Wednesday 14th December 2016 – IT’S NOT LOOKING …

… so good.

Blood count collapsed to 8.7 and protein loss dramatically risen to 2.4. And not only that, there might be a thrombosis in my lower right leg. All of this means that I have to go back – not in a fortnight, not in a week, but on Monday.

And I’ve had the stimulation injection too. That’s usually the last resort before the transfusions.

I am so fed up.

My sleep last night was disturbed. There wasn’t much of it and I had to go down the corridor too. but I’d been on my travels. Back in a relationship and back to Labrador. Clearly my subconscious is trying to tell me something.

My eye appointment was at 10:00 and my hospital appointment was at 11:10. but at 13:30 I was still having my eyes seen to. The bad news here is that my eyesight has deteriorated considerably with my illness – deteriorated to such an extent that they can’t give me a full prescription for the eyesight as my eyes wouldn’t take the dramatic change.

All in all, it’s not going to well.

Then up to the hospital and all of the shenanigans, including an echograph.

I have had my medicaments all changed and quantities adjusted, and that should see me through. And then back on Monday as I said.

I used my little wok tonight and it really was good. My tea worked out just fine.

Now I’m exhausted and I’m going to have an early night. i’m completely fed up with all of this

Tuesday 13th December 2016 – I’M NOT BUYING …

…any of these burgers and schnitzels.

They might be on sale in the Bio range of the Delhaize supermarket in the centre of Leuven, but they don’t look as if the are vegetarian, never mind vegan, do they?

Yes, I went up to town today to do some shopping. A baguette, some hummus, some rice and a carton of iced tea, and that’s me fixed up for the next few days.

Not only that, I was browsing around in the HEMA on the corner, and that had a mini-wok on sale, reasonably good quality, for just €10:00. It’s just the thing for cooking while I’m here, and with this I can do some fried onions and all that kind of thing.

My curries will take on a new dimension with this machine.

With my early night last night, I was wide awake by 06:30. I’d been on my travels during the night, but don’t ask me where I’d been now, because it’s all gone out of my head.

By the time that the alarm went off, I was already eating my breakfast and that is something that hasn’t happened for a long time, has it?

And then I came back to my room to witness the excitement.

They’ve turned the Kruisstraat, the street at the side of the building, into a one-way street but not too many people have taken much notice of it.

Consequently, they sent a police van and a police patrol out to ambush the motorists. But if you notice, you’ll see that the police van is parked the wrong way round in the one-way street, and that’s the kind of thing that can only ever happen in Belgium.

After lunch, I carried on with some work on the website, with a little bit of rest here and there, and then I went for my tea and an extremely lengthy chat with my housemate.

It’s late now, and so I won’t have much of a decent sleep unfortunately. But that’s the kind of thing that happens when you socialize, and that’s a new experience for me.

Monday 12th December 2016 – WHAT A GOOD …

… night’s sleep that was. I was off early – awoke to switch off the radio and there I was, gone until about 06:45. And gone on my travels too. I was in a relationship with one girl, a relationship with which I wasn’t happy and so I was trying to involve myself in a relationship with a second but somehow, beyond all my control, I was drifting towards a relationship with yet a third girl and it was all becoming very, very complicated.

I was alone at breakfast and then came back here and tidied up in my room, trying to put the stuff away seeing as I’m going to be here for quite a bit. But round about 10:30 I went down to Caliburn and sorted out a pile of stuff to bring back.

Including my halogen heater. The radiator in my room isn’t working properly and I sent a mail to the landlord about it, but I want to be on the safe side.

Narrowly avoiding being knocked down on a pedestrian crossing by a wayward cyclist, I came back here to drop off the stuff and then went to the supermarket on the corner for a baguette, a lettuce and some pears. Back here, I had a coffee to warm me up because it was freezing outside.

After lunch I was disturbed by the central heating man who bled my radiator and that’s much better. I didn’t need my halogen heater after all.

Once he’d gone, I cracked on with work. I’ve found a magazine from the International Grenfell Associaton, the charity that supplied health services to the Labrador coast in the days from the turn of the 20th Century until 1949 when Labrador was a forgotten British colony. All of the issues from 1903 until the 1970s are on line now and there are tons of stuff of interest in them.

Tea was a lentil curry, and I was joined by a British guy who is staying here. He proudly told me that he voted for the Brexit, but was here to work. The irony, if not absurdity of his position has clearly gone right over his head.

It was delicious, my lentil curry too, with more left for tomorrow too.

Now it’s an early night again. I hope that I have as good a sleep as I had last night.

Sunday 11th December 2016 – SEE IF YOU CAN GUESS …

… where I am right now.

In fact, if I walked forward a dozen or so spaces and stood on that slab just there in between the rails, I’d be on the very spot where the Armistice was signed between the Allied powers and Germany on 11th November 1918.

And it’s also the place where the armistice was signed between France and the German Reich on 22nd June 1940 and which brought to an end the Battle of France.

And despite what you might hear, this is not the railway carriage in which the armistice was signed, even though it dies carry the same fleet number.

After the signing of the 1940 Armistice, the original carriage was taken to Germany where it was displayed for a while in Berlin. But as the noose closed in around the city, the carriage was one of the artefacts evacuated.

It was taken to relative safety to near Ohrdruf in Thuringia, but was burnt by the Germans in late April 1945 to stop it falling back into Allied hands.

This carriage here is one of the original carriage’s younger sisters, but is fitted with many of the fittings and accessories of the original carriage, which were discovered in Berlin after the end of the War.

There are quite a few other bits and pieces on display here too.

This is a Renault FT light tank of 1918, and despite being built less than 2 years after the first appearance of the tank on the battlefield, it really is a modern vehicle, well in advance of anything else that any army had to offer at the time and is the basis of almost every subsequent tank built even today.

In fact the design was so advanced that dozens of them went to war in World War II with several different armies. The one here actually did see action in the latter stages of World War I.

But pride of place from my point of view in the absence of any contemporary aeroplane, has to be this piece of artillery

This is the French Army’s 75mm rapid-fire cannon, much better known as the soixante-quinze. And when I say “rapid fire”, I really do mean “rapid fire”. The official firing rate of one of these is 7 shells per minute, but fully-trained crews have been times as firing 24 and even more rounds per minute under pressure.

This was certainly the most astonishing piece of artillery of World War I and its rapid rate of fire with a trained crew saved many a battle.

You could always tell when they were at the front because instead of going off with a dull thud or a bang like most artillery pieces, they had a very distinctive whine that anyone who has ever seen a World War I film featuring the French Army will immediately recognise. It sends a similar shiver up my spine as does the hooter of a North American diesel engine.

Apart from that, the one trouble with going to bed early is that you awaken early. And after a long while of tossing and turning, I finally rose up from my (very comfortable) stinking pit to find that it was … errr … 04:26

But never mind. That gave me an opportunity to back up all of the files on the laptop and to do a few other things too.

And have a shower. And a shave. And not just clean clothes but brand spanking new socks and undies. I bought a pile of those last year just before I was taken ill, and I hadn’t even unwrapped them. Anyway, I’ve brought them with me.

Breakfast could have been a little better, but apart from that, I enjoyed my stay at the Akena Hotel here at Claye-Souilly and I’ll remember this place for again, that’s for sure. Add it to the list if I can’t make one of my other two stops. It was a good find.

By 11:00 I was back on the road and after fuelling up with diesel on the N2, headed off for the clearing at Compiègne. This was another one of the places on my list that I can now cross off.

The rest of the journey was pretty uneventful and even after my sight-seeing, I was back here in my little room by 17:00 with a couple of bags full of stuff.

I had a good rest, a pizza from round the corner, and now I’m off to bed. I’ve had a busy last few days and I need to catch up with my beauty sleep.

Saturday 10th December 2016 – I’M GLAD …

… that I went home.

I was dreading what I was going to find when I returned, and with a mouse loose in the attic I feared the worst. In the middle of winter too, and an Auvergnat one at that.

But I really must have made a pact with the devil or something because although it was cold at night, the days were like spring days – plenty of sunshine non-stop from morning until night and the batteries were always fully-charged by 11:00.

There was accordingly more than enough power to run the ash-sucker, and that made short work of the mess. I gave the table a really good scrub too so that looks okay, and with some of the tidying-up that I did, it looks much better than it has for a while.

The cold wasn’t a issue either because I had had the foresight to bring a huge pile of wood up last year. That was now nice and dry and the attic heated up in seconds once I fired up the woodstove. What a good buy that was!

All in all, while I can’t see me going back to live there full-time now, I had a satisfactory stay there and I’m glad that I did it.

But returning to our moutons, as the French say, I dunno what happened at all last night. I was in bed quite early as I said, and I was soon asleep. But I awoke again at about midnight when the alarm went off – I knew that it was a mistake to put new batteries into the clock here and I wish that I could remember now how to switch off the alarm. But I did notice that with the fire on last night the temperature in here reached 26.3°C. That’s not bad for December.

I must have gone back to sleep again, but it wasn’t for long. I’ve no idea what time it was that I awoke but after tossing and turning around in bed for ages and ages, I went for a stroll down the corridor and noted that it was 06:20. And that was that – I couldn’t go back to sleep.

It wasn’t as if anything had awoken me either. No beastie scratching away at the roof or anything like that. It’s rather a disappointment when I was hoping for an early night ready to hit the road this afternoon.

After breakfast I started to load up Caliburn and then tidied up in the attic and gave everything a good once-over. By the time that I had finished, it was just before 12:00 and so I thought to myself “sod it” and we hit the road.

An anxious moment while I couldn’t remember where I had put the key to my room in Leuven, but I found that and off we set.

A stop for lunch at 14:00 on a motorway service station near Cosne sur Loire, and then I drove on northwards.

Now here’s a thing.

We have had beautiful, glorious weather down in the Auvergne but suddenly, as I hit Dordives, a bank of fog came rolling across the motorway. And the temperature plummeted in minutes from 13.8°C to 7.1°C.

From then on, all the way northwards, this was what it was like, and I’m glad that it hadn’t been like this back at home.

And doesn’t Strawberry Moose take a good photo?

We hit the usual problems on the Francilienne, all the way along and it got worse because my hotel, the Akena Hotel which is another Budget chain at €46:00 that I have yet to try, is in the middle of a centre commerciale, a shopping centre at Claye-Souilly and I arrived at chucking-out time.

It was freezing here with the fog, and the receptionist told me that it had been like this all day here too.

It took a while to sort out the heating and after my pizza had come, I had a shower. And now I’m off to bed, ready for part II of my journey.

Friday 9th December 2016 – I HAD MY …

… early night, and I was quickly away with the fairies too. But I was soon awakened by some kid of beastie scratching away in the roof.I’d forgotten all about them, you know, and how they used to scratch away all the blasted time. I did recall how, on my first night asleep in the bedroom downstairs, how deep a sleep I had without being disturbed at all.

But anyway, this scratching went on for quite a while and I couldn’t get off to sleep while all of this was going on. It was so annoying. But anyway, I did finally go off to sleep and was wide awake again before the alarms went off.

After breakfast and a little relax, I made a start. The corner in the attic that had been left open for access to the cables and (whenever it might be) the water pipes for the solar heat exchanger, I cut some plasterboard quickly and screwed it up to cover the gap on both walls. And then I cut a bigger piece for the ceiling to close all of that up too.

There’s a hole too behind one of the beams that I hadn’t managed to fill in when I did the ceiling. I cut some wood offcuts and I’ve blocked that off now – well, sort-of.

All of this involved a huge run-around for bits and pieces of wood and plasterboard. All of this wore me out completely. I had to stop regularly for a rest and at the end of it all it took me until just after 13:00 to do a couple of simple jobs like that. It’s easy to see just how much this illness has affected me.

But one thing can be said – and that is the 500-watt ash-sucker that I had bought years ago with the aim of converting it into a vacuum cleaner. Seeing as how we were having another impressive day, I gave it a run out to clean up the dust and plasterboard. And it worked in spades too. It’s made an astonishing difference to everything, particularly once I’d started to attack the rest of the room with it. I should have tried this before, and I wish that I had more time to do it again.

After lunch, I did a little more tidying up and then went down to pick up Caliburn. And he was ready too. And even more interestingly, the bill came to much less than half what I had paid in Brussels. He had checked the other side too, the one that they had done up there and told me that it was okay and any other sound that I might hear are not anything to worry about.

As an aside … "you’ll get used to these" – ed … I’d enjoyed driving my little Peugeot. Certainly showing her age, but she was still a fun car to drive around in and considering it had cost me just the diesel to borrow her, I had had a good deal.

Montlucon was next. I was early so I went for a stroll around, and then down to the tyre place. Caliburn now has brand new tyres on the rear to go with his good snow tyres on the front, and a reasonable spare too. Two more snow tyres next winter and then two more decent Hankooks in 18 months time and that will do for a couple of years.

With a full tank of fuel, I drove back here. It was 18:45 when I returned.

After tea, I had a relax again and now I’m going to have an early night. I’ve decided to hit the road tomorrow and head back to Leuven.

Thursday 8th December 2016 – LAST NIGHT, I DIDN’T …

… have such a good night’s sleep. I dozed off quickly enough, even with the radio on, but I was soon awake again when something loud came on the radio. And once I’d sorted that out, I couldn’t go back to sleep again for ages.

However,I must have done because the alarm awoke me. And then it took ages to leave the comfort and warmth of my bed. I’d been on my travels too for some part of it, wandering around somewhere with a young lady.

For the first part of the morning I pottered around and then set off for the garage to leave Caliburn for his wheel bearing.

The courtesy car was there too this time. It’s a 1994 Peugeot 306 with 308,000 kilometres on the clock and a rear flasher that didn’t work.

There wasn’t any diesel in it either so I had to put 12 litres in it to get me about, an don my way back home I went via the Intermarché at Pionsat for a little shopping and to visit the bank.

Liz phoned me up too and we had a good chat.

After lunch I carried on with the tidying up in here, slow as it is, and then went down to see how Caliburn was doing. But he wasn’t ready and that’s something of a disappointment as I would have been on the road tomorrow had he been ready. Now, I have no idea when i’m going to leave here.

Tea was mushrooms, green beans, vegetables and pasta in tomato sauce cooked in the oven. And that was nice too.

So let’s have an early night and see what tomorrow will bring us.

Wednesday 7th December 2016 – AND SO …

… as it cooled down here last night I snuggled up underneath my quilt on the sofa. and that was everything that I remember until the alarm went off at 07:00.

By 07:15 and the second alarm, I was taking full advantage of the comporting toilet. And seeing as how it hasn’t been used for over a year and there was some stuff in there from before I left, I had living proof that my comporting toilet really does work.

It took me a while to gather my wits, which takes quite a long time these days as we all know, and then I went off on the attack. There were a few clean clothes hanging around in the bedroom so I put them away. And then I sorted out some work clothes.

Downstairs, I checked over all of the tyres. Two of the winter tyres are really quite good but the other two were border-line and I have been thinking about replacing them. In the end, after much thought, I’ve left them back in the tyre pile and just fitted the two front ones. Caliburn is front-wheel drive of course and so if snow tyres are going anywhere, that’s the best place for them. I’ll buy two new ones next year.

I reckon that the two new Hankooks that I’m having on Friday – they can go on the rear and then Caliburn will really be set up. In the spring I’ll put the work Hankooks on the front and run the rest of the tread off.

Hanging up the spare wheel in its cradle was rather fun. It took me ages to work out how it went, which is quite a surprise. It’s one of those things that once you work it out, it goes up in seconds and you wonder where the difficulty was.

Caliburn has been emptied, everything has been sorted out and piles of stuff discarded. It looks quite good in there now. There’s plenty of food in there to tide me over for much of the time while I’m in Belgium. It’ll keep me out of mischief for a while.

I went down to the garage but … shock!… horror! … the hire care hadn’t come back in. I can’t leave Caliburn because I have no way of getting back home again. And so I’ll have to come back tomorrow morning. This is getting to be quite uncomfortable.

Back here I made a butty and then took downstairs all of the crockery and cutlery that I use regularly, and washed it under the water butt. I feel a little more comfortable about that now.

I had a little tidying session and sorted out a few more things to take back to Belgium, did a little work on the website and then lit the fire to warm me up and make tea. Pasta, ratatouille, vegetables and a bit of boulghour and I was well away this that. And for the first time in I don’t know how long, I watched a film.

Now I’m ready to bed and I hope that I sleep as well as I did last night.

Tuesday 6th December 2016 – SO HERE I AM …

… back home again to stay for a few days if I can last out. The first time that I will have stopped here since November last year.

And I wish that I wasn’t here either. The internet is down, the ‘phone isn’t working, the room is covered in dust, some animal has made it inside and made a mess that I shall have to clear up. It’s all so depressing.

I lit the fire and that immediately awoke a hibernating fly that has been buzzing around my head all night. I can’t find half of the stuff that I need for cooking so it was a very rudimentary meal that I had, cooked in the oven bit of the woodstove so that’s something, I suppose. But I can’t see me being here for long.

On a more positive note, all that I can say about these Ace Hotels is that they live up to their names. I’ve paid twice the price for conditions and facilities that haven’t been as good as this. I had a really good sleep and was off on my travels again during the night, although you are probably eating your breakfast this morning so I’ll spare you the details.

Breakfast was superb too. In fact, everything about it was definitely good value for money from my point of view.

When they threw me out I went to the Tax Office and found that my hospital payments are all up-to-date which is good news. I did a little shopping and then headed out to Evaux-les-Bains. I was early so I tidied up a little (yes, just a little) in Caliburn. The garage where I have to go is a body shop as you might expect, and he had an old Ford Vedette V8 awaiting attention.

These are copies of 1940s American cars sold by Ford France, and when that company was nationalised after World War II, Simca took over the plant and designs and carried on making them. Simca Vedettes are reasonably common, but a Ford is rare.

So we have a plan for the repair, and he’s going to have a look at the rust that’s appearing on the nearside sill while he’s at it. I’m entitled to borrow a car while the repair work is being done, so I may as well have everything done all at once.

From there I had a delightful meander through the countryside. The wheel bearing is by now driving me mad so I went to see the garagiste there and we had a chat. He can fit Caliburn in Wednesday afternoon and Thursday which is good for me – it means that I can hit the road Friday night. He’s going to find me a hire car for a couple of days while Caliburn is receiving attention.

I’ll nip into Montlucon tomorrow morning and take two wheels with me. If the tyres have arrived, i’ll have them fitted. If not, I’ll leave the wheels and go back for them in the hire car. That means that I’ll spend the first part of the morning fitting Caliburn’s winter tyres on the front.

That’s what I should have done in the first place.

Monday 5th December 2016 -DRAT AND DOUBLE-DRAT!

The other week, we discussed the problem of burst tyres on the motorway.

And so it should come as no surprise to learn that it was the turn of Yours Truly today.

Not quite on the motorway – in fact about 400 metres after I’d pulled off at Montlucon. But a flat tyre just the same. There’s a nail in it somehow.

Luckily, if there is such a thing that can be called lucky, regular readers will recall from 2012 when I had a blow-out on the M6 near Stoke on Trent, I’d pushed the boat out and bought three really good Hankook tyres. The fourth was a second-hand cheap tyre that I had bought because of the wheel that was attached to it. There was plenty of tread on it but I didn’t expect it to last very long. Anyway, it’s this one that has the puncture.

There’s a spare on Caliburn and that was a second-hand one that I bought for the wheel (it was the time when I was collecting a second set of wheels for the winter tyres). But when I had a look at it … well … I’ve thrown away better tyres than this. A fair amount of tread to be sure, but standing around for as long as it has has done it no favours. But at least I was mobile with not much effort.

My new enhanced mobility took me to the LeClerc supermarket where I stocked up with another big supply of food for Belgium. And while I was there, I had another big laugh at the selfishness of other drivers.

The driver of this car parked it up at the supermarket – and pretty badly parked at that – and walked away – and then turned round to come back and parked his car even worse, straddling the white lines.

The selfishness of people is astonishing, isn’t it?

Having done the shopping, I went off in search of some tyres. I’ve ordered two brand-new Hankooks and they will be delivered on Friday. They will be going on the front, the other Hankook that is still on the front will be the spare, and the nasty spare tyre will be going in the bin.

But I’m not thinking very clearly here. What I should have done was to forget about the new tyres, come back home and fitted Caliburn with his winter tyres on the front. And the money situation is going to be important because on the way down from Leuven, I could feel the other wheel bearing start to tighten up and that’s going to have to be looked at. It’s yet more expense that I can do without.

I had a decent sleep last night and the breakfast at the Premiere Class was quite good. And then I hung around there doing stuff until about 11:00. When they threw me out of the hotel I hit the road and drove steadily down to Montlucon

I cut the corner off down at the end of the road and came back through Bourbon l’Archambault, and this building caught my eye.

You should all know what it is because I’ve taken you to see a few of these. It’s the old railway station of Bourbon l’Archambault and the railway concerned is the tacot, the metre-gauge railway network that covered the Allier during the first half of the 20th Century.

Built far too late to have a decisive influence on the country’s transport policy and built too cheaply, serving the layout of the terrain rather that the needs of the passengers (one commentator described the railway stations as decorating the abandoned landscape), the only surprise was that they lasted aslong as they did before road transport swept them away

There’s a new chain of budget hotels opening in France – called Ace Hotels. One has been built on the edge of Montlucon and so I went for a look around.

At just €49:00 per night, it’s excellent. Certainly the best budget hotel in which I’ve ever stayed. The only complaint is that there aren’t enough of them yet.

My view from the window was excellent, right across the motorway and into the Combrailles at the back. That’s where I’ll be heading tomorrow.

So in the meantime, I ordered a pizza and wasn’t that a disappointment? Overpriced, undercooked and crushed up on one side of the box – someone had carried it vertically.

I shan’t be going to that pizza place again.

Sunday 4th December 2016 – I’VE HAD A FEW …

… twinges just recently but last night I had a major attack of cramp. Both calves too and I was in agony for half an hour. First time for absolutely months and months and months. I’d almost forgotten all about them.

But eventually the pain wore off and I could carry on with sleeping – until the alarm went off.

I’d been back to Labrador as well during the night. That seems to be a regular route these days. It’s all clearly playing on my mind.

First into breakfast this morning, and all alone too. and my 08:05 I’d finished, been to the boulanger for my baguette and rescued three plastic crates from the skip at the supermarket.

The morning was spent doing some tidying up (which is not like me, is it) and getting my room ready for being away for a week or so. I have to make an effort, I suppose. I did some stuff on the laptop too and an early lunch saw me down the road and at Cailburn by 14:00.

We hit the streets and fuelled up and then had a very uneventful drive down as far as Paris. One thing that I had forgotten is that Sunday late afternoon it’s “red” rates on the péage in the direction of Paris and I really was nailed for that. It wasn’t half painful

The Franciliènne was packed too – end-to-end traffic all the way around and it didn’t clear either. Things only eased off when i left and headed into Melun.

Plenty of room at the Première Classe on the edge of the city and the room was quite comfortable, even though some people in the room above seemed to be having a party. I had a really good pizza brought to me and then I crashed out for an hour or so.

Tomorrow after breakfast I’ll have part II of my journey, back to Montluçon at least. To do some shopping tomorrow evening and find a place to stay ready for part III.

Saturday 3rd December 2016 – AND IF YOU THINK …

… that the last couple of nights were bad, you ain’t seen nuffink yet. Because there I was, it was 06:30, and I was still wide-awake. I just couldn’t drop off at all, and I’ve no idea why.

But I must have done shortly after that. And I heard the alarm go off at 07:00, and the next one at 07:15, but that was nothing like enough to make me leave my bed. Instead, I breakfasted at something like … errr … 10:30.

I was up in town a little later to buy some stuff for my butties. And here I had a big surprise.

There was a new van on there and it seemed to be advertising home bakery products, including bio, lactose-free, gluten-free and vegan products.

I had quite a chat with the owner and he pointed out to me the products that he had which were vegan. There were two varieties of cake that you buy by the slice and some biscuits too. That was so exciting.

He’s here every Saturday so I shall be frequenting him when I come back.

After lunch, I had a shower and a clean up ready for Alison coming round. We went down the road to the café for a coffee and a good chat about this and that, all that’s happened to us for the last couple of weeks.

Alison ran me down to the railway station afterwards where I bought my ticket.

OH Leuven are playing away tonight against AFC Tubize. Tubize is a town that I have never visted and of course I’ve certainly never seen the football club play. Apart from that, as I said to Alison, I ought to get out more often and connect with the real word every now and again, and going to the football is one way of doing it.

The ground is a good 20 minute stroll south of the railway station and, would you believe it, there’s no fritkot between the town centre and the ground that I could see. That meant that I had to do without my tea. But isn’t that astonishing?

The ground is a modern two-sided wonder with a couple of concrete stands with basic seat forms put on there. Underneath the stand where I’m sitting is a long hall with a pie hut inside and the players’ changing rooms and the like. It’s all very basic.

It cst me €15 for a seat which wasn’t so bad, but actually finding my place was something else. The security guards clearly didn’t know the stadium all that well and I was sent from pillar to post before I found the correct entrance.

I suppose that a good number of other people had difficulty finding the ground too, because I don’t think that I’ve ever seen such an empty stadium at this level of football. At a rough estimate of what I could see, there can’t have been 1500 people in the ground for this match. 100 away supporters if they were lucky.

The Kop for the home fans is a little standing area on the far side -capacity about 500 I suppose and maybe 120 people in it. They made a bit of noise I suppose, but it wasn’t anything to be worked up about.

There’s another small stand behind the goal, out of shot to the left. That maybe has room for 700 people I suppose but it was empty and closed off.

It’s not quite a one-sided wonder that you might find in Scottish lower-league football but it’s not far off. One of those places where they set out with the best intentions and then ran out of money.

As for the match itself, the first half was pretty uneventful. Both sides had their chances, including a shot from an AFC Tubize player that hit the post, rolled along the goal-line and back into play, with Gillekens in the Leuven goal totally flat-footed.

But there were a few strange decisions out there. The OH Leuven n°10 was being kicked, pushed, dragged and swatted off the ball by the defenders and never a foul was awarded despite how much protesting he did; It totally astonished me.

And when he was booked for complaining too much, I really did feel for him.

At half-time, I went down for a hot drink. I dunno what they flavoured my hot water with, but at €2:00 it was flaming expensive

The second half was a little more lively at first, and OH Leuven took the lead. They have a centre-forward called Casagolda who somehow has always flattered to deceive. But today, he had a really good game, living up to his promise. as a Tubize player dallied on the ball à la Pionsat defence, ha was harried out of it and Casagolda whacked it into the net.

The game them came alive and we had about 25 minutes of exciting football and it was a shame that the match couldn’t have been played like this all the time.

OH Leuven scored a second with about 15 minutes to go, and they hit the bar and had another cleared off the line too. As it finished, they thoroughly deserved the victory.

I walked back into town looking for a fritkot. I photo-bombed a group photo and so was invited to be formally included in it, which was good fun, and then carried on my search.

I walked past the really beautiful Church of St Gertrude and eventually came across a fritkot on the way out of town. a big bag of chips and garlic sauce was beautiful and as I sauntered back to the railway station I noticed that if I had come out of the station building via the second door, I would have been right by a fritkot.

GRRRRR!

The train brought me to Brussels-Midi and then we had more excitement as our train to Leuven via the Airport arrived at the wrong platform and we all had to run for it.

By 0045, freezing cold, I was back in my little room in my hostel. I’d had a lovely day out with good company, and now I’ll have a good night’s sleep ready for my trip tomorrow.

Friday 2nd December 2016 – I ACTUALLY MADE IT …

… out this morning.

Last night was yet another late night – 02:00 this time – and I had to leave my bed during the night too which is disappointing. The first time for ages too.

I’d been on my travels during the night too – back to Labrador and exploring a few isolated settlements with a few other people too but I can’t remember who it was now.

When the alarms went off, I ad little trouble leaving my bed. Breakfast was another problem though as there was no orange juice available. I’m not a big fan of apple juice but that’s all there was.

After breakfast I came down here and cracked on with a few other things that I needed to do. And I didn’t forget the Bank either for that was where I went when I went out this morning. At 11.20 I was in the Fortis Bank around the corner and paid the rent for my three-month stay.

On the way back I went via the supermarket for the bread and a bottle of drink – I get through pints of liquid these days with this problem that I have.

after lunch I cracked on with my website until tea time, on-and-offish, and finished off the kidney bean whatsit for tea.

That’s the highlight of my day anyway. At least I didn’t crash out at all.

Tomorrow I’m off gallivanting and then Sunday I’m hitting the road.

Thursday 1st December 2016 -I HAD A …

… very bad night last night.

Well, sort-of-ish anyway.

Remember yesterday when I told you about that good book that I downloaded yesterday? So there I was last night reading it and I happened to notice the time. 03:30 it was.

It’s been a long time since I’ve been so deeply engrossed in a book like that, I have to say. I was well-away. But anyway, I closed down the laptop, turned off the light, and went to sleep – or, at least, tried to.

I must have dozed off eventually because it was the alarm that awoke me. And surprisingly, I didn’t feel too bad just then. I’d been on my travels too, although I don’t remember anything about it right now.

After breakfast, I lay down here on the bed and closed my eyes for 5 minutes in order to build up my strength ready to face the morning. Next thing that I knew, it was 11:20. i’d been out if it for over three hours. And serve me right too.

I’d missed the bank to pay my lodging, so I mustn’t forget under any circumstances to do that tomorrow. Otherwise I’ll be out on my aspidistra. And coming back from the shower room, I walked into the wrong room. I knew that I would end up doing that sooner or later. Did I say that I’m in a different room here? It’s the cheapest in the house but I have negotiated a good deal so I’m not complaining. It’s just not my usual room and so it’ll take some time to become used to it.

After lunch I cracked on a little with my pages on Happy Valley-Goose Bay. It’s amazing the stuff that has come on line since the last time that I researched into this in early 2011. Tons of stuff and I’m spoilt for choice these days.

Something else that I did this afternoon has shaped my plans for next week. You know that Caliburn was hit in the rear a few weeks ago and needs to be examined. And I’ve also been keen to go home for some time, just for old time’s sake.

And so I rang up the insurance and made an appointment with their expert for Tuesday afternoon. and it’s at Evaux-les-Bains, and so that means that I have to go home. And that’s what I’m going to do. I’m seeing Alison on Saturday afternoon, and so on Sunday morning I shall hit the road and head back.

My plan is to stop on Sunday night at Meaux, and on Monday night at Montlucon – a Première Classe each time. And then go and have Caliburn sorted out on Tuesday and go back home for a few days.

For tea I made a kidney-bean whatsit, with enough for tomorrow night. And then I’ve been searching on the internet. OH Leuven are playing away on Saturday night at Tubize, just south of Brussels. There’s a reliable train service which is quite interesting, as so seeing as I have never really been to Tubize, I’m thinking of it.

Or as William Shakespeare might have said “Tubize or not Tubize? That is the question!”

Wednesday 30th November 2016 – I’VE BEEN BACK …

… to the hospital as you might expect today.

I saw the doctor and he told me the news. Blood count is down to 10.0 from 10.6, although not as low as 9.7 as it was the other week.

We had a chat about the protein loss too. It’s supposed to be 0:15 and mine is 0:51. But that’s somewhat better than 1:11 that it was last week and nothing like what it was a while ago at 2:98. It seems to be that the higher the blood count, the higher the protein loss. The protein loss is as bad, apparently, as the blood count and a low blood count with low protein loss is as good as a high blood count with a high protein loss.

This is why they don’t seem to be too worried about my blood count right now because the protein loss thing seems to be working for now. They want to see how it goes for another couple of weeks.

One thing that they did say is that I don’t need to continue with a high-protein diet. But that’s not something that I’m going to abandon for now. It has its benefits, apart from keeping up the proteins in my body in the face of this excessive loss.

But anyway, they threw me out at about 14:00 and I have to go back in two weeks time – but I forgot to go to the reception to check on the time. I shall have to telephone them some time.

And so it took ages to go to sleep last night and to be honest, I didn’t think that I’d dropped off at all. But whatever I did or thought that I might have done, I didn’t move from my bed.

At least, so the story goes. I did leave the bed but only in a virtual fashion. I was off to Labrador last night among the Inuit,carrying out a few projects. But then I moved back to the west and I was trying to track down an Asian girl – one very much like the Vietnamese girl with whom I shared a house a few months ago. We’d managed to track her to a student house not so far away and I knew that one of her former house mates lived there. Off we went to this house – it was a modern, expensive type of place and when we arrived there was a big party going on in there; Loads of students about and I remember saying to whoever I was with that I wouldn’t like my house treated like this at all; Anyway we found the girl and she told us where the Asian girl could be found. We had a file of hers that needed to be given to her and so I was all for taking this file around to her new place but the others seemed to think that we should just put a white name tag in it and put it in a pouch that we could stick to the side window of the house where we were. A silly idea, if you ask me, but that was what we did.

I wasn’t alone at breakfast – there were the usual crowds – and then after I did a little work, I set off for the hospital. It was freezing outside – minus 3°C apparently – and it’s only going to become worse apparently.

After the hospital I came back here for a relax and a crash out for a while and then round about 16:00 I went off down to Caliburn to fetch some more stuff back. I remember the hair cutter but I forgot the nail scissors though – I’ll have to find them next time I’m down there.

There’s a good book that I discovered on the internet this afternoon.It’s called “Outlines of the Geography, Life and Customs of Newfoundland and Labrador” and it’s about 800 pages of observations of a Finnish expedition to Labrador and Newfoundland back in 1937 and 1939.

It’s full of observations from a most unusual group of people and contains a lot that is glossed over by more-mainstream historians. And I enjoy reading books like these because I can add the stuff into what I write and recirculate them, to make sure that they aren’t forgotten.

For tea, I finished off the lentil curry from last night and now it’s almost bed time.

I deserve a good sleep. It was quiet last night and the more of this that I can get, the better.

EPIC HALL

The Poisoned Pen (or Poisoned Chalice, more like) – or my relentless struggle against reality