… that I was up at 08:00 this morning. at 08:20 I had a ‘phone call. "Are you back at home?".

The nurse had finally tracked me down and wanted to know if he should come round. Not much I could do except to say “yes” so we’re back in the routine again after our little pause of a couple of days of respite.

Mind you, I didn’t feel much like raising myself from the Dead at 08:00. I hadn’t gone to bed until 01:30 or thereabouts this morning.

After I’d finished writing my notes I strolled through the highlights of this weekend’s matches in the JD Cymru League and watched as Y Fflint, in danger of being overhauled in the Relegation Stakes after Y Drenewydd and Llansawel’s draw, responded by surprisingly beating Connah’s Quay Nomads and putting yet more daylight between them and the bottom two or three.

Aberystwyth are almost certainly down – their activity in the current transfer window has done nothing to improve their position, but Y Drenewydd, LLansawel and Y Fflint are having an exciting battle down there in the basement to keep out of the other relegation place. This is hotting up.

In fact, the whole of the bottom six are going to be exciting for the next nine games. Y Barri and Connah’s Quay Nomads fighting for that vital spot at the top of the pool to play off for the European Championships, and the other four in a desperate life-or-death struggle to avoid relegation.

Meanwhile, the battle for promotion in the Cymru North has taken a surprising turn and thrown the league wide open as Trefynnon beat leaders Airbus and Colwyn Bay put five past Mynydd y Fflint.

Over the last couple of weeks Airbus’s lead in the league has evaporated. Colwyn Bay have won something like the last 16 games on the run and nothing seems to stop them. So that’s the Kiss of Death on them for next weekend.

Later on I dictated the note for the 11th track for the previous programme that I completed, and then dictated the notes for the ten tracks that I’d chosen so far for this week just gone.

But once more, standing up and crossing the foot or so of bedroom from my chair to the bed was an insurmountable gap. I don’t think that even the combined efforts of the Fearsome Foursome of Castor, Zero, TOTGA and Moonchild could have enticed me into bed last night at any kind of respectable hour.

Somehow, I found, and I don’t know where I found it, the effort to rise up from my chair and go to prepare to bed. And once in there, I realised just how wonderful my own bed is.

When the alarm went off at 08:00 I didn’t feel like anything else at all but I hauled myself out and into the bathroom where, while I was washing, I had the aforementioned ‘phone call.

Back in here I had a listen to the dictaphone while I was waiting for the nurse to arrive. We were in a supermarket when a German women came in to shop. She bought several whole trays of different things – well, selected them and put them in her trolley. My friend who was the under-manager went over to see her to tell her that she wasn’t allowed to do this She replied that “well, we are allowed to do this in Germany” to which he replied “yes, that’s as may be but this isn’t Germany and over here we aren’t allowed to”. He pointed out to her the special offers that she could buy, where tins are either sealed together in plastic or with a label. You could buy the special offers like that but you can’t buy the whole trays of food. In the end she put back most of her stuff and kept the special-offer kind of food. My friend was going through some of the stuff that he didn’t recognise. He asked “what’s a bratwürst?”. I replied that it was a large sausage. He replied “in that case I’m going to buy a few of these special offers and take them home with me for tea”.

Seeing that in a dream you aren’t allowed to buy whole trays of food, why is there a tray of baked beans sitting on my kitchen worktop? Admittedly, it’s only half-full but it was full when it arrived here. No-one makes baked beans like the British. The European ones are insipid, ones in the USA and Canada are pumped full of maple sugar and even the “British recipe” ones on sale in the Maritime Provinces of Canada taste nothing like the real thing, as I have regrettably found out. So if you are coming to visit me from the UK, let me know and I’ll give you a list.

The nurse turned up and moaned at me because I hadn’t contacted him yesterday but I was in no mood to listen. He sorted out my legs and was gone in less than five minutes so I could make breakfast and read MY BOOK

We are at long last reaching the final pages, but the offensive insults are continuing without abatement. We’re seeing remarks such as "This is the sort of argument that might have been expected, not from an Astronomer Royal, or from a barrister like Lewin who knew the world, but from a clever schoolboy." directed at his contemporaries.

But finally we’re coming close to the end where he’s summarising his argument, despite having said a few paragraphs earlier that "I need not say anything by way of recapitulation, for no man who has read this article attentively can be lacking either in patience or in intelligence". It’s not “patience and intelligence” that has kept me going, but sheer disbelief that any academic could use the kind of abuse, insult and invective that he has, and I was curious to see how would end. We shall know tomorrow or on Tuesday and then I can push on to, hopefully, some less controversial work.

Back in here there was yet more football, Forfar Athletic v Stranraer in Scotland in the windswept, freezing Station Park in Forfar, with snow on the hills in the background.

And for the first time since records began … "2014 actually" – ed … Stranraer came away with the points.

Having survived a withering onslaught on their own goal only to roar upfield and in one of only a handful of half-chances, score a goal that the keeper could, and should have saved quite comfortably. He won’t want to watch the replay of how the ball squeezed between both his hands

With no cooking to do this weekend I had a leisurely amble through the radio programmes and I finished what I needed to do – that’s one more complete programme and the other one that only needs the 11th track. That track is chosen and the text written ready for dictating next weekend.

The editing took much longer than it should otherwise have done because despite having used this sound-editing programme for ten years, I’m still learning new tricks. I managed to dramatically improve the quality of the sound and to improve the quality of the “false stereo” voice tracks that I’m making. Had I the time I could make some exciting improvements to everything.

It’s a good job though that I have nothing to record this afternoon. There’s a hurricane blowing outside and all of the windows are rattling.

Lunch was missed today but I managed the Christmas Cake break and the disgusting protein drink. Hot chocolate is postponed for now while I sort this drink out.

Tea tonight wasn’t pizza. I had Saturday night’s tea – baked potato, salad and one of those breaded quorn fillets followed by chocolate sponge and soya dessert. And having said that I don’t need to bake anything today, cake supplies are running low.

Anyone have any ideas about the next oil cake? What can I use to make it different?

So bedtime in a few minutes and then back to the daily grind and four hours of dialysis. First task tomorrow though after the Welsh homework will be to update the portable computer. If I’m going to be doing some serious work in the dialysis centre I need it to be up-to-date.

But seeing as we are talking about Germans … "well, one of us is" – ed … two Germans walked into a bar in London
"Bitte …" asked the Germans
"Bitter?" asked the barman
"Martinis" asked the Germans
"Dry?" asked the barman
"Nein" said the Germans
"Nine?" asked the barman
"Zwei" replied the Germans