Blood count is down. And protein loss is up. The result of all of that is that I have to go back in just two weeks.
This is a bitter blow to me of course. I need to move on and do things, and I was hoping for six months – or even three months would have done me. But not two weeks.
But I’m not surprised, because I had a horrible night.
I wasn’t in bed all that early, and even so I just couldn’t drop off at all. I gave up trying to sleep at 05:45 and started to read a book – and that had the desired effect, albeit 6 hours too late. It really was a struggle to crawl out of bed at 07:15.
And despite the small amount of sleep, I’m managed to go a-wandering. I was in a car driving down a lane and ended up crossing two railway lines, about 40 yards apart. I’d always believed that they were simply each track of a double-track line built by someone with a sense of humour, but the book that I bought on Sunday in Montreal convinced me that these were just another set of “parallel lines” laid by the Canadian Pacific Railway and the Canadian Northern Railway during the Canadian Great Railway Wars.
It’s funny how, even when I was asleep, I was able to think along logical lines like this, because it’s perfectly true. If you think that the Railway Wars between companies in the UK was savage, vicious and extremely wasteful, you haven’t seen anything until you read about what took place between the Canadian Pacific, the Canadian Nothern and the Grand Trunk Railroad. The useless infighting and unnecessary duplication of routes cost Canada millions of dollars and bankrupted a couple of the companies for no good purpose.
And so at 07:15 I crawled out of bed, at 07:30 I crawled out of the shower (so much for thinking that it would do me some good) and by 07:45 I was crammed like a sardine along with about 500 other people into an articulated bus, having grabbed a coffee on the way. I was decanted out at St Rafael so that I could go down to Caliburn to drop off the stuff that I had bought yesterday.
Having left all of my vegan cheese behind (that’s bad planning if they had decided to keep me in) I then boarded the wrong bus that led off in a completely different direction. I ended up having rather a long walk.
At the hospital, I had my blood test and a chat with the doctor. 2 hours later, the doctor came to see me. “It’s about yuor blood test …” she began. That sounded ominous, and no mistake. But she carried on to say that the blood testing machine had broken down and I would have to hang around for the results. Clogged up with root beer and maple syrup, I reckon.
Kaatje the Social Services girl came for a chat and I had to fill in a form. And having spent most of the morning reading Lord of the Rings
Anyway, I managed just about to keep awake during the afternoon and about 16:30 they came back with the bad news.
With that ringing around in my ears, I went downstairs for a coffee and to make a phone call. And so here I am – back in the hostel where I stayed during the summer. There was a room available – not at the same good price that I was offered last time unfortunately – and so I took it. It’s cheaper that going back home and coming straight back and far less stressful. Stress – or the elimination of it – is quite important.
I set off for the hostel but within 20 minutes I was back in the Day Centre. Bane of Britain has, once again, gone off with his catheter still plugged in. You couldn’t make this up, could you?
And it’s good to be back on familiar territory with no pain at all. And I can have my old room back on Monday too. In the meantime, this one will do. I settled down for a while and then a bit later nipped down the road for a falafel butty for tea. I’ll rescue all of my supplies from Caliburn tomorrow.
Having organised that, I’m off to bed. Nice and early. Remember that I had a bad night last night.
