… absolute agony yet again, having been standing on my feet for several hours.
It’s the lack of muscles in my knees that is causing the pain. If I want to stand up without my crutches, such as if I want to use my hands, I have to wedge my legs so that the knee-bones lock in a certain way and after a while it hurts like hell
Still the most important job of the week is done, even if several less-important ones have not so been.
Take the radio notes for example. Last night after I finished writing my notes I had the dictating of the radio notes to do – two lots of them. I was also having a chat on-line with my niece from Canada.
Her middle daughter, my great little niece (or is it “little great niece”?) was married a year ago and now lives in Michigan in the USA and her youngest daughter, another my great little niece (or is it “little great niece”?) is at “St. F-X” – St Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Scotia, the best University in Canada.
We’re planning a group meeting soon, a video chat on one of the on-line platforms seeing as we haven’t all seen each other for an age.
Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I was invited to the wedding in Michigan last November so I tried a “dummy run” to Belgium last September to see how I would cope with the journey on my crutches with just a backpack, but failed miserably so I didn’t manage to go to the USA.
Meanwhile, back at the ran … errr … apartment I finished off the dictation, finished off the chat and crawled into bed much later than I would have liked.
When the alarm went off I fell out of bed and wandered off for a quick wash and brush up. It’s Sunday, I’ve had an hour’s lie in and the nurse will be here soon so I need to hurry.
But back in the bedroom I have a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I was during the night. The wind awoke me at 03:00 (not that I knew anything about it) but at that point I’d been off on an expedition with the native Americans. We’d paddled down the coast as far as we could to Florida and then walked back, describing a few of the tribes that we’d met and a few of their characteristics. Several of them were noted as lazy and several others had different epithets. In the end we said that it’s a far better representation of ourselves amongst the native Americans, we want to build a stronger fort to protect our settlement. He goes on to say that although there’s not a lot of land in each settlement they’ve crammed in many men, sometimes more men than the land is worth and they really need more soldiers going to serve as colonists so that they can have some kind of native element to protect the settlements against the French or the French can protect their own settlements against anyone, even the British who were currently their allies at the moment.
This reminds me of the book that I’m reading right now. Our author travels by water all the way down the St Lawrence River and then comes back on land.
But the conflict between the English and the French, with various native American tribes on different sides (or not as the case may be) went on all along the Hudson River valley and out into Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee for the best part of a hundred years, on and off. It was a fierce, vicious war at times and was well-documented in stories such as Fenimore Cooper’s LAST OF THE MOHICANS
Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that WE VISITED MANY OF THE BATTLEFIELD SITES in the Hudson valley in 2013 when we had that slow drive back to Montreal that took several weeks
We made it to Ticonderoga, Fort William Henry and all of the other places that Fenimore Cooper made famous in his “Leatherstocking Tales” of the Seven Years War in North America.
I’m not sure where I was but there was a choice of two cars. We had to choose one of three cars, An Austin Maxi, an Austin Princess HL and a Marina. I remember thinking that that’s the whole total of the British car output of the United Kingdom represented in that lot. We had a really good look round at them but couldn’t see anything or any reason to break any kind of monopoly position with Ford because there were quite a few issues with the British cars, even coming just straight off the production line and we couldn’t really at the time negotiating and repairing all of the bits that they needed to give us a car that we wanted
In the past I’ve had various cars and vans and I have to say that I’ve always returned to having Fords. I’m not sure what I’ll be having next. It’ll have to be whatever is available at the moment that has hand controls fitted.
The nurse turned up and was in chat mode today. She asked for my Carte Vitale – my health card – because she’ll be off on Tuesday and won’t be back until after the start of the next month so she has to make up her accounts.
After she left, I made breakfast and carried on reading my book. And I learned something new today.
Over the years, I have always wondered why the “District of Columbia” where the city of “Washington DC” is situated, is not included in the territory of any of the States. And thanks to Isaac Weld who was there at the time of its creation, now I know.
Congress used to meet in Philadelphia but at the end of the Revolutionary War it was besieged by discontented soldiers whose pay was in arrears. And the Pennsylvania State Government, in sympathy with the soldiers, refused to summon up the State’s forces of law and order quell the riot.
Consequently it was decided that there should be a territory created to house the Congress, where Congress itself could act as the local Government, issue by-laws, control the law enforcement officers and so on, and not be dependent upon any State authority.
In HIS BOOK he talks at great length about why that particular site was chosen. He is certainly very informative, if not garrulous.
Back in here, much later than usual thanks to the late arrival of the nurse, I had football to watch.
For some reason I couldn’t find a video of Stranraer’s game against Spartans. I later found out that the match had been postponed.
As for te Welsh football, there was one game missing – Hwlffordd v Y Bala, and it took an age to find that one.
The radio notes that I’d dictated were quite complicated. So far, I’ve only managed to finish editing one and I’m halfway through the other. I’m a long way from being where I wanted to be, with two radio programmes fully completed.
That’s because after the hot chocolate I set about dealing with the freezer.
It took much longer than you might imagine to unpack the two new drawers. Whoever packed them certainly deserves a medal because they would never be likely to break in that box, with all the padding that was around them.
Then I had to switch off the freezer, unplug it and take out all the drawers. Luckily, I’d put ice packs in there and they, being frozen solid, would help keep the contents cold.
Then I could attack the freezer with the hair dryer that I’d liberated the other week.
That took much longer too. I was surprised at just how much ice there was in there. And what didn’t help was that having put a towel at the front to catch the water that melts, the water actually drains out of the back.
For the time that it took, I was on my feet for several hours and hence the issue with my knees. But it was worth it because the freezer is now totally defrosted, the new drawers are in and filled, and you’d be surprised at how much room there is in there now.
At lunchtime I’d taken out some pizza dough from the freezer and that had been defrosting. When I finished with the freezer I rolled out the dough and later, assembled the pizza.
With no small tomatoes I had to use large ones sliced thinly. Nevertheless it took much longer to bake. However it was delicious all the same. Now I’m going to have a quick tidy-up of the packaging and then go to bed. It’s dialysis tomorrow.
But talking about the Last of the Mohicans … "well, one of us is" – ed … reminds me of Hawkeye and Chingachgook on their way to Fort Ticonderoga
After separating for a few days Hawkeye comes across Chingackgook with his ear to the ground.
"What is it, Chingachgook?" asks Hawkeye
"Stagecoach. French stagecoach" says Chingachgook. "Eight horses, two drivers, twelve passengers, five women, seven men. One driver, he have wart on side of face. Other driver, he have patch over left eye. "
"That’s astonishing" said Hawkeye. "You can tell all that by just lying there with your ear to the ground?"
"Oh no" replied Chingachgook. "Me standing here having little pause, and damn stagecoach ran me down"