Tag Archives: blood count

Monday 29th October 2018 – IT’S NOT LOOKING …

… too good right now.

The blood count and the protein loss are stable – and while that might sound like good news, it isn’t. It should be ameliorating rapidly. And even worse, they are continuing on this the Multigam treatment, even though it’s not doing what they were hoping that it would do. It seems that they haven’t come up with an alternative yet and I suppose that I shall be having it from now on, every few weeks until my inevitable demise.

That’s what I call depressing news.

And talking of every few weeks, it’s back again on 26th November and yet again on … errrr … 24th December. So it looks very much as if it’s Christmas here in Leuven. Another Christmas away from home, but at least it’s better than last year when I spent it in hospital.

And if you think that that’s bad, the very worst news is that I had a “special interview” too, with the result of which Kaatje the Social Worker was summoned to see me. Apparently people here think that I might now start to benefit from some help around the home and wheels will be put in motion.

Apparently my apartment needs to be continually in a state of pristine cleanliness to avoid me picking up a disease or a virus. Remember that they took out my spleen 30 months ago so I have no immune system. I’m thought to be in such a state that the slightest disease or infection will polish me off.

I’m not quite liking the sound of this.

But at least my body clock is functioning correctly.

Wide awake at 05:13 and that’s good news. I hope that it keeps on going. That will be useful. But I do have an early start on Wednesday so I bet that the body clock will fail to respond on that morning.

It goes without saying that I didn’t leave the bed quite then. No point in rushing and anticipating the alarm when I have plenty of time.

Plenty of time to reflect on my little nocturnal voyage last nignt, because I was off on my travels again. I was the father of a young girl and I’d sent her to a finishing school in Switzerland (although she was far too young for that). After a few months I’d travelled to Switzerland to see how she was doing, to find that she was out on the ski slopes skiing. I waited for her, and she eventually came down to join me. We ended up sitting on a terrace thinking about ordering a meal, when she decided to go into the bar for “the usual reasons”. On her way in she started to talk to a boy by the door, and had a brief conversation with him.
When she came back we went off to the restaurant and while we were waiting to order I asked her what the conversation was all about. She replied that she had mentioned where she was going for lunch in the hope that he would come over to chat. Obviously he wasn’t all that interested, and she told me that while she was up on the ski slopes she had chatted to a few other boys and told them about her lunch arrangements, hoping that one of them would come down to accompany her. But not one of them turned up and I felt really sorry for her because she seemed to be so disappointed.

We had the medication of course, and then the breakfast. Following which I attacked some work that had built up.

With having had a shower last night, I didn’t bother with one today but instead, had a good shave and a clean-up before heading for the hills.

The weather was rather cloudy, misty and overcast and showed no real sign of brightening up. And quite cold too. It made me reflect that when I was last here for a night in Leuven, for my July visit, I was sweltering in the heat. Last night, I had the heating on full-blast.

In the Tiensestraat the shops change hands regularly and it’s always interesting to see the comings and goings.

This is the latest arrival, the Bia Mara fish and chip shop, although he’s not quite arrived yet.

But I think that he might be on a hiding to nothing. Perhaps he hasn’t heard about Brexit and the abolition of Free Movement for UK citizens.

He would be better off offering mosselen en fritjes.

Here at Castle Anthrax I was early. But I still had to wait rather longer that I should to be plugged in and wired up. I was weighed too, and much to my surprise I’ve put on the weight that I had lost. I couldn’t believe that all of the food that I ate on the Good Ship Ve … errr … Ocean Endeavour and I lost weight, yet back home where I’ve been more restrained I’veput on weight.

But once it was organised, that was that. I lay in a state of semi-consciousness for most of the day drifting in between wakefulness and sleepiness. Not that there was much else to do.

Once I was liberated from my chains, I left and then had to go back again to pick up my wallet that had fallen out of my pocket behind the chair where I was sitting.

On the way back, I called in Delhaize for food for tea and then in the Loving Hut for some more vegan supplies.

Back here, at 128% of my daily activity, I crashed out on the bed for an hour. It’s getting worse, isn’t it?

Tea was baked potatoes and chili beans, and that’s my lot. I’ve done enough for today and I’m going to have a lie in tomorrow to recover my strength and then go for a bus ride.

Tuesday 2nd October 2018 – AND SO BACK AT CASTLE ANTHRAX …

… and start as you mean to go on.
Our Hero – “I seem to be half an hour early today”
Ann the Receptionist – “no you aren’t. You’re several weeks late!”

As might be expected after all of my sleep yesterday, I found myself wide-awake at 03:15 this morning. And by 03:40 I had given it up as a bad job and was sitting on the bed working.

That had still given me plenty of time to go off on a nocturnal ramble. Back on The Good Ship Ve … errr … Ocean Endeavour and back in the High Arctic again, only this time in the company of a couple of my spurious characters and it’s not very often indeed that they ever see the light of … errr … well, you know what I mean. Yes, two people, who shall be known as, say the QC PQ and C, for want of any other name, were out there last night on a voyage and not necessarily doing what they do best either. All in all, it was something of a cosy voyage being out there retracing many of the steps that were traced a couple of weeks ago and in interesting company too.

Yes, I’m feeling all broody again, aren’t I?

I’m not sure whether it’s nostalgia for the voyage, a desire to return to the High Arctic (which is by far and away the most splendid place on earth), an unwillingness to go home or trepidation about my appointment with destiny at Castle Anthrax later this morning tha has got me going like this.

Or maybe I’m just lonely. Mustn’t rule that out either. But as they say in France, it’s better to travel alone than be badly-accompanied. And I wouldn’t have done half of the things that I have done had I had anyone else to think about too.

While there’s a kettle in the hotel room, there isn’t any coffee. And so those little tubes of coffee that I keep in my backpack for emergencies came in very handy here. That was a handy bit of inspiration, that was and no mistake.

It was also a very good job that I was up and about early too, for I would never have been able to sleep through the racket that my neighbour made after he awoke at 04:20.

A shower at 07:00 and a general organisation of myself, and then off to catch the train. Not forgetting that I needed to have my rail ticket for tomorrow printed out. The receptionist here duly obliged.

At the Carrefour in the Gare du Midi I picked up some raisin bread for breakfast and then as there was a Leuven train already in the station I leapt aboard.

And then my leisurely walk to my appointment with doom.

As well as the interaction with the receptionist, I had an interaction with a young nurse.
“Your heartbeat is very fast today” she remarked.
“You lean over me one more time like that” I muttered to myself “and it will beat even faster”.

She had her revenge. She was very rough with the catheter tube.

As a punishment for missing an appointment they kept me waiting for a while before they hooked me up. And once I was hooked up I went off. Out like a light – well, as far as possible as it is to go with people buzzing around me.

And despite what you might think, after all of the good food that I have eaten on my travels, I have LOST 3kgs in weight. I shall have to go back to the Arctic, won’t I?

From the railway station I trudged my weary way across town towards the hospital.

And ground to a splendid halt in the Grote Markt bu=y the big cathedral.

It’s soon going to be the centenary of the Armistice, and there was a display of notices to the population from the First World War.

Leuven was occupied by the Germans in late August 1914 and was a major victim of the German policy of “Frightfulness”.

The town was sacked and then set ablaze. The huge Medieval library and all of its contents dating back to the 6th Century were burnt to ashes.

The population lived under a most repressive Martial Law. Hostages were taken and were shot for the slightest “provocation” by the civilian population.

It was a nightmare time for those who lived here.

At the hospital, they did their tests and gave me the news. As expected, the blood count is down and the protein loss is up. And for the first time, a doctor has admitted that they are concerned about my lack of response to the treatment.

So back in 4 weeks by which time they might have come up with A Cunning Plan.

On the way back I called at Delhaize for some fruit and tomatoes for lunch tomorrow, and then The Loving Hut for more vegan cheese and sausages (and where I was recognised by the cashier). Finally Kruidvat for some gelatine-free sweets.

back at the Leuven railway station, and I didn’t have to wait long for a train back.

It’s one of the Class 18 electric locomotives and is probably about 8 years old, although it doesn’t look it.

She brought me to the Gare Centrale for 18:10. I’d arranged a meal with Alison at The Moon but she was delayed as there was no bus. They are all on strike.

But she arrived soon enough and we had a beautiful vegan and gluten-free meal. And I took the opportunity to discuss with her an incident that had happened to me several weeks ago and had left me feeling totally puzzled. And I wanted a woman’s point of view.

Much to my surprise (because things don’t usually happen like this) she immediately saw my point of view without me even having to prompt her. I was convinced at the time that I had been correct in my understanding, and Alison’s opinion was that, if anything, I had been far more restrained that she would have expected in a similar circumstance.

So I dunno.

We had a coffee and I showed her my prize photo, and then she took the train back out of town to the railway station near to where she works. During the bus strike, the train is the best solution.

I walked home past the big Tintin mural and had a strange encounter with three guys in the street. I know what they were after but they weren’t quick enough.

Back here I had a chat with Liz on line, and then with Alison who by now had made it safely home. A little crash out and now I’m off to bed.

We had a coffee and I showed her my prize photo, and then she took the train back out of town to the railway station near to where she works. During the bus strike, the train is the best solution.

I walked home and had a strange encounter with three guys in the street. I know what they were after but they weren’t quick enough.

Back here I had a chat with Liz on line, and then with Alison who by now had made it safely home. A little crash out and now I’m off to bed.

It’s been a long day and tomorrow I’m heading home.

I wonder what I’ll find back there.

Monday 27th August 2018 – THE GOOD NEWS …

… is that the blood count has gone up yet again.

The bad news is that it hasn’t gone up enough and the people in the hospital don’t want me to travel.

Despite the racket in the reception last night, I did manage to go off to sleep quite easily in the end and I was flat out until all of … errr … 04:38.

But even so, I was back asleep until the alarms went off at 06:20.

I had my medication and then a shower and a good clean up. But I was so bust sorting myself out that I forgot to have a coffee. And with no water or anything to drink, I had a thirst that you could photograph.

But I was out early and down to the station where, when I was buying my ticket, I heard them announce a train to Leuven. So I RAN – yes, RAN, dear reader (and you’ve no idea how pleased that made me) for the train and leapt aboard.

And it was then that I realised that I had forgotten to buy any breakfast either.

But there’s a supermarket at the back of the station at Leuven so I picked up some bread rolls and at them as I marched across the city.

I was early for my appointment so I settled down in a comfortable seat, and bang on time, the nurse came to see me and I was all plugged in and hooked up.

When the doctor came to see me, he told me that my blood count had only gone up to 9.3. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that this time last year it was at 13.0 and they were happy to let me go a-wandering off.

Not this time, though.

They want me back in 3 weeks time, so I spent the afternoon in between sleeping having a discussion with Rachel about a cunning plan.

Kaatje came to see me too. I’d had two more bills from the hospital so I handed them to her to pass on to my health insurance people.

When they threw me out, I wandered back downtown.

My route took me down to the Kapicijnenvoer for a change, and outside the Sint rafael Ziekenhuis I noticed that they had dug up the street completely.

It’s quite an impressive piece of work that they are doing.

In the town centre I stopped at a couple of places- the Carrefour, the Loving Hut and the Kruidvat for some supplies, and then I caught the train back to Brussels and my hotel.

Later on, I went out again. Alison had discovered a vegan and gluten-free restaurant called Moon at the back of the cathedral so we met there. It’s a simple buffet where you pay for the food by weight.

Delicious it was too and this will go onto our list of places to revisit, although it’s a bit amateurish in the way that it’s run. The rice ran out and “there’s no more now until tomorrow” – that kind of thing.

We went down to the Gare Centrale for a coffee and a good chat afterwards.

Later, we went outside and I put Alison onto her bus home. Once she’s ridden off into the sunset I had a bit of a loiter around outside.

With all of the photos that I’ve taken of Brussels over the years, I’ve never taken one of the Central Station. It’s not very impressive in the daytime, but at night it’s something else.

The exterior of the station at the Carrefour de l’Europe never used to be very impressive.

When I lived here it was just one main street with traffic just about everywhere, but not the traffic has been blocked off and it has been turned into a pedestrian zone.

The addition of a few pillars and arches, and a few cleverly-positioned streetlights make the place look really good.

From there I went for a little wander around in the dark, boldly going where I haven’t gone for quite some considerable time.

My perambulation took me past the Place de la Vieille Halle au Blés where the statue of the famous Belgian singer/songwriter Jacques Brel stands sentinel.

He’s come out quite nicely in the subdued street lighting.

Now back at my hotel, and 205% of my day’s activity – 16.2kms – I’ve walked today. And it feels like it too.

I’ve made my butties for my journey tomorrow and now I’m off to bed. I have an early start in the morning.

05:20 to be precise.

carrefour de l’europe gare centrale bruxelles belgique

grande place hotel de ville rue de l’etuve bruxelles belgique

Monday 6th August 2018 – I HAD A SMASHING …

… time in the café this evening.

There was nowhere to sit so Alison and I took our drinks outside to sit on the wall. I carefully put down my glass and my bottle of water, carefully put down my rucksack, went to sit down, lost my balance and smashed my glass.

Ahh well.

Having crashed out so dramatically last night, we had the Sleep Of The Dead until about 04:50. Totally painless – didn’t feel a thing.

I beat the alarm too and was out of bed before it went off. The washing wasn’t dry (of course) so I searched for a clothes hanger – and instead, found a cooling fan in the wardrobe! I wish that I had found that last night!

Breakfast was very pleasant of course, and then I set off for the hospital. A long, hot weary trudge through the streets in the heat;

I’d gone out early because last time when I had tried to go to the Bank, it was closed in the afternoon. So I arrived a couple of minutes after 09:00, only to find that it was closed for holidays.

It’s really not my day, is it?

There was a new girl on reception at the hospital and she didn’t recognise me, so we had to go through all of the identity checks again which is a pain.

And then with them being under so much pressure, I had to wait a good 25 minutes before I was seen to. And the nurse was somewhat rough with the needle too.

All throughout the day I melted and melted. They wouldn’t open the windows so after I had had a good moan for a while they bought me a fan. And that was much more like it.

The good news is that I have lost 5kgs in weight, and my blood count has gone up to 9.1. Not as much as I had wanted – last year it was 13.0 after the session had finished, but I have one more to go of course, but it won’t reach that.

The doctor doesn’t think that things are quite so urgent, so I told him that I was thinking of taking a holiday after the August visit. His response was “see you when you get back then”, which means that I can at last think of a plan.

I’m not sure what, but Alison and I saw a trip to Cape Verde that could be interesting.

Kaatje was there too and we had a chat. She’s off to Croatia soon so I asked if there was any room in her suitcase.

Eventually I was released, and I walked down to the town in the heat and did a little shopping, as well as buying myself a sorbet.

Alison left work and came to join me, and we had a really good walk before breaking off for a burger in a new vegan rstaurant (although the owners claim that the restaurant isn’t new at all, but we had never seen it before).

We had another sorbet for pudding and then walked down to the cafe on the canalside where I had my adventure with the glass.

Now I’m back here, having had a nice shower to cool me down, and I’m off to bed. With the fan blowing all over me because it really is hot tonight.

But it doesn’t look as if it is the case now, because we’ve just had a power cut. So that’s put paid to that idea.

And even as we speak the power comes back on. So I might have a decent sleep yet.

Thursday 5th July – WHAT A DEPRESSING DAY!

But let’s not go getting ahead of ourselves.

Last night was weird. I crashed out as soon as my head hit the pillow, woke up again after about half an hour, and then crashed out for good until about 04:30.

And then of course, I dozed off again just a couple of minutes before the alarm went off.

Consequently it was a very tired and weary me that hauled itself out of the stinking pit, and even a shower couldn’t really bring me round. I was feeling awful and for two pins I would have gone back to bed.

But I have things to do, and so I staggered downstairs to the van.

On the car park I met Hans who was loading up his van ready to leave, so we wished each other a good trip and like the Knights Of The Round Table, we each went our separate ways.

There wasn’t all that much traffic on the motorway given the time of morning, so I made it to Leuven in good time. And it seems that my parking spec has been taken by someone else. So I parked in an empty spec and anticipated a row when I returned.

The walk from there up the hill to the hospital was a long, weary walk and I almost didn’t make it. “I’m definitely not feeling myself today” I said, and just as well too because it’s a disgusting habit.

At the hospital I was early so I had to wait around for a while. And the first lot of bad news is that my weight has gone up by 3kg. Hardly a surprise seeing as I’ve been without my tablets for 12 days.

Plugged in and switched on, I slept for most of the day. With just the occasional awakening from the medical staff. And it was during one of those awakenings that I had some even more bad news.

The protein loss has doubled to just over 2.0 and the red blood count has collapsed to 8.8. No wonder I’ve been feeling so ill today.

They are totally dismayed by that and they want to bring me forward to three-weekly visits. That is out of the question for the next visit so we agreed on Monday August 6th – which means that I’ll be travelling back to Belgium with Alison.

And the one after that will be on August 27th, which is also bad news and rules out any possibility of going to North America.

Eventually they threw me out and I headed for Caliburn. Loads of things that I wanted to do but I just wasn’t up to any of them. No-one had said anything about Caliburn being in the wrong place, so we all came back to Liège, stopping off at Bio Planet for some vegan cheese and vegan sausages.

The traffic in Liège was horrendous yet again and it took ages to reach the hotel. By now I was thoroughly and completely tired and fed up so I went straight to bed and that was that.

It’s been a very bad day.

Thursday 7th June 2018 – THE GOOD NEWS …

… is that my blood count has gone up from 9.4 to 9.8 and that my protein loss has declined from 1.42 to 1.08 (which is still however a long way from the ideal of a maximum of 0.15)

The bad news though is that the improvement isn’t rapid enough. If you remember last year, it shot up to 13.0 and they signed me off for two months. This time though, they won’t sign me off and the monthly treatments will be continuing.

This means unfortunately that there will be no trip to Canada this year so how dismayed am I? I was looking forward to a nice long break away in Labrador and some other places too, but I can rule all of that out now.

And not only that, the 2kgs weight that I lost over the last couple of months have come back. And I don’t understand that either because regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I’m not eating anything like as much as I used to and I’m keeping up with all of the exercise that I can.

Despite everything that I said about being exhausted, that long crashing-out yesterday evening didn’t do me any good at all. My usual stand-by of watching a film on the laptop didn’t work – in fact I ended up seeing two from start to finish and it didn’t have the slightest effect.

And then I had a really bad night with several attacks of cramp, and even a trip down the corridor at 03:15 and it’s been a long, longtime since that has happened.

But it wasn’t so bad to prevent me going on a nocturnal ramble. And it was another one that might put you off your supper or something. I was up on a hill with someone looking down on atypical suburban street scene, and we were watching a man delivering parcels in one of these big brown UPS vans. He would arrive near his destination, switch off the engine and before the van shuddered to a halt he would leap out, deliver a parcel and leap back in, switching on the engine so that whatever momentum was left in the vehicle would fire it up again. I admired his style and I suggested that I ought to recruit him to drive one of my taxis. But suddenly he was called away elsewhere so he leapt out of his van, having forgotten to switch it off. The van collided with two vehicles and did them some serious harm before coming to a halt. The two drivers were, as you might expect, extremely annoyed by this and with their badly damaged cars, proceeded to ram this van and to reduce that to rubble too. A pedestrian had been knocked over in the initial collision and, thinking that he was the van driver (there was no-one else at the scene) they proceeded to beat him to a pulp. We called the attention of the van driver, now a long way from the scene, to what was going on but he either didn’t hear us or didn’t want to hear us, and was well away. I reckoned that maybe I wouldn’t want him to work for me after all.

We had the usual morning performance and then a shower and change of clothes. And outside as I was leaving the building I was once again assailed by the hotel cat who wanted to be picked up again.

I’d hardly gone 50 yards when the heavens opened and I was drenched. Luckily I had my rain jacket but I was still soaked to the skin nevertheless.

And a poor little kid about 5 years old was scootering through the streets with her mum when she encountered a metal grating where her scooter slid and she had a very heavy and uncomfortable fall. Poor little kid!

But the rain soon cleared up and the rest of the walk was quite pleasant.

But there are big changes afoot in the city.

This is the St Pieters Campus of the hospital and it’s here where I stayed when I first came to Leuven. It’s hardly used these days despite hos modern it looks, and all of the signs plastered around it seem to indicate that it’s going to be demolished and a kind of art gallery and public park are to be built on the site.

‘What a waste of a good modern building” was my immediate thought but it is something of an eyesore and the plans that they have seem to be quite exciting, especially as they intend to uncover a culverted arm of the River Dilje.

But we’ve seen all of these projects on paper before, and finding the funds to carry out the architect’s intentions isn’t as easy as drawing up the plans.

And regular readers of this rubbish will recall four weeks ago I published a photo of this spot in the Brusselsestraat in my “Only In Belgium” series of photos.

And it’s clear that my blog is being very widely read these days, especially by the local council, because they have now put up the correct road sign, showing the road narrowing on the right.

I’ll have to find something else to complain about now, won’t I?

Like parking for example.

Pathetic parking features regularly on these pages but only regular readers of this rubbish will recall that it all originated in Belgium when I was there in early 2013

So it’s only correct that I post yet another example, once more in Belgium.

I was really early at Castle Anthrax. So much so that I was all plugged in, wired up and sat in my comfortable seat a good 15 minutes before my appointment was even due. You wouldn’t have service like that in the UK under the NHS.

And I was there until about 15:30 before they threw me out. Back in four weeks.

Having picked up my medication I walked back to my little room, going via the Loving Hut (where SHOCK HORROR they have run out of vegan sausages) and Kruidvat for some gelatine-free sweets.

Coming back from town I came a different way and this sculpted relief on the side of a house here caught my eye.

Leuven was invaded by the Germans in August 1914 and in their well-publicised policy of “frightfulness” they set out to wipe out the city.

The library, that had tens of thousands of books going back 1500 years was burnt to the ground and dozens of acres of the city were destroyed.

This sculpted relief is a symbol of that period. And what is astonishing about it is that it managed to escape the attention of the Germans who came here again in May 1940 and burnt down the library again.

As I have said before … "and you’ll say again" – ed … it’s very easy for people to criticise what they consider to be a lack of resolution against the invaders, but they didn’t have to suffer what the invaded people had to suffer.

And don’t forget that the British abandoned the Channel Islands to the Nazis and didn’t dare invade the islands to reoccupy them until after the War was over.

For tea tonight I encountered the world’s only Italian restaurant that doesn’t have any pasta. Instead I had to have a pizza. Just as well I’d been for cheese at the Loving Hut.

So now another early night. I’m off for a day out tomorrow so I need to be on form.

Wednesday 9th May 2018 – AND SO DESPITE …

… all of the racket going on around me last night I must have gone to sleep at some point because I remember being awoken by the alarm at 06:20.

And not only that- I’d been on my travels during the night too. I’d been in a car accident and was filling out a form to claim my losses from the other driver. I wasn’t sure about something so I went to seek advice from a qualified person (I can’t remember now who it was but I have a feeling that it was someone connected to the defendant). She told me that on no account must I fill in this form. This form related to actual, tangible losses only and if I were to submit it, I would be nullifying any claim to abstract losses such as compensation for the pain and suffering and the inconvenience etc.

Funnily enough, when I awoke this morning, a friend of mine came on line to talk about the issues that she was having with regard to the sequel to a car accident that she had had a couple of months ago. Small world, isn’t it?

We had the usual morning pantomime and then I leapt under the shower for 5 minutes. A quick scrub does me the world of good.

There were a few things to do around here and then I headed off for the hospital. It was grey and misty when I set out but I hadn’t been out long before the sun broke through. And by the time that I arrived at Castle Anthrax I was half-undressed and sweating like a horse.

But I did stop off along the way in the Brusselsestraat to take a photograph. And you might have to look at this for a while before you work out what’s wrong with it.

It’s the kind of thing that you only ever find in Belgium

10:50 was my appointment, and at 10:50 I was already being seen to. My monolingual nurse again so we did it all in Flemish and that cheered me up no end (although it would have cheered me up even more if Doctor Piglet and Doctor Winston had been there to practise their art.

Once I’d been all wired up and plugged in (and I’ve lost another kg which has surprised me considering everything that I ate in North Africa) I was stuck in a chair and left to get on with it.

Eventually the doctor came round to see me. While my protein count continues to be really depressing (and even more so) there’s some good news on the blood count front. Last month it was 9.0. This month it’s 9.4.

They are quite happy with that, so it seems – to such an extent that they fixed up the final three appointments. 7th June, 5th July and 2nd August. That means that a trip that I have planned for the end of June may well come to pass, and also that an early trip to Canada might possibly be on the cards.

But I’ll need to find out what their plans are after August. If it’s a 2-month visit I shall be laughing. Even more so if it’s a three-month visit.

Once they kicked me out I walked on back into town and did a little shopping in the Delhaize and the Loving Hut, picked up an ice-cream sorbet to celebrate, and then came back here where i … errr … relaxed for a while.

Having … errr … relaxed at the hospital I reckoned that I might have got away with it, but it’s obviously the heat.

later on I went to the fritkot on the railway bridge. And when I say ‘no tomato sauce on the veggie burger” I really do mean “no tomato sauce on the veggie burger”. Bar-steward!

A little walk around a couple of the back streets afterwards because I don’t really know the area behind the railway station.

But never mind that for a moment. My attention was drawn to this car that was parked up here. I’ve no idea what it is and there was no maker’s badge or anything to identify it. I thought at first that it might be a Subaru, but that’s not a Subaru emblem on the grille.

But whatever it is, its number plate tells me that it’s quite modern.

Arriving back here, I was attacked by the hotel cat yet again.

Bed-time now. An early night. A long day ahead of me tomorrow as I return to the Land of thr Undead.

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”.

Thursday 14th December 2017 – SO FAR TODAY …

… I’ve managed to go a whole 24 hours without a single disaster. That makes a nice change for recent times doesn’t it?

And I’ve also done 198% of my daily activity too, and that has to be a good thing.

We started off last night as we mean to go on, and that meant an early night. And to guarantee a decent sleep I switched on a “Bulldog Drummond” film. Always does the trick, that does.

A bad attack of cramp at 01:3à wasn’t quite so good, but that’s the kind of thing that happens. Soon back to sleep and right through to the alarm as well.

The morning was quite leisurely and included a shower, and then at 10:30 it was out to the shops.

I’d previously forgotten the Kruidvat – but not this time. They have pick-and-mix sweets and they are all labelled as to their allergy rating. I treated myself to a couple of hundred grams of gelatine-free gooey sweets. And they were delicious.

At Zeeman I bought a black jumper for €7:99. I don’t have enough jumpers back at Granville and another cheap one will do me just fine.

But of all of the shops that I went into (and there were dozens) I couldn’t find a cake tin. I don’t know what’s happening to the world.

Alison turned up and we went for a coffee and a wander around the shops looking for Christmas presents for her entourage. And we called into the Loving Hut for another pile of Vegan cheese and some spray-on vegan cream.

I then took my leave and headed off to the hospital.

A new place to visit. No longer do I go to the Day Centre but to the Haematology unit. And there, the girl fitted the vampire bat to my catheter port and extracted the blood in a matter of seconds.

But the thing there is amazing. They don’t call out your name – your photo appears on the TV screen thing next to the room which you have to visit. That’s new technology!

The good news is that – rather surprisingly – the blood count is UP – from 9.2 to 9.5. And also that the protein loss is DOWN – and that’s even more surprising. Professor Janssens is pleased with me – so back in another 2 months.

Back into town again in the rain where I again met Alison. And we went to la Cucaracha – the Cockroach – the new Mexican restaurant. My taco or tortilla or whatever it was stufffed with spicy mushrooms in tomato sauce with rice was absolutely delicious and I’ll make this at home sometime.

We put the world to rights until her bus came, and then I walked back here, stopping to photograph all of the lights. But the camera on this phone is unfortunately pretty useless.

I’m now going to try for yet another early night. It’s quite cold out and my room isn’t as hot as I would like it.

Curling up under the covers is what’s called for in a situation like this.

Friday 13th October 2017 – IF EVER I GET …

… my hands on the person who decided that it would be amusing to play his music at full volume at 04:40 this morning, he’ll be drinking soup through a straw for the foreseeable future.

Having a little party in one’s room at 01:30 was rather disturbing, but this was something else completely.

Mind you, it’s taught me a lesson, which is to make sure that all of the windows in my room are closed in future. The noise wasn’t half as bad once I had done that.

And this was all a shame because my room was quite pleasant and I was very comfortable in my bed. I shall look further into this hotel once I return home.

So wide awake, I attacked some stuff on the internet that needed doing. And found some more stuff about my grandmother Ivy Cooper performing in Winnipeg in January 1923. Hard to believe that just 33 months later, she was back in the UK, remarried and giving birth to my mother.

With not having paid for breakfast, I had bought some raisin buns and orange juice from the supermarket while I was out last night, and they made a very agreeable breakfast.

And so all of that was followed by a nice shower and shave (and it really was a nice shower too) and change of clothes, and then I packed everything up to go.

The owner was on duty at the Hotel Midi-Zuid. He apologised for yesterday too and let me put my suitcase in the cupboard as my room wasn’t ready (so what REALLY happened yesterday?)

I wandered off down to the Gare du Midi to buy my ticket to Leuven. And here I made something of a mistake. It was well before 10:00 when I bought them so I had to pay full price.

But it was a nice day anyway so I went early (falling asleep on the train) and sat on the Square outside the railway station, soaking in the sun and also supping a well-earned coffee.

Later on, despite still aching just about everywhere, I decided to walk right across the city to the hospital. It was market day down the main street so I fought my way through the crowds, stopping to admire the fruit and veg stall with its lovely collection of grapes, which were so irresistible.

The Loving Hut wasn’t open yet but nevertheless I blagged my way in to buy some more vegan cheese, seeing as I had forgotten to bring over any from Canada. And the manager gave me a couple of names of mail-order vegan suppliers who might help me out.

And here’s a thing. it’s been a while since we’ve featured an old car in these pages.

I didn’t really have the time or the inclination to do much around the USA. I need to catch up, and here by the merest chance happens to be an old Mini Traveller.

rare enough in the UK these days so I never expected to see one here in Leuven.

But then again, regular readers of this rubbish will recall that we saw a mini van here in Brussels a couple of years ago.

Calling at St Pieter’s Hospital for the usual morning reasons, I continued on my way only to bump into one of my former co_kottiers from the Hostel. He’s now managing the little bistro place that’s attached to the other hostel and he invited me in for a coffee and a chat.

Unfortunately I was obliged to decline, seeing asI had a prior appointment, but I made a note. And then pressed on to the hospital.

We had a new student nurse today, so it was a good job that I knew the routine. And when she told me to “move over to the far side of the bed”, I couldn’t help but reply “that’s the most exciting thing that I’ve had said to me for quite some considerable time”.

The news though isn’t so good. While the protein might be “stable”, whatever he means by that, the blood count not so. That’s dropped from 9.6 last time to 9.2 just now. And he reckons that there’s also a leaky valve in my heart.

None of this is anything that I particularly wanted to hear. Things aren’t sounding quite so good just now, so i’m glad that I took the opportunity to carry out all of the tasks on my “to-do” list when I was able to.

It took the doctor until 17:20 to come to tell me that I could go, and to give me my prescriptions. I have to come back on Thursday 14th December, but to go to a different department, and I don’t like the sound of that.

But now I’m horribly late. I was hoping to be gone from here hours ago. I have to run to the pharmacy to collect the prescriptions and, as usual, they are short of product.

And then run for the bus, which is in no hurry. No chance of going for that coffee now.

Luckily the trains to Brussels are quite regular and I don’t have to wait long. Mevertheless it’s 18:33 when we arrive. I have to run down to the hotel, register (why he wouldn’t let me do that this morning I really don’t know), leave my backpack, and run back to the station. And i’m on the platform southbound with just three minutes to spare.

Since I’vs topped going to see OH Leuven, they have been on an impressive run of form and are up there in 2nd place in the league. On the other hand, AFC Tubize are on a woeful run of form and are well adrift at the foot of the table.

There’s a football match played in each division on a Friday night, and by pure coincidence, tonight is AFC Tubize v OH Leuven. it’s just a handful of stops down the line from here, and I’m at a loose end.

Obviously a home banker then.

But we have a tragedy – i’ll tell you that. They’ve reorganised the times of the trains and the last one back is at 22:12. The 23:12 has been taken off. What that means in real money is that if I don’t want to walk back to Brussels, I’ll miss the last 20 minutes of the game.

But never mind. Grabbing a bag of chips from the fritkot across the road from the station, I set off to the ground.

It’s a modern stadium, but they ran out of money after doing just two sides.

And that’s hardly surprising because it’s another one of those places where they announce the crowd changes to the team.

I have a coffee, chat to a couple of people, and take my seat in the stand.

AFC Tubize aren’t all that bad. In fact they can match OH Leuven in most departments but you can immediately see the problem that they are having. Their centre-forward is ploughing a very lonely furrow up front, with no service and no support.

OH Leuven are on the attack from the kick-off and only a brilliant save from their keeper stops them going 1-0 down in the first 5 minutes.

But they are in front after half an hour with a brilliant glancing header from Casagolda from a free kick.

Tubize equalize in the second half and I start to have this rather uncomfortable feeling. But it can’t be helped – I need to be on my way.

Back at the hotel I find my room, and its quite comfortable too. One of the bigger ones. I learn that OH Leuven went on to win the match but it’s bed-time for me. It’s been a long day and it’s going to be another long one tomorrow.

Monday 14th August 2017 – AT THE HOSPITAL …

… the news is not so good.

While the blood count is up slightly at 9.6 from 9.5, something else in the body (and I’ve forgotten what it was) has plummeted by over 25% – from 39 parts to 29 parts.

This has caused a few raised eyebrows and they wanted me to come in again to see if it might be just an errant result.

But no chance of that! My flight to Montreal is at 15:20 and I intend to be on it – and I won’t be back until 12th October. So my appointment is on 13th whether they like it or not.

And here’s a thing – I asked the hotel manager whether it’s cheaper to book a room over the counter or over the internet by a booking agency. To my astonishment he replied “over the internet”.

That was the last thing that I was expecting because I know how much commission these booking agencies charge. But if that’s what he wants me to do, then that’s what I will do.

Despite being awake at about 06:00 or something, there was no chance of me moving. It took the alarm at 07:00 to shift me from my stinking pit. And after breakfast I came back here and attacked yesterday’s magnum opus.

That took me up to shower time, and then a slow meander down the road to the railway station.

And my luck was in too. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that the trains to Leuven run at peculiar times – there are three all at once and then nothing for 40 minutes.

And so no-one was more delighted than me when an Inter-City pulled in just as I arrived at the station.

It was a double-decker too. Very nice, comfortable and modern, so I went off to sit upstairs.

Of course, Brain of Britain had forgotten his book and so he had to sit there and admire the scenery for the whole route.

Not of course that he was complaining about that too much.

At Leuven we had a nightmare of queueing for a new travel ticket – mine is on the verge of running out. But once it was organised it was off on the bus to the hospital and my appointment with Destiny.

I walked back through the town, picking up some stuff for lunch tomorrow as well as a nice sorbet as a treat. I reckoned that I had earned it.

You know about the irregular running of the trains between Leuven and Brussels. But here again I was in luck.

The train to Knokke was running late so just as I arrived on the platform, so did the train. otherwise I would have had an uncomfortable wait for the train from Welkenraedt.

These trains are old, dirty and rattly but they are here and that’s the important bit. I was soon back here.

We had another disaster for tea tonight. I’d been saving my plate of lentils for tonight but after they had taken my order and having waited for 20 minutes, they told me that “lentils were finished” even though I’d seen a plate in the cooler.

I ended up with a bag of chips instead.

It seems that I’m fated to have bad luck with my meals this time round. And so I’m glad that I’ve bought some emergency supplies for the plane tomorrow, to go with the crisps that Alison gave me on Sunday and which I forgot to mention.

Monday 12th June 2017 – BACK …

… in 8 weeks.

It seems that my blood count has gone down from 9.8 to 9.5. It’s not down enough to bother them that much and they don’t intend to do anything about it, so having arrived at 10:30 I was out of the door and down the road by 12:30.

Down the road as far as the café anyway, where I watched the woman sitting opposite me drop half the contents of her butty down her more-than-ample cleavage. And gentleman that I am, I would ordinarily have offered to help her remove it, and indeed so would I, had she been 19 instead of 90. At that age, people would have worked out how to do it for themselves.

Sleeping here wasn’t too bad, and I was awake fairly early. After my tea last night I didn’t feel much like breakfast and even held out over a coffee until the hospital. It’s a brief walk from here to the bus stop and the buses are every 12 minutes so I didn’t have to wait long.

Leaving the hospital, I had to try several different chemists until I could assemble all of the pills that I needed, and then went off for some vegan cheese and a couple of pairs of the trousers that I like to wear. Still on special offer too!

And that coconut sorbet that I tried? Delicious!

Back here I crashed out for an hour or so and then headed off to meet Alison. The vegan restaurant had a special offer meal available so I treated her to it ad then we went for a coffee and to put the world to rights.

So it’s early to bed as I need to be on my best form for tomorrow. It’s a long way back home again.

But before I drop off into the arms of Morpheus, I’ll leave you with a little photo.

As you know, we’ve been running a little feature entitled ‘Only in Belgium”. And here’s the latest photo for our collection – I’ve forgotten what number it might be.

But I’m sure that you don’t need a translation to be able to work it out. It is pretty self-explanatory. And to be fair, I have seen similar in other parts of the world too.

Wednesday 12th April 2017 – WELL, THAT’S THAT …

… for another EIGHT (yes, EIGHT) weeks!

Blood count is at 9.8, which is nowhere near as high as I would like and the protein count is at 1.77, which is still way above the norm, but they seem to think that I might be ready to try for 8 weeks.

And now I’m regretting that I didn’t come here in Caliburn, because he has his own little safe hidey-hole here, and given my accommodation issues just now, I could (and should) be on the next plane to Montreal – and I could go and have my accommodation issues over there.

What’s the difference?

Last night I had a good sleep even though the fridge rattles and the fan in the heater squeaks and groans. I was certainly well away, and for most of the night too. Awake at 05:45 and I’ve no idea why, but never mind.

Breakfast was the stuff that I had bought last night at the Colruyt, and I wasn’t really all that hungry, I suppose. And after a shower, I headed off to walk (about 100 miles) to the bus stop to catch the bus to the hospital.

But not before I had made a rather dismal discovery. I travel light, as you know, and don’t bring many clothes at all with me – I wash them in the shower as I go and leave them hanging to dry. But it seems that Bane of Britain here has bought two spare pairs of trousers and no spare tee-shirt. I was obliged to send Alison a message to tell her to make sure that she stands up-wind of me on Friday.

After the hospital I had a steady walk into town to buy food at Delhaize for tea, and then I went to pick up some Vegan cheese and ginger beer from the vegan place.

There was a glorious five minutes of bright sunshine and so I found a bench near to the big library where I could sit and drink my drink and admire the view in the gorgeous afternoon.

And, it has to be said, narrowly avoid being buttonholed by a Jehovah’s Witness handing out leaflets and wanting to chat to people. I waited until his back was turned and then nipped off, smartish-like.

But you do have to think about the Library here. Burnt to the ground by the Germans (along with the rest of Leuven) in 1914. And then again in 1940. So why is it that Belgium – and the whole of the rest of Europe – has more faith and confidence in Germany than it does in the UK?

Clearly the UK is doing something very wrong, and you wouldn’t expect a silly Brexiter to come up with the answer.

Back here, I made myself some cheese on toast and had a little relax. And then made up my mind to nip into the city to one of the cheap shops for a clean tee-shirt so that I could wash the one that I was wearing. Wibra had nothing cheap but Zeeman had a tee-shirt at €3:99 that would do the job.

On my return, I had a little … errr … relax for half an hour and then attacked the shower. Twice in one day, you might be thinking, but I needed to wake myself up and to wash my tee-shirt. And then I hit the town again.

I had a very pleasant evening with Sean and finally met his wife and daughter who are both lovely. Little Charlotte is 6 but she’s quite a character.

Now I’m set for bed, and I hope that I have as good a night’s sleep as I did last night.

Monday 27th February 2017 – NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL …

… the Sleep of the Dead!

By about 21:30 I was totally out of it, what with all of my exertions over the weekend and my late night on Saturday. And with a hectic 10 days to come, there’s no point in pushing out the boundaries so I hit the sack. I vaguely remember at about 23:30 waking up to switch off the laptop, and that was absolutely that until the alarm went off at 07:00.

Totally painless, and I felt so much better for it.

I had company a breakfast – one of these Obsessive Compulsive Disorder people who spent 10 minutes washing a mug, and then 10 minutes washing a glass – that type of person. And then, inexplicably, he left his dirty knife in the sink – and told me not to wash it as he would do it later. Not that I was intending to of course – each to his own around here – but it was such a strange thing to do given how much time he had spent washing the rest of his stuff.

Hospital came next – and I had to get a move on because Bane of Britain had taken his hospital folder down to Caliburn last night and he needed it up there. It’s all keeping me fit anyway. And up there, the nurse who fitted my catheter into my catheter port did so with such skill and dexterity that I didn’t even realise that she had done it and taken the blood sample.

This led to the following fantastic exchange –
Our Hero – “you know, I’m so impressed. You did that so gently that I didn’t even realise it”
Nurse – “I was Belgian Ladies’ national darts champion in 1984 and 1986”

I had to wait ages to see the doctor, but in the meantime I saw Kaatje, my Social Welfare worker and Ingrid, the trick cyclist. Ingrid managed to wangle me a visit to see the Professor who is handling my case, and Kaatje conformed that absolutely everything is up-to-date as far as payments go, and she’ll find all of the required information that I need for my insurance by next week (I shall be passing by).

As far as my health goes, the news isn’t quite so good. Blood count is down, to 10.3 and I’m not very happy about that. The protein loss is stable, but it’s still way too high as we all know.

But the professor didn’t give me much encouragement. I have renal failure – well, we’ve all guessed that with the protein loss didn’t we, so no surprise there. But I have a rare disease as you all know and according to the Professor, “it’s not responding like it should”.

She thinks that moving house is a good idea, because hauling wood and water is not such a good idea, but as to whether I need to go into a care home, rent a property or buy something else, she recommends renting. Apparently I’m
well enough right now that I don’t need a care home, but if I rent somewhere rather than buying it, I can escape from that commitment much easier than a purchased accommodation. She can’t say whether I’m good for &5 years, or good for 10 years, and when you add up all of that, it doesn’t sound too healthy, does it?

On the way back, I went to buy some bread for lunch, and had a goodbye kiss from the girl in the supermarket on the corner. That cheered me up no end, I’ll say!

After lunch, I carried on packing and moving stuff down to Caliburn. But I had a brief moment of distraction ringing up my bank. There’s an “issue” with a payment on my account, for no reason whatsoever, and it’s the monthly payment that i need to make to my Storage company in Montreal – the ones with whom I’ve had all of these issues just now.

“Unusual spending patterns” is the issue so I phoned them up – with a French mobile from Belgium to the UK, explained this to the girl on the phone, who promptly put me on hold for 8 minutes. By the time that I was reconnected I was steaming. The discussion that we had was … errr … rather heated, and in the end they put the phone down on me before I had quite finished telling them exactly what I thought of them and their bank.

But at least the payment has been made and I hope that this will be the last of it. But I’ml getting rather sick of it all.

For tea I had sausage, mash and frozen veg for tea, followed by vegan ice-cream and peach halves. That’s most of my food from here finished, and whatever is left is left.

Another four loads of stuff down to Caliburn, and I even found time to go for a coffee with Sean, the guy who used to live here. I quite enjoy his company, until he starts on about the EU. He really has a bee in his bonnet about it and he isn’t ever going to change my opinion, so I don’t know why he wants to start a discussion about it – unless it’s something to do with the two or three beers I suppose.

And I had a weird experience on the way back. Some French van with three men in it, were stopping at each girl that they saw in the Kapucijnenvoer and asking them a question. It didn’t seem quite right to me, especially when they almost stopped at the same girl twice, realised that it was she and drove off rapidly. I’ve taken the vehicle the registration number of the van just in case, because I can smell a rat from here, never mind from there.

Ad so now I’m totally exhausted, so I’m just about to go off to bed. My last ever night here in this hostel (I hope) and I’m exhausted. I’ve had a really busy day and I need to relax.

Let’s hope that the weather improves.

Monday 30th January 2017 – WHAT A WONDERFUL …

… meal that was.

Pizza with fresh vegetables with garlic bread, followed by pineapple rings with lemon sorbet. There’s no doubt that having defrosted the freezer cabinets in the fridges here the other week has certainly expanded my culinary whatsits, and I can’t wait to have a decent little kitchen with small freezer. I shall be well away, that’s for sure.

Last night I forgot to watch a film, so I dozed on and off for hours before dropping asleep. And I was disturbed during the night by a noise that awoke me at some point, although I did manage to go back to sleep until the alarm went off.

But never mind that for a moment, I was away with the fairies during the night. I was having some kind of issues about plants and I’d had to pick up some packs of compost – three sacks I wanted. I couldn’t find any to buy so I had to order it for delivery. The girl at reception wrote down the phone number for me on her note pad so that I could phone it and order what I needed. Outside, I was discussing push-bikes with someone and we made the point that up until about 10 years ago, the average age of pushbikes on the street was probably about 30 years old, but recently of course, buying new bikes seems to be the thing, and this would have brought the average age of bikes down to a much-more reasonable figure.
Meanwhile, my sacks of compost hadn’t come and I needed to remind the company. I was driving past the offices of this place and could have called in to pick them up but I was driving a school bus with kids and it wasn’t quite the right thing to do. I couldn’t find the secretary who had given me the phone number, and I couldn’t see it on her notepad so I wondered what she had done with it. This was getting confusing.
A little later, I’d gone for a manicure of my finger and toe nails. Who should be doing the manicure but “The One That Got Away”. As an aside, I have to say that just recently in real life I’ve been taking better care of my finger and toe-nails and this came through in the dream. Although they were cut very short and irregular, it was clear that I’d been taking care of them, and she was impressed. She said that she liked a man who took good care of himself. Then I made a comment about how warm it was in there, to which she replied that warmth always made her more amorous, and she gave me a big smile.

It would be at that moment that the alarm went off – had I known that I was ensconced in a tiny studio on the verge of a close encounter with her, I would have had a lie-in.

They had forgotten us yet again at breakfast and it was a struggle to find stuff to eat. And drink too because the juice supply was exhausted. When this afternoon I saw the guy who does the stocks, I had a good moan at him about that.

And then we had the hospital.

Walking that distance to the hospital hardly affected me at all – I was feeling quite cheerful on my way up there despite the light drizzle. And then we had the good news. Blood count stable at 11.8 and protein loss at 1.97 – still far too high but stable.

They offered me a six-week absence before the next visit, but I insisted on four weeks. That takes me up nicely to the end of my rental period here and if it’s still stable then, I can negotiate a six-week absence and disappear off to wherever it is that I’m going.

This afternoon was quite relaxing. I didn’t do too much. And now it’s bed-time yet again. A quiet day is called for tomorrow and then I’ll have to start to make plans.

EPIC HALL

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