Tag Archives: blood transfusion

Wednesday 20th December 2023 – TODAY I HAVE HAD …

… a lumbar puncture (the fourth that I’ve had if my counting is correct) and a thoracic puncture – one after the other without a pause.

And if you think that a lumbar puncture is bad, you want to try a thoracic puncture. I promise you – a lumbar puncture is a walk in the park in comparison.

Furthermore, even as we speak, I’m having a blood transfusion. You might not believe this, although I’m sure that regular readers of this rubbish will recall this kind of thing happening on several occasions in the past, but despite having had two pochettes of blood during the other night, my blood count has GONE DOWN and I’m still below the critical level.

And so I’m having another one right now.

That’s not the best of it either. They’ve had my blood whizzing around in something that looks as if it’s come from CERN and they have discovered that I have a genetic disorder.

That might explain a lot about a lot of things, but it might also create even more problems because I’ve signed an agreement for them to take my DNA so that they can start work on trying to find the problem.

They’ve told me to contact my family in order that they might undergo a test to identify anything that might arise, but who the hell is my family?
"What about your parents?" asked the doctor.
"My mother’s been dead for years"
"WHat about your father?"
"I never knew who my father was"
"Didn’t your mother ever tell you?"
"To be honest, I don’t think that she ever knew who he was either"

Our family was screwed up right from the very beginning. We were never a family, just a group of people living under the same roof scrambling and fighting for position

And I’m wondering what happens to my DNA sample afterwards. I can see a few issues arising here and there and none of them medical either, at least, from my point of view. However, quite frankly I’m too old, too ill and too tired to care.

Tired is certainly the word because not only was it a really bad day, it was a really bad night too.

Not that there was much of a night to be bad about because I was wide awake at 03:10 and up working, transcribing the dictaphone note, such as they were, at 04:00. There was a battleship that was ostensibly American but was actually owned by a private person and leased to the US Navy. One day he announced that the ship had disappeared. No-one knew where it had gone. A couple of weeks later it turned up in an American port being painted white. When the authorities caught up with it he announced that all the crew had deserted and was having to recruit another crew. The matter then went to Court and it turned out that the crew on board the ship, mainly Japanese, had all been dismissed and the owner was trying to recruit cheaper personnel. The Courts however ruled that the ship’s crew had unalienable right to be on board the ship. If the owner didn’t want them on board the ship, which was quite clear, then the ownership of the ship would pass to the crew, which was exactly what happened. In order to fill in the gaps in their ranks they began to recruit in West Germany. Consequently the ship was to become part of the West German Navy. This was going to lead to all kinds of complications.

And then I was with a girl from school last night, someone who has previously featured at some point or other in my dreams in the past on one or maybe two occasions. Her older brother had a Velocette Venom that he traded in for a Honda K1 750. We (the girl, not the brother) were actually a couple. I was living at home and so was she. She was quite young, small for her age as I remembered her. We’d go on a Saturday night to a little pub that we knew where they weren’t all that particular about the ages of people who went in… "The Rifleman in Volunteer Fields in Nantwich" – ed …. We’d sit in a very quiet corner towards the end of the evening, our arms around each other, and we’d just sleep. We’d wake up and I’d take her home in time so that her parents didn’t suspect anything. After we’d been there for several weeks doing that – we’d go out and do things like go for a walk, go to the cinema or something and end up back at the pub where we’d sleep together for an hour on a bench with our arms around each other. But after we’d been there for several weeks I’d noticed that the pub was becoming more and more crowded. I was thinking that we can’t really go on like this. One night while we were there, she noticed too and made the comment that this place seems to be becoming more and more crowded. I said “well, we don’t really have very much alternative, do we? You still live at home and I still live at home. I might be able one day to have an apartment but at the moment it’s not possible. There isn’t really anywhere else where we can go”. We really ended up just like that again on that particular Saturday night, arms round each other, asleep on a bench, heads against the wall in this particular pub.

It was just like Mark Knopfler and DOWN TO THE WATERLINE – a song all about an adolescent romance with a girlfriend, a Saturday night and simply nowhere to go.

But it was this dream that awoke me. It was one of those that I have every so often, a nice, warm, comfortable dream of the type that I wish would go on for ever where I feel totally at ease and relaxed with a girl really comfortable in my arms.

Being at ease and relaxed are of course things that seems to be happening less and less often these days.

It’s the kind of thing that rarely happens in real life. In fact, it’s only ever happened with two girls.

At one point in my life I was just so stressed out that I could no longer function correctly and everything – absolutely everything – was falling apart. So I’d make a huge effort, go on a trip and p-p-pick up a Penguin – a Percy Penguin in fact.

We’d find a place with running water, because water is very important in my life and the sound of it is relaxing, and we’d just lie there. She had loads of issues (and so did I too, and still have) and she’d wrap herself around me really tightly so that I’d protect her from whatever demons were threatening her. Sometimes she’d even cry on my shoulder as she poured out her problems.

And I’d hold her tight to protect her, her long brown hair all over me, and I’d lie there listening to her breathing as she calmed down and began to sleep. She breathed like a cat, exactly the same frequency and that, and the running water, would calm me down as well. Then I’d be ready for the second round of whatever battle I was fighting at the time

Sometimes I wonder whatever became of her. She would (and did, sometimes) follow me into Hell itself without a pause, a question or a second thought. But she didn’t understand the dangers or the risks and it was really unfair of me to encourage her under those circumstances.

She was someone to whom life had dealt an absolutely wretched hand of cards but I admired her for the way that she fought on regardless.

As for the other girl who drifted into my life, calmed me down and gave me the same kind of comfortable feeling, I’ll let you guess who it was. If you like, you can tell me and I’ll tell you if you’re right or wrong.

Having had Alquin on the playlist just as I was going to bed last night, today I’ve had their three albums going round in a continuous loop all day and that, together with all of my medical issues, has depressed me to a point that I could do with p-p-picking up a Penguin right now.

In fact, I actually crashed out for 5 minutes and it was she who came to check on me. That was rather ironic.

But retournons à nos moutons as they say around here.

The first time that I encountered Alquin was, despite the fact that they are from the Netherlands, Delft in fact, in a dingy damp cellar under a decaying hotel in Crewe in the Spring of 1975 where there was a rock club frequented for a while by the misspent youth of the town.

They are (because they are still going) a bass-driven multi-instrumental band, although they have lost a lot of their power after bassist Hein Mars left them.

In fact I had a bit of a desultory correspondence with them at one time. The bass lines are some of the best that I’ve heard on a consistent basis and all of the songs are pitched in a key and a narrow vocal range that I can actually sing well enough.

After all, you never know. When a young boy called Alan Davey was learning to play bass he played along to Hawkwind records and one day sent off a tape of his efforts to Dave Brock. 10 years later, when Brock was looking for a new bassist after Harvey Bainbridge moved to keyboards, he remembered Davey, and Davey played bass with Hawkwind for 20-odd years in a couple of spells

But meanwhile, back at the ran … errr … cellar, any group that can produce a song LIKE THIS on THEIR DEBUT ALBUM, MARKS has to be worth checking out so I’d been keeping an eye on them.

Their second album, THE MOUNTAIN QUEEN is even better. If you haven’t heard the bass solo near the end of the TITLE TRACK Grahame, give it a listen.

What interests me most about that track, and the bass solo in particular, is the rapport between Hein Mars on bass and Paul Weststrate on drums.

As far as I’m aware, I’ve only ever heard an interaction like that between two musicians on one other occasion. Listen to Simon House on violin and Adrian Shaw on bass during the violin solo in the middle of DAMNATION ALLEY and you’ll see what I mean. Put your headphones on and turn the bass full up.

Now THERE was an underrated rock musician, Simon House and his violin. If I had engineered and produced ASTOUNDING SOUNDS, AMAZING MUSIC, while Robert Calvert reads his poem in the middle of STEPPENWOLF I’d have had long, long pauses after every line while Simon House winds up the magic and builds up the suspense and tension.

But anyway, more Alquin is going round. So, in the words of the Mountain Queen
"take your time and join me
I’ll tell you an endless story
Rest your head beside me
In that fading light."

And right now I’d settle for almost anyone’s head beside me, not just Percy Penguin’s or the other person whose name I didn’t mention. I don’t want to drag her into all of this rubbish any more than she’s been dragged into it already.

Tuesday 19th December 2023 – THE GOOD NEWS…

… is that if there is a change in condition of my heart, it’s an improvement. The cardiologist put me through my paces this morning and her opinion is that whilst the evacuation of the heart isn’t 60-65% as it’s supposed to be, it’s not the 48% that the previous cardiologist recorded.

For the benefit of new readers, of which there are more than just a few, let me explain.

A normal blood count should be between 13 and 15. My carcinogenic protein is attacking my red blood cells so my blood count is less than it ought to be.

If, for example, I have a blood count of, say, 9, it means that my heart has to beat 50% faster to move enough oxygen around my body.

If the evacuation is, say, 48% instead of 60%, it means that it has to beat 25% faster still to take the oxygen loss into account, and that means that it’s beating at 185%-190% – almost twice as fast.

The heart can do this for so long of course, but not for ever. And this is why they are keeping a close eye on mine.

But the bad news is that they gave me the tests where they pulse electricity through my nervous system to see how the nerves and muscles respond. It’s the fourth time that I’ve had this test and each time they have noted a deterioration.

And that’s how it was today. I’m losing more strength in my legs.

But returning to last night I mentioned yesterday that my blood level had dropped below the critical limit, which is 8. Then there’s not enough oxygen to make the body function. And, I suspect, that’s why I’ve been feeling so miserable these last few days and why my co-ordination is going.

And so at 23:44 they cam around with two pochettes of blood to give me a transfusion.

It took four hours for the transfusion to be completed, with someone coming around every half an hour to check my pulse and blood pressure. And being the light sleeper that I am, it awoke me every time.

And what was the worst about this was that at one point Zero came to check on me too but just as I started to talk to her one of the nurses awoke me to take my blood pressure, and I couldn’t go back into the dream afterwards to carry on our conversation.
"Candles burn
dull red lights
illuminate the breasts of four young girls
dancing, prancing, provoking …
Dreams are always ending far too soon
Life’s to short to be sad
wishing things you’ll never have
You’re better off
not dreaming of
the things to come
Dreams are always ending far too soon"
It seems that CARAVAN HAVE BEEN HERE BEFORE ME and know the feeling only too well.

But as I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … that after having lived a life full of excitement, the only excitement that I seem to have these days is what goes on during the night.

I’ve been told on many occasions that I ought to take sleeping pills to have a good night’s sleep and I’d cope with things much better during the day

And miss out on what goes on during the night and the possibility of a visit from TOTGA, Zero and Castor, and anyone else who comes along to keep me company? You must be joking!

And strangely enough, the walls of my room are actually grey and pink.

By about 07:15 I’d given up the idea of a good sleep and once I’d gathered my wits, such as they are, I set out for the bathroom and a good wash.

However no sooner had I started than a nurse came round to take a blood sample. It was quite a while before I made it into the bathroom and the chance of a shower was gone.

Having said that, the van to pick me up to take me to Cardiology was rather late but the driver stuck me in a wheelchair and pushed me outside to his vehicle.

Once more, for the benefit of new readers, this hospital isn’t built “up” like most modern hospitals, it’s built “out” on 33 hectares with a whole series of buildings built since the earliest hospital building on the site, in 1648. Consequently there’s a fleet of electric vans with drop floors and ramps in the back for wheelchair-bound passengers and a bus service for those who can walk, to take people from one building to the next.

First stop was Cardiology, second was Neurology and finally, after much waiting about, I came back here in time for lunch.

For each of the trips I had the same driver and vehicle. He’s a rock music fan and one-time musician so we had a good chat. He imagines people like us in an Old People’s Home in out 70s and 80s still rocking the crowds of old women, and 70-year old groupies throwing their panties onto the stage.

Back in 1973 a group of us was hired as roadies for “The Sweet” when they played at the Liverpool Empire and the things that we saw, well, perhaps they are best left unrecorded.

This afternoon I had an endless stream of visits from different medical personnel doing all kinds of different things. But my neighbour, the President of the Residents’ Committee, is in Paris again and she came round for a chat which was very nice.

She stayed for about an hour and we chatted about nothing in particular and then she had to nip off.

However her visit coincided with afternoon coffee so they didn’t bring me a cup. But I managed to blag a cup of coffee later on from one of the nurses.

They don’t like my blood pressure. They think that it’s far too high and there’s no real reason for it as far as I can tell.

However it wasn’t as high as the time at Castle Anthrax when the young student nurse with the low-cut overall and no t-shirt underneath climbed all over me to couple me up to the machine.
"I don’t know why your blood pressure is so high this morning."
"I do" I thought to myself. "And if you climb over me like that again it’ll go even higher."

There was plenty of work that I have to do but I didn’t accomplish all that much. Last night’s lack of sleep took its toll on me and I was falling asleep for 10 minutes here and there all day.

However I did manage to transcribe the dreams from last night. I’d been to a Saturday lunchtime class for my University course. Coming out I went a couple of doors away to where Zero was living. The house was empty but I had a key so I went in. There was a book there. It was part II of “500 photos of the Bangor area of North Wales Published Consecutively” or something like that. I sat down and began to read it. After I’d been reading it for a couple of minutes the front door opened and I could hear Zero’s voice along with my elder sister and her husband. That was quite a surprise. It was Zero’s birthday today and there was a party later on to which I’d been invited. Zero opened the door into the room where I was sitting. I said “hello gorgeous” to her and at that moment I awoke.

It seems that the medical staff of the hospital has joined forces with my subconscious in preventing Zero from succumbing to a virtual fate worse than virtual death.

And of course, I couldn’t step back into that dream, could I?

There was also a golfing competition taking place. The club decided that it would have an annual tournament so many of its members took part. I went along a a sort-of adjudicator, not that I knew any rules about golf. There were all kinds of things happening. On one occasion one player lost a stroke, or, rather, he had a ball moved so he had to play an impossible shot and then play on because of some infringement. People wondered if that was legal. Then someone hit a ball which was then lost from view so he took a penalty and another shot, and he found that ball but it was right by the one that was lost so he wanted to play the first ball again and withdraw the penalty but I didn’t know what to do. It was another one of these long meaderings that seemed to go on for ever and ever. As I said, I know nothing about golf and I don’t know why I was there. I don’t know any of the rules and couldn’t give any decisions on anything.

We were next building an armoured lorry for a trip into the Middle East. We came down to the question of the doors. We found a door that would fit, an armoured door, but it had seized up. We tried to dismantle it but one of the things was that the cover on one of the inspection hatches where the lock was, a bolt had seized solid and there was nothing that we had that would free this bolt. The girl who was going to drive the lorry also pointed out that it didn’t seem safe because the window winder had broken . I took it apart and found that there was a bearing and retaining clip missing so while the window winder would go round, if it went over a bump or something it might drop off and the window would fall down again to the bottom. That wasn’t in accordance with the idea that we’d had about this armoured lorry. She was insisting that we found another door where the window worked. My father was more interested in trying to remove this inspection panel off so that he could check the lock. The girl and I were joking about 1 or 2 things, talking about unnecessary heat that would ignite any kind of conversation. One of the guys had some WD40, sprayed the bolt with it and fetched a cutting torch with the idea that he’d use the cutting torch to set the oil alight that would heat up the bolt to free it from the hosing where it was stuck so that he could unscrew it. It was funny him doing that just as the girl and I were talking about heat so of course we had to smile. All the time my father was trying to remove the lock. He had someone else there who was freeing off another inspection panel to show the girl how the lock worked, trying to convince her that this was the most secure door that could be found but the young girl was extremely frustrated because she was still insisting on doing something about the window. If that dropped down in the middle of the mountains or something people would be able to enter or fire a gun into the cab. She was much more concerned about that but no-one seemed to be taking any notice of that. They were all trying to prove to her that this door was secure when it was quite obvious to the girl and me that it wasn’t, because of the window.

Having told them this morning (again) that I’m vegan, tonight’s tea was veal and carrot soup followed by salmon lasagne with spinach in cream

Luckily the nurse who came later saw what was going on and made me a bowl of cheap vegetable soup with bread, and my neighbour had brought me some bananas and clementines.

But it’s not that I’m unprepared. Following what went on at Riom over the food when I was there for my “second opinion” in 2016, I have brought a few supplies with me “just in case”.

In a few minutes I’ll be off to bed, and hope that Zero comes back to check up on me, or maybe TOTGA or Castor might come along.

But Castor seems to have disappeared now. It’s been ages since she’s come to visit me. Our three nights on the upper deck of THE GOOD SHIP VE … errr … OCEAN ENDEAVOUR looking at the midnight sun and the northern lights and singing to each other are long gone now.

Life’s too short to be sad, wishing things you’ll never have, but when you are sad wishing for things that you actually might have had and which slipped through your fingers on a deserted, windswept airstrip in the High Arctic as a ‘plane prepared to take-off for Ottawa, life is never too short for that

Before I went to bed, a Dutch group called Alquin came round in the playlist and we had their song THE DANCE from their second album THE MOUNTAIN QUEEN.

As we were talking … "well, one of us was" – ed … about ships that pass in the night and that kind of thing, somehow some of the lyrics of “The Dance” seemed relevant to our parting.
"Where will you be tonight?
Where will you be tomorrow?
Fly in your silver kite
And leave me here in sorrow
Hey dude can you see what you’ve done to me
Oh I’m feeling so bad
Yes I’m feeling so blue"

Thursday 2nd March 2023 – JUST ONE LOOK …

… was all it took for them at the hospital to send me off for a blood transfusion. it was that obvious. They didn’t even wait for a sample of my blood.

No wonder that I’d been feeling like The Wreck Of The Hesperus for the last week or two.

They asked me a few pointed questions about some symptoms and when I answered in the affirmative that was all it took and I was off dragged to the Day Centre.

It was cold in my room last night and what with that and the general change in situation (because I’m having some real difficulty sleeping right now, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall) I hardly had any sleep at all last night and it was most uncomfortable. There was nothing whatsoever on the dictaphone, and that should give you a clue.

Breakfast was included in the price of my room so when the alarm went off I was downstairs quite quickly. Breakfast was actually quite nice although there wasn’t anything special to eat. And then back up here for a nice shower.

At 09:00 I was out of the door and across the road into the bus station and I didn’t have to wait long for a bus. It was quite crowded but I managed to find a seat.

Registering at the hospital was quite quick but then I had to wait an age to be seen because I’d arrived well in advance of my appointment. The doctor had quite a long chat to me and then went to fetch her professor who had an even longer chat with me.

They weren’t too happy that I hadn’t gone for my appointments at the New Year but I explained all of the issues that I was facing – how I couldn’t walk, how I can no longer go through Paris, how there were no buses running when I needed to leave etc etc.

It all resolved itself with them saying that they will arrange a few appointments for me in 3 months time and they would like me to attend.

We shall see.

It was a different Day Centre to the usual one. It was quite a hike as well so they stuck me in a wheelchair and sent for someone to push me. I had to wait about half an hour for someone to come and then we set off on our marathon hike.

At the Day Centre I had another long wait until a comfy chair liberated itself and then an even longer wait for the blood to arrive from the central repository. They found me some food and a few cups of coffee while I was waiting so it wasn’t all despair.

Everything took so long to organise that it was almost 18:30 when I finally left. Too late to go to the chemist to redeem my prescriptions and too late to go to pick up the spices from the Asian warehouse. Instead, I caught a bus back to town.

On the way back to the hotel I popped into the supermarket down the road and bought some bread and tomatoes. It’s going to be another long day tomorrow on the road and I’ll need some supplies.

And then I borrowed a knife from the restaurant and made some sandwiches here for the journey back home.

There’s a fritkot around the corner from here and you can’t come to Belgium and not have your supply of fritjes so I went down there later on and had my fritjes with some vegan loempjes that they had. One thing about being in Leuven is that with so many students here there’s a good range of vegetarian and vegan food.

So an early start tomorrow, probably without breakfast because they don’t start serving it until 07:00 and I’ll be leaving Brussels on the bus at 08:20 so I need to get a move on.

Sunday 27th November 2022 – SO HAVING GONE …

… off to sleep at some kind of early night and I was in the middle of a dream but I can’t remember, although at one point I was being pulled somewhere by someone. Then I awoke to find that it was the nurse pulling on my hand trying to connect me up to some kind of antibiotic fluid that she’d put up on my portable patient thing. I thought “didn’t I feel funny and silly trying to resist whatever was going on?”.

But anyway, that could have been quite an interesting moment had I been the kind of person who talks in his sleep.

Half an hour or so later just as I was about to drop off to sleep the nurse came back and disturbed me by uncoupling me and then I settled down again to try to go back to sleep but really that was that as far as sleep was concerned.

In the WORDS OF AL STEWART, “.. all that is left is the clock on the shelf
as it ticks one day into another”.

As regular readers of this rubbish will recall, back in the old days when I had fewer preoccupations in my life I had regular visits during the night from three young ladies, one of whom was nicknamed “Zero” after the “girl, she’s almost a woman” IN THE SONG and there are more truths in this song than you would ever realise.

Yes, it was getting to the stage of Warren Zevon and “A RED-HEADED GIRL
IN THE RED SILK DRESS
YA’ KNOW, I’M ASKING HER TO DANCE WITH ME
SHE MIGHT SAY YES”

By 03:00 I had given up everything and had the laptop up and running with the Old-Time Radio going. First up was an episode of Paul Temple, and there’s nothing quite like THE CORONATION SCOT at 03:00 to stir the spirit.

And I settled down later under the bedclothes with the headphones and the computer still going ready for the alarm at 06:30 and wondered how deep asleep I would be right now had the doctor yesterday not decided to wreak her petty revenge on me last night by disobeying standing instructions by telling me about my operation later in the day

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I have requested no knowledge whatever of any surgical intervention. I prefer that they say nothing, creep up behind me with a length of 4×2 and deal with whatever surgery is required while I know nothing about it.

At about 05:00 I was shaken awake by a group of nurses wanting to take a blood sample and reminding me of my operation, which I now know is going to be at 07:30.

Apparently the catheter in the back of my hand isn’t the right kind of catheter to take a blood sample. They had to insert a needle somewhere else in my arm to continue the work of trying to transform me into a pin cushion or a junkie or something.

When they finished the sample they dumped a pile of washing stuff in the bathroom and told me to get washed. I don’t know if I replied with an expletive but if I did, I wouldn’t be surprised.

When the alarm went off at 06:30 I grudgingly staggered off towards the bathroom.

At 07:00 a nurse came to see me, one of those who had awoken me at 05:00. She asked me if I was ready for the operation. I ran through the timeline of what had happened during the night and expressed my feelings in no uncertain terms.

She beat a hasty retreat and for once I was left alone.

Only until about 07:15 when a nurse came to weigh me. I made her wait while I went to the bathroom. She retaliated by cleaning my catheter port with a force that doubled me up and connecting me to an antibiotic. So I’m not going for my operation at 07:30.

Anyway at 07:30 regardless of anything else they came to fetch me, antibiotics and all, and wheeled me off down into the basement and I saw parts of the hospital that I never new existed.

Eventually I arrived in some kind of holding area where I waited. And waited. And waited.

At about 08:00 they came to fetch me. And in the operating theatre –
Our Hero – “am I the first patient of the morning?”
Assistant Surgeon – “in this theatre, yes”
OH – “well let’s get going while the knife’s still sharp”.
But as Kenneth Williams and Alfred Hitchcock once famously remarked, “it’s a waste of time telling jokes to foreigners”.

They actually used a laser on me to remove my infected and damaged catheter port. And now I know what burning human flesh smells like even if, because of the local anaesthetic I couldn’t feel it.

When they had finished (in an operation that had lasted 28:55 according to the stopwatch on the ceiling) I was put in another holding area where they took my blood pressure. and I reckon that 94/67 is pretty low in anyone’s calculations.

It was 10:15 when I arrived back after a lengthy stay in the Recovery Room, and you’ve no idea how much I was looking forward to coffee and breakfast. And as you might expect, it was strawberry jam this morning.

They had taken a sample of blood a little earlier this morning which showed a blood count of 6.6. I wasn’t aware that I had lost so much blood during the operation and I told the little junior doctor so. She asked me if I’d been bleeding anywhere else so I told her the story of the carcinogenic protein and gave her a small lecture on basic volumetrics.

While I was at it, I did ask her about what’s going to happen now that we know that the story about “being too full of virus for an operation”. She replied that “this was a different type of operation” so I took great delight in showing her last night’s blog entry.

She thinks that I need to see one of the doctors who sees me during the week but regular readers of this rubbish will recall that we don’t see them every day.

And as she left, I couldn’t help but say that “well, we both knew that this story about ‘too full of virus to operate on me’ was a load of nonsense, didn’t we?”

All very juvenile and childish of me I’m afraid, but you can imagine how I was feeling.

With breakfast being so late, I wasn’t in much of a mood for lunch especially in the middle of a blood transfusion. But at least that’s over now.

Having had a really bad morning I spent much of the afternoon asleep or else chatting with my friend in Eastern Kent – or is it my Eastern Kentish friend? I can’t remember which is which.

After my rather stressful day it’s time now for me to settle down under the covers ready for the rigours of tomorrow.

It’s strange, isn’t it, that I was worrying about having a very quiet day and it turned into one of the most difficult to date. Tomorrow will have to go some to match the events of today

Thursday 17th November 2022 – IT LOOKS AS IF …

… this idea of kicking me out of the hospital on Friday is gathering momentum. And so we’ve had a day of arguments and disputes today.

Anyway, all of that is for the future. Last night I was curled up in bed at 21:00 fast asleep, and wide-awake again at about 00:00.

And I DO mean “wide-awake” because it took me hours and hours to go back to sleep. I was in such a state that I could easily have done a pile of work during the period that I was awake, so it was last night..

As usual the rattling of all of the stuff that they push around on trolleys early in the morning awoke me before the alarm went off. And then we had the endless procession of nurses coming in here doing their stuff.

One of the things that needed doing was changing my catheter in my chest. As well as the trained nurse, there are two young student nurses here and they are really cute. I asked them if they had changed a catheter before and thy replied “no” – so I told them to do mine. It will be good practice for them.

And so the more senior one changed the catheter while the junior one watched closely and the trained nurse supervised. It all passed off very well and these nurses can change my catheter again whenever they like – not that they’ll have much chance with me being kicked out tomorrow.

That was the nurses. The issues with the doctor didn’t go quite so comfortably.

At some point in the morning a professor from one of the departments concerned in my health came by. She told me that because of the way things are, they are going to cancel my appointment for a lung examination this afternoon. It’ll take place in two weeks time instead.

As you might expect, I went totally berserk. I made this person read my letter to the hospital from last August and made sure that she understood it. And I expressed all of my concerns, as I have done ad nauseam.

The net result was that it didn’t sway her one little bit. And so I played my trump card. I told her that if I had to come back in two weeks time (and I explained all of my difficulties of travelling) I wanted to see an euthanasist because I’m totally fed up and can’t go on any more like this.

That was met with a stony silence.

Later on, at lunchtime, the physiotherapist came to see me. He gave me a few exercises to perform and then tried to make me walk. We managed 30 steps before I had to stop for breath.

At that point I asked him if he was happy that they were throwing me out tomorrow and he looked appalled

Despite having said that my appointment this afternoon they came to fetch me and took me downstairs.

Having waited for a while a doctor came out and repeated what the doctor had said to me this morning. And so I repeated what I’d told the doctor this morning, including the bit about euthanasia. He tried to discuss and debate the position but I wasn’t having any of it.

Back in my room the regular doctor came to see me. She told me that the scan yesterday revealed a trapped nerve in my back, one that corresponds with my right leg. There was then a pregnant pause while I waited for her to tell me what their plan was to deal with it.

However there was no response and I’m still none-the-wiser. I’m not even better-informed.

We discussed the situation in general and once again I expressed my dismay at the way things have unfolded. I told her that the physiotherapist was concerned about my mobility and she looked surprised. She told me that she would check with the physiotherapist but I doubt whether it will change her opinion any.

While I was at it, I gave her my little speech about if I’m having to come back in 2 weeks I want to see an euthanasist etc etc. That shook her a little but she didn’t seem all that bothered in the end.

It looks to me as if I’m leaving here regardless tomorrow.

Something strange happened later on. Alison came to see me and while we were chatting the doctor saw us. She came in and interrogated Alison about who she was and why she was here. That was what I call extremely bizarre.

As regular readers of this rubbish will recall, Alison and I used to work together at that extremely bizarre American company, but that’s by the way.

One thing at least that might help a little is that I seem to have shamed them into giving me a blood transfusion. Being let loose to go into the great wide world with a blood count of only 7.8 when the critical level is 8.0 is not a good idea at all and this will explain why I’ve been feeling so bad just recently.

it’s a very far cry from when they let me go for 6 months or so with a blood count approaching 10.0. Whatever the situation is, this Iqymune or whatever they call it isn’t the answer to my problems.

Sure enough, they turned up with some blood later in the evening, and this is the first transfusion that I’ve had for several years..

So now it’s all gone, I’m going to finish listening to this Paul Temple episode that’s currently being broadcast and then I’m going to bed. I need to gather up all of my strength if they really are going to expel me tomorrow.

Wednesday 9th November 2022 – WE HAVE HAD …

… all kinds of people wandering around the hospital today.

As well as the usual run of nurses, doctors and all kinds of ancillary staff, we had one of the professors putting his sooty foot inside my little room.

“There will be some student doctors on the wards later this morning” he said. “Is it OK if they come and check up on you?”

Here I am in a teaching hospital with all kinds of nice young students, whether nurses or doctors, so why would I not want to be examined by them?

Consequently I agreed and so much of the morning was spent with me being poked and prodded around. In fact it was all very reminiscent of something out of DOCTOR IN THE HOUSE, especially when two of them had to come back because they had forgotten to ask me for some basic information..

Last night I was in bed quite early the way things have been going just recently, and I slept right the way through to the alarm. No-one seems to be disturbing me during the night these days.

Although I was awake, I wasn’t that much awake and here and there, now and then, a nurse had to shake me awake.

Plenty of stuff on the dictaphone too from during the night and the odd sleepy moment later. I was doing something that involved supervising a couple of companies (as in groups of people) moving across the desert towards a new life somewhere in a new fort or whatever. One party was particularly difficult because we kept running out of everything, including the ginger beer that we were supposed to drink, and that was difficult. We had a really savage guard dog that patrolled the limits of the camp. Each time one of our members of staff appeared or one of the people who was travelling, we had to go to rein in this guard dog so that the people could come through. It was all quite savage in a way. One of the guys had actually baked some fairy cakes so one breakfast we had fairy cakes. There was the usual ribbing about either he hadn’t baked them himself or whatever. In the end we decided that the only way to prove that he’d baked them himself was next Saturday to have an open house baking session where he’d bake in front of anyone who cared to watch.

There was something about being in a group last night, a group of us. I can’t recall what we were doing but there was a lot of drawing etc in it. Right at the end I asked my brother what were the objects that he was picking. He replied that it was some fruit or vegetable of some description so we wanted to know what was the fur on the face of it, whether it was some kind of rottenness or whether it was actually supposed to be there. He said that he’s on his way to the car now so he’ll pick a few and have a closer look. But I couldn’t see where he was going to fit them because he had his arms full and he couldn’t be carrying anything more than he already had

One of the nurses changed the needle in my catheter port on the grounds that it’s been in there nearly two weeks. I made sure that my little student nurse watched closely because I told her that she’s going to change the next one.

Later on this afternoon they took me down deep into the bowels of the hospital where I’ve never been before. There were two people sticking pins in my leg and sending electric shocks up and down it. They haven’t told me any results but coupled with the tests that they have been carrying out, they are of the conclusion that there’s a definite problem with the right leg and information so far suggests that it’s a lower back problem although I fail to see the connection.

After tea Alison put in an appearance. She brought me some of that banana-flavoured soya drink that I like and some vegan crisps.

We had a good chat for well over an hour while the nurses were trying to pump some plasma substance into me.

So now that I’m on my own, everyone has gone home and the place is in darkness, I’m going to put myself in darkness too. But I’m relieved that they are at last taking some of my complaints seriously. It’s been a long time since I’ve been waiting for them to do something – since March 2021 in fact – and as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I’ve been quite fed up with the lack of action.

So here’s hoping that they’ll be able to do something about my problems. It won’t be before time either.

Friday 28th May 2021 – I HAVEN’T BEEN …

… discharged from the hospital, it seems that I’ve been expelled.

And I heard at least one nurse say “if he comes back, then I’m leaving!”.

So right now I’m sitting on my comfy sofa back in my room in the Dekenstraat here. I’ve had to re-book it again but I found it just as I left it, with my frozen food still in the freezer and the cold stuff still in the fridge. Just like old times.

What was also like old times was that I almost fell sleep watching a film last night. I summoned up enough energy to switch off the laptop before collapsing and that was basically that until the nurses awoke me at 07:30.

2 files on the dictaphone though. It must have been a busy night. There was something going on between me and my brother. Someone else stepped in and said that he was going to fence off half of this ground and I wasn’t going to be allowed on it . I thought “yes, try and stop me”. He was extremely insistent and extremely unpleasant with it as well so we were walking off across a field somewhere and we came to a river or canal. There was some kind of activity taking place on the other side that involved processions. I noticed that half of it had been closed off as well. There was a really strong wind and I had some kind of tap washer or rubber seal joint type of thing. It suddenly blew our of my hands and in a big circuit up in the air and then blew round and blew back again much to the astonishment of this little boy in this procession. We had a laugh about that and someone else said “yes, he’s going to do something else spectacular in a minute”. I wondered what this procession was about, closed off on half of this ground by this net that went across this canal and what was going on on the other half. As I said, someone said that we couldn’t go that way but that kind of net wasn’t going to stop me no matter how offensive and aggressive that other guy had been towards me in the matter of how talking to my brother had been.

Later on we’d been doing some plumbing repairs in the house of a girl we knew at school, at least it was a house somewhere near Acton. I turned up with some guy who was going to do the work, and a young kid. We started to dismantle this pipework, which wasn’t easy because it had been done in a Heath Robinson matter with these really long nuts and bolts. We had it dismantled and then we had to reassemble it. To dismantle it, it had all gone out of centre and it was tightening up the nuts on the threads so we couldn’t undo it the more by hand no matter how long they were. We had to use a spanner right through to the end. So we repositioned it better and anyway I was determined not to do the last bolt. I ended up running some kind of jewelled ornament down these threads until everyone complained. In the end I found the missing nut and put it back on. But the girl was there. It was her parents’ house. We were about to, or I was trying to manoeuvre myself round to having a really good chat with her, but then I awoke before I could actually start to talk to her. Another one of my friends had been saying for years that he wished that he knew how he could get in touch with her and he’s going to be ever so pleased and impressed that I’d actually met her. I was going to give her his contact details, everything

After the medication it was comparatively quiet. No doctor and train of students from urology or anywhere else, and even my own doctor never put in an appearance.

There was the usual bustle of nurses with their students practising on me, but I don’t mind that at all. It’s all part of the thing about being a guinea-pig and they have to learn somehow. And of course they are all young and pretty and keen and enthusiastic, with a nice cheery smile, and they always bring me a cup of coffee afterwards.

There was a shower and a shave too, so now I’m all clean – well, sort-of – and in clean clothes too.

The absence of bustle meant that I could finish off the notes for the radio programme on which I’ve been working, and then finish off choosing the music for one that I had started before I was hauled off to hospital

And when I’d done that, there was even time to choose the music for another one too. After all, I may as well use this time profitably.

After lunch they brought round my blood results – 8.0. So it had gone up to reach the critical level. And they also brought more blood. “When you’ve had this, the doctor says that you can go home”.

Well, that was news to me, although regular readers of this rubbish will recall that yesterday I’d suggested that as a possibility.

The doctor came to see me in mid-transfusion with a pile of paperwork. The amount of medication that I now have to take is astonishing. I’m sure that this time next week, if you were to shake me I would rattle.

Disturbingly, one of the things that he’s prescribed for me is Vitamin B12 and that’s a bad sign. As a vegan I don’t have it naturally and I have to have supplements. I always look for stuff that has it in. And not enough Folic Acid either, so I need more of that.

4 lots of ointment for various things too. You can’t say that their examination wasn’t thorough.

Another thing that he mentioned was that in certain cases there was an injection that they can give to people with renal issues that will help and will stimulate the blood cells too. It’s given very rarely but he reckons that I qualify and so he will be making his recommendation.

When the transfusion was over they unhooked me and the nurse brought me a pile of medication “so I don’t have to go to the chemist until Monday”. They are really sweet here.

There was still one thing that I needed to do before I left the hospital. The doctor had given me a written report but addressed it to the wrong doctor. “That’s what it says on your record” he said. So I had to go to the office and change my doctor to the correct one.

My trek into town didn’t get me very far before I had to reach for the camera.

On the car park there was an ambulance with its blue lights flashing, and also a plain-clothes police car with his blue lights flashing too, blocking part of the road. And sitting up on the bank with one of its doors open.

I’ve no idea what was happening there, but I did muse to myself that if anyone were injured, they wouldn’t have far to go in order to seek medical attention. Not from the hospital car park, anyway.

Having dispensed with that, I carried on down the Monseigneur van Waeyenberghlaan just in time to see a big digger drive up onto the trailer at the back of this lorry.

“What’s going on here then?” I thought. “They have only just finished digging up this road. They surely aren’t going to be starting again”. But there is some kind of park just there where all of that green shrubbery is and apparently the digger is doing something in there.

At the corner of the Goedsbloemstraat the workmen were cutting all of the stones to fit the new tactile avement around the street furniture. And as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, I had some kind of thing once with the girl who invented tactile paving.

What these workmen are doing here is extremely interesting – at least to me anyway.

Another thing that regular readers of this runnish will recall is that for a period of a considerable number of months a year or two ago a reasonably modern building was completely gutted, rebuilt and refurbished and the apartments were sold at … errr … something of a premium.

And so it’s not very impressive if they have had to call out the repairers to repair the door to the building’s garage when the paint is only just dry. It’s not what I would call confidence-building.

So I left them to it and carried on down the road without any further incident except narrowly avoiding being squidged by the schoolchildren stampeding out of school at home-time.

There’s another building site in the vicinity that’s attracted our attention of late. Well two, really, but I was looking at this one.

This is in the Kapucijnenvoer and backs onto the Zongang, and it was only when I noticed the fine building at the back of the site that I realised that something has gone from the ploy. But we saw them clearing the site a month ago and now something is springing up like a mushroom on the site.

So it’s not every Belgian (or French) building company that takes its time. Some of them can really crack on. Although I shall probably need reminding that I said that in 6 months time

One site that has held our attention for quite a long time – far longer than really it ought – is the demolition of St Pieter’s hospital here in the Brusselsestraat.

Now that all of the superstructure had finally bitten the dust (and quite literally too) I was intrigued to see where they would be going next. And the answer to that is that they seem to be going down.

We’d noticed them doing something at an old cellar or something the other day, and today we can see that at some point they have dropped a digger down into there. Unfortunately it’s impossible to see what it’s doing.

Nut all of the rubble is being ground up into very small pieces and even into sand and there’s piles of the stuff all around, all heaped into nice big … errr … piles. So they are making quite an effort to tidy up the plac.

And in 6 months time I’ll probably regret saying that as well.

One thing that we have noticed over the last week or 10 days since we’ve been here has been the work that they have started at the junction of the Brusselsestraat, the Amerikalaan and the Franz Tielemanslaan.

They seem to be cracking along with this as well – not hanging about at all which is good news. Although I would have liked it so much more had they uncovered more of the River Dijle.

Climbing up the hill was killing me. It’s a long hill to climb and when I think of the hills in Granville that I have to negotiate and the trouble that I have in getting up this one, I’m not looking at all forward to going home.

Halfway up is the ice-cream place and already having stopped once or twice to catch my breath (something that I have never done before) it’s a case of third time lucky and I grabbed an ice cream. I may as well take advantage of my rest-stops while I can.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that a feature that runs through these pages is me taking photos of people taking photos.

We’ve graduated beyond there on numerous occasions, such as today in this shot where there’s a guy taking moving pictures of the events taking place in the Tiensestraat. And I’m not sure what it is that he finds so interesting because I couldn’t see anything.

When I knew that I was to leave hospital I’d telephoned the guy who runs the place where I stay to see if he had a room. Better than that, he had my previous room with all of my food still in it. And as I had the key, nothing could be better. I came in here and flaked out completely.

A little later I summoned up the energy to nip to the Spar supermarket down the road here for a handful of things and now I think that I have everything to last me until Monday morning. I was going to go home on Sunday but there are rail issues holding things up around Paris and I can’t stomach the bus trip.

The Covid test that I had before I left the hospital is valid until Monday afternoon so I’m staying here for the weekend and coming home on the Monday after a weekend’s rest.

Now that Alison has been to check up on my and I’ve written my notes, I can go to bed. I’m whacked and if I don’t improve over the weekend I’ll be going back to the hospital on Monday morning.

Saturday 22nd May 2021 – AND NOW I KNOW …

… why I’m here in the hospital right now.

They gave me a blood test he other day and the count was 7.6. That’s well below the critical limit of 8.0 and represents quite a dramatic drop from the last test that I had 4 weeks ago.

This will explain a lot about my behaviour over the last couple of weeks and also explains why I’m here. The drop has been so dramatic that they are quite concerned.

As an aside – that’s why I write so much about my health and how am feeling – so that I can look back and compare my results with how I’m feeling and it gives me some kind of guide to how I’m doing.

This morning I was allowed something of a lie-in, and I found out why, and that was because I needed an ecograph and a stomach x-ray and for that I needed an empty stomach. And so no breakfast for me. Tomorrow we’ll have a 06:30 start, despite it being a Sunday.

And another thing too, in that the girl who gave me the ecograph can run her apparatus all over my thorax any time she likes too. Not for nothing have I chosen to be in a University Teaching Hospital with loads of students examining my credentials.

Meanwhile, where had I been during the night? I had started off in London, trying to get back to Aunt Mary’s. I didn’t know which way to go. I was going to get on any train and work my way around because the metro stations were just so packed with people and even I was having to wait on the stairs until the platform was cleared. Finalltya train pulled in but I couldn’t get on that one. The next one pulled and it was a Northern Line train. It didn’t go into the City at all. It went around the top of the town and I was trying to work out where I could change. I noticed that it crossed the line that I wanted, cross the Northern Line so I had to alight at one station and walk to another one. I didn’t think that they would be far away even if they didn’t connect so I thought that I’d ask someone. There was this girl standing next to me and I asked her. She looked at me and said “why did you ask me? Why didn’t you ask someone else?”. She said that she didn’t know. I think she thought that I was trying to chat her up, which I probably was, but anyway … I asked someone else, a couple of others on the train but they didn’t know. The girl said that she knew a woman and the woman explained roughly how to get there. It was only a 5-minute walk so it didn’t make any problem of mine. The girl asked where I was going so I told her. I said that my aunt lived near there. She said “ohhh la la, plenty of money there!”. I had a laugh and a smile. She said “I hope that you’ll be OK there” and “watch out when you are out on your bike” everything like that, teasing, because people who live near my aunt have piles of money – it was well-known as an area that was well-off so she was having a good tease at me about it. I wondered what was going through her mind. It was a shame that I had to get off when I did and walk through a couple of streets to find this other metro station to take me to the one near my aunt’s

Later on there was something about playing tennis with an old woman. She said that she was 70 but she looked much older than that. She was hitch-hiking to a tennis court so I picked her up. She said she was off to Ellesmere Port so I left her at my friend’s at Neston but she didn’t have the red card that you needed so I don’t know how she was going to manage with that. She had some kind of illness too. I went on with this guy who I’d also picked up hitch-hiking. We parked and we walked somewhere around North London again and ended up at the supermarket. We didn’t go in, we just looked at all of the kids playing all around. I walked over to the river where there used to be a bridge that had fallen down. There were crowds of people hanging around and there were people jumping off the bridge onto the sand about 60 feet below. They were braver then me. They would jump It was a hilly outcrop, one or two of them would get on the hilly outcrop and then spring forward again. others would go straight down in a variety of gymnastic positions until they hit the ground. But there wasn’t much room as there were lots of rocks that had fallen there. They had to land on the sand between the rocks and from 60 feet up, doing that wasn’t easy. This guy came over to me and said goodbye. he explained that the thing with boring people is that they don’t really make life interesting etc but “you were very interesting” he said “even though I wasn’t very keen on what you were saying or doing, you made it sound quite interesting so that made it an enjoyable time”. I thanked him and he disappeared.

Some time later they came along with a pouch of blood and I was given a blood transfusion. We’ll see what good that does me.

But there are many more tests planned for me during the next couple of days so I dunno about that. By the time that they finish their tests and give me a report, I’ll probably need another blood transfusion.

This afternoon in between the interruptions I brought the blog up to date and then later I settled down to watch the football. Barry Town were entertaining Caernarfon Town in the first of the playoff matches for the vacant Welsh place in the European Cup next season.

Barry is a team that is technically so much better but the players of Caernarfon have an extraordinary team spirit and actually play like a team.

And that was how things went in the game. Barry pressed forward relentlessly in the earlier part of the game but Caernarfon looked quite dangerous on the break. And they took advantage when Mike Lewis in the Barry goal got his foot to stop a dangerous shot on goal but could could only divert it into the path of Mike Hayes who buried it in the back of the net.

Their lead didn’t last long though. From a corner a Barry Town header hit a Caernarfon defender and the ricochet completely flat-footed Tyler French in he Caernarfon goal.

In the second half Barry Town pushed forward but were caught by a beautiful ball by Jack Kenny into space over the top of the Barry defence was pounced upon by Mike Hayes who was quickest to the ball and he put a beautiful lob over the head of Mike Lewis into the net for the second goal.

Barry Town threw everything at Caernarfon but the Caernarfon defence stood firm and deep in stoppage time with everyone up in the Caernarfon penalty area looking for the equaliser, Caernarfon caught them again and Jake Bickerstaff ran almost the full length of the field to score a third.

Later on I had a video chat with Alison but now I’m off to bed. It might be early but tomorrow is Sunday and a Day of Rest when I usually have a lie-in. But with a 06:30 start, I need to totter off now.

Friday 11th October 2019 – REMEMBER YESTERDAY …

… when I wrote about the evil (because there is no other word to describe it) humour in which I found myself?

Today I was rather hoping that I might have been over it, put it all behind me and moved on. But looking back over some of the stuff that I had written in an internet debate this morning, that’s clearly not the case because much of what I wrote, even though it reflected my true feelings, can best be described as “incendiary”.

It’s no surprise either because there was that much turmoil going on in my head that even at 01:30 the thought of going to bed hadn’t even occurred to me. I spent most of the night wide-awake.

There was some sleep of some kind though, because there are one or two items on the dictaphone. And when I get round to listening to them, it should be extremely interesting to say the least.

The alarms went off at the usual time but I didn’t. 07:15 again for me and this is getting monotonous. The school run too this morning and for a change I had Hannah’s Golf diesel.

So that’s now everything around here that I have driven at one time or another, and my favourite is still Rachel’s Golf estate, although the VWs are far too low for me and difficult to get out of.

Rushed off our feet again today. The place is closed for the weekend and on Monday so everyone wanted their supplies and work done today. I ended up shunting cars around, hauling bags of feed about and going to the bank.

And I’m right about tiredness too. Despite my dreadful night I kept on going all day with only a brief pause, not like yesterday when I was stark out. I was expecting to be much more exhausted today.

Excitement up on the railway line at the back of the depot. The old station was formerly a tractor-pulling venue but it’s up for sale. It seems that the fixtures and fittings have been sold and there were people up there dismantling the grandstand in order to move it to Grand Falls.

This evening there was just Darren and me. He had an omelette and I found some leftover vegan meatloaf in the fridge, followed by apple crumble.

later, I was reviewing some postings from my Arctic voyage. A few (well, one particular) memory came flooding back to me and so I decided to listen to some music to distract me and to soothe my fevered brow. It wasn’t a particularly good choice though. I played Colosseum Live, which will forever be associated in my brain with late, dark, cold nights on board The Good Ship Ve … errr … Ocean Endeavour in the High Arctic, and that is exactly what I’m trying to put out of my mind.

Yes, events in the High Arctic have scarred me somewhat and I can’t chase them out of my mind. It’s all very well listening to Joachim du Bellay and that I should be “Heureux qui comme Ulysse a fait un beau voyage”, I’m more inclined right now to the words of the Duke of Marlborough who, on his way to fight at (thinks) Malplaquet, said “God knows I go with a heavy heart, for I have no hope of doing anything considerable”. Or even John Major’s legendary “When your back’s against the wall it’s time to turn round and fight”.

On that note, I’ll go to bed, I reckon. I’ve had a hard couple of days now that demons whom I thought that I had laid have now come back to haunt me. I have to remember, I suppose, that today I really should have been in hospital having a blood transfusion – having already missed three. Bit I’m missing this one too.

Who knows what state I’ll be in when I finally return home?

Perhaps I need some more music
All of the sudden she disappears
just yesterday she was here
somebody tell me if I am sleeping
someone should be with me here
I wanna be the last thing you hear when you’re falling asleep….

Monday 7th October 2019 – JUST LIKE OLD TIMES!

Just pulling into the yard this evening with Amber after picking her up after cheerleading practice when Rachel stuck her head out of the door
“Could you go down to the tyre depot and pick up Darren?”

So I dropped off my passenger and headed off to my next job, musing that I ought to fit a meter under Strider’s dashboard and a taxi sign on the roof. When I sold my taxi business in 1989 I thought that I had put this kind of thing well-and-truly to bed.

But no. It was just like old times.

However, if anyone thinks that I’m complaining or that I’m unhappy about it, then that’s far from the truth. I was actually enjoying myself being out and about, especially with some decent music churning away on Strider’s hi-fi.

Actually, one of my old Mancunian acquaintances had made an appearance on my playlist. And as I listened to the words, I realised that they are really quite appropriate to the situation in which I have found myself these days as I struggle with my illness and events associated with it all.

The killer lives inside me: yes, I can feel him move
Sometimes he’s lightly sleeping in the quiet of his room
But then his eyes will rise and stare through mine;
He’ll speak my words and slice my mind inside
Yes the killer lives

Angels live inside me: I can feel them smile…
Their presence strokes and soothes the tempest in my mind
And their love can heal the wounds that I have wrought
They watch me as I go to fall – well, I know I shall be caught
While the angels live

And I too, live inside me and very often don’t know who I am
I know I’m not a hero, but I hope that I’m not damned:
I’m just a man, and killers, angels, all are me:
Dictators, saviours, refugees in war and peace
As long as Man lives…

Because, make no mistake, I am starting to struggle now. I had a really miserable afternoon yesterday and even though I was in bed early and had (for once) a really decent night’s sleep, I wasn’t feeling much better.

Luckily the girls had a lift into school so that I could take things easy this morning. I was in no hurry to surface. I had some food for breakfast, and a coffee, and then a play around on the laptop doing some stuff.

Zoe had told me when she left that she hadn’t been able to find Cujo the Killer Cat, so before I left I tried to hunt her down so that I could put her in one of the rooms where there’s no alarm sensor.

45 minutes I spent trying to find that blasted cat and when I went to the front door to accept a huge parcel delivery, there she was sitting on the bonnet of Strider. Outside all the time!

For most of the day I’ve been running around western New Brunswick fetching parts. It’s been really busy at work today. What added to the confusion was that just as everyone had something important to do, we had a delivery of 72 winter tyres and they all needed sorting and stacking.

Not only that, I’ve been doing my salemanship efforts today. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I’m something of an expert in Ford Cortina Mk III, Mk IV and Mk V, having made my fortune with them when I ran my taxi company. There are one or two in North America and someone posted on a forum that he couldn’t find any tyres anywhere to fit them

This place where I’m working right now is like an Aladdin’s Cave of treasures dating back years so I had a good look around. And sure enough, there are a handful just the correct size stuck down the back of the depot. And so I put an advert on the appropriate forum.

Back here, still in the driving rainstorm, i went to the Post Office on the way home to post the letters and then came back for tea. Plenty of pasta left over from the weekend, and rice pudding left over from last week. A meal fit for a king.

And then out taxiing until late. Just like old times.

But that’s enough for tonight, I reckon. I’m going to bed and I’m hoping to sleep. I need to pull myself round if I can but then again it’s been almost four months since my last blood transfusion, which I’m supposed to have every four weeks.

But do I care? Of course not. I’ve had a good time. And who wants to lie in bed at home to sit and stare at the bedroom ceiling anyway?

Saturday 14th September 2019 – FOR THE FIRST …

… time in I don’t know how long (you can scroll back for yourself to see) I actually had a decent night’s sleep last night.

In bed by about 22:30, on the internet for a short while, and then away with the fairies.

A brief awakening and a trip down to corridor at some point during the night (I’ll have to cut out these evening tea-drinking sessions with Rachel) and that was that until the alarm went.

A look on the dictaphone showed me that there are two tracks on there that weren’t on there when I went to bed so clearly I had been on my travels during the night. But as for when and where and who with, you’ll have to wait until I find the time to transcribe them.

For a change I was up and about quite early which was just as well because I had work to do. Rachel had a stall at a craft fair at the ice rink so I went along to carry her stuff and mind the stall.

And among the interesting things to take place there was a woman from the Netherlands so I spent a good few minutes talking in Dutch (well, Flemish in my case) to her. I’m back in Leuven shortly for a blood transfusion so I need to keep up with my Flemish and practise it when I can.

We were hit by a torrential rainstorm, as I discovered when we went to reload the cars afterwards. A really miserable day in fact.

Strider and I went on down to Woodstock afterwards to Sobeys for some more shopping. By the time we got to Woodstock we were half a million strong so it was rather crowded in his cab but we managed. And now we have enough food to make vegan pies and pizza as well as piles of other stuff – including some mixed fruit vegan sorbet.

Back home I crashed out for an hour or so and then made a lentil, pepper and mushroom spaghetti for the two of us vegans here. I made some home-made vegan garlic bread too, so our little visitor can’t complain that we are starving her.

Later that evening the two young girls went off to a friend’s for a sleepover, and Darren and Rachel had visitors over. Consequently I’m in my room working and playing guitar.

And I’m in luck! Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that when I bought this laptop it had the stupid Walmart IPOS splash screen on it that I was unable to move and Walmart was of no help.

You might recall that I was in BIOS mode the other day, so this evening I had another look deep into the bowels of the computer and, sure enough, the password that controls it is only recognised and functioning on the Windows interface.

Consequently, in BIOS mode, I could simply delete it without needing to know the password. Well, delete a few of the more important files such as the password files and then go back into Windows and use the “uninstall” function to remove the rest.

And it seems to have done the trick too, which is a big surprise to everyone, not just me. Anyone care to guess why the “techies” at Walmart couldn’t tell me that?

Tomorrow Strider and I have a settee to move for Zoe so, for a Sunday, it will be an early start. I’m hoping for a good sleep so that I’ll be on form.

But two good nights in a row is being rather optimistic, especially as Rachel and I have just had another cup of tea. Tomorrow, if I were a Native American, you would probably find me drowned in my own teepee.

Thursday 15th February 2018 – THAT’S NOT SUCH GOOD NEWS

My blood count is now down to the critical level – almost.

It should be between 13.0 and 15.0 as you know, but recently it’s been hovering round about the 9.2 mark.

8.0 is the critical amount when the emergency services swing into action, and today it’s down to 8.2.

This should come as no surprise to anyone who has been following my adventures over the last few weeks. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I was quite ill over Christmas and New Year and I’m still not back up yet.

So that plan now is that I’m going to have to undergo a series of blood transfusions – one per month in fact, for the next 6 months “and then we’ll see”.

That’s going to disrupt all of my plans.

Last night the old plan worked a charm. I took the laptop with me to bed to watch a Bulldog Drummond film in bed. And I managed about 10 minutes of it before I was away with the fairies.

And off on my travels too. Quite literally. I’d moved house and was living in a completely different town. And a letter came from one of the other inhabitants of my old place telling me how she knew about my relationship with the postwoman. I took hours to craft a very non-committal reply and was on the point of sending it when I thought to myself that it was easily open to misinterpretation nevertheless, and the easiest way to deal with the matter, seeing as whatever had happened in the past was to totally ignore the letter. And so I did. And instead I went for a walk and much to my surprise at the end of the High Street, which I hadn’t explored before, the road took a steep drop down to a nice bay where there were crowds of people having fun in the water. I went off for a look around and ended up on a grassy bank. Somehow I wasn’t able to reach the water at all.

Just for a change I was up quite early, and with no medication (because I had forgotten it as you know) I had an early breakfast and then a shower. And while I was under there I washed my clothes too.

After doing a few things I hit the streets and the shops. But I found another part of the old city walls that I hadn’t discovered previously, and so I followed them around for a while.

First stop was Kruidvat for some gelatine-free sweets, and then to the cheap shops like Zeeman and Wibra for a new jumper, but there was nothing doing.

At Sports Direct though, there were some more of the trousers that I like, but also some good-quality jumpers at a reduced price of €14:00 each, or 2 for €24:00. So they disappeared into my backpack along with a couple of pairs of trousers.

On the way up to the hospital I stopped at the bar to see if the guy who runs it whom I know was there, but he wasn’t. So I went on my way up the hill – very slowly.

You know what happened at the hospital because I told you just now, and then a very depressed and fed-up me headed into town. Alison wasn’t ready so I went for a coffee until she appeared.

We went to la Cucaracha and had another Mexican like last time, which was just as delicious, and then round for a coffee.

Afterwards she drove me back here which was very kind of her, and that’s my day finished.

It’s all so disappointing, but so what? I just have to get on with it. No point in brooding on it. Just like the defendant who found out that the judge of his case was only four feet tall – “these little things are sent to try us”.

Monday 18th July 2016 – I WENT TO THE HOSPITAL …

… this morning, and just for a change, seeing as how I’m not too well, I went up on the bus. I definitely can’t be feeling up to it if I’m having to travel by bus and spend €1:40.

Just for a change I’d had the best night’s sleep that I’d had for ages. Apart from one trip down the corridor, I was out like a light until the alarm went off at 07:00, and then promptly went back to sleep until the alarm went off again at 07:15.

I’d been on my travels too. Back driving a coach tour along the North Cornwall coast. The holiday had come to an end and we were ready to go home. The advertised way was down across the county to Exeter and then up the M5, but the prettier way, even if it was a longer way, was along the coast and so I asked the passengers if they would like to go that way. Many of the passengers had been with me last year when we had gone along the coast too. They were having a discussion about that and so I decided to move the coach off to a safer spot. However I had a hell of a time getting the coach to start and when it finally did start there were clouds of white smoke everywhere and the coach wouldn’t accelerate. This was a bad start to the final day’s holiday and I was hoping that the passengers hadn’t noticed.

I had another go at having a decent breakfast ready for my long day, but I ended up leaving half of it. I’m still not up to it, I reckon. And it was scorching outside, even at 08:00. I’m glad that I had decided to take the bus.

At the check-in at the day care centre I was taken by surprise. I was sent straight to a little room instead of having to go through all of the preliminaries downstairs. That didn’t sound too good. And I had a nurse who had exactly the same accent as Goldmember. That was worrying too. She fitted me with a drain and took a blood sample. And I have to give a urine sample too and that’s taking the p155.

My weight has gone down by 3kgs, which is probably normal seeing as how little I’ve been eating just recently.

The Doctor came to see me – not Hermione unfortunately – but the other one and we had a good time discussing everything that has been going on with me just recently. She’ll know more when she has the results of the blood test later today but to her it sounds as if I have caught an infection and it will soon pass through. I hope that she’s right.

She did however send me to have my chest x-rayed. Done on the spot!

Strangely enough, in between the blood test and the visit of the doctor, I’d suddenly started to feel so much better. How is that for an irony? I managed the soup and bread for lunch, as well as a large packet of crisps that Alison had bought me and which I’d taken along for emergencies.

The perfusion was ready quite quickly and didn’t take long. By about 14:45 it was all finished. The doctor came back with a prescription for the medication that I had finished off, and told me some good news. My blood count is 10.0 – exactly the same as it was 2 weeks ago. And given all that I’ve done and all that I’ve been through this last 2 weeks, that’s quite impressive. I’m very pleased with that.

And when was the last time that I have had a blood transfusion?

She told me that I do have an infection too. She’s not too worried about it and it’s one of the things to which I’ll have to become accustomed giving the loss of my spleen, but she wants me back next week (instead of in two weeks time) to see what is happening.

She did offer me the chance to stay at the hospital. Had I been living anywhere else that I had during the last three months, I might well have taken her up on it. But I’m comparatively comfortable here so I decided to come back home. I must be feeling better.

Having paid the odd account or two, I set off home – on foot too – and ended up in town at the supermarket buying a few bits and pieces. I’ve even eaten tonight – nothing special or exotic but proper food. And three good meals too.

And not only that – it’s now 23:45 and I’m still awake and not in the least but tired despite my full, exhausting day.

Things are looking up.

Ans we’ve had more excitement in Parliament today. During the debate on the new Trident replacement, the new Prime Minister, Theresa May, attacked Green MP Caroline Lucas for speaking against the proposals, saying that Lucas was “defending the UK’s enemies”.

Now have a close look at this speech – “Naturally the common people don’t want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”

Did you notice the bit about “denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger” which has clearly influenced Theresa May’s speech? The speech that I quoted just now was one given by none other than Hermann Goering.

Having had the B Liar paraphrasing the Nazi speeches during his period in office, it looks now as if we’ve got yet more Nazi clones in charge in Drowning Street.

That’s a frightening thought now, isn’t it? Or were we all expecting it?

Wednesday 13th July 2016 – I’M BACK …

… in Leuven. My stay back in France didn’t last too long, did it?

I had another good sleep, only having to leave the bed once. Well, twice actually, but seeing that the second time was 05:50, just 10 minutes before the alarm was due to go off, I didn’t bother going back downstairs. Instead, I dressed and went down to make breakfast.

By the time that I had done that, made my butties for lunch and had a shower and change of clothes, it was 07:10 and Terry was ready so we hit the road.

It was a beautiful drive right across France to the Rhône valley and Lyon, and we were there on the outskirts of the city by 09:20. The next 6 kilometres was a different proposition. With the traffic queue that we encountered and then the changes to Lyon’s road network that weren’t shown on Terry’s Satnav, it was 10:10 when we arrived at the station. It’s a good job that we had allowed plenty of time for the journey.

There was however plenty of time for a coffee as the TGV was late arriving. 11:00 was the time of departure, but we finally set off at 11:25. We stopped at Marne la Vallée, Paris Charles de Gaulle and Lille as I expected, but also at Haute-Picardie and Arras which I hadn’t realised. Consequently it was 15:30 when we pulled into Bruxelles-Midi.

The journey wasn’t boring though. I did a pile of work on my website, though and I was sitting next to a woman whose father was born in Les Ancizes. We had a lengthy chat about the Auvergne, and she and I set the world to right about the Brexit. It’s not very often that I meet someone who thinks along my lines.

A brief amount of excitement at Bruxelles-Midi was when I bought my ticket for my onward trip to Leuven. I used one of the automatic machines and I received my ticket, plus one from the previous passenger who had clearly forgotten to pick it up. I had to find an information booth to leave it there.

15:56 was my train to Leuven, and by 16:30 I was there on the station. And it was pouring down too. It started almost as soon as we arrived at Charles de Gaulle and had continued for almost all the way. Typical Northern French and Belgian weather.

It soon brightened up though and so I set off for my place of residence. Half an hour’s brisk walk it took me to arrive here and that was carrying a large bag too. That made me think how much my health must have improved. I would never have done this two or three months ago, and round about now i ought to be experiencing a collapsed blood count and expecting a blood transfusion instead.

It’s nice to be back in my little room again, even if I am moving on to another room tomorrow. I grabbed a coffee and sat down for a relax. Tea was rice with lentils peas and carrots and it was delicious too. I must remember to buy some more boulghour tomorrow.

Now, I’m going to have an early night. After my marathon voyage today, I reckon that I’ve earned it.

Monday20th June 2016 – I SUPPOSE THAT YOU ARE ALL WONDERING …

… what the outcome of my visit to the hospital today was.

Firstly, no danger of my being late for the appointment, for I was wide-awake at 05:30 this morning and surfing the internet, for want of anything special to do. I had a leisurely breakfast and then, making an executive decision, I set off to the hospital in plenty of time without my rain jacket, seeing as how the day looked as if it might just be promising. And how I regretted that decision on the way home, when I had to brave a rainstorm to return to my tiny garret.

First person that I saw after registering was my doctor. She told me that the bone-marrow sample showed no trace of any illness having spread into there and so they too were making an executive decision – which was to definitively stop the chemotherapy. That’s good news as far as I am concerned. Instead, they are going to try another type of treatment and see what effect that has, as well as giving me a medicament that will stimulate the red blood cells.

The nurse then came and dragged me into a little cubicle where she took my blood pressure and pulse, and fitted me with a drain to my chemotherapy port. Once that had been done, she took a blood sample.

An hour or two later I was led to a little private ward where they coupled up three perfusions to me. One was the aforementioned stimulant, the second was a steroid and the third one was some kind of medication. They were all connected to me via a metering machine and I had to ring them every half hour so that they would come and increase the speed.

10 minutes later the doctor came to find me, to tell me what they were going to do to me, but she told me that she wouldn’t bother, seeing that they were already doing it. But the good news is that my blood count, a good week after the last transfusion, is at 9.3 and it’s a long time since it’s been this high. And so no blood transfusion this week.

It was round about 18:00 that I was thrown out of the hospital so I went to check on Caliburn, give him a couple of laps around the car park to warm him up, and park him in a different place so that it looks as if he’s doing something. Plenty of space on the car park at that time, so I reckon that if I decide to move him, I’ll have to keep him out all day until the evening when I can take him back.

I’m running short of socks and undies here so I fetched some more down, and I also meant to bring some more foodstuffs, but I forgot. And how I wish that I had remembered, as I have no small tins of mushrooms or vegetables to pack out the remains of Saturday’s Indian meal. I had to use plain rice and a stock cube instead.

So with my next appointment now in two weeks’ time, I can relax for a while and not worry too much. But I’ll be intrigued to see what my blood count will be when I go back.

-1

EPIC HALL

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

Tag Archives: blood transfusion

Wednesday 20th December 2023 – TODAY I HAVE HAD …

Tuesday 19th December 2023 – THE GOOD NEWS…

Thursday 2nd March 2023 – JUST ONE LOOK …

Sunday 27th November 2022 – SO HAVING GONE …

Thursday 17th November 2022 – IT LOOKS AS IF …

Wednesday 9th November 2022 – WE HAVE HAD …

Friday 28th May 2021 – I HAVEN’T BEEN …

Saturday 22nd May 2021 – AND NOW I KNOW …

Friday 11th October 2019 – REMEMBER YESTERDAY …

Monday 7th October 2019 – JUST LIKE OLD TIMES!

Saturday 14th September 2019 – FOR THE FIRST …

Thursday 15th February 2018 – THAT’S NOT SUCH GOOD NEWS

Monday 18th July 2016 – I WENT TO THE HOSPITAL …

Wednesday 13th July 2016 – I’M BACK …

Monday20th June 2016 – I SUPPOSE THAT YOU ARE ALL WONDERING …

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