Tag Archives: belgium

Wednesday 11th Aoril 2018 – SO HERE I AM ONCE MORE …

… not in the playground of my broken dreams but in a little studio in the Dekenstraat in Leuven. Didn’t that four weeks go quickly?

But at least my body clock seems to be working okay still. Despite a night that was … errr … somewhat later than I intended, I was wide-awake at 05:40 and waiting for the alarm;

Despite not having breakfast and not having a shower, I still didn’t have time to do everything that I wanted to doso the floor will have to remain unwashed until I return. But I emptied the rubbish, bleached everything that needed bleaching, cut my fingernails and changed the bedding so that I’ll have nice clean comfortable bedding when I return.

Yes, I lead such an exciting life, don’t I? At least I remembered yesterday to turn off the electricity for the heating and the hot water, even if I did forget to unplug the machinery in the kitchen. And I also forgot the opened jar of jam that I was planning to bring with me.

For some reason or other the walk to the station didn’t take as long as it usually does and I was there in less than 20 minutes. Plenty of time for a coffee and a relax as despite what happened four weeks ago, the train wasn’t in the station.

When it did come in, it was a six-carriage train instead of the usual 12-carriage train, and the seats were not reserved. We could sit anywhere we liked. I chose a seat right at the front – less distance to walk at my destination. As we know, time is pretty important when on the Traversée de Paris without Bourvil to carry your suitcase.

We were late arriving at Paris Vaugirard due to track repairs and the subsequent congestion but there was no queue at the Metro ticket window so I was through there very quickly. And even better-I convinced them to sell me a carnet of 10 tickets which means that I don’t have to queue at all for the next few weeks. And a carnet comes at a substantial discount.

The metro was reasonably painless -line 4 to the Gare de l’Est and then line 5 to the Gare du Nord and that’ll be the route for the next while until the repairs to the Gare du Nord station on line 4 are completed. It’s all getting to be quite complicated.

For the first time so far this year I was able to sit outside and eat my butties. How long this weather will last, though is anyone’s guess. We’ll be back in the snow before long.

The TGV was packed yet again but I had a good spec. And much to my disappointment we arrived 10 minutes late in Brussels.

That meant that I had missed the train that I like and had to catch the older less-comfortable one instead.

And at the place here I had to wait around for the office guy to come with the keys.

So now having been shopping at Delhaize and had my tea, I really am going for an early night. I’ve been fighting off the sleep all day and I’m about done.

I’ll be up early tomorrow though. A shower and a clothes wash and then the hospital.

Tuesday 10th April 2018 – AND SO I WENT OUT …

… this afternoon into town, as I mentioned that I would.

And with the weather being so appalling (no surprise there) I was dressed up like Nanook of the North.

What then happened was completely predictable. The clouds dramatically raced away, we had a bright blue sky with this strange round, golden object in the sky and I melted. First time this year. I was so hot it was unbelievable.

But as I returned, the weather just as dramatically closed in again and we had a pile of rain. I tell you – this is really getting on my wick now. It’s beyond a joke.

Another night of not very much sleep, and I was on my travels yet again. I was driving down the hill (at the Clermont-Ferrand side) into St Eloy-les-Mines of all places in a car that was comparatively modern, and was joined by a pale blue early MkII Consul (the type with the small rear lights) in a rather tatty condition, and an ancient F-series Vauxhall Victor. Our descent took us into the suburbs of London (like you do) and the local MoT station where the three vehicles were examined. On enquiring of the tester, I was told that “they’ve all passed OK” – which totally surprised me. As he handed me the documents I asked him if there were any advisories. “No, none at all. They are all good” – and that I found even more surprising. But who am I to argue with an MoT examiner when he has just passed all of my cars?

We had breakfast and the usual relax afterwards and then SHOCK! HORROR! I vacuumed the floor of the apartment and cleaned the kitchen cupboard. Not that you’d notice, of course, but I do and that’s what’s important.

For lunch I finished off the soup with some more bits of baguette from the freezer and then headed into town.

My wanderings took me to the harbour to see what the crane was doing, but there was nothing particularly evident as to why it should still be there. And there was no-one around to ask either which was surprising.

I went round to the boulangerie where the good baguettes are sold and picked up one of the baguettes that keep for a couple of days. That’s for my butties on the road tomorrow of course. I’m heading back to Leuven aren’t I?

The post Office was next, to post a letter to the Tax Office and then round to the estate agent’s to pay them this famous €0:34 before I go away.

And here I tackled head-on a subject close to my heart. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that the kitchen here is rubbish and I want to do something about improving it. So I asked the estate agents if the owner would consider making an investment into his property by making a contribution to the cost.

My demand wasn’t dismissed out of hand, which is one good thing. I need to make a report and to draw up a little plan about what I would like to do. This involves a trip to IKEA to price out a few things and I may well do that on Friday if I can – the one at Zaventam. I’m sure that there must be a bus from Leuven that goes that way. I shall have to make enquiries. I shall have to measure the kitchen area before I go out tomorrow.

This afternoon I was planning to wash the floor and then go for a walk while it dried but shame as it is to say it, I was stark out on the sofa. And you have no idea just how much this is depressing me.

Tea was a frozen curry out of the freezer and then I had my evening walk around the headland. Ready for bed now and I need a good sleep because I’m on the road tomorrow.

I wonder what Thursday at the hospital will bring for me.

Tuesday 27th March 2018 – AND THERE IT WAS …

… gone!

Yes, if you compare this photo with one … "of the many" – ed … that we have taken earlier of this view, you’ll notice that the large crane working on the harbour gates has now gone.

I’m not sure if this now means that the work on the harbour gates is now finished, but I shall go down there in the course of time and take a butchers.

I should actually have gone down this morning, what with it being Tuesday and the day when I try for a walk into town, but you wouldn’t even send a dog out in this weather.

As we know from past experience, hanging clouds aren’t only encountered back on my farm in the Auvergne, we have them here too. And they are good ones when they arrive too.

And this one brought with it a pile of rain and so that put paid to any plans that I had of going out.

I’d had a really good sleep last night (for once) and if I had been anywhere during the night I certainly don’t recall it. And when the alarm went off for the first time at 06:20 I was bitterly regretting the fact. So much so that when I felt myself drifting away into a little voyage I didn’t fight the temptation – and was still there when the second alarm went off.

We had the usual morning performance followed by the usual morning relax and then, much to everyone’s surprise, I did some tidying up and started to prepare for my next voyage to Belgium. I’ve decided that the small suitcase is too small for the winter when I’m lumbered up with an overcoat, so I’m taking the next size up.

And then I had plenty to do after that but someone with whom I wanted to speak was on line so we ended up chatting for quite some time. There are always other times for working of course.

After lunch I attacked some of the backlog of photos that I’ve been trying to sort, and then went out for my walk as you have already seen.

The weather had by now dramatically improved which was just as well.

And apart from the crane (or absence thereof), one of Plenty’s dad’s lorries (or trailers anyway) was parked up on the fish dock. Refrigerated trailers they are so presumably they come for some kind of shellfish.

Which they share with their friends of course because, after all, you mustn’t be selfish with your shellfish.

And if you notice very carefully, on the map of Europe there is no dividing line between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, is there? It’s another one of these Quebec/ Labrador 1927 border issues.

This declaration from the Republic in 1981 or whenever it was that their dispute with the North was over is only so much lip servioe. And talk is cheap. Unless of course they are in advance of the situation post-Brexit when the North will choose prosperity and Europe instead of a leap backwards into the Dark Ages with the United Kingdom.

We had the usual session on the guitar and I was working on an arrangement of “Locomotive Breath”. It’s quite a simple track if you play it quite simply and so I have a cunning plan – more of which anon.

Tea tonight was the other veganburger and bap with vegetables and it was just as delicious. The strawberries were superb too and that really was a good plan to buy those.

With the change of hour on Sunday, it was still just about light when I went for my evening walk tonight.

And so here’s a (very grainy) photo of the Place Marechal Foch and the view stretching down to Donville-les-Bains in the dusk. Considering that it was a hand-held shot on long exposure, it’s ome out okay.

I took some others too but I have an idea about them. I have a 50mm f1.8 lens somewhere around here and I’m going to take that with me tomorrow night and see what that shoots like in the dusk. It did okay with my football photos so it might do some good around here.

The least it will do is to tell me whether this standard lens that I have is at fault, or of it’s the camera itself.

Saturday 17th March 2018 – I’M BACK!

And so is Marité.

As I wearily trudged (and it was a weary trudge) up the hill to here I saw her moored at her usual anchorage. She’s been away for the winter and now that Spring is just around the corner she’s come back to resume operations.

And I for one will be checking out just what these operations are.

But “Spring is just around the corner” did I say? You wouldn’t think so because it was snowing outside this morning in Leuven when I went for my baguette and how about that for this time of the year?

Not what I would call a major snowstorm, but snow nevertheless. The thermometer on my new mobile phone showed “-1°C, feels like -7°C” and I wasn’t going to argue with that after even two minutes outside at the boulangerie – or maybe I ought so say bakker just around the corner.

Just for a change, I slept the Sleep of the Dead last night. And with having had an early night too, I felt so much better this morning.

And the new phone and new alarm did their business too, although switching it off it something of a performance.

I’d been on my travels too, loitering near the edge of the kerb as Terry turned up to pick me up. In an old FX4 and having trouble trying to make the handbrake engage. Liz shouted across that he had the sandwiches down by his side, bit all I could see was something that looked like a cardboard box all wrapped up in newspaper.

We had the usual performance this morning but I drew the line at having a shower. For some reason that I haven’t remembered, I closed the door to the bathroom last night so it was absolutely taters in there. And that was hardly a surprise given the weather.

So armed with a baguette I made my butties for the road and then having tidied up the place a little, hit the streets for the station.

They weren’t wrong about the temperature either. I was frozen to the marrow by the time that I arrived.And with the ticket machine in the basement I had to retrace my steps to the booking office.

On the platform waiting for the train we were entertained by a photographer across the tracks who was organising a photo shoot with a little girl aged about 6, dressed in clothing that was completely unsuitable for the Arctic conditions.

The poor kid looked as if she was freezing to death over there and I can’t say that I was surprised.

I didn’t have to wait too long though. There was an Intercity train for Blankenberge due in, which was handy, and so I hopped aboard. And it was heaving too.

It looked as if everyone in Belgium was heading off for a day at the seaside regardless of the weather. I ws crammed in rather uncomfortably next to three people who were watching videos on their phones at full volume, and that didn’t half get on my wick.

But it was only for half an hour or so, which was just as well. I wouldn’t have put up with that for a three-hour journey.

No excitement at the Gare du Midi today either. No-one arrested and no train derailed either. In fact nothing to laugh at at all.

And crowded too. You couldn’t even have got a cat on board the TGV, never mind swung one around. It’s getting to be more and more popular this as summer approaches – not that you would ever recognise summer in this weather of couree.

I spent most of the journey with my ears closed to keep out the noisy brats and – shame as it is to day it these days – with my eyes closed too.

I know. I’m in a bad way.

We were minutes late arriving in the Gare du Nord and that’s crucial. I’m tight for time and even more so now that the line metro station is closed here. The deviation that I took on the way out took me about minutes, and that’s all the time that I had available so I took an executive decision (that’s a decision where, if it goes wrong, the person who made it is executed).

I took the line 5 as far as the Gare de l’Est nd then leapt on the line 4 train there and braved the long walk. It ended up being quicker than via the Porte d’Italie which wa good news and I reached my platform with 10 minutes to spare, totally out of breath.

In the freezing cold we rattled off to Granville, with me yet again sleeping most of the way.

And it was a long weary journey where we crawled at snail’s pace on the stretch between Argentan and Briouze. I was pretty much fed up by the time that we arrive back in Granville.

My OAP railcard expires in April so I took the opportunity to renew it. €50:00 for a year but you’ve no idea how much it saves me in discount. I couldn’t afford to do this trip if I had to pay full fare for it.

And then the long trudge back home into the cold, where I switched on the heating and made a coffee.

Tea was pasta and vegetables tossed in oil, garlic powder and chili. All of that followed by a walk outside. I’m on 111% of my daily activity and it feels like it too.

So tonight it’s back into my warm bed. And aren’t I looking forward to it?

Friday 16th March 2018 – AND SO, AFTER …

… all of my exertions, I was awake quite early this morning.

And although last night was still a tossy-turny affair, it wasn’t as bad as the previous one. And I was on my travels too – heading for home on the bus (the n°11 as it happened) from stoke on Trent, so work that one out. And I was going home to “sort out” a few things and a few people over my taxi business. There had been some considerable discussion about how inconvenient the buses were, but i’d insisted that they were more convenient than people think. As the bus turned from Ruskin Road into Gainsborough Road (good, these buses, aren’t they?) I saw TOTGA standing on the corner. I made a gesture indicating that I wanted her to follow on down, but she gave a blank look. Suddenly, it turned into a flash of recognition. The bus stopped right outside my front door (I’d explained to the driver where I had lived but he knew anyway) and the whole house was in darkness. That was weird for 19:30 on a Wednesday evening when we had the taxis and I’d certainly have words about this. But even with dropping me off at my front door I had a long walk home and it was a weary, tiring trudge, what with my illness, all down along Coppenhall Land towards The Playing Fields I was on the track through the woods and there hanging in the trees was a towel that looked very much like my old blue one, and as I followed the path I had to cross onto the road but someone had planted a hedge in the way and I had to climb over it. It took me two attempts too. But I was so tired and weary that I realised that I couldn’t go on and my business would have to go.

after the usual morning performance, I had a little … errr … relax on the armchair. I’m really not doing this, am I?

And it took me quite a while to come round as well. I must have been out. In fact it took me until about 11:00 before I was in any kind of state to leave the room.

Halfway down the road I realised that I had forgotten my prescriptions – so that meant that I would have to come out again this afternoon.

My perambulations took me down and across the Ladeuzeplein, where my progress was arrested by these goings-on.

I’m not sure what it was that they were trying to do – except building a wall to presumably keep out illegal Mexicans, but they are using piles of crates that belong to that well-known manufacturer of iced tea, all of which had been brought to the Square by a large fleet of lorries.

So shrugging my shoulders, I continued on my way.

First stop was at Kruidvat, for a pile of gelatine-free sweets, and then to Wibra. I’d seen some good microwave steamers last time that I was here. Not very substantial and probably won’t last all that long. But that’s not going to be much of an issue because I probably won’t either.

But star of the show was in the FNAC. As you know, I’ve been having mobile phone issues since December and I ended up with a cheap Chinese import. And cheap was the appropriate word too. It does work but it was only ever going to be a stop-gap until I could find something better.

And so when they had some Samsung J3s on sale for a price less than I could have had one with a renewed contract, and when I negotiated another €20 off it too, I’ve now ended up with that. and the exciting thing about it is that with me having saved my settings on the old Samsung phone, this new phone simply downloaded everything as soon as I logged in, and it’s just like my old phone now.

Back here with a baguette and a tomato and some vegan cheese, I made myself some lunch. And then back out again.

And I was halfway down the road when I realised that I had forgotten my prescription yet again. I did a little wander around though, bought a tin of spicy beans from Delhaize for tea and then came back here.

Rounding up the prescription, I went back out and rounded up the medicaments.

Tea was baked spuds and spicy beans, and then I went for a little walk. And the temperature which had really been so nice today, had now plummeted. Snow is forecasted, but I might miss it.

Now it’s an early night. I have a train to catch back home in the morning.

Thursday 15th March 2018 – I DIDN’T ENJOY …

… that one little bit. Not at all.

And it all went wrong right from the beginning when I hardly had any sleep at all. I spent most of the night tossing and turning and that clearly didn’t get me off to the best possible start.

But nevertheless, I was up and about just as the first alarm was going off and after the usual medication and breakfast, I had a shower and washed my clothes. I need to look pretty for the hospital.

There were a few tasks that I needed to do before I went and then I wandered around the corner for the bus.

6 minutes late it was too, and we had something of a performance as there wasn’t enough money left on my card. So that involved some negotiations with another card.

At the hospital they checked me in and informed me of the change in tariffs (that doesn’t concern me of course) and then I went to the wrong room, so they had to come to look for me.

The needle went in the tube in my chest totally painlessly – yes, it was the former Belgian ladies’ darts champion who was nursing me today. And then she gave me the treatment.

As well as the saline drip I had four bottles of Multigam 5%. That’s a stimulant made from human plasma and it attacks the viruses that I seem to have and builds up my immunity. Five hours it’s supposed to take.

It was OK for the first couple of hour but then I started to feel the cold in my veins and it sent the shivers right through me. Not as bad as when I had the chemotherapy but horrible none the less. I had to wrap up in all my clothes.

The doctor – a young girl – came to see me and so did a skin specialist – likewise a young girl escorted by two even younger female students. It all ended up like the scene at Castle Anthrax.

And then I went to sleep.

The nurse awoke me to say that it was finished. And so was I. She unplugged me and told me that I could go but I was in no fit state to leave. I had to stay there on the bed for a good 20 minutes.

I made it to reception though. My next appointment is April 12th – likewise a Thursday.

And so I sat downstairs for a while and then came home. It was pouring down with rain outside but I walked back all the same. I bought some potatoes and tinned ratatouille for tea from Delhaize, and some vegan cheese and vegan sausages from The Loving Hut – I fancy some sausages and cauliflower cheese when I return home.

Soaked to the skin, I vegetated here for a while in the warm and then had my tea.

And later on in the evening I went out for a walk. The rain had eased off and I wanted to pass the 100%on the fitbit.

There’s the Philipssite complex just down the road from here and I’d never been to see what goes on there so I went for an amble around.

That building there is actually a Sports Centre of some kind and there were hordes of people disgorging themselves into the street as I went past. I was tempted to go in for a look around but I didn’t feel up to staying out.

There are offices there too because I knew someone once who worked there.

Quite a few, in fact, all nicely illuminated in the evening which probably costs someone a small fortune.

And I found the police station too. There’s quite a big one on the site, And and underground car park too – I didn’t know about that

So I’ll have an early night. Tomorrow I’ll be gathering my strength – what’s left of it.

Wednesday 14th March 2018 – SO HERE I AM …

… in my little studio in the Dekenstraat.

It’s smaller than the previous room, and what that means is that there is much less of it to heat and I’m all in favour of that.

And as far as I’m concerned, it’s a better room too. And considering that it’s a good few Euros cheaper, I’m more-than-satisfied with this.

I’ve been down to the Delhaize and bought some food, so tonight I had baked potatoes and a tin of Fajita beans for tea. Delicious it was too and now I’m alls et up for bed.

Talking of bed, I was bang awake this morning, right on the button at … errrr … 06:00. The old body clock seems to be doing just fine right now.

And that was something of a surprise seeing that I’d been on a rather unpleasant voyage. I was in my garden, back in Vine Tree Avenue of all places, doing some work there (not like me, is it?) and two boys came past. They started to throw coconuts up to the eaves of the house to see if they could knock down some more that were festooned across the front of the house (it all happens during the night, doesn’t it?) so I told them to clear off. They carried on doing it however and one of the coconuts fell down, missing me by about half an inch. So I told them yet again to clear off. They carried on and when yet another fell down right by me I manhandled … "PERSONhandled" – ed … them off the premises. They then started to mess about with the tyres of my car (a Ford Cortina mk III) and we ended up having something of what the French call a bagarre. I went to phone for the Police but they told me that I was wasting my time. There was one of me and two of them, I couldn’t prove anything and they would say that I attacked them in an unprovoked fashion.

So almost (but not quite – I wasn’t in THAT much of a hurry) beating the first alarm I set about making my sandwiches, preparing my … errr … samples (and I still can’t make this vacuum pump thing work no matter what I try) and SHOCK HORROR doing some cleaning up. That’s not something that happens every day, is it?

The rubbish went out to the bin outside and there was even some time left over to do a little work on the laptop.

On my way up the hill to the station I made an unexpected encounter of some very expansive woman who told me that she had booked to go to Tunisia and that her friend had let her down and would I like to go with her. And all the time I was thinking to myself “are they open already?

Even more of a surprise – although I arrived 25 minutes before the train was due to leave, it was actually waiting in the station and so grabbing a quick coffee, I grabbed my place on board and in the warmth.

And here I breakfasted on the coffee and the biscuits that I had brought with me from home (due to certain inconveniences, I don’t have my medication and breakfast at home when I’m setting out early on my travels).

And it was round about here that I realised that I had forgotten my headphones. I’ll have to use these earpieces and I hate those.

But at Avranches I perked up a little. Glancing out of my window I saw a “shed”, or “Wisconsin”, or “Red Death”, whichever nickname you prefer.

The notorious unreliability of British-built diesel locomotives caused the British railway operators to look elsewhere for their motive power and the “English, Welsh and Scottish” railfreight company went across the Atlantic to General Motors who supplied the EMD Class 66.

They proved to be so reliable in operation that more and more were brought over, leading to the scrapping to much of the native fleet. And as rail freight in the UK declined, some were sold abroad and regular readers of this rubbish will recall a few years ago that we saw one, still in its EWS livery, pulling a freight train in France.

They were so successful over here too that the SNCF ordered some for itself. these are called “Type 77” and they differ from the UK ones in that, inter alia, they are equipped with air conditioning, a microwave and fridge, and a comfortable (!) seat.

But don’t ask me if this a British import or a “77” because I can’t tell from here.

We were late leaving Granville but we arrived at Paris Montparnasse Vaugirard on time. And now I had to negotiate my way to Paris Gare du Nord via a new route, with the metro station on Route 4 being closed.

The new “revised” journey on the metro via the Porte d’Italie is rather longer – it takes about 50 minutes to go round instead of 42 or 43 minutes and I hope that that isn’t going to be crucial for the return journey. It is rather tight for time on the way back.

And there seems to be a change to SNCF policy too. We noticed the train being parked up at the platform at Granville station this morning instead of parked up in a siding and arriving with five minutes to go.

And here at Paris Gare du Nord the boarding gates were open for the TGV almost as soon as it pulled in, rather than 10 minutes prior to departure. That gave us ample time to take our seats and it was all quite comfortable.

But we had the “flying customs” patrol on the platform and true to stereotype they picked on a passenger of African descent. I would have bet the mortgage on that one, as I’m sure that you would have done too.

Despite having had a little doze on the way into Paris, that didn’t stop me from having another little doze on the way to Brussels. I’m really feeling it these days.

In Brussels, I missed the 15:52 train to Leuven due to issues with the ticket machine, so I had to wait for the one at 16:03.

That was an old-generation train with the plastic bench seats in a 3-plus-2 configuration so it wasn’t very comfortable. But it brought us here all the same, and at quite a rapid speed too so I didn’t complain too much..

And then the trudge up the road to the Condo Gardens

And so, here I am in my little room. I’ll have a good sleep, with a shower in the morning ready for my treatment. And I’m not looking forward to that.

Monday 5th March 2018 – JUST FOR A CHANGE …

… I managed to wake up bang on the first alarm – and be well out of bed by the time the second one went off. That’s not happened too often just recently, has it?

And it’s astonishing considering the voyage that I was on during the night. That’s enough to tire out almost anyone, never mind me.

I was in my old beige Cortina (UOB, not YLO) driving over Chester Bridge and up to the turning in Delamere Street when I slid on some ice, overshot the turning and collided with a vehicle on the opposite side of the road coming round the bend. The police were called and statements taken, and the policeman told me that it wasn’t really my fault because of the weather conditions and the ice. So back in the car and up Delamere Street and turned into Queensway, where I collided with some cyclists coming the other way. And I wondered how I was going to explain to my insurance company these two accidents in a matter of five minutes, especially as my dash cam will show that although the cyclists were totally in the wrong, I could have done more to avoid them.
From here we were back in the London Underground (a fairly regular destination for our nocturnal rambles as regular readers of this rubbish will recall). I was buying a ticket for a long-distance flight (like you do in the Underground of course) and the flight wasn’t for 90 minutes so I would have plenty of time to go home and pack (of course). But one woman said that I had dropped my insurance card so when I had completed the transaction I bent down to pick it up, but it was only the stub. I had to prove to the person in the booking office that it really was mine by comparing the serial number of the stub with that on the card. And so I went back home again (to Gainsborough Road) to pack for my trip, pulling up in my car (by now a Mark 2 Cortina) on the opposite side of the street a way down, leaving me with a lengthy walk back). As I arrived, my sister’s husband came round the side of the house ad came in with me. He said that he was hungry so I offered him some rice and a tin of something, which he accepted. And I had to show him how to use and induction hob – a strange parallel with something that had happened in the LeClerc on Saturday.

After the usual start to the day, and a little relax, I attacked a pile of photographs that needed things doing to them – and that took longer that I reckoned. And the photos are coming out far too blurred with this new camera, as I have said before. I’m not all that happy with it now, which is a shame.

Having done that, I attacked my travel arrangements for next week.

The rail journey isn’t as cheap as it might have been, due to the fact that I’m coming home on a Saturday rather than a Sunday. If I’m having some kind of transfusion, I’ll be staying the Friday in my room without doing too much.

But the increased rail fare is offset by the room. I can see now why the manager told me to book directly with him rather than with the booking agent that I usually use. They have smaller, cheap rooms for working men that aren’t offered via the booking agent and they are at something of a reasonable discount. I wish that I had known this a couple of years ago.

So at the end of the day, it still works out cheaper.

This afternoon I designed and furnished a room. Yes, I’ve managed to get into the depths of this 3D site that I mentioned the other day and had a play around with furniture, accessories and poses . And once you solve the key, which is not very easy to do, it’s pretty straightforward and I can see some kind of opportunity here.

We had the usual walk this afternoon at 15:30, and I was joined by the heaving multitudes today, including a family looking for a playground for their children.

But my attention was distracted by what ws going on in the Boulevard des Terreneuviers.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I have discussed … "on numerous occasions" – ed … the crane in the Boulevard des Terreneuviers and how once or twice there has been another crane present too.

I was lucky enough to see what it was doing today, and it wa winching some heavy stuff into the building site underneath.

And that puzzled me, because that is three times to my certain knowledge that the crane has been there. And it must cost them a fortune to pay for these regular visits. Why didn’t they just hire in a bigger crane in the first place?

Back here I almost managed to stave off the falling asleep bit – succumbing for a mere 10 minutes.

Tortilla wraps for tea, and then my walk, and now my early night. High time I had one. It’ll set me up for an early start.

That is – is I don’t have phone issues. I noticed that this morning the phone was on 78% charge, and tonight, a mere 9% even though I haven’t used it.

Something’s clearly not right.

Monday 26th February 2018 – DON’T SOME PEOPLE LIKE TO RUB IT IN?

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I went to my Health Insurance people the other day to hand in a pile of documents so that the Doctor who oversees my case at the Insurance office could see them.

And today I had a leaflet from them. “What steps to take when a member of our scheme dies”.

Yes, nothing like rubbing it in, is there?

Mind you I felt like death this morning. Having had a really good sleep yesterday it upset my body rhythm completely and it was 02:00 and beyond before I went to bed.

Struggling out at 06:20 was clearly too much and after breakfast I crashed out well and truly for a good 90 minutes.

However during the night I’d been on my travels again. A few of us were on a train travelling from Chester to Crewe past the old Calveley station, but someone kept on inserting into the voyage old photos of the Chester – Mold – Ruthin railway line. And I’ve no idea why.

After my little wasted morning I decided that it was time to do some work. And so I’ve been hard at it since then. I’ve had another session with this 3D program that I use. I’ve been doing something that I promised quite a while ago, and that is to experiment with textures and templates.

It’s one of those things that the first step takes for ever, but once you have done one of them, it’s fairly straightforward. As regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I’ve been using Paint Shop Pro as my graphice editor for over 20 years, but even now I’m having to find and use facilities and functions that I never knew existed.

Despite all of my efforts, it’s still not doing what I think it ought to do. And so I’ll have to put a great deal more effort into it. It’s certainly progress though, all the same.

Having spoken to Rosemary on the telephone, I went for a rather late walk this afternoon.

And I once more fell in with the workmen digging the trench. It seems that they are laying the conduit first, and the cables will follow. And then there will be the connection to the network later.

I did ask about the timescale, and he reckoned that it would be about a year to have it up and running. That’s disappointing from my point of view – I was hoping for it to be much more rapid than that.

But nevertheless, that’s progress too, and I can’t complain too much about that.

Back here, it was time for coffee, as it always is when I come back from my walk.

And I usually allow myself a little treat, and that’s why I like birthdays so much because, having visited Liz and Terry, I’m supplied with another vegan chocolate birthday cake.

Sticky, gooey and chocolatey, and absolutely delicious. This should last me a couple of weeks and then I’ll have to have another birthday.

Tea was a stuffed pepper with the leftover stuffing from the other day. And my walk this evening took me past quite a few people also out taking the air.

So having had a decent morning’s sleep this morning, I wonder how I’ll get on tonight.

Friday 23rd February 2018 – AND YET ANOTHER …

… mystery is resolved today.

And I’ll tell you about it in a little bit.

But first, let me tell you about last night. Although I didn’t get to bed as early as I would have liked, I was still right away with the fairies almost from the word “go”. And I did go on my travels too during the night.

And when I awoke suddenly at 06:15 I thought to myself that I would remember all of the details about this.

But a lot can happen in the five minutes between going back to sleep at 06:15 and the alarm awakening you at 06:20. But what I can remember is that a group of us went a-shopping in different place and when we compared our articles ad the prices that we had paid, they were so wildly fluctuating that we were convinced that something was wrong somewhere.

It was a struggle to leave the bed, and the leisurely start didn’t help much to get me going. But I was jolted out of my reverie by an urgent appeal.

A friend of a friend of a friend has some kind of website with some kind of chatroom facility on it, and he’s changed the chat program for another one and although he could make it work, he couldn’t explain the mechanism to anyone else, even after two days of trying to draft something.

And so I spent the morning looking at this chat program and as luck would have it, it’s based on something that was pretty common 20 years ago and a testament to the idea that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. And, as it happened, I happened to know all about it because I worked with it extensively during the period 2003-2007 during another existence.

And so having refreshed myself with the program quickly, I spent the morning writing a tutorial for it.

The problem was that the one that came with the program is, well, let’s just say “complicated”. And people don’t want anything that is complicated. The truncated attention span of the MTV generation doesn’t run that far and they’ll just walk away. So I had to express it all in about 10 or 12 simple bullet points.

That took me up to lunch, which was another butty, and then I … err … had a little relax. And a little later, another session with the European Photograph Mountain.

And then we went for a walk.

And beautiful weather it was too and so I took myself off around the headland.

On the car park by the lighthouse was a digger digging a trench, and I fell in with a couple of workmen. It seems that, at long last, fibre-optic cable has come to Granville and they are laying the cables.

For once, I’m going to be at the head of the queue for something rather than at the tail end, as I was back on the farm, but when you consider that my first encounter with fibre-optic internet service was back over 20 years ago in Brussels, then maybe it’s not all that much to crow about.

My walk though was considerably extended because away in the distance I could see that myastery ship of yesterday back in the harbour.

So seeing as it was such a nice day I continued on with my walk and went down to the harbour for a closer look.

She is indeed called La Grande Ancre and is indeed out of Cherbourg. But apart from that, I’ve not been able to find anything about her at all, except that back in 2005 she assisted at a shipwreck off the Iles de Chausey, rescued the survivors and towed the damaged boat here to Granville

And while I was there admiring La Grande Ancre, two men from the harbour office came from the port office to liberate a pontoon that was in the way of something.

And so seizing my opportunity I pounced on them. I’ve always said that if you want to know the answer to a question, you have to ask the question. And so I did.

And no the mystery is solved.

The lock gate that we have seen is only temporary and will be replaced in two or three weeks by the new ones.

And as for how it works, it’s on a horizontal pivot and simply folds flat on the bottom of the harbour when the tide is in.

So now we know.

Back here I had a coffee and then SHOCK! HORROR! I did some vacuuming. The place was still littered with confetti from the carnaval and it was getting on my wick. It filled the dust container of my vacuum cleaner (it’s only a smallish one) and I had to work out how to empty it. But at least the place looks a little better now.

After the guitar session it was tea time, and that was frozen lentil and green pepper curry from a couple of months ago. And delicious it was too. And once more, I took the route along the clifftop outside the walls for my evening walk.

Now I’m going to have a glass of lemonade and an early night (I hope). And a pleasant dream too.

Sunday 18th February 2018 -FOR A REASON …

… that I didn’t understand at first, I slept the Sleep Of The Dead last night.

But I awoke with a start at about 06:40. I realised that I had changed the time of the alarm yesterday so I knew that it wasn’t yet time to awaken, but after about two minutes it hit me that today is Sunday and the alarm was programmed not to ring. And so instead of the usual Sunday morning procedure where I try my best not to awaken, we had the opposite procedure with me trying not to go back to sleep.

And then another thought hit me too.

All throughout the night there had been complete and utter silence from next door. I hadn’t awoken once. Perhaps they weren’t out partying last night at all, but had left the place yesterday morning.

I wondered whether to do a lap of honour.

I’d been on my travels too. Nina, a former girlfriend of mine, was to put in an appearance and so I needed to tidy up Caliburn, especially the back if a little session of indoor alligator wrestling (unlikely) were to take place. I also had to do some more tidying up elsewhere and this involved Dismantling the hi-fi system. Some woman helped me do this because it wasn’t easy, with cables, headphone leads and all of this kind of thing all tangled up into some kind of spaghetti mess that we were desperately endeavouring to sort out.

So with my noisy neighbours apparently having left yesterday, and having had a good night’s sleep as a result (and about time too) I was ready for anything.

Well, almost.

I made a mistake in the boulangerie. To me, a baguette is a baguette, but apparently not in Leuven. Had Jesus ordered five of the ones that were given to me there would have been no miracle about feeding the 5000. I have enough to feed myself for a week.

I took my leave of the guy at the hotel. He asked me if I’d enjoyed my stay. I explained the issues that I’d had with my neighbours and he pulled a face. I told him that I would see him in a few weeks time, and hopefully he would have a quieter room for me…

Emerging from the alleyway at the back of the hotel (to save walking all the way round the block) I burst out laughing when I saw the boulangerie.

We’ve all seen (and some of us have stood in) the queues outside the bakers’ shops in Poland and Bulgaria, places like that under the Communists. And here in Belgium we have exactly the same situation.

Of course, maybe not for the same reasons, but it’s amusing nevertheless to see it.

My luck was in at Leuven station. The earlier express to Brussels was held up while they endeavoured to negotiate a wheelchair and its occupant aboard, and so I leapt on board too.

There’s no doubt whatever that the guy was disabled, but when I saw him a little later walking around the train I thought that he might have given the porter at the station a little more help. But then, that might have meant that the train would have left earlier and I would have had a cold and miserable wait on the station for the next train.

And I managed to drop my woolly hat – the one that goes on my woolly head – in the train and some woman shouted after me as I was about to alight.

And although it was a cold and miserable wait in the waiting room at Bruxelles-Midi, at least we had some entertainment. For police officers manhandling … "PERSONhandling" – ed … two boys out of the restricted area. “I didn’t steal anything” wailed one of the boys but the police are the same the whole world over and took no notice whatsoever.

The TGV previous to mine had been 10 minutes late but my train actually pulled in early, which made a nice change, and so I was one of the first to clamber aboard which is always helpful.

Old, tired and a little tatty around the edges. And the train wasn’t much better either. These first-generation TGVs have done quite a lot of work.

There were a surprising number of empty seats too – probably 80 or 85% occupancy. My experience of TGVs is that they are usually packed to the gunwhales.

We arrived at Paris Gare du Nord bang on schedule, which is just as well seeing that my train to Granville has been advanced half an hour because of the engineering works on the line. There’s no time to loiter.

But even more importantly, I arrived totally intact with nothing else missing from my trousseau. That makes a change after the events of the past few weeks.

But this train thing is going to become an issue in early course. They have a rolling programme of modernisation of the stations along Line 4 – the direct line between Paris Gare du Nord and Paris Montparnasse-Vaugirard. And on 17th March the platforms on the line here will be taken out of service.

There’s always an alternative route, like Line 5 to the Place d’Italie and then Line 6, but it’s complicated and takes much longer. And time is tight.

And in case you’re wondering, it is a different train from the one that I photographed in Brussels. Our train was made up of two train sets coupled together and they were of different classes.

I arrived at Paris Montparnasse-Vaugirard and my waiting room with 20 minutes to spare. And found a seat next to a girl from California who spoke French with a remarkably good accent.

You’ll remember last time I was here and the “incident” involving the woman and her mother. Here, we had quite an ugly incident where a couple arrived after boarding for their train had completed but before it had left, and they were refused admission to the platform. The abuse, insults and vitriol that they were giving the staff was outrageous.

Just to make things clear, it states quite definitely on your ticket that you should be present on the platform no later than 2 minutes before the departure time, and I’m sure that people don’t realise just how much of a walk it is to Vaugirard. Apart from the 1.3 kilometres of foot passage from the Metro (I’ve measured it), the platforms at Vaugirard are right down at the end of Montparnasse’s Platform 23, which is a very long platform. It’s a marathon hike and you won’t do it all in a couple of minutes.

Eventually we could board our train so I took my leave of my companion and had another nice travelling companion for some of the way home.

I left my seat though a couple of miles out because at a certain point there’s a really good view of the Eiffel Tower and I wanted to get an eiffel of it.

It’s not come out very clearly because there’s only so much possibility with a swaying train and a camera shot through a dirty double-glazed window.

After my companion left I settled down to my butties and then dozed almost all the way to Granville.

We arrived on time, which is late these days because of the engineering works, and I had to help a woman with her suitcase (what help would I be?) as she struggled with a screaming infant.

And then through the drizzly rain (quite a change from the weather in Paris) I had a weary, dreary walk home. It’s definitely taking a lot out of me. If my health deteriorates further (which it’s bound to do) I’ll have to remember not to come home on a Sunday. The buses don’t run on Sunday.

Back here after I eventually arrived, I crashed out on the sofa with a coffee and was out of it completely until about 20:30. I missed tea of course, but I did have a bag of nuts and raisins.

And with the fitbit telling me that I’ve done 80% of my day’s activity, I crawled out of the apartment for a lap around the old town. When I came back I was on 102% so that’s enough for today.

I’ve done enough. I’m off to bed where I shall sleep for a week.

Saturday 17th February 2018 – I’M A MISERABLE PLEADER.

Yes, I’m definitely losing my touch.

Maybe it’s trying to do it in Flemish that’s the problem, but on the other hand being a miserable ignorant foreigner who has travelled for for no avail usually works wonders.

But retournons to our moutons as they say back home.

Yet another miserable night as my neighbours awoke me when they returned home at 02:00 and carried on their party until 04:00 or whatever. And as I have said before, it’s not really their noise that’s the issue – it’s more the fact that i’m a light sleeper and the walls are very thin.

I compensated by setting the alarms for 07:30 and 07:40 instead of the usual time one hour earlier. After the medication and breakfast, I had a shower and change of clothes and then attacked a few things that needed my attention.

Alison came through at 10:30. She was just about to leave home so that gave me 15 minutes to gather up my wits (it doesn’t usually take me that long these days as you know) and go to loiter on the corner at the end of the street.

She arrived on time and we hit the road for our day out. She had made several suggestions as to where to go (I always have this problem of people telling me where to go) but the one that stood out above all of the others was Aachen of course – in Germany.

The thing that I like about living in Belgium is that you have a choice of four countries – France, Luxembourg, Germany and the Netherlands – on your doorstep. Luxembourg at 100 minutes is the farthest away and the rest are a lot closer than that.

The weather wasn’t what I expected though. Considering that it was Germany in February I was hoping for sub-zero temperatures and several feet of snow. Instead, we had a glorious Spring day with a beautiful blue sky.

I felt rather disappointed.

Alison is off skiing in a few days so she wanted to look at some of the clothing in the big Sports shop on the edge of the city centre. So that was to be our first port of call

But we were distracted by a café that we hadn’t noticed before. It wasn’t the vegan options on offer but the fact that sitting in the window were four rather large cats.

This place is called the “Katzencafé” and the idea is that you can go in there for a coffee and cuddle a kitten. And on chatting to a few friends later I was told that there are these cat cafés springing up all over the place these days. I’m all in favour of that idea of course except that these cats were rather aloof.

Still never mind. The coffee was good and we enjoyed the company.

There was nothing that took Alison’s fancy in the Sports shop (at least, not at a reasonable price, that is) and so we went up the road to the Muller supermarket where I bought some more of that white vegan chocolate that I like

We found a square that we hadn’t noticed before where there was a good view of the rear of the town hall and the rear of the cathedral.

I’d not seen the town hall from this angle before, and I do have to say that it was quite impressive.

As an aside … "you’ll get used to this" – ed … the German for "Town Hall" is Rathaus, which is rather appropriate, as I’m sure you’ll all agree.

Our new little route took us on an exploration of the city in places that we hadn’t visited and past sites that I hadn’t previously seen. And that’s always good news.

And to my delight, I discovered a Bio shop that sold the very brand of vegan cheese that I like. They only had two packs of it though, and now they don’t have any at all.

I also discovered a huge model railway shop and we passed a good half-hour in there. I would love to have a little N-gauge layout back at home, but not at the prices they are asking. There was an HO/OOgauge Big Boyof the type that we all know and love and which was on sale at an astonishing €2599.

Passing via several other shops we made it to the Source where I had another drink of the hot sulphuric water. It tastes disgusting of course, but there’s no point in going to the Waters if you have no intention of taking them, even if you have been misinformed.

Unfortunately there wasn’t all that much of a photo opportunity seeing that the building was cluttered with pedestrians and street furniture and the like. I shall have to come along here at 05:00, and bring a Stihl Saw with me too.

The market stall that was selling those delicious fennel-flavoured sweets last time – that wasn’t here today which was bad news. And although our walk was quite interesting there wasn’t really all that much to see that was exciting.

And so, feeling the cold and the exhaustion and the hunger, we detained to the little restaurant that we know – the one by the Roman remains. Alison had a spicy chicken meal and I had the quinoa salad.

Being duly fed and watered, we set off for a slow wander back to the car. But Alison drew my attention to the rays of the early evening sun that were just catching the clock tower right by the town hall.

Alison reckoned that it was worth a photograph, and who was I to argue with that?

Back in the car we headed for Leuven in the early evening sunset – our journey being interrupted by the scenic tour of the roadworks halfway along the highway. And when I arrived back I had a coffee and a little … errr … relax.

Round about 19:30 I set off for the football ground. OH Leuven were playing KFCO Beerschot-Wilrijk, a team that I have yet to see, so I was quite looking forward to the match.

But hereby hangs a tale.

With there having been “certain incidents” in the past, the whole ground and surrounding streets were surrounded by police and admission was by prebooked ticket only. And no amount of pleading on my part would convince anyone at all – Police, admission booth, security staff, stadium management (yes, I got to see them all) would change their minds.

Of course, arguing with Belgian administration – particularly from a position of weakness – is a pointless argument as anyone who has ever tried it will tell you. But you have to go through the motions anyway – I don’t give up without a fight.

However in this case, I was singularly unsuccessful and repaired to a bar across the street where several other people, including someone who had come from Italy, in the same position as me were gathered to watch the match on television.

I’ve never understood the fascination for watching football on TV. Yes, fair enough if it’s the only way of seeing a game, but it’s nothing like watching the match in the flesh – nothing at all. There’s no atmosphere for a start, and the focus of the camera cuts out all of the interesting stuff going on in the background.

So at the final whistle, I headed back home again in the cold – to total silence next door. Perhaps they are out partying and they’ll be back at something silly like 03:00. So I’m going to bed quick and grab a couple of hours sleep.

Friday 16th February 2018 – MY NEIGHBOURS …

… are getting on my wick.

I dunno what they are doing in their room but involves noise – noise that goes on until 04:00 in the morning.

It’s not as if it’s a very loud noise but the walls are paper-thin here and as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I’m a very light sleeper.

And so with my noisy neighbours next door, I had no qualms whatever about my very noisy alarm going off at 06:20 this morning. Or the noisy repeat at 06:30.

But despite everything I was off on my travels during the night.In a shed where a group of young kids had barricaded themselves in to protect themselves against some kind of monster. But they had left their pony outside in its stable in the field and someone was wondering if they should protect that too. But another kid piped up that if you spread out your forces too thinly to try to protect everything you end up protecting nothing. So they didn’t. And the monster’s attack on this shed was very half-hearted and the pony was unscathed.
A little later, these kids were looking for their black kitten that had escaped. The search involved wading up to their knees in some very muddy water much to the amusement of some nearby workmen, and this became even more amusing when one of the kids had made it into the water and the kitten was spotted running across the top of a brick wall nearby.

After breakfast and the usual pause to let the medication do its stuff (yes, I obtained another prescription when I was at the hospital) I went off to the railway station.

There was an Intercity to Brussels that was running late, and it pulled into the station just as I arrived so I leapt on board and settled down in a comfortable corner with my book.

And as a result of the late arrival of the train, I for one arrived in Brussels at the Gare Central before time, which is always very nice.

The metro was quite painless too – took me all the way to Merode in minutes.

Consequently I was early at my health insurance people, even though we had another distraction.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I have a thing about “parking”, and there are no finer examples of bad parking to be had than in Brussels.

Here we have a delivery van stopped to unload a couple of parcels and so he’s blocking the street as he double-parks.

But hed he not been so lazy, he could have advanced not even 10 metres and parked his van for two minutes in front of the dark blue Peugeot.

But obviously walking that extra 10 metres is far too difficult for the poor dear.

So back to the plot.

I presented myself at the reception.
“You’ll have to wait – it’s not 09:30 yet”
“But …”
“You’ll have to wait”.
And so I waited
At 09:29 “it’ll be open in a minute. Can you show me your badge?”
“I don’t have a badge – I’m a foreign visitor”
“Then you’ll need to go to reception to fill in a form”.
“I know. That’s what I was trying to do when you stopped me”

Eventually I was allowed in and, to be frank, I needn’t have bothered. When I’ve been there before, they’ve been most kind and considerate in that office.

But not today. I dunno what’s the matter with them but they just seemed to be more keen to see the back of me. I didn’t accomplish half of the things that I intended to do.

But instead, I went for awalk across the park and down to the Rond-Point Schuman. It was a beautiful morning.

The park is the Parc de la Cinquantenaire – the 50th Anniversary Park, and was established by King Leopold II in 1880 (although the huge arch wasn’t built until 1905) on the site of a military parade ground for the nearby barracks, to host an exhibition to celebrate 50 years of Belgian independence.

Several subsequent exhibitions were held here until the new site out by the Atomium was developed.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I have mentioned parrots in Belgium before.

There was an aviary in the city that was bombed during the war and all of the exotic birds escaped. Surprisingly, many of them survived the cold winters and went on to establish breeding colonies in the wild.

There are considerable flocks of these exotic birds all over the city these days, and here are two of the aforementioned sitting in a tree in the park. It’s hard to believe that this is a city in north-west Europe with a continental climate.

At the bank I picked up two of my cards (for some reason the third hadn’t been prepared and I’ll have to go back) and even more surprisingly, they work. That’s all of my financial issues resolved right now – for the time being. I can actually access my money now.

Back down on the metro to the Gare Centrale and Malou turned up on time.She’d been out on the Belgian coast for a holiday and was returning to Luxembourg. We’d agreed to meet up for coffee seeing as it’s been years since we last met.

We put the world to rights for a couple of hours and then we both went our separate ways. She on to Luxembourg and me back to Leuven.

There were still a few things that I had wanted to do here in Brussels like visit the railway museum, and this was what I had planned for this afternoon. But having had a bad night, I came home instead.

Via the Vegan shop in Leuven where I picked up some more vegan cheese. I came back here, made myself a cheese and tomato butty or two, and then … errr … relaxed for a while. I’d had a bad night.

18:00 saw me head off to the railway station for my train at 18:36. And because it was departing before 19:00 I had to pay full price and not a weekend saver ticket.

And the train was 20 minutes late coming in and – would you believe – 23 minutes later still in leaving (just missing the 45 minutes-late threshold for compensation) Which meant that I could have bought a weekend saver anyway.

We arrived in Lier 45 minutes late which meant that I had to scramble over the road for my big bag of chips for tea, and then scramble off in a hurry down the road to Het Lisp.

No prizes for guessing why I had come to Lier, of course.

There’s one game in the Belgian Second Division on a Friday night every week, and this week it’s the turn of Lierse SK against KSV Roeselare.

Lier is easily accessible from Leuven even late at night (or early in the morning) so it’s always a good choice of ground to visit.

With KSV Roeselare being the visitors, I was hoping that we might have the Battle of the Cheerleaders.

Both teams have cheerleaders, which is always very good for the morale, but I do have to say that the young ones of Roeselare can knock spots off the home team. Much better organised and much better choreographed.

But no such luck. It was just the Lierse SK cheerleaders here tonight. It’s better than nothing of course.

Cheerleaders we might have, but fans we didn’t seem to.

I’ve been to Lier and the Het Lisp Stadion on several occasions to see the football, but I don’t think that I’ve seen the ground as empty as this.

It’s not quite the “announcing the fan changes to the teams” that you have at Tubize, but it was disappointing all the same. And there wasn’t much in the way of atmosphere to compensate. It was all very subdued.

The supporters weren’t the only thing that was subdued either. The Lierse SK team played like they were half asleep. They had little enthusiasm, little attacking spirit and, so it seemed, little interest.

Strangely enough, Roeselare didn’t seem to be in all that much of an attackign mood either, content to move the ball around ahead of the defence.

It wasn’t until about the 25th minute when they first tried the ball over the top. And a player running in shot, the keeper could only parry it, and a Roeselare attacker followed up.

Roeselare still kept on pouring forward, and much to everyone’s surprise Lierse SK scored against the run of play.

Well into the second hald, the first time they tried one over the top and won a corner. From the corner we had a carbon copy of Roeselare’s goal.

The match still went on at a pedestrian pace from Lierse SK’s point of view and with about 10 minutes to go, Roeselare were awarded a penatly – which was saved.

This had the effect of switching on the current to the Lierse SK side and they started to attack. The final 10 or so minutes of the game were quite exciting.

In stoppage time, Lierse won a series of corners and had two (dubious) appeals for a penalty turned down. And so as you might expect, Roeselare roared upfield and scored the winner with almost the final kick of the game.

I was back on the station just in time to catch the earlier direct train to Leuven, which cheered me up no end. So I was back here before midnight.

But my neighbours are partying again. I think that it’s going to be another long night.

Thursday 15th February 2018 – THAT’S NOT SUCH GOOD NEWS

My blood count is now down to the critical level – almost.

It should be between 13.0 and 15.0 as you know, but recently it’s been hovering round about the 9.2 mark.

8.0 is the critical amount when the emergency services swing into action, and today it’s down to 8.2.

This should come as no surprise to anyone who has been following my adventures over the last few weeks. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I was quite ill over Christmas and New Year and I’m still not back up yet.

So that plan now is that I’m going to have to undergo a series of blood transfusions – one per month in fact, for the next 6 months “and then we’ll see”.

That’s going to disrupt all of my plans.

Last night the old plan worked a charm. I took the laptop with me to bed to watch a Bulldog Drummond film in bed. And I managed about 10 minutes of it before I was away with the fairies.

And off on my travels too. Quite literally. I’d moved house and was living in a completely different town. And a letter came from one of the other inhabitants of my old place telling me how she knew about my relationship with the postwoman. I took hours to craft a very non-committal reply and was on the point of sending it when I thought to myself that it was easily open to misinterpretation nevertheless, and the easiest way to deal with the matter, seeing as whatever had happened in the past was to totally ignore the letter. And so I did. And instead I went for a walk and much to my surprise at the end of the High Street, which I hadn’t explored before, the road took a steep drop down to a nice bay where there were crowds of people having fun in the water. I went off for a look around and ended up on a grassy bank. Somehow I wasn’t able to reach the water at all.

Just for a change I was up quite early, and with no medication (because I had forgotten it as you know) I had an early breakfast and then a shower. And while I was under there I washed my clothes too.

After doing a few things I hit the streets and the shops. But I found another part of the old city walls that I hadn’t discovered previously, and so I followed them around for a while.

First stop was Kruidvat for some gelatine-free sweets, and then to the cheap shops like Zeeman and Wibra for a new jumper, but there was nothing doing.

At Sports Direct though, there were some more of the trousers that I like, but also some good-quality jumpers at a reduced price of €14:00 each, or 2 for €24:00. So they disappeared into my backpack along with a couple of pairs of trousers.

On the way up to the hospital I stopped at the bar to see if the guy who runs it whom I know was there, but he wasn’t. So I went on my way up the hill – very slowly.

You know what happened at the hospital because I told you just now, and then a very depressed and fed-up me headed into town. Alison wasn’t ready so I went for a coffee until she appeared.

We went to la Cucaracha and had another Mexican like last time, which was just as delicious, and then round for a coffee.

Afterwards she drove me back here which was very kind of her, and that’s my day finished.

It’s all so disappointing, but so what? I just have to get on with it. No point in brooding on it. Just like the defendant who found out that the judge of his case was only four feet tall – “these little things are sent to try us”.

Monday 5th February 2018 – MY HUMBLE AND SINCERE APOLOGIES …

… to the Crédit Agricole for having described them … "on numerous occasions" – ed … as being the worst bank in the world.

As part of my mega-letter-writing activities the other day I sent a letter to the Royal Bank of Scotland telling them of my new address. I received a reply today –
“We’ve changed your address. Thanks for your request to update your address; we’ve now changed this for your personal account. …. then there’s nothing for you to do”.

And they sent it to my old address!

I don’t know why it is but I seem to be surrounded by a staggering level of incompetence – much of which is not, surprise surprise, of my making. I’ll be the first to admit that my financial affairs are not straightforward, but this is astonishing. In the days before blogs were invented, I had endless troubles with the Generale de Banque in Belgium, but I sorted them out “good and proper” and since they’ve been taken over by Fortis Bank, they have been good to me. But I can’t be doing with the rest of the motley crew. What on earth is going on?

And I was asking myself this this morning when the alarm awoke me. I’d been driving a komatik – complete with huskies – around the frozen wastes of Northern Labrador during the night and ended with me being shacked up – or, more probably, iglooed up – with a girl called Sylvia whom I know from another parallel existence. Not my ideal choice of companion to share my sleeping bag for the 6 months of night in a dark and crowded igloo but then again in the frozen wastes of Northern Labrador you have to make the best of whatever entertainment is available, as many a Métis‘s father will tell you.

After the usual start to the day I had a task to perform. In my mission to inform the Rest of the World about the Welsh Premier League I challenge every news source that I see that concentrates on Welsh rugby at the expense of football.

I had a good attack on a news source on Friday and they challenged me to send in my own information about the Welsh Premier League. And so this morning I sat down and wrote off a report covering all six of the weekend’s matches.

It goes without saying that they haven’t published it. I didn’t expect that they would, but one has to go through the motions.

After that, I once more attacked the database, determined not to let my frustrations overwhelm me. And it was a hard task too, I’ll tell you. Eventually I ran aground in Verdun when I was taken ill, and with reams of photos and no notes, and the blog wasn’t written up for that period, I’m stuck up a gum tree. I can’t even find the map that I had with the notes on it.

As for the hi-fi, I’ve found another unexpected hitch. For some reason it doesn’t like tracks longer than 24:59. And so all of my hour-long live concerts are being cut off in less than midstream – after all of the effort that I went to in order to prepare them. One unhappy bunny here.

Lunch was onion soup with pasta and bulghour and for some reason it tasted awful and I’ve no idea why. I’ve noticed that my taste buds seem to have changed since my illness and some foods – and even coffee – doesn’t taste like it did.

This afternoon I took everyone, including you lot and including myself, completely by surprise. Having cleaned and tidied the bathroom the other day, you may remember that I resolved that, when I had no plans to go off anywhere special, I would do a little bit of cleaning. And so today, I attacked the kitchen.

It’s been cleaned from top to bottom, a home found for almost everything that was loitering about, and it’s been vacuumed and the floor washed.

And it does look different.

Having talked to Steven and Rosemary for a while on the computer I went out for my afternoon walk. And for once, it wasn’t raining. But it’s cold out there. Down to 0.5°C last night – a far cry from the -16°C and -19°C of the Auvergne but still the coldest night yet. And it even snowed chez Liz and Terry. And more low temperatures are on the cards for tonight.

Tea was another splendid tortilla and spicy rice with an excellent filling. I’m getting good at these. And then my evening walk.

Bed-time in a minute, presumably to go back into my igloo. With a different companion tonight, I hope. Where is TOTGA when you need her?

EPIC HALL

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