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LIVE: Sunday 25th October 2026 – THIS WAS HOW …

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… a proper Sunday should be organised, and I enjoyed every minute of it, for a change.

Despite not finishing my notes and going to bed instead, it was by no means early when I hit the hay. It might not have been after midnight, but I bet that it wasn’t far off.

But never mind. Sunday is my Day of Rest and my aim was to sleep for as long as I could and be awoken by Isabelle the Nurse when she arrived, especially as today we were all treated to an extra hour in bed.

Although I awoke a couple of times during the night, I was soon asleep again, and it was indeed Isabelle the Nurse who awoke me when she came into my bedroom. I didn’t hear her ring the doorbell or open the front door to come in. Considering that I’m supposed to be a light sleeper, what use would I be if someone broke into my apartment overnight?

She gave me my anti-flu injection and then dealt with my legs and feet. Once they had been oiled and massaged, she had to hang around because there was a wait time of fifteen minutes to see that there were no unpleasant side-effects with this injection, so we had a cosy little chat about dialysis.

After she left, I raised myself from the Dead and went into the bathroom to sort myself out. Then, into the kitchen for breakfast – porridge, black coffee, juice for the morning medication and the last of my delicious home made apricot jam croissants. I’ll make some more like that next Sunday too.

While I was eating, I was reading some more of THE REPORT OF THE WOOLHOPE NATURALISTS CLUB 1867.

Today’s topic concerns a visit of the group to Llandrindod Wells, and the first item is that of salmon fishing. Apparently a bunch of salmon poachers had been arrested in the river there, and the leader of the group was lamenting the fact that these days, salmon in the upper reaches of the Wye and its tributaries were few and far between.

However, he tells us that "as we have lately seen new and wise fishery laws passed, giving a much better chance to the upper proprietors than they ever had before, by the removal of fixed engines, a weekly close time for nets, and the prohibition of all fishing by nets after the first of September—all which regulations are very much in their favour—we may hope now for a better spirit to prevail. We have heard from more than one member of the Board of Conservators that there is every disposition on their part to act in the fairest and most liberal manner to the upper proprietors, and on the other hand it is fair to expect that they, the upper proprietors, will assist all they can in protecting the breeding fish"

On the following page, he records with pleasure of "Sir J. Bailey’s fishing cottage, then by the Nydd and its far-famed salmon catch of Cavan Shwn Lewis, where it is said Mr Charles Stretton killed twelve fish in one day".

With equal pride, he adds that "A salmon was taken as high up as Newbridge by angling, 39.5 lbs., and several over 20 lbs., and at Holm Lacey, four miles below the city of Hereford, the monster fish of 56 lbs. was caught by the nets …. Two other salmon were caught at the same draught, one 11 lbs. and the other 12 lbs. Numbers of others, varying from 35 lbs to 15 lbs, have been taken, and this season the capture of a 25 lb fish has been an ordinary occurrence."

It seems very much to me that his supposed admiration of the “new and wise fishery laws” and his crocodile tears over the salmon being “few and far between” were really nothing more than window-dressing.

Back in here later, I attacked the outstanding notes, and they are now on line. They took quite a while to do because there was so much of them. I don’t know how, out of a boring day like yesterday, I could have written so much.

One thing that I noticed, though, was that it was warm in here. In fact, the thermometer was showing 23°C. Consequently, I turned all the heating off to let things cool down a little.

After the outstanding notes were on line, it was time for the disgusting drink and the midday medication, and then I was back in here transcribing the dictaphone notes.

I was mixed up with a group of people who were in all kinds of different things, like actors and so on. One or two of my friends had arranged for a weekend in Dublin. I thought that that would make a pleasant surprise for Nerina because it’s her birthday very soon. We all got down to making plans about it, and during the week, we ended up with about eighty-odd people. I mentioned to Nerina that we were going away for the weekend. When she asked where, and I replied “Dublin”, she went berserk and, for some totally unknown reason, completely lost her head about this idea. We had a huge row, which was complicated by the fact that I just couldn’t understand her reaction. Anyway, I went back to sort things out with my friends to see what they were doing and how they were going on, hoping that Nerina would cool down. However, she ended up taking a room in a really posh hotel in the immediate vicinity of where we were. Once we’d finalised all these details about Dublin, I went over to the hotel to see if she’d woken up yet, and the receptionist pointed outside, and Nerina was waiting by a set of traffic lights in Earle Street. I thought that from the position that she was in, she was not going to Dublin. I said “I suppose that you have finally decided not to go”. That triggered another huge argument. She said something like “I hope you have fun there”. I said “if you’re not going, then I’m not going, and we’ll go home”. “Right,” she said. “In that case, I’m not going home”, and stormed off. I was busy trying to scratch my head about all of this because I didn’t understand her totally unreasonable attitude about this.

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This is not an unreasonable dream because, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, we did have a travel club, a little group of us … "certainly nothing like eighty though" – ed … but it’s not been as active as it used to be since I lost the use of my legs and began dialysis.

Actually, in real life, the “traffic lights” were the zebra crossing in Earle Street between Tiko’s café and the Cheese Hall pub. However, there’s certainly no luxury hotel across the road from there. There’s a very cheap building with what used to be the old Victor Value supermarket and with government offices on top.

As for Nerina, it really was her in the dream. Her mother was Italian, and Nerina had inherited not only her mother’s cooking but also her mother’s Italian character. It took me a while to come to terms with her somewhat flamboyant emotional side, but once I’d understood the psychology behind it, I found that married life was refreshing and exciting, and, to be frank, since I’ve met other women afterwards, I really wish that things between Nerina and me had worked out better. Anyway, this dream went way, way beyond anything that I had ever experienced with her.

It’s hard to explain what was going on in this dream, but this was one of those rare dreams that seemed to be completely real when I was asleep. And although there is nothing in the dictated notes about this, I can still remember going with Nerina up a set of stairs over a shop to a small, candlelit restaurant with red furnishings and heavy dark oak furniture in the Victorian style, and also getting on board a train made up of individual carriages, although I was with just one other person on that train, who wasn’t Nerina.

And the bit about “busy trying to scratch my head about all of this” – this afternoon, I noticed a scab of some sort on the back of my head as if I had been scratching it so much that it had bled. That wasn’t there yesterday.

Later on, we had more football – this time it was the Scottish Cup between Stranraer and non-league Tayport, played in a monsoon at the bottom of a waterfall in a tornado.

Tayport played with the wind in the first half and made the most of it, going in 1-0 up at half-time.

But class will out in the long run, and in the second half, Stranraer scored three, with this site’s favourite forward, Robbie Foster, scoring one of them.

Greenock Morton’s game against Ayr United was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch.

While all of this was going on, my chatbot was busy researching music for me, and he came up with piles of interesting stuff. He’s done about two days worth of my research for me while I’ve been doing other things, and that’s one of the benefits of artificial intelligence. And based on what he’s found, this programme is going to be a really interesting one, I reckon.

Later on, it was time to go a-baking, and a sunflower-seed loaf was first on the agenda.

While the was proofing, I began to prepare the ingredients for the recipe for the aubergine and chilli whatsit that my chatbot found for me the other day. And after I’d added the sunflower seeds into the bread and left it to prove for a second time, I fried the onions, aubergine and garlic lightly and then tipped them and everything else into the slow cooker on “low”, where they will be festering all night.

The loaf was magnificent. It had risen the highest that I have ever had a loaf of bread rise, and it’s cooked to perfection. As for the stuff in the slow cooker, it tastes wonderful, although before I have a helping of it, I shall have to remember to put the toilet paper in the fridge first. It seems that the measurements for the chilli powder are somewhat exaggerated.

While the bread was cooking, I had a bite to eat – the first food on a Sunday night for ages. It was a small helping of this vegan chilli meal that was on special offer at Leclerc, with a generous helping of steamed vegetables tossed in butter. It was nice, but if it had been sold at full price, it would have been expensive for what it was.

So with the notes now written, there are just one or two more things to do, and then I’m off to bed, ready for dialysis tomorrow … "I don’t think" – ed … with the heating still switched off and the thermometer showing 18°C.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about playing football in heavy rain … "well, one of us has" – ed … I remember discussing a football match at (thinks) Llanberis several years ago which was postponed because there was three feet of water covering the pitch.
Whoever the opponents were, I can’t remember now, but they were keen to play the game.
When I asked their manager why, he replied "Llanberis can switch on the floodlights, and we’ve brought a full complement of subs."

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Sunday 3rd May 2026 – WHAT A DAY …

… this has been today. But not for any positive reason – in fact, quite the reverse.

And yet last night, things were looking rather better. Although I seemed to have taken a positive age in finishing off everything, it couldn’t have been before 22:30 when I finally crawled into bed. Not to worry, though, because with it being a Sunday, if things go according to plan … "some hope" – ed … I don’t have to move until about 08:30 when Isabelle the Nurse arrives.

So once under the quilt, and when the wracking fits of coughing stopped, I tried to go to sleep, but as usual, it took longer, much longer, than it ought.

And that was all that I remember until I awoke, for the usual reason. At that point, I checked the clock and it was just after 06:00. I’d slept for about seven and a half hours.

Back in here, I climbed back into bed and I was dead to the World when Isabelle the Nurse arrived. She sorted out my legs and feet and then she cleared off, and I went back to sleep. Once more, it was a really, really deep sleep.

It was another one of those dramatic sitting-bolt-upright awakenings, something that I haven’t had for quite a while. It took me a while … "as usual" – ed … to summon up the energy to go into the bathroom to sort myself out, and then on arrival in the kitchen, it was 10:30. That’s a nice time to start the day.

But going back to the night, at some point, and I’ve no idea when, I had one of those coughing fits that was so intense that I ended up being violently sick again. As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I can’t stand much more of this.

The first thing that I did was to switch on the oven to let it warm up. Next was to brush with milk the croissants that I’d made yesterday and, when the oven was hot enough, put them in for fifteen minutes.

While they were baking, I made my porridge and strong, black coffee.

Breakfast was really nice this morning, and the croissants were excellent. And while I was eating, I was reading some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

Today, we are discussing the Saxon system of civic organisation. He quite rightly says that very little is known of this, and so we have made a quantum leap into the ninth, tenth and eleventh centuries where there are plenty of charters and decrees extant that give us some idea of how things ended up before the arrival of the Normans.

However, this is probably a rather biased way to look at things because half of the country was held by the Norse and much of the rest was under Alfred the Great, so it’s hardly a fair and representative capture of the true situation.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.

I was responsible for the publication of two books written by famous people when they were children. There was an older lady of that age, the acrobatic age, and she was rather injured at that particular time, so they went through the muddle with her … fell asleep here … and the particular problem with this. Anyway, the first one there was rather disabled so there wasn’t much in there that needed to be edited or corrected. But the second girl was a much more lively person. There was a story that she’d been to a zoo in Chester and then gone on to meet Jimmy Saville … fell asleep here … so from there, she had received some very healthy advertising revenue and popularity, and then … fell asleep here …

Whatever time this was dictated, I must have been really tired. I do, however, admire how I kept on going after the first two fallings asleep and only threw the towel in at the third hurdle. That’s some perseverance. But it’s another dream that means nothing at all to me, although imagine meeting Jimmy Saville.

There were other things to do, and then I had a little footfest.

The first game was Morton v Airdrie United. Both clubs were fighting to escape the relegation playoffs, with Morton needing to avoid defeat – something that was not looking very likely after their dreadful performance last week.

And when Airdrie took the lead, we were all thinking “here we go again!”.But late in the game, Morton managed to equalise, and, even more surprisingly, managed to hang on until the final whistle. So Airdrie must face the winner of the promotion playoffs of the league below.

The next game was Elgin City v Stranraer. There was nothing really for which these two teams were playing so Stranraer’s manager gave an outing to a huge batch of fringe players.

On the bench was Robbie Foster, and how nice it was to see him back after over ten months out with a serious injury. And the script couldn’t have been written any better. He eventually made it onto the pitch and, believe it or not, scored the only goal of the game. I don’t think that I’ve ever seen a football player try so hard with such little reward as him in the past.

After that, fatigue caught up with me and I was unable to respond for a good couple of hours. Eventually, I staggered into the kitchen and made the next loaf of bread, but it really was a struggle. The loaf, however, is excellent.

No pizza for tea. Instead, I had a taco roll with salad. Much as I didn’t want to, it will help keep the lupus from the porte, as they would have said in Ancient Rome.

So now, after finishing my notes, there are one or two things to do and then I’m off to bed, ready for dialysis tomorrow … "I don’t think" – ed … What a waste of a day this was.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about being sick … "well, one of us has" – ed … it reminds me of the sign in the parish church at Neston on the Wirral when we all went there for Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve fifty-odd years ago.
"Will patrons please note that the box marked ‘for the sick’ is restricted to monetary contributions only."

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Sunday 23rd February 2025 – I HAVE BEEN …

… a busy boy again today. Not only have I completed everything that I intended, or, as TS McPhee would have it, I’ve DONE EVERYTHING THAT I’VE EVER SET OUT TO DO, I had half an hour to spare too, and that’s not something that happens every day. And how I wish that it did.

That was despite several interruptions too, because I can’t seem to have a day without something happening to knock me right out of my stride.

Things actually set off with a good start because I’d finished my work and all of the dictating quite early. Although it was after 23:00 when I went to bed, it was before midnight which means, with my lie-in, that I could have over eight hours of uninterrupted sleep.

In theory, at least.

As I mentioned yesterday, I’m back with my turbulent sleep patterns, and last night was no exception. And following a Dialysis Day, it was a hot, sweaty night too and I really am going to have to find a solution to this

However, for a change on a Sunday morning, I was still in the bed when the alarm went off at 08:00 and although I can remember times when I have felt less like rising from the bed, there aren’t many of them that have been more difficult than today.

After my trip to the bathroom I came back in here because on a Sunday there’s not much time before the nurse arrives. I made a start on the dictaphone notes (of which there were more than just a few) instead.

In midstream I was interrupted by the arrival of the nurse who tended to my legs and then spent a few minutes trying to make his card reader read my health card so that he can invoice the Social Security for his visits. Being someone who is terminally ill, I’m 100% covered for my medical expenses so I don’t have to pay anything.

After he left, I made breakfast, took my medication and carried on reading MY BOOK.

Today we’re discussing dykes and ditches and we’re back on things about which I might know something.

He’s discussing the building of these earth ramparts and ditches that straddle the countryside and I’m not following his logic at all.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall the discussion from a few days ago where he stresses that invaders wouldn’t build earthworks and complicated defences. They would be the work of the beleaguered defenders.

Now when you build a wall, the purpose of the wall is twofold – one is to hide behind it and the second is to stop your enemy crossing it. To build a wall, you need to find the earth, so you would have to dig a ditch from which to extract it. That serves two purposes too – it means that you only need to build the wall half as high, because the other half of height is the depth of the ditch, and it also makes the defence stronger.

So if you are going to dig a ditch, you would dig it in front of the earthen bank, firstly to make the defence stronger, and secondly to keep your enemy farther from the wall. If you had the ditch behind the wall, it would allow your enemy to shelter behind the wall and you wouldn’t be able to come close enough to dislodge them. So the ditch will be the direction from where you are expecting the attackers to arrive.

Having said all of that, if the Cambridge ditches are to the south-west of the dykes, why does he propose, on page 511, that "they may very well represent the work of some of the earliest of the Baltic immigrants, who, as is now believed, began to make settlements on the east coast of Britain".

Why would the “earliest of the Baltic immigrants” be building these extravagant earthworks when they are the invaders? Especially when he tells us on page 518 he tells us "none of the finer and more elaborate English dykes contradicts the fact that the civilization of the island has moved always from east to west.", which is, I imagine, what the “earliest of the Baltic immigrants” will be doing.

So although I don’t have a clue exactly what his argument is, I shall refrain from saying “neither does he” because you will all be calling me “T Rice Holmes”.

When I’d finished I began to make a small bread roll for lunch. I’ve enjoyed the ones with my soups and the flexibility of an air fryer means that I can serve up one or two without any effort or heating the big oven

Back in here the first task today was to finish the dictaphone notes. I was preparing myself ready to go to dialysis, explaining to Nerina just how painful it was. She didn’t seem to believe it particularly. She thought that I was being a baby. She told me that I ought to do better with it and think more positively. Then she began to discuss operations with me. That’s the kind of thing that makes me squirm and was causing me all kinds of agony in all different parts of my body so I asked her if she would stop talking about it. Eventually she agreed. Later on that night though I was writing out my notes. She asked if I was writing out the story of what had happened early in the day between the two of us. I replied that I was. She replied “that’s fine as long as you don’t write anything personal about me”. I replied “that’s rather difficult to avoid because the fact that you and I were together is something rather personal”.

Actually, I suspect that the nurses are secretly, under their breath, telling me “not to be a baby” but we all have our phobias. But the situation about people in my dreams, I had a discussion about this with someone just recently. I’m not obviously in control of what goes on during the night and so I don’t usually “name and shame” people who appear. It’s bad enough that they know me at all, poor people, without being outed for it. But some people’s association with me is too well-known to be hidden behind a nickname.

There was a plot of waste land opposite out house in Crewe that actually belonged to us. One day I sat down to clear it all out. I removed most of the weeds, bushes and shrubs, and there was a stream that ran through it. When I was upstairs in the bedroom I could see that it was full of big fish swimming around. I thought that it was wonderful. From a horrible, stony limestone surface it gradually began to turn green as I watched it. I thought that with another couple of hours work we’d have a nice lawn over there with a little featured brook running through. I went outside and sorted out a few things. I had an old Ford Thames van … "a Thames 400E" – ed … parked in the street with no tax and no MoT so I pushed that onto there too. In the end it was really looking quite nice and I was quite impressed with it

There actually was a patch of waste land (almost) opposite the family home in Davenport Avenue when we moved there in 1970. And the story of the fish relates presumably to the fish farming from the other day.

Later on I was working in the despatching of the ambulance company. One of the drivers came in towards the end of his shift and said that he had to go to fuel up his taxi ready for the morning. He asked if he could still keep the same car for tomorrow morning. I said that there’s no reason why he shouldn’t but he’d have to let me know what number it is so that I could mark it down on the sheets. He went outside and I heard his car start so I called him up on the radio and asked him to tell me his number but he didn’t reply and drove out. Then I was in the car with him after that. he said that he still had to go to pick up fuel and his car was number 210. I noted “210” on the sheets and he set off. He drove through Crewe down Badger Avenue and up to Bradfield Road at probably 100 mph. Someone pulled out a little further ahead and he said “look at that person there! No respect for anyone else. I whispered to the other passenger and said “said he, driving at 100mph through the town”. We turned onto Bradfield Road and he said “I hope that the petrol station down here is still open”. When we passed over the railway bridge there was a queue of taxis, the biggest queue you have ever seen. he looked at me and said “all of these will be alright for you, Eric” because of course they were Crewe taxis. He swung round and pulled up onto the station with a big line of vehicles but he weaved his way up the inside and went to an empty pump to fuel the car. There was a van next to us. Our driver had a jerry can and went to fill the car and the jerry can. The woman next to us was pumping diesel and it smelt horrible. he said “that’s a disgusting diesel, isn’t it?”. I replied “it’s the low sugar stuff so it doesn’t smoke and clog up your injectors”. he replied “I can’t think why people use it so I repeated that it doesn’t smoke and doesn’t clog up the injectors.

There is actually a petrol station where this one in the dream was situated. But the whole place being saturated in taxis is most unlikely, particularly as many as there were parked around there last night. But despite all that I have said about Crewe in the past, they do stop and fuel up their cars with diesel. There’s not one single driver left in the town today who stops at the stables to fuel up his cab with a nosebag full of oats

There was also a dream where I was with some friends of my own age. maybe we were at school, I don’t know. Someone turned up with some parcels and I wondered what this was all about because it was nearly Christmas. It turned out that it was a girl who had left. She’d sent some of us some presents and one of them was for me. It looked as if it might have been a cake. I thought “this is nice of her”. When I looked at it, it was the wrapping that resembled the cake. When I undid it, it was a board game all about growing your crops, harvesting them and making all kinds of vegetarian and vegan food, which I thought was really wonderful. One of two of the others then received some strange board games from this girl too. I thought “this is a really nice idea. I shall have to try to find where this shop is and investigate it for myself to see what else they had that I could maybe give as presents to other people”.

That game actually sounds quite interesting and I wonder how it could be made to work. There’s an on-line course doing the rounds on OpenLearn about making a game app for a smartphone and I’ve been debating about using my dialysis spells to catch up with a few more short courses. This game app one might be interesting, with this idea as its theme.

I’d been in Northampton and was heading back out towards the motorway with “that” Liz. We’d gone a different way this time to see what was alongside the motorway the other way. We ended up in this town but didn’t recognise it. It was a very modern town with a huge distribution centre for a supermarket, one of the ones in red, right at the end of the main street. We parked up and walked out to have a look round. We asked these two boys the name of the place. They wanted to know why we were here if we didn’t know where we were. We explained that we’d been to Northampton and wanted to go back a different way. He began to ask passers-by “which is the best way from here to reach the motorway?”. He told us that this place was called TW17. He then went to a travel agent’s to ask her where she could send him on a flight while we decided that we’d go for a look around and maybe have a meal. I set off to find the car to park it somewhere better so that we’d have time to eat.

So here’s “that” Liz back yet again. We had someone who sat on a University Committee on which we served who lived in Northampton and we went there a couple of times. But Liz was more of a friend with her partner and she unfortunately sought her release from her difficulties in an extremely tragic way and we never went again. One thing is certain though. None of this took place in Shepperton.

Next task was to watch the football, Stranraer at home to high-flying Stirling Albion, and against the run of play demolish them 3-0 even though a friend of mine from University days plays in goal for Stirling Albion.

And hats off to Robbie Foster. A big, burly, clumsy but quick and powerful centre-forward, out of his depth at this level of football but due to an injury crisis of epic proportions, forced into the side for the last couple of months.

He knows where to be and what to do – he has all of the strikers’ instincts, but he’s just not able to do it. No-one on any football field ever has ever tried harder than him and today he had his reward when he muscled his way into the path of a loose ball and prodded it home

But one day someone is going to give the “man of the match” award to eighteen year-old Josh Lane, forced into goal for the first team for the last few games. A nervous start a few weeks ago but the last few matches he has pulled off some wonderful saves to give his team a fighting chance.

If you are interested in the highlights, you can SEE THEM HERE

Today’s work was to edit a series of radio programme notes that I’d dictated last night, and prepare or complete the programmes.

The first one was a concert that I stumbled upon in Germany in 1981. I’d written the notes the other day and they were the first that I’d dictated.

By the time that I’d finished the editing I was almost four minutes over, but that was part of the plan because there were several short tracks that I could edit out to fit everything down. So one track then went, a pile of applause and other “irrelevances” followed and it all went together quite nicely

There were two “extra tracks” for the two programmes that I’d prepared last Sunday, and I managed to resolve one of them and complete the programme before lunch.

Lunch was a fresh bread roll cut in half and transformed into “cheese and tomato on toast” in the air fryer. And it really was delicious too. I shall do all of this again too.

This afternoon I attacked the remaining programmes and despite stopping to make a full-sized loaf of bread, I finished bang on the moment as the telephone rang. I’m convinced that Rosemary mounted a camera in this apartment when she was last here.

Our chat today was only a small one, just one hour and three minutes. And the most exciting news is that Myrtille the cat goes to sleep under the bed but when Rosemary awakens, the cat is asleep on the foot of the bed. I’ll give it two weeks before they are both curled up together.

As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … no-one I ever knew ever won a battle with a cat.

After a half-hour break I went to make my pizza. And it’s another one of the “best ever made” pizzas. My loaf was perfection itself too . it all seems to be working fine these days. What I think has been happening is that firstly my technique is improving and secondly, I think that my water measurer is inaccurate. If I use more water than suggested in the recipe it works so much better.

So having done all of my work, I’m having a Day of Rest tomorrow. Well-earned too, I reckon. If only I could work as hard as this all the time.

If I had worked as hard as this when I was at school I probably would have had a different path. I had this discussion with Nerina once and she asked me "what would you have done?"
"I would have been a criminal lawyer" I replied
"How far did you go in your studies?" she asked me.
"Only half-way, I’m afraid" I said. "I still have to do the ‘lawyer’ part."

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