Tag Archives: antonine wall

Saturday 4th April 2026 – I HAD NOTHING ON …

… the dictaphone again from last night. That tells you just how deep my sleep must have been.

And I needed it too. I’d been exhausted all day and as the evening went on, it went from bad to worse. With no tea again, apart from a slice of my delicious chocolate cake with home-made ice cream, I’d finished everything by 21:30 and by 21:45 I was tucked up in bed with my head buried under the quilt, and I went straight to sleep.

However, regular readers of this rubbish will recall what happens every time I have an early night. And round about 01:20 too. But this time it was for reasons that any person of my age will understand, and I was obliged to leave the bed.

Once I climbed back in, I was asleep almost straight away and that’s how I remained until the alarm went off at 06:29. And surprisingly, I was in exactly the same position in the bed as I had been when I went to sleep. I can’t have moved a single muscle during all that time.

It took an age for me to summon up the courage and energy to leave the bed, and what with a clothes-washing session too, I was hours late going into the kitchen for my hot drink and medication.

There was also a task that I had to carry out while I was in the kitchen. As I said yesterday, Isabelle the Nurse and I had had a discussion about hot cross buns, and she had asked me if I had a recipe. And so, taking the book in which I write down all of my recipes, I wrote out the recipe for her, ready for when she arrives.

Back in here, with no dictaphone notes to transcribe, I had a few other things to do. And while I was doing them, I discovered that the attendance at the game between Colwyn Bay and Caernarfon attracted a crowd of 2357. That was higher than the average gate of Accrington Stanley in League Two and higher than eight games in League Two in March.

Isabelle the Nurse turned up as usual and was grateful for the recipe. We had the usual chat about nothing at all, and after she left, I could make breakfast and read some more of THE ROMAN FORT AT BALMUILDY on the Antonine Wall, written by Stewart Napier Miller.

In fact, read all of it because it’s now finished. And my assumption about the attacks by the natives on the fort are confirmed by his assumptions. He can, in fact, name two periods when the destruction was likely. The first being an invasion from the north that occurred, according to some contemporary writers, in 155 AD and another one being an attack some time later that prompted the evacuation of the Antonine Wall and the retreat to that of Hadrian.

So tomorrow, I’ll be starting a new book, if I wake up, which at this moment appears to be extremely unlikely.

As for my breakfast, my hot cross buns were excellent again, even if they are somewhat over-baked. In future, I’ll cook them at 180°C, regardless of what the recipe says.

Back in here, I had a few things to do, such as to watch the highlights of last night’s matches in the JD Cymru League, and then I attacked the next lot of notes for a future radio programme. And now, the two halves of the programme are complete, the joining track has been chosen and the notes written, ready for the next dictating session, whenever that might be.

And it might have been finished a long time beforehand, had I not fallen asleep for well over an hour round about midday.

After all of that I went into the bathroom and went one better than Dave Crosby, probably because I had the ‘flu for Christmas, and right now, I’m definitely not feeling up to par.

Later on, I went into the kitchen to make some more ice cream.

This time, it’s based on some chocolate milk with coconut cream, and by the time that it’s finished, it will have a stream of mint syrup running through it.

And I remembered my mistake about the cornflour when I made my first batch. This time, I heated half of the milk and added the cornflour into it to thicken it. When it cooled, nice and thick, I added it into the rest of the milk, and it seemed (to date) to have worked.

There was plenty of time left after that, and regular readers of this rubbish will recall a project that I mentioned on thirteenth of March or thereabouts, so I concentrated for a few hours on continuing that. It’s not going to be finished for ages, if at all because it’s an enormous piece of work, and it will take me forever, bearing the time that I have available.

Mind you, this is another one of those things where I could have done much more had I not fallen asleep at one point. In fact, I’ve been fighting off wave after wave of sleep all day, quite unsuccessfully at times. You wouldn’t think that I had had such a good sleep last night.

While I was having a little doze during the late afternoon, there had been a snowplough with a blade and rotating brush at the front and a salt spreader at the back, working the Trans-Labrador Highway. It came to a fast-food or coffee place and actually drove inside to clean up the inside of the building, especially the area in front of and behind the counter.

Part of the things that I have been doing today did include a discussion about the Trans-Labrador Highway and MY FIRST TRIP AROUND THERE IN 2010. And there was a discussion about snowploughs, although not cleaning out a Tim Horton’s or one of those places that was found by a High Court judge to be "guilty of exploitative marketing to children, some animal cruelty, anti-union practices, low pay, and misleading health claims.".

Anyway, that’s enough of that. These waves of fatigue have been doing me in all day and it’s surprising that I’ve accomplished as much as I have done. And so, I’m going to go to bed.

Once more, I’ve had no tea except for a lump of cake with some home-made ice cream. I’m more interested in sleep and trying to keep my weight down for dialysis rather than eating right now, although I won’t say “no” to my cake.

And in any case, with a lie-in tomorrow … "he hopes" – ed … tonight is a good night for an early night, so I shan’t hang about. I’ll go back into the kitchen and give the new ice cream a good forking, and that will be that.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about my home-made ice cream … "well, one of us has" – ed … one of my friends asked me "where did you actually learn to make ice cream?"
"Simple" I replied. "When I was small, I used to go to Sundae School. "

0

Thursday 2nd April 2026 – YET ANOTHER HORRIBLE …

… day today, and I’m totally fed up with these.

The only highlight, I suppose, was the memory of that really nice butternut squash soup and fresh bread that I’d had the previous evening. But not even that lasted very long.

Back in here afterwards, I had my notes to write and a few others of the usual things to do, and I was actually in bed by 23:00, and asleep shortly afterwards.

But again, not for very long. Round about 02:30 I awoke, and then we had a desperate battle to go back to sleep again. I actually didn’t think that I did because I was still awake when the alarm went off at 06:29.

It was another desperate battle to rise to my feet and head off into the bathroom for a good wash and shave, and then into the kitchen for my hot lemon, honey and ginger drink that I take with my medication.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. And to my surprise, I had actually been out and about. And one of the time stamps tells me that I must have gone back to sleep at one point.

There was something last night about some kind of change of history exercises. There were several people involved in this, and the aim was to rewrite the history of certain events if alternative situations had taken place. For some reason, it turned out that it was to do with maths rather than actual history and it involved reworking certain maths questions. There was one girl who was rather slow doing the work but she seemed to have it all correct in the end. One thing was that there were no adults who managed to make it correct.

This is another one of those dreams that seems to relate to nothing at all.

There was also something about splitting the Catholic Church into two. Someone was keen to do this but for some reason, he put the western border down between France and Germany and France and Italy so that Rome ended up in the eastern part of it, which was a most unusual situation, but I can’t remember the rest of this now.

We did, in the early Medieval times, have Christianity split into two, the Catholic Church centred on Rome and the Eastern Orthodox Church centred on Constantinople. Although Constantinople has long gone, the Eastern Orthodox Church still carries on, mainly in the Balkans and in Russia. But I can imagine the outcry if someone decided to include Rome and Italy in the Eastern Orthodox Church.

When the alarm went off, there was something about a memory, and certain memory tests that were being taken but everything evaporated the moment the alarm went off and I can’t remember any more.

So obviously, I must have been asleep when the alarm went off, despite what I was thinking.

Isabelle the Nurse turned up as usual, in her “chat mode” and we had a little discussion about nothing very much at all. After she left, I could make breakfast and read some more of THE ROMAN FORT AT BALMUILDY on the Antonine Wall, written by Stewart Napier Miller.

The Antonine Wall was only occupied for about twenty or so years, yet already Miller has uncovered two different periods of major destruction of parts of the fort. I’m not sure as yet what his conclusions will be, but it does seem to indicate that things were rather warm on the northern border.

Back in here, I had things to do, and then I edited two lots of additional notes for the joining tracks of two radio programmes. So now, those programmes are complete and ready to go at some point in the future. There was even time for a little “relax”.

However, I awoke in time for my cleaner to apply my anaesthetic and then I had to wait for my taxi, which was fifteen minutes late.

My arrival at dialysis seemed to be fortunate because at that moment, there was a gap in the patients arriving, so I was seen to quite quickly. But to my horror, I seemed to have put on three litres of fluid to be removed – the highest for ages.

This is something that I don’t understand. I’m controlling my liquid intake very closely and my visits to the … errr … smallest room have if anything been more frequent of late. So what’s going on? The doctors were so concerned that they instructed the nurse to set the machine at two litres and remove the rest the next time. That is, if there isn’t another ridiculous weight gain.

And because of that, there were constant interruptions, checking my blood pressure every fifteen minutes, and I couldn’t even go to sleep as the nurses would shake me awake, for fear that I’d gone into a fainting fit. All in all, it was a horrible session there today.

The taxi was waiting for me and there wasn’t much traffic on the roads so we had a quick drive home, where my faithful cleaner was waiting to help me into the apartment.

But by now, I was totally exhausted. I warmed up the rest of the butternut squash soup and sat down to eat it, but after five minutes, well over half of it went into the bin, followed by the bread, and I came in here.

All that I did was to type out a terse note on the blog and then I crawled into bed, fully clothed. It was just 20:20.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about The Antonine Wall … "well, one of us has" – ed … I was telling a friend that it reminded me of that well-known Biblical ice-cream company.
"Which one was that?" she asked
"Walls of Jericho" I replied.

0

Wednesday 1st April 2026 – I HAD NOTHING ON …

… the dictaphone this morning when I awoke.

Not that that was any surprise. Leaving aside the question of these new medicaments that Emilie the Cute Consultant prescribed for me, if you don’t go to bed until 23:30 and you awaken at 04:00, there’s not a lot of time to go anywhere, is there?

Yes, it was another late night last night. For some reason or other, tea last night took ages to cook and consequently, I was quite late finishing. And then with the writing of the notes and everything else that I have to do, we ended up finishing much later than I had hoped.

Once in my nice, clean bed, I was hoping for a really good sleep. And for the first part of the night, that was what I had. Asleep quite quickly and not moving a muscle at all. However, it all went wrong at 04:00 when I awoke.

For quite a while, I stayed with my head tucked firmly under the quilt, nice and comfortable, but after about an hour, I began to think of all of the things that I could be doing instead.

Consequently, I managed … "eventually" – ed … to crawl out of bed and take my place at the computer.

And by the time that the alarm went off, I had dictated no fewer than five sets of radio notes. That was a good morning’s work, especially as there are only now a handful left to do.

When I’d finished, I crawled into the bathroom to sort myself out and then went into the kitchen for the hot drink and medication.

Back in here, I checked the dictaphone and then occupied myself with a few tasks to keep me busy.

Isabelle the Nurse arrived as usual and sorted out my legs and feet. She didn’t have much to say for herself today, which is not like her. After she left, I could make breakfast and make a start on the new book.

It’s called THE ROMAN FORT AT BALMUILDY on the Antonine Wall, written by Stewart Napier Miller and concerns the excavations in 1912-1914 of a Roman fort on the Antonine Wall that ran between the Forth and the Clyde in Scotland.

Its ruins were always visible up to about 1820 or so when it was quarried for its stone. With its existence being threatened by the expansion of Glasgow, it was decided in 1912 to excavate it to recover what might be lost. The excavations finished in 1914 when Miller was mobilised into the Army at the start of World War I.

Back in here afterwards, I sat down at my desk, and the next thing that I remembered, it was 11:27. I’d fallen asleep yet again and had been out like a light for a little over two hours. That was a huge disappointment because I had so much to do today, and I thought that, by and large, I’d overcome these rather dramatic crash-outs.

Then again, I suppose that with only four and a half hours sleep during the night, I’d have to catch up on it somehow, some time. So with not having much time to hang around, I immediately attacked the radio programme that I’d been preparing.

There was a deadline for this today – 16:00 for reasons that you will soon find out. And despite a pause for a disgusting drink, by 16:00, I’d chosen all of the music, remixed and re-edited it all, paired and segued it, end even written all of the notes for it. That was probably the quickest radio programme that I’ve ever prepared, and I wish that I could do them all as quickly as this.

At 16:00 I went into the kitchen.

The first task was to make some bread baps – four of them. Two of them were destined for this evening and the other two for tomorrow evening.

While they were proofing after their first knead, I melted a bar of cooking chocolate over an ad-hoc bain marie with a little water. When it had all melted, I put it on one side to cool, and then, when it was cool enough, poured it over the top of my chocolate cake to make a kind of chocolate shell.

That’s going to be my Easter treat and I bet that it will be as sickly as anything. And won’t I enjoy it?

In the meantime, I’d been preparing my butternut squash, scooping out the seeds and filling the holes with garlic and chili. Then drizzling some olive oil over the two halves. The two halves went into the oven to roast, along with an onion and some potatoes.

At some point during all of that, I’d kneaded the dough for the bread rolls and separated it into four equal portions that I then shaped in the form of discuses, which I left to prove again.

When the squash, potatoes and onions were ready, I took them out of the oven and put in the bread rolls. With the squash, potatoes and onions etc, I made a soup using the carrot water that I’d saved from blanching my carrots that I’d ordered from Leclerc.

Once the soup was ready, I whizzed it up, added some plain soya yoghurt and a few handfuls of these little pasta elbows and let it simmer for ten minutes. Half of it then went into my bowl and the other half was put on one side with two of the baps, for tea tomorrow.

And it was absolutely delicious, one of the best soups that I have ever made. And there wasn’t any room for any trifle afterwards either. The soup and bread were quite enough.

And now I’m off to bed. I’ve had a hellish day today. Never mind the crashing out, I’ve been coughing all day, sneezing and I have a streaming head cold, so strong that not even any Vick’s or Olbas Oil can control it. I hope that it all clears up quite quickly because it all gets right on my nerves all of this. As if I don’t have enough problems.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about waking up early … "well, one of us has" – ed … when I was back in Crewe, I used to wake up early quite often, even after only an hour or two of sleep.
One of my friends once asked me "whenever that kind of thing ever happened, did you wake up grumpy? "
"Oh no" I replied. "I always let her sleep in."

0

Monday 2nd November 2015 – WOW!

Yes indeed. We’re having one of the windiest days that we’ve ever had since I began keeping records. We’ve had gusts of up to 47kph and all of the wind turbines here have been going round like the clappers. We’ve not quite had record wind energy figures, but we aren’t far off it and it’s still cracking up (although I’ve taken the records now so the rest will be added to tomorrow’s figures).

As for today, I was up fairly early, and after breakfast I spent some time on the computer. This course on Hadrian’s Wall that I’ve started to study is rather different. It’s done on line with embedded videos and that’s going to cause a load of problems with my sad internet speed. But it looks quite interesting.

Not many people realise this but there are two wall systems in the UK. Hadrian’s Wall between Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Carlisle, and the Antonine Wall between the Firth of Clyde and the Firth of Forth. Some people think that both walls were built by the same Emperor but the Northern one is definitely by the Roman Emperor Antoninus Pius. Hadrian had only got one wall.

I didn’t have lunch today – I went out and started work instead and was rather carried away. We had beautiful sunny weather and with the wind we had a nice pile of electrical energy and with no dump load at the moment, I adopted plan B and fetched the chop saw.

I set up a workbench outside and started to attack the huge stack of wood that’s been building up outside over the past few years. Old branches and tree trunks that I’ve pulled up and cut down in the past as well as the old chevrons from when I replaced the roofs here.

The stack of wood doesn’t look much smaller but I’ve cut up enough to make a huge pile of wood. I’ve filled up the woodshed with some of it, and I’ve filled an IKEA bag to bring up here ready for whenever winter might arrive. But the chop saw idea worked in spades. With plenty of electricity to play with, it was 10 times quicker and 10 times less tiring than doing it with the hand saw. But there are some bits that won’t fit under the chop saw and so I’ll need the chainsaw for that, when Terry has finished with it.

But it does go to show. I once had a friend with whom I shared all of my hopes and aspirations about this place and my aims for the electrical system. I regarded him as being my best ever friend but then I found out that he was going onto a Land Rover forum on the internet and mocking my ideas, he and his friends having a really good laugh about it and a few offensive comments being thrown in for good measure. Of course, no friendship can withstand that, but it’s this kind of thing that is showing that I’m having the last laugh.

When I finished, I came up here to watch a film (I’m reverting to my old habits at long last) but crashed out instead. Once I had woken up, I cooked the pizza that I had forgotten to eat.

Tomorrow if the weather is good I’ll be carrying on with the woodpile. And if not, there are plenty of other things to be getting on with. High time I cracked on.

0