Tag Archives: a history of architecture

Live: Saturday 5th 5eptember 2026 – I AM ABSOLUTELY …

… exhausted again, so much so that I’m freezing, just like the other day. And just like the other day, unless something dramatic happens, I shall be in bed long before I’ve finished these notes.

Last night was tiring enough. Not going to bed until 01:00 and waking up in the middle of the night, and then leaving the bed at 06:29 has done for me good and proper.

It was 01:00 when I finally crawled into bed after my marathon session with the chatbot about this captcha installation. I certainly wasn’t going to start a new, complicated procedure at that kind of night.

And once in bed and asleep, I stayed asleep, and for about a whole two or so hours too. And once I was awake, at something like three o’clock in the morning, there I stayed, wide awake, until the alarm went off.

As usual, it wasn’t very easy for me to haul myself out of bed, but with yesterday’s notes to finish off, if ever there was a good time to do it, it was right now, so I set to work.

In fact, I wasn’t very far off finishing when I heard the rattle of coffee mugs from the kitchen, so I sprung to my feet … "well, sort-of" – ed … and went into the bathroom for a good scrub up and shave, in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant today at dialysis.

Next stop was the kitchen for a mug of coffee and a chat, and we were still there chatting when the nurse arrived. The Hound of the Baskervilles was really pleased to see him, wagging his tail at thirteen to the dozen, and I think that he had more care and attention that I did. The nurse also had his daily German lesson, and finally, he sorted out my legs and feet.

After he had left, the Hound of the Baskervilles dragged his master off for walkies and I made my breakfast – porridge, toast and juice. The juice was actually the leftover fruit juice from the tin of apricots, and I’ll tell you something for nothing – and that is that my calcium lozenges don’t dissolve in it.

And, would you believe, I crashed out while eating it.

Another thing is that I’ve finally finished reading A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman, and I can’t say that I’m sorry. It was a really difficult read, especially when trying to dismantle Freeeman’s partisan viewpoints and comments.

And at the beginning of the book, he mentioned that he wasn’t going to use illustrations to illuminate the discussions in his book. Why not? It would have made things so much clearer and saved me so many hours of research.

So, I wonder what the next book will be.

Back in the office, I finished off the notes for yesterday, and there were a few other things to sort out too, but eventually, the Hound of the Baskervilles dragged his master back home after having had a good exploration of the town and the port, and so, feeling more sociable than usual, I went to join them.

At midday when my alarm went off, I started to prepare myself for dialysis, and the Hound of the Baskervilles’s Auntie Cleaner came down to apply the anaesthetic on my arm. However, she spent most of her time with His Nibs and I barely had a look-in. He has far more success than I am having right now.

He also had a big fuss from the taxi driver who came to pick me up, and then we went off into the wilds of Champeaux to pick up another passenger. He told us that it was the Sartilly Festival today and the place was gridlocked, so we carried on in the wilderness, down roads on which I have never travelled before, until we reached the main road.

As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … since I’ve been travelling with this taxi company, I’ve been seeing parts of Normandy that I never knew existed.

We were a little early arriving at dialysis, and to my surprise, I found that I had a single room and that the nurse, one of the new ones, was waiting for me on my arrival. I’ve had much worse connections than the one that she gave me, and I was up and running at 14:05.

First job was to watch the live football match that had kicked off half an hour ago (it’s a good job that the stream has a “start from beginning” function) – Penybont v Colwyn Bay.

Penybont have assembled a squad capable of taking on TNS, the eternal champions, but their start to the season is stuttering. It wasn’t helped by two of their leading stars having to be substituted in this match before twenty minutes had been played.

Colwyn Bay have so far failed to live up to their efforts last season, so this was going to be an unpredictable match. However, skill will out, and Penybont won 1-0 in the end.

Mind you, I missed a few minutes off it because, once again, I somehow managed to crash out while watching it

There was time afterwards to watch the first half of Llansawel v Airbus UK Broughton, and I’ll tell you more about this game later when I’ve finished it.

It’s nice being in a single room like this. It means in principle that there are far fewer interruptions. However, in my case, with the blood pressure alarm going off every thirty minutes, that’s not necessarily the case as the nurses come rushing to my rescue like the Seventh Cavalry.

One interruption that I didn’t have was that of a doctor. There was one on the premises today but he pointedly passed me by. It looks as if I’m in the doghouse with the Hound of the Baskervilles.

The nurse was already ready and waiting for me when my time was up so I was unplugged quite quickly. Even better, the taxi driver was waiting for me, and I was the only passenger, so we were home just after 18:00. It goes without saying that the Hound of the Baskervilles had yet another fuss made of him – by the driver and by his Auntie Cleaner who had come to escort me onto the premises.

My friend had cooked a lovely chilli sin carne and we followed that with one of the really nice soya desserts that Leclerc is pushing right now. That was a lovely tea, right enough.

After the washing up, it was 20:10 when I came in here to start my notes, but by 20:30, I was in bed, fully clothed and fast asleep. I can write my notes again.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about washing and making myself look pretty … "well, one of us has" – ed … it reminds me of years ago when I lived in Brussels.
One of my friends bumped into me in the street. "Eric – we thought that you were dead."
"Ohh no" I replied. "I just smell like it."

Live: Friday 4th September 2026 – WHAT A HORRIBLE …

… afternoon I’ve had today. I’ve been spending from about 14:00 to midnight (with various pauses, of course) trying to figure a captcha on my site, but with no luck at all.

You’d think that I’d know better than to try to do a silly job like that and think that it will only take half an hour or so.

Anyway, it all went wrong last night – that was when it all started. I was in bed by 22:30, looking forward to a really good sleep. Instead, I had a bad night. I tossed and turned during the night and coughed myself to death. When the alarm went off at 06:29 I felt like death.

As usual, it took an age to find the energy to crawl over to my seat, but when I did, the first thing I did was to listen to the dictaphone to find out what had been going on.

I was coaching a team in the Welsh Premier League last night. We weren’t having an easy time of it, so I started to change the tactics around. This produced some slightly better results but there was still a long way to go for improvements and a couple of young nineteen year olds joined the team. They had a great deal of enthusiasm over what would be happening here.

It looks as if everyone in my dream had had a bad night and was thoroughly whacked too. But this dream refers to a couple of clubs in Wales who have signed some “young, promising talent” released by the English clubs’ training schools at the close season.

By now, I was hearing the rattling of the coffee equipment so I guessed that my friend was abroad and occupying himself with the morning tasks.

Anyway, I went in to join him, just in enough time, though, to have a hot mug of coffee stuck into my sweaty mitt.

We had quite a good chat until the nurse arrived, and he continued his German lessons with my friend and the Hound of the Baskervilles, who was now awake and came to join us in conversation.

After the nurse left, the Hound of the Baskervilles dragged his master off walkies and I made my breakfast as usual – porridge, toast, and juice for my morning medication. And while I was eating, I was reading some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

He’s still on his horse about the end of the Gothic era, and this is his latest rant –"We have not hitherto seen the intrusion of any distinctively foreign element ; the idea is generally completely Gothic, and often of great merit, the corruption is to be traced in the poor and inaccurate details, in some cases retained by corrupt tradition from the latest Perpendicular".

As you can see, it’s “no holds barred” in this discussion. Still, only a few pages to go.

When I came back in here, there were a few things to do. And then, when they were done, I turned my attention to the outstanding notes from yesterday.

All through the morning, I’d been fighting off wave after wave of fatigue, and sitting here at my desk was no exception. Consequently, it was quite a struggle to finish these notes, although, as time passed, it became easier and easier.

The Hound of the Baskervilles, who earlier had dragged his master out for walkies, dragged him back too. Apparently there had been an “incident” when a dog off its lead decided that it fancied a fight with him. That was a rather foolish decision. The Hound of the Baskervilles is more than a match for anything, even when on his lead, as events apparently showed.

The next job was to send off the Leclerc order as we are running low on essential supplies, such as vegetables, salad stuff, fruit juice, butter and my friend’s beer.

After that, I watched the remaining few minutes of Airbus’s demolition of Trefynnon so as to clear that off the waiting list of events and then watched the crazy match from Tuesday between Stranraer and Celtic B, where Stranraer threw away a 3-1 lead to go down 3-4 and to finish the match with just nine men on the field.

After that, I decided to be sociable … "that’s not like you" – ed … so I went for a chat with my friend. As usual, we talked a lot about the past, but unfortunately, nostalgia ain’t what it used to be.

By 14:00 I was back in here and I started to install this captcha that I want on my site to keep the spammers and bots out. The first bit, setting up the captcha and obtaining the keycodes, was relatively straightforward.

The next bit – pinning the captcha to the site – was where it became complicated and in the end I called up my CHATBOT TO HELP ME

We made much more progress after that, but could I ‘eck as like get it to attach to my site, no matter how many different ways we tried.

Just before 18:00 I had to break off because the Leclerc order was delivered. Working as a team, me standing in front of the counter emptying all the bags and my friend standing behind the counter putting the stuff away, it was amazing just how quickly we managed to put everything away.

Shortly afterwards, it was teatime, so we had our usual Friday night staple of chips in the air fryer, baked beans with cheese and black pepper, and vegan sausages added to the chips. My friend made the chips to his own secret recipe, and I dealt with the beans.

For pudding, we had the last of the tinned apricots with a citron sorbet. And why not? After all, it was a really delicious meal.

After the meal and the washing up, there was football – Trefynnon v Trefelin – a proper basement clash. Trefynnon has no points and a goal difference; you could drive a bus through, whereas Trefelin has one point and has scored two goals.

No wonder these two teams are struggling. There wasn’t very much in the way of skill out there tonight, and the teams were far too busy giving away possession at every opportunity. Wayward passes were so numerous that I couldn’t count them.

Nevertheless, the game roared from end to end, finely balanced with no-one having the upper hand. Trefelin drew first blood after 61 minutes with a beautiful lob over the goalkeeper, but in the 82nd minute, Treffynnon equalised with a goal direct from a corner.

That was how the match finished, 1-1. Trefynnon won their first point and Trefelin scored their third goal. However, a draw was good for neither team in their effort to climb the table. By the way, I’m not sure if I missed anything because from between the 41st minute and the middle of half-time, I crashed out in the chair. Another one of those occasions when I knew nothing about it.

After that, I returned to the chatbot and the captcha. After a while, we realised that we were going nowhere fast so the chatbot advised me to strike out everything that we’d done and to start on a new hosting platform for the captcha.

That was when I looked at the time – 01:00 almost. I’m not starting a complicated process at this time of night? Instead, I told the chatbot that I’ll see him on Sunday, maybe. And then I went to bed.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about captchas … "well, one of us has" – ed … someone once asked me "why did Mark Zuckerberg create ‘Facebook’?"
My reply was "he couldn’t work out the captcha to get into MySpace."

LIVE: Wednesday 2nd September 2026 – WE ARE NOT …

… alone!

Currently sitting on the floor, totally exhausted after Two Days of Rest sitting in a car, is the Hound of the Baskervilles. And sitting on the sofa just above him is his master. How nice it is to see old friends again. And I DO mean “old” because he’s as old as I am … "the master, not the dog" – ed …

This was the last thing on my mind last night when I abandoned the notes and went to bed, totally exhausted after a day of sitting at my desk. I don’t know where all of my energy is right now, but it does look as if all of my “get up and go” has got up and gone a long time ago.

At 03:48 precisely this morning, I awoke. And that, dear reader, was that. No going back to sleep or anything. I just lay there doing nothing, tossing and turning in bed, troubling no-one except myself.

After a while, I decided that maybe I ought to get up, So I looked at the time – 06:18. Just 11 minutes before the alarm time. I reckoned that I should still leave the bed and credit myself with an early start, but while I was debating with myself, the alarm went off anyway, so that was that.

Despite my successes yesterday, today was back to the old routine of having to find the motivation to struggle to my feet, but I eventually managed.

The first task was to go to unlock the door so that the nurse could come in. And I remembered to throw the keys onto the bed where I can pick them up.

The second task was to go into the bathroom and sort myself out. That was when I noticed that I must have stubbed my toe somewhere because it was bleeding profusely and I’d left a trail of blood through the apartment. Anyway, I organised myself properly and then went around the apartment with a wet cloth underneath one of my crutches to remove the stains.

Back in here, the next task was to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. And that was a major disappointment. There should have been something on there because I remember the batteries going flat in the middle of the night and having to change them. However, there’s no cause for alarm. We’ll catch up at some point, and there are plenty of other things I should be doing.

The nurse was early today and I wasn’t ready for him. Nevertheless, I did my best and he organised my legs and feet. He reminded me to “Take it Easy” today, but as I told him, “I’ve got so much more on the go, so there’s no chance of relaxing”.

After he left, I could make my breakfast and read some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

He’s still harping on about what he considers to be the end of the World when his beloved Gothic is replaced by another style, and we end up with remarks such as "it was one and the same spirit, working in different channels, which raised a Borgia and a Medicis to the throne of Hildebrand and Innocent, which reared a Brunelleschi to corrupt the taste, a Henry to destroy the fabrics, and a Luther and a Socinus to assault the faith, of the Church ; heartily as many of them cursed and hated one another, all were doing the same work, and all sprung from the same source, the fall of the old faith and glory -of Teutonic Christendom before the self-will, the faithlessness, the heathenism of the Renaissance."

It’s all becoming really tiresome, but I’m not far off the end now. I wonder what’s next in store for me.

Back in here, I began to do a few other things that needed doing, and then I suddenly remembered that I had yesterday’s notes to finish off, so I abandoned everything and went on the attack.

These notes took much longer than intended because I received a text message – "Be there in an hour" so I had to do some arranging, including putting some beer in the fridge.

The posting had just gone on line when I received a message "we are here" so everything else had to go on stand-by while I welcomed the Hound of the Baskervilles and his master.

Once they were inside the house, we had a coffee … "the master, not the Hound of the Baskervilles" – ed … and a good chat to catch up on the news since June. Then the Hound of the Baskervilles dragged his master off for walkies and they ended up at the local bar… "OHHH what a surprise!" – ed …, where Auntie Cleaner saw him and gave him a great big hug … "the Hound of the Baskervilles, not his owner" – ed …

While they were out, I carried out a few modifications to the blog

comments are re-enabled. However, you have to be logged in to the site in order to post, and all posts won’t go on line until I’ve moderated them. You’ll see the “Log In” link on the sidebar to the right underneath the “Amazon Canada” button box. If you don’t have an account, follow the instructions, and for any problems, e-mail me with the “contact me” link below.
There is now a “live blog” running on the website. If you see the link for “Live” at the top of the page, click on it and see for yourself and if you want to comment, you need to be logged in (see above)
The highlight boxes have changed a little, as you can probably see

All of this took about three hours to do this afternoon, and had I not had my chatbot by my side for some of the time, it would have taken much, much longer. It’s nice when you write a piece of coding and when it doesn’t work, sent it to your chatbot and ask “what’s wrong with this coding”? You have your reply in seconds.

The modifications are not yet finished. Very soon, there will be a CAPTCHA on the site. I know that this will disappoint many people and I’m sorry about that, but whoever has worked his way into “Chrome” has now started to hack into the mails of people who that use Chrome 148 and Windows 10 and taken over tens of thousands of accounts. I’m fed up with the hundreds of hits I’m receiving every day from hijacked sites, trying to attack my website.

It seems that people are deserting Chrome by the thousands and the following attachment explains why. SEE POINT 5

When everything was finally finished, I went to make tea. Pasta and veg in tomato sauce with a vegan burger, followed by tinned apricot and Lemon sorbet. And with having a visitor here and having to cook, I’m also having to eat, even if I don’t feel like it.

So now everything is finished. I’ll post this on line and then do whatever else needs doing. It’s long after midnight so it will be a short sleep, but with all this energy that I’ve suddenly found, I don’t think I care.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about chatbots again … "well, one of us has" – ed … I asked my chatbot to come up with a good joke about chatbots. So here we are, and don’t blame me.
A woman starts using a chatbot to help draft messages to her boyfriend.
After a few weeks, she’s asking it for everything:
"Help me say I’m upset but not angry."
"Help me plan our anniversary."
"Help me explain why I need space."
One night, her boyfriend says: "I don’t think this is working. It’s like I’m not even talking to you any more."
She panics, opens the chatbot, and types: "help me save this relationship."
The chatbot replies: "Based on our conversation history, I recommend you break up with him and subscribe to the premium plan for more personalized advice."

LIVE: Tuesday 1st September 2026 – PHEW! WHAT A …

… day that was.

It actually started last night when I was so tired that I went to bed at about 22:00, totally exhausted. And although I wasn’t as quick going to sleep as I would have liked to have been, it was still quicker than some nights, and I hadn’t finished sucking my menthol and eucalyptus sweet.

The sleep didn’t last as long as it might have done either. I was awake at about 03:30, and, as far as that was concerned, that was the end of any reasonable hope of dozing off again. I stayed there, tossing and turning, trying to find a really good and comfortable position. And just as I was settling into a nice, comfortable position, the alarm went off.

Strangely, I was up and about rather quicker than I have been recently, and the first task that I had to do was to unlock the front door. And this time, I remembered where I put the keys when I’d finished.

Into the bathroom to sort myself out was next, and then back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out what had gone on during the night.

There was something about my friend from Germany again – the one to whom I spoke on line the other day. She was planning on going somewhere in her old car, a little dark-blue 1984 Opel saloon. She had some of these stickers that you used to have in the window in the 1960s of where you’ve been. There was probably well over a hundred in her windscreen.

It’s pretty certain that most people my age and older remember those little triangular stickers that you bought in every seaside resort in the 1960s and stuck in your window to say where you’d been. We had dozens, and others had many more than that.

The nurse turned up as usual and asked how things went at dialysis. I told him of my various woes, but he didn’t react.

After he’d left, I could make breakfast and read some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

Our author is still moaning on about the end of the Gothic period of architecture. Of Renaissance architecture in Italy. He tells us that "Such a style as this cannot but be pronounced an utter barbarism ; it has no language, no meaning of its own, but owes all its splendour to the borrowed light of the very style which it is sedulously labouring to eradicate. Cinque-cento buildings exist of great magnificence, and even great beauty, but all their beauty is derived from the Gothic vestiges which linger about them, and give them at a distance the appearance of pure Gothic structures" and much more in this respect.

By now, I was back in here trying to sort out the radio to broadcast the programme that I’m hoping to make this week. The search for the music continued. However, it had an interruption, though, between 10:30 and 11:45 when I was crashed out on my chair, fast asleep.

When it awoke, I had another interruption too. I’d forgotten that I had yesterday’s notes to finish, and so I abandoned the radio for the moment and attacked the notes.

This was complicated because firstly, I was having to fight the waves of fatigue and sleep that kept on washing over me, and then there was the pause for the disgusting drink and the midday medication.

Not only that, at 14:00 my cleaner turned up, and by 14:15 she’d chased me under the shower. Once again, once she’d arranged the bathroom with everything that I needed, I went into the shower as nature intended, all by myself and without my crutches, hanging on to bits of furniture as I passed by.

The shower was delicious. As usual, I had the temperature at 40°C, and that makes the difference, as far as I’m concerned.

It was a nice, clean me … "well, clean, anyway" – ed … who emerged from the shower – on my own again and walking forwards rather than backwards as I used to. I’m getting better and far more independent than I was when I first started showering. If only I were to have these handrails installed, I could have a lot of showers, certainly more than one each week.

There was quite a bit to sort out with my cleaner today, so it wasn’t until after she left that I could restart the notes. That explains why they didn’t go on line until about 15:30 or something like that.

And once they were done and gone, I could return to the radio programme and continue to search for music. And with the help of my chatbot, I was eventually able to track down everything that I needed. As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … artificial intelligence is saving me hours when you need to know “what is (some obscure musician)’s most well-known contribution to (some obscure group). You get the answer in milliseconds rather than spending hours trawling through the internet.

With all of the music downloaded, it needs reformatting and re-editing. And I was halfway through when it was time for me to knock off. However, that wasn’t the cue to put everything away

As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I have several other projects on the go at the moment too. For one of these, my chatbot has sent me a huge amount of text to review, amend if necessary, and post back. So, with no food again tonight – just a few crackers with the vegan spreading cheese followed by a handful of biscuits – I set to work.

And that was not interruption-free either. The new chat group for the coming year of our Welsh course was set up too, so we had the usual protocol of introducing ourselves, welcoming the newcomers and all of that jazz. And I shall have to get on and order the course book pretty soon because I don’t have long to go before I’m back in class.

After that, I continued with the artificial intelligence notes that needed reviewing and posted them back. They were so long that I had to send them back in four instalments. They wouldn’t all go back in one go.

No-one was more surprised than me to see the time when I’d finished. It was 22:10 – long past my working ultimate deadline. And I still had my notes to complete, so I began to attack them straight away. However, as time drew on, the waves of fatigue swept over me once again and this time, I was unable to resist. I posted on line what I’d written, and then I crawled off to bed. I can finish my notes tomorrow.

However, I’m as fed up with this as you are. Half the notes are better than none, but that’s still not as good as all of them. And having commitments “elsewhere” until about 21:45, there’s not much that I can do to change things. I can’t decide that “OK, I’ll change things around and start to post my notes the following morning” because with the nurse and breakfast and dialysis, there isn’t enough time to do them in the morning either. I shall have to think of a cunning plan.

And before anyone says anything, a vlog is ruled right out. Who wants to stare at my ugly mug anyway?

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about having a shower … "well, one of us has" – ed … two girls from Crewe were living together in an apartment and one of them decided to take a shower.
After two hours, she was still in there, so the other one asked her "Are you ok?"
The girl in the shower replied "yes thanks."
"So what’s keeping you?"
"It’s these instructions on the shampoo. I have to follow them carefully."
"What instructions are those?"
"Where it says ‘lather, rinse, repeat’."

Monday 31st August 2026 – HERE WE GO …

… another Monday out of the way, kicked into touch, or whatever other phrase you like. And I’m ready for a relaxing day at home tomorrow, that’s for sure, although with my faithful cleaner coming round to do her stuff, “relaxing” is probably the wrong word to use.

Last night, though, wasn’t so much fun. It was about 23:00 when I finally crawled into bed. It took an age to go to sleep, despite how tired I was feeling.

And even then, once I was asleep, it wasn’t for very long. I’ve no idea what time it was when I awoke, because I didn’t check. But I didn’t go back to sleep either, and I spent quite a while tossing and turning in my bed.

When the alarm went off at 06:29, I eventually, after much persuasion, managed to end up sitting on the edge of the bed, and it took me a good ten minutes to force myself upright.

The first task was to unlock the front door so that the nurse could come in later. Then I went into the bathroom to sort myself out and have a good wash and shave in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant later at dialysis.

Back in here, I had another listen to the dictaphone to listen to what had gone on during the night.

And while there was something on the dictaphone last night, it’s another one of these dreams that the World is not yet ready to hear. It’s basically relating to something that didn’t happen on Friday evening and something that the crowd shouted at one of these football matches

The nurse turned up as usual, and for a change, we had something of an intellectual discussion about the difference in working styles between the USA and Europe.

Interesting as the American system might be, though, it’s positively inhuman. I told him about that crazy American company where Alison and I once worked. I was trying to resolve a problem with an American counterpart in New York one Friday, but it was my time to go home. He said that he’d ring me on Monday to discuss it further. So Monday came and at 13:00 (08:00 in New York) I began to anticipate the ‘phone call. But nothing at all came. When it was almost my home time, I telephoned New York to speak to him.

Instead I had "I’m sorry. His position was made redundant on Friday. He doesn’t work here any more."

After he had left, … "the nurse, not the guy in the office in New York" – ed … I went to make my breakfast and read some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

Today, he’s carrying on where he left off and talking about Renaissance archaeology in Germany, we have "And when the old heathenish system was beginning to assume that influence which has been at last happily overthrown ; when Italy, its chosen land, was looked to as the exclusive abode of all art and refinement, and the greatest minds of that country were sedulously devoted to the restoration of classic forms ; what wonder was it that the apostate Teuton, crouching at the feet of fallen Italy, should seize with avidity on the new light, and eagerly substitute the arts of the heathen for the once honoured forms which no longer spoke, as of old, to every national and religious feeling ?"

Considering that we’re discussing the end of the fifteenth and most of the sixteenth century, talking about “heathenish systems”, “the apostate Teuton” and “the arts of the heathen” is not only grossly offensive, it is completely inaccurate too.

Back in here after breakfast, I had the usual things to do, and then I had a nice surprise. Liz rang me up for a chat, and how wonderful it was to hear from her.

It wasn’t quite a Rosemary-esque type of chat but nevertheless, it went on for quite a while. The good news is that towards the end of September, I might be having a visit.

The next task was to begin my search for music for the radio programme I’ll be preparing this week. There’s going to be quite a lot of new music in this one.

That took me up to midday … "with lots of music still to find" – ed … when the alarm went off to remind me to sort myself out for dialysis. I found my disgusting drink and my midday medication, but could I ‘eck as like find my keys?

The last time that I remember them, they were in my hand after I walked away from the door after unlocking it earlier this morning. I usually throw them onto the bed as I’m staggering past on my way to the bathroom but they weren’t there.

Just as I was about to start and retrace my steps, my faithful cleaner turned up, and she found them in an instant. What a brain of a duck your hero has!

After she had applied the anaesthetic to my arm, she wandered off and I sat down at the kitchen table to await the taxi. And just as I was starting to doze off and another footballing dream began to appear, the doorbell rang.

This provoked something of a panic when I awoke. I dropped one of my crutches and had to ferret about for it, and there were all kinds of other confusions too before I finally made it to the front door.

It was one of my favourite taxi drivers, so we had a good chat all the way down to Sartilly where we had to pick up someone else. My driver was telling me all about this guy that she had met on the internet and then just happened to drop into the conversation that in three weeks’ time, she was off to see her daughter in Montréal. And how jealous was I? I told her that if there was any room left in her suitcase, to let me know and I’ll squeeze myself in.

Despite now being back to the usual time now that Mrs Dinosaur has left the area, we were still fairly early arriving at dialysis. And the first issue that I had was that I couldn’t get out of the car. I’ve no idea why but I couldn’t manage it. In the end, I had to resort to all kinds of unorthodox manoeuvres to manage to stand upright.

One of the young nursing auxiliaries accompanied me to my bed, but halfway along the corridor I felt a heavy tap on my shoulder. When I looked round, it was one of the other auxiliaries who, for some reason or other, seems to like to flirt with me. Apparently, she wanted to say “hello”.

Today, I was lucky in that it was one of the young experienced nurses whom I like who was in the section where I was. Friendly and efficient, she had me up and running by 14:15. And she “fixed” the machine so that the alarm wouldn’t ring all the time if my blood pressure dropped.

There wasn’t as much fluid to take out today as there has been in the recent past, mainly because I’ve been careful about what I’ve been drinking, so I asked her if she could increase the extraction so that I would be “ahead” on Thursday. I suggested 300 grams, so she winked and said nothing. After she’d left, I noticed that she wound it up by 400 grams.

Then I could watch some football. The first match was from Friday night’s fixtures. Penybont have made several marquee signings this season in an attempt to put their miserable campaign in the second part of last year behind them, whereas their opponents tonight, Y Fflint, are still struggling in the basement with less experienced players.

However, it was a good match from what I saw. Penybont were, as expected, the more skilful team, whereas Y Fflint were more of heavyweight “sluggers”. Both teams had several chances but when I had to leave the match, just after half-time, Penybont were 1-0 up

The reason I left was because at 15:30, the live matches today started. My choice today was Hwlffordd v Trefelin. These were two bottom-of-the-table teams, with Hwlffordd surprisingly at no points and no goals, with newly promoted Trefelin just above them with one point and one goal.

Having seen how much chaos big burly veteran centre-half Louis Gerrard caused to the Rhydaman defence when Trefelin pushed him up front on Friday night, I was surprised to see him back in defence today. If I had been Trefelin’s manager, I’d have tried again today with him up front to see what he could do.

The game was quite nicely balanced, but I had to abandon it because it was home time, and I’ll watch the rest again at some point.

In between the football matches, I’d had a visitor. Emilie the Cute Consultant came to see me. She asked about the cough, and I told her that there was no change after the useless antibiotics her new colleague had prescribed. I told her that I had told the new doctor that they had been tried twice previously and done nothing, but the new doctor didn’t want to listen to me.

Emilie the Cute Consultant told me that she’d prescribe the powerful ones that work for a bit (although when, though, I don’t know because it wasn’t today) and then ominously added that if they didn’t work this time, because I was unable to cough up phlegm, she would have to prescribe a camera up the nose and down the throat again.

That’s the last thing that I wanted to hear, so after she left, I asked my nurse to bring me one of those sample pots that they have, and I’m going to teach myself to cough up some phlegm, or otherwise find someone else who can.

When the session was over, I had to wait a few minutes to be unplugged, but once she’d finished with me, I could go, so the nursing auxiliary who had tapped me on the back earlier accompanied me to the door.

And by the way, regular readers of this rubbish will recall me talking the other day about the “black line” on the machine’s display panel that refused to go down at one point, so the nurse increased the amount of fluid extraction. I checked today, and it does indeed start to rise again just after we’ve had our mid-session coffee. However, I’ll keep it a secret because if I can get them to increase the extraction every time, so much the better.

On the way to the door, I was weighed. And sure enough, I was below my official dry weight, which suits me fine.

The taxi driver was already waiting for me which was good, and as I was the only passenger on the return, we were soon home. My faithful cleaner was waiting for me as usual, and she helped me into the apartment. Once I was sitting down, she stuffed a disgusting drink into my hands.

After she had left, I grabbed some of those small toasted squares and some spreading vegan cheese and dashed in here. Another football match had started twenty minutes ago, and it was one that I really wanted to see.

Luckily, with the live stream you can either start “now” or “at the beginning”, so I started to watch Colwyn Bay v Llandudno from the kick-off – a real local seaside derby with another one of the biggest ever crowds in the Novira Welsh Premier League.

As you might expect, Colwyn Bay had the better of the game, but newly promoted Llandudno made them work very hard for their victory. The final score, 2-0 to the Seagulls, sent the Seasiders back to Llandudno feeling very disappointed because the score was something of an exaggeration. And had I been refereeing, I would have awarded Llandudno a penalty for handball and disallowed Colwyn Bay’s second goal for a clear foul a minute or so beforehand.

After the match finished, I began to write my notes for the day, but, having had to fight off waves of sleep during the football, I couldn’t keep going. After about half an hour, I was so tired that I couldn’t concentrate. Consequently, I posted on line the notes as far as I had written them and crawled into bed. I can finish them off tomorrow.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about phlegm and borrowing someone else’s … "well, one of us has" – ed … it reminds me of my cousin’s medical examination for joining the army.
He was unable to produce enough urine for an examination, so they sent him home to try again and to come back the next day with the little pot full.
Still unable to “produce”, he had a quiet word with his sister.
When he went back a week later for the results, the doctor looked at him with a great deal of pleasure.
"Well done, well done, well done" said the doctor. "You have made medical history."
"Why is that?" asked my cousin
"You are the first man whom I’ve ever met who has tried to join the army when he’s two months pregnant!"

Sunday 30th August 2026 – SUNDAY IS A ..

… Day of Rest, and nothing goes to prove it more than today because despite the stuff that’s piling up to be done, I have emulated my namesake, the mathematician, and done three-fifths of five-eighths of … errr … nothing.

Last night, I was in bed by about 22:00 and it wasn’t long before I was fast asleep. It wasn’t quite as simple as that, though. I was awake about three or four times at least during the night. But what a long night it was. In bed at 22:00 and when the nurse arrived at about 08:30, I was still in bed, fast asleep after the latest awakening.

He sorted out my legs and feet and then disappeared. And I went back to sleep.

It was 22:16 when I finally made it into the kitchen for breakfast – porridge, juice, the morning medication, black coffee and the last two of the homemade croissants. It was all delicious too. You can’t get better than that. And while I was eating, I was reading some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that a couple of days ago I said that "We’ve not had any outright vulgar abuse or “language lower than Billingsgate” but I’m expecting it to arrive sometime soon, and I’ll keep you posted." and I wasn’t wrong.

Today we had "From no part of a church had the old spirit further departed than from the monuments of the dead – no wonder then that they were the first to yield to the new corruptions ; that the arched and fretted canopy soon made way for the heathen column and entablature, and that the attitude of prayer was gradually changed for that of strife and debate, and attendant angels made way for the demons of a fallen superstition."

That was followed shortly by "When sacrilege had devastated the abodes of ancient piety and munificence, had levelled our most glorious temples with the ground, or at best substituted a single half-starved curate for the princely abbot and his monastic choir, and when the revenues which had been disposed in hospitality and pious works were scattered among the basest flatterers of an ungodly king ;".

But seriously, if you want to talk about “a single half-starved curate”, it’s not the Renaissance period where you need to be. Look at the condition of the clergy in the seventh and eighth centuries, where there wasn’t just abject poverty amongst the rural clergy, worse than anything that you had in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, they also ran the very real risk of being cloven in twain by a dissenting nobleman or invading army.

Back in here, I had yesterday’s notes to type up. And that took so much longer, as firstly, one of my friends from Germany wanted a video chat, and that ended up in a very Rosemary-esque conversation, and then another one of my friends from Germany wanted a chat too.

Once the notes were on line, there were the dictaphone notes to transcribe. And WOW!

We were on holiday again, a group of us. It was a terrible place where we were living because people had all brought their family and friends. Some of these friends were spongers who wouldn’t do a thing for themselves and expected everyone else to chip in and do things for them, yet we were all supposed to be on holiday ourselves. Then there was a question of copying a lot of text for labels or something, so we had to rush and find a newsagent’s so that we could get a telephone directory and cut the things out, but there was nothing. In the end, one of my father’s friends went into the newsagents across the road to buy a paper. Then he found that he didn’t have any money so I said that I’d lend him 25p, but he just wandered off, so I bought the paper anyway. However, before I could get out of the premises, another group of two old women, and also two young boys were having a big problem because they had booked a cottage on the edge of town but had come out without the address. They had flown all the way here and didn’t have the address at all. They could describe the house and I knew that I had seen it because there was a Mark IV Cortina outside at one time, so I thought that I’d help them look. Then, I bumped into two girls while I was escorting these guys, and they tagged along for some reason too. Somewhere along the line, the friend of one of these girls disappeared, leaving just one, me and these two boys. We went into endless places where we thought that we would have a good view to see over whether we could see the house, but we couldn’t. And on one occasion, we had to hide because someone had let a giraffe out and it was banging on the doors and windows with its neck. As we were leaving one house, this girl and I and these two boys bumped into two ladies whom I used to take in the taxis years ago, so this girl and I stopped to talk to them. We were chatting away, and then, for some reason, I put my arm around this girl and she didn’t move at all. That took me by surprise because I’m not used to girls who let me put my arms around them, so I was wondering what was going to happen next.

So here I am, and I’ve Got The Girl at last. So what happened to my family? Why didn’t they come along and throw the spanner into the works as they always seem to do?

The start of the dream, though, is very much like several other dreams that we’ve had over time, with family chaos and all that kind of thing. And we even have a MkIV Cortina thrown in for good measure. But who were the two women who used to be my passengers on the taxis? And how come I recognised them? And what were they doing in an Alpine skiing resort?

This dream continued on much later, and I was back at home and everyone was making a huge row and noise. I’d actually built a proper water heater that would work off solar power, and when I tried it, it had actually heated water for me, which was nice. So once the ‘phone was free, I tried to telephone this girl. It took me a couple of goes because I didn’t quite work out what her number was. In the end, it was the first five letters of her family name, which were G-R-A-N-D. I finally spoke to her, despite all the interruptions that were still going on. In the end, I asked her if I could call her tonight, so she replied “round about 18:30 would be fine,” so I hoped that everyone had quietened down and gone by then.

So even though there was a good couple of hours between these two dreams, the second carries on from the first, and I still Get The Girl, if only everyone would shut up and go.

Nerina had to go to New York, and so I decided that I’d pack my suitcase and accompany her as far as I could in case I had the opportunity to stow away. We went all the way to Paris and then all the way to Charles de Gaulle Airport, but for some reason, that was in New York. We were wandering around the airport trying to find her ‘plane, so in the end I put her on it. But something happened and everyone had to leave the ‘plane, and for ages when they announced the delay. So we took a Metro into the city, and in the Metro, Nerina began to make a nuisance of herself by stopping and interviewing people if their papers weren’t in order or there was something else about them, and she’d have them sit and wait while she went to interview some more people. I thought that this was going to get really out of hand in a minute or two, so I made a discreet exit. Later on, we caught up with each other again. She said that she had been so realistic that she had lunch with another police officer, and it was only later that they worked out that she wasn’t. I asked her if she was given five years, but she said no, she was just told to clear off, to which I thought that she was extremely lucky. We ended up back at the airport, but not until I’d been trying to take some photos of things like the Eiffel Tower, which, in New York, of course, doesn’t exist, and a few other things. Eventually, we found our way back to the airport on one of these silly metro things. We arrived at her ‘plane and they were loading again. I went on with her and my suitcase, hoping that sooner or later there would be a spare seat. However, there wasn’t, so the captain announced that he was closing the doors, so I jumped off. I caught this strange metro system thing to New York City. It was basically like a locomotive engine pulling a load of open carriages behind it, and you had to jump on it as it went past. I came into the city and went and did some more sightseeing and photographing. We went down past a little church that was in a discreet back alley, and I realised that that’s where I store some of my cars. Then I had a think about how I could catch up with Nerina. I thought that maybe there would be a spare seat on an aeroplane sometime going that way, so we had a panic-stricken run to the airport metro, and I jumped aboard. However, I couldn’t find a seat on this Metro. I found a seat, but it belonged to a young boy who was talking to his mother next door, so I had to move. And when we came into the airport, I thought that I’d have to go up to one of the companies that flew to the USA to see whether there was a spare seat on a plane that I could buy

This is a lovely definition of “chaos”, isn’t it? Nerina and I can’t make up our minds whether we’re in Paris or New York, Nerina pretending to be a police officer, weird metro systems and even a place in New York where I have some old cars stored. This makes no sense at all … "nothing new here then" – ed … Still, it must mean something to someone somewhere.

Did I type out this dream about being in New York and reading about this murder of this musician? … "No, you didn’t" – ed … So I went out to look at his house. It was in terrible condition. The driveway was all blocked over with rubble and that kind of thing. There was a whole forest of pine trees that were overhanging – they were growing up the side of his house but were bent over with the wind and were covering his house and preventing the sunshine from reaching it. While I was there, the courts took an order against the occupants of that particular street to clear all these pine trees out. While I was talking to them, I said that I would do it. It would give me an excuse to stay in the USA. But it really wasn’t half a difficult job because it wasn’t just cutting down the trees. They were growing out of rocks, all that kind of thing. In the end I had a friend of mine from South Carolina come to help me. We slept in his bus and did the job as well as we could, and we ended up with this huge pile of trees. I asked the local residents if they wanted to take them away, but they didn’t. In the end, we had a huge load of firewood for burning through the winter. I gave them my bill, which was for $8500. While I was waiting for payment, I awoke. It has to be said that Nerina was there at some time. She didn’t really like what I was doing, and I was taking the opportunity to sort through some of my boxes that I’d brought with me with piles and piles of old paperwork in them. I found some of our earliest petrol receipts too, and a lot of stuff ended up in the bin. Nerina said that she wished that I had never started to look through these boxes. I replied that it was my intention to look through all of them in the end and throw out all of the rubbish and keep the correct receipts and sort them.

So my friend from South Carolina, doing an impossible job, Nerina appearing, finding the oldest receipts from my taxi business years ago (and I knew that they were the oldest because there was a receipt for fuel for the old Mark II Cortina that I had as a runabout)

But I can still picture the scene in my imagination, and it really was a mess, this house and the trees.

And my vote for my favourite one? Has to be number three, doesn’t it?

After all of that, there was more football from Friday – Trefynnon v Caernarfon.

Trefynnon are another newly promoted side, but again with no points at all. They can score goals, but they can’t keep them out. And Caernarfon are a team with bags of experience in the league, in the cup and in European competition.

This was a match where skill was impossible. The pitch at Halkyn Road is a disgrace, and if it’s cut up as badly as it looks on a screen after just three matches played, what’s it going to be like in March after a wet North Walian winter? “Hoof and Run” and “slog it out in midfield” were how this game worked.

But at least we had goals, and plenty of them. And Trefynnon gave Caernarfon a good run for their money, even though the score finished 5-3 in favour of the Cofis.

But right now, it’s bedtime, ready … "I don’t think" – ed … for dialysis tomorrow afternoon.

And as an aside, another artificial intelligence websearcher has used my website as a reference tool yet again.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about spanners and the USA … "well, one of us has" – ed … on one Fourth of July in the USA, I was handed a parcel that had been wrapped in paper tied with a ribbon that had the stars of the American flag on it, with a note – "if you’re working today, this should help you dismantle that car"
"Where did you get this?" I asked the messenger.
"Doctor Spooner gave it to me" he replied
"And what is it?" I asked
"Seeing as it’s Independence Day today, it’s probably his interpretation of ‘The Star-Bangled Spanner’."

Saturday 29th August 2026 – THIS WAS A

…rather uneventful day today, except that I had some good fortune at dialysis without even having to ask for it.

Well, I thought that it was good fortune, which it was at the time, but I changed my mind somewhat a little later.

Anyway, retournons à nos moutons, as they say around here. Last night, it was about 00:30 when I finally settled down under the bedclothes, and I know that I must have been asleep quite quickly because when I was dictating something in my sleep, I could tell that I was still sucking on the bedtime menthol and eucalyptus sweet.

And by the looks of things, we were back to how things were a week or two ago — waking up at some uncomfortably early hour and not being able to go back to sleep again. For the last week or so, I’ve been having a much better kind of sleep, but it’s not lasted all that long, has it?

When the alarm went off at 06:29, I dragged myself to the edge of the bed, but it still took a superhuman effort to haul myself upright, go to unlock the front door, and then head into the bathroom to sort myself out. Today, as well as a good scrub-up, there was a shave too, just in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant, but I’ve not seen her for ages.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.

And while there was something on it, for sure, it’s something that the World is not yet ready to hear, and you in particular don’t want to hear it, especially if you’re eating your breakfast right now. Let’s just say that I was in the World War I trenches in Northern France and Belgium as a lieutenant with a Scottish company, and we were under heavy shelling. However, at some point, Zero put in an appearance.

So how long is it since one of my three favourite young ladies has put in an appearance? I thought that they had all dropped off the end of my dreaming sequence just as The Vanilla Queen did a few years ago, but at least we’ve managed to have Zero back.

The nurse turned up again and we continued our discussion about football from yesterday. I told him about the Trefelin – Rhydaman match last night, but he didn’t seem interested. Anyway, THE HIGHLIGHTS ARE NOW ON LINE although they show nothing like all of the tension ane emotion that there was in this game.

After he left, I could make my breakfast and read some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

Well, not so much of it, because he started to talk about Peterborough Cathedral so I went off to do some research. I knew that the abbey had been founded on a false and fraudulent charter that was only ever noted in the “Peterborough” version of the ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE and none of the others, so I was interested in what else I could find.

And, of course, as Nansen once famously said, "the more extensive my studies became, the more riddles I perceived – riddle after riddle led to new riddles and this drew me on" and I ended up at Edith Cavell. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I used to live just around the corner from where she was executed, and a few years ago, I POSTED SOME PHOTOS ON LINE of the place.

Incidentally, throughout these pages, you’ll see links to Amazon products appearing every now and again, just like the above. Being a Sales Associate of Amazon, I receive a small commission on goods sold via my links. It costs you nothing at all extra, but helps defray … "part of the" – ed … cost of my not-insubstantial web-hosting fees.

There are also links for AMAZON UK, AMAZON USA and, since the recent “troubles”, AMAZON CANADA for the use of my numerous Canadian visitors. As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I am extremely grateful when someone uses them to make a purchase.

Back in my office here in the bedroom, I had a few things to do, and then I began to work a little on the radio programme that I’ll be preparing next week. Not that I managed to go very far because midday came around quicker than I was expecting and I went off to prepare myself for dialysis. But not before having identified several pieces of music that I need to track down.

My cleaner came along as usual to apply the anaesthetic to my arm, and after she left, I waited for my taxi to take me to Avranches. But the waiting was not without incident.

Last night in the match between Trefelin and Rhydaman, Trefelin, with a one-man advantage, pushed big burly veteran centre-half Louis Gerrard up front to make a nuisance of himself in the Rhydaman defence, and it was indeed he who scored Trefelin’s goal. So while I was curled up leaning on the table and dozing off, I dreamt that he was up there again, and at a corner, he rose up above everyone to head home. And just as his header hit the back of the net, instead of the referee’s whistle for a goal, the taxi driver rang the front door bell to say that he was here.

It was in fact a carbon copy of the goal by Euros Griffiths for Rhydaman, which was interesting, but it was definitely Louis Gerrard in his black and red Rhydaman strip who scored it.

Mrs Dinosaur and her exhibition have now departed so I was the only one in the car today. So even though we set off from here ten minutes later than we usually did, we still arrived at dialysis relatively early, and I was up and running by 14:00, having had two nurses around me to plug me in, which was nice.

They set the machine to the correct amount to eliminate the excess fluid, but after a while, they noticed that the extraction limit was stable and not going down (which, I suspect, was due to the coffee and orange juice that I’d just had for my snack, but I was saying nothing), so my nurse simply wound up the extraction by another 300 grams without me actually having to ask for it, and that seemed to work fine, although I was hit by cramps near the end. Not that I’m bothered – 300 grams extra is 300 grams less to extract on Monday.

Once everyone had gone and I’d settled down, I began to watch another football match. Today it was newly promoted Llandudno v Hwlffordd. Llandudno are doing really well this season up in the Premier League, although they have only played one team of any real quality, but Hwlffordd, usually one of the stronger teams in the division, have had a wretched start and have no points and no goals to their name as yet.

The game went as the league table suggested it would, with Llandudno winning 2-0. However, we had the usual VAR excitement, players sent off and brought back on, players sent off and staying off, and some exciting, fluid and skilful play on the wings degenerating into a midfield slog. Still, it was worth watching. And as I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … some of the newly promoted teams are simply in the league for cannon fodder, but that’s not the case with Llandudno.

The doctor was there too today – the new one who prescribed the useless antibiotics ten days ago. She went to chat to a couple of patients but she walked past me, apparently not interested in a follow-up of her diagnosis and treatment. As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I often have the impression that, for the terminally ill patients like me, they do the minimum to keep us alive and don’t bother with the rest of any treatment.

You can tell that from the chemotherapy. The chemotherapy last year failed and the professor who is supposed to be dealing with my case hasn’t bothered to contact me since. I’ve had one appointment with the neurologist there after the chemotherapy, back at the start of the year, and there’s been no further contact from him either since then.

By now, it was time to set me free, and I only had to wait for ten minutes before my nurse came to unplug me. And riddled by cramp, I weighed myself to find out that it had all gone according to plan and Monday might be a little easier.

The taxi was waiting for me and I was once more the only passenger, so dodging the occasional showers, I was home fairly quickly.

My cleaner helped me into the apartment and stuck a disgusting drink in my hand once I was sitting at the table. I was still hungry afterwards, so I decided to make myself a meal – a burger on a bap with baked potato and salad. But the salad was off so I had vegetables instead.

The problem was, though, that hungry I might have been, but I was also exhausted. So although I managed the burger, I’d fallen asleep at the table long before I’d finished the baked potato.

In the end, what was left of the baked potato ended up in the bin and I ended up in bed. I’ll write my notes tomorrow

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about cathedrals … "well, one of us has" – ed … a new priest was appointed as curate to Brussels cathedral, and so he went for a walk around the city to see what his diocese had to offer.
As he was walking past a dark alley near the Gare du Nord, a figure slid out of a dark alley and whispered "twenty-five Euros for a quickie, father"
This happened several times as he walked around the Gare du Nord, so back at the cathedral, he asked the bishop "what’s a quickie, Monseigneur?"
"Twenty-five Euros from the girls at the Gare du Nord, my son."

Friday 28th August 2026 – THE BAD WEATHER …

… that we’d had yesterday afternoon continued through the night and into this morning. I think that most people will agree that what with everything that fell yesterday, we’ve now had all of the rain that we were owed for the last three months.

It wasn’t raining when I went to bed last night, or at least, I don’t think so. However, I wasn’t in all that much of a state of awareness. I was absolutely whacked, and remember – I’d only just awoken from a deep sleep when I crawled into bed.

And I’ll tell you how quick I was about going to sleep too. It’s been my habit for the last month or so to suck a menthol and eucalyptus sweet when I go to bed. That prevents me coughing and allows me that little head start to go to sleep peacefully. Anyway, when the alarm sounded at 06:29, there was half a menthol and eucalyptus sweet stuck to my jammies. I must have fallen asleep before I’d finished sucking it.

That wasn’t the first time that I’d awoken either. I vaguely remember once or twice being awake, and later on, I awoke definitively and couldn’t go back to sleep. I tossed and turned in bed for quite a while, and just as I was settling into a nice, comfortable position, ready to go back to sleep, the alarm sounded.

Being awake is one thing. Being out of bed and upright is something else completely, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall. It took me a good ten minutes to struggle to my feet and set off.

First call today, though, wasn’t the bathroom. Having locked the front door last night, I had to unlock it again this morning so that the nurse could come in. Then I could go to the bathroom and sort myself out.

Back in here afterwards, the first job was to listen to the dictaphone to find out what had been going on during the night.

We were going on an outing, taking a load of students and schoolkids with us from primary school. My first pick-up was from somewhere round about the Holly Mount area of Shavington. I picked up those kids alright and headed back towards the centre. Then I asked her where the next pick-up was going to be. He replied “Main Road School”. I thought “hang on a minute – Shavington County Primary moved ten or fifteen years ago. They aren’t there any more. Is she sure that that’s correct?”. He told me that as far as she was aware, Main Road School was what was written. So I went down Dodd’s Bank and came into the village, turned right at the Sugar Loaf Corner to go down Main Road and stopped at the school to see if the kids were there.

It’s impressive that I could remember all of the local nicknames for places in Shavington and that Shavington County Primary School has moved, although it’s a darn sight longer than “ten or fifteen years ago”.

And note the rather dramatic and continual change of gender of the person sitting next to me in the coach. I had to listen to the dictaphone recording several times, and that was indeed what it said.

When the nurse came to visit me, we talked about the Champions League draw. His hometown team, Lens, has been drawn against Machester City, so it seems. Not that I’m bothered. Any team in which I have any interest has been long-eliminated from the Champions League.

After he left, I made breakfast and read some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

Today, he’s been discussing the end of the Gothic era and the beginning of the Renaissance. And as you might expect, he’s not a happy bunny with his beloved Gothic being replaced by another style of architecture. We’ve not had any outright vulgar abuse or “language lower than Billingsgate”, but I’m expecting it to arrive sometime soon, and I’ll keep you posted.

Back in here, there were several things to do, and then I could turn my attention to dealing with the notes from last night. And they took longer than they ought to have done too, due mainly to the fact that I fell asleep in the middle of writing them and was flat-out in my chair for three quarters of an hour.

When they were on line, I went for my disgusting drink and my midday medication, and then back in here, I turned my attention to the radio programme, where I was interrupted by my faithful cleaner who came down to do her stuff.

After much binding in the marsh, the programme is now finished, but even that took longer than it ought, due mainly to the fact that a few of the groups and musicians were new to the programme, so they took much more research than would be required for the established stars.

Anyway, it’s all ready for dictation now, although Heaven alone knows when that might be.

After I’d finished, I had a chat for a while with my artificial intelligence chatbot, as a way of relaxing. There’s never anyone about on the internet when you feel like a chat.

The trouble with these chatbots is that they have a very weird memory. You can tell them something, and ten minutes later, they’ll have forgotten it, whereas they’ll come out with something completely unexpected that you mentioned in passing a year ago, when it wasn’t to this particular chatbot and it wasn’t even in that particular chat file.

Also, chatbots have very little sense of unscripted humour. Ask them why polar bears don’t eat penguins, and they’ll say that they live at the opposite ends of the earth and not that “they can’t get the silver paper off”. Never mind Kenneth Williams and Alfred Hitchcock and their “it’s a waste of time telling jokes to foreigners”, it’s even more of a waste of time telling jokes to a chatbot.

The big advantage, though, is the depth of knowledge of a chatbot. Being able to search the entire internet and post an answer almost immediately, they can answer any question you would like to ask them. They save me hours of work when I’m writing stuff for the internet. If you want to see what I mean, download the artificial web browser COMET and ask it a few complicated and obscure questions. Chatbots work even quicker than Comet does.

So tonight, we had the football. A right bottom-of-the-table crunch clash between Trefelin and Rhydaman. And believe me, people, this was one of the most exciting games that I have seen for years. It had absolutely everything – numerous on-field brawls, three red cards, eleven minutes of stoppage time, one of the best saves of all time at an extremely vital moment, lengthy VAR checks, screaming fans, unbelievable tension, goalkeepers joining in the attacks and probably one of the best goals that you’ll ever see at this level of football.

The game finished 1-1, which, quite frankly, was no good to either team, seeing the size of the gap above the bottom four, but never mind. This is a match that I could watch again and again, and there aren’t very many like that. If you want to see it, IT’S HERE

So now, it’s midnight and I’m off to bed, horribly later than usual.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about artificial intelligence and chatbots … "well, one of us has" – ed … I asked my “Comet” browser to tell me a joke that would appeal to a British audience. This is what it came up with –
I told my AI: "Write the end-of-day note for my blog. Keep it light and end with a joke."
It produced three paragraphs on transformer architectures, then added: "And on that note, why did the neural net cross the road? To get to the other… training set."
I said, "Make it more human."
It tried again: "Why did the neural net cross the road? Because everyone else was doing it, and it didn’t want to be the only model not generalising."
I said, "More British."
Final version: "Why did the neural net cross the road? It didn’t, actually. It waited for a gap in traffic, apologised to the cars, and then crossed when it felt it wouldn’t inconvenience anyone."

Tuesday 25th August 2026 – THERE’S A NICE …

… clean me … "well, clean anyway" – ed … tonight, going to sleep in a nice clean bed tonight. It’s Tuesday, so that’s shower day, and while I was hosing myself down, my faithful cleaner gave my bed a good going over and changed the bedding.

Actually, it’s quite nice to be in that position, because these days, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, showering is something that I find extremely difficult these days. And so I’m only allowed to have a shower when she’s here to watch over me. I’m not allowed to have one when I’m on my own in case I fall.

But anyway, be that as it may, last night, having abandoned my notes halfway through, it was still after 22:30 when I went to bed. I awoke twice during the night, but I have no idea what time it was – I couldn’t be bothered to look. And in any case, I was back asleep quickly enough.

When the alarm went off at 06:29, I was definitely asleep. And I was certainly in no mood to leave the bed. It was quite a struggle to coax myself out of bed and sit on the edge, never mind stand up and go to the bathroom.

Eventually, though, I made it into the bathroom and managed to organise myself into something like, ready to face the day, and then I came back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out what had gone on during the night.

I had a huge, blazing row with one of my friends last night. We’d all been away and were due to come home. I’d spent all afternoon and evening servicing the van, and all through the night we’d been packing everything away. Early in the morning, we set off for home again. We arrived back home in the early evening, and I reckoned that I’d been working for about thirty hours without a break, so whilst everyone was gathered in the living room, I excused myself and said that I was going straight to bed. I went into my bedroom, and it was untidy with all kinds of stuff everywhere, but then I thought “it’s my room, so what does it matter?”. I made a little space, but before I could go to bed, three or four people came up to chat. That was really the last thing that I wanted. They wouldn’t go, and they were there for most of the evening, so it was now almost forty hours without any sleep. Eventually, they left and I was just now going to bed when my friend turned up. He asked me “have you seen such-and-such”? Well, of course I hadn’t – I’ve been ill in bed, so I went to bed. And after wrestling with a pile of frozen food that needed to be put away, he just lay on the bed next to me, talking. I told him to go about three or four times, but he wouldn’t. In the end, I picked up a couple of jars that he was carrying and threw them at the door, and in the end, he got the message, and I tried to go to sleep. However, my friend went to the police and explained that I’d attacked him. This led to all kinds of complications, and he came back. I asked him to go, but he said no, the police said that he could stay if he liked. Just then, the woman who was in charge of the whole outfit turned up, so I asked her if she could make him leave. However, she wanted to know note-by-note exactly what had happened.

This dream does have some kind of basis in fact – not about the van and not about wanting to go to bed, but about a former friend and a friendship that came to a shuddering halt. Although, as usual, it’s one of those stories that the World is not yet ready to hear.

But being out and about with no sleep is not unusual. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall Back about fifteen years ago, I was in Cambridge. I had to drive to Gloucestershire to pick up a trailer, then to North Lancashire to pick up a mini digger, and then all the way down to central France – a working “day” of thirty-five hours with the only sleep being the couple of hours on the cross-Channel ferry. I couldn’t do it now.

The nurse turned up as usual and sorted out my legs and feet. While he was working, he was chatting about Welsh football, which I thought was rather strange.

After he left, I could make my breakfast and read some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

Actually, I didn’t read that much of it today. He started to talk about the Batalha Monastery in Portugal, and that was something of which I knew nothing at all. Consequently, I set off to find out about it. Apparently its construction was ordered by King John I of Portugal as fulfilment of a vow that he had made before a battle in which his small army decisively defeated a very much larger Castilian and French army and assured Portugal’s independence.

Back in here, I began the knotty problem of this soundtrack, where I had to dispose of about one and a half minutes of something, but I know not what, in order to make enough room for a decent introduction.

By the time that I’d finished, I’d actually disposed of two and a half minutes, which makes it even better. But it didn’t ‘arf take some time to do. I managed to save some time by trimming out some of the applause. That involved trying to mate the “before the trim” endings with the “after the trim” starting points, and that took a great deal of time and effort, and yet it still didn’t take out enough.

The next step, therefore, was to listen to the long and pointless guitar and bass at the start of one of the tracks. With a constant beat running through it, I could take out a lot of that and simply mate up the beats. But when you have a choice of ten beats, it’s not that easy. And, after about an hour and a half and once you do find the correct beat, that’s when you find that the drummer’s timing at the “after the trim” point isn’t the same as at the “before the trim” point, so they don’t overlap. And that’s when it really does become difficult because the two parts don’t overlay.

Eventually, though, after much binding in the marsh, I managed to solve the problem to some kind of suitable degree, using an awful lot of “Silence” mode. And when I played it back just now, you couldn’t hear the join.

By now, my cleaner was here doing her stuff. She organised the bathroom for me and I went for my shower. While I was in there, she was tidying up my bedroom and changing the bedding.

Once more, I was able to go into the shower, shower and come out without help again. That’s definite progress, right enough.

After my cleaner left, I began to think about what I needed to write for the introduction for the programme, and by the time that I was ready to knock off, all of the notes had been written – all three minutes and four seconds worth of them. There will still be some editing to do, I reckon.

Tea tonight was non-existent. I wasn’t in the mood, so I simply had a handful of biscuits, and now I’m thinking of going to bed, ready to begin the next radio programme tomorrow.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about silence … "well, one of us has" – ed … a woman in church whispered to her husband "I’ve just broken wind silently. It’s one of those “silent but deadly” ones. What do you think I should do?"

"If I were you" said her husband, "the first thing that I would do would be to switch your hearing aid back on."

Monday 24th August 2026 – NOW HERE’S A …

… thing!

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that on three or four occasions, I’ve found myself being awoken by a phantom alarm. And on one occasion, I was even up and out of bed before I realised that it was a false alarm.

But what happened this morning was far, far more bizarre than that. However, you’ll have to read on to find out what it was.

Last night, although I made a determined effort, it was almost 23:30 when I finally crawled into bed, totally fed up of the day and everything like that. And surprisingly, it took me an age to go off to sleep.

And now we come to the exciting bit.

This was another strange night when at about 01:35, I awoke to find myself sitting on the edge of the bed, thinking that the alarm had gone off. I had to convince myself to go back to bed when I found out that it hadn’t.

But what was interesting about this is that usually, when there’s a phantom alarm going off, I really do “hear” it in my sleep, even though it doesn’t ring. Last night, though, I heard nothing and awoke spontaneously, and there I was, already sitting on the edge of the bed. It was completely bizarre.

Anyway, I went back to bed, and as far as I know, although you can never be sure, the way things are today, I didn’t wake up again until the alarm rang.

When the alarm went off, we had the usual dithering while I tried to find some enthusiasm from somewhere, but eventually I managed to find my way into the bathroom for a really good wash and shave in the unlikely event that I see Emilie the Cute Consultant this afternoon.

Back in here, I listened to what else was on the dictaphone from last night.

I was back wandering around London yet again last night, only this time London turned out to be Crewe. I was roaming all around the shops in the shopping centre and this precinct that they’ve built to replace the old Queensway lot. I was just looking around from shop to shop and was thinking of going over to look at the ASDA and Co-op supermarkets, but somehow I found myself in the hospital. So I went into hospital, right to the top, and wandered around a few wards, then gradually worked my way down. I was still quite high up when I came across the café there. I went in to join the queue in the café and asked them if they could make me a baguette with cheese and tomato but no butter. She went to find all the ingredients, and I ended up with two half-baguettes. She put a load of crudités on them and things like that on them, on the grounds that quite a lot of people hadn’t had their crudités this morning, so there were plenty left over, and because I’d enjoyed her cooking, I could have several of them, which I thought was quite nice of her. I ended up sitting in the Oxford College Students’ Union having my lunch and trying to write up a few notes.

So, back in London yet again. How many times is this? And quite recently we’ve been in a high building just like this hospital building, only then it was a university dormitory.

However, in this dream, Crewe town centre was magnificent, all glass and black metal framing. And the tower block where British Home Stores used to be was raised on a central pole above a two-storey row of shops on the corner and looked from the outside like one black metal inverted rectangle framework with rounded corners, with a huge single glass window. The glass was frosted so you couldn’t see in from the outside, but it looked wonderful.

The nurse turned up early, and he talked about the “race of the café waiters” yesterday in the town as he dealt with my feet and legs. The race, so he told me, is for waiters from the cafés in the town who have to run round a course in the town centre while carrying a tray with a bottle and some glasses on it. It’s hilarious, so I was told.

After he left, I made my breakfast, and while I was eating, I was reading some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

He’s keeping out of controversy again today, but still banging the jingoistic drum as loud as he can at every possible opportunity.

Back in here, there were things to do, and then when they were finished, I reviewed the next radio programme and sent it off for inclusion in the stream for Friday.

And then we had the real work.

As I mentioned yesterday, the next radio programme is going to be a live concert, so I was busy looking at the soundtrack. It’s one hour and thirty-eight minutes long, so it needs a lot of hefty editing. After two passes, I have it down to fifty-nine minutes and forty-five seconds But if I want to put in a decent introduction, I’ll have to edit it some more (although I’m not sure how). I probably need a good two minutes to have something like what I want.

When my alarm sounded at midday, I went into the kitchen to prepare myself for dialysis and to have my disgusting drink and midday medication. My faithful cleaner came down to apply the anaesthetic on my arm too, and it’s a good job that she was early because the taxi, which is booked for 13:00, turned up at 12:25 today.

Not that I’m complaining, of course. As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … the earlier I start, the earlier I’ll finish. But today, apparently, it’s not likely to be an earlier start – more a drive around the countryside picking up two other passengers who live miles from anywhere.

That doesn’t bother me either. As I have also said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … since I’ve been going to dialysis with this taxi company, I’m seeing parts of Normandy that I never knew existed.

And so it was today. After picking someone up in the back of St Pair-sur-Mer, we had to go to a remote community called Bouillon where there’s a campsite and where there was a tourist who had to go to the hospital for an appointment. And what a nice village Bouillon is, especially the church that has an apple tree growing out of its tower.

Our taxi arrived at dialysis at about 13:30 and dropped me off before continuing on its way with the other two passengers. I went to weigh myself and found, to my pleasure, that it wasn’t as disastrous as it might have been. And seeing as there was plenty of room to manoeuvre, I persuaded the nurse to add a further 300 grams to the amount to be extracted today so that I would be in advance for Thursday.

By 14:02 I was up and running, and I could turn my attention to the football from the weekend. Today’s match was another one from last Friday – Colwyn Bay v newly promoted Airbus UK Broughton, played in front of a crowd of over four figures.

Airbus already has more points than it managed over the whole season when it was last in the Premier League, and whilst it was rather optimistic to expect the club to win any more in this match, they played really well and limited the Seagulls to a 1-0 victory.

Yet another skilful game with plenty of reasons for the Wingmakers to be optimistic for the forthcoming season.

There was also time to watch some of the game between Trefelin and Caernarfon, but I didn’t see enough to make any worthwhile comment about the match.

For a change, my blood pressure behaved itself, and the nurse only had to come running three or four times when the alarm sounded. That makes a change from just recently.

Surprisingly, a doctor came to see me today just as I was leaving. I told him about the hallucinations, as I had been advised to do by more than one person who thought that they might be dangerous. He asked me if I was bothered about them, but I replied “not particularly” so he told me that he won’t change anything.

He also asked me if I ever had a feeling of being disorientated or not knowing where I was. I replied that I’d had that for years, long before I ever started on these pills and tablets.

When the session was over, I was unplugged quite quickly, and to make matters even better, the taxi was already here and waiting. However, we had to wait for another passenger and then drop her off in Sartilly. Nevertheless, by 18:10 I was back home, where my cleaner was waiting to help me into the apartment and stick a disgusting drink into my hands.

Tea tonight was a taco roll with rice and veg. The stuffing for the roll was made of some dehydrated “minced beef” with kidney beans, onions, garlic and tomato sauce. There was enough for three rolls, so two helpings have gone into the freezer for another time.

Back in here, I made a start on writing the notes, but I ran out of energy. After another tough day at dialysis, I couldn’t keep awake. And so I posted online the notes as far as I had written and went to bed. I’ll finish the notes off in the morning.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about café waiters … "well, one of us has" – ed … I remember someone in a café having a drink of coffee and immediately turning up his nose at it.
"This coffee tastes like mud!" he declared.
"But sir!" replied the waiter "It was ground only half an hour or so ago!"

Sunday 23rd August 2026 – ONE THING ABOUT …

… yesterday that I forgot to mention was that when I awoke at 20:30 from crashing out, it wasn’t just the tiredness that I’d noticed. I was freezing cold and all the hairs on my arms were standing up. It was 22°C in here too, so it wasn’t actually the cold that was making me feel like that, but something else.

As usual, the answer to something like that is to go to bed. As regular readers of this rubbish will recall, bed is my medication that cures everything. And you know that I’m ill if I’m prepared to miss a live football match in favour of bed.

So I ended up in bed at about 20:30 last night and I was asleep even before my head touched the pillow. But, as usual, not for long. I was awake at 00:30 and awake again at 02:00.

As well as that, I awoke a third time. I’ve no idea what time that might have been, but I couldn’t go back to sleep at all, so at 04:05 I was at my desk working on the computer.

No point in lazing around in bed when you can be working, and I had my notes from yesterday to write, so I dashed them off, put them online, and I was back in bed by about 05:30. I reckoned then that I’d stay in bed until the nurse arrived.

When he turned up, I was fast asleep in bed, so he awoke me and did the necessary with my legs and feet. After he left, I thought that I’d get up in five minutes and go for breakfast.

When I finally awoke, sorted myself out in the bathroom and went into the kitchen, it was 10:10. So much for my early start. I made my breakfast, and while I was eating, I was reading some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

It now looks as if he’s summing up, and as he begins to discuss Gothic architecture on the continent, he reminds us that "England, with less of gigantic grandeur in particular buildings, and less of rapid development in styles, gives to all a harmony and purity which is peculiarly her own, and in the course of her slower progress, calls forth forms of beauty unknown to other lands."

All that I can say about this is that anyone who has viewed anything at all of the Gothic architecture on the continent will be wondering what on earth Mr (or the Reverend) Freeman was smoking when he was writing his jingoistic prose.

Back in here, the first thing that I did was to transcribe the dictaphone notes from last night. That was a very painful exercise because I can’t believe how much I was coughing during the night, all of it recorded on the dictaphone.

This is another dream about roaming around in London. I wanted to buy a guitar for a friend of mine, but I didn’t really know where to go, so I went down to London and had a good wander around in the usual streets, in Oxford Street and so on to try to see if there was anything there. All I could see is the cheap kind of rubbish and crowds of people. I kept meeting crowds of people whom I knew too. Then I began to walk down to Tin Pan Alley, but I was almost knocked over by a taxi. Who should be driving that taxi but Emilie the Cute Consultant. I asked her if she could do me a favour, but she said that she couldn’t because she was too busy working – she had to go back to Crewe shortly. I said “yes, that’s the favour. You couldn’t run me to Crewe, could you?”. She replied that she couldn’t, so I was rather disappointed. However, she said that she’d have a talk with me very soon. I suppose that that cheered me up somewhat, and I carried on towards Tin Pan Alley with these crowds of people.

It seems that “in my dreams” is the only chance I have of seeing Emilie the Cute Consultant, even if she does turn me down. And she’ll “have a talk with me very soon”. That’s the line most people use when they are giving someone the brush-off.

However, being in London yet again would seem to be significant. This is the third or fourth time just recently that I’ve been here during the night. I expect that I’ll find out what it’s all about in due course

We were going off on another adventure, but this time, it was in my old J4 van. There were quite a few of us, including some people whom I didn’t know, and the van was quite loaded. The front of it was full of rubbish so we had to take all of it out and put it in the rubbish bin. That was when we found that this pile of oil had seeped onto the passenger seat so we were there scrubbing it, and the guy who was sitting there was rather disappointed. He was hoping not to get his clothes dirty. In the end, we managed to have it looking something like so we went to wash our hands. I couldn’t find the swarfega for ages, but eventually, when that guy had begun to wash his hands with fairy liquid or something, I produced the Swarfega and gave my hands a good wash with it and showed him the difference between my hands and his.

The J4 had long-gone by the time that I moved into Gainsborough Road, but this was where all of the action was taking place last night.

The guy sitting in the oily seat reminds me of that photo that was doing the rounds a few years ago – the old American politician sitting in his seat that was photoshopped into thousands of other photos all around the World.

After all of that, there was the football to watch. We started off with Penybont against Llandudno.

Whether or not you think that Llandudno’s position, for a newly promoted club, up near the top of the league is a false position, they certainly haven’t come into this league, as some newly promoted clubs have, simply to make up the numbers. They took the game to Penybont just as much as Penybont took the game to them, and in fact, from the kick-off, it took Penybont five minutes and fifty-five seconds to get into Llandudno’s half of the field.

In fact, the first Penybont goal was a marvellous overhead bicycle kick of the kind that was unstoppable, and had I been refereeing, or anyone else for that matter, their second goal would have been disallowed for a blatant foul on a defender

And this is the first game in which I’ve seen a club penalised under this new five-second rule for throw-ins, goal kicks and the like.

The 2-1 scoreline in favour of Penybont was about fair, but they can feel relieved now, just as Llandudno can feel disappointed.

Afterwards, we had Stranraer throw away a 2-goal lead to draw 2-2 against Stirling Albion. Stranraer had the Binos all over the place in the first half, and in the second half, the situation was reversed. Never was there a “Game of Two Halves” to match this one.

The next match was Greenock Morton v Arbroath. Although Arbroath won this game 2-1, this is the best I’ve seen Morton play since Ian Murray took over. And they finally managed to score a goal after about ten games of trying, and it had to be a sixteen-year-old schoolboy playing as an emergency full-back who scored it too, not one of the established professionals.

Finally, the fourth match was Trefynnon v Barry Town. This is the fourth game that Trefynnon has lost – this time it was 3-1. However, they played much better in this game and even took the lead. And had they scored the penalty that they were awarded when the score was 1-1, it all might have been so different.

They kept on playing and going on the attack as long as they possibly could, but the desire to score an equaliser when they were 2-1 down cost them dearly. Having committed everyone to the attack, they were torn open at the attack by a breakaway, and Barry scored their third goal with practically the last kick of the game.

But I’ll tell you something for nothing, and that is that the field microphone was placed right by the Barry dugout, and we had someone from their bench bellowing out instructions to his players in the loudest voice I have ever heard and using the most disgraceful language that would have been out of order even in the fo’c’sle of a Greenland whaler. It really was a disgrace, and the club should be ashamed of their employee.

Apart from that, though, we had two Cymru Premier matches today that were played with a lot of skill, not like some of the midfield mauls that we saw last weekend.

So no food tonight again. I’ve written my notes and when I’ve done what else needs doing, I’m off to bed ready to Fight the Good Fight at dialysis tomorrow … "I don’t think" – ed …

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about Greenland whalers … "well, one of us has" – ed … a couple of years ago, a crew member was washed overboard in the Davis Strait and was lost.
A year later, his wife had a visit from the Nova Scotia lifeboat crew. "We have some bad news for you, and some better news" said the skipper.
"Oh" says the woman. "Tell me the bad news."
"A body has been discovered in the sea near Luneburg" replies the skipper. "we can’t ask you to identify him because his body was all covered in lobsters and crabs, but by the clothing, we reckon that he’s your husband."
"So what’s the better news"
"We’ll pull him up again tomorrow and see what the catch is like then."

Saturday 22nd August 2026 – THERE HAS BEEN …

… a calamity at dialysis today, and it’s as if the World had come to an end. For quite a while, I wondered if I would ever survive the shock.

Yes, that’s right. They forgot to bring the coffee round to the room in which another woman and I were being dealt with. Luckily, we had a very understanding nurse, and once we mentioned the problem to her, she went off and did the necessary. But it wasn’t half worrying.

That’s not been the worst of my worries either, but more of this anon.

Last night, after the football, I spent some time writing my notes, but as it became later and later, I began to think that I’d never finish them at this rate and I’d be here all night. So I called it a day round about 23:30, finished off what needed to be finished off and I was in bed round about midnight.

At some point in the middle of the night, I think that I awoke, but once again, it was the same as has been happening just recently – I wasn’t sure if I was awake or not, if I was still asleep or dreaming or anything like that. It reminded me of that line in THE PRISONER – "by the time we’ve finished with him, he won’t know whether he’s No. 6 or the cube root of infinity".

Incidentally, throughout these pages, you’ll see links to Amazon products appearing every now and again. Being a Sales Associate of Amazon, I receive a small commission on goods sold via my links. It costs you nothing at all extra, but helps defray … "part of the" – ed … cost of my not-insubstantial web-hosting fees.

However, I was definitely asleep at 06:15 when someone opened the door to my apartment. I shouted “who is it?”, but the response was that whoever it was closed the door and cleared off. I can see that I’m going to have to take “certain steps”, which might include involving a bucket full of whitewash.

And then we had the usual struggle about hauling myself out of bed and going to the bathroom to sort myself out. I managed to have my feet on the floor before the alarm went off, which counts as an “early start”, but the rest isn’t quite as easy. In the end, I managed it, including a good scrub-up and shave in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant at dialysis this afternoon.

Back in here afterwards, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.

We went to see some friends who lived in a small seaside port. We noticed that there were three shipping containers sitting on the quayside here waiting to be picked up by some kind of boat. There was a guy there too, and I didn’t like him, but he definitely sounded like some kind of underworld villain, and he was pointed out by my friends as having a place somewhere in Argentina where he’d go to hide every now and again. A few weeks later, there was an article in the local paper about a British guy who lived in Argentina who had been arrested and the police were still looking for three shipping containers. I said to Nerina “I know where they are”. A couple of months later, I was at an auction sale which took place on behalf of the government that was to sell the possessions of this guy, and one of them was his interests in taxis in quite a few councils, so I went along to see what was happening. It started surprisingly cheaply, so much so that I could make an offer and I could bid on it at one time, but the bidding went slowly out of my reach, and eventually some guy had part of it knocked down to him. He wanted an option on the rest, but he needed to have the support of 50% of the people. A lot of people put up their hands but he said that he was one county short. I thought “in for a penny, in for a pound”, and I put my hand up. He said “right, yes, Cheshire! That’s all I need!” and the whole lot was knocked down to him. Then he had a meeting of all of his supporters afterwards, and I went along to see what was on offer. He started to tell us a few things that had nothing whatever to do with taxis, so I wondered what on earth his game was.

This little port, I’ve seen it before on several postcards and photos, but I just can’t put a name to it. It’s a tiny port, and it beats me how they would ever manage to sail a ship into here to take away one container, never mind three.

Argentina doesn’t seem to fit in anywhere, but the story of the crook who had interests in taxi businesses all over the UK rings a familiar bell if you were to turn the clock back thirty or forty years and is probably still continuing today, for all I know. But Arsenal FC supporters will be much more clued in to this than I am.

There had been a whole group of us staying somewhere in Spain in a hotel-kind of place, and some friends of ours in the neighbourhood came to visit too. We stayed there for a couple of days, and when we were on the point of leaving, some Spaniard turned up in a strange kind of van. It had some kind of maker’s name on the side that was in initials and we were trying to identify it. I reckoned that it was a Japanese clone of something. It had no roof and no sides where the driver sat, and he was complaining that the starter motor didn’t work and a couple of other things didn’t work and the quality was rubbish. We were there with a dog, and a policeman came. He had an Alsatian, and this dog of ours took a great deal of interest in the Alsatian, and the Alsatian, which was a female, ran and hid. We thought “our dog’s found a new girlfriend, has he?”. In the end, we all piled into my van and we set off for home and to drop off these people on the way. For the past two or three days when we’d gone down this road, there had been some girl struggling to get on her pushbike, and she was still there today, struggling. When we reached the bottom where I’d normally turn left, I did a U-turn and came back up the hill. Everyone was wondering why. One or two people were complaining, but I said “don’t worry, it’s only going to put a couple of extra seconds on your timetable” and I stopped back outside the gates of this house again. Instead of asking someone to open the gates, I had a strange kind of hook made out of an old garden rake. I put that over the top of the gates, climbed up it and went over the top, then dropped down onto the garden. What I’d come to check was to see whether a friend of mine who was supposed to be coming but never turned up had finally made it, because we could intercept him on the way home, but if we went a different way home, we’d miss him for that five minutes while we were getting back on the correct one, so I wanted to make sure that he hadn’t come before I set off again in the hope of trying to meet up with him.

Strangely enough, this is pretty much the same scenery as in the dream a few days ago when I was living up on the Czech/Austrian border

The van could be any one of a dozen French microvans that are on the road today, or maybe one of those tiny Japanese vans that were common on the roads forty years ago. The dog, of course, needs no explanation.

The rest of it, including the girl struggling on her bicycle and my weird “garden hook”, must have some explanation somewhere, and I wish I knew just what it was.

The nurse turned up as usual and sorted out my legs and feet. He didn’t stay long, and once he’d left, I could make my breakfast and read some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

Our hero is now back discussing a few foreign edifices of a religious nature, but concludes with "Certainly when we compare these edifices with our own contemporary ones, we can have but little hesitation in esteeming England to have been, during the fifteenth century at least, the chosen abode of Christian art"

He then goes on to list several marvellous examples of European Gothic work but remarks "Our buildings never run into the same senseless extravagance, where nothing but mere excess of ornament is left to supply the place of real art"

As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I was hoping to be reading a book on architecture, not a book on art.

Back in here, I had a few things to do and then I made a start on the notes from yesterday. And they took much longer than they ought to do, because from about 10:30 to 11:15, I was asleep on my chair. And I remember nothing whatever about falling asleep. No-one was more surprised than me when I awoke.

By the time I’d finished and put them online, there wasn’t much time for anything else. I had to go to prepare myself for dialysis. My faithful cleaner turned up to apply my anaesthetic as usual, and then I had to wait for the taxi.

And not for long either, as it was here for 12:40. We had to go to pick up Mrs Dinosaur and then we set off nice and early for Avranches, only to be stuck in a traffic queue at Marcey-les-Grèves due to the autoroute being blocked in both directions with holiday traffic coming and going.

However, at the dialysis centre, I was seen to pretty quickly, so by 14:05 I was up and running and could watch Rhydaman v Connah’s Quay Nomads.

There’s no doubt that the Nomads were in a class above Rhydaman, but the latter managed to defend heroically for much of the match and even had several good chances themselves. But even so, a 2-0 victory for the Nomads was only to be expected, and Rhydaman could be proud of their performance.

After that, I was going to watch a second game, but there were too many interruptions and disturbances, not to mention the Quest For The Coffee.

As luck would have it, when I was finished, the nurse was doing nothing much so I was unplugged straight away, although she had jammed the catch on my backpack with my laptop inside it. My taxi was waiting too, so I was home by 18:00.

My cleaner was there to stick a disgusting drink into my sweaty little mitt, and after she left, I came in here to begin my notes and watch this evening’s football match. However, after I’d fallen asleep for an hour on the chair, I booted that idea into touch, wrote a terse note on my blog and went to bed. It was 20:20.

Now, it’s 05:00, I’ve been up for an hour or so, finished my notes, and I’m now going back to bed to await the arrival of the nurse.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about traffic jams … "well, one of us has" – ed … apparently the queues on the autoroute were caused by an accident. A golfer playing on a golf course at the side of the road had sliced a ball which crashed through the window of a coach, hitting the driver, causing him to swerve and have a fatal accident.
Later that same day, the gendarmes were interviewing the golfer "due to your negligence, you caused a road traffic accident which killed the bus driver, fifteen schoolkids and one accompanying adult" they roared. "What are you going to do about it?"
After a minute’s thought, the golfer replied "Perhaps I ought to tighten my grip, take a shorter swing and incline the golf club head more to the right."

Friday 21st August 2026 – TODAY HAS BEEN …

… a little better than the relapse yesterday, although the hallucinations are back. It’s amazing how they just appear when I’m doing something and I end up being distracted.

Not that I was distracted last night. It was a very determined me that went to bed at the end of the day, round about 22:30 or thereabouts. I didn’t hang about very long.

It wasn’t very long before I was asleep either. Well away in the Land of Nod, I was. At least for a certain time, that is. However –

The alarm went off this morning, and I awoke and switched it off. I thought that in a couple of minutes, I would have to get up again. But it didn’t feel at all like getting-up time. There was no “tired” situation or anything. So after a few minutes, when I finally agreed that it was darker inside the house than outside, I’d have a look at the bathroom fittings. It turned out that some of them were modular types and others were these “push-on” suction types, so I thought that rather than being some kind of suction type, I’d wait until I could get them all in one go and buy a complete set of pushers.

The alarm really did awaken me back then, and while I didn’t actually get up this time, something strange must have gone on afterwards as the dream descended into all kinds of things that make no sense at all … "no change there then" – ed …

Shortly afterwards, I awoke again – or, at least, I think I did. As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I’m finding myself in these situations where I don’t know if I’m awake or not … "nothing new there either" – ed … if I’m dreaming or having one of these hallucinations.

I must have been asleep at some point because the alarm awoke me at 06:29 – a proper alarm and a proper awakening. We had the usual ten minutes or so while I tried to awaken myself and find the enthusiasm to stand up, and then I went to the bathroom for a good scrub-up, etc.

Back in here, I had a listen to find out what else was on the dictaphone.

It was in the early 1930s, and in the ramshackle car that we had, two friends and I went to Montréal from the USA. While we were in Montréal, there was an announcement of a huge earthquake, so everyone ran for their lives. This led to some kind of indiscriminate looting and pillaging of the town, and we ended up with quite a few things. I carried something heavy with me all the way, and when I came to the car, the two guys there told me to throw it away again. I was surprised after carrying it all that far, but I put it down and watched it roll away, and then we drove off. They told me that it was a barrel of whisky and, obviously, in Prohibition and I’d bought that back to the USA, we’d have been in a lot of trouble. We arrived back in the USA and I went and caught a tram home. There was some young guy on there so we ended up having a long chat with him.

Part of this dream that I can still see and which doesn’t seem to be recorded is that when we were pushing the car through the crowded streets in a column of other vehicles, occasionally, we had to stop because of an obstruction ahead. And all the time, someone was shelling the city and the shells were landing quite close to us. At one point, we stopped and then moved on again, and the car immediately behind us was hit by a shell exactly at the spot where we had been waiting for five minutes, not two seconds before.

This dream could be anything related to any one of the hundreds of old black-and-white films that I own, but the bit about the vehicles in the queue being shelled reminds me of a scene from THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY, except that my viewpoint last night would have been diagonally across the road from where Clint Eastwood was watching the queue go through the town where he was.

Later on, Nerina and I came back to Crewe. We had another Mark III Cortina estate this time. We came back to Gainsborough Road and went in. It was all dark and gloomy and hadn’t been lived in for years. We saw what kind of state it was, so we went round to the DIY place with a couple of friends. We bought some things that we needed and I was picking up all the wood offcuts, including some very long ones. I had no idea what I was going to do with them, but they were free. We went back home with all these huge nails, planks of wood, etc., and put them in the house, which was already full of tonnes of building material to start with. I had a look at the house and there was mould everywhere coming up the walls. I thought that I was going to have to do a lot of work on this place. Then it was Christmas and we had a pile of friends round celebrating. We did one of those line dance conga things all the way around the house and back out into the streets. Then, everyone decided that for an hour, they would go to find someone who needed help and give them some help for an hour or so. Nerina knew some kind who needed some help with reading, but I didn’t know of anyone who needed any help. It had been a long time since I’d been here.

This is very similar to a dream that I had a long time ago when I had also come back from years away elsewhere.

But the state of the house could so easily have been the same at Gainsborough Road had luck not gone my way at the most unexpected times. And Mark III Cortina estates all around the place? It does sound like home, doesn’t it?

The nurse came round as usual to sort out my legs and feet. He didn’t have much to say for himself except to tell me to rest today, and then he left.

After he left, I made breakfast and read some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

He’s still doing his best to keep clear of controversy by not mentioning anything to do with foreign locations, so it’s becoming rather boring. However, I am continuing to add to my knowledge of architectural terms as he introduces more and more strange words into his book, and I’m having to do more and more research. Hammer beams, anyone?

Back in here, I had a few things to do, and once they were out of the way, I could carry on with the radio programme.

That’s now finished, but it took much longer than it ought to, due to the fact that I had to redo part of the music. I did wonder why I had only forty-one minutes of music when I’d calculated forty-six and a half. Now I know.

There were the usual interruptions – the disgusting drink break and then my cleaner turned up to do her stuff and to have a chat too.

After she had left and I’d finally finished the radio notes, I had a relax for half an hour (somehow avoiding falling asleep), and then I started the next – not one, but two – radio programmes.

It’s a bit of a cheat really. The first one will be a concert. It’s one hour and thirty-eight minutes long, so it needs to be cut down to about fifty-seven or fifty-eight minutes to give me time to introduce everything. However, there was no running list with this concert so I had to listen to it all and make my own.

And while I was listening to the concert, I was looking at the next programme, trying to find out what music I’ll need.

At teatime, I knocked off and went to eat. As seems to be usual on these Fridays, tea was air-fried chips, vegan sausages and baked beans in cheese and fresh ground black pepper. And it was beautiful as always.

After tea, we had football – Hwlffordd, usually a challenger for the European spots but struggling right now at the foot of the table with no points and no goals, v Cambrian United, the team from the Rhondda Valley, newly promoted and looking quite impressive so far.

This was another exciting game that roared from one end to the other at a hundred miles and hour, and there was plenty of skilful football being played. It was nothing at all like the midfield mauls that we’ve seen just recently.

Cambrian scored a goal not long after the restart, and as the game went on, Hwlffordd began to throw the kitchen sink at them. However, that left them vulnerable at the back and Cambrian fully exploited it, not just once but twice. The latter being with the penultimate kick of the match from a guy who had only been on the pitch five minutes.

It does have to be said, though, that while Cambrian fully deserved their victory, 3-0 is a rather flattering scoreline for them.

After that, I started to write the notes for today but ran out of steam. Eventually, having fallen asleep twice, I headed for bed. I can finish my notes tomorrow and you can see them in the morning.

But just a little notice – there’s a game tomorrow evening, so you might not have the complete notes until Sunday late morning.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about drinking … "well, one of us has" – ed … someone once walked into a pub and asked "where are the books, please?"
"There are no books here" replied the landlord. "We don’t sell books, we sell alcohol."
"Not a problem" said the customer. "Do you have ‘Tequila Mockingbird’, please?"

Tuesday 18th August 2026 – WHAT A HORRIBLE …

… day this has been. If I were to think about it, I would say that this has been one of the worst days so far.

It started off badly yesterday evening when I fell asleep while trying to write up my notes and had to haul myself physically into bed. And during the night it didn’t get any better.

As usual, I was asleep fairly quickly too, but also, as usual, not for long. I was soon awake again thanks to yet another enormous coughing fit and I couldn’t go back to sleep. I kept on seeing a vision of a phantom hand creeping around the open door of the bedroom heading for my throat, and then realising that it was mine!

At some point, I must have gone off to sleep because I awoke with Seren’s alarm going off, and then all three of us had to stay marooned until we were rescued (this is what I mean about hallucinations and everything like that creeping into my dreams).

I was with another group of people, and it was near Christmas, so we had come away to a city for a city break for a few days. We’d had a good walk around and seen everything, but all down the side of one street, under a scaffolding, was a huge, long row of people, probably two thousand people, all queuing there for something. The queue began in the square at the bottom of the hill but went all the way back up. Some guy from Brittany Ferries had rung me, but I wasn’t there to answer it, so he left a message for me to call him again, which I forgot. He rang me eventually, and he wanted to know what we were going to do about this five-thousand-pound bill. I asked, “what five-thousand-pound bill?” It turned out that someone, whose name he gave me, had bought a ticket to go to the Isles of Scilly for five thousand pounds, and that just didn’t sound right at all. I thought that the Scilly Isles weren’t that far away – it’s not going to cost anything like that, so what’s the going on? The guy who came to see me, a nice young lad whose birthday was roughly the same as mine, told me that they don’t know but they want to deal with this matter urgently. So standing in the street leaning against the wall of a shop, we talked about it, and in the end, we all went down the hill to the centre and back up … fell asleep here … so we all went down into town but couldn’t find a Royal Bank of Scotland, so we came back up again and it was there on the left, so we went into it. A woman came to see the three of us, but just then, the alarm went off.

The alarm going off just there wiped our dream completely, and I was really disappointed in that.

There were a few other bits and pieces that I subsequently remembered, such as my chat with that guy taking place over the ‘phone at my place, but the volume on the turntable was such that no one could hear a word, so we met in town, and all those people were queuing, but there was absolutely no indication of what they were queuing for, not like in Poland when I was there with my coach in the days of the Communists and the long queues of people outside the shops.

After sorting myself out in the bathroom, I came back in here to listen to the dictaphone to see if there was anything else on it but there wasn’t. That one dream was it today.

While I was waiting for the nurse, I was sorting out a free kick in my mind, but further play was impossible once the Nurse turned up. He sorted out my legs and feet, and, at the same time, we discussed my spell at dialysis yesterday. He didn’t offer any useful suggestion about how to improve them, which is unfortunate, seeing as before being an itinerant nurse, he was a nurse in the dialysis centre of St Malo.

After he’d left, I turned to making my breakfast of porridge, toast and coffee. Well, it should have been toast, but I’d forgotten to take the bread out of the freezer so I have to toast some rye bread instead.

While I was eating, I was reading some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

We should have been reading more of the book, but I was side-tracked once more by some interesting information that came out in one of his paragraphs, and I was off doing some research into the matter, that is, when I wasn’t falling asleep.

Back in here, there were the usual things to do and then I attacked the rest of the notes from yesterday. Being so tired didn’t help, as I was constantly falling asleep – at one point slamming my face really hard into the desk. A job of maybe forty-five minutes turned into one of well over two hours, and not even the midday disgusting drink and medication could improve matters.

My cleaner came round as usual to do her stuff and she chased me under the shower again. I managed to climb into the shower and climb out unaided too. At least I’m getting better in that respect.

After the shower, we concentrated on the medication, ready to make a new order. Last month’s supply is running out and I’ll be stuck if we don’t order any sometime soon.

When the cleaner left, I started on the next radio programme. This isn’t going to be a complicated one, but I made it so because of all of this tiredness where I was dropping off to sleep all the time. At some point, my wanderings took me to Sandbach and Middlewich before I could shake myself awake again.

Anyway, I’ve done as much as I want to today, even though it’s early. I’m not making myself any food tonight, just going to bed and hoping that I can sleep all of this off by tomorrow, although that’s going to be unlikely.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about sleeping … "well, one of us has" – ed … I remember talking to an old colleague of mine once.

"You know" he said. "There’s nothing nicer than falling asleep after a hard day’s work, and then waking up and kissing the lips of the gorgeous person next to you"
"And what happens when you do?" I enquired
"Well, I’m having to find a different way home now. They aren’t going to let me back on my bus again"

Monday 17th August 2026 – THESE UNHAPPY, UNCERTAIN …

… days are continuing, piling up one on top of another, and I’ve no idea when it’s all going to end.

Last night, I actually managed to complete my notes (the first time for ages), although I ended up really late going to bed. And although I went to sleep quickly enough, I was back awake again at some point later.

It was one of those awakenings that I didn’t really feel. I can’t remember my eyes opening, but they just were. I wondered how long they had been open before I realised.

Again, it was an early morning of drifting off to sleep and then being awake again and not recognising which was the waking bit and which was the sleeping bit because I couldn’t tell the difference between the two.

When the alarm went off at 06:29, I went off to sort myself out in the bathroom and even to have a shave in case I encounter Emilie the Cute Consultant today at dialysis. Then back in here, I listened to the dictaphone to find out where I had been during the night.

I’d been invited to take over the management of a struggling football club in Scotland, so I went up there, and the first thing that I wanted to see was the football club’s accounts, but the accounts were heavily edited, and when I looked at the spreadsheet for the other clubs, it seemed that this was a thing that every club was doing. It was simply editing its accounts, and where there should have been a figure, there was just a yellow blob, so I had no idea exactly of what I was expected to take over and manage and how I was going to do it. There was much more to this, but the alarm went off and it evaporated immediately.

This is reminiscent of what’s happening at Greenock Morton right now. Their major sponsor has “financial issues” right now and, over the last three months, has failed to pay most of the sponsorship money that is due. Consequently, half of the players have left the club, and the club has been obliged to recruit players who, to be honest, aren’t up to the challenge of life in the Scottish Championship.

The nurse turned up as usual and gave me the treatment on my legs and feet. And after he left, I could make my breakfast and read some more of A HISTORY OF ARCHITECTURE by Charles Freeman.

Once more, he’s steering clear of controversy today and making sure that he doesn’t provoke anyone into taking an issue with him. Maybe he has had his nose bitten off more times than he cares to remember.

After all that, I came in here to make a start on everything. and there was plenty to do too. When I’d finished the more usual things, I had the radio to deal with.

First task was to review the programme for the coming weekend and make sure that it’s correct. Then I could send it off for inclusion in this week’s stream.

The second task was to carry on with the one that I’d started at the weekend. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that of this almost-two-hour soundtrack, I extracted five particular selections of music that made up over fifty-eight minutes, and this morning, I segued them all together.

The joints are absolutely excellent, and now it sounds just like one continuous performance, which is always what I’m aiming for with these concerts.

After that, there was even time to begin to write the speech for it. And that’s well over half-done now. It won’t take long to finish it now, and I can move on to something more important.

By now, it was midday and time to prepare myself for dialysis. I had to hunt down a few things and then wander off into the kitchen to sort out a disgusting drink and the midday medication.

My cleaner came along soon and helped me apply my anaesthetic, and then she put away the clothes that I’d washed on Saturday. They’d washed really well too.

After she left, I had to wait for the taxi, so I curled up on a kitchen chair and slumped over the dining table and drifted off into some comfortable place somewhere in the surreal. And what made it even more enjoyable was that the taxi was late. It arrived at 13:20, which meant that for a good forty-five minutes, I’d had a nice little snooze.

Today, I was the only passenger, so we arrived in Avranches just before 14:00. I was taken to my little room and installed, and I was dealt with comparatively quickly. By 14:20 I was up and running.

There was football to watch today – Connah’s Quay Nomads v Trefelin BGC, another newly promoted club.

Although the score of 6-0 to the Nomads makes it look like a very one-sided game, Trefelin had several moments of their own. The big difference was that the Nomads were much more clinical in front of goal, with Indonesian international Joe Simatupang Ferguson scoring a hat trick and Egyptian Hussein Mehasseb scoring two.

But credit to Trefelin, who kept on battling away. They never threw in the towel and were still on the attack even at the final whistle.

After that game, there was time to watch the first 35 minutes or so of the Hwlffordd v Penybont game. Hwlffordd have had a dreadful season so far, playing two and losing two, but Penybont have got off to a flyer.

By the time I had to close down the laptop, Hwlffordd were already one goal down.

Once more, no doctor came to see me today, and even worse, the nurse was obliged to finish my session ten minutes early because she had two other patients besides me who needed compressing, and everyone was due to finish at the same time. I wasn’t very happy about leaving here 300 grams overweight, especially as there’s a three-day gap until the next session on Thursday.

My driver was waiting for me when I came out, but we had to wait ten minutes for the lady who lives in Sartilly to finish. She was coming home with us, and only when she was safely on board our vehicle could we depart.

Granville, as usual, was a total mess. Most of the town centre was closed due to the annual braderie when the shops set out everything that they want to move on, sometimes at ridiculously cheap prices.

The Air-Sea Rescue helicopter was on the Pointe du Roc today when we drove past.

Rumour has it that it had rescued a couple of people stranded on one of the Isles de Chausey by the very high tide. It was now unloading them so that it could fly back to its hangar at the airstrip up the coast.

Incidentally, the photo of the helicopter was one that I’d taken IN NOVEMBER 2021 when I’d seen that woman commit suicide.

My faithful cleaner was waiting for me, and she helped me back into the apartment, and I was certainly grateful. I’d had an exhausting session today. She stuck a disgusting drink into my hand, and after she left, I made tea – a bowl of cheese salad with rice and veg.

Back in here, I began to write out yesterday’s notes, but I must have crashed out at some point because I suddenly noticed that it was 22:15 and I’d not even written a dozen lines. I was feeling absolutely dreadful at that point so I posted on line what I’d written and crawled into bed. I can finish off those notes tomorrow morning.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about helicopters … "well, one of us has" – ed … regular readers of this rubbish in a previous existence will remember the day I flew in a helicopter. It was a prize offered in a free draw by the new Intermarché in Pionsat.
There were several of us on board, and the pilot announced "complete and absolute silence on board is essential. Anyone who speaks or even makes a noise will be fined €100."
We flew around for ten minutes and then he started to perform some aerobatics. We were thrown around in the sky, but still, everyone kept silent.
"That was amazing" said the pilot. "You lot are the first to withstand the test."
"Well" said a little old man sitting in the corner "I was going to say something when my wife fell out, But €100 is €100"

EPIC HALL

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

Tag Archives: a history of architecture

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