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Sunday 10th August 2025 – HA HA HA HA!

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall the Welsh football club TNS. Created out of what used in the good old days to be Oswestry Town FC, and bankrolled to an enormous degree by its extremely wealthy chairman, in the last ten or so years the club has won just about every trophy or prize the Welsh domestic league can offer.

Some say that it’s a bad thing, that they monopolise the Welsh football system, but as it happens, I’m in two minds. I’ve seen the dramatic improvement in playing standards and in facilities in the Welsh pyramid over that period as other clubs struggle desperately to try to keep pace.

It’s also quite good for the morale when some lesser football team manages to scrape a win against them and their supporters collapse in a delirium of delight.

Last season, TNS became the first ever Welsh domestic club to qualify for the group stages of a European club competition and against all the odds, they managed even to win one of the group games to ensure that they didn’t finish bottom.

However, the success has gone to their heads. With the 5,000,000€ prize money, they have gone out and bought a raft of top-class professionals who really have no place in this league, and they kicked a pile of their journeymen professionals into touch.

Victims of their own hype, they had a dismal pre-season as their new stars struggle to adapt to the physical nature of lower league competition, and having predicted another successful European campaign, they failed embarrassingly to progress beyond the first round of the competitions in which they played.

Today, the JD Cymru League season began, and they were at home to Llansawel, a team that struggled near the bottom all last season and one of the clubs heavily tipped for relegation this season.

And if you want to see how the game progressed, HERE ARE THE HIGHLIGHTS. You don’t need to be a football fan to enjoy them. TNS are in the green and white.

Just two weeks ago, I wrote an article for a football magazine in which I said "having seen TNS’s performances to date, it’s a certainty that several optimistic managers will be searching desperately for some rapid wingers to exploit the cracks over the top and round the sides of the TNS defence". In this game, you have a perfect example of a manager doing just that – and doing it in spades too. THE KEYSTONE COPS have nothing on the TNS defence.

Anyway, retournons à nos moutons as they say around here.

Last night was another … well … not exactly “early” night, but I was in bed by 23:00, having once more dashed through everything at another uncomfortable rate of knots.

It goes without saying that I awoke quite early – at about 04:10 this morning. But this tile I was determined to go back to sleep and to my surprise, I actually succeeded, only to awaken at 06:29 precisely.

That’s the time that the alarm is set to sound on six days of the week. Sunday is a Day of Rest and the alarm is set for 07:59 so in theory I could have tried to go back to sleep yet again, but instead, I decided to raise myself from the Dead.

In the bathroom for a good wash and scrub up, and then into the kitchen for the medication, followed by coming back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.

And who had come with me too, because TOTGA appeared in a dream last night. I was in Crewe, sorting out some food, jars of all kinds of things, tomato sauce etc that we’d collected. I was going to put them into Gainsborough Road. However, one of the jars had leaked so I’d had to clean it. My friend told me to knock before I went in, made sure that the tenants knew that I was there etc. I decided in the end that I didn’t really want to go because being inside that house again would dismay me. By this time, TOTGA had appeared and we were due to go back to Normandy, the three of us. First of all, I wanted to telephone an old school friend. TOTGA knew who he was and she said that he hed been ill, he had depression and all of that kind of thing. As I picked up the ‘phone, I suddenly forgot his number, so I just dialled a number at random and then hung up, saying that there was no answer. Then we decided that we’d ring up Rosemary to see if she fancied a quick visit before we went back. I couldn’t think of Rosemary’s ‘phone number then. Eventually, I managed it so I ‘phoned up and we had a chat. I asked her if she fancied a quick visit and she was really surprised. She wondered where we were and what we were doing, so we agreed to go down there. By this time, some people from the street had come past. They recognised me and came for a chat. TOTGA knew who they were because her aunt had a shop in the street and she had served in there on several occasions. They wanted to be introduced to her of course but she was teasing them with little suggestive hints from back from when she was a kid and worked in the shop. They were scratching their heads trying to think who she was. She thought that it was rather amusing so we left it at that. By this time, we were standing on the edge of a river that ran through a little gorge with a stone arch bridge over it in the background. We were all chatting, and then we decided that we’d better shoot off and visit Rosemary quickly otherwise we’ll be going home without seeing her.

It’s been ages since TOTGA has been around during the night. I thought that she had gone for good, just as Castor seems to have done and The Vanilla Queen did quite a while ago. But it really does make a change to see a dream full of nice people and no member of my family coming along to throw a spanner into the works.

Curiously though, when we were moving jars and bottles and so on downstairs, there was one jar where the top had worked loose and the contents had leaked

Later on, I was somewhere in Africa with a group of people in one of our old Fordson E83W vans. I was trying to find some paper on which to write some notes about a job that I had just completed but the only paper in the van was wet, soggy and mainly had other people’s calculations on it. I couldn’t find a big piece at all. By now I was running behind the van that was driving so I made a signal to the driver to stop. I opened the back door and my notebook was in the back. I rescued my notebook and waved on the van to start off again. Once it was going, I closed the door and carried on running behind it.

We did have a couple of E83W vans when we were kids. The first one was one of the early ones, KLG93, which my motor traders’ handbook tells me was registered in October 1937, and one of the last ones, XVT772, registered in January 1957. And you might think that walking behind one would be ridiculous, with an 1172cc side-value engine, a three-speed crash box and a downrated gearing on the rear axle, these vans would struggle to see 35 mph flat out. In fact, I have very vague memories of all of us having to get out and walk behind one once because it didn’t have enough power, fully loaded, to climb Shooter’s Hill in Blackheath, and when I mentioned it to my parents as I grew older, I was told that my memories were correct.

Isabelle the Nurse was back to her usual routine and back on time. We had a brief chat about one of my neighbours who is now in an Old Folks’ Home and she dealt with my legs, and then she cleared off as quickly as she came in.

Once she’d left, I made breakfast and read some more of THE OLD ROAD.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that yesterday, we left our author arguing with the police, having been detained to “help them with their enquiries” and he, in a show of innocence, "of I know not what crime"

Today, however, things become a whole lot clearer. In order to cross a river, "my companion and I clambered down the hill, stole a boat which lay moored to the bank, and with a walking-stick for an oar painfully traversed the river Wey. When we had landed, we heard, from the further bank, a woman, the owner of the boat, protesting with great violence."

Later on, "with Margery Wood it reaches the 700-feet line, runs by what I fear was a private path through a newly-enclosed piece of property. We remembered to spare the garden, but we permitted ourselves a trespass upon this outer hollow trench in the wood which marked our way."

All that I can say is that if those events are samples of his habitual attitude and behaviour, I’m surprised that he hasn’t been arrested a long time before the previous day.

After I had finished breakfast, I came back in here to watch Stranraer lose at home to Edinburgh City, and then I had things to do.

It seems that no-one is interested in the furniture that I have for sale or that I’m trying to give away, so I rekindled my long-dormant on-line auction account. That took much longer than it did in the past, and putting your articles on-line is much more complicated than I remember it.

So after a great deal of huffing and puffing, I managed eventually to list everything that needs selling on. But probably there won’t be anyone from there interested either. It seems that selling on-line isn’t the thing that it was twenty years ago. But then, the internet is nothing like the community that it used to be back in those days either.

After lunch, I had a relax for a while before the TNS v Llansawel game, and then at the final whistle I went to make the bread for next week and the pizza for tonight.

Rosemary rang me for a chat while I was baking, but I couldn’t stay long because there was yet more football. Colwyn Bay, newly promoted to the JD Cymru Premier League, were at home to Connah’s Quay Nomads in front of a massive crown of over 1500 people.

Last time Colwyn Bay were in the JD Cymru Premier League, they didn’t last long. This time though, they have signed a whole raft of experienced players and they looked a much more formidable outfit. They went toe-to-toe with the Nomads for the entire 90 minutes and the 1-1 scoreline was quite a fair reflection of the game.

Almost immediately after the final whistle, the telephone rang. It was one of my former girlfriends from school years ago, with whom I’m still in touch. She’ll be in France in late September, so would I like a visit?

Now that’s a silly question. I don’t have enough visits, and so anyone can visit me at any time they like. If she would like to come, she’d be more than welcome, and so would anyone else (except of course, my immediate family)

Tonight’s pizza was excellent and I shall have to make more like that. There’s already been an order from my fiend from Munich when he arrives here next weekend.

That’s right, next weekend. That’s when my house move begins. Just four more climbs back up the stairs. I can’t wait for the torment to be over.

But right now, it’s over for tonight because I’m off to bed.

But seeing as we have been talking about TNS’s laughable performance against Llansawel this afternoon … "well, one of us has" – ed … it reminds me of a boxing match that I saw years ago where one of the contestants had been very quickly and very badly beaten.
The commentator was doing his best to console him, saying "Never mind. If you hadn’t been there, it wouldn’t have been much of a fight."

Thursday 17th July 2025 – MY KITCHEN DOWNSTAIRS …

… is looking wonderful, it really is.

It’s not finished yet – it probably needs another full day’s work – but even so, it’s quite impressive as it is. The oven and microwave are installed and the hob will be next, and then it will just be a case of the final touches. But it really is impressive.

It will be another five weeks or so before I’ll be moving in. It seems that the weekend round about 22nd, 23rd and 24th of August is when a few volunteers have offered to come along to help, although I’ll be hoping to move a pile of stuff before then, if I can. So if anyone is at a loss for a few things to do one week or one weekend in the near future…

Meanwhile, back at the ran … errr … apartment, it was another late night last night by the time everything was finished. Or, rather, it wasn’t finished because I had forgotten, would you believe, the backing up of the computer.

But anyway, once I was finally in bed, there I stayed until 06:27 precisely, two minutes before the alarm was due to go off, and I managed to struggle to my feet to beat the alarm. But if that’s not impeccable timing then I don’t know what is.

After a good wash and my medication, I came back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. I was having some kind of injection because of all these foreigners who were coming to play football around here. Many people were disillusioned by the fact that they had signed a lot of the youth players from English clubs because they were thinking that the academies of these clubs were of absolutely no useful purpose at all – it was simply a paperwork exercise to show that the club has some kind of development certificate and there was no possibility of these young boys ever being included in some kind of first team round-up and some kind of Premier League involvement in due course. Most of these lads were destined to have the job when they reached the end of the age group.

This actually refers to a discussion that some of us were having on a football news forum yesterday, talking about how many under-17, under-18, under-19 etc football academy players, even youth internationals, are now playing part-time in non-league or minor league football, saying that these football academies are really nothing but window-dressing for the clubs concerned, simply to abide by certain rules and regulations with absolutely no intention at all of promoting local youth talent.

Isabelle the Nurse came in to see me and gave my knee some heat treatment, and then she attended to my legs.

After she left, the kitchen fitter put his sooty foot in the door. I organised him and he wandered off to start work. I made breakfast and read some more of MY BOOK.

Our author is still giving us the conducted tour of various churches. He tells us that in the Church of St Mary Woolnoth there is a memorial to"Thomas Roch and Andrew Michael, vintners, and Joan, their wife." And I’m definitely eager to find out more information about that cosy set-up.

Interestingly too, he tells us that "in divers countries, dairy houses or cottages wherein they make butter and cheese, are usually called ‘wicks’.". A “wich” is quite often associated with a salt town and has other meanings in Norse and in Anglo-Saxon too, but Stow’s interpretation of the ending is certainly food … "groan" – ed … for thought.

After breakfast, I came back in here to sort out the radio notes that I dictated yesterday. In total, there is about twenty-five minutes’ worth and that’s going to take an age to edit. I shall be here for the next two months doing that, I reckon, and miss the actual programme dates if I’m not careful.

My faithful cleaner came along and sorted me out with my anaesthetic patches, and I came back in here to carry on working.

The driver who came to pick me up was the Belgian girl and I like her very much so we had a lovely chat all the way down to Avranches, except for the time when she was having an argument with one of her children on the telephone. I suppose that a pair of eleven-year-old twins would be a handful for anyone.

My luck was in at the dialysis centre. I was attended to by Julie the Cook who showed me some photos of her latest culinary creations. And wonderful they are too. But she had a lot of trouble coupling me up to the machine today and for quite a while, my machine kept on sounding the alarm.

One of the doctors came to see me today to ask me how I was. I told him that it’s pointless asking me because they don’t do anything about what I’ve told them already. So he departed with a flea in his ear.

The dietician was next to come along, with a prescription for forty-eight samples each of four different varieties of a new protein drink. I wonder what all of that will be like.

And then all Hell let loose. There’s a patient who has a four-hour dialysis session who is currently in hospital at Granville. His session is due to start at 14:00 but the ambulance didn’t bring him until after 15:30, meaning that the girls have to stay until about 20:00 this evening. It goes without saying that they were not too happy about it, and they expressed their displeasure quite forcibly to the ambulance crew.

There’s another person there who is … errr … well, he <DOESN’T HAVE BOTH PADDLES IN THE WATER. He was an endless source of trouble and stress to the nurses this afternoon and in the end, one of them had to sit with him for quite a while to keep an eye on what he was up to.

For once, I was unplugged quite quickly and the taxi was waiting for me too so we were soon on our way home. We came back via the town centre so that we could have a look at the chaos with the rebuilding paused for the summer, and then the driver dropped me off at home where my faithful cleaner was waiting.

First thing that I did was to go to inspect the kitchen and to chat with the kitchen-fitter and his wife who was helping. And my kitchen does look lovely. He’s done a really good job and I’m well-impressed. It will be even better when it’s finished.

Mind you, I had a very late tea tonight because I had to wait for an age while he finished off and packed up his tools.

He also presented me with a bill to date, and after I’d paid it, I had to go to lie down in a darkened room for a while.

Tea tonight was just like The Carmichaels, as SUPPER WAITS ON THE TABLE INSIDE A TIN. It was too late to cook a proper meal.

So now I’m off to bed, later than I would like. And I need to be on form as there’s a lot to do tomorrow. There’s the Sunday Woodstock notes to continue to edit and also June and Catherine are coming round to see me before they head off back to South Germany.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about the kitchen fitter … "well, one of us has" – ed … I asked him if he would like to install a mirror for me in the kitchen.
He thought for a while and then replied "ohh yes, why not? That’s just the kind of job that I could see myself doing."

Sunday 22nd June 2025 – AFTER YESTERDAY’S EXCITEMENT …

… today has been a much more normal day, highlighted by the fact that I actually managed to eat something.

And when I say “a normal day”, what I mean is one that actually began at 05:05 this morning, which is a pretty normal time for my day to begin these days.

The morning began, once I’d hauled myself out of bed of course, by making a start on the notes from yesterday. Not that it was actually 05:05 at that moment because it did take me rather longer than usual to haul myself out of bed after yesterday.

When I finished the notes, I had the dictaphone notes to transcribe. It was a surprise that there was actually something on there – I certainly wasn’t expecting it. There was a Football League playoff match between Huddersfield Town and someone else, taking place in Huddersfield. I was in a hotel and saw the outside broadcasters turn up so I was helping them install all their equipment. They were on the roof of an annexe at the back of the hotel where they had everything set up. I gave them a hand to install the equipment. We settled down on this sofa afterwards – there were five of us on this sofa with a couple of TV monitors and a screen, and began to watch the preparations. The commentator turned round to me and said “here, you can’t sit here and watch the game”. That really disappointed me and in the end I had to go to try to find another vantage point on this roof to look, but there was a fog settling down over and the view was becoming pretty hopeless. In the end I had to just shrug my shoulders and walk away. I thought that that was quite disappointing after all of the help that I’d given the group to set up

Why an outside broadcast unit was on the roof of a hotel watching a football match I really don’t know, but I bet that they had a screen and some TV monitors if they were trying to watch the game through a fog. It’s reminiscent of the GAME BETWEEN CONNAH’S QUAY AND BALA BACK IN JANUARY when they tried to play football in a fog so thick that the linesmen couldn’t see across to the other side of the pitch.

However, being disappointed in the outcome when I’ve done my best to help people is also par for the course. As Ambrose Bierce once famously said, "A year is a period of 365 disappointments".

There was time to do some more work on the outstanding radio programme before everyone else awoke, and then, having realised that I’d spent the night sleeping in my day clothes, I grabbed some clean clothes and went into the bathroom for a good wash.

The washing was piling up in the bathroom, seeing as there are more people than me living here at the moment, so I filled up the washing machine and set that going while I went in to try to drink some coffee. I found that I can’t drink strong coffee, so I had to thin it out with some boiling water. And, even worse, I can’t drink much of it before it begins to upset my stomach.

My faithful cleaner stuck her head in the door to see how I was doing, which was nice of her, followed by Isabelle the Nurse who was back to her cheery old self after yesterday’s emotion, and The Hound of the Baskervilles dragged its master off for walkies.

When the latter two came back, I tried some breakfast. A small amount of porridge, very thin, and so it overflowed the dish and flooded the microwave. I was half-expecting my slice of toast to set the kitchen on fire, the way things were going.

By now the washing was ready so we figured out a way to put the clothes airer up in the bedroom window on the windowsill. That’s the first time that the window has been opened since I lost the mobility in my legs. I can no longer go a-mountaineering over the chest of drawers in the bedroom.

Later on, we went for a drive northwards along the coast, visiting a few of the tidal islands (luckily it was low tide), finding a place to stop where my visitor could at long last have some fish and chips (they were delicious, apparently), a beach where the Hound of the Baskervilles could go for a roll in the sand, and ending up at the mouth of the River Sienne.

A turning tide prevented us from going much further so we turned and headed for home, having been out for a total of six and a half hours.

Tea tonight was, as usual, a pizza and blast me if the oven finally decided to cook something correctly in the correct time, after I’d set the oven to overcook by ten minutes as usual. A pizza with a scorched base is not as nice as it should be.

The football season has started in earnest with the first of the televised matches, and I had Stranraer FC against Larne from Northern Ireland in a friendly. Stranraer, who are probably one of the worst teams in the Scottish pyramid, only had a scratch side out with several trialists, and if the best that Larne (who are competing in European Club Football in three weeks time) could do is to beat them 1-0, then their European season is going to be a remarkably short one. They were not very convincing at all.

So right now I’m off to bed to try to recapture my usual routine – as in
1) A doctor’s appointment at 08:40
2) Dialysis between 14:00 and 18:00
3) An appointment with a dietician at 15:15 (and how they are going to fit that in when I’ll be coupled up to a dialysis machine I really don’t know)

And with the pain in my foot having subsided during the day, it’s started to come back this evening. I’m thoroughly sick of this.

But seeing as we have been talking about a dietician … "well, one of us has" – ed … the last time I saw her, she asked me how things were.
"Actually" I said "I haven’t eaten anything for three days"
"Good grief" she gushed. "You REALLY must tell me your secret of how you do it."

Thursday 19th June 2025 – WE NOW HAVE …

… a fridge-freezer downstairs to go with the oven that came on Wednesday. A large van must have done half a dozen laps around here before deciding that this building is where he wants to be.

And we need a large fridge-freezer too because the temperature is ridiculous today. My faithful cleaner is convinced that she saw 38°C indicated on a temperature reader in the town. If that’s the case, it’s the hottest that I’ve been since I was IN HUNGARY IN 2020.

It didn’t look like that last night. It was fairly cool when I came in here to write up my notes, and I was so comfortable that I wasn’t in any rush to finish. It ended up a slow, leisurely evening and after midnight I was still letting it all hang out.

Eventually I made it into bed and was asleep quite quickly. But once again, not for long because at 05:35 I was wide awake.

With the extra-early start, I dictated the radio notes that i’d written earlier in the week – and then had to dictate them a second time as the first attempt didn’t record. And the volume is still weak and feeble, just like me at the moment

By now, everyone else was awake so I went for a wash and shave in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant this afternoon. Then we assembled in the kitchen and sat around drinking coffee.

The Hound of the Baskervilles dragged its master off for walkies and I came in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. I was doing something with the radio last night, having to play around with various tracks to work out how long they were and work out whereabouts in the programme they would actually fit. I wasn’t doing it for very long because I don’t know what awoke me but I happened to wake up round about 05:35 so I’ve no idea.

One of the songs that was going round and round in my head when I awoke was Steve Earle’s THE DEVIL’S RIGHT HAND, sung by the Phil Beer Band. It was probably stuck in my brain due to the fact that I was listening to a concert by the group just before I went to bed.

After that, I made a start on editing the radio notes but everyone came back from walkies so we had more coffee.

Interestingly, the hackles on the Hound of the Baskervilles stood up and he began to have a deep, menacing growl. 30 seconds later, Isabelle the Nurse came in. He barked at her but she soon won him over and left me thinking “I wish that she’d stroke me like that!”

Once she’d left I could have breakfast, and then we plotted what we intended to do this afternoon and sorted everything out. We also watched a strange van circle around here a couple of times

My cleaner came bang on time to fit my anaesthetic patches, having noticed a strange van circling around. She’d asked then if it was for me but then denied it all, and carried on circling.

The taxi was early, and when I descended, I noticed that the van had made up its mind and had stopped. They had the tail-lift down and were manoeuvring … "PERSONoeuvring" – ed …. an enormous package – my fridge-freezer. My friend helped them move it into the apartment downstairs while I rode off into the sunset.

There were two other people to pick up on the way, but even so, we were early. However, it was to no avail, being early, because they weren’t ready for me. I had to loiter around for twenty minutes.

The coupling-up was painful as usual, and then I was so exhausted that I crashed out for fifteen minutes or so. The staff, though, left me mostly alone, except for the odd check of my blood pressure when the alarm sounded.

In the middle of it all, there were several ‘phone calls. There was another delivery but the driver was lost. Consequently I had to liaise with him, my friend and my faithful cleaner in order that the parcel arrived as it should. All of this effort for a new spice rack.

Océane uncoupled me this evening, and not for the first time, she held my hand while she compressed my arm, which I thought was sweet. When I was let go, she came with me to hand my bag over to the taxi driver, and as she turned to go back in, I expressed my surprise that she wasn’t going to come home with me.

But honestly, any one of a dozen or so of those nurses could come hime with me any time they liked.

Back here, I inspected the new purchases, and also the insides of the wardrobes that my friend had painted for me. They look so much better now, and will look even nicer when they are dry.

As a treat, I took him out to the Italian restaurant that we like. I had my usual penne al arrabbiata and he had ham in a gorgonzola sauce. I hope that it tasted better than it smelt.

So right now, thoroughly exhausted and the fan on to try to cool everything down, I’m off to bed where I intend to sleep for a week.

But seeing as we have been talking about the delivery driver … "well, one of us has" – ed … when I came home my friend told me that the Hound of the Baskervilles had been chasing the delivery driver down the street in his van.
"That’ll teach him a valuable lesson" I said. "Next time he comes here, he’ll take the keys out of the ignition and close the door"
Nevertheless, I was quite impressed. I didn’t even realise that the Hound of the Baskervilles could drive

Wednesday 11th June 2025 – I DON’T THINK …

… that I’m going to have my shower installed for when I move downstairs, unfortunately.

Having had a good chat this afternoon with the guy who is going to fit the kitchen, he’s not convinced that he’d be able to do the work that I want. He’s happy to do some of it but not the rest. He really thinks that we ought to have a professional plumber on hand, and he’s probably quite right too.

But you try to find one. I shall ask around and see who knows one, and maybe trouble my friend Liz to put another advert on that Social Media page. Maybe there might even be someone on one of these tradesmen’s sites who has a week or two free. There is bound to be a solution somewhere.

Anyway, last night I had another fairly late night, not being able to motivate myself sufficiently to have everything done in any kind of urgency. It was about 23:45 when I finally crawled into bed.

Once in bed though, I remember nothing at all. I must have gone to sleep quite quickly, and there I lay until about 06:15 without moving at all.

When the alarm went off at 06:30 I was in the bathroom sorting myself out. Then after the medication, I came back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I had been during the night.

There was a police investigation taking place last night and I was in charge of the enquiry. It had taken place in a large house where a lot of people were staying. We’d had a stroke of luck in that someone had identified a coat, a blue and white checked coat. This was not general knowledge so I kept that to myself but I arranged for the rooms of all of the people to be searched. We found someone with a blue and white checked coat, so we decided to keep an eye on her. There were one or two other things too that led us to believe that she was the one who committed the offence but we wanted to make sure that we had all the evidence that we needed. That involved taking her coat and examining it so we had to wait until she was ready to go into the bath. We arranged to send some young girl around who was to tell everyone that she was looking for a blue and white checked coat so that it would divert suspicion if the girl was found carrying one, or if someone else was found carrying one. Then this woman decided that she was going to have a shower. I waited until she went and then I collected my shower things ready to go into another bathroom but she stepped out of her bathroom and saw me. She asked me if I was going for a shower too. I told her not to worry because the two showers were on different circuits. In the meantime, the young girl was coming upstairs and was asking if anyone had seen a blue and white checked coat. I suddenly realised that I had a blue and white checked coat and this could be complicated if the two became mixed up so I had to think of how to say something, but the girl was wandering around the corridors asking everyone whom she met and I thought that she was going to be up to me fairly soon so I need to be able to have some kind of story ready for her

This is a road down which I’ve travelled during the night on many occasions – the one where I’m full of doubt and indecision, just as I am with the kitchen and the rest of the apartment right now. I’ll be really happy when it’s all done (if it ever is) and I don’t have to do anything else. However, being involved in a murder case during the night without Holmes and Watson being present is quite unusual. They’ve joined me on a few trips in the past.

Good Queen Bess (that is, Queen Elizabeth I) was having to choose a new personal confidante and admirer because her previous one, with whom she got along really well, was suspected of being in the pay of the French and all the British secrets were being passed over to the French before the English could do anything about it. Anyway so it was all possible to talk about having a new set of official suites during the interval between the terms but she is believed not to be very happy about that.

Whatever this is all about I have no idea. Apart from a brief reference in passing to a couple of the books that I’ve been reading, it doesn’t appear to have any relevance at all.

The nurse was even earlier this morning. Not that it’s a surprise because he probably doesn’t have much to do. He was soon gone too and I could make breakfast and carry on reading MY NEW BOOK.

Once more, we’re stumbling on little-known facts. John Stow has been describing the rivers, stream and wells that ran through the City of London in the past. Although the existence of one or two of them is disputed today, he’s quoting charters and deeds that refer to many of them, and even gives an inventory of people who contributed money towards their upkeep, and how much they donated.

We then moved on to bridges, and there was a lot of information about those too, doing back to the time of the Saxons.

Interestingly, he talks about a siege of London in 1471 by an army led by someone called, rather eloquently, “Thomas the Bastard Fawconbridge”. With a name like that, he sounded as if he was well-worth tracking down. It turns out that it’s a reference to Thomas Neville, son of William Neville, Lord Fauconberg and a leading supporter of the House of Lancaster during the Wars of the Roses.

For much of the day, I’ve been dealing with a radio programme. There’s the anniversary of a concert coming up soon and I found the recording that we made of it so I’ve been editing it, remixing it, cutting out bits that we don’t need and merging the joins together so that it all runs smoothly and seamlessly.

Then I needed an introduction so I sat down and wrote a couple of thousand words that will make a nice lead-in to the music. And that’s all ready for recording on Saturday night, or maybe even earlier if I have any more really early starts.

My cleaner turned up this afternoon to do her stuff. We went downstairs to the new apartment and took a few more measurements that the kitchen fitter needed. Back up in here, I had a nice shower to try to make myself pretty for dialysis tomorrow, in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant, even though she doesn’t love me any more.

The kitchen fitter rang me afterwards. We had a lengthy, Rosemaryesque chat and he now seems to have all of the information that he needs. He’s going to stick his head into IKEA to find out the answers to a few questions that I can’t answer, and then we’ll move on and order the product and have it delivered ready for installation

There was time to make a start on another radio programme. Another day that is coming up in due course is “International Biodiversity Day” and with musicians such as Robert Plant, Herbie Flowers and Kate Bush, and groups such as Porcupine Tree, there is the basis of a programme already suggesting itself

If I were to play Herbie Flowers’ song DANCE OF THE LITTLE FAIRIES, I wonder if the editor of Aunt Judy’s Magazine would make any comment.

Tea tonight was a taco roll with rice and veg followed by ginger cake and soya dessert, and very nice too, s usual.

So now, having wasted enough time this evening, I’m off to bed. I have a visitor tomorrow morning, dialysis in the afternoon and another visitor tomorrow evening. I seem to be in great demand right now, which is nice, if it weren’t for the dialysis of course. But at least I’ll smell nice for Emilie the Cute Consultant.

But seeing as we’ve been talking about Thomas the Bastard Fawconbridge, it reminds me of when Nerina went for a job interview.
They asked about her family life, and she replied, mentioning "my husband" quite a few times
"But what’s his name?" asked the interviewer. "What do you call him?"
"I call him quite a few names" replied Nerina "but if I told you what they were, I wouldn’t get the job."

Sunday 8th June 2025 – THIS LITTLE PROJECT …

… of mine is turning out to be not so little.

But surprisingly, it all seems to be slowly coming together and we are making progress, although I shudder to think of what the cost might be by the time that we finish it all.

As I mentioned yesterday, you come across one problem, but the way to resolve it leads to the creation of two more problems. And to resolve them involves four more problems und so weiter. I’m beginning to wish that I’d found somewhere else.

However, finding somewhere else at the price that I paid for this place downstairs would have been impossible, and by the time that it’s finished (if it ever is) it will be exactly as I want it to be, so it had better be exactly what I want by the time that it’s finished, because it will be too late afterwards to do anything about it.

Meanwhile, back at the ran … errr … apartment, I had a relatively early night last night. It was only a few minutes after 23:00 when I finally fell into bed, although it took quite a while to go off to sleep, what with all of this turmoil swirling around inside my head

Once asleep though, I remember nothing at all until I awoke at … errr … 05:50. So much for my lie-in until 08:00. Whatever happened to the Sundays where sometimes I’d lie in bed until midday and sometimes long afterwards too? I realise that I can no longer do that, with the nurse coming round at 08:30, but a lie-in until 08:00 would be nice.

Not that I crawled out of bed straight away, though. I waited until I heard the electric water heater switch off at 06:20 and, having decided that I wasn’t going back to sleep, I bit the bullet and fell out of bed.

In the bathroom I had a good wash and then in the kitchen I sorted out the morning’s medication. There are fewer and fewer to take these days, which is good news. One day, we might reduce that figure down to none at all, but I don’t ever think that I could ever be that lucky.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. I was in a house with Neil Young last night and he began to play LONG MAY YOU RUN. I was listening to it and I was tempted to go to find my bass guitar and have a play with it but I was too busy listening to him actually performing it. It was about 04:00 in the morning or something like that when he was playing.

These days I don’t have to go far to find a bass guitar. There are two of them at the foot of the bed and the third is in the living room. Mind you, the fourth one is in Canada right now so that would be a long way to go, but it’ll be back here soon when I organise myself downstairs.

But if only I could play my bass guitar again. With this thing that they did to my left arm for dialysis, bending my fingers round is really painful. And then there’s the fact that I can’t stand up to play, and playing while sitting down is next-to-impossible

As for what time it was, I really have no idea at all but the dream itself was probably because just before going to bed I was listening to a Neil Young acoustic concert.

There was also something about Peter and the Three Wars of the Roses but that was one that sounded confused to me and I wasn’t sure of where I was supposed to be in the middle of all of that but I was certainly being swept around in some form of thing and I don’t know any more.

The Wars of the Roses probably relates to all of this stuff that I’ve been reading just recently about medieval castles, but if I was confused during a dream, that’s really something because when I dictate them, they all seem to be quite logical, no matter how confusing they might be during the light of day.

There’s no doubt about it – since I’ve been having dialysis my sleeping patterns have changed dramatically. As for the “I wasn’t sure of where I was supposed to be” – that’s the story of my life, isn’t it?.

When Isabelle the Nurse came round, she whipped off the plaster on my right leg and saw that the oedema had swollen up into a blister, so she promptly burst it. But it really does seem that we are just going backwards. This is exactly how things were early last summer and which I thought that we had long-since left behind us. It looks as if I’m on a race against time to move into this apartment.

After she left, I made breakfast and read some more of MY BOOK.

We’re still in York, and after about twenty pages of glorious exhilarating prose about the city, we’ve just about made it to the arrival of the Conqueror. We’ve still not begun to talk about Medieval Military Architecture. And when we eventually do, there’s another four Centuries to go at before we leave the medieval period and reach the Age of Enlightenment.

He’s still churning out the bewildering, flowery prose, and here’s another fine example –
"Considering the magnitude, population, and wealth of Roman York, and the number of public buildings which must necessarily have accumulated during the four hundred years which elapsed from the conquest by Claudian to the end of the Roman rule, and the presence of some of which is attested by inscriptions and foundations, it is remarked how very few monuments of the period remain above ground, or rather how completely the whole, with one or two exceptions, have disappeared."

Obviously, back in those days, there was no rationing of commas. And I shudder to think about what the flowery prose in this book of 1840 that we downloaded yesterday will be like.

Back here I finished off the radio programme and now that’s all ready to go when it’s ready. But it won’t be a while, that’s for sure. I’m well ahead now, which is just as well for the next few weeks I’m going to be occupied somewhat with my new abode.

And while we’re talking about our new abode … "well, one of us is" – ed … the rest of the day has been spent drafting a reply to the twenty questions that my kitchen fitter has asked me. I mentioned earlier that it all seems to be coming together and this series of e-mails that I had on Friday night and Saturday sound quite optimistic.

As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … it’s nice to find someone who wants to do my project rather than his own. I don’t mind advice – in fact, I’ll take all of the advice that I can get and use it too – but I do object to people who try to impose their own ideas for no purpose other than it’s their idea (and to rack up the bill too, of course).

While I was at it, I sent an e-mail to the electrician to say that the electric is back on, and I asked him to let me have some kind of idea as to when he might be coming by.

We’ve no pizza dough so for an hour or two this afternoon, I’ve been kneading. We now have three lumps of dough – well, two actually because I had the third for tea and it was another delicious pizza. But I’ve no idea what I’ll be doing in the future because I’ve heard on the grapevine that the company that makes this excellent vegan cheese is going out of business.

While I was in the kitchen I also made a new loaf of bread. I didn’t really need it as there is quite a stock in the freezer but it seemed like a good idea. Once more, we aren’t going to be short of food for a while, which is good news.

So having done all of that, I’m off to bed. Later than I would like, of course, but that’s how it seems to be. I have my Welsh homework to do in the morning and then dialysis in the afternoon. At some point I have to fit in another lengthy WAR AND PEACE e-mail about the work downstairs.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about decorating my new apartment … "well, one of us has" – ed .. a painter once told me that a woman wanted him to paint her in the nude.
"So did you do it?" I asked
"Not at first" he replied, "and even later, not exactly"
"How do you mean?" I asked
"I told her that I’d have to at least wear my socks, otherwise I’d have nowhere to stick my paintbrushes."

Saturday 31st May 2025 – AS I SHOULD …

… have expected (because, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, it’s par for the course), this idea of changing my dialysis to the mornings was just a brief, ephemeral illusion.

When I arrived there this afternoon, I told them that my cleaner and I had had a lengthy discussion and decided that it was a much more practical arrangement for us, only to be told "it’s OK – we’ve found another solution now."

What with everything through which I have gone over the past few years, I’m convinced that the medical service (everywhere in the World, not just here) fails to understand that we are not pawns on a chessboard that can be moved here and there at will or at a whim. We are human beings, with lives of our own to fulfil and (in my case at least) my own life and activities have a much higher priority that anything that the hospital can conjure up.

So, as you can probably tell, I was in a bad mood today.

There isn’t any special reason for that either. Although it wasn’t early when I went to bed, it wasn’t all that late either. I was asleep quite quickly too, and there I stayed, totally flat out, until about 05:50.

It took something of an effort to raise myself from the Dead but when the alarm went off at 07:00 I’d sorted myself out in the bathroom, washed the clothes that needed washing and was on my way to the kitchen for my medication.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. There was a group of us from school again hanging around together. One of them was a girl from Shavington who went to Nuthurst, the exclusive private primary school in Nantwich. We were talking about the maths classes, discussing in particular these pyramid graph things that we used to do, describing how we used to do them and talking about one or two examples. This girl was saying that during one or two of her maths classes she became carried away and began to make one of these pyramid graph things for the pills but by the time she reached about the third row she just put the downward shafts and wrote underneath “lots and lots”. There was also something about someone whose idea of a pyramid graph was that if he had something like a small party and a big party he would just draw simply one line between the two elements and that would be his pyramid graph.

There’s a story about that girl too, but that’s another one that the World is not yet ready to hear

One thing that I, and, presumably, regular readers of this rubbish will recall is that just recently there has been a whole spate of these stories that the World is not yet ready to hear, coming into my subconscious mind during the night. There’s definitely an undercurrent of something, and I wish that I knew what it was. Maybe is simply a story of regrets for my wasted, mis-spent youth. But on the other hand, it’s certainly not wasted or mis-spent because everything about it was what brought me here. As Paul Peña once famously wrote and Steve Miller famously sang, YOU KNOW YOU GOTTA GO THROUGH HELL BEFORE YOU GET TO HEAVEN

Later on, I was in Congleton with the guitarist and drummer with whom I used to play. We were going somewhere in my van and we reached a house. I left the van and said that I’d be back in a minute, and wandered off. Then I came back and we climbed into the van and went to the next place. I said again “I’ll be back in a minute”, left the van and went into the drive. There was a woman there smoking a cigarette. I asked her a question and she just gave me a strange look, so I asked it to her again. She just smiled and gave me a very non-committal answer so I’ve no idea what was the matter with her. I went round to the back of the house and knocked onto the door. I could hear someone say that there was someone at the door. At that moment a big tabby cat stuck its head through the window so I went to stroke it. Then some young guy came to the door. I told him that my guitarist wanted to see him. He grabbed his cigarettes, came outside and went down to the van. We ended up then in another house. His response was that he was really comfortable with the idea that people from the street could come and go into their house at any time they liked. When the guitarist came back from wherever he had been, they began to talk. The drummer joined in with the conversation. I felt that I was being isolated here and I’d no idea why. In the end I simply sat down and waited for everything to finish.

When that group came to an end back in the Winter of 1976, my intuition told me that I actually was being slowly isolated and edged out, which was a shame. And then I had a load of other preoccupations that stopped me from pressing on. For the next couple of summers I lived in my van with the winter spent in that squat. It was not a very happy time and it took me a while to sort myself out – a task that is still not finished 50 or so years further on.

The nurse was on time today for a change, and we had the usual banal chatter about nothing of any importance whatsoever.

After he left I could make my breakfast and read some more of MY BOOK. We didn’t stay long at Scarborough, and we’ve now arrived at Skenfrith Castle, which is in that fine old English county of … errr … Monmouthshire.

And here we go again. On page 469 he tells us that "there is a sort of recess, which may have been the kitchen fireplace, the cooking being usually, in these towers, carried on in an upper floor".

Meanwhile, on page 471, he tells us that "The history of Skenfrith is obscure, but it is evident that it was built simply to contain a small garrison, and not at all as a private residence. The area contains no trace of hall, chapel, or kitchen."

Don’t you wish that he’d make up his mind?

Back in here, I’ve been chatting to plumbers. I posted an advertisement on one of these traders’ websites for someone to take away the bath and tile around where the bath used to be. I’ve had a few enquiries and I spent most of the morning following them up. We’ll see where this takes me.

My cleaner turned up, bang on time, to fit my anaesthetic patches and it was such a lovely day that we went outside to stand in the sunshine until the taxi arrived. And we took full advantage of the nice weather, because the taxi didn’t arrive until 13:05.

It was a nice, sunny drive down to Avranches and, to my surprise, I was seen quite quickly too. And only three and a half hours today which is good news. The less-than-good news is that the ice-cold spray that they recommended didn’t seem to do me much good and one of the pins hurt like Hades all through the session.

Early on, for about fifteen minutes, I crashed out but I soon got to grips with myself and pressed on to revise my Welsh, seeing as I’ll be in Paris on Tuesday instead of at my lesson. But it’s hard going when I’m wracked with pain like that. I really can’t concentrate.

Eventually I was let out and the same driver who brought me took me home in the sun and warmth. My cleaner was waiting for me and it was just as well, because it was a very, very weary me who climbed up these stairs. I shall really be glad to be downstairs and can cut out all of this.

Back in here I collapsed into a chair for a while and then eventually went to make tea. Falafel, baked potato and salad followed by ginger cake and soya dessert.

So right now, I’ll dictate my radio notes and go to bed, in the (vain) hope of having a nice, long sleep. It’s been a while since the last one and in principle, it’s a lie-in tomorrow.

But seeing as we have been talking about pyramids … "well, one of us has" – ed … it reminds me of a story that Frankie Howerd used to tell.
During World War II he used to say that he served in Egypt and on one occasion he was taken in an aeroplane to see the pyramids.
Halfway round the circuit, the plane was hit by a gust of wind. It turned upside-down and Frankie fell out.
The pilot recovered control and performed a circuit around to see if he could see anything, when suddenly there was a “thud” and Frankie was back in his seat.
"What the …" uttered the pilot
"Don’t you worry about it" said Frankie. "The point on that pyramid is sharper than it looks"

Saturday 17th May 2025 – I AM CONVINCED …

… that they tried everything that they could at the dialysis centre this afternoon to make me run as late as possible. It’s been one of those days today.

In fact, it’s been one of those days all day today and it started last night, as a matter of fact. Although I wasn’t feeling particularly tired, I still managed to complete my notes by 22:30 and by the time that I’d done everything that needed doing, it was just about 23:05 when I finally fell into bed, hoping for a really good night’s sleep.

And believe it or not, I managed to stay asleep until all of … errr … 03:40 this morning.

Once I’d awoken, I tried as usual to go back to sleep seeing as it was such an early start, and eventually I did manage to drop back off, although it took quite a considerable while. I thought that it would never happen.

Having gone back to sleep, I awoke again at 06:15, and after trying for about 20 minutes to go back to sleep, I gave up and headed for the bathroom.

After a good wash and shave in case I meet Emilie the Cure Consultant, I rounded up all of the winter coats and the like and put them in the washing machine so that the machine can do its stuff. It looked like a lovely day outside.

After I’d had my medication, I came back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. And once more, I was surprised that there was so much stuff on it, bearing in mind how short a night it was.

There was some kind of confusion about Lee Dorsey and music. I think that Lee Dorsey used to write songs that were sung by females and Gerry Dorsey who used to write songs that were sung by males but I’m not sure why I thought of that and I’m not sure why it came into my mind.

In actual fact, not that it’s particularly important, Lee Dorsey is the old American pop singer who actually owned a car repair business and Gerry Dorsey is better-known as Engelbert Dumper truck

Later on I was being held prisoner in a house by some kind of weird kind of obscene bully. I was friendly with his daughter and he had a handicapped wife. The relationship between his daughter and me developed into something rather more than friendship. He was extremely unhappy about this and so were the rest of his children. They remembered her being with a parson and had spent eighteen months together. It was supposed to be the next big romance but it ended dramatically just before I came along. I was extremely resented by this man and his other children. The woman and I became quite friendly. I had a suspicion that this was going to be rather more than friends and I was trying desperately not to have any kind of involvement in anything that might be misconstrued in this respect because I was simply interested in the daughter despite all of the issues with her father. This woman and her husband began to have fierce arguments and I felt the situation becoming more and more uncomfortable until in the end the woman must have told her husband that she was going to leave him and run off with me. Of course that was the final trigger to an extremely unpleasant moment where I was quite literally forced into a room with all the family. The family first of all, that is, the other children of the man began to interrogate the daughter about the time that she’d spent with this priest guy. She was saying that what turned her off him was the idea that he was going to rescue all of these animals and keep them at home. They pointed out that she had a hamster or a gerbil or something. She replied “that’s hardly the same thing as that which this priest guy was trying to bring in to any kind of home where he would be living”. I could see that this situation was not going to turn out very well at all and I began to wish that I was somewhere else indeed. I didn’t really have much choice at that particular moment.

This next one was a return to the dream of that domineering, bully father where I was mentioning that I was being interviewed in the hope of tripping me up or of persuading the daughter of the house that I was not the man for her future. Either way, as the time passed, it was becoming less and less comfortable and I began to feel more and more anxious about the situation.

It’s been a while since I’ve had some kind of menacing dream like this one, and I certainly didn’t appreciate dropping back into it a second time. However, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I can in real life easily find myself stepping into situations just like that, quite by accident and with no real effort at all

And then I was in hospital again after the biopsie musculaire having the wound checked over again. On the way I’d noticed a huge advert on a roadside advertising tablet, advertising the National Folk Dancing Championships taking place in the town. I’d checked my agenda and found that I was actually doing something on that particular day which would have been a shame because I would have loved to have gone and maybe to have competed but it’s rather late in the day now … fell asleep here … anyway so I would really have liked to have taken part but being in hospital, it was not possible.

This is another one of those dreams about which I remember absolutely nothing at all. However, I can say that these hospital issues are really getting to me these days, that’s for sure.

Finally, I was back living at home. Looking through the newspaper I saw a room to let with shower. I rang up about it and a very polite young Afro-Caribbean voice answered and gave me some information. I asked where it was and he replied that it was in Tiananmen Square in Crewe. I’d heard vaguely of that at one time and thought that it was near Bedford Street but he told me that it wasn’t so I set out to go to look at it. My car wasn’t outside the house. I suddenly realised that I’d left it in Bedford Street in a car park there. I had to walk to Bedford Street and walked into the car park where there was my old white Luton Transit that was parked in the car park. I climbed into that and to my surprise it started so I set off to go to look at this flat.

Wherever Tiananmen Square might be in Crewe, I really have no idea. It’s certainly not near Bedford Street. And there’s no car park there either

The nurse turned up, early as usual. He didn’t have anything to say for himself which was just as well because for some reason or other I was spoiling for a fight. I’ve no idea why, because nothing had happened to trigger off anything.

So after he left, I made breakfast and read some more of MY BOOK. We’re still at Norham, discussing the civilian architecture of the castle and mentioning the odd tower and curtain wall here and there in terms that I find difficult to understand.

But one thing is certain, and that is that we aren’t explaining anything about the whys and wherefores of the military features of the castle.

After breakfast I hung out the washing in the living room and opened the window seeing as it was such a lovely day, in the hope that it would soon dry.

Back in here I drafted a few advertisements about the work that I need doing, having split it up into individual tasks, and then posted it on this Chamber of Commerce website. And within no time at all I was swamped … "well, sort of" – ed … with replies and before I left for dialysis I’d already spoken to a few and arranged appointments.

When my cleaner turned up, she fitted my anaesthetic patches and sorted out a few things ready for my taxi to turn up. It was one of my favourite drivers, the Belgian girl with twins in the first year of High School across the car park. We picked up our usual Saturday afternoon passenger and we had a lovely chat all the way to Avranches.

We were early arriving at the centre but so was everyone else and I was last to be seen, as usual. There was a problem with someone’s connection so for quite a while all of the nurses were congregated around his bed.

There’s one of the nurses there who is not quite so attentive as the others, so guess who I had. At first she tried to run my machine for four hours, and I had to explain to her, and not once either, that she’s not deducted the 700 grammes for my shoes. It took a while for her to grasp the issue, recalculate the figures and switch the machine to three and a half hours.

And then she had three painful goes at coupling me up to the machine. so once again, all in all, it took one hour from my arrival to the start of the process.

My machine was misbehaving all the way through the session, and then once more, right at the end I had to wait an age to be uncoupled from the machine. I was thoroughly fed up by all of this.

It was the same taxi driver who brought me home which was nice. We had another interesting chat. And then my cleaner was waiting for me to watch me up the stairs.

Tea was a breaded quorn fillet, and I notice that I’m running low of those. I shall have to think of a Plan B.

But not right now because I’m going to dictate my radio notes and then go to bed, in hope of a decent sleep.

But seeing as we have been talking about dancing … "well, one of us has" – ed … I once went to one of these Country Dances in the local village hall, and I was so impressed. Everyone was leaping up and down and around quite energetically like some kind of Jitterbug Competition from the 1920s or like something out of HELLZAPOPPIN’
Finding a local standing around idly watching the show, I expressed my amazement.
"Don’t worry" said the local – a very vocal local yokel. "It won’t last long"
"Really?" I asked. "Why’s that?"
"They’ve sent for the caretaker" he replied. "He’ll soon turn off the underfloor heating."

Monday 12th May 2025 – IT HAS BEEN …

… one of those days that has been a disaster from start to finish, a day when nothing has gone right at all.

At least, that’s how it seems The truth is that most of the disasters relate to this afternoon and concern the dialysis centre. The rest, well, ça va as they say around here.

The morning actually started quite brightly, but before we arrive at that point, let’s just mention last night, which was another late-night calamity when I couldn’t summon up the energy to go to bed early.

Not that it would have been early either. It would have been about 23:30 by the time that I finished my notes and that’s not early by any means. And even then, it took me over half an hour to stagger off into the bathroom and then into bed.

Nevertheless, I was asleep quite quickly though, but not for long. And I tossed and turned throughout the night until round about 06:30 when I finally gave up trying to go back to sleep and headed off back into the bathroom.

After a good wash and the medication, I came back in here to listen to the dictaphone. We had some silver pie base container things. For some reason we were going to have our evening meal in them. The girl who was nominated to do it had first of all to fetch our knitting files from Sam Apple Pie or wherever into the mix and merged properly. That took her a while. The supper came and it was leek soup … fell asleep here … I’m sure that one of the players playing alongside me was Adam Davies but anyway, going back to the story, these pie cases were flattened by some kind of road roller and we had to have them so that the sides came up again. We were managing a block of three hundred houses and apartments so imagine the cheer when one of them was rectified. Then it would go dark again and it, it would join one of the others that had yet been seen with floodlights and this carried on all the time. It was very, very rare that the product … fell asleep here … but we had these silver dishes and looking for one that we’d thrown out and trying to find one that was this Adam Davies, trying to make the sides stand up for some usage.

Adam Davies is of course centre-forward for Caernarfon, whom we watched yesterday, and “Sam Apple Pie” is the group in which my friend Dave Charles, the recording engineer for Rockfield Studios, played before joining “Help Yourself”. As for the rest of the dream, I’ll let you lot work it out and if you come up with an answer, don’t forget to let me know, because I don’t have a clue … "nothing new there" – ed ….

By the way, seeing as we are talking about Caernarfon … "well, one of us is" – ed … HERE ARE THE HIGHLIGHTS OF YESTERDAY’S GAME

And next, we were offered a pile of dressed stone for two shillings apiece so we arranged for them to have these stones delivered to the Haurace (?). They brought it in through the ice and deposited it just by his front door so he couldn’t move it and couldn’t open his door. He had to start to put it away quickly and do it well so that we could press on but that wasn’t his speedy work at all, wasn’t his thing. He’d seen the things that take the ghost when he played with the cards from Metz and he wanted to go to … fell asleep here … and we were peddling works after six series of taking it, I suppose you’d call it, where each club has been on it for over a month. It doesn’t work beforehand like that.

It seems that I have ashlar … "and rubble" – ed … on the brain right now with all of this medieval architecture that I am reading. As for the rest of it, this is something else that seemed to degenerate into the usual load of … errr … nonsense.

Finally, I went for a walk with a couple of friends of mine. One of them might have been Cécile. We’d been strolling over this agricultural area where she said that she had bought some land. The further we walked, the closer we came to something that looked like an old mill with a big, tall chimney. It was an abandoned place in this field. I went to look at it, but as I did, my attention was distracted by something in a quarry that was covered in rocks. I climbed up this ladder into this quarry. There were these two boys playing at the foot of the ladder. In the quarry it turned out to be an old American 6×4 lorry, camouflaged by being covered over in rocks. I took a couple of photos of it and had a good look around it, then climbed back down. I nearly put my foot on the hand of one of these boys. I told him that it was dangerous, playing around like that. I walked off to rejoin my friends. They had come to some kind of ruined house of the kind that you find in North America. Cécile, if it was Cécile, was extremely depressed because she’d bought it thinking that it was a place to live but it was in fact a ruin. We had a really good look around inside it. There was abandoned furniture and everything and the floors were unsafe. It was in a terrible condition. The two girls decided that they would go upstairs so I said that I’d stay down here to take some photos because there was a really good view of the mill from up here on the top of this hill where we were at this house. I walked out onto the verandah ready to take some more photos of the mill while they were upstairs looking around.

Cécile of course, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, featured in my life quite significantly for a six-month period. And the American army lorry presumably relates to the one in the Grès de Lapeize … "we’re talking “ashlar” again" – ed … quarry at … errr … Lapeize where Clotilde lives, the quarry that we visited BACK IN 2010 and found the lorry. However, climbing up on a ladder to the quarry is a new departure.

Isabelle the Nurse turned up early. "I can’t stop long" she said. "There are plenty of blood tests to carry out back at the office". Of course, it’s her final day today before her week off, and her colleague’s “reluctance” in this respect is well-known.

After she left I made breakfast and then read some more of MY BOOK. We’ve had the guided tour of Ludlow Castle and we’re now having the potted history of the place. What this has to do with the “Medieval Military Architecture” I really have no idea.

Back in here I attacked my Welsh homework and I actually managed to complete three-quarters of it. It was quite difficult too, especially seeing as I had missed the one-and-a-half lessons that covered this section.

When my faithful cleaner turned up, I was still bashing away at it, so I gave up and went to have my patches fitted.

And just as well that I did, because the taxi came early – 12:20. And it was my favourite driver too. After she installed me, she told me "we have to go to the Centre Normandy to pick up another passenger". So much for my hopes of an early arrival.

Even less chance too. The other passenger was in a wheelchair and he took some rounding up. It was 12:45 when we drove away from the “Normandy”.

And when we arrived, they weren’t ready for us. They had been explaining to a new stagière how to clean and then calibrate the machines.

There were some additional tests to perform on me too today, which meant that I wasn’t finally coupled up until 14:15, fifteen minutes after the effectiveness of the anaesthetic patches has worn off, so you can imagine how the coupling up went.

At least they left me alone pretty much once the machine began to work, although there were still some tests to carry out. But everyone finished at roughly the same time, so guess who was left until last.

Once I was finally sorted out, I went outside to find that the vehicle sent for me was the minibus. And, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I have an extraordinary amount of difficulty climbing into it. In the centre, I’d banged my wounded leg putting on my shoes, and now I banged it again trying to enter the vehicle. And it was so complicated and difficult to climb in.

The torrential rainstorm didn’t help. I was soaked to the skin trying to climb in.

To cap it all, the guy in the wheelchair from the “Normandy” was in there already, and the driver wanted to drop him off first. Not much that I can do about it.

It was 19:30 when I arrived home, soaked, uncomfortable, in pain and completely fed up.

Tea was a stuffed pepper with plenty of stuffing left for the rest of the week, followed by vegan chocolate cake and soya dessert.

So now, thoroughly fed up and thoroughly exhausted, I’m off to bed where I shall sleep for a hundred years.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about “Sam Apple Pie” and “Help Yourself” … "well, one of us has" – ed … It reminds me of when I was arranging my CDs on shelves down on the farm.
Half-way through the exercise I burst out laughing.
"What’s so funny?" asked Cécile
"Have a look!" I replied.
I’d been labelling the shelves with the musician at the start and the musician at the end, and one of my shelves was labelled "Help Yourself to Kate Bush."

Sunday 11th May 2025 – WHAT A GAME …

… that was. Another fine illustration of the quality and excitement that exists in some of the matches in the JD Cymru League. And for a town of just 9800 people, the 1,568 people who flocked into the stadium to see the game were treated to a pulsating, entertaining match.

But that’s something to savour later. Let’s talk about last night first.

By the time that I finished my notes and whatever else I had to do, I was running miles behind as usual. And, completely exhausted, I made a total cod of the dictating that I had to do and it ended up as being one of the longest that I’ve done. There is going to be a huge pile of editing to do there.

Anyway, it was at about 00:30 that I ended up crawling into bed, and I fell asleep before I’d hardly begun my usual nighttime mantra

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall what happens next. It’s the Sunday after a Saturday dialysis session and so round about 06:50 I was wide-awake. So much for my lie-in until 08:00. I lay there for a while tossing and turning but at about 07:05 I gave it up as a bad job and fell out of bed.

Off I staggered into the bathroom and cleaned myself up. Then I wandered into the kitchen for my medication, remembering to take the Vitamin D and Vitamin B12 that I should have taken yesterday.

Back in here I checked the dictaphone but there was nothing on it. That’s a disappointment because, as I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … the only fun and excitement that I have these days is what does on during the night. And if it involves my family, it’s not much fun and not what I would call “exciting” either.

Instead, I made a start on the back-up that I should have done yesterday but I didn’t go very far because Isabelle the Nurse arrived.

She changed the plaster and cleaned the wound where I’d had this biopsy, lanced the blister where I’d had my compression sock that I couldn’t pull over the wound on Thursday, dealt with my legs and fitted my compression socks for me. She was grateful for everything that my faithful cleaner had fetched on Saturday but she had forgotten the prescription that she promised.

After she left, I made breakfast and read some more of MY BOOK. We’ve finally left the Tower of London, not before doing some lengthy research into the Earls of Gloucester, and have now moved on to Ludlow Castle where, doubtless, the finer points of civilian architecture will be pointed out, at the expense of anything military.

Back in here, I had work to do.

The free trial period of an expensive antivirus that came when I installed Windows on my new System drive has now expired and so I disabled it. I have a favourite free antivirus – or, that is to say, I did – but just recently, it’s been picking and choosing what sites I can or cannot access.

It keeps telling me that even my own sites, that I wrote with my bare hands, are “unsafe”, not to mention many of the more famous sites on the web, many of which I access on a regular basis.

After a play around with it this morning, it still wouldn’t respond so I reluctantly uninstalled it. I used another one previous to this one, that I had rejected several years ago in favour of the new one, so I went back to install that one again, and it works just fine.

When I’d finished breakfast I had made some dough for a lunchtime bread roll. I baked it and then made some lovely cheese on toast for lunch. You’ve no idea how nice it tasted. And as I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I’m really impressed with my air fryer, almost as much as I was with my galvanised steel dustbin.

This afternoon I made a start on the radio programme notes that I’d begun to edit just before going into hospital. And in a mad fit of energy I’d finished them, assembled the programme as far as I could, chosen the final track and written the notes ready for dictation next Saturday night.

There were of course the notes that I’d dictated last night but I ran out of time, which is probably just as well. I’ll try to catch up with those during the week some time.

There was more baking to do this afternoon. I’ve almost run out of bread so now seemed like a good time to make a loaf. I assembled enough ingredients for an 800-gramme loaf and with the correct amount of water thanks to my new scientific measuring gauge, with which I am also impressed etc etc, the dough rose up like a lift.

Not that I was watching it. I was in here watching Caernarfon play Cardiff Metropolitan for the right to play Hwlffordd next weekend for the coveted final spot in European competition in the summer.

The Caernarfon fans packed the ground and they had the privilege of being entertained to one of the fastest, most competitive games that I’ve seen all season.

The Cofis had the bulk of the attacking play but the Met’s defence stood firm and if their defence were to play like that in every game, they would be a force to be reckoned with. They had recognised long before the game that flying winger Louis Lloyd was the Cofis’ main attacking strength and had three men marking him throughout the game, giving him no room at all to move.

It wasn’t until near the end that the Met began to attack in numbers, and they created a few moments of panic in the Cofis’ defence.

And, would you believe, the match was decided by the very last kick of the game. You can see the game HERE or wait until the TV company has edited the highlights. But the highlights will miss the flavour of the game, that’s for sure.

While all of this was going on, I’d had some pizza dough, the last lot, defrosting in the kitchen. So while the bread was baking after the final whistle, I assembled my pizza.

The bread looks superb, the pizza tasted really good and everything now looks fine for the week to come. So I’ll finish my notes, back up the computer, take the statistics and then go to bed. Later than usual of course, but that’s just how things are these days.

But seeing as we have been talking about Isabelle the Nurse lancing my blister … "well, one of us has" – ed … they had a specialist unit once at Leighton Hospital near Crewe where a man was employed specifically to do just that.
However, I had head that it had closed down so I asked my friend who still lives there.
"It’s quite true" he said. "The unit has closed down"
"Why was that?" I asked, bitterly regretting ten seconds later that I had done so
"It was the man who lanced the boils and blisters" he replied. "He kept on falling off the horse."

Saturday 10th May 2025 – GUESS WHO …

… forgot to switch the alarms back on this morning? That’s right. Bane of Britain has triumphed again.

Consequently I had a nice, long sleep until all of 07:31 when I suddenly awoke with one of these dramatic awakenings that I have every now and again. It was nice, bright sunlight outside so I immediately guessed that there was something wrong, so I glanced at the time.

And after another late night last night a really good sleep probably did me some good too. I was exhausted after the journey back and by the time that I’d finished my meal and was back in here I wasn’t fit for very much.

Nevertheless I wrote the notes and performed some of the backing- up and then crawled off to bed at about 23:40 or something. I was asleep quite quickly and, for a change, I was dead to the World throughout the entire night. I remember nothing whatever until I awoke at 07:31.

Once I’d realised exactly what time it was I dashed … "errr … quite" – ed … into the bathroom for a good wash and scrub up, and sorted out the washing. Far too much to put in one machine so I just put the important things into the washing machine and set it off on its routine.

In the kitchen I had my medication, forgetting the vitamin D and the vitamin B12 that the hospital wants me to take and then back in here I was just about to check the dictaphone when Isabelle the Nurse turned up.

She admired the huge plaster on my leg and read the prescription attentively. She made a list of what she needed and ticked off what we had, indicated on the hospital’s prescription what she needed, and then issued instructions as to what else she needed, promising to write a prescription for tomorrow.

After that, it was breakfast. And then I read more of MY BOOK. Except that I didn’t. I was side-tracked yet again, firstly reading about the curious antics of Ranulf Flambard, the treasurer of William Rufus and imprisoned by Henry I, only to become the first-ever prisoner known to have escaped from the Tower of London, and then of the downfall and subsequent resurgence of William de Forz and the siege and subsequent capture of Castle Bytham by Henry III.

You can probably understand why I was no good at being a University Student. I was always wandering off down alleyways that led me far away from my course syllabus.

Back in here I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. There was something last night about a ferry – a small one like one of the ones that they have here in Granville that go out to the Ile de Chausey. In some kind of tempest or hurricane it had been badly damaged. The ferry company had one of their previous ferries – it was sitting on a plinth outside their office. What they did was to take the boat off the plinth and put it in the water and began to use that. The damaged one, they hauled it out of the water and put it on the plinth. The owners of the company decided that they would give it a thorough overhaul and repair it. Then they would check it every three years for any kind of deterioration and keep on repairing it if it needed it so that if something similar happened again they could take the one off the plinth and drop that in the water and it would be ready to go without any problems whatsoever

There was a similar story about the “Gate Guardians”, the Spitfires and Hurricanes that stood on plinths outside former World War II airfields. When we were kids, on our way to North Wales, we always noticed the one at Hawarden Airfield. However, when the film BATTLE OF BRITAIN was proposed, all of the Gate Guardians were rounded up and where it was possible to do so, were put back into the air.

There was also something about being in hospital and a nurse doing something to me which impressed me so I said something. She replied that she was only a student nurse, which surprised me. I wonder who she was. I’ve had several student nurses attending to me in the past

After that? I had some e-mails to write. There is a mountain of correspondence here going back weeks that I really must answer. However, I must have let the time slip away with me because my cleaner turned up to fit my anaesthetic patches when I was nowhere near ready.

She turned up, but the taxi didn’t. After waiting half an hour, I ‘phoned them up. "Ohh merde!" said the dispatcher in a voice loud enough that even my cleaner heard it. "I’ll find another vehicle for you".

We decided to go outside and wait, and we had a lovely forty minutes under the sun until an ambulance turned up. I hate them – it’s quite a fight for me to put myself inside – but if it’s the only vehicle available I can’t complain.

It was driven by the driver who took me to Paris. She told me that they had been on the autoroute not far from St-Lô when the call had come through. No wonder that it had taken so long to arrive. I told her that I didn’t understand any of this – after all, the taxi company had brought me back from Paris yesterday so they knew that I was at home.

Hours late at the dialysis centre, and what made it even worse was that it was a three-and-a-half hour session today. Had the taxi been on time, I could have had a very pleasant late afternoon back at my place.

The consolation was that I had Lexi and Océane dealing with me today. All of the nurses there are wonderful but as I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … Lexi really does have the most delicate touch.

Who cares whether or not the coupling-up was painful? After Tuesday afternoon and the muscular biopsy, nothing else is painful. I had plenty of work to do, apart from sitting there watching the blood pressure slowly sink through the floor to a rather dangerous 88.

Emilie the Cute Consultant was there too, but she remained stoically in her little glass cage. If she wanted something, she sent one of the girls for it. It’s a shame that she’s no longer speaking to me after my revolt the other week.

This evening, I was the last one there so they were both dealing with me. While Lexi was compressing me, Océane was inspecting my feet. I told them that I had delayed my arrival on purpose so as to have the undivided attention of both of them.

The taxi was waiting for me to bring me home and we had a very silent drive back. My cleaner was waiting and she watched and helped a little while I struggled up the stairs. She’d been to the chemist’s to buy what was needed and had bought a lettuce and some potatoes for me.

After she left, I made tea. Baked potato, salad and breaded quorn fillet followed by chocolate cake and almond soya dessert.

Now that I’ve finished my notes, I have some dictating to do and then I’m off to bed. I have plenty of work to do tomorrow, and there’s footy too – Caernarfon v Cardiff Metro, the winner going on to meet Hwlffordd to compete for the vital third European spot, accompanying TNS and Penybont.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about student nurses … "well, one of us has" – ed … regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I’m not made correctly and taking a blood sample from me is not easy.
Nevertheless, I always encourage the student nurses to have a go. After all, they have to learn somewhere.
One of them was having so much difficulty that I told her "cheer up! If I leave this hospital alive, you won’t need to sit your exams. You will have earned your diploma by default."

Thursday 1st May 2025 – WHEN I WAS SMALL …

… and Christmas trees were tall
We used to love while others used to play
Don’t ask me why, but time has passed us by
Someone else moved in from far away

Now we are tall and Christmas trees are small
And you don’t ask the time of day
But you and I, our love will never die
But guess we’ll cry come FIRST OF MAY

Happy Journée International de Travail – the “International Day of Work”, a day in which, with absolutely no sense of irony whatever, everyone celebrates work by taking a day off.

That is, of course, except the nurses and staff at the dialysis centre who were hard at it today. And hard it was too, because I have a head spinning round at I don’t know what speed, I’m feeling nauseous and I’m rather groggy on my feet. I shall be going to bed as soon as I finish these notes.

It’s probably something to do with another late night. It was after 00:30 when I finally crawled into bed after I’d finished everything. And I was asleep quite quickly too.

During the night I awoke several times but I was fast asleep when the alarm went off this morning.

No-one ever felt less like leaving the bed than me this morning but I struggled to my feet and staggered off to sort myself out.

After a wash and shave (after all, I may meet Emilie the Cute Consultant) I went off to take my medication. And then back in here for the dictaphone notes.

And a special visitor came to see me during the night. Welcome back, Zero. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen you! In the dream I can’t remember too much about this but there was certainly something about her being there. I’d had another dream during this particular dream, about Emilie the Cute Consultant who was there. She’d been treating me for something or other that meant that I had to stay over. There were all kinds of things that needed doing and I had to stay over in hospital. One of them was to do some kind of cleaning process. I was going to be heavily involved in that for some reason but I can’t remember where the border lay between the “dream within the dream” and the “dream”. At some point the idea was Zero was there so I was hoping that it would work out that Zero would be staying on too so that while I was doing the cleaning she would be there. I was desperately trying to negotiate myself onto some kind of work rota that would involve me actually doing the work when I knew that Zero was going to be present so that I could talk to her. But this was proving to be extremely complicated because every time I tried to approach Zero to talk to her, something happened and she kept on moving two steps away. I was trying all through this dream to end up next to her to speak to her, to end up on the same shift that would work when she was going to be present but it never seemed to happen. There always seemed to be something that was coming along to stand in my way again

More and more than ever before I’m convinced that it’s my subconscious that is keeping me apart from making a fool of myself over all of these young ladies during the night. It obviously knows something that I don’t know, but I’m not going to let that worry me. I shall live for the moment and cling on to whatever crumbs of comfort I can catch.

And next time anyone hears me bewail the fact that I never seem to step back into a dream involving any of my special young ladies, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, make sure to remind me that last night, Zero appeared again later on. It was her birthday and she was quite a young woman round about this time. I was wondering what had become of her, whether she was married, whether she had had children, everything like that. I was musing over this when the dream ended.

It often makes me wonder in reality where she is, what she’s doing, whether she’s married, whether she has kids. I mean, another one of my favourite young ladies is a grandmother these days. But whatever Zero is doing now, I hope that her life is happier than it was when I knew her. I felt really sorry for her back then, but there was nothing that I could do to help.

Later on, a friend of mine was managing a project for some young people and was finding it very difficult to go ahead. He said that the trouble with the younger people today was that they are so naïve. They are open to believe almost anything that someone tells them. “It’s making my life really difficult to bring them into the real World for any particular kind of project that they are trying to deal with”.

That’s something that I have noticed quite frequently these days.

The nurse came earlier than usual and we had a good chat. I told him that I’d missed his friend at that builders’ place yesterday. He didn’t know why but he imagines that she’ll be in contact with me. However, I have had another thought in this respect.

After he left, I made breakfast and read some more of MY BOOK. Having passed by a few smaller piles, we’re now at the Tower of London and discussing William the Conqueror’s arrival on the scene and the beginning of the construction.

It’s likely that he will have a lot to say on the subject as it’s one of the most important places in the Capital. But seeing as its history is well-known, I would be surprised if we were to learn anything new.

Back in here I made a start on programme 260403. I’ve not gone very far but even making a start is some kind of progress, I suppose. I doubt if anything will be finished for dictating on Saturday night but I do have some unedited notes that need attention on Sunday.

My cleaner turned up as usual, but my taxi didn’t. After she had fitted my patches we waited and waited. In the end I telephoned. "We thought that you were still in hospital" said the despatcher.

Whoops! I knew that there was something that I had forgotten to do on Tuesday morning. That was what they call an omelette sur le visage moment.

The young garrulous driver turned up and the three of us (there was another passenger in the car) had a lively, chatty voyage all the way down to Avranches.

Today’s nurses were Océane, Amandine and Alexi. I really like Alexi – she has a very soft touch and it’s like being stroked rather than being handled. Mind you, they all have their little speciality and I like them all. I really do think that the nurses who work in dialysis here have been hand-picked for their charm. Even the Nursing Auxis are lovely.

The coupling-up was comparatively painless which was nice, and then I had plenty to do. I’m making a list of tasks to do downstairs and it’s growing longer by the minute.

Liz contacted me too, asking if it was convenient to chat – we’d had a brief on-line discussion this morning. It’s difficult to talk in dialysis so she’s going to contact me tomorrow.

Starting late, I was finished late, even though it was only three and a half hours today. I managed it without a crisis but as I mentioned earlier, the low blood pressure is knocking me out right now

The garrulous driver who took me brought me back, and we chatted all the way home. My cleaner was waiting and watched as I staggered up the stairs., rather worse for wear.

Tea was a delicious leftover curry, but no naan. And there was so much left over that there’s enough for two more meals in the future. Having emptied some stuff from the freezer, it’s filling up.

So now, much earlier than usual, I’m off to bed, hoping that Zero will come to see me again and that I wake up feeling much better than I do now.

One thing that I learned today is that my dialysis session is arranged for 08:00 on Monday, so I’ll be leaving here at 07:00. Which means leaving my bed at about 05:30 if I’m going to eat anything before I go.

But seeing as we have been talking about the Journée International de Travail … "well, one of us has" – ed … Nerina once told me "I’m totally fed up with all of the sexual harassment that I have while I’m doing my work"
"Well," I told her, "if you don’t like it, the answer is to give up this working from home and go back to the office."

Wednesday 30th April 2025 – I HAVE HAD …

… another wonderful day out today. And I’ve been shopping today again too. It was really pleasant to hit the streets again and I enjoyed it tremendously.

And that’s even after the lack of sleep that I had last night.

In fact, it was after 01:30 when I finally hit the sack. I was quite wound up after all of my efforts yesterday and couldn’t settle down. Instead, I found a few things t do on the computer and had a wander around in cyberspace doing a bit of this and a bit of that. As for “a bit of the other”, I managed to restrain myself.

When I finally made it into bed, I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned for quite some considerable time.

However, I must have dropped off to sleep at some point because BILLY COTTON awoke me at 07:00.

Surprisingly, I wasn’t as tired as I might have been. I made it into the bathroom and sorted myself out, as far as it is possible to do so, and then went into the kitchen for my medication.

There was a beautiful draught of air coming through the open window (I’d left it open all night). And as I sat there, the sun rose from behind the church and immediately the current of air became warm. I was only there ten minutes too.

Back in here I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night, and the answer was a predictable “nowhere”, given the amount of sleep that I had had.

The nurse was in full chat mode and for a change it was quite interesting. He also mentioned another one of his friends who had some kind of connection with a building company. As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I know all about his friends.

While we’re on the subject of friends … "well, one of us is" – ed … my friend turned up shortly afterwards and we had a good chat as we waited for the builder to show up (late, as usual, but we expected that).

When he turned up, we found that he was quite efficient, quite frank and quite easy to talk to. He made me fully aware (however, I already knew) that there would be no guarantee or promise that his company could start work within my deadline. It was that that impressed me the most.

He’s arranged for an appointment on 3rd June (when I should have possession) to measure up and talk to his contractors. And it can’t be done any quicker than that.

After he left we had breakfast and continued our discussion for a while, tearing apart all kinds of ideas and plans for downstairs.

Eventually, we decided to make the most of the lovely weather and went out to the car – or, rather, we went outside and my friend went and brought the car to me.

Our first stop was at Donville-les-Bains. The branch of my bank there is much easier to access and parking is easier so I went in and drew out some cash – the first time since I can’t remember when. Not that I need it, because I do have an emergency supply here in the apartment and I haven’t spent any in ages – but it’s always handy to have around “just in case”. And I won’t have many other opportunities.

After we left, we went down the hill to the seafront and had a very, very leisurely drive along the coast as we chatted about old times. We saw some wonderful sights, and made quite a few U-turns as our path led up into various dead ends.

We decided to go to Coutances for lunch and my Artificial Intelligence search engine made several suggestions as to where a vegan could eat.

However, I don’t know what France has come to these days.

When Marechal Foch took over overall command of the French Army in 1918 it is said that he said that he only had two conditions – "a free hand with the Army, and two hours for lunch". We arrived in Coutances well before 14:00 only to find that every single restaurant that we tried had closed its kitchen at 13:30

We ended up at the LeClerc supermarket where we grabbed some “Tricatel” food, thanks to a couple of nice serving wenches who took their time closing at 14:30 so that we could just about have time to be served.

On the way back home we stopped at Noz, my first time since October 2023 where I struck lucky with some fabric softener, some coffee, some noodles and a pile of frozen vegan food.

Leaving Noz, we drove slap bang past the place that my nurse had mentioned, so we went in anyway. His friend wasn’t there but a helpful girl gave me several pointers and arranged an appointment for someone to come to see me. There’s no harm in it, I suppose.

On our arrival home, we found that my faithful cleaner had been to LeClerc in Granville and had found my pyjamas as well as more of those curry patties that we had bought yesterday.

For tea I had lasagna out of the freezer, making space to put in everything that we had bought. It’s not ‘arf crowded in there but it all went in, right enough.

Our chat, reminiscing about old times, continued for ages. He showed me some photos of our project in the UK – the “before” and the “after”. The “after” is so impressive and looks wonderful and we will soon be ready to start Stage Two of our project but the “before” photos are horrifying and I was genuinely appalled.

Eventually he left to go back to his hotel ready for an early night as he has to set off for back home at 05:30 tomorrow morning. We had a lovely two days together, going to places, catching up on old times and discussing new times, but what kind of state is this to be in when someone has to drive all the way from Newport in Shropshire to take me to the shops?

Now that I’ve finished my notes, I’m off to bed, later than usual yet again. Dialysis tomorrow and I’m not looking forward to it at all. I wonder if there will be any more feedback from my rebellion on Monday

We shall see.

But seeing as we have been talking about going down a few dead ends … "well, one of us has" – ed … I am reminded of a report on male sterility that was published a few years ago.
A newspaper had laid its hand on the article and the headlines the next day were "Male Sterility – a dead end?"

Wednesday 16th April 2025 – I WAS RIGHT …

… about my hot cross buns. They have risen up like the proverbial lift and look absolutely magnificent. It just shows the difference that having an accurate water gauge makes. All these years that I’ve had some very hit-and-miss baking …

Something else that was magnificent last night was the fact that I was in bed by 23:00, for the first time for ages. I really appreciated it too, having blitzed through everything after tea – the notes, the statistics and the back-up et cetera.

As well as that, it didn’t take long to drop off either, and there I stayed, fast asleep, until 06:55. Probably the best night’s sleep that I have had for ages.

When the alarm went off I was awake thinking about leaving the bed early but BILLY COTTON beat me to it. Surprisingly it took me a few minutes to summon up the energy to leave the bed.

In the bathroom I had a cursory wash (after all, it is shower day today) and then went into the kitchen for the medication.

Back in here I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. I had to meet Rosemary and we arranged to meet in London at one of the big railway station termini. She had a rough idea of when she’d be there. I was already in London so I said that I would be there or thereabouts. As the station is so big, I’ll just arrive there and we’ll contact each other by ‘phone or something. When it came time to go I set out on foot on my usual way. I suddenly realised that I was nowhere near where I was supposed to be. Just at that moment I was walking past a house when a taxi pulled up. I asked the driver which was the best way to the railway station. He pointed out the way from which I had just come. Down at that end of the road was a dirt track that led through some kinds of fields or common. I asked “surely you don’t mean that I am to go past there?”. He replied “no, it’s a great big main four-lane road”. I realised then where I’d gone wrong – I’d gone wrong a long way before the junction back down the road. I asked “could you run me there?”. He replied “I can’t. I’m finishing work. I live here”. I tried to persuade him but it didn’t work. Another taxi pulled up so I asked him but the first driver told him not to bother – that I was going to walk. I was rather disappointed by the two of them. I set out to walk back and walked probably the quickest that I have ever walked in my life. Eventually I could see the railway station in the distance. There was a big road junction just before it. There were millions of cars milling around there trying to go through, totally ignoring the traffic lights and the pedestrian crossing but people just surged across. Some girl in a car tried to drive through the crowd and the crowd was quite irate. They made something of a demonstration about it. In the end I extricated myself from this mess but still had ten minutes of walking to go and I thought that I was going to be late yet again.

This all rings a bell with me. I’ve walked down that dirt road and across those fields and common before during one of my previous nocturnal rambles, quite a while ago now. As well as that, I can see the railway station now. I was up on the top of a hill, something like Highgate in London. The railway station was on a slight rise across a valley, with its huge arched train shed clearly visible. However, we are once again overwhelmed in confusion and anxiety in a dream. Someone has commented on my anxiety and confusion dreams in the past and suggests that it might be due to stress. All I can say is that if my life now is stressful, what must my dreams have been like 40 years or so ago when I was running my taxis?

Later on I went back into that dream … "which dream is this?" – ed … I was wandering around Crewe near the Square, talking to a friend of mine while I was typing out some notes for the radio. One of the things that I was typing out was the notes of something about the Blues Brothers. At that moment friend climbed into his car and shot off just like the Blues Brothers did. of course, at that moment, a police car appeared. The police car went to block him off on the Square. I could see it all perfectly from my vantage point but my friend’s vantage point was obscured by the old Marks and Spencers building. When he came round the corner there he found himself face-to-face with the policeman. Of course he had to stop, he couldn’t really do anything. The policeman stepped out of his vehicle and the first thing that he did was to close the bonnet of my friend’s car – it was one of these bonnets that hinges from the front, not from the rear. He would often leave it open as he drove around, held only by the security catch

That reminds me of a time 40 or 50 years ago when we were all out late one night (or early in the morning, more like) in Crewe when there was a heavy snowfall. My friend took his car onto the public car park, that was totally empty, and was spinning round doing doughnuts on the slippery surface. What he had failed to take into account that it was right next to the police station. Two constables came out and gave him a ticket for “using a car park other than for the purpose of parking”.

The nurse was in a better humour today and was rather more cheerful than yesterday. However he didn’t stop for long and I could get on and make breakfast and read more of MY BOOK.

Our trip around the castles of England (and Wales) is turning into a real whistle-stop tour. On some of these sites we aren’t discussing architecture of any type (never mind military architecture) because there are no extant remains, so I’m not convinced of the reason why we’ve even come here.

However, he does make an interesting observation when it comes to Huntingdon Castle. He tells us that "William the Conqueror was at Huntingdon 1068, when he ordered a castle to be built, evidently on the site of the old fortress restored by Edward the Elder in 918. The names in Domesday show how complete had been the removal of the larger English landowners."

We’ve talked rather a lot just recently … "well, one of us has" – ed … about the ethnic cleansing that must have taken place as several waves of invaders overwhelmed the native population during the various invasions back in the early days of history and prehistory. So these “larger English landowners” – what happened to them? I can’t see them being allowed to remain, even as serfs and slaves, in the local area where they might command the respect and loyalty of their previous tenants and possibly incite a rebellion.

Back in here I had things to do that needed my attention, and then I cracked on with the radio programme. All of the notes for programme 260227 are completed and ready for dictation on Saturday night.

There was time for a disgusting drink break and to sort out my faithful cleaner when she arrived. And then I had a wonderful shower and found some nice, clean clothes so that I shall look fine for Emily the Cute Consultant tomorrow.

After my cleaner left, I had my second disgusting drink and then I had things to do.

After breakfast I had put some lentils and split peas into the slow cooker and after an hour and the water had boiled, I rinsed them and then put them back in the slow cooker on the lowest heat with some clean water. So after the afternoon’s disgusting drink break I began to plan my lentil lasagna.

First though, I had hot cross buns to make. And here I almost had a disaster. I didn’t have enough vegan butter.

However, any oil is good, as we have proved with our oil cakes, so why not use coconut oil? I made a really good mix of flour, coconut oil, salt, yeast and mixed spices with warm soya milk and melted coconut oil – the correct amounts of liquid – and left it to fester.

While it was festering, I fried a large onion and some garlic in my wok, tipped the lentils and split peas in after I’d rinsed them again, along with a pack of this soya mince in tomato sauce that I wanted to try. In went some tomato sauce and herbs and so on and I left it to simmer away.

The dough for the hot cross buns had risen nicely so I added some sultanas, raisins and some orange essence, and kneaded it all again.

After it had stood for a while and risen again, I moulded the dough into six balls, flattened them and put them on the biscuit tray. I made some thick flour mix and with my icing piper, piped the crosses on the buns and left them to rise again.

While they were festering, I assembled my lasagna and made a vegan cheese sauce that I poured over the top, and stuck it all into the oven.

When it was cooked I put the hot cross buns in and then had a quarter of my lasagne with some vegetables. And it was delicious. Even better, there are three more slices to go into the freezer for another time. It was the lst of the orange, ginger and coconut cake today too. Tomorrow I’ll start on my chocolate cake.

Rosemary had rung up while I was baking so after I’d finished tea and washed up, we had a little chat. Not very long – only fifty-four minutes.

Consequently I’m running really late but never mind – I’m off to bed right now. Tomorrow is dialysis day and shopping order too.

But while we’re on the subject of buns … "well, one of us is" – ed … one of my friends once told me that he had served in the Army in a regiment where the chief cook was Doctor Spooner’s brother.
"How interesting" I replied
"Very interesting" he said "especially when the Germans launched an attack on the kitchen"
"Why was that?" I asked
"Because Doctor Spooner’s brother personally led the counter-attack" he replied. "He went into action with all buns glazing"

Tuesday 15th April 2025 – I HAVE HAD …

… a Day of Rest today.

Our Welsh class is on an Easter break this week and next week so I was planning on having a leisurely day today for a change.

What contributed to that particular idea was the fact that I had another very late night – long after 01:30 when I went to bed. But there again, a Marshall Tucker Band concert came round on the playlist and as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I have something of a weakness for Southern Rock and lead guitar solos that can sometimes last for as long as several weeks. After all, how many other Southern Rock bands can you name WHO CAN MUSTER UP A FLUTE?

So eventually I made it into bed and settled down for a good sleep only to awaken in a real panic when the alarm went off – sheets and bedding flying everywhere. For some reason or other I was convinced that I’d heard the alarm go off previously and that this was the second alarm.

As it happens, it wasn’t, because it went off five minutes later. So whatever that was all about, I really don’t know.

The sad part about that was that I was off on an interesting little voyage at that particular moment and in the panic, the whole lot was wiped away completely and I can’t remember anything at all about it.

In the bathroom I had a good wash and then into the kitchen for the medication. It’s a non-dialysis day so I remembered the disgusting powder that I have to mix with water.

Back in here I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. We had a car parked on the lawn somewhere and the front end of it had sunk into the grass. We were debating on ways to manoeuvre it out. I would have expected that we would have raised up the front, put it on a couple of planks underneath the wheels and then pulled it backwards. My father though was going on about changing the gearbox. Even if it had been a practical proposition to change the gearbox, I didn’t understand how that was going to help to move the car out of the trenches that it had dug for itself.

The car, I can still see it now. It was my red Cortina Estate that I came in when I immigrated to Europe, all of my wordly possessions that remained, crammed into the back. I still have the car today – inter-galactic mileage and needs the valve guides replacing but apart from a spot of rot on the scuttle underneath the windscreen the bodywork is perfect and, rare for a Cortina, has never been welded. It’s sitting in my warehouse in Montaigut quietly gathering dust with the 2000E saloon that Nerina bought me once and my Citroën “Traction Avant”.

The nurse turned up early for the start of his week’s shift. No surprise, because he doesn’t have the injections or the blood tests to do, by popular request of his clients. He was complaining that he didn’t have much sleep last night, but that’s a quite common state of affairs around here.

After he left, I made my breakfast and read some more of MY BOOK.

We’ve finished our visit of Helmsley Castle and after a remarkably brief passage by Hereford Castle – a mere dozen pages devoted to one of the strongest fortifications in the Marches – we’re now visiting Hertford Castle.

Our author is once more tying himself up in knots. When talking about Helmsley, he tells us on page 106 that "it is possible that the whole may have been the work of Robert Fursan, especially as, remarkable as it is, it is not named in Domesday nor any early record"

However, on page 121, when talking about the town of Hertford, he tells us that the town of "Hertford was so held of the Confessor, and so accepted by the Conqueror, and entered in Domesday, which, however, as was not uncommon, makes no mention of the castle,"

So why is it remarkable that some castles such as Helmsley Castle aren’t in the Domesday Book, but not uncommon that others such as Hertford Castle are omitted?.

After breakfast I had some paperwork that needed attention and then I had quite an idle morning not doing anything except searching for items of personal interest on the Internet.

Something else that I did was to have another in-depth look at some Artificial Intelligence programs. Every day it seems that there are more and more slowly coming onto the streets every day. The latest one seems to be an automatic story writer. All you need is to write out the very basic outline of your plot, your main characters and their characteristics, press “send” and sit back to let the machine type out a book for you.

You can type as much – or as little – as you like for the story outline and so I had a little fun with it, testing out its limits and finding out what it could – and couldn’t or wouldn’t – do. But it’s going to spoil all kinds of creativity and imagination once it all becomes on-line.

While we are talking about Artificial Intelligence … "well, one of us is" – ed … I was told of a discussion between two people on the Internet about how someone, unable to find any secretarial assistance anywhere on the island where he lived, had engaged an AI bot to do all of the work for him and it seemed to be working fine.

Interesting as all of this might be, I couldn’t keep on doing that all day and in the end I began to concentrate on programme 260227 for the radio. First of all though, I checked over programme 250418 and sent it off for broadcast this coming weekend.

For 260227 I didn’t have half of the tracks that I needed so I had to hunt them down. One or two were quite obscure and took some finding but I found them in the end thanks to help from my Artificial Intelligence-powered search engine.

So all of the tracks are sorted out, re-edited and re-mixed, paired and segued. Tomorrow while my cleaner is here, I’ll write out the notes ready for dictation on Saturday night. For the rest of the week I can make a start on Saturday at Woodstock. There will also be a LeClerc order to prepare.

For tea tonight I searched through the freezer and found one of my aubergine and kidney-bean whatsits and cooked it with some pasta and veg, followed by orange, ginger and coconut cake and soya dessert. There is just one more slice of that cake, and then I’ll be into the chocolate cake.

Something else that I have to do tomorrow and not forget is to bake some hot cross buns. We can’t have Easter without toasted hot cross buns. The batch that I made last year weren’t particularly well-made but they tasted delicious all the same. I’m hoping that my new improved technique will improve things this year.

But now that I’ve finished my notes, I’m off to bed

But seeing as we have been talking about Artificial Intelligence … "well, one of us has" – ed … before I go I’ll tell you about the chat that I have just had with an Artificial Intelligence chatbot.
What I did was to ask it to tell me the funniest joke that it knew.
It came back with "A man takes his sick Chihuahua to the veterinarian. They’re immediately taken back to an exam room. After a while, a Labrador walks in, sniffs the Chihuahua for 10 minutes, then leaves. Next, a cat comes in, stares at the Chihuahua for 10 minutes, and leaves. Finally, the vet arrives, examines the dog, and prescribes some medicine.
The man is shocked and says, “That must be a mistake! I’ve only been here 20 minutes!”
The vet replies, “No mistake. It’s $100 for the lab test, $100 for the cat scan, and $50 for the medicine.”"
It finished by telling me " If you want, I can share more like this!" but I don’t think that I’ll bother. At least, when I remember a joke from the old “Plymouth Polytechnic” days (and that’s a story in itself) I don’t forget half of the story like my AI chatbot has just now. Artificial Intelligence is not all that it’s cracked up to be. I’ll prefer natural stupidity any day.

EPIC HALL

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

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Sunday 10th August 2025 – HA HA HA HA!

Thursday 17th July 2025 – MY KITCHEN DOWNSTAIRS …

Sunday 22nd June 2025 – AFTER YESTERDAY’S EXCITEMENT …

Thursday 19th June 2025 – WE NOW HAVE …

Wednesday 11th June 2025 – I DON’T THINK …

Sunday 8th June 2025 – THIS LITTLE PROJECT …

Saturday 31st May 2025 – AS I SHOULD …

Saturday 17th May 2025 – I AM CONVINCED …

Monday 12th May 2025 – IT HAS BEEN …

Sunday 11th May 2025 – WHAT A GAME …

Saturday 10th May 2025 – GUESS WHO …

Thursday 1st May 2025 – WHEN I WAS SMALL …

Wednesday 30th April 2025 – I HAVE HAD …

Wednesday 16th April 2025 – I WAS RIGHT …

Tuesday 15th April 2025 – I HAVE HAD …

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