… 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.
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.
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!"
