Saturday 12th December 2015 – REMEMBER …

… that I talked last night about my early night last night and waking up in the small hours? It was at about 05:00 that I eventually turned off the light and settled down to sleep again. Of course, I was in the really deep sleep cycle when the alarm went off, and so that really was something of a waste of an early night.

After breakfast, I went and had a nice hot shower – the one that I should have had yesterday morning – and then I settled down to do some work. I had to finish off my revision, and that took ages for some reason or other – and then I had my exam.

The exam didn’t take too long to do and I ended up with 93% as my score. I’m quite happy with that of course, but I can’t remember now where it was that I dropped my missing points. I had to complete an on-line survey too, and that seemed to take longer than the exam.

I’ve now started transcribing my notes from my journey to Canada in the autumn. High time that I caught up with this, having neglected it for so long. I have four weeks until my next course begins so I need to make the most of the time available.

And the district nurse came round to inject me, and tonight it was really rough. He really hurt me and I was in pain for about half an our afterwards, and I can still feel it now. I’m really not enjoying this illness one little bit and it’s all down to the little things like this. I hate needles at the best of times but people really are taking the mickey out of me.

-1

Friday 11th December 2015 – EEEUUURRRGGGHHH

I had to go to the hospital today. And so that meant a 07:00 start. And never did I feel less like it either after yet another uncomfortable night.

When the alarm went off I crawled downstairs and made a coffee. Some muesli and fruit juice later, I was properly fed and watered but still not on the same planet as anyone else, I reckon.

As I drove to Montlucon I slowly started to wake up and by the time I arrived at the hospital I was maybe feeling as much as half-human. “Half-man, half-aardvark” I thought to myself. “I’ve clearly been varking too ard”. But at least my luck was in somewhere. I was 20 minutes early and there was a parking place right outside the door of the hospital.

One of the more friendly nurses was on duty at the day-hospital and she even found me a mug of coffee to go a little further in rousing myself from lethargy. But she has three goes at trying to put a drain in me, without much success, and went off to call a colleague to have a go. I thought to myself “hang on a minute – these b******s are playing darts with me!”. They were all having a good moan about not being able to find a vein with any blood in it. “Hardly surprising” I retorted. “You’ve already taken most of it!”

So I was there at 08:40 – I had a drain put in at 09:40, and the blood finally arrived at … errr … 11:40, by which time we were three people in a day ward meant for two. They managed to conjure up something for lunch too – mushrooms in tomato sauce with rice and bread, with a pear for dessert. Hardly the most appetising meal that I’ve eaten – I’ll take butties next time.

My first blood pochette was empty by 13:05 – and it took until 14:00 for them to couple up the second. As a result, I wasn’t able to leave until 15:30 and that annoyed me a little – I should have been long gone from here by then. But feeling like nothing on earth, I went for a coffee in the cafe while, apparently, all the time they were frantically searching for me to tell me that I need to come back on Tuesday at 10:40 for another series of tests.

So having recomposed myself a little I went back home – to Pooh Corner that is. I had a little relax, ate some biscuits and watched something on the laptop. And then I came back to Liz and Terry’s for tea and my evening injection.

None of this did anything to cheer me up and, being totally whacked and thoroughly fed up, by 20:10 I was off to bed. And it wasn’t long before I went to sleep either.

And the result?

Here I am at 04:00 updating my blog. I’ve been awake since about 02:15 and I can’t go back to sleep. I’ll probably be like this now until mid-morning when I’ll crash out yet again and this will mess up my revision plans for today – having had them totally messed up already for today. I’m never going to finish this blasted course.

I just really wish that I could bring a little order into my life right now, but that’s not going to be possible, so it seems.

-1

Thursday 10th December 2015 – IT WASN’T ANYTHING LIKE …

… as good last night as it had been for the previous two nights. It was another night of tossing and turning in bed for a couple of hours in the middle of the night and while I did manage to wander off on my travels, I don’t remember a thing about it.

The nurse came round early enough for my morning injection and also to take a blood sample. I have to go through this routine twice a week, Mondays and Thursdays, as well as my twice-daily injections of anti-coagulant.

Later in in the morning, Terry had to sweep the chimney. It’s blocked up a little and the boiler here isn’t drawing to well. At least that’s his excuse. The real reason is that there will be a couple of Little People here over Christmas and Father Christmas will need to have a free passage into the house.

I think that I have it tough with having to stand on a step-stool and reach out of my attic windows with a very long brush to sweep the snow off my solar panels. To clean his chimney, Terry has to dismantle one of his attic windows, climb out onto the roof and then climb up onto the chimney stack. Then he can brush the chimney downwards from the top. He’s built a soot trap into the wall on the ground floor and all of the soot falls down into there where it can be shovelled out and vacuumed up.

After that, I cracked on alternating between having a doze and doing my revision. That kept me going until 18:30 when I had a most unwelcome phone call. It seems that my blood count is down again and I have to go into the day-hospital tomorrow for a blood transfusion.

An early start, a drive to Montlucon, an injection and then a blood transfusion. I’m not looking forward to tomorrow at all.

-2

Wednesday 9th December 2015 – I’VE BEEN OUT …

… on my travels today – the first time since I came back from hospital last Friday.

In fact, I was out on my travels during the night too. I was working in an aeroplane hangar and one of the jobs that I had to do was to fit a new wheel and tyre on the undercarriage of ar aeroplane. In fact, the wheel bore a very great resemblance to the wheel and tyre that I fitted the other week on my wheelbarrow. And each time I fitted it, the air pressure went down and the tyre went flat. Eventually I had a good listen and I could hear the air escaping from a puncture in the inner tube. But like a good Civil Servant that I was, I’d been told to put this particular wheel and tyre on the aeroplane, and so I did. Fixing the puncture was obviously too much like hard work.
But from there we moved on a little and I was part of an undercover police force that was investigating the theft of a very dangerous chemical from this hangar. It was one that dissolved almost everything with which it came in contact (so how did they find a container in which to keep it?) and was on the Top Secret list. And as we were searching this hangar for clues, there was a man, badly eaten away by the acid and with bits of his body like his left thigh missing and with yellow skin, trying desperately to hide from our view underneath a 50-gallon oil drum that was lying on its side. But having failed in our search, we did however know that something had been posted to someone, put in a letter box somewhere. We were all crushed inside an old Ford Y van, a red Post Office van, and we were looking at all of the letters that had been collected from various letter boxes. All of a sudden, one particular letter caught my eye so I opened it. It was addressed to a cycle maker, and seemed to be some kind of coding in a five-letter group on an old blue order form. We sent a woman with the order form to give to the cycle maker to see what happened, which she did. And a couple of days later, she was called back and gived a brand new specially-made kids’ cycle painted green and white and she looked totally ridiculous on itn being a rather large woman. But we were no further forward and so we retired to plot our next move.

And this is when the alarm went off and I had to struggle to find the phone which, in the meantime, was waking everyone in the house. And I was thinking what another good sleep I’d just had.

After breakfast and the visit of the nurse to give me my injection, I had a shower and packed my bag and then Terry and I set off for Montlucon, stopping on the way at Pionsat for fuel and my order from the pharmacy.

At Montlucon we went to the hospital for my 11:00 appointment, which turned out to be about midday before I was seen.

The good news is that I don’t have leukaemia. The bad news is that I have a form of lymphoma. There are several types of this illness, some of which are quite aggressive and others not so. It seems that I have one of the lesser kinds. There is a whole range of reasons why this might have occurred, and one of these reasons is due to something to do with an aggressive protein, and my blood count shows that there is a protein that has gone off the scale in the blood count. It’s not the “usual suspect” in this respect, but nevertheless it merits further enquiries and so I’m due for further tests.

But as an aside, two points raise their ugly head. If it is a protein issue, there are not the facilities to treat it at Montlucon and so I will have to go elsewhere. It looks as if I’ll be on my travels again in the New Year. And in the second case, I seem to be full of ganglions. Not that they are dangerous apparently, but their presence has certainly been noted and in all kinds of places too.

On the way back we stopped for a late lunch and then went to Neris-les-Bains in search of chocolates for Liz because it’s her birthday today. After that, I went back home, for the first time for almost three weeks.

We’ve had plenty of sun, plenty of wind and plenty of excess solar energy, 694 amp-hours in just 19 days and that’s impressive for a period approaching the winter solstice. I also had a good rummage around and found a spare door lock, and I fitted that onto the front door so that it can be opened from the outside. This might come in handy if people other than me need access to the house.

I hung around here for a while too because, although it was cold, it was nice to be on my own for a while and relax in the relative comfort and security of my own surroundings. As Barry Hay once famously said on the beach at Scheveningen about 25 years ago “I tell you what man, it’s good to be back home”.

I started up Caliburn, threw some spare clothes, soya milk and vitamin B12 drink into the back and set off for Liz and Terry’s. First time Caliburn has had a run out for a while of course. And I mustn’t forget Strawberry Moose who has been invited to spend Christmas away from home.

As I drove back here, I remembered thinking “wouldn’t it be nice if the next round of tests were to reveal that I don’t need these twice-daily injections and the district nurse didn’t have to come round so often” and then I thought “blimmin’ ‘eck – it’s 19:00 and if I don’t put my foot down I’ll miss the nurse!” I had completely forgotten.

But I was back first and here I am at Liz and Terry’s. All ready for Round 2, and trying to work out a cunning plan about going home. I managed to take a huge load of wood upstairs to my attic without stopping, and that was certainly better than before I went to hospital, so things are looking up. I’ll see what my next couple of blood tests tell me and then I’ll make a decision.

-1

Tuesday 8th December 2015 – I WAS OUT …

… of it completely today. I spent most of the day up in the clouds somewhere in the distant land between the sleeping and the waking. It’s been absolutely ages since I’ve felt quite like this.

Mind you, there are a couple of really good reasons for that.

Firstly, I was on my travels again during the night. We were interested in a really big and wealthy businessmen, the Russian oil magnate type. I suspected that he had been up to no good and I was interested in finding out more about him and his activities so I called him into my office and began to ask him questions. I’d been told by my boss that these people were “untouchable” and that we shouldn’t interview them, and that if we did, we wouldn’t be likely to get very much sense out of them, but I ploughed doggedly on nevertheless.
And this led to me being on the London Underground with a girl, smaller and younger than me with loads of black curly hair tied in a kind of bow at the back and she was wearing black-rimmed glasses. We went to the refreshment counter for something to eat and drink but a young boy pushed in front of us. He asked for four coffees but said that he wasn’t to say that he’d been here because last time they had done something nasty to the coffee and he told the other cashier that he wouldn’t ever come again. We had a coffee and a sandwich (I asked my companion if she wanted two sandwiches but she gave me a dirty look) and we took them back to one of the two double beds on top of this iceberg overlooking a kind of ice-beach. On the ice-beach was a guy in swimming trunks admiring the view, the water, the clear blue sky and the bright sunshine, but there was a young woman in a bikini creeping up on him and, much to the consternation of my companion, she pushed him right into the water and he began to struggle desperately while we watched, open-mouthed.

Strange as it is to say it, despite all of this going on, I had the best night’s sleep that I have had for weeks. Apart from a visit down the corridor, I was flat out until the alarm went off and it was all totally painless. I could have stayed in bed like that for a year.

But the second reason is not so good. I had the results of my blood test this morning and my blood count is 9.1. It’s a far cry of course from the 3.8 of three weeks ago, but it’s still a long way short of 13 that is the minimum for good healthy blood. After the 9 pochettesof blood that I’ve had this last couple of weeks, this figure is a major disappointment. It’s no surprise that I’m feeling a little down in the dumps.

And so I spent most of the day stuck in this never-never land, using whatever lucid moments I had in some kind of effort to revise for my end-of-course exam later this week. But I was clearly wasting my time in this respect so I called it a night and crawled off to bed

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Monday 7th December 2015 – HOW ABOUT THIS …

… for being brought back down to earth with a bump?

I can’t remember now what we were discussing but Liz came out with a “well, if you are still with us on Thursday …”, something that I thought was a delightful statement of pessimism. It turns out that what she means is that if I’m not detained in the hospital on Wednesday when I go for my check-up, but that was not how it sounded to me.

My late night last night meant that I was right out of it all through the night, and despite the odd trip here and there to go riding the porcelain horse, I don’t remember a thing. I do remember though waking up with cramp in my good arm, and that was pretty inconvenient. But at least it makes a change from having it in my legs.

The nurse was late too, and seeing as how I was having a blood test today I had to sit around starving until he arrived, and that didn’t improve my humour very much. That showed when I was doing my course work for my Hadrian’s Wall studies. Going back over what I’d written and submitted during the day, I can see that I’m becoming quite petulant in my old age.

I really need to cheer myself up a little, although I’m not quite sure how I can do that, especially given the present circumstances and my current state of health. New Zealand sounds quite enticing right now, sitting on a beach in the sun while everyone in the Northern Hemisphere is freezing to death, but seeing how I need injections twice a day, blood tests twice a week and the occasional control from the hospital, it’s clearly out of the question.

But this leads me on the a fantastic business idea which, I’m sure, would make millions. I’m certain that I’m not the only person to feel like this – there must be thousands like me – so instead of having a hospital, we had a floating hospital and all the sick, miserable and unhappy people like me just steamed off on a cruise somewhere on our floating hospital. Looking out of our “hospital” window one day and seeing Venice – the next day seeing the Acropolis (well, you know what I mean) and maybe even going to visit them – I’m sure that this would cheer up almost everybody. It certainly would cheer me up. There must be some mileage in this idea and I shall have to make further enquiries.

But I’ve effectively finished my course now. All that remains is the revision and then the exam, and then we shall see how I’ve done. But the issue then is “what am I going to do next?”. My animation course doesn’t start until mid-January and I need something to keep me out of mischief until then.

Perhaps I ought to write a book or something similar?

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Sunday 6th December 2015 – IT’S SUNDAY TODAY …

… and in what can only be described as a first for about a hundred years, I set an alarm for s Sunday morning.

Not that I wanted to, but the nurse is coming round some time between 08:00 and 08:30 to give me an injection of anti-coagulant and so I need to be here. Not much point in him coming if I’m still in bed asleep.

But I was glad that I awoke because I’d been on my travels during the night. You won’t be interested in them because I’m not. It was all about hospitals and injections and blood tests, and I’ve had a darn sight too many of all of that just recently. It wouldn’t have been so bad had a nice young attractive nurse featured prominently somewhere, but as if that were ever likely to happen.

We had some more excitement later. Terry and Liz have a Volkswagen Golf but it’s been off the road for a while due to an undetected fault. According to the ECU there’s nothing wrong with the vehicle, but it just won’t start. Several garages have tried (and failed) to get it to go. In fact, it’s just like Crawshay Bailey’s famous engine, and “going to Cardiff College for to get a bit of knowledge” would be about just as much use in this case too.

However, on the internet a week or so ago, there was a very low-mileage engine for sale at a very democratic price and so, to cut a long story short … "hooray" – ed … the engine turned up at lunchtime. With a bit of luck, God’s help and a Bobby, the new engine might be fitted this week some time and who knows? The car might even go!

Anyway, that was about all of the excitement for today. I’ve done a pile of stuff for my course on Hadrian’s Wall, and I’ve been told that in 5 weeks time my course on Animation will start.

Did I tell you about this course on Animation? As you know, I mess around with a 3D program on the computer, one where you can create your own models and perform simple animations, but I’m not much good at it. Whilst the poor specs on this laptop don’t help, a lot of it can be put down to my own lack of technique and so I’m going to be following this course to see what it can teach me.

And that’s really all today. We had the second helping of curry for tea tonight and it was even better, as predicted. And right in the middle of tea the nurse came round to give me my evening injection. Magnificent timing!

I had an early night too – the strain of an 07:45 start on a Sunday was far too much. But someone with whom I hadn’t spoken in ages came on line just as I was about to switch off the laptop and so that put paid to that idea.

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Saturday 5th December 2015 – AND SO …

… here I am, on Day One of my second period of rehabilitation, and I hope that I can keep going for longer this time than I did last time.

I had a nice, warm and comfy bed but something of a disturbed night. Not with pain in the arm of course but with just general restlessness and having to nip to the bathroom a couple of times. And the alarm took me totally by surprise too – it’s been a long time since I’ve heard that of course – but I had to set it as the visiting nurse is coming round sometime between 08:00 and 09:00 so I need to be up.

A leisurely breakfast and then, with it being Saturday, a pile of football on the television. That about sums up my day today. And I did enjoy having a good laugh at Chelsea. I can’t help it because it’s really nice to see, for once, a smaller club getting the “rub of the green” against a multi-million pound outfit.

As for food, while I was in hospital I had spent most of my time imagining all different kinds of meals, one of which was vegan cheese on toast with tomato rings on top. So when Liz asked me what I would like for lunch, then considering that the mobile boulanger had just passed by, there could only be one answer to that question. And it was delicious too.

For tea, Liz made the long-awaited vegan curry. We’ve tried to have this for the last couple of weekends but each time, a crisis (like me going into hospital) has intervened. The French have a saying Jamais deux sans trois – or “never two without a third”, whereas the British say exactly the opposite with “third time lucky”. This time, we were lucky and it was beautiful too.

Furthermore, there’s enough left over for tomorrow and as we all know, spicy food always tastes better the second day.

-1

Friday 4th December 2015 – I’VE LEFT …

…the hospital today and I’m back chez Liz and Terry. And the first thing that Liz did for me was to make me a tea of baked potato, vegan cheese, baked beans and a side-salad. And wasn’t it lovely to have some real proper food properly cooked for once? Never mind eating it – I could have dived into it and rolled around in it.

Last night, with my late night, I didn’t seem to get very much sleep. I lost count of how many times I had to go to the bathroom – it was at least 5 times and could easily have been more. And then we had the usual interruptions of people sticking their heads around the door, people coming to give me injections, all of that kind of thing.

But I did manage somehow to get out and about on my travels too. Not that I remember anything much about it, but I do recall a separated couple being involved, and despite having agreed as part of the terms of separation that they would refer to each other as vous , but we did notice, with smiles on our faces, that they were back to referring to each other with the more familiar tu.

So having had breakfast and so on, I went for yet another shower. I’m really making the most of this. And then we had the bad news. It seems that my medical appointment for later this morning has been cancelled. They still haven’t been able to complete the analysis of all of my examinations.

Mind you, this might be good news. I imagine that they would look for the most serious options first and then they would work their way up the ladder, and the longer that it takes to find the problem, the less serious it might be. But of course, I’m ruling nothing out.

But apparently I’m to have an anti-coagulant injection twice a day at home for the next THREE MONTHS, and a blood test twice a week, and I’ve been given a prescription for a lorry-load of medication. Not only that, Liz has bought some vitamin B12 tablets and some iron tablets, and has found a fruit juice that has B12 in it. I need to make the most of my recuperation and keep a close eye on my diet for a while while I sort myself out.

And I did query the “three months” bit too. Would I still be here in three months? But the doctor did confirm that, in his opinion, there was every likelihood that i’ll be here then, and long after that too. And that’s good news;

At the pharmacy in Pionsat, the bill – just for the first month – came to €474. That doesn’t include the smelling salts that they used to bring me round. This is going to be an expensive illness, I can see that.

So after a good evening’s relaxation, I had an early night. We’d bought an ice -pack and we’d had it in the freezer for a couple of hours, so I put it on my swollen arm to draw the heat and give me a good night’s sleep. But it was totally unbearable after about half an hour so I ended up taking it off. But never mind – it had done the rick and, at least for the moment, the discomfort had gone.

I did warn Liz and Terry to make sure though that when they went to bed to wear plenty of garlic around their necks, just in case I feel thirsty during the night.

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Thursday 3rd December 2015 – WELL, THAT SORTED THEM OUT!

Yes – clearly my discussion with the Accounts department yesterday seems to have worked, and galvanised them into action, because they rang me up this morning to say that the Direct Billing account has now been established and I needn’t worry about the payments.

As if I was worrying about the payments anyway. It’s no concern of mine. As I said yesterday, the hospital could have done all of this on the day that I was admitted.

Anyway, it’s amazing what you can do when you set your minds to doing it, isn’t it, Accounts Department of Centre Hospitalier Montlucon?

Before all of this erupted however, I’d already been on my travels. Down to the depths of the hospital and the domain of the Body-snatc … errr … scanners. It’s like a huge time portal (made by one of my former employers, General Electric) and you pass in and out of it on a cantilever trolley. I did of course ask if I was going to wake up in the 25th Century, but knowing the Auvergne like I do, it’s probably something for bringing people kicking and screaming into the present day.

I had to drink something totally disgusting before I was scanned and to give you an idea of just how unpleasant it was, this is the first place anywhere in any hospital in which I have ever been in mainland Europe where I’ve been offered a cup of coffee afterwards. But that didn’t work and even 15 hours later I can still taste whatever it was.

But there was a moment of light entertainment down there in the bowels of the hospital. In the body-scanner machine you have to wear a kind of helmet and there are different sizes of padding; depending upon the size of your head. Chief Body-Scanner went on a fruitless search to find the right size for me.
Chief Body-Scanner – “but don’t you have a big head?”
Our Hero – “well, there’s quite a lot in it!”.

After that, I was left pretty-much to my own devices and cracked on with my University course on Hadrian’s Wall. A great chance to catch up on the outstanding stuff.

But we did have some kind of interruption. The doctor came to see me “you can go home later on today. You’ll be back tomorrow for a check-up and again in another week”
“I’m not so sure that that’s a good idea” I replied. “I’ll have to disturb someone at work right now to come over 50 kilometres to pick me up, and drive over 50 kilometres back. And then tomorrow, he’ll have to drive me over 50 kilometres to come here and then over 50 kilometres back again. If I can stay until tomorrow afternoon, there will be someone in Montlucon already who can bring me back without the slightest inconvenience to anyone”.

And so common sense has prevailed and I’m here until Liz comes to fetch me tomorrow afternoon.

When Liz turned up later (with some spare undies and a punnet of grapes) I told her the news, and that is indeed the plan. I warned her and Terry to make sure that they had plenty of garlic in and to wear it around their necks when they go to bed just in case I feel thirsty during the night.

And so that was that today. But I didn’t go off to sleep easily. I had borrowed a couple of books from the library and one of them looked quite interesting – namely the story of the discovery of some “treasure” in 1924 in a small village called Glozel, about 60kms from here.

It turned out to be one of the most controversial treasure trove discoveries in the whole of the country because while many of the objects are of a typical early neolithic style, many of them appear to be made in the Medieval period and some even contemporary to the discovery. And this led to all kinds of village feuds, court cases and the like, and the affair rumbles on today.

Anyway, there I was, riveted to this book from start to finish and it was 23:00 when I arrived at the last page. It’s a long time since I’ve been stuck to a book like that.

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Wednesday 2nd December 2015 – JUST FOR A CHANGE …

… I didn’t have a great many interruptions today. And even better, being free of tubes and pipes for once, I took advantage of the shower that is in my little washroom here and had one of the nicest showers that I’ve ever had. And don’t I fell better for it? It certainly cheered me up.

Last night’s sleep was nothing much to write home about, particularly after the good night that I had had previously. But nevertheless I was on my travels once more during the night. I was running a taxi business with a group of kids, all about 9 or 10 and one day we were clearing up the yard and gathered together an enormous amount of waste or scrap which was valued at £280. For this, I was offered a brand-new car and that seemed like a once-in-a-lifetime deal to me so I was keen to accept. But these kids must have misunderstood because they thought that I was swapping it all for a set of new tyres, which was nothing like the same deal. as a result they insisted on accompanying me to do the deal. But we ended up in the local swimming baths and the papers somehow or other found their way into the water and no sooner had I retrieved one of them then another paper would find its way into the water and I had to fish that out of the water too. And so on.

And so having sorted myself out, I had the first of my visits today. I have finally made the acquaintance of the doctor who is dealing with my case. And while she’s not yet completed her enquiries, it’s pointing more and more towards a lymphoma. But in other news, my haemoglobin count has gone right down again to 7.8 and that means that this afternoon I’ll be having another blood transfusion.

We then had the usual pantomime with the Accounts Department. I shan’t bore you with the details because I’ve talked about them before, and doubtless I’ll be talking about them again. But basically, they are moaning that I haven’t paid them anything for my treatment so far. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I have an assurance from my former employers, and the idea is that whenever I go for any major treatment, I produce a card with an emergency phone number on it, the hospital or whatever phones it up and this opens a direct billing account. However, you might recall that the person on “reception” at the Emergency Admissions refused to call it up.

And so I had to request a form, which duly came, and I completed it and handed it to the hospital to fax off and to keep a copy so that they had all of the details to hand. But they refused to do that too, and so I had to post it off my snail mail.

And the result of all of this is that they now have to wait upon the pleasure of the Post office – and serve them right too.

While I was waiting for the blood I did the test that I needed to take for the end of my fourth week of my University course. I ended up with 90% which was disappointing as far as I was concerned because I fell down on the identification of the god Mithras and also on the pathological question concerning the kid’s skeleton that had been disinterred from under the floor of an army barracks.

I’m now four days behind on this course, despite at one stage of having been three days ahead. I need to get a wiggle on.

Later on, they came round with the blood.
“You’re having a lot of blood” said the nurse
“Well don’t worry” I replied. “If you run short, I’ll put on a black cape and prowl the streets of Montlucon at midnight”

They took so much time to organise themselves with this blood that by the time they had finished with the blood transfusion, it was after 22:00. I was too tired to try to watch a film and so I just crawled under the covers and went off to sleep.

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Tuesday 1st December 2015 – YOU WON’T BELIEVE ANY OF THIS …

… but never mind. Do your best, because it really DID happen like this.

First of all, last night’s nocturnal ramble is far from complete. And for a couple of very good reasons too.But the good news is that I had the best night’s sleep that I have ever had in a hospital (despite being woken up two or three times). That, I reckon, is due to the cold poultice or whatever it was that they put on my arm just before I went to sleep. That seemed to do the trick.

So, in as far as I could remember it, I was still in hospital but I’d been allowed out to go to a theatre in Deansgate, Manchester to watch a Chris de Burgh concert with my family (what are they doing intruding into my nocturnal rambles?) and also a very new girlfriend of mine, so naturally I was pleased about this. We went into the auditorium and the first thing that I noticed was that everyone – including us – was dressed in black. But as the concert got under way, I was called back to the hospital for a blood test. Once that had been completed I made my way back to the theatre and ended up going in through the stage door and there was Chris de Burgh, not actually performing, but using a record player to play his records to the audience. He asked me what I was doing there and so I explained that I’d been called away. He apologised that I’d missed half his concert and gave me a free ticket for another one (I noticed that I didn’t ask for two – one for my girlfriend) and so I went into the auditorium and … it was deserted. everyone had gone. I dashed outside and started to scour the streets around Deansgate and Whitworth Street for my friends and this girl but I couldn’t find them at all.

From here we went on, via various removes which I have now forgotten unfortunately what with all of the interruptions and so on, to Stoke on Trent and a housing estate built of 1960s bungalows rather like the top half of Coleridge Way in Crewe. In one of these bungalows lived someone whom I once knew, his wife and his daughter, Zero (who occasionally accompanies me on my nocturnal rambles). The bungalow where we were rather resembled the ground floor of my house in Gainsborough Road, but to get into the sitting room (where the aforementioned were gathered) meant passing under a rather low brick wall, which necessitated crawling, but each time I went to do so I was interrupted by someone who wanted something doing. So by the time I had done that and went back, I was convinced that the arch had become smaller. But before I could pass under the arch it was the turn of someone else to interrupt me with a request. And so it went on, and on, and on, but eventually everyone had been satisfied. So I went to the arch to crawl under into the sitting room, to find that it was now far too small for me to pass under, and I was stranded.

It’s a shame that I’ve forgotten everything else that happened, for I really was riveted to my bed by all of this that was going on, despite all the interruptions. But then someone awoke me quite insistently to say that the Day Ward was to open in half an hour and I needed to leave. And so I said OK and went back to sleep. 15 minutes later they woke me again and I really did have to go. And with that, most of the details of my nocturnal ramble left too.

Back in my real room, I was on my own. I don’t know what had happened to my room-mate of yesterday and I didn’t think it politic to ask. But it was round about here that all of the fun began.

First visit of the morning was the dietician. We had an extremely lengthy chat about my diet yet again, when I set out quite clearly exactly what my dietary requirements were

And the result? For dessert at lunchtime I was served a “Lactel” crème caramel “containing fresh eggs”.

I can see quite clearly that I’m wasting my time here.

But what surprised me even more about the dietician is that she knew nothing whatever about vegans and potential vitamin B12 deficiency and potential iron deficiency. What kind of dietician is this?

Next stop was the echography, where they examined my arm with an ultrasound scan. And not that I know all that much about echographs, but even I could see some kind of foreign body showing up in the scan. It might be a blood clot, or it might be a foreign object, and so I’m destined to have an X-ray all about it.

And so off to the X-ray department where we have one of these 20-somethings in charge. I went to take off my dressing gown but she replied “we can photograph through that, you know”.
I explained that the doctor had drawn on my arm the area of interest, to which her response was “I’ve been doing this job for longer than just yesterday”, and so I left her to it.

When she’d finished (11:50, this was) she wheeled me outside, presumably to wait for a porter to take me back to my ward, and she put on her coat and went off for lunch.

By 12:50, no porter had appeared and I was still sitting in this draughty corridor and I’d had enough. Spoiling for a fight with someone and in a totally foul mood, I set off on foot to find my way back to my ward. It wasn’t easy because the hospital here at Montlucon is quite a labyrinth, but it didn’t really take me too much time and the walk, and the change of scenery, did me good.

Back here, I sent out for my food – seeing as I was an hour late for my lunch – but before I could receive it, the doctor stuck his head around the door “you have to go back to be X-rayed- they’ve X-rayed the wrong place”. So much for our self-confident 20-something, hey?

Back in the basement, I had to wait 20 minutes before I could be seen, but as soon as our 20-something came out and saw me in fighting form, she cleared off and someone else came to X-ray me. Once this had been done, I didn’t even bother waiting. I walked straight back to my ward, and finally had my lunch (with “Lactel” crème caramel “with fresh eggs” as part of a vegan diet).

Liz came round later with a supply of snapping for me to keep in store. Biscuits, crisps, fruit juice, and a big bag of grapes. This is how to be organised for a hospital when the dietician doesn’t seem to have a clue what is involved in a vegan diet. And we did a trade too. I swapped my “Lactel” crème caramel “with fresh eggs” for Liz’s banana.

And the librarian came round with a trolley-load of books from which I could choose. And I joked to Liz that both previous times when the librarian had been round with books and I’d chosen some, I’d moved rooms straight away afterwards.

And so after Liz left, they came round to tell me that I was moving across the corridor. You would have bet your mortgage on this. But at least I’m in a single room again, nice, clean and modern.

Here I seem to have settled in quite nicely and if I have to stay anywhere, this will do me fine. But 5 changes of room in 24 hours must be something of a record in any kind of residential establishment. You couldn’t make that up.

And you couldn’t make up anything else that had happened to me during the course of the day either. It’s astonishing as far as I’m concerned.

But anyway, as the night drew on, I settled down to watch Bulldog Drummond in Africa and managed to see it right through to the end for once. I had another one of these cold poultices and then tried to settle down to sleep but for some reason I found it difficult to drop off.

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Monday 30th November 2015 – THIS WAS A TOTAL DISASTER.

We had the usual performance of falling asleep in the middle of a film, being awoken relentlessly during the middle of the night, the injections, the blood tests, the total rubbish food etc etc.

And then the doctor appeared. He wasn’t totally convinced that I had a phlebite – he was more of the opinion that I was suffering from an infection and he proposed a course of antibiotics. I told him that I didn’t agree with the use of antibiotics but he reckoned that it was essential given the gravity of the situation.

Anyway, a short while later, it was agreed that I should go back to the hospital at Montlucon. After all, they had been treating me in the past and they will still be treating me later in the week. Accordingly a private ambulance arrived to take me. And then this is where it all went from bad to worse.

In France, you have to pay for ambulance services, and this is covered by your health insurance, which means effectively that 99% of people don’t actually pay for it. But with my insurance scheme I have to pay for most things unless they are pris en charge and with this being sprung on me at the very last moment, I hadn’t had the opportunity to make a phone call to arrange it. And so I had to pay … gulp … €190.

And the driver asked me if I could pay for it, to which I replied that if we stopped at a cash machine. And then five minutes later she asked me “do you really have your cards on you?” to which I went totally berserk. It’s a long time since I’ve been insulted like that, and I’ll tell you something – I bet it’s been a long time since she’s been insulted like she was just then by the time that I had finished.

Some people might say that it’s not very gallant of me, but my response is that you shouldn’t give it out if you can’t take it back.

Back at Montlucon, the receptionist at the hospital asked me what I was going to do about my outstanding bill. I replied “nothing at all”.
She looked at me strangely, and so I continued “when I came here the other Friday, I gave your emergency admissions people my Insurance card with contact details and everything on it, so that you could set up a direct billing account on the spot, but they refused to do anything about it.
“And so I had a form sent to me on Monday and I filled it in and gave it to you on Tuesday to fax off so that you would know that it had gone and that you had a copy with all of the details, but you refused to do that too, and so as far as I’m concerned, what’s happening now is all your problem, not mine. I couldn’t care less”.

Back up here, the doctor looked at my arm and was horrified by what he saw. He was astonished that I had been discharged like this. He drew quite carefully on my arm the area of interest.

They managed to rustle up some food for me and even though it was rather ad-hoc, it was streets better than anything that I had had to eat in Riom.

I was ushered into a bedroom where a rather elderly gentleman was already installed. And as the afternoon drew on, I could see that it was going to be another one of “these” nights as my room-mate was clearly not at the races. But what did help was that one of the nurses found a type-of alcohol-impregnated covering that was freezing cold and when she put it on my inflamed arm, I could feel the relief immediately and I wish that someone had thought of doing that a few days ago.

And then the pantomime began. My room-mate had a seizure. I was evacuated and eventually ended up in a totally empty room, with my bed, chair, table and possessions following on behind. And so I settled down again, only for it to be decided that the empty room was more valuable as an empty room and I was moved yet again, this time to one of the empty day wards.

I had my alcohol pad changed, and then settled down for third-time lucky. I switched on a film and slowly dozed off into a deep sleep.

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Sunday 29th November 2015 – AND SO BACK AGAIN …

… in hospital, and back to the usual hospital routine. An early night, falling asleep watching a film on the laptop, and then waking up at about 02:00, lying awake for a few hours and then dropping off again just in time to be awoken by the continual comings and goings of nurses in and out of my room.

And I wasn’t alone last night either. I was in Vine Tree Avenue in Shavington, where we lived in the 1960s, and I was working on my 2000E saloon, TNY 143 M, sanding down the offside rear wing where I’d just welded on a wheel arch repair panel, and Nerina turned up. We were admiring a tree in the garden next door in Edwards Avenue – a small tree or plant about 2.5 metres high that looked like a very immature weeping willow – and we decided that we would like a cutting to go in our garden here too.

Strangely, when I went back to sleep a few hours later, I stepped right back into the dream where I had left off and was reading a catalogue that was displaying all kinds of kinky Christmas underwear made of tinsel. Nerina didn’t think very much of that and made a few typical disparaging remarks, and I was thinking that it was a good job that she hadn’t noticed what I’d been looking at on the first 10 pages of the catalogue.

So after breakfast, such as it was, we had what can only be described as a perfect example of extreme boredom. I hadn’t brought anything with me because I hadn’t expected to be here, so no laptop and a flat battery in the telephone because I didn’t have the charger. There wasn’t anything around to read either which was even worse.

But I did find a brochure about the terms and conditions of the hospital so I can tell you all about that now. And apparently I have the right to have a person of my choice in my room with me, and a spare bed will be provided. I did wonder what Kate Bush might be doing right now, and they needn’t bother about the spare bed.

At 15:00 Liz came round and brought me some clothes, my wash bag, a phone charger and the laptop. And not just that, but a couple of snacks too. Which is just as well because the food in this hospital is thoroughly disgusting. Part of the hospital’s charter, which I read assiduously this morning, tells me that the hospital will “take into account the tastes and the eating habits … of the patient”. How they do that is simply to remove from the plate anything that one isn’t allowed to eat. and so for lunch I had half a plate of carrots and green beans, and for tea I had half a plate of overcooked courgette. And that was that. It’s a question of whether they find out what’s wrong with me before I die of starvation. I can see me striking up quite an acquaintance with the lady who runs the cafe across the road and having regular wisits from her;

But there’s another thing as well about the hospital at Riom that is even more important. And that is that there is no internet. Luckily, Liz had helped me to set up “tethering” on my mobile phone and so I can stay in some kind of contact with the outside world.

But whether or not the outside world wants to keep in touch with me is another matter. Of my 132 “friends” on my social network, I’ve had just 14 expressions of best wishes. I know that everyone has their social network account for their own particular reasons and that’s not an issue with anyone, but I don’t see the point of being “friends” with anyone if you aren’t going to take an interest in them and their own personal issues. Consequently I’ve had yet another major purge of my “friends” list. and quite right too. it’ll soon be down to just me.

On that note I settled down to watch a film on the laptop because it’s the most sure-fire way that I know of falling asl……

… ZZZZZZZZ

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Saturday 28th November 2015 – DAY THREE …

… of my rehabilitation has ended up being something of a disaster. I had the worst night’s sleep yet.

I had a couple of hours sleep but that was basically it – I remember watching the clock go round at least three hours and I didn’t watch it after that – but I did somehow manage to go back to sleep, because I woke up again at just after 09:00.

By this time, my right arm was swollen out of all recognition and was starting to turn a blotchy red. When I had briefly chatted with the nurse on the phone about this yesterday, he told me that if it started to go red, I needed to have something done about it. As a result, we telephoned Liz and Terry’s doctor in Les Ancizes and as luck would have it, she was there and so we went round.

There’s no doubt that the world is a small place, and getting smaller day by day. The doctor’s son (or was it nephew?) had the same day and month of birth than me, and she was born in the same year as me. Furthermore, she comes from Romania and closer discussion revealed that she came from Brasov, which, as long-term readers of this rubbish will recall from one of its many, many previous reincarnations long-lost in the mists of time, was the scene of some of my many triumphs back in the early 1990s.

But returning to our moutons, as the French say, apparently I have a phlébite, which judging by a few things that people have subsequently said, might be a blood clot in the arm. I had to seek immediate attention, and the casualty department at Riom was by far the closest.

And so here I am. I’ve been inspected by a couple of nurses and a junior doctor, I’ve been injected with warfarin to stop the blood clotting (so it’s a good job that I’m really not a rat) and then I was stuck on a trolley in the corridor waiting my turn for a scan on the arm.

Unfortunately, despite waiting about 4 hours, we ran out of time and so I’ve been “detained” until at least Monday. I felt sorry for Liz who had to wait this long for no good purpose, but at least she nipped out to buy me some grub because I’ve missed all of the meals in here and I’ve had nothing to eat since breakfast

They’ve found me a single room for the next two nights, and this was touch-and-go. Riom Hospital is quite small and there’s not much in the budget, but the rooms are light and airy and comfortable enough although the walls haven’t been painted since the place was built.

And so I wonder what the nurses are going to be like here. There has to be some kind of consolation for being stuck back in a blasted hospital yet again.

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