Tag Archives: linda mccartney

Monday 13th February 2017 – IT GOES FROM ONE EXTREME …

… to another, doesn’t it?

Saturday night, I had one of the best nights’ sleeps that I have had for ages. Last night was one of the worst. Still awake at 03:00 and a long way from sleep. All of this was very sad.

But go to sleep I did, and I remember nothing of any travels, except the usual 06:00 awakening, the 06:30 awakening and then my 07:00 alarm going off. And they had forgotten to bring the breakfast around this morning so it was very short commons.

Back down here, I went back to sleep and that was where I stayed until 09:30. And having sorted out an issue that I was having with the laptop and some kind of bug that it had picked up, I got down to work. I did some tidying up, a pile of paperwork was sorted, some of which was thrown out and the rest neatly filed away in the binder that I had remembered to bring with me.

For a change, I didn’t have lunch either. I wasn’t feeling hungry. I just ate some fruit as well. And seeing as the cleaner was in here today, I wanted to vacuum the laptops here to clean out the keyboards. He wouldn’t let me use it but did it himself, including the screen which now has four scratches and I’m really disappointed about that.

A little later I went for a walk in the sunshine down to Caliburn. I took a few of the black plastic boxes down there, started him up and ran him for 15 minutes while I sorted out another pile of stuff down there that needs to be dealt with here.

And I found two bank cards for which I had had been searching. That has got me back up and running now, as I have a few things that need to be dealt with.

Another crashing-out was called for afterwards, and then I made tea. Potatoes, carrots, green beans, gravy and the last of my vegan pies. And just for a change it was all cooked to perfection. I still had one of those fresh fruit packs left over from the weekend so that did me for pudding. I’ll be starting on the ice cream and pineapples tomorrow.

So now we’ll have another early night. Hopefully I can do better than last night as I have paperwork to deal with and issues to resolve.

I hope that it works for me.

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Friday 10th February 2017 – I CAME BACK TO BELGIUM …

… for the good of my health, but it’s not working out quite like that. It’s not doing my pulse rate and heartbeat much good, but that won’t stop me going out for a walk to take the air around the town on another occasion round about University chucking-out time, that’s for sure.

In fact, we got off to a good start – I stepped out of the front door and almost bowled a young schoolgirl straight into the centre of the road. She gave me such a beautiful smile that it cheered me right up for the rest of the day. I had a nice smile from the pharmacist too (not my usual one) as I picked up my next supply of medication, and then I hit the streets.

Last night, in order to get off to sleep early, I watched a film on the laptop. But that didn’t work, just for a change. Mind you, it wasn’t a Bulldog Drummond film so that might explain it. And then we had the usual awakening in the middle of the night and a couple of rude awakenings as people started to stir around here.

During the night, I’d been on my travels. I was having to prepare a thesis to be read out in front of an examining board and I wasn’t all that enthused about the subject that I had to present. On the other hand my friend June has to prepare her thesis on “travel” and she was saying to our mutual friend Krys that it was a shame that I wan’t presenting it because it was a subject that I clearly enjoyed. There was a cabbage that featured somewhere in this story too but I’ve no idea where and why now.

There were only three of us at breakfast but others had clearly been before us as we’d run out of orange juice and other stuff too. And then I came back down here to go back to sleep for a while. When I awoke, I went for a shower, a change of clothes and this led to a shave, and even … shock! horroh! … a haircut.

And I’m glad that I prettied myself up because they came to change the bed linen. So I’m all nice and clean everywhere tonight.While they were doing that, I went out for my baguette.

After lunch, I had another snooze but it was only for about another hour or so. And then – I made an executive decision. I don’t have enough trousers here and this is causing issues. In fact, in the shower I washed one of my pairs. But then I decided that maybe I ought to do something about this, and so I hit the streets as I said just now.

C and A had nothing, and so I went to the Sports shop where I bought my new shoes at the end of Autumn. Two pairs of decent trousers of the kind and of the material that I like, and reduced on special offer to €11:50 each. That’s more than I pay in Montlucon but it can’t be helped.

On the way back, I kept on tripping over college girls. Yes, I’ll come out again at this time of afternoon.

Tonight’s tea was vegan pie, beans, carrots, boiled potatoes and gravy. Totally delicious. A chat on the internet with Liz too.

And so we’ll try to have an early night again tonight. I hope that I’ll feel even better tomorrow. But there are no girls out there to cheer me up.

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Sunday 29th January 2017 – WHAT A NICE …

… afternoon!

Alison sent me a message – “I’m going to the English Shop. Do you need anything?”

My reply was simple and to the point. “Why don’t I come with you?”

And so Alison came to pick meup and we went off to the shop. I came back with vegan sausages, vegan pies, dandelion and burdock pop and some Bombay mix. So that’s me set up for the next few weeks, isn’t it? The pies out there are delicious and go down well with spuds and veg. But I also have more kidney bean stuff and a pizza to eat too, so I’m not short of food.

After that, we went for a coffee and then for a meal. We tried a new fritkot as the usual one is undergoing renovation and … shock! horror! the guy in there knows me from somewhere. Dunno where, but he greeted me like a long-lost friend, and that’s uncomfortable. And he made a reference to where we had met but he spoke so fast that I didn’t understand it.

Last night, I had a good sleep – for a change. I tried the usual tactic of watching a Bulldog Drummond film in bed. And that was me stark out. I’d been on my travels too, to visit a couple that I know on the Wirral. But they had moved house and were living on the ground floor in a terraced house. It seemed that they only had one room – I asked about upstairs and they said that this was a different flat, and as for the other room, this was lived in by a girl who had some kind of unusual attachment to the male person in this couple. In fact, all-in-all, I know someone – or two people in fact – who would be very uncomfortable with the significance of this dream.

The trouble with going to bed early and crashing stark out is that you wake up early. And I was awake long before 06:00 too. but I didn’t go up for breakfast until the usual 07:00. I was on my own up there too.

And to my dismay I found that I’d forgotten my loaf yesterday. I had to go out and buy a baguette and even at 08:30 they had sold out. I had to have bread rolls instead.

But this morning has been busy. Editing a pile of photos and a few blog entries, discussing a few things with friends on the internet and watching a football match on the internet from yesterday.

So now, let’s try another Bulldog Drummond film. See if this sends me off to sleep. After all, it’s hospital tomorrow!

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Wednesday 11th January 2017 – WHAT A BAD NIGHT!

Just as I said, I was in bed early last night, and was soon asleep. But then I awoke at about 00:45 when a noise on the radio awoke me, so I switched off the laptop and went back to sleep.

And then it all happened.

All I can say is that I must have had a nightmare, because I had one of those dreams that was extremely disturbing and which made me sit bolt upright. and it wasn’t just the fact of the dream either but the person who was the central character and all of the people who surrounded her. It was such a graphic, disturbing dream that I couldn’t go back to sleep and ended up typing it up on the laptop to make sure that I didn’t forget it.

But I must have gone back to sleep because the alarm awoke me at 07:00, and for some reason we had a most astonishing cacophony from the church bells and I’m not quite sure why. But never mind anyone else in the building, it probably would have awoken the dead too.

At breakfast I was on my own, and then I came back down here to carry on with my research. I started to read the report of that Finnish expedition to Labrador. And it’s come up with a couple of interesting facts.

  1. There’s a lengthy discussion of the Churchill Falls and the Bowdoin Canyon into which the Falls descends. A huge pile of statistics that will be of great interest when I start to write about my trip out in the Wilderness of Labrador to visit the Falls
  2. Even more interestingly, you need to remember that this is the period 1937-1939, long before the discovery of the Norse remains at L’Anse aux Meadows on Newfoundland. And yet there’s a map in the preface of this expedition’s report where they discuss the Norse settlement of Newfoundland, and as far as the small scale of the map can isolate, the expedition places Vinland in round about the same area that Helge Ingstad discovered the Norse remains (although Ingstad hesitates to identify them as “Vinland” and as you already know, I don’t think that it corresponds at all with the description given in the Norse Sagas). It’s a little-known fact that L’Anse aux Meadows was identified in 1914 as the location of “Vinland” by an insurance agent and amateur historian called William A Munn in his book “Wineland voyages;: Location of Helluland, Markland, and Vinland”, but Munn isn’t listed as a source by the Expedition, and so I’m now more intrigued than ever before about the source of this Expedition’s information about the location

Just before lunch I went out to the supermarket on the corner for a baguette and came back with a black plastic box as well – another one in the waste bin and I now have a dozen of them ready for packing, whenever that might be.
And I also had a major crash-out this afternoon too, but that’s hardly a surprise.

Tea was delicious – potatoes, carrots, broccoli, gravy and a vegan Linda McCartney pie. That was the best meal that I’ve had for quite a while. And my djervushka from the Ukraine was there too. I have to make the most of my time with her because she’s leaving on Friday, having found a studio for herself. I wonder if she needs a flatmate?

And there are more new people here too – but I’ve not had the pleasure of their company as yet.

Tonight I’m looking forward to my bed. As well as having a shower and a shave, I have a clean bedroom and fresh bedding. I’m all set up for a good night’s sleep but whether or not I’ll have one is another thing.

Who – or what – is going to interrupt me tonight then?

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Saturday 7th January 2017 – I HAD A NICE …

… afternoon out this afternoon. But before I tell you about that, let me tell you a little about the morning.

And it was a morning too because although I had an early night, I couldn’t drop off to sleep again. In the end I put on one of the films that I had downloaded from archive.org and as you might expect, that did the trick. In fact it did so well that I can’t now remember which film it was.

Nevertheless, I was awake before the alarm and although it took a good while to find the strength to leave the bed, I was up there quite early. And I wasn’t alone either because my housemate came up there. She left the house shortky afterwards and it seems that I am now on my own again.

snow kruisstraat leuven belgium january janvier 2017After breakfast I had a peek out of the window and sure enough, we did have another fall of snow during the night and early morning. It’s not a lot but just about half an inch or so and it’s freezing cold.

Minus 3°C in fact and heavily overcast. I was planning on going to watch the football this evening at Brussels, OH Leuven against Union St Gilles, but it didn’t look as if it would be hopeful.

But I did have a nice surprise. A message from Alison. She’s in town and so did I fancy a coffee?

Accordingly I went and had a shave and shower, and changed my undies. After all, I have to look my best and smell nice. And having accomplished that, I went off uptown in the freezing sleet to do my shopping.

The town was empty and there were only a few stalls on the market. And that wasn’t a surprise as the weather was thoroughly dreadful. I did my shopping at the Delhaize and that was all that I could stand. Freezing cold, with freezing hands, I came back here.

Alison and I had a coffee (or two) and then adjourned across the road to the fritkot for lunch. A bag of chips each did us proud, and then Alison came forward with a proposition. She needs a new ski-suit for a trip she’s planning and did I fancy going with her to help her choose?

We hit the road and headed for Wavre and the huge Decathlon sports shop. It was crowded with people, mainly kids preparing for the classe de neige. Although there was a huge selection of clothes, there was some kind of issues about sizes. Either very small or very large and very little in between, which was a disappointment for her.

There’s another big sports shop, the Intersport, at Herent on the other side of Leuven and so we headed off there, calling at the English Shop on the way where I could buy some more Dandelion and Burdock, some more Linda McCartney pies and, at long last, some vegan sausages. We stashed the pies and sausages in the freezer in the kitchen with the left-over croquettes, and then headed out to Herent.

They had some beautiful clothes there but as you might expect, the stuff that I liked and that Alison liked was by far the most expensive, and the more affordable ski clothes were, well, of …shall we say … lesser quality. Entertainment was provided by a two-year-old boy trying on a ski-suit and trying out the toboggans.

We went for a coffee afterwards and then Alison brought me home. By now it was too late, and too cold to think about going out to the football. I warmed up instead and then went for tea.

I’d remembered to buy the pasta so I had a second lot of my kidney bean stuff and, as I predicted, it was even nicer tonight. And now I’m going to have an early night and take advantage of the fact that I’m on my own.

But it was a really nice afternoon out – all in favour of a “change of ideas” every now and again and it’s always nice to be with friends. If I had more friends, I’d do this more often.

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Tuesday 20th December 2016 – I MADE SURE …

… that I dropped off early to sleep last night.

What I did was to do something that I hadn’t done for quite a while, and that was that I got into bed and started to watch a film on the laptop. Sure enough, after only about 10 minutes or so, I was off.

But if I ever lay my hands on whoever it was who left the building at 02:40 this morning, slamming the door behind them, they they will know about it. Because I didn’t go back to sleep afterwards.

And it was just as well because the girl in the room next door was up and about at 06:00 and she wasn’t exactly quiet either. But then you can’t pick your housemates, can you?

Anyway, I was in at breakfast at 07:00 and out by 07:30 and back down here at work.

Meanwhile, I forgot to tell you about a couple of things that happened to me at the hospital yesterday.

parking uz gasthuisberg leuven belgium december decembre 2016For the benefit of those who don’t speak French, the sign on the back of the Fiat van says “Please don’t park within 3 metres …” of the rear doors, to allow the rear doors to open to admit a wheelchair.

And so the car behind is parked within 1 metre of it – right outside the entrance to a hospital.

I went up to the driver and asked him if a sign has to be written in both official languages (French and Flemish) to be legal, but as you might expect, my comment went clear over his head.

As Alfred Hitchcock once said to Kenneth Williams “it’s a waste of time telling jokes to foreigners”, and reminds me of the spoof Open University course on “Understanding Irony”, which actually received several applicants.

But it’s a sad reflection of the selfish attitude of many Belgians, isn’t it?

But the second thing was even more unnerving.

I walked up to the reception desk and the woman looked at me and said “ahh, Mr Hall …” Yes, I’m even being recognised by the clerical staff in the hospital now. This is uncomfortable, isn’t it?

ginger beer dandelion and burdock vegan mince pies custard pies bombay mix, linda mccartney vegan pies bisto gravy browning english shop kortenberg bertem belgium december decembre 2016Another thing that I have forgotten to do is to post the photo of the stuff that I bought on Sunday at the English shop.

Working clockwise around, we have Linda McCartney vegan pies, a vegan Christmas pudding, Bisto vegan gravy browning, a bottle of ginger beer, a bottle of dandelion and burdock, a bag of Bombay mix, some custard powder and, pride of place, two boxes of vegan mince pies.

Now I’m all set up for Christmas.

Later this morning I went down to Caliburn to sort out some stuff to bring up here and then went down to the Carrefour. I came back with a baguette and some tomatoes, some seitan slices (for Christmas dinner), some potatoes, some carrots and some leeks as well as a couple of pots of fresh spices.

That was because, for tea, I had boiled potatoes with fresh mint, carrots with fresh rosemary, leeks and Linda McCartney vegan pie covered in thick Bisto gravy. It made such a change from my usual fare and it was absolutely delicious. It all worked out fine too, much better than my pizza did. I shall be doing more of this, as well as looking at the possibility of baked potatoes in the microwave here.

High time that I was organised.

This afternoon I crashed out for a while and also did some work on my web pages.

Another thing that I did was to walk into the (unlocked) bathroom just as my nubile next-door neighbour was wrapping herself in a towel after her shower. Serves her right for not closing the door!

So now we’ll have another go at an early night. And I’ll hope for better luck too.

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