 200 grammes over my dry weight when I left, and that was so disappointing because I’ll just have to take it off on Saturday along with everything else that has accumulated. But it really is bad news when I have to fight with these people.
What made things worse was that there were two nurses around my bed while I was being unplugged, and they were talking about me as if I wasn’t there. It was hardly polite, as were some of the comments. Not that I was upset by it, just bewildered as to why it was happening.
The taxi was waiting for me as I came out of the building, and as I was the only passenger, we could go straight home.
When I arrived at … gulp … 19:20, my cleaner was waiting for me to help me into the apartment. That was just as well because as the evening drew on, it was quite cold. And it’s soon going to be jacket-wearing weather in the morning and evening, I reckon.
Once I’d sat down, my faithful cleaner bunged a disgusting drink in my hands so that I didn’t forget, and then went up to her apartment.
After she’d left and I’d drunk my disgusting drink, I went to make my tea – some more of that potato salad that I made the other day with some ordinary salad and a spicy burger. It was a strange meal, but there were bags of protein in it, and that’s what I need.
In here later, I began to write out the notes for the day, but once again, found myself asleep on my cjair later on with my notes only half written. I posted them on-line with a “to be continued” stamp and I’ll finish the rest tomorrow morning.
Before going to bed, I went for a ride on the porcelain horse and at one point, I almost fell off. Then in the bathroom and trying to stand up after sitting on the chair, my hand slipped off the freezer and I smashed my head really hard on the fridge door as I almost fell. I really was in no fit state to be around, so I was glad that I had decided to go to bed. I wasn’t safe anywhere else.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about my cleaner … "well, one of us has" – ed … she told me when I arrived home "there was a report on the TV about a 75 year old guy who was stopped by the police for going at 157 kilometres per hour (about 95 mph) in an area with a 90 kilometre per hour (about 55 mph) limit."
"Really?" I asked. "He was probably afraid that he would be late for his own funeral."
LIVE: Wednesday 7th October 2026 – FOR THE FIRST …
… time in ages, and it must really be a long, long time, I’ve actually had a decent, unbroken sleep, and you’ve no idea how much better I’m feeling.
And it might not have been like that either, because once more, I was really late going to bed. I’ve no idea what time, but the last file that was updated on my computer from yesterday was timed at 23:30, so it was certainly after that.
Once in bed, I fell asleep quite quickly. There were no interruptions, no dreams, no phantom alarm calls, no anything, and when the alarm went off and woke me, I was still in the same position as I was when I’d gone to sleep. Nothing had changed at all.
Be that as it may, it still took a good ten minutes or more for me to find the energy and enthusiasm to stand up and head into the living room to unlock the door for Isabelle the Nurse. Having done that, I went into the bathroom to organise myself for the day.
Back in here, there was nothing on the dictaphone, as I said just now, so I found plenty of things for me to do. And it’s just as well, because Isabelle the Nurse was late coming today.
While she was dealing with my legs and feet, she told me about her week off. We’ve had some beautiful weather just now … "although today is cold, grey and wet" – ed … so she spent a day or two relaxing on a sunbed in the garden. And who can blame her?
After she left, I made my usual breakfast, and while I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
We’re beginning the summing-up now, with all kinds of papers being read to the members at the 1870 AGM. Every subject is being discussed. And our author here talks about the American Meadow Lark and announces with absolutely no sense of irony whatever, that "This interesting bird was killed by a man when snipe shooting close to the town of Cheltenham, about the year 1840, when it rose from a boggy place. According to the Editor of The Field it is one of only three instances in which this bird is known to have appeared in England, and the first—for the others are recorded by Mr. P. L. Sclater in The Ibis for 1861, one being killed at Thrandeston, in Suffolk, and the other at Walsham, in Norfolk."
Can you imagine today, shooting a bird that rare?
And thanks to Seàn, who saw my note yesterday and sent me some info about the sinking of “Foxhunter” on 6th December 1770 during the great storm –
Foxhunter
Wooden sailing vessel newly built in 1770 for the Liverpool-Dublin packet service.
Captain Butler, Liverpool to Dublin
Wrecked near mouth of Mersey on 6-7 Dec 1770; wreckage driven ashore.
All 21 passengers and 6 crew lost.
Wooden sailing vessel newly built in 1770 for the Liverpool-Dublin packet service.
Captain Butler, Liverpool to Dublin
Wrecked near mouth of Mersey on 6-7 Dec 1770; wreckage driven ashore.
All 21 passengers and 6 crew lost.
On 6 December 1770, a storm from the Southwest struck and continued with violence, with the wind veering Northwest over the next days. Shipping near Liverpool was heavily disrupted with many vessels driven ashore and lost.
Advert 31 July 1770:
The FOX-HUNTER PACKET, A Vessel built on purpose to ply between the Ports of Liverpool and Dublin only, and calculated to accommodate Passengers with the most genteel Conveniences suitable to their Ranks and Qualities, has 11 in the Cabin, besides several in the Steerage, with other Conveniences for taking the Carriages, Horses, and Baggage of any large Family, will sail from Liverpool for Dublin.
Thanks again.
Back in here, I had a few things to do, such as to download some more music that I needed for my radio programme, and then to reformat it all and then re-edit and then remix it. Having done that, I chose the tracks that I needed and then paired and segued them.
That stop was perfect for a disgusting drink break with my midday medication, and also because a friend of mine with whom I’d been talking told me at that very moment, he was off out to the shops.
After lunch, I began to write the notes for the radio programme, and in a mad fit of energy, they are all now written. Just one or two things remain to be done, and then after that, the programme will be finished. That’s a new record time.
After that, I had another good chat online with someone, and then it was time for tea.
Tonight, I had rice with veg and a taco roll filled with a spicy tomato and kidney bean whatever that I found in the freezer, and it might have been a leftover of something that my friend cooked when he was here. Whatever it was, though, it was really nice, and there’s another helping in the freezer for another time.
Back in here, would you believe, I was giving some virtual guitar lessons on the computer. It’s more complicated than you might think, trying to explain something visual and audible to someone by using just a text medium, but in the end, after about an hour and a half, I had her playing an A chord and a D chord.
Next time, we’ll do C, E and G if we have time (which I doubt), but with just those five chords, you can play a great many popular rock songs.
But that’s for another time. Right now, I’ve finished my notes, and when I’ve finished the backing up and the stats, I’m going to go to bed and hope that I’ll have just as good a sleep as I had last night. We shall see.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about guitar lessons … "well, one of us has" – ed … one day, someone ‘phoned me about guitar lessons, so I told him to come round.
When he turned up later, I saw that he had no hands.
"This is crazy" I said. "How on earth can you play guitar with no hnds?"
"It’s not a problem" he replied. "I can play the piano and the violin with no problems."
"How do you manage that?" I asked.
"Well, I’ve always played music by ear."
LIVE: Tuesday 6th October 2026 – IT’S BEEN ANOTHER …
… one of those days where I’ve not been able to accomplish much, much to my regret, of course, but I seem to have gone from one interruption to another.
Those interruptions started last night, as I’m sure that you will remember – typing out the notes quite efficiently until I crashed out at the desk, and the worst thing about it was not knowing that I’d crashed out until I awoke.
As I mentioned yesterday, when I awoke, I went more-or-less straight to bed, hoping for a good sleep.
And so I thought, but I had not one, but two phantom alarm calls during the night. The first one was sometime round about 02:30 and I managed to ignore that one pretty much. The second one, round about 04:30, I took much more seriously. I found myself sitting on the edge of the bed waiting for the second alarm. And after a while, when it didn’t come, I checked the time and it was 04:38, so I climbed back into bed.
However, the damage had been done with the call at 02:30. From then on, I was just drifting in and out of sleep. I was definitely asleep at 04:30 or so, but I was awake before the alarm went off at 06:29.
Once again, we had the same old struggle to rise up from the bed and to unlock the front door, but I managed it eventually. And then back into the bathroom to sort myself out, ready for Isabelle the Nurse.
Back in here, I had last night’s notes to finish, so I buckled down and bashed them out, but just before I could put them on line, Isabelle the Nurse arrived. She asked me about my week while she was on her break, so I told her, but that didn’t leave much time for her to tell me about her week.
And she gave me a lecture about dialysis too, saying that I was expecting too much if I wanted things to go as normal every time. There could have been a hundred reasons why it all went wrong and she told me some of them. However, that’s not really the point. The point is that they didn’t tell me about them, so I couldn’t argue about the situation then and there.
After Isabelle the Nurse had left, I made my breakfast and read some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
Today, they are still discussing the safety concerns relating to the local weather, but something they mentioned caused me to go off on a tangent again and begin to search for the sinking of the Dublin Packet Boat in 1770, with the loss of all hands, without very much success.
Back in here, I finished off the notes and posted them on line, then I began to revise for my Welsh lesson. The revision went really well and I managed to finish the first unit, so I was looking forward to the lesson.
And the lesson went really well too. I did quite well, except for a couple of mistakes that I made, and I was quite happy with my progress. Sad as it is to say it, much as I loved my previous teacher and wished that she was still teaching our year, the current teacher, apart from being really scatty, seems to be more efficient, and I’m learning more with her than I did with her predecessor.
When the lesson was over, I wrote up the notes from the dictaphone last night – and about time too.
We were in a big city that might even have been London. In fact, it probably was, and we were walking down that street that we walk along quite often in a dream but this time, going the other way, from the city centre out to the suburbs. There were three of us, and we were fooling around a little. One of them wanted to go to use the toilet, but there was nowhere, so in the end we found a pub that was open early in the morning, and he allowed them to go to the bathroom there. I was much more interested in an old car across the road. Eventually, my friends came out and we carried on walking and chatting until, in the end, we came to a café where we thought that we’d go and have a coffee. We went in and sat down at a table and we noticed a couple of kids watching us. Suddenly, one of the kids blurted out something in English, so I mentioned it to Nerina and said that you can’t go anywhere, can you? Anyway, these people came over. She looked at my camera and asked if I was me. I said that I was, and she told me that I’d commented on a photo of hers ages ago, and she said that she was very pleased to see me. We chatted for quite a while, and then they invited us to come on their boat in the river. We began to get ready, but this couple was really strange. She insisted on appeal because, being polite and very well-dressed, but not on her own children. Eventually, we sat on this boat. We thought that we’d been on this boat before, so we wanted to know what else was going to happen. Then they began to put a few films on, and these films were dubious, to say the least, and … fell asleep here …
What a dream that was!
Regular readers of this rubbish will recall a dream a week or two back about Nerina and me being in New York for something to do with her work. This boat was moored on the Hudson River in New York, roughly where we were in the previous dream, although the crew of the British freighter were all for buying the boat and doing some privateering on the way home.
Apart from that, there’s the street in London that we know so well, although not this end. We know much more about the far end, which is presumably in Edmonton somewhere and where we buy our chips and pastries.
But, as usual, the dream is just an example of the kind of nonsense that I can conjure up when I try.
The cleaner turned up next to do her stuff, but she sorted out the bathroom first and then chased me under the shower for my weekly scrub.
Back in here, I did some work on my radio programme, and the music is really taking shape. For the last two or three weeks, I’ve had to search for loads of music that I don’t have to hand, and this week is no different. But as of tomorrow, I’m going to have to crack on if I want to finish it before the weekend.
When teatime came round, I went into the kitchen and made myself some mashed potato with onion, peas and carrots and the last slice of my vegan pie. That was delicious, and I’m going to have to make another one at some point. A slice of that makes a nice, traditional meal.
It was followed by a raspberry soya dessert, and they are quite nice too. I’ll have to order some more of these when they next come round on special offer.
Back in here, Rosemary ‘phoned me. Her external hard drive had arrived, but she wasn’t sure how to use it. We ended up just having a quick chat – a mere 00:53:48 today – and helped her install the external drive and perform her first complete backup. With a bit of luck, God’s help and a bobby, she won’t lose any more files.
Once I’d finished with Rosemary, I could crack on and do the notes for the day, and now, they are finished. There are just the stats and my back-up to perform, and then I can go to bed.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about alarms … "well, one of us has" – ed … I heard a story that one of my friends had bought a new alarm clock earlier that day.
It had come by post from the Tourettes Society, and we were having a good discussion about it.
At least, we were, until one of my friends said "well, he’s going to be in for a rude awakening tomorrow morning then"
LIVE: Monday 5th October 2026 – I AM REALLY …
… convinced that the people at dialysis … "or some of them, anyway" – ed … are pulling my leg or taking the mickey. We’ve had yet another showdown about the length of the sessions.
More of this anon however. Let’s start at the very beginning … "♬ a very good place to start ♬" – ed … and go back to last night. By the time that I’d finished everything and crawled into bed, it was just a few minutes past 23:30. So much for my early night;
And it all went worse after that. I awoke a few hours later – don’t ask me what time – and after that, I didn’t go back to sleep at all. I just lay there, tossing and turning, all through the night.
When the alarm went off, I was still awake, but be that as it may, it was another desperate struggle to rise to my feet. And it wasn’t just a lack of motivation either. I had to wait a good few minutes for the room to stop spinning round before I felt able to stand up.
Having unlocked the front door for the nurse, I headed back into the bathroom to organise myself for dialysis. Except that I forgot to have a shave this morning. Whatever will Emilie the Cute Consultant think of me if she sees me this afternoon at dialysis?
Back in here, there was nothing on the dictaphone from last night, so I went to find myself something else to do. But there wasn’t very long in which to do it because the nurse turned up at 08:04 this morning, and that’s early.
While he was sorting out my legs and feet, he was telling me some more stories about Saturday’s fire in the restaurant in the town centre. Most of it, though, is pure gossip and speculation, so I’m not going to repeat it in a public forum.
After he left, I made breakfast (and my new loaf is wonderful) and while I was eating it, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1870.
We’ve finished talking about fungi now and were discussing extremes of weather. And one example caught my eye – the entry for 1816.
"1816. July was unusually boisterous and wet.
Aug. 31. Accompanied by a fall of rain of nearly three inches in two days. A tremendous gale of wind visited Birmingham, Liverpool, and Manchester, and other northern towns. Much damage done to shipping, and many vessels lost at sea. This was the diastrous harvest time previously mentioned."
This corresponds with the volcanic eruption of Mount Tambora in Sumbawa, in Indonesia, in April 1815, the most powerful volcanic eruption in modern times. It led to 1816 being called “The Year Without a Summer” as crops failed and extremes of weather battered the World.
Back in here later, I had this week’s radio programme to review, and when I was satisfied with it, I sent it off to the studio to be fitted into the stream for broadcasting on Friday and Saturday nights at 21:30.
Having done that, the next item that needed my intervention was my Welsh homework. I called up the page, copied and pasted the questions onto the computer, checked that they were appreciated as being quite the careful and faithful copy, and then began to answer them.
When I’d answered them, I checked with my chatbot to see if I was on the right lines, and once he confirmed that everything was as it should be, I sent them off. That’ll give our tutor something to think about.
There was an interruption when the telephone rang. A neighbour called me to ask if he could come to visit me sometime. We agreed on Wednesday morning at 11:00. Then he telephoned me again five minutes later to say that he’d forgotten about an appointment on Wednesday, so could he come another time? As long as I’m here and I’m not in my Welsh class, he can come when he likes.
But what with neighbours coming to visit, the possibility that I’m going to have a friend here for a week and all of that, I seem to be quite popular these days. I’m not sure why, though. Do I owe you any money?
It’s not as busy, though, as it was last year. I shall have to remind a few more people that it’s open house for whenever they want to come to stay.
When the alarm that reminds me that it’s time to prepare for dialysis went off, I wandered into the kitchen for my disgusting drink and midday medication and then began to pack the travelling laptop to take with me. My cleaner turned up too to sort out the anaesthetic for my arm.
After she left, I waited for the taxi, in my usual “slumped over the kitchen table, head resting on my arms” position. And I began to have a lovely dream and remember saying to myself that I really must remember this, but then the doorbell rang and the whole lot evaporated immediately, and that was that.
At first, I was alone in the car, but then we had to pick up a guy at the hospital as well as my regular companion from Sartilly, as a result of which we were a little late arriving.
Not only that, but several people had arrived together just before me, so I had to wait until 14:25 before I was finally connected up.
My plan was to sit quietly and watch a football match but my dialysis machine had other ideas. It was constantly ringing up errors, and that brought the nurses a-running when the alarm went off. I hardly had any peace at all.
Nevertheless, I did manage to watch Airbus UK Broughton v Trefelin, after a fashion. This game was played between two of the newly promoted sides, and what different sides they were too. Trefelin were more “kick and rush” whereas Airbus played some really good, technical football. The final result, 3-0 to Airbus, wasn’t a surprise to anyone.
It seems to me that Airbus have managed to suss out this Premier League, and while they are never going to win the championship, they have what it takes to avoid relegation, but unless Trefelin can find something magical from somewhere, it’s going to be a long, hard season.
In the middle of all of this, we had a confrontation. One of the doctors … "not, unfortunately, Emilie the Cute Consultant" – ed …came to see me. She asked me how things were, and so I launched into my tirade about the last two sessions and how disappointed I was.
Of course, it wasn’t she who had made the decisions – she wasn’t on duty – so she only knew what was in the records.
First of all, I complained that whatever had gone on had gone on without my knowledge, and I thought that that was shameful. That surprised her because, apparently, every patient has the right to know what’s happening about his treatment.
Secondly, on Thursday, I’d made the decision to come home at the right weight by staying for four hours instead of three, and coming home 700 grammes over my weight, as I did last Thursday, was, in my opinion, a waste of forty-five minutes of my time when I have better things to do at home.
She couldn’t really find an answer to that. One thing that she suggested was that there wasn’t enough time even with four hours to take everything out. They are limiting my extraction to 950 millilitres per hour because of my low blood pressure. But leaving my blood pressure aside, which has been low like this for twenty-odd years, what with everything that’s pumped into me during a session, there were three thousand eight hundred millilitres to take out last Thursday, so that was exactly right – and I realised that the end of the World had come upon us when she – a doctor of medicine – had to use a calculator to divide three thousand eight hundred by four.
After much argument and discussion, we agreed that I should be leaving at my recognised dry weight, even if I have to stay there for a week to do it.
And having made such an agreement, the dialysis breathed its last, ten minutes before the end of the session with 200 grammes still to go, so I was unplugged, under-extracted and overweight. It wasn’t my day, was it?
The taxi was waiting for me when the dialysis was over and I was able to head for home quite quickly, especially as I was the only passenger. However, we ended up being stuck behind a service bus between La Havaudière and the roundabout at the ring road just outside Granville, and the bus was crawling along, stopping to drop off and pick up passengers all the way round and we couldn’t go past.
Eventually, we arrived at chez moi where my faithful cleaner was waiting for me. She helped me into the kitchen, and when I was sitting down on a chair, she stuck a disgusting drink into my hands.
After all of my exertions at dialysis today, I didn’t at all feel like cooking anything, so I grabbed some crackers and some of the cheese spread, and an orange for pudding. And when I went to spread the cheese on my crackers, I found that it had gone off. It’s really not my day, is it?
In the end, I started to write up the notes from the day, and I was pushing on quite well but the next thing that I knew was that it was almost 22:00 and I must have fallen asleep in mid-page at some time previously.
At that point, I was in absolutely no state at all to carry on working, so I posted what I had written, added a “To Be Continued” stamp and went to bed. I’ll finish everything off tomorrow.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about things breaking down … "well, one of us has" – ed … two young Russian conscripts walk to the Ukraine front line and surrender to the Ukrainians.
"Our lorry has broken down, we’ve no more fuel, and we’ve been abandoned. " they said.
They are consequently taken prisoner, but one of the Ukrainians is a mechanic. "There’s no-one about" he said. "Let’s go and see if we can salvage it."
The Russian prisoners lead the Ukrainian patrol to the lorry, and the mechanic gives it a good examination.
After half an hour, he announces "the fuel pipe has come off and all the fuel has drained away. There’s a hole in the sump that has drained out all the oil, the cam belt has snapped, one of the tyres is punctured, the starter has fallen out and there’s a leak of water in the radiator."
"A leak in the radiator?" asks one of the Russians. "I can’t remember doing that."