Tag Archives: belgium

Wednesday 22nd June 2016 – I WAS OUT GALLIVANTING …

… at lunchtime. June and her husband were travelling back to Germany today and as we know, the motorway passes just a couple of miles from here. In fact, I’ve had more visitors here than I’ve ever had when I’ve been living in France, haven’t i?

But we started off as we meant to go on this morning. I was awake by 05:45, downstairs breakfasting by 07:15 and working on the laptop updating the blog by 08:30. That kept me out of mischief for a couple of hours.

I had a shower, a shave and a change of clothes (such are the highlights of my life these days that I record rubbish like this) so that I could look pretty, and then I hit the streets.

June and her husband appeared bang on time and we wandered off to the fritkot in the centre of town for lunch. The food was, as you might expect, very good there and there were no complaints from anyone, not that there ought to have been. And then we moved down into the main square for coffee and a really good chat. It was a beautiful morning for once, but soon clouded over as the afternoon wore on.

They left the town at about 14:30 and I wandered back to my little room, where a strange thing happened. Yes – I crashed out completely and not just for ten minutes or half an hour but for over 3 hours, which is quite astonishing. I was well-gone.

There’s been something of an upheaval here too. We had two people who left at the weekend, as you know, but someone who had been away came back this afternoon. There had been some confusion in the fridge when I arrived and when I went down to make my evening meal everything in there had been turned around. But now it’s all properly organised and as it should be, which makes a nice change.

For tea, I had boulghour, kidney beans and vegetables with rice and tomato sauce and very nice it was too. Loads of protein in all of that and as you know, I need to be on a high protein diet these days. I followed up with more of the spicy cake and soya custard substitute.

Liz was on the internet tonight so we had a long chat, and now I’m off for an early night. Despite the three hours or so of crashing out, I’m still exhausted and a good sleep will do me good.

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Tuesday 21st June 2016 – YOU WOULDN’T BELIEVE …

… that it’s the Summer Solstice today. It’s been a cold, miserable, grey wet day today from start to finish, just like a grim February day.

Well, that’s not quite true. The rain did ease off for an hour or so round about midday – just the right time for me to nip out and buy my baguette and a few other bits and pieces for lunch. I wasn’t back all that long before the heavens opened again and that’s how it stayed. Many people have asked why I don’t get out and about and go for much more of an exploration, but in this weather, who can blame me?

I had a bad night again. It was well after midnight before I managed to doze off, despite how tired I must have been after walking to and from the hospital. And I had the odd trip down the corridor too but I was wide-awake by 05:40. I did manage to stay in bed until about 07:00 before I made my start to the day, and I’ve had a little crash-out this afternoon.

So what have I been doing today then.

The short (and the long) answer to this is that I’ve spent most of the day working on my blog, doing a lot of the updating. I’m well into the month of May 2010 and I’m finding that the weather back then was just the same as it is right now – to wit cold and wet. We even had a snowstorm on 5th May 2010 when we were all on our way home from Clermont Ferrand.

For tea tonight I’ve been finishing off the mixture of stuff that I had left over from Friday night.It tasted just as peculiar tonight as it did then, but it wasn’t unpleasant.

The Vietnamese girl was in the kitchen too so I had a good chat to her. Unfortunately, she didn’t seem to be too interested in talking about life in Vietnam and that was what I really wanted to know. People of my generation were brought up with all kinds of tales about life there either in the Communist North or the corrupt American-backed South,and the unification of the country stopped our habitual flow of news. I was keen to have an up-to-date opinion, but it looks as if it won’t be any time soon.

And so tomorrow, I’m off gallivanting again. June and her husband are passing by on their way back to Germany and I’ve invited them to the fritkot for lunch. You can’t pass by Belgium and not visit a fritkot, can you?

Monday20th June 2016 – I SUPPOSE THAT YOU ARE ALL WONDERING …

… what the outcome of my visit to the hospital today was.

Firstly, no danger of my being late for the appointment, for I was wide-awake at 05:30 this morning and surfing the internet, for want of anything special to do. I had a leisurely breakfast and then, making an executive decision, I set off to the hospital in plenty of time without my rain jacket, seeing as how the day looked as if it might just be promising. And how I regretted that decision on the way home, when I had to brave a rainstorm to return to my tiny garret.

First person that I saw after registering was my doctor. She told me that the bone-marrow sample showed no trace of any illness having spread into there and so they too were making an executive decision – which was to definitively stop the chemotherapy. That’s good news as far as I am concerned. Instead, they are going to try another type of treatment and see what effect that has, as well as giving me a medicament that will stimulate the red blood cells.

The nurse then came and dragged me into a little cubicle where she took my blood pressure and pulse, and fitted me with a drain to my chemotherapy port. Once that had been done, she took a blood sample.

An hour or two later I was led to a little private ward where they coupled up three perfusions to me. One was the aforementioned stimulant, the second was a steroid and the third one was some kind of medication. They were all connected to me via a metering machine and I had to ring them every half hour so that they would come and increase the speed.

10 minutes later the doctor came to find me, to tell me what they were going to do to me, but she told me that she wouldn’t bother, seeing that they were already doing it. But the good news is that my blood count, a good week after the last transfusion, is at 9.3 and it’s a long time since it’s been this high. And so no blood transfusion this week.

It was round about 18:00 that I was thrown out of the hospital so I went to check on Caliburn, give him a couple of laps around the car park to warm him up, and park him in a different place so that it looks as if he’s doing something. Plenty of space on the car park at that time, so I reckon that if I decide to move him, I’ll have to keep him out all day until the evening when I can take him back.

I’m running short of socks and undies here so I fetched some more down, and I also meant to bring some more foodstuffs, but I forgot. And how I wish that I had remembered, as I have no small tins of mushrooms or vegetables to pack out the remains of Saturday’s Indian meal. I had to use plain rice and a stock cube instead.

So with my next appointment now in two weeks’ time, I can relax for a while and not worry too much. But I’ll be intrigued to see what my blood count will be when I go back.

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Sunday 19th June 2016 – NOW THAT’S MORE LIKE IT!

I had to leave the comfort of my stinking pit once during the night, but I was soon back in it and fast asleep. And the next thing that I remember were the bells of the local church summoning the faithful. I tried to count the peals of the bells but was easily defeated by the crazy campanologist so I had to look at my phone to find out the time.

Ohh yes, 09:47. That’s what I call a lie-in. When was the last time that I had a decent sleep like that?

I’d been on my travels too, driving a sports car in some kind of rally. as far as field positions had gone, we had finished down the field but bearing in mind the individual start times, we were well out in front in the classifications and I was expecting, with all kinds of confidence, to leave the field behind me the next day. But on setting off, the tractor-digger that I was towing behind me suffered a collapsed digger arm and that seriously delayed me as it wouldn’t raise back up. Of course, the idea of switching on the engine to start up the hydraulic pump never ever occurred to me.

After breakfast, I went for a pleasant stroll down to the boulangerie down the street – the one that I looked in the other day – for my baguette. I’ve run out of hummus so it’s vegan cheese, tomato and olives today for lunch. For a change, it was quite nice weather outside but it soon clouded over. The weather is really miserable right now and no-one would ever believe that it’s flaming June.

And while we’re on the subject of vegan cheese, I forgot to post a photo of my exciting discovery from several days ago. So now’s the chance to catch up with the outstanding issue.

As you can see, it’s the same brand of vegan cheese that I discovered a month or so ago, but this time it’s a Cheddar cheese substitute. THis is quite an exciting discovery and will definitely make my cheese butties taste much better.

This afternoon, I’ve been on at the Titanic public enquiry again – the American version. Today, I’ve been reading a great deal of nonsense from some of the passengers – the most important part of the disaster according to one woman was a sailor sitting next to her in a lifeboat lighting up his pipe, and another passenger regretting that sailors were put in the lifeboats to row and that their places should have been given to some of the “gallant and heroic First-Class male passengers who gave their lives so that those wretches could escape”.

But I have said before that I have no time for Senator Alden Smith who chaired the enquiry, but this nonsense about “what is an iceberg made of” has finally been put to bed.

You remember that we said the other day that the American Press of the day ridiculed him for asking the question – on the basis that “everyone knows that icebergs are made of ice, which is water”. But we had an Arctic expert giving evidence today who stated that icebergs are full of rocks, and it’s those rocks that could easily split the iron sides of a ship and cause the damage that led to the sinking of the ship. So Senator Alden Smith had the last laugh after all, although you would never expect the American Press to apologise.

It was such a nice evening that I went for a walk into town. And I’m glad that I did because I encountered a motorbike that I didn’t recognise, so I went for a closer look.

This is a Hercules, a German make of motorcycle – a company that was famous for producing a Wankel rotary engined bike and which ceased production in 1996. There was nothing to indicate anything more about this bike, but it’s a single-cylinder four-stroke of about 125cc, something like that.

We don’t have a classification for old motorcycles so I’ll file it under “old cars”.

The Town Hall in the city centre looked absolutely splendid in the late evening sun and was well-worth a photograph. It does make you wonder just how splendid the city must have been before the Germans burnt it to the ground in 1914 and blew it to bits in 1940.

Now that I have my vegan cheese I could go for a pizza, after all, it is Sunday. And I had a beautiful vegetarian pizza that went down well. And a lovely walk back home where I polished off the rest of the cake with some soya custard-substitute.

Now, I’m going to have an early night. I have a busy day tomorrow at the hospital.

Saturday 18th June 2016 – WHAT A NICE EVENING …

… that was!

Tonight was the night that we had our little farewell party. The student exams are coming to a close and two of the students are leaving on Monday morning. And so they decided to have a little party, with each person contributing a course of the meal, and I was invited.

I went to the Asian fast food place and bought a biryani, and also a bottle of wine. Everyone else made something, much of which was vegan, so there was plenty to eat. We sat around the table chatting away for quite some time too and it was after midnight that I came up to my room. The people here are very nice indeed, very friendly, and I’m glad that some good has come from staying here.

But here’s a thing. I had a couple of trips down the corridor during the night but they didn’t inconvenience me too much, and went back to sleep each time. When the alarm went off, I simply turned over and dozed off again, and it was almost 08:30 when I finally awoke. That makes a pleasant change too, a little lie-in.

I was back on the Titanic public enquiry this morning, with Senator Alden Smith still stuck in this monomania that he had about the two wireless operators, Cottam and Bride, selling their stories to the Press. I can’t see an issue with it – after all, it’s their own personal story and they waited until they were on dry land before making contact with the Press, and yet to date, 12 days into the enquiry, Alden Smith has devoted about a third of the time into interviewing everyone from the Marconi company, wasting everyone’s time and even summoning Marconi himself not once but twice to a meeting in the USA to interrogate people over the issue as he thinks that it’s “improper practice”.

As I said, I don’t see an issue with it. It’s their own personal story and has nothing whatever to do with an issue involving Marconi, the White Star Line, the American public and Senator Alden Smith.

At lunchtime I braved the showers to go to do some shopping and passed by the market for some olives where I bumped into Melanie, one of the students here who was also doing some shopping. I’ve finished off my hummus so tomorrow I’ll be having cheese and tomato butties. I don’t want to buy anything perishable yet because on Monday I’m not here – in the hospital in fact, and out gallivanting on Tuesday lunchtime.

Back on the Titanic this afternoon and then off to the shops for the food for the party – and now I’m back here. I’ll have a nice lie-in tomorrow (I hope) with no alarm. High time that I had a good rest.

Friday 17th June 2016 – THAT WAS A WEIRD TEA TONIGHT.

Yes, I should have had rice, bulghour, lentils and vegetables for tea tonight. But I mistakenly took a tin of vegetables for couscous with me, and ended up with chick peas and tomato sauce mixed in with it. The taste was unexpected, but not disagreeable.

You can tell that I’ve been to the shops today. I’m starting to run out of certain foods and so it was to the Delhaize supermarket in the town centre. Apart from the baguette, I bought some tomatoes, bananas and peaches, and then some rice, bulghour and vegetable stock cubes. All of the proteins in that lot should keep me going for quite a while. I need to concentrate on those as you know.

Apart from that, I’ve not done too much today. I was up early yet again, had breakfast and then spent most of the day on the laptop. I’ve been continuing the reading of the American enquiry into the sinking of the Titanic, which is extremely intriguing.

And I’ve managed to dispel one rather mischievous story about the enquiry, which has pleased me greatly. I have no time whatever for Senator Alden Smith, the chairman of the enquiry, but he was ridiculed in all of the Press for asking an officer of the Titanic “what is an iceberg made of?”. Especially when the answer of “ice, I suppose” was given.

But this is VERY VERY selective news reporting – for in fact at least two other witnesses gave evidence that an iceberg is made of ice plus stones plus soil plus all kinds of other things – with the idea that it was the stones caught up in the iceberg that damaged the hull of the ship, and one person even suggested that the shallowness of the Grand Banks was caused by centuries, or millennia of rocks and soil in the icebergs falling out of suspension and sinking to the bottom of the sea when the icebergs begin to melt. Alden Smith was simply trying to clarify the position when he asked the question and in my opinion, he has been unfairly pilloried.

I had a long chat with Liz on the internet too. She’s enjoying herself in Normandy in her little turret and having a good time by the seaside. Long may it continue.

So now I’m off to bed – not quite as early as I wanted, but never mind. I fell asleep listening to the radio last night and I’ll probably do the same again.

See you in the morning.

Thursday 16th June 2016 – I’VE BEEN OUT GALLIVANTING …

… this evening.

Alison was coming into Leuven so we arranged to meet up and go for a meal, a coffee and a chat. And so, as indeed you might expect, when it was time for me to go off to meet up with her, it started to rain.

However, at least it did prompt me to have a shower, a shave and a change of clothes so it can’t be all bad, can it? And I must say that I needed it all too. And in another major step forward, I’ve tracked down a launderette so I can give all of my clothes a good going-over as soon as I have a bag full.

The launderette is actually on the way to the boulangerie, and seeing as how I had a full complement of everything that I needed today, I reckoned that instead of the supermarket I’d just nip to the boulangerie to see what it’s like. The baguettes cost €1:25 but they are enormous and I had something of a struggle to eat it all. And while I was in the kitchen preparing lunch I was joined by one of the students and we had quite a chat. Not only that, one of the girls is leaving on Saturday and there’s a party for her, and they have invited me to attend. Isn’t that nice of them?

I didn’t have the sleep that I wanted last night. I awoke twice with the urge to visit the porcelain horse and it’s a flaming long way down (and an even longer way back) especially in the middle of the night. But years of living in a van have taught me a trick or two and I have come well-prepared for eventualities like this. One day, I’ll explain my littie secret to you.

I’ve been on the internet for much of the day, reading the report of the American enquiry into the sinking of the Titanic. I read the British Board of Trade report years ago but the other day I came across the American one. This is very interesting because it was the first of the two enquiries and there was a huge argument recorded in its pages between the officers on one hand and the seamen of the other hand about whether the Titanic split in two before it sank. Most of the seamen who expressed an opinion were firmly of the opinion that the ship had split in two, whereas the officers disputed this idea.

The conclusion reached by the inquiry was the ship had not split in two, and at the British enquiry, the point was not pursued as firmly. Yet when the wreckage of the Titanic was discovered and filmed, they way that it was lying on the sea bed left no doubt that the ship had indeed split into two before sinking.

I met Alison at the parking of the Sint Jacobsplein and went for a walk through the rain into town. Yet another gorgeous meal at the city centre fritkot followed by a coffee around the corner, and then a slow wander back to Alison’s car, seeing as it had stopped raining by now. It’s nice to be sociable and meet up with friends.

Back here, I’m having a little late night for a change. Serve me right for drinking that coffee!

Wednesday 15th June 2016 – I FELT SORRY …

… for my landlord. He came all the way here with a new flourescent tube for my little room, and I didn’t use it.

I was in bed listening to radio programmes on the laptop, long before it went dark. And I must have crashed out completely because I remember nothing until waking up to switch off the laptop round about midnight. And that was about that until 06:33 when I awoke. And I did feel much better after that.

But here’s the most exciting news of today, and that is that I may well have found somewhere else to stay for the 11 weeks that I need a place. I had a reply from a kind-of tourist hostel and so I went off to have a look at it. It’s right by the Sint Jacobsplein where the famous fritkot is situated, which is extremely handy and very well-situated for the hospital. It’s a big house which, admittedly, has seen better days, but nevertheless, it’s still quite acceptable.

I’m having a single room all to myself, with a shared bathroom and kitchen. Everything is provided – wi-fi, bed-linen, cleaning and so on, and there’s a breakfast included in the price – and it’s going to cost me about €26 per night. It’s more than I wanted to pay, of course, but it’s here and it’s now, and a lot less that I would have to pay in a hotel. And, of course, once I’m in, I’m in and if I need to extend my stay for any reason, I can do that from the comfort of within rather than from out in the street in some kind of desperation.

As well as that, the included breakfast will save me some money. The presence of a kitchen will help me in this respect too – I can live on tinned food and so won’t have to pay for meals out in the evening. I reckon that if I’m careful, I can keep within my means but there won’t be a lot spare.

Anyway, it’s all now reserved and I’ve paid a (substantial) deposit. Just watch the place burn down now.

Apart from that, we have the internet working. The college’s intranet runs on an underlying public access internet network and one of the students here let me have the access code for the public access part of it, which was quite nice of her. So now it’s all systems go.

We had a torrential rainstorm at lunchtime too about half an hour after I went out to the shops for my lunch stuff, and so I was rather caught out in it and was soaked to the skin. It’s a long time since I’ve been out in a rainstorm quite like that and my baguette was all soggy in places.

Tonight for tea, I finished off the kidney beans and mixed veg from last night, along with some pasta and tomato sauce. And, of course, the spicy cake and soya dessert for pudding.

Now, I’m going to have an early night and a good sleep. I’m off gallivanting tomorrow.

Tuesday 14th June 2016 – SO HOW WAS MY FIRST NIGHT IN MY NEW DIGS THEN?

The answer was “not very comfortable”.

What with one thing and another, it was long after midnight before I ended up going to bed. And once I was in, I had a little listen to the radio but it wasn’t long before I switched everything off and settled down for the night.

But the mattress, which I have put on the floor, as I have no intention of climbing up to the eaves of the room, is really uncomfortable. It’s a very cheap mattress to start with and it sags just about everywhere. But it wasn’t long before I’d dropped off to sleep, and that was how things stood until all of … errr … 05:30. I’m not used to the big city and all of the traffic and the like.

It goes without saying that I didn’t actually leave the stinking pit at that time, and when I finally did, I had plenty to do up here. Breakfast was therefore at 09:00 where I made the acquaintance of one of my co-cottiers. I had to run up and down the stairs twice as well – the first time wasn’t too bad but I was on my knees for the second. This is clearly not going to be sustainable.

The walk up to the hospital was quite pleasant even though it was all uphill. I called at the boulangerie that I had discovered yesterday. and of course, it’s closed on Tuesdays. But there’s an Asian supermarket across the road and they sold baguettes, so that’s that problem resolved.

The parking problem for Caliburn is semi-resolved too. I picked up a document from the hospital yesterday setting out my visits to date, and with this I was able to apply for a parking card for a free car park in the vicinity. This was duly granted.

But having the pass is one thing – finding a free space there is quite something else. I ended up making an ad-hoc space for myself at first, and then going back out at lunchtime to pounce on a liberated space. And that took quite a wait. By the end of the afternoon though, there were a few free spaces so if I do decide to go anywhere in Caliburn it will have to be in the late afternoon that I come back.

I made use of the hospital’s internet to check up on things and to send off another pile of e-mails. I’ve already had two replies from this load of messages, but they were both refusals.

Walking back here was pleasant too in the early evening sun and I encountered the landlord in the building, changing a few light-bulbs including the one that doesn’t work in my room. I also had an encounter with a couple of the girls here, sorting out a place for me in the fridge.

Tea tonight was pasta, kidney beans, veg and tomato sauce followed by slices of spicy cake and soya dessert. Loads of proteins in all of that. And now, having almost fallen asleep a couple of times at the hospital, I’m off for an early night.

I hope that I can have a good night’s sleep tonight.

Monday 13th June 2016 – IT’S NOT VERY GOOD NEWS!

No, I had the results of the two samples that were taken from me the other week.

The first bit concerns the bone marrow. Whilst it’s true to say that the lymphona hasn’t spread into my bone marrow, the fact is that the bone marrow itself is quite fragile and as a result they won’t be giving me any more chemotherapy. This is because the marrow is quite fragile and they fear that the chemotherapy may damage it.

The second thing is, if anything, even worse. And that is that my illness has spread to my kidneys and that is what is the matter with them.

I don’t know if the situation is dangerous or not – I didn’t ask. What I do know is that they are going to have a meeting on Wednesday to discuss a course of treatment and I have been summoned for next Monday to a meeting to find out what will be the plan. All that I can say is that I don’t like the sound of this at all.

I had a difficult night’s sleep again, awake quite early and having a trip or two down the corridor. When the alarm went off at 07:15 I was awake but it still took me a good few minutes to leave the comfort and safety of my nice warm bed. After breakfast I packed everything away and even found time for a shower, then paid up for my stay and hit the road.

It was pelting down with rain this morning and traffic queues everywhere. However I made an executive decision (an executive decision being, for the benefit of new readers of this rubbish, a decision that if it happens to go wrong, the person making the decision is executed) to follow the signs for the motorway once I reached Korbeek-Lo and that was a much better idea. There was heavy traffic on that road but it was all turning off to the various business parks down there and it didn’t take long to hit the motorway. And once on the motorway it took me a mere 10 minutes to reach the hospital by going right round the city and onto the campus from the rear. I was there half an hour early.

A couple of doctors, one of whom was the girl whom I normally see and the second one was the urologist – she who gave me the bad news – came to see me. That wasn’t all that she gave me either because she ordered an injection for me – one that would help purge me of excess water. And I’ll tell you what – that worked in spades and made me feel so much better.

The Social Welfare girl came to see me too. We discussed my accommodation situation and she’s going to make further enquiries for me. Mind you, although she’s given me a great deal of moral support she hasn’t really gome up with too much in the way of practical help. But then again, I don’t suppose she encounters too many people who have my kind of problems.

They gave me a blood test too, and my blood has dropped down to 7.6. That of course meant a blood transfusion and I had two pochettes of blood. What with all of that, it was nearly 19:00 when I left the hospital. I had a walk down into town and stopped off at a fritkot for a falafel butty and chips for tea – all for €5:50.

And then it was back here to my new home for my first night.

There’s no internet (there’s a student.net site but of course I don’t have a password for it) and there’s a leak around rthe edge of the roof light.

As I said yesterday, I’m glad that I’m only spending a couple of weeks here.

Sunday 12th June 2016 – I’M GLAD …

… that I’ll only be in this new place for two and a half weeks. It’s nothing at all like the kind of place that I would like to be and, even worse in my opinion, I’m up in the attic three and a half floors up and I was having something of a struggle to find my way up there. If I do manage to meet a nubile nymphette and invite her upstairs to see my etchings, I’ll be in no fit state to do anything about it.

But I’m not going into too much detail about the place. It’s just outside the centre of Leuven, not too far away from the hospital that I visit, and it’s €10:95 per night, everything included. That’s all that you need to know about it. The cheapest hotel in Leuven is €37:00, to give you some idea of what is involved.

I had something of a mixed night last night and was up and about long before the alarm went off, having had breakfast and a chat with someone whom I knew who was on the internet this morning. And then I went off to that boulangerie that I discovered the other day. Half of Belgium was in there in front of me, but I was seen eventually and picked up my baguette. And it was nice too – well-worth the wait.

This afternoon I’ve been tidying up in here and everything has gone down to the new place, except for the stuff that will fit in my backpack. I’ll take that to the hospital with me, leave Caliburn on the car park, and then walk down to the new place from there, and see if I can find a boulangerie in the neighbourhood. I had a quick drive around and couldn’t see one, and I need to put my priorities in the correct order.

On the way back, I stopped off for a pizza – after all, it is a Sunday. I sat on the car park of the Carrefour at Korbeek-Lo and ate it, and pretty good it was too. Then I came back here for pudding.

I’ll have an early night tonight and see what tomorrow brings. It’s the day that I have my hospital results and so I’m not much looking forward to it. I shudder to think what they might have found.

Saturday 11th June 2016 – YESTERDAY AFTERNOON …

… I sat down and sent off a whole ruck of e-mails about accommodation, asking for appointments to view for this weekend. And how many replies do you think that I’ve received?

Krys guessed right (good old Krys!). She said “none”. As I have said many times before … "and you’ll say many times again" – ed … there is no such thing as a recession. There is just a whole load of people who are letting all kinds of income-generating opportunities melt away before their very eyes. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall dozens of similar occurrences – solar panel suppliers in March 2009, caravan suppliers in July 2015 – two examples that spring readily to mind.

And not forgetting two suppliers of slide-in camper units for Strider whom I visited, one in New Hampshire and the other one in Quebec – and asked them to send me quotes for the Spring so that I could order one ready for the summer. That’s an order worth over $12,500, would you believe, but it’s too much trouble for any of the sales staff to reply to me.

Anyway, enough of my ranting. I have better things to do.

Like waking up at 07:00, long before the alarm, finding out that two of my friends are on line already, and having a chat that went on to … errr … 13:00, with me missing breakfast. And then just as I was about to nip off, Liz came on-line for a chat and so I was here for another 90 minutes.

Not that I am complaining, of course. Far from it. It’s nice to see friends and chat aimlessly for ages. I’d much rather chat to a friend than eat breakfast. That’s much more important.

And so I eventually made it out to buy a baguette for lunch. Dunno if I mentioned that yesterday I finally discovered a boulangerie so I went there first. But by that time they had long-since sold out. I ended up at the Bio-Planet where I bought a lovely artisanal baguette, sampled a pile of delights and had two free cups of coffee. You have your money’s worth in the Bio-Planet.

Back here in my room it was stifling, but I’ve managed at long last to force the window so that now I can open it, and listen to the arrival of a serious rainstorm as the weather has broken.

But not before I went out to make my tea. The chick peas left over from Thursday had gone off already and so I ended up with pasta, tinned vegetables with chick-peas already mixed in, and tinned mushrooms followed by the usual pudding.

Tomorrow will be an exciting day for me as I’m taking all of my possessions to my new digs in Leuven. I hope that they are okay but for the money that I’m paying to stay there, I’m not expecting too much. It’s all a question of money’s worth, as you all know already. I’ll put up with inconvenience if I’m not paying very much – I’m on the economy package.

So i’ll clear off now and listen to the rain. It sounds lovely outside.

Friday 10th June 2016 – I’M ANNOYED!

In fact, I’m furious!

Yes, that nice place that I went to see, the landlord has now decided that he didn’t want to rent it to me after all.

So let me tell you the full story. He advertised several rooms, the one of which I wanted was available from 15/06 until 15/09. But when I arrived, it had gone. He did have another, from 01/07 until 15/09, and I said that in principle I would take that if I could find somewhere for the period from 13/07 until the end of the month. So he sent me an e-mail with all of the details of a place that he knew, and that was what I booked. And so I told him that all was arranged and could we go ahead. This was when he sent me a mail to say that he didn’t want me as a tenant.

I don’t have a big issue with that, but what I do have an issue with is why he wasted my time getting me to go to this other place and booking there for two weeks. I could easily have found another place for the whole three months on this web-site that I’ve been using. Why send me a mail with this information? Why not just tell me in the first place that he had changed his mind?

Mind you, I suppose that I do have another two weeks to look around, and it does give me more leeway to find out what they will tell me on Sunday.

It wasn’t all doom and gloom though, for I was out gallivanting just now. Alison and her cousin Jennifer came to visit me and to inspect my country estate, and we ended up going back into Leuven together for a fritkot and a coffee. That made a very nice change indeed – it’s very pleasant to spend an evening in the company of interesting and stimulating people and I was sorry when it was time to go home. I don’t meet enough interesting people these days.

So what else have I done today?

Ahh, yes. I went to the big Carrefour at Korbeek-Lo for shopping. I spent quite a sum in there but then I needed to because this new place where I’m going is far from the big shops and I’ll have no transport while I’m there (there’s no parking in the vicinity so Caliburn will be staying at the hospital) and so I needed to stock up with tins and the like to drop off there when I go by and leave my stuff on Sunday evening. Whatever else I need to buy, I can do that bit-by-bit as I’m out on my travels.

But I did make one small boy’s day today. At the Carrefour they give away football stickers and models depending upon how much you spend, and I was given quite a few. Not that they are of much interest to me but there was a boy of about 6 in the queue behind me, all dressed in Belgium football gear, so I gave the lot to him. He’ll have more fun with it all than ever I will.

The bank was next on the list too. I had a couple of hospital appointments to pay for, and I wanted to do that as quickly as possible. Put everything like that out of the way so that I’m up-to-date. When I’m in the hospital, I’ll check to see if there is anything else to pay.

Now that I’m back home, I’ll have an early night ready for tomorrow. But I’m still fuming about this flaming landlord and his blasted room.

Thursday 9th June 2016 – I WAS RIGHT …

… about my return to my bad old sleeping habits. I was awake for hours after I’d finished watching a film, and then I was passing in and out of sleep for the rest of the night. I’d been on my travels too but once I’d finally awoken (at 07:07 for those of you who are interested), I couldn’t remember a single thing.

We’ve had a day of nothing in the way of excitement. I went out to the Delhaize for my baguette and salad, noticing that, once more, the patisserie is still closed.

Apart from that, I’ve been working on the blog, doing some more updating of the older parts of it, and having a little crash out as well, which is hardly any surprise because once the sunshine came round into my room, it was beautiful.

For tea tonight, I had pasta, mixed vegetable and chick peas mixed up with more of the spicy tomato sauce (loads of protein in that) followed by the usual pudding of spicy cake, soya vanilla custard substitute and some mixed fruit in syrup.

Tomorrow, I’ll be off to the big Carrefour for a pile of shopping. I think that I have found a place to stay until the end of the month and so I need to lay a few supplies in. I’ll be having to leave Caliburn parked up while I’m staying there so I’ll need to do a major shop beforehand to make sure that I have everything that I need.

Wednesday 8th June 2016 – YOU MISSED …

… all of the excitement here this morning. A lorry was delivering to the front of the hospital across the park from here, and because it’s all so tight for manoeuvring, the only way that he could leave was to drive 20 metres the wrong way up the drive, reverse back around a corner, and then go back the right way.

That’s exactly how I would have done it and this was indeed what he was trying to do, but some old woman in a car coming up the drive had deliberately blocked him in, refused to move, and told him to go out of the hospital via the exit – totally oblivious to the fact that it’s too tight for him to turn his lorry around the corner.

And there she sat, and there the lorry driver sat (not that he had much choice in the matter) until Yours Truly and someone else intervened . And then, instead of reversing 20 metres backwards, she pulled forward and blocked off the turning down which he needed to reverse. And we were back once again in the impasse.

I tell you – you can’t make up stories like this in Belgium, can you?

But we’re back with our old sleeping habits, so it seems.

Not exactly 100% though, because I did manage to stay awake to watch the whole of a Boris Karloff “Mr Wong” film. And then I couldn’t drop off to sleep straight away – must be my guilty conscience I reckon.

But then I awoke sometime during the night to go for a ride on the porcelain horse, and the 05:00 dawn chorus finally managed to arouse me from my slumber and that, I reckon, was that.

I did manage to drop off to sleep again at some point because I was on my travels with Nerina. We were at some place down the east coast of the USA and I’d arrived at the hotel which I had booked (in advance, not like me) to stay the night, and I was parked up at the side of the road on rather a wide verge waiting for Nerina to appear. She came along eventually, via the golf course, where she was playing a round of golf. Not that I know anything about golf, but this golf course was weird. There weren’t greens as such, but what would normally be the “green” was gravelled over with tiny loose chippings and the “hole” was a small, narrow trench that conducted the ball to where the hole would be. But Nerina was clearly enjoying herself. Away in the distance on the skyline was another complex, of buildings, hotels and a huge amusement park and this was where I had arranged to stay for the following night (none of this sounds like me, does it?) which pleased Nerina even more.

I’d switched the mobile phone off yesterday and had forgotten to switch it back on before going to bed, so that accounts for the reason that I didn’t finally awaken until 08:45, and it was a grey, miserable, overcast day that greeted me this morning. Nothing like the last two days that we have had.

That patisserie that I mentioned yesterday – it was closed today too so I reckon that we can rule that place out for the rest of my stay. I ended up at the Delhaize further on for my baguette. And I’ll have to go back there tomorrow too because my shredded lettuce mixture stuff has gone off and I need to buy some more. A small pack is only €0:51 in there.

After lunch, the weather brightened up considerably and it was a lovely, warm summer’s afternoon while I was in here working (with windows that don’t open either). But tonight I went out to Caliburn and cooked the second part of my meal. And with it being so nice, I sat outside in the evening sunshine and ate it.

Exactly the same meal as last night, in fact, and it tasted just as beautiful. But tomorrow, I’ll have to try something else. Maybe a ratatouille with tinned mushrooms, or chick-peas perhaps. That sounds like a plan.

It’s a gorgeous evening, with the late, low suns streaming into my little room. I’m going to settle down now and watch a film or something, and see where I end up tonight.

EPIC HALL

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