… why, but today, I’ve been walking around … "as best as he can" – ed … thinking that today is a Sunday, and it’s been, from my point of view anyway, very much as if it really was too.
This morning, though, was really weird. At just past 04:00, the alarm went off. However, even in my sleep, I recognised it as a phantom alarm, and so I just ignored it.
The next time that the alarm sounded, it was for real, so I thought, and I was actually sitting on the edge of the bed, about to stand up, when I decided to check the time. And it was a good job that I did, because it was 04:34, so I abandoned the idea and went back to bed.
When the alarm sounded for a third time, I made sure that it was a real alarm call before I left the bed. And in any case, I don’t want another morning like yesterday morning.
It took me ages to leave the comfort and safety of the edge of the bed this morning, but I eventually made it across to the front door to open it ready for the nurse when he comes, and then I staggered back to the bathroom to sort myself out for the day.
Back in here, there were a few things to do, and then I reviewed my Welsh homework. When I was satisfied that I’d done my best, I saved it as a *.pdf file and sent it off to my tutor for marking.
The nurse put in an appearance as usual. He was full of tales of woe because his caravanette, a fairly new Volkswagen T7, has had to go back to the supplier to fix a fault. They wouldn’t fix it locally, so on Monday, he’d had to drive all the way to Caen for 10:00, hang around Caen for 8 hours and then pick it up again at 18:00.
After he left, I made my breakfast and read some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1867.
Well, actually, I didn’t. After about three words, I was sidetracked and dragged off elsewhere. There was not even the slightest of reasons to go maybe even to a German site, because everything that I needed to know was available on the internet in this country.
After breakfast, I came back in here and began to revise my Welsh, ready for the lesson later. And it was only a small class yet again – just four of us with the teacher, so I’m glad that I’d done my revision because in a class like this, there’s nowhere to hide. And even then, I still made a few mistakes.
At the halfway break, I had my disgusting drink and midday medication, and then after the end of the lesson, I sorted myself out ready for my Tuesday shower.
When my faithful cleaner turned up, she sorted out the shower for me, and even though it was cold in here … "but you had set the heating in there for 24°C" – ed … I went for the shower, and it gave me an absolutely wonderful wash. I was well pleased with it.
While I was showering, my cleaner had been busy. She’d tidied my bedroom, tidied my bed, and taken down the bat that was attached to the net curtains in the living room for Halloween. The small Christmas tree with its LED lights has now taken over pride of place in the living room. We have to keep the festive spirit going somehow.
Back in here, I was finally able to deal with the radio programme, on the vocal track of which I’d been working. That’s all nicely dealt with, and there’s just the joining track that needs attention, and I’ve written the text for that one too.
When I’d been making my plans, I thought that that was the last set of notes that had been dictated. However, I found three more. I must have had another session of dictation at some point and forgotten all about it.
The first one was a live concert, and that was quite straightforward, except that when I’d finished, I had thirty-four seconds of the voice track to lose, which is going to be some going for a length of introduction of one minute and fifty-seven seconds. However, after much binding in the marsh, I managed to complete it, and so that radio programme is now ready to broadcast, whenever its turn comes round.
The two other tracks will have to wait until tomorrow for their turn. And then I’ll dictate some more. I have to catch up with this massive backlog of notes awaiting dictation.
This was the time to stop and think about tea, and it ended up being a late tea because, once more, I fell asleep on the porcelain horse for a while. I’m not doing very well with this.
When I looked in the fridge, the leftover pastry from the other day was only fit to go the way of the west, but the leftover stuffing looked and smelt OK, so I made rice and veg, and the leftover stuffing became the base for a pretty good curry. I try not to let anything go to the waste bin if I can help it.
For pudding, there was still some mixed fruit left, so I had what remained with some of the lovely vegan ice cream that my friends had brought for me the other week.
On the way back in here after washing up, I stopped off at the porcelain horse. And wasn’t that a fatal mistake? It was about 20:20 when I stopped off, and when I was finally back in here, it was 21:45. Consequently, I have had to rush my notes.
At first, it wasn’t easy. My head, my hand and my thoughts were all over the place, and you should … "or maybe you shouldn’t" – ed … have seen the gibberish that I was writing. But I seem now to have found my second wind, and I’m doing much better … "he hopes" – ed …
So now that everything is finished and it’s horribly late, I’m going to go to bed. I have a lot of work to do tomorrow, and I have to stop wasting all this time if I’m ever going to have anything finished.
But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about falling asleep … "well, one of us has" – ed … a friend of mine was telling me that he found it hard to sleep at night.
"What are you doing to help yourself?" I asked him.
"I’m counting all of the girls I’ve ever had sex with" he said.
"Have you tried counting sheep?" I asked.
"Ohh stop it" he replied. "I should never have told you. It was only that one time anyway, and even then I was drunk."
