Tag Archives: thomas wright

Thursday 23rd April 2026 – HERE I AM …

… running hours late yet again, but tell me – if you had the choice between coming inside to your miserable, depressing life in here or standing outside in the absolutely glorious evening sun, chatting to friends and neighbours, what would you do?

That’s right, it’s been the most beautiful day of the year today, with not even a single cloud in the sky to put a damper on the proceedings, so naturally, I had to spend the afternoon in dialysis, didn’t I?

Still, at least last night wasn’t as bad as some have been.

By the time that I’d finished my notes etc. and was ready for bed, it was just about 22:00, later than I would like but never mind. I was soon under the covers, all nice and comfortable, and although it took, as usual, quite a while to go off to sleep, I was so comfortable that it didn’t really matter.

However, a few hours later, also as usual, I was awake again. No sign of going off to sleep so I ended up counting sheep. I had quite a flock but eventually I must have fallen asleep because when the alarm went off at 06:29 as usual, it awoke me.

And, also as usual, it took an age for me to struggle to my feet and go into the bathroom, where I had a good scrub-up and even a shave, in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant this afternoon.

Not hot drink this morning – just a small mouthful of orange juice to wash down my medication – and then back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during what little night I’d had.

At some point, I dreamed that I was helping a girl who used to live in the Auvergne move her crockery and things like that. We had to be very careful with some of it because the handles could easily break. She sent a mail to me to tell me that someone else was coming along to help, and I should give him the same warning too. Then, in the dream, my alarm went off and I leapt out of bed and put on some football gear that was lying around in my room, as if I were going to be playing in a football match. Then, I found myself back in the bed and I wondered what happened to the alarm and me dressed in – that I was still in bed in my night clothes.

That’s something that I’ve done a few times, helping people move house, and I’ve done more than just a few of those in the Auvergne. But I’m sure that some people will recall who this girl might be if I were to mention that it’s par for the course for her to disappear as soon as the work starts.

The nurse turned up as usual, and I mentioned that I had a taxi coming for me at 08:00 so he’ll need to be here beforehand to sort out my legs and feet. His response, quite typically, was “go to bed tonight in your socks. I won’t be able to make it”. No surprise there.

After he left, I made breakfast and read some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

Today, we’re talking about religion, and here’s a surprising thing. Our author tells us "Over the left shoulder of Saturn is a sickle in form of our modern bill-hook, Sol wears a radiated crown, Luna, a crescent, Mars is helmeted and carries a shield, the head of Mercury is winged, the bust of Jupiter has been injured, and his emblems are not clearly to be recognised, Venus carries a mirror. Other museums in Germany, I am informed, contain sculptures of the planets similarly arranged."

In France, and in many other places too, I would imagine, it’s the custom, and has been for hundreds of years at least, to draw and sculpt images of the saints, each with his or her own particular emblem. One saint is always seen with a child, another with a loaf of bread, another with a dog and so on. I wonder if this dates back to the very early years of Christianity and is a reflection of adopting the practice from the Roman gods.

While I was sitting at the table, I crashed out yet again, and while I was away, I was off on my travels.

While I was having another little doze at the breakfast table, I dreamed that I was playing with the Spencer Davis Group at a festival in Greece. After we’d played, we took a boat and went across the strait to an island to look at the lighthouse there. However, we weren’t impressed so we came back. However, we didn’t land near our hotel but at a secluded beach about a mile down the coast. We came ashore on some kind of jetty and one of our party threw a plastic bottle into the sea. We found a place to spread out and lie down, but I went for an explore. I came across another hotel that was being used for concert performers and crew, so I went in. For some reason, I came out of the lift at the second floor and walked along the corridor, looking at the names of the occupants, and down at the far end, I saw the name of a former girlfriend from school. I knocked and went in to say hello, and she was delighted to see me. Her room had a window that tilted horizontally in the middle, so I tilted it wide open and flew outside for a good look. Back in the room, we were discussing her career. I told her that honestly, only one person in a thousand at this level makes it to the top. She replied that she was determined to work as hard as it takes so that the one person in a thousand would be her.

Dreams about me flying are very rare indeed. I’ll have to go back probably twenty years for the last one.

But as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, we went to GREECE in 2013 and spent a happy week on Anxios, one of the Sporadic Islands, but not with the Spencer Davis Group. And I didn’t meet a girlfriend from school there either.

Back in here, I spent a little while sorting out a few things and then attacking the radio programme. It’s still been a struggle tracking down the music that I want, and one day, I hope that I will have what I need.

My cleaner turned up as usual to help me with the anaesthetic, and then I had to wait for the taxi to arrive. Bang on time he turned up, but with all of the roadworks and having to go to pick up someone else, we were late arriving at Avranches.

Late arriving means late being plugged in and with the machine playing up, I was resigned to it being a long session. One of the doctors (not Emilie the Cute Consultant, unfortunately) came to see me, and she told me that they were going to reduce my dry weight. “At long, long last!” I said to myself. “Now we can go about doing this properly”.

When I’d finished everything, I was next-to-last leaving but my taxi driver, one of my favourites, was waiting for me and we had a good chat as she drove me home. But once again, we were caught up in the roadworks so we ended up being late back. And after my neighbourhood chat, it was even much later when I came back in here. But it was worth it, being out in the sun.

After my cleaner left, I had half a piece of chocolate cake and home-made ice cream and then came back in here to finish off everything. And in a short while, I’ll be off to bed. I’m not looking forward to tomorrow, as you can imagine.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about counting sheep … "well, one of us has" – ed … out on a ranch in the Australian outback, the ranch owner asked a farmhand "how many sheep do we have?".
"No idea" said the farmhand.
"But I’ve sent you out three times now to count them."
"I know, but every time I reach ‘six’, I fall asleep!"

Wednesday 22nd April 2026 – NOT YET ANOTHER …

… night like last night! I can’t stand many more of these. Especially as I made a point of finishing everything early last night.

After knocking off work at about 19:30, I began to write up my notes, and after one of the shortest blog entries in modern times, finishing off everything that needed finishing and sorting myself out in the bathroom, it wasn’t even 21:00, and it was still daylight when I crawled in under the covers.

As seems to be the case these days, it took a while to go to sleep, but once I’d gone, I was asleep for – ohhh, I dunno – three hours, maybe. I’ve no real idea because I didn’t look at the time.

After that, I lay awake, coughing myself to death and ruminating over my guilty conscience yet again, but just as I began to feel the need to leave the bed, for the usual reasons, the alarm went off at its usual time of 06:29.

As usual, it took an absolute age for me to summon up the energy and the morale to leave the bed, but after I’d sorted myself out in the bathroom, I was sat on the chair in there for quite a while, unable to move.

My arrival in the kitchen was considerably later than usual, but I made my hot drink and took my medication and then came back in here to check the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.

Mind you, I needn’t have bothered, because there was nothing on it again today. But then again, if you don’t go to sleep for very long, it doesn’t leave much time for travelling.

There were a few other things that needed my attention, but I was interrupted by the arrival of the nurse who came to sort out my legs and feet. We also had a little chat about my sleep issues, although they didn’t help much. He was pleased that I don’t take a medication to help me sleep, although he didn’t say why.

After he left, I made my breakfast and read some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

We’re now discussing industry and, at the moment, pottery. Apart from being confused by his adherence to “Richard of Cirencester”, he’s not come up with anything particularly controversial so far.

However, he made a reference to the Roman fort at Ambleside, which I followed up, and while I was reading about the site, I came across something interesting.

The excavations at the fort had shown that it had been destroyed on two occasions, and outside the east gate, there was an enormous collection of leaden slingshot pellets. The indications are that they had been fired from the walls of the fort, presumably aimed at attackers. There were two distinct kinds of slingshot, made of lead from different sources, suggesting that there had been two attacks at the fort, separated by a lengthy period.

The most surprising find, however, was that of a tablet that may well have been part of a tombstone, and the inscription on that part reads “killed within the fort by the enemy” – indicating that the fort had been invaded but the Romans had managed to regain control within a short space of time.

While I was eating, would you believe that I fell asleep on the chair? And while I was asleep, I was off on my travels.

While I was asleep, I was driving a narrow-gauge steam locomotive up an incline but was running out of steam. I left the controls and helped the fireman shovel more coal into the boiler but even so, we were slowly grinding to a halt. I arranged to stop at a distant signal where there was a telephone so I could telephone Control to tell them, because it was a single line and I would be blocking it. Control told me to roll back a quarter of a mile where there was a siding and I could put the train in there while I built up steam. I thought to myself that a three-and-a-half-hour sleep would do me a world of good, but then I realised that to build up steam probably wouldn’t even take ten minutes.

Much as I have an interest in railways, especially closed ones, unlike most small boys, I never had any ambition to be a steam locomotive driver. I do, however, have a friend who is a part-time guard with one of the “great little trains of Wales”. Consequently, I have no idea to what this dream relates.

As for a good, long sleep, I’m open to one of those at any time

Back in here, I finished off what I’d been doing and then began work on the radio programme that I’d started yesterday. And by 17:00, I’d finished selecting all of the music, reformatted, remixed, re-edited, paired and segued it, and written all of the notes. That was despite an interruption from my cleaner who brought the medicine that was outstanding from yesterday.

There was another interruption too, from the hospital. They ‘phoned me to say that I need to be at the hospital at 09:00 on Friday for this fibreoscopy. Still, I suppose that the sooner we start, the sooner we’re finished.

After a pause of about an hour, I started on the next radio programme and by the time I’d knocked off at 19:15, I’d identified all of the artists whom I wanted to appear in it and had even begun to select the music. Considering that I thought that I’d be lucky to prepare one programme this week, that was good going.

When I finished, I went into the kitchen, where I had a piece of my chocolate cake with my home-made ice cream, and then came back in here to write my notes.

Now that they are finished, there are a few other things to do, and then I’m off to bed, hoping for a much better night than those just recently … "he’ll be lucky" – ed …

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about railway guards … "well, one of us has" – ed … my friend, before he retired, was a schoolmaster, teaching geography.
He once asked me "what’s the difference between a schoolmaster and a railway guard?"
"I’ve no idea" I replied
"Well, the one trains the mind – the other minds the train."

Sunday 19th April 2026 – WHAT A NICE …

… way to start the day. When I opened the shutters in here and sat down at my desk to start work, it was already … errr … 12:20. Who could ask for a Sunday morning any better than that? As was said once a long time ago in a “Gunsmoke” episode, "Sunday is the one day of the week a man can get up at noon and sit around with his boots off without anybody hollering at him about it."

Mind you, for reasons that I still don’t understand, Saturday was a rather late night and I didn’t finish everything and slide under the bedclothes until 22:30. The football can’t have taken all that long, surely?

But Sunday is a lie-in so I was planning to sleep until Isabelle the Nurse came to sort out my legs at about 08:30 as usual.

At least, that was the plan, and, as we all know, "The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men gang aft agley an’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain for promis’d joy." At some point during the night, I awoke for what seemed to be the usual reason and went off to stroll the parapet. I’ve no idea what time it was, and neither did I care.

Back in bed, I went to sleep again fairly quickly and although I awoke at some point when it was light outside, I shoved my head back down under the quilt and went back to bed.

Isabelle the Nurse awoke me, ringing the doorbell to announce her presence. She sorted out my legs and feet, chatting away about the brocante in the town while I was cowering under the quilt. After she left, I went back to sleep almost straight away.

When I checked the time, sitting on the edge of the bed ready to stand up, it was 10:33, so all in all, it was a very good sleep and a very relaxing morning.

In the kitchen, I just had some of my medication and then made breakfast – porridge, coffee and two of my home-made croissants – and the croissants were, as usual, delicious after ninety seconds at 180°C in the microwave.

While I was eating, I was reading some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

We’re discussing agriculture today, and he tells us that "Mr. Bruce observed … traces of cultivation on the waste lands in Northumberland, and he is probably right in attributing them to the Romans. ‘A little to the south of Borcovicus,’ he says, ‘and stretching westward, the ground has been thrown up in long terraced lines, a mode of cultivation much practised in Italy and the East. Similar terraces, more feebly developed, appear at Bradley. I have seen them very distinctly marked on the banks of the Rede-water, at old Carlisle, and in other places."

These terraces are called “lynchets” and date all the way from the Iron Age and maybe before, to the early medieval period

By now, it was 12:15 after my lazy start to the day, so I headed back in here and switched on the computer after first, of course, opening the shutters.

The first thing that I did was to transcribe the dictaphone notes to find out where I’d been during the night.

I’d come across a brochure about coach tours so I was looking through it. There were lots of coach tours going all around the UK, but it was a shame that every one just picked up in London rather than anywhere else. There were adverts in there for British Rail which said “we aren’t only this and we aren’t only this and we aren’t only this” and someone suggested that they aren’t only anything, in fact. There was someone who had to return to the USA and someone was giving her some kind of instructions about where to go to catch the bus to take her back to her home town. There was a guy there with an elderly woman who was probably his mother, and they were in the queue for having a burger so he asked his mother if she wanted rye. The mother didn’t understand at all what he was walking about and tried to have him explain, but he wasn’t being very patient with her. Then it was my turn to order so I asked for a veggie burger. They asked me what else I wanted on it but the dream faded out there.

As if I’m ever likely to go on a coach trip anywhere as a passenger – except those few times to football matches. Mind you, I did go on a few with Nerina in the past.

The rye bread relates to some bread that Jackie left with me when she left. It’s been ages since I’ve had some good German bread, so I really enjoyed it, thanks, and I’ve been thinking of ordering some more at some point.

One thing though, and that is that I have no idea why British Rail would be allowed to advertise in a coach company’s brochure.

There was also something about being in Virlet. I was down there and I was looking at the barn. There were all kinds of things growing out of the slates on the barn but right at the peak of the roof where the wind turbine is, there was a tree growing out of it so I tried to find a ladder. I eventually found a ladder and I was trying to stand it up but it fell over. I picked it up but it was the wrong way round, upside-down. I needed to clean some electrical contacts so I was looking for something to clean the contacts but I couldn’t find anything. There was probably something in the barn, but I wanted to put this ladder up so that I could climb up onto the roof and pull this tree out. However, I was in my work clothes, so I was really tidy, with tidy shoes, and I was afraid of dirtying them, but I couldn’t think of how I could change into anything or whether I had anything with me.

It’s not like me to bother about making good clothes dirty – I’ve ruined enough of those in the past. And I never really was much good at manoeuvring ladders around, particularly the old, heavy wooden ones. But anyway, there won’t be plants growing in between the slates on the roof because there aren’t any. It’s a sheet roof pressed to resemble slates.

After that, we had a footfest. Firstly, we had the highlights of the rest of the matches in the JD Cymru League. There was nothing of any excitement there today, except a few heart-stopping moments as a couple of clubs tried the “let’s play it out from the back, guys” routine, but unfortunately, it came to nothing as the teams recovered and cleared their lines.

Secondly, we had Greenock Morton at home to Queens Park. And what a match that was. Morton could have had a dozen goals before half-time and another dozen in the second half, but a well-known phrase involving the hindquarters of a ruminant animal and a stringed musical instrument comes to mind. They were so dominant, especially after a Queens Park player had been sent off, that I was expecting an extremely tragic ending for Morton in the last couple of minutes, but both teams left the field with a 0-0 draw, accompanied by the boos and jeers of both sets of supporters.

Finally, we had Stranraer at home to their bogey team, Forfar Athletic, and as you might expect, the Loons went back to Angus with the three points and a 0-1 victory.

After all of that, I vegetated for a while and then did some more of the long project that I mentioned several weeks ago. And now, it’s slowly beginning to take shape, but there’s a long way to go.

There was a pause as well during the afternoon when I went to make a loaf of bread. That’s now cooked and cooling down in the kitchen, and I’m going to be off to bed in a minute or two, without any tea again.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about lying in bed … "well, one of us has" – ed … Nerina and I went camping once, and I awoke in the middle of the night. The view was so magnificent that I awoke and pointed upwards.
"Look at all of that!" I exclaimed. "I don’t think that I’ve ever seen so many stars before in my life! And there’s a shooting star over there if you look that way!"
"Do you know what that means?" she asked.
"Not at all" I replied.
"It means that some swine has stolen our tent, you berk!"

Saturday 18th April 2026 – I HAVE HAD …

… a somewhat better day today. Mind you, that’s not at all difficult because yesterday was pretty awful.

But never mind. After writing my notes and doing everything that I have to do, it was about 21:00 when I finally made it into bed. As usual these days, it took a while to go off to sleep, but once I fell asleep, I remember nothing at all for quite a while.

At some point, and I’ve no idea when, I had to leave the bed, but I was soon back into bed and soon asleep again. At a later moment, I had to go down the corridor again, but I’d only been back in bed fifteen minutes or so afterwards when the alarm went off.

Despite the fact that I’d not long ago been up and about, it was another one of the usual struggles to leave the bed, and I eventually managed to stagger into the bathroom.

Afterwards, I headed into the kitchen for my medication and hot drink and then came back in here to listen to the dictaphone.

Nerina and I had gone on a coach tour and we’d been put into a hotel room like everyone else, and we went to sleep. When I awoke this morning, I noticed that there was a mouse, a crab and two really strange creatures. One was blue and the other was olive green. There was also a huge spider. I managed to deal with the crab straight away and threw it out of the room. The next one was something with a hard shell, so I hit it with a fluorescent lamp tube that was lying around and it shattered the shell, so I threw it out of the bedroom window. The spider – I managed to chase it out of the room and it ran off down the corridor. The mouse was not a mouse – it was the thing that I’d hit with a fluorescent lamp tube. It resembled a mouse of a kind. The two others – they were really gruesome things. The green thing was like a starshell, like a star or something with its tentacles. I managed to catch that at the right time and with the door open, I could flick it outside. But this blue thing was really rapid. Every time I tried to catch it, it ran off down another end of the room. Eventually, Nerina came out of bed and joined in the hunt. We managed to corner it but it still slipped out. In the end, I had the bedroom door open wide and we manoeuvred it over to that side of the room so that when we came close to it, it ran outside the door and off down the corridor so we closed the bedroom door.

These are obviously my brother’s monsters from last night’s notes, following Nerina and me about. But what a hotel in which to stay when it’s infested with things like those. I wonder if any other room had such a collection.

However, reflecting on yesterday, if anyone had asked me even five years ago to go a day without coffee, I would have said that it’s impossible. I used to drink coffee by the bucketful. But ohhh! How times have changed! Needs must when the devil drives and all of that.

This was a dream where I was in Edinburgh, and I was asleep in my car. When I awoke next morning, there had been a couple of stickers stuck on it. I wasn’t sure what they were about, so I didn’t read them at first. Eventually, I managed to tear one off because these stickers were on the inside. It said something about bad parking and how my vehicle would be taken away if it weren’t removed. I then had a look at the other stickers. These were car park receipts with £0:00 in them so I don’t know what this was all about. Anyway, I was trying to make up my mind which car I was in because I couldn’t remember and it wasn’t until the day began to dawn that I realised that I was in a gold-coloured MkIII Cortina saloon and I have no idea what I was doing in there because a gold MkIII saloon is one that I have never owned.

Sleeping in my car is nothing new for me and even Nerina has shared a car with me on occasion. There’s a story about Nerina and me sleeping in the car in Cherbourg, but the World isn’t ready to hear it.

Surprisingly, MkIII Cortinas of all shades and colours have passed through my hands at one time or another, either as taxis or to be broken for spares, except a gold one. Even now, I still have a dark brown one and a bronze one, and I shan’t be letting them go at any price. They are both 2000E models so they are worth a fortune. The bronze one, one of the very few surviving 2000E estates, will fetch a mint of money.

I was planning on moving down to London, and I’d noticed this huge estate on the north-east side which was terrace after terrace after terrace of modern houses so I went along to enquire about one of them. It turned out that many of them were social housing, reserved for undergraduates or pensioners, but there was one part of it where single people could either buy or rent one of these places, so I told him that I may be interested in one of those. We went through all of the procedures and everything, and I ended up signing for one of them. Once the contracts were exchanged, they gave me the address of the property, which was in Onllwyn, which is in North Wales, so I went there to see what it was that I’d bought. It was a small cottage with a very large garden. I thought “never mind. I can do quite a lot with this”.

Leaving aside the fact that Onllwyn is actually in South Wales, in between Neath and the Brecon Beacons, I would love a small cottage with a big vegetable garden, but I need to be fit and healthy to cope with it. The housing estate seems to remind me of the flats in Bartle Road in London near Ladbroke Grove underground station, built on the site of Rillington Place where Christie, the mass murderer, lived.

Isabelle the Nurse turned up as usual and was pleased to see me looking better, just as I was pleased to be feeling better. She sorted me out and then wandered off on her rounds. I made breakfast and read some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

And here we go again. We’re revisiting Roman Roads, passing by briefly on our way to agriculture, and out author tells us "Antiquaries seem often to have been misled by their dissimilitude to the great Roman military roads, to imagine many of these to have been British. It is not very probable that the older inhabitants of the island, such as Caesar found them, divided into separate and hostile tribes, which seem often to have changed their boundaries, as they were pressed forwards by other colonies, should have been great road-makers."

How did he think that the “other colonies” managed to press forwards? And how did he think that products only found in certain places, like the blue stones of Preseli, travelled from one part of the country to the other, such as Stonehenge? It has been recognised for a great many years that there is a whole network of prehistoric trackways across Britain dating back to Neolithic days and even before.

Back in here, I had a few things to do, interrupted by a couple of bouts of falling asleep unfortunately, but then I set about editing one of the radio programmes whose notes I dictated a couple of weeks ago. That programme is now actually complete and ready to be broadcast, although editing out thirty-eight seconds of speech was quite a challenge.

After a disgusting drinks break, I was debating whether or not to start editing the next one in the queue, but my mind was made up for me when Rosemary rang for a chat. I don’t know for how long we were chatting, but it took me right up to the start of the football.

It was the last match of the season for the league, and what a dramatic day it was. Two matches were of major interest, Y Bala v Llansawel and Y Fflint v Cardiff Metropolitan.

The situation was simple – Y Fflint had to equal or better Y Bala’s result, and Llansawel had to beat Y Bala and hope that Llanelli would beat Hwlfordd so that Llansawel would qualify for the European playoffs.

We were watching the Y Fflint v Cardiff Metropolitan game, which I thought was the wrong one, and although it was rather “agricultural”, it had plenty of action. And as goal after goal was scored in both the matches, the pendulum swung from one way to the other – Y Fflint stay up and Y Bala go down, and then a couple of minutes later, Y Bala stay up and Y Fflint go down.

Our game finished in a 2-2 draw, but Y Bala were undone late in the game to go down 2-1 after leading 1-0 at one point, so Y Bala are relegated to the Cymru North next season. Llansawel, even though they won, were forestalled by Hwlffordd hitting Llanelli for six with no reply.

Y Fflint threw everything that they had at the Met and did everything they could to keep the Met out. They finished the game with only nine players, two having been sent off for “denying a goalscoring opportunity”. However, I thought that the first one was rather harsh as there were two other defenders rushing back to cover.

Other good news on the football front is that the five clubs whose Tier One licence application was refused – Colwyn Bay, Y Bala, Trefynnon, Caerau Trelai and Caerfyrddin – have all been successful on appeal. For the latter two, they’ll have to wait another season because they both missed the promotion bus this time around.

So right now, I’m going to bed, early as it may be, and hoping for a nice lie-in tomorrow. Isabelle the Nurse can treat my legs while I’m still in bed.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about my old vehicles … "well, one of us has" – ed … someone once said that the group “Queen” had written a song about me.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"Well, who else would a Cortina landslide in ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ refer to?"

Thursday 16th April 2026 – HOW LONG IS IT …

…. since I had a really decent sleep? Just for once, after all this time, I finally managed to have a really profound sleep and it did me the World of good.

Not that it was early, though. Making tea took much longer than I imagined, and even though I enjoyed it, I had other things to do, for which I could make better use of my time.

By the time that I’d finished writing my notes, taking the stats, backing up the computer and all of that, it was just after 22:00 when I climbed into bed. As seems to be the case these days, it took a while to go off to sleep, but once I was gone, boy, was I gone?

There was one moment when I awoke, for what seems to be the obvious reason at the moment, but I was soon back in bed and asleep almost immediately. I’ve no idea what time it was, but the electric water heater was buzzing so it was certainly after midnight when I let it all hang out.

There was another awakening later, for the same reason, and I was debating whether or not to check the time to see if it was worth getting up permanently, but I was barely back in bed, tucked up under the covers, when BILLY COTTON’S RAUCOUS RATTLE made up my mind for me.

Considering that I’d only just gone back to bed, it took an age for me to leave it again, but after I’d finally managed to sort myself out in the bathroom, including a shave in case I meet Emilie the Cute Consultant this afternoon, I went for my medication. In the interests of my weight, I eschewed the usual 200 ml of hot drink and just washed everything down with a small mouthful of orange juice.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night, but to my dismay, I had nothing on. It must have been a really deep sleep, I reckon. So instead, I found a few other things to do.

Isabelle the Nurse came in as usual to sort me out. She was chatting away about not very much at all, and after she left, I could make breakfast and read some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

Today, we’re in the countryside discussing Roman villas, and apart from a few more “Richard of Cirencester” moments, he’s managed to steer pretty well clear of controversy. But while he was being led up the garden path by the aforementioned, we were being led through the sewers of Lincoln by the archaeologist Charles Roach Smith, who had apparently crawled through them in the past and whose notes were being quoted by our author.

Back in here, I had a few more things to do and then in a mad fit of enthusiasm, which came from I know not where, I attacked the radio programme that I’d started at the end of yesterday. And now, all of the music is reformatted, remixed, re-edited, paired and segued, and I’ve even written a few notes. I can finish the rest tomorrow.

My faithful cleaner was late today so she didn’t have much time to apply my anaesthetic, and then I had to wait for the taxi. It was quite early today and caught me in flagrante delicto with a frozen curry that I’d just taken out of the freezer in the bathroom. I just had to dump it on the worktop, hoping that it would melt quietly, rather than find a bowl for it.

The driver had never been here before, so she was parked across in the car park. Eventually she brought the car round to the entry and we could set off. We had another passenger to pick up at the Centre de Reeducation, but rather than a return to Avranches, from where he had come this morning, it was a return home, so we ended up driving around the obscure corners of Granville.

Nevertheless, at dialysis, I was somewhat early but I was still the last to arrive, so I was last to be connected, as usual.

And there were all kinds of problems there today. As far as I was concerned, they couldn’t make one of the auxillary machines work. Consequently, for about an hour and a half, I was surrounded by people trying to fix it, and I couldn’t do any work at all while they were there. And once again, I spilled some coffee onto the laptop. This time though, I was much quicker wiping it off.

Being the last to be connected, and with all of the other problems, I was last, as usual, to be unplugged. The taxi driver had been waiting a good fifteen minutes for me, so at least our departure was rapid enough, but I was still late home.

My cleaner helped me inside, and after she left, I made some rice and heated the curry that had been quietly melting on the worktop all afternoon, without leaking from its plastic bag, I’m pleased to say. It was delicious, as usual, and filling, so I once more eschewed my chocolate cake and home-made ice cream.

By now, though, it was late and I was totally whacked. I could hardly keep my eyes open. And so I just posted another terse note on my blog and went to bed. And that was that.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about problems with machines … "well, one of us has" – ed … it reminds me of one of the old Andy Capp stories from the 1960s.
They were trying to bring into a building an IBM mainframe computer but it wouldn’t fit through the door. They had a pile of people around it making suggestions, and trying their best to help, but to no avail.
Eventually, Andy Capp shouted across to them "why not plug it in and let it work it out for itself?"

Wednesday 15th April 2026 – THAT WAS A …

… better night than some have been just recently. In fact, I had a really good sleep once, and the waves of fatigue didn’t come until early evening. And I was ready to fight them off too, which makes a change.

Last night, being back here later than some have been just recently after my evening meal, I ended up being rather later than usual going to bed. The dictaphone notes didn’t take too long to complete, and neither did everything else afterwards either, but I really do wonder where the time goes these days because by the time that I crawled into bed, it was about 22:10.

That is, of course, earlier than my curfew time of 22:30, which is the whole point of doing what I’m doing right now, but I’d still like to be in bed earlier than that if I could.

It took much longer to go to sleep than usual, something that seems to be becoming a habit these days, but once I went to sleep, I slept right through to some ungodly time when I had to go to stroll the parapet, something else that seems to be becoming a habit these days too.

Whatever time it was at that point, I have no idea because I couldn’t be bothered to look. But it was still fairly early because the hot water heater hadn’t switched on at that point.

Back in bed, I went almost straight away back to sleep, and although I have some kind of vague memory of waking up at some point, I was flat out, dead to the World when the alarm went off at 06:29.

It took the usual extreme amount of effort to force myself to my feet and into the bathroom, and I ended up being rather late into the kitchen. But never mind. I made my hot lemon, ginger and honey drink, took my medication and then came back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night.

There was some kind of new Welsh rock group created. They made an LP which contained about twenty songs. They were all played at full volume, with plenty of noise etc. It was really nice music and it was clear that they were trying to emulate Led Zeppelin and their success. Led Zeppelin even went to the lengths of creating their own record label and a fictitious group, which was them, so that they could re-record their songs, produce them and release them too so that they would be hits the second time around to bring in more money. But there was a query about the Welsh Government, whether it was financing or subsidising this group, because some accounts had been printed, and the theatres in the country were receiving some kind of really large subsidy, with one in North Wales receiving the most.

This dream seems to be about nothing that has occurred just recently, although the radio programmes might have some distant bearing on it. As for the theatres, I’ve no idea where they fit in at all. I was reading something yesterday that, in Wales, the school meals allowance payable to schools for their “free meals” programme is the highest in the United Kingdom. But apart from that, I don’t know.

We were discussing football again and Caernarfon’s unstoppable run to the top of the table, except that in their last match, they were beaten 1-0 by Cardiff Metropolitan. People were criticising the team selection and quite a few other things about it, the display, but no-one seemed to mention how well Cardiff Met played during the game.

Presumably, this relates to Caernarfon Town’s victory in the Welsh Cup Final on Sunday. But as for Cardiff Met, they are languishing safely, but still near the bottom of the Welsh Premier League. They aren’t having a very good season but occasionally, they can come up with a surprising result or two. For example, a couple of months ago, they beat perennial champions TNS in the league, and then blow me up … "down" – ed … if a few days later, they didn’t do it again, knocking TNS out of the Cup and paving the way for the Cofis to go on and win it.

Isabelle the Nurse turned up as usual but although she was in chat mode, she didn’t really have a lot to say of any importance. But I’m not complaining because it’s nice to hear another voice in here other than my own.

After she left, I made breakfast and read some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

Today, he remarks, apart from the usual quotes from “Richard of Cirencester”, that "the mortar … strikes the ordinary observer by its extreme strength and durability; he will break with much greater ease the stones with which the wall is faced than the mortar which holds them together. As we find it in Britain, the Roman mortar is generally composed of lime, pounded tiles, sand, and grave"

So Thomas Wright has had his first introduction to Roman concrete. The Romans were big users of concrete in their constructions but the art had been lost after they left. Although John Smeaton had rediscovered some of the art and had built his famous lighthouse on the Eddystone Rocks using “pebbles and powdered brick as aggregate”, according to The History of Concrete, its use was relatively unknown outside a very small circle of engineers at that time.

But as for the art being lost, we have so far in our various books that a great many arts were lost after the Romans left. So I’m still convinced that there was an element of ethnic cleansing once the Saxons arrived.

After breakfast, I came back in here and had a few more things to do. And then I attacked the radio programme that I intended to prepare.

And despite a disgusting drink break, I still managed to complete everything by about 17:00. I even managed to start the next one too, but I was dismayed to find that I hadn’t in fact found all of the music that I needed and had to start the hunt again.

By the time that I knocked off for tea, I reckoned that I’d found everything at last, and so I can make a start tomorrow before dialysis. But I bet that there’s still something that I’ve forgotten.

For tea, I had my first real protein meal for two weeks. It was vegan bangers, mash and baked beans with cheese. And it was totally delicious – so much so that I could eat it again.

At least, in principle. I had rather too much on my plate again so, just like last night, I eschewed my chocolate cake and home-made ice cream.

So with all of that out of the way, I’m going to bed, hoping for an even better night tonight than last night … "he’ll be lucky" – ed …

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about concrete … "well, one of us has" – ed … two concrete slabs walk into a bar.
"We are the hardest in this town" says one of them. "No-one can even come near us."
Just then, a slab of tarmac walks into the bar, and the two concrete slabs hide under the table.
"I thought that you said that you were the hardest in town" said the bartender. "Why did you hide under the table from a piece of tarmac?"
"Oh him, yes, but he’s an absolute cyclepath."

Tuesday 14th April 2026 – I HAD NOTHING ON …

… the dictaphone this morning.

Mind you, that’s not a surprise, because if you don’t go to sleep, you can’t have a dream. It was a really miserable night last night, lying there with my head under the pillow trying desperately to go to sleep and not managing a single moment.

The only highlight was a trip down the corridor, which seems to be happening almost every night these days. But, at least, it’s keeping my weight down, which is good news.

What made matters worse was that it was an early night too. Even though making and eating my meal had taken some time, I still managed to have everything done and dusted and to be in bed just a little after 22:00, so I was hoping to have some sleep to match. However, it was not to be.

When the alarm went off at 06:29, I was wide-awake already. However, as you might expect, it took me a good while to summon up the courage to leave the bed. However, I found to my surprise that when I finally made it into the kitchen after my sojourn in the bathroom, it was actually quite early.

After I’d had my medication and my hot drink, I came back in here to listen to the dictaphone, and that was when I found that it was blank today. So instead, I found plenty of other things to keep me busy.

Isabelle the Nurse turned up as usual, in “full chat” mode after her week off. She told me about everything that she had done, although she hadn’t made any hot cross buns, despite me giving her the recipe just after Easter.

After she left, I could make breakfast and read some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

I really think that I’m going to have to stop criticising his hasty “speculations and conclusions” because it’s driving me berserk. His faith in “the works of Richard of Cirencester” has led to him planting fictitious towns and camps all over England, Wales and Scotland, and, as usual, making a mess of the ones that were known to historians in those days.

But not only that, he tells us that "If the traveller had taken the western road from Deva, at the end of the first stage, he would have reached the town of Condate, supposed to be Kinderton in Cheshire."

Deva is, of course, Chester, and Kinderton is just a stone’s throw south of Middlewich in Cheshire, where, just on the northern edge of the town a mile or so away, a Roman fort was first identified in the mid-eighteenth century and excavated about thirty or so years ago.

However, you wouldn’t be taking the western road from Deva – you’d be travelling eastwards towards Middlewich.

But while I was doing some idle research into nothing in particular, I came across THIS GUY. I know that it’s hard to stop laughing, but really we should feel sorry for people with ethnic names who have been caught out by the rapid spread of globalisation. There isn’t really anything funny about it, as we would find out if it were us.

Back in here, there were more things to do and then, regrettably, I had a little doze for a while. That’s not surprising either, after a night with no sleep.

When I awoke, it was a mad dash to sort myself out for my Welsh class as I was running late. And the lesson was not as successful as some have been just recently. I can’t think quickly enough these days so my conversation is rather stilted. Mind you, I can read and understand quite quickly, so I did well in that bit.

At the end of my lesson, I made myself ready for my weekly shower, and when my cleaner came, she shooed me underneath it. And although I was in no mood for a shower, I did feel better afterwards.

After she left, I began to look for the music for my next two radio programmes. And although I now have what I need, it all took an age to find and to reformat. I’ll start on the next radio programme tomorrow.

Actually, though, I could have been ready much earlier, but once more, I fell asleep in my chair, this time for about half an hour.

While I was having a doze in the late afternoon, I was with a girl and another couple. We ended up sitting at a table in a crowded bar somewhere, although I was set back somewhat from the edge. There ended up being a question about separating my girlfriend and me from the others and so I suggested pam lai lansio roced rhyngom ni? – “why not launch a rocket between us?” But there was then some commotion going on at the bar so I turned my attention to over there, but then I awoke with yet another coughing fit.

What a shame that I awoke, because I would have loved to know what else was likely to happen, what with me actually being with a girl just then.

But dreaming in Welsh? That’s the effect of today’s lesson, I reckon. This course must really be getting to me and there’s still two years to go at least, and more if I want to push on into higher education.

Once I’d come round into the Land of the Living, I went to make tea. A plate of pasta and vegetables, all mixed up in a vegan cheese sauce. And it was delicious. There was more on the plate than I had expected, so I decided to forego my chocolate cake and home-made ice cream.

But I’m not going to forego my bed, because now that I’ve finished my notes, I’ll tidy up, finish off and go to bed.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about showering … "well, one of us has" – ed … when we were on THE GOOD SHIP VE … errr … OCEAN ENDEAVOUR, one of the passengers, whenever he was on board the ship, he carried a bar of soap with him.
"Why do you do that?" I asked.
"It’s in case we have a shipwreck" he replied.
"How will the bar of soap help?"
"Well, if the ship sinks, I can get washed ashore."

Monday 13th April 2026 – THIS EVENING, I …

… have had my first cooked evening meal for almost two weeks. And about time too, because one or two things in the fridge and vegetable drawer are beginning to look rather fruity, and I see that I shall probably have a good clear-out at some point soon. I hate throwing food away, but sometimes, keeping stuff like that goes beyond a joke.

And actually, I was looking forward to a hot meal too. After my chocolate cake and home-made ice cream last night, I was definitely feeling hungry. But I resisted the temptation until after dialysis this afternoon.

Instead, I came back in here to write up my notes and do everything else that I have to do. However, I still managed to run rather late and it was 22:00 or maybe a little later that I finally crawled into bed.

Not that I slept all the way through to the alarm, though. I awoke at one point for the usual reason and had to leave the bed. Not that I’m complaining, because all of this keeps the weight down for dialysis. I’ve no idea what time it was either. I didn’t look and I didn’t care.

Once back in bed, though, I slept right the way through to the alarm, which probably did me a world of good.

When the alarm finally went off, it took the usual struggle for me to rise to my feet and wander off to the bathroom, and what with having a shave too, I was late going into the kitchen. Never mind though, my usual glass of hot lemon, ginger and honey has been replaced on Dialysis Day with just a small mouthful of water. As I said just now, keeping my weight down for dialysis is the most important thing at the moment.

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

There was something about a young male ballet dancer who had begun to dance with a troupe and there were a lot of high expectations placed upon him, but as time went by, he didn’t fulfil those expectations and drifted off into a sort of middle range of professionalism. He ended up at one point at Y Fflint, where the music hall director was in despair about his inability to try to represent the sound on a computer, but they needed to keep the sound whilst trying to … fell asleep here …

As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I’m actually asleep when I’m dictating. But what happens at times like this is that I suddenly go silent and then you can hear the heavy breathing as I fall into a deeper sleep.

As for the dream itself, it means nothing to me. Y Fflint probably relates to the Welsh Cup Final on Sunday but nothing else seems to go anywhere. As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I just type out whatever is on the dictaphone. If there ever is any editing, it’s just for things like grammar and so on and has nothing to do with the content. If the content is too gruesome for delicate ears, I don’t print it but put a little note in there instead.

The nurse turned up as usual, full of happiness and joy because he’s off on his week’s break this evening. We had a chat about dialysis, seeing as he was formerly a nurse in a dialysis clinic, and then he left to continue his rounds.

Once he’d gone, I could make breakfast and read some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

Our author is off on his hasty “speculations and conclusions” again.

We’re talking about Roman roads, and today he tells us that "two imperfect itineraries, giving us the names and distances from each other of the towns and stations on the principal military roads, have been preserved; the first is contained in the great Itinerarium of the Roman Empire, which goes under the name of Antoninus and is believed to have been compiled about AD 320. The other is contained in the work of Richard of Cirencester and is supposed to have been copied by a monk of the fourteenth century from an older itinerary or map. They differ a little from each other, but our faith in Richard’s itinerary is strengthened by the circumstance that nearly all the roads he gives which are not in Antoninus have been ascertained to exist."

In fact, the work of “Richard of Cirencester” has been proved for almost 200 years to be a pure fabrication, created in about 1750 AD, based on the Antonine Itinerary and its author’s rather fertile imagination.

He continues by saying that Ermine Street "proceeded in a direct line to Durolipons, the site of which is fixed without doubt at Godmanchester", whereas all the evidence today points to it being the site of Cambridge.

Back in here, I had a radio programme to check before I sent it off. And it’s a good job that it did because it needed a little tweaking. And then I could press on with reviewing my Welsh, because the lessons start up again tomorrow.

My cleaner turned up as usual to apply my anaesthetic, and then I had to wait for the taxi. but not too long, because he was early today.

We had two other people to pick up en route but even so, I arrived at dialysis early. Even luckier, I didn’t have to wait too long to be plugged in either. The fact that it’s the thirteenth and that I was put into bed thirteen has proved to be lucky for me.

And the luck continued too. My weight was down to such an extent that there was nothing to remove. Nevertheless, I persuaded the nurse to take out 500 grammes just for form’s sake.

After she left and went off to another patient, the doctor came along before she had the chance to talk to him about my weight. So he looked at the chart and simply, with no further enquiry, also increased the debit by another 500 grammes. I, of course, said nothing.

Before he left, he gave me my usual three-monthly lecture about chatting up the nurses, but what do I care? I’m far too old to change my habits now. And I don’t care if he reads this either.

During the session, I was left pretty much alone, which suits me fine. But I had a lovely chat with the nurse who came to unplug me. And when I weighed myself, I found myself to be at the lowest weight at which I’ve been for thirty years, when I used to go running around the streets of Brussels late at night.

And my luck continued. It was my favourite taxi driver who came to pick me up, and as we were on our own, we had a good chat about cats all the way home.

My cleaner was waiting for me when we arrived and she helped me back into the apartment. I was feeling a little light-headed after this dialysis session today.

Back in here, after she left, I had a baked potato with cheese and veg, followed by chocolate cake and home-made ice cream. Not too much, because I need to break myself into eating again after all of this time. I’d be really ill if I tried a binge session, rather like one of the Donner Party of emigrants who, after being stranded in a snowdrift for six months, upon rescue, ate to death, quite literally.

So right now, I’m off to bed for a good night’s sleep before my lesson tomorrow.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about the contents of my dreams … "well, one of us has" – ed … it reminds me of a famous exchange that took place between Doctor Finlay and his faithful servant Janet in Dr Kenlay’s Feesbook or whatever it was called back in the 1960s.
"Ohhh Doctor Finlay: It’s gruesome."
"Och aye, Janet. Look again. it’s gruesome more."

Sunday 12th April 2026 – SO FAR, I HAVE …

… managed to avoid falling asleep today.

However, that’s not such a big deal today, because when you don’t wake up until about 09:00 and you don’t leave the bed until about 09:40, there isn’t much time to fall asleep afterwards.

In fact, you might say that I spent twelve hours in bed last night and, believe me, I enjoyed every minute of it. I didn’t actually, to my shame, rush through everything last night – it was something more like a leisurely stroll – and by the time that I’d finished the notes, the stats and the back-up, and then gone to sort myself out in the bathroom, it was just coming up to 21:30.

How long I spent in the bathroom, I didn’t record, but it wasn’t all that long and I was soon in bed, tucked up under the quilt.

And there I stayed until … errr … 03:55, when I had to go walking the parapet, and then back in bed, I slept until 07:05. However, I managed to go back to sleep quite quickly, and there I lay until the nurse awoke me. And that first sleep was not far short of six and a half hours, and it’s the best sleep that I’ve had for ages.

The nurse was having another good moan at me this morning. He was complaining that I hadn’t pulled the curtains. Well, much as I love the dark, seriously, I love the light too so I’m happy in the morning with the sunlight creeping around the edges of the shutters in here. He thinks that I ought to be in a perfect state of darkness in here while I’m asleep.

Once he left, I tried to go back to sleep but without success. And Alison made up my mind for me when she sent me a text message. Trying to reply when you have your head and your ‘phone down under the quilt is not easy, believe me, and when you drop the ‘phone on the floor and the message turns into a load of gibberish that sends itself, it’s even less easy than that.

With all of that going on, I decided to leave the bed, although it took me a good twenty minutes to find the enthusiasm and the energy to stand up. But once I was up, I headed off into the bathroom to sort myself out.

Back in the kitchen afterwards, where I forgot to take my medication, I baked my croissants, and they turned out really well. I was so impressed, especially as I was using some of the cheap pastry rolls.

So, with two of my croissants, some porridge and some hot black coffee, I sat down to read some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

And here we go again. In a footnote on page 115, he launches another attack on one of his predecessors, Thomas Stukeley, saying "The antiquary Stukeley published a “Medallic History of Carausius”, which, although it displays too much of that writer’s hasty speculations and conclusions, shows us with how much advantage the coins might be made to illustrate the history."

Whilst he’s not wrong about the coins illustrating the history, as we have seen before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … the phrase “the writer’s hasty speculations and conclusions” reminds me of a well-known phrase involving a pot and a kettle.

After breakfast, I came back in here to transcribe the dictaphone notes.

There was some kind of civic centre opened in a local town. It had a huge ballroom-type of place, meeting room or whatever and there was a small annexe that had a licence for fifty people. Someone had applied to hire the smaller room for a birthday party and had sent in a list of fifty people who would be attending. However, the local council was dithering about this because they were thinking that whilst a couple of people on this list might not turn up, a couple of other people might turn up unannounced and take the attendance to over fifty, in which case there would be all kinds of legal issues, so they were still dithering about this for ages.

We were actually talking yesterday about people turning up uninvited to funerals and weddings. It’s strange how these things come round so quickly. And, of course, fire regulations, particularly in the UK, are such that there is a genuine fear of being found over the limit for the room. And when you see the size of the fines, no wonder people are rather nervous

I was staying with Bob Dylan last night. We were at his house, which was overlooking one of the lakes in either Vermont or New Hampshire. It was a very steep climb up to the front door and the garden was filled with flowers. We were sitting on a kind of terrace, and the way to go back to the front door was to go down, across and back up again, but he went inching his way along the edge of one of the flower beds, which looked extremely dangerous to me. He came back with a plate of cold baked beans. I asked him about why he preferred them cold instead of hot, but he didn’t really answer. Then, he said a little later that we had to go into town for something so I went into the house to put on my shoes. However, every couple of minutes, there was some kind of interruption, and there were lots of things that I had to do. Each time that I tried to put on my shoes, there was something else, but in the end, I managed to put on my shoes. Then, the story skipped and it was about a musician in a group who also played for Y Bala. He had mysteriously disappeared and no-one knew where he was. The police report said something that he had been living in a two-bedroomed terrace but he had seen something that had dragged him out, and no-one knew what that something was. He’d gone to follow it but hadn’t returned. Later on, back at Bob Dylan’s house, he was having an evening with his friends. There were three of his friends there and the father of this missing musician, footballer or whatever. They were all eating mashed potato and baked beans that were cold.

Actually, this looked much more like one of the lakes in northeast Maine to me, a region that we have visited ON NUMEROUS OCCASIONS.

But the cold baked beans are interesting, especially if they are American ones, packed full of sugar and additives. They must be disgusting. Even the “British recipe” baked beans don’t taste the same as they do back in the UK. I can’t recall whether a musician ever played for Y Bala, but Ywain Gwynedd had a long and successful career in the old Cymru Alliance League, mainly for Porthmadog FC.

With all of these interruptions while I was trying to put on my shoes, I’m surprised that a member of my family didn’t turn up. The odds would have been nailed on that they would have been involved somehow with all of that.

After that, I had a few things to do and then I recommenced the editing of the radio notes from where I had fallen asleep yesterday.

Not that I advanced very far because the girls arrived to say goodbye. We had a little chat and then an exchange of presents before they pushed off to catch their train for a girly evening in Paris. It was really nice of them to come to see me, and I appreciated it very much. I hope that they come again soon, and stay for longer.

Once they had left, I carried on with the editing, and the programme is now finished. It’s not very good at all, but given the circumstances that surrounded this concert, it’s lucky that there is a tape recording at all. Its value is in its rarity – it’s probably never been broadcast on the radio previously.

By now, it was time for the football. I’d already seen Stranraer beat Spartans 2-1 away from home and Greenock Morton lose away at Kirkaldy against Raith Rovers earlier this afternoon, but now it was the Welsh Cup Final between Caernarfon and Y Fflint. And for seventy minutes, we had one of the most exciting games that I have seen recently.

It’s a pity, though, that Y Fflint didn’t wake up until the twentieth minute, because the match was all over by then. Caernarfon had roared into a 3-0 lead while Y Fflint were still sleeping.

But as I implied just now, after that Y Fflint made a game of it and had several chances to score, but it was all too late and the score remained the same until the final whistle.

There were a few things to do after that, and then it was time for tea. Just chocolate cake and home-made ice cream again. That will do me for this evening, and now, when I’ve finished everything, I’m going for an early night.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about walking the parapet … "well, one of us has" – ed … someone once asked me "you know how we say ‘spend a penny’ to say that we are going to the bathroom"
"Yes?" I replied.
"So what do you say in Europe?"
"Simple" I replied. "We say that we are going to euronate."

Saturday 11th April 2026 – THIS IS RIDICULOUS!

Most of the day has been spent fighting off wave after wave of sleep, quite often unsuccessfully.

Anyone would think that I wasn’t in bed by 21:30 last night with all of this, but it’s true that I was. Once again, tea last night was just chocolate cake and home-made ice cream, and then I came back in here to write up my notes.

Once my notes were finished, there were the other usual things to do, and then I went into the bathroom to sort myself out ready for bed. As I slid under the quilt later, it was just 21:28, and that made me feel so much better.

It didn’t take long to go to sleep either, and there I stayed, flat out until all of … errr … 03:20. Mind you, that’s almost six hours of continuous sleep and I was happy with that. I even managed to go back to sleep a little later too.

When I awoke again, it was 05:23 exactly. I hung around in bed for a while and then raised myself from the Dead to go to walk the parapet.

Back in here afterwards, in a fit of keenness, I dictated a pile of outstanding radio notes. However, I had this very dry throat, which seems to be a symptom of one of these new pills that Emilie the Cute Consultant prescribed for me, so I binned what I had dictated, went into the kitchen to gargle with some water, and then came back in here to start the dictation again.

By the time that the alarm went off at 06:29, I’d dictated the notes for four “additional tracks” and also the notes for a concert to replace those that I had discarded yesterday.

The next stop was the bathroom, where I had a good scrub-up and then went into the kitchen for my hot drink and medication.

Back in here, fighting off the first of many waves of sleep, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out what had happened during the night. But first, I had to find the dictaphone. Eventually, I came across it underneath the little bedside table at the head of the bed. It looks as if I’d missed my aim after I’d finished dictating something and had been presumably trying to put it on the table where it lives during the night.

There was some kind of new society or something like that which was created. It had all kinds of different social rules with the aim of people living together more happily than they seem to do at the moment under the current system. One of the surprising things about this was that they had “sock hand grenades”, you stuck a brick down the end of a sock and you would wield it around as a weapon and challenge other people in your society to a duel with these sock hand grenades. When these socks weren’t in use, they were hung over what looked like a horse hitching rail that you see outside saloons in Westerns, something like that.

It beats me how people can live together more happily together when they are clouting the living daylights out of each other with bricks stuffed down socks. But bricks or stones stuffed down socks made an effective blackjack during the war when you wanted to remove a sentry from his post without alerting his colleagues. You could have a nice swing from short range if you were to hold the open end of the sock, that’s for sure.

There had been a new artificial intelligence encyclopedia opened on the computer. But this time, instead of people making contributions to the meaning, people would suggest a word and the computer would work out the meaning and insert it. The plan was that people would only request words when they were actually working on a topic that included it. But some of these definitions were not very accurate at all and of course, people were not happy. However, it became quite quickly some kind of established way of job hunting, and people would look for new jobs on this system. Apparently, the keywords were something like “I want to push myself further on”. But this program actually was liked from that point of view.

We’d been talking about artificial intelligence yesterday evening and the rather variable quality of some translators, so that will explain this dream. But it’s true that many of these translators do leave something to be desired. They haven’t been perfected yet.

The nurse turned up, rather later than usual this morning, which is not like him. He didn’t have much to say for himself and was soon back out on his rounds. I could then go to make breakfast and read some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

Today’s highlights include "the barrows and other monuments of this island, which we are accustomed to attribute to the Druids, belong, not to the earlier Celtic population, but to the later settlers". Seeing as the arrival of the Celtic people is generally dated to the period 100 BC – 0 BC, he’s putting all of these Neolithic (4000 BC to 2200 BC, give or take a bit) barrows and monuments such as Stonehenge and Avebury towards being at least contemporary with the Roman occupation of Britain, if not closer to our own time.

That was bad enough, but I really and honestly did groan with dismay when discussing cave-dwellers, whom these days we associate with the Old Stone Age of 10,000 years ago, and I read his "these caves … were probably inhabited in the times of the Roman rule,"

Back here eventually, after fighting off a few waves of sleep at the breakfast table, I had a few things to do, and then I began to edit the radio programmes. However, it wasn’t long before a wave of sleep caught up with me yet again. Wave after wave, in fact, and at one point I fell asleep at about 12:00 and didn’t awaken until the girls came and rang the doorbell at 13:30. If they hadn’t, I’d probably still be asleep even now.

We had a good chat, catching up on old times, until they went out at about 15:30 to take some photographs. I came back in here to carry on … "and to sleep" – ed … until they came back again a little later, and our discussion continued.

After they left, I made the next batch of homemade croissants, and they are now ready for baking tomorrow morning, and then I came back in here to carry on. However, once more, I fell asleep. And there I stayed until teatime, which is ridiculous.

Tea tonight was, as usual, just chocolate cake and vegan ice cream. But I am starting to feel hungry again. I’m going to try to hold out until at least Monday night after dialysis, to see what happens there, and then I might slowly begin to reintroduce more food into my routine.

But not right now, though. I’m going to have another early night and then … "he hopes" – ed … a nice long lie-in. The girls say that they will be round at about 11:30 so I shall have to set an alarm for tomorrow, but I’ll tell you one thing for nothing, and that is that it won’t be at 06:29, that’s for sure. It’ll be enough time to have a good wash and have breakfast before they arrive, and that’s the lot. The nurse can sort out my legs and feet while I’m still in bed.

And before long, I really am going to have to snap out of this chronic fatigue. It’s one of these new tablets that’s causing it, I’m pretty sure, so I’d better hurry up and become accustomed to it.

But at least, today, despite everything, I’ve managed to totally complete four radio programmes, which is better than a slap in the face with a wet kipper. I would have loved to have finished the fifth too, but you can’t have everything, I suppose.

Tomorrow afternoon, by the way, it’s Welsh Cup Final day between Caernarfon and Y Fflint. If you want to watch the game live, THE LINK IS HERE and the programme begins at 15:00 UK time (16:00 CET, 10:00 Toronto time) and the kick-off is fifteen minutes later.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about the Welsh Cup … "well, one of us has" – ed … a strange fly saw a large group of flies running round the edge of a saucer, stopping to stretch and to limber up every so often.
"What are you doing?" the strange fly asked.
"We’re warming up" replied one of them
"Warming up?" asked the strange fly. "What for?"
"Well, we’re playing in the Cup in half an hour."

Friday 10th April 2026 – I HAVE HAD …

… a lovely early evening just now. Two of my friends, Alison and Jackie, have dropped in to see me for a chat. They decided to have a weekend away and so they have come down here to see me, which is really nice. As I have said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … I don’t see my friends half as often as I would like to.

It certainly breaks up my miserable routine, which never seems to change from one week to the next. I seem to be doing the same old things week after week after week after week, basically because I don’t have anything else to do with my life.

Like last night, for instance. I had my chocolate cake and home-made ice cream at 19:30 and was back in here by 19:50, when I began to write out my notes for the day. There were the usual things to do afterwards, such as to take the stats and to back up the computer, and after I’d been to the bathroom to sort myself out ready for bed, it was a mere 21:20 when I crawled underneath the covers.

That’s what I call an early night, but it didn’t do me much good. Even though I was asleep quite quickly, regular readers of this rubbish will recall what happens next at times like these. At 01:20 or thereabouts, I was wide awake again, and I had to leave the bed, for the usual reasons that any man my age will understand.

Back in bed, it was another session of tossing and turning, dozing, sleeping and so on. I couldn’t settle down at all.

When the alarm went off at 06:29 though, I was fast asleep, and I wished that I could have stayed like that. However, I was having coughing fits like I had never had before, I had a streaming head cold that I’d caught from somewhere, and despite the painkiller that I’d taken last night, the pain in my right foot was killing me.

Eventually, I managed to struggle into the bathroom and sort myself out, and then I went into the kitchen for my hot drink and medication. And one of the tablets that I took was another painkiller because I could no longer stand the pain.

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

I was reading the Bible last night. And while there were plenty of obsolete words in there that had either been removed or been changed to represent the actual occurrences of the time, the language was generally left quite basic. It was one of those things that, the way that it was left and the way that the voices were speaking, it was almost as if it was threatening me with violence on my way home that night from dialysis – it wasn’t dialysis – it was teaching that I was doing.

This is another one of those dreams of which I have no recollection at all. It certainly wouldn’t be anything like me, going teaching for a living. I don’t have the patience.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I’m asleep when I’m dictating, but I usually have some very vague memory of the dream when I’m transcribing the notes. However, this one wasn’t one of those at all.

When the alarm went off, I was busy editing a very long speech, about three different copies of what had been said. I was trying to go through them to sort them out and see where the common threads were at first. What I was doing when the alarm went off was that I was actually spell-checking the documents to make sure that there were no spelling errors in them before I started to copy and paste them.

Three different copies of what had been said in a recent speech by someone. I remember from the dream that two had been digitalised but the third one had been handwritten, which made things much more complicated.

The nurse turned up as usual. He’s trying his best to make me change my lifestyle, but I am resisting valiantly. He also thinks that painkillers are a waste of time, and I don’t necessarily disagree with him. He knows of many cases where they don’t seem to work, and, as it happens, so do I.

After he left, I had my breakfast to make, and some more of THE CELT, THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright to read.

And right now, I’m becoming fed up of Thomas Wright and his “likely assumptions”, and I’ve only read about 15% of his book. Up to the present, he’s certain that the hillforts are of Saxon origin, that all bronze artefacts found by archaeologists are Roman and not from the Bronze Age, 1000 – 2500 years previously, and that the monuments like Stonehenge are Celtic, probably concurrent with the Roman occupation, rather than built by Neolithic farmers some 3500 years earlier.

There are still 480 pages to go, so I wonder what other “likely assumptions” he’s going to make before we reach the end.

Back in here, I had a few things to do, but by now, the painkiller was beginning to have an effect, and I ended up drifting away to sleep for a couple of hours. I really didn’t need that.

While I was having a little doze this morning, I was editing songs, trying to make up a radio programme and having to decide which ones to include, which ones to exclude and whether any would need shortening or lengthening.

That just sounds like a normal day in this apartment – nothing new in this.

When I awoke, it took me half an hour to get to grips with myself and then I had those things to finish off.

Once they were done, I could turn my attention to another lot of radio notes that needed editing. And fighting off (sometimes unsuccessfully) wave after wave of sleep, I edited the notes, assembled the two halves of the radio programme, chose the joining track and prepared it, and wrote the notes for it, ready for dictation.

There was even time to edit the notes for a subsequent concert, and I could have prepared a full radio programme by doing so, but the more editing I did, the less I liked the result. I’d dictated it a couple of weekends ago when I had another stinking head cold, and it sounded as if I were dictating with my head in a bucket.

No matter what I tried to adjust the sound, it only seemed to make it worse. In the end, I chucked it into the bin and decided to re-dictate the notes when I’m feeling better, whenever that might be.

At this point I knocked off because my visitors arrived. My cleaner had been around to do her stuff earlier, so everywhere was looking quite nice and tidy. My friends had brought me some presents too – a book of photos from their last trip last August and, most importantly, some ground cumin from one of the Leuven spice shops. The French spices are nothing like as strong as the genuine Indian product.

We had a lovely chat for an hour or so, and then they wandered off for a meal. I had some of my chocolate cake and home-made ice cream, and that’s my tea for tonight.

Back in here, I wrote up my notes, and now I have a few other things to do before I can have another early night, hoping that tonight, I’ll FINALLY have a really good night’s sleep.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about Stonehenge … "well, one of us has" – ed … I was talking ages ago to a small girl about Stonehenge
"These stones are really old, you know. They go back a very, very long time" I said.
"How old are they?" she asked.
"Nobody knows for sure" I replied. "They are really ancient stones and go back to a time before people could write and tell the date."
"Oh, I see" she replied. "Are they Mick Jagger and Keith Richards then?"

Thursday 9th April 2026 – I HAD NOTHING ON …

… the dictaphone again this morning. But that’s no real surprise.

Last night, I’d finished my chocolate cake and ice cream really early, so I came back in here and didn’t hang about. I raced through my notes and everything else that I needed to do, and I was in bed not many minutes after 21:30. And I didn’t need much rocking either. I was asleep quite quickly.

However, regular readers of this rubbish will recall what usually happens on nights like this. And even so, 00:30 was rather ridiculous. It’s also a fact that I didn’t go back to sleep either. I lay there, curled up under the quilt, trying my best to go back to sleep or, at least, stay nice, warm and comfortable.

Eventually, I said “sod it” and prepared to leave the bed to do some work, but it was 06:20 by then so there wasn’t really much point. Nevertheless, I had my feet on the ground when the alarm went off, so it counts as an early start – only just.

Having my feet on the ground is one thing – having them moving in the direction of the bathroom is quite another thing. And when I was eventually in the bathroom, I forgot to have a shave.

It was late when I finally made it into the kitchen for my medication, and I made an executive decision – that is, a decision where if it’s the wrong one, the person who made it is executed.

The decision was that I wasn’t going to have a hot drink this morning. With dialysis looming this afternoon and not knowing what will happen, I just had a mouthful of cold water to wash down my medication.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone but to my dismay, there was nothing on there from last night. But with a sleep of just about three hours, what was I expecting?

The nurse was early today. He was wondering why I don’t stay in here to have my feet attended to, to which my reply was that I need to eat my breakfast afterwards so I may as well be at the kitchen table.

After he left, I made breakfast and read some more of THE CELT THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

Today we have finally begun to talk about the Celts in the pre-Roman days. But for how long, I don’t know. But he’s another one of these Victorian “experts” who attribute the various hillforts to the Saxons rather than the Neolithic people. He’s not quite so far out with Stonehenge, to which he attributes the Celts rather than, again, the Neolithic people.

In fact, in a most unprofessional manner, he ridicules the early nineteenth-century archaeologist Colt Hoare for daring to suggest that those constructions date to that earlier period.

Back in here, I finished off a few things and then turned my attention to the radio notes. It only took an hour or so to finish them off too. After that, I went to the bathroom for a shave and then came back in here to do one or two other things. That included reading the surprising news that Colwun Bay, Y Bala and Trefynnon have been refused a licence to play in the JD Cymru League next season. The clubs have six days to put right the shortcomings or else they will be in the Cymru North next season.

That would mean that the JD Cymru League would only run with fifteen teams next season instead of sixteen, or even fourteen if Caerau Trelai, currently in fourth position in the Cymru South and who was also refused a licence, finishes the season in one of the promotion places.

My faithful cleaner turned up as usual to apply my anaesthetic, and then I had to wait for the taxi to come for me. It was ten minutes late coming for me but seeing as I was the only passenger today, we soon made up the time and I was even early arriving.

And for a change, I didn’t have to wait too long to be plugged in. But it was one of these connections that seemed to take a lot longer than it ought.

And as for my weight, for the second time in succession, I clocked in at under my dry weight. Nevertheless, I let them take out 500 grammes. I was hoping that they’d take out more but after a discussion with the doctor, 500 grammes was the best that they would do.

They wouldn’t leave me alone either today. The nurses kept on coming by to do this and to do that, almost as if they were keeping a close eye on me. It wasn’t until right near the end that they relaxed their vigilance and I could close my eyes for fifteen minutes.

While I was asleep at dialysis, I was off to Crewe town centre – Boots Corner in Market Street, to be precise. I grabbed hold of a girl – I don’t know if I knew her – and we ran hand-in-hand over to my pushbike which was chained up at the side of Boots. I undid the chain, and then I gave her a “croggy” all the way up Market Street and Edleston Road to Nantwich Road. But then, I ended up making sandwiches, with cheese, lettuce, tomato and a few other salad things.

All of that takes me back many years. It’s been years since I rode a pushbike, and years too since Boots moved from Boots Corner to a modern shop somewhere else in the town.

By the time that I was ready to be unplugged, so was everyone else, so guess who was last. However, at least it was one of my favourite nurses so I didn’t complain.

The taxi driver was waiting for me already when I was ready so I didn’t have to wait, and on weighing myself upon leaving, I was below my ideal non-active weight. At long last. I hope that I can keep it up … "or down" – ed …

When we went outside, I could hear the birds singing. That’s the first time this year. It reminded me of being back in the Auvergne and I felt terribly nostalgic.

We were no earlier arriving back here, and my cleaner helped me back into the apartment. And I needed it too because the wind had sprung up since I’d left.

Once she had left, I had my tea – just chocolate cake and home-made ice cream. I’m determined to keep on with this for as long as I can.

So right now, nice and early, I’m off to bed. And one of these days, I might actually have a good sleep. But probably not tonight, if it’s anything like the last few nights.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about the birds singing … "well, one of us has" – ed … one of my friends once asked me if I used to hear them when I lived in Crewe.
"Ohh yes" I replied. "Every evening in Spring, round about 18:00, I’d go outside and listen to them."
"Singing?"
"No. Coughing."

Wednesday 8th April 2026 – AND YET ANOTHER …

… night when I’m going to bed without any tea, apart, of course, from my wonderful chocolate cake and my delicious home-made ice cream.

Another early night is on the cards … "he hopes" – ed … and a better sleep tonight than I had last night … "ditto" – ed …

Yesterday, I’d finished my cake round about 20:00, and I came straight back in here and began to write out my notes. By the time I’d finished, done everything else that I needed to do and crawled into bed, it was a mere 21:45, and that’s good going.

Once in bed, I went to sleep quickly and there I lay, flat out, until all of … errr … 22:57. That’s what I call a long sleep!

After that, we had a continual bout of tossing and turning, dozing off, waking up and all that kind of thing until the alarm went off at 06:29. At that point, I must have been asleep but nevertheless, it was a huge disappointment, last night, except for the fact that I didn’t have to leave the bed for once during the night.

When the alarm went off, for some strange reason, it didn’t take as long as usual to rise up from the bed and head off into the bathroom to sort myself out. And then into the kitchen for my hot drink and medication.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out what had gone on during the night, and I was astonished that there had been so much.

This dream involved a couple of kids, about eleven or twelve years old. They were being compared against other people but that’s really all that I remember about this dream at the moment. It’s one of these that evaporated as soon as I reached for the dictaphone.

This is another one of those dreams that seems to have no meaning at all. But wouldn’t it have been nice to have remembered the rest of it to find out to what it relates?

There was something about a rock group remixing some of its songs. They’d gone back into a previous album, selected a song and they wanted to put snippets of this into appropriate places on their new album so they sent a copy of their album and a copy of the track from the previous album. They put it in one big black plastic bag inside another and took it round to the guy’s house in Flag Lane who was going to remix it. But when they came to play back the result a few days later, it had all the wrong soundbytes in from a completely different song so they wanted it doing again. They had to threaten this guy in Flag Lane – it wasn’t Flag Lane, it was Wistaston Road – they had to threaten this guy in Wistaston Road with legal action for breaching the copyright in order for him to redo the task, this time with the correct song sliced up and pasted in.

There’s an interesting story about the Flag Lane – Wistaston Road area of Crewe but the World is not yet ready to hear it. And there is a recording studio involved in it somewhere too. However, it had nothing whatever to do with the subject of this dream.

Later on, there was something going on in a bakery. There were a few people there, and there was a guy there who was moving all of the stuff around. He picked up several large trays at the time and hoisted them over his shoulder. But one tray began to slide off and I immediately reached out to grab it as it fell, and I ended up grabbing the hoof of STRAWBERRY MOOSE instead.

This actually did happen last night too. I remember the tray of bread starting to fall and I did reach out to grab it. Then I awoke and found that I was actually holding a hoof of His Nibs. How bizarre!

There had also been a lot of discussion about the prefix “an-” and what it actually meant. It occurs quite regularly in Welsh in words such as anrhegion and we had to try to work out its meaning and think of other words that began with it. In the end, after a lot of calculating around and trying to work out things, we came to the conclusion that it actually meant “to” and that was what it was supposed to mean.

When I was dreaming this, I was actually in Flag Lane looking down the slope towards the traffic lights on Wistaston Road. That was bizarre too.

However, “an” as a prefix actually means the negative of a word that doesn’t have it, i.e. – onest = honest, anonest = dishonest, gwybodus = knowledgeable, anwybodus = ignorant. The exercises with prefixes and so on are things that we have to do regularly in our Welsh course.

There was another short dream about my class at school, and it really was my class at school. We were in one of the new laboratories, working on some kind of project for our school exam. However, it just seemed to fade away at that point. I remember that there was one of the girls there, holding some chemical product in some kind of large eye-glass … "he means “watch glass”" – ed … but that’s about everything.

This is happening far too often these days, dreams evaporating while I’m reaching for the dictaphone. And it’s getting on my nerves. I would love to know how they all end.

I was working in an Italian restaurant somewhere in Birmingham and I had to tell them that I was going to have to leave because my full-time job had transferred me to Shrewsbury. We’d set the restaurant out for the night but it started really slowly and we didn’t have a client for quite some time. I remember someone walking up to the restaurant – he looked very official – and he looked at me and my colleague who were waiting outside, shook his head and walked away again. Some people then turned up and went inside and went to sit in the garden to have their meal, which I thought was strange because it was cold. But we were talking about lights and light fittings. Someone in the area was making something out of lights and had used over three hundred tacks to hold the lights in. I said that if I’d put up the fairy lights that were in the back of the restaurant and in the garden, I’d have probably used about half a dozen. Then I noticed that in the annexe across the road, a girl walked in. I went in with the menus to see her, and it was someone whom I knew from years ago, but I couldn’t think of her name, but she looked a lot better now than she did back in those days. I asked her how she was, and she replied that she was alright. I replied, jokingly, “yes, I know that, but how are you really?” because I seem to remember that she was ill at one time. I gave her the menu but she didn’t seem to want it. She just wrote down what she wanted, and things for three other people too. I asked “don’t they have any choice?”, and she smiled. I took the order over to the restaurant. They were having an argument in the kitchen about the lack of business and how they were going to have to close. I gave them the receipt and said “well, here’s another thirty quid’s worth for you for tonight”.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that one winter when I was looking for work, I went down to London and ended up living in Wandsworth where I worked in the day driving a school bus for the local council and in the evenings and weekends in an Italian restaurant. That work in the restaurant was probably the hardest work that I have ever done, but I enjoyed it immensely and I’d do it again if I had the chance.

As for the girl in the story, I do know who she is but I just can’t think of her name. And she certainly did look better than she did when I knew her for real.

The nurse turned up as usual and we had a little chat, but he didn’t stay long and was soon off on his rounds. I could make breakfast and carry on reading THE CELT THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

Today, we’ve been discussing the campaign of Suetonius Paulinus in North Wales, followed by the revolt of Boudicca and its consequent suppression. One thing that stands out from this is that the brutality and cruelty committed by both sides were appalling, and with the savage treatment of the locals by the Romans, it’s no wonder that they were quite often in rebellion.

Back in here, there were things to do and then later on, I attacked this confounded radio programme.

What with one thing or another, I lost count of how many blind alleys I’d run up while I was trying my best to track down the music that I need. Eventually though, with what I already had on hand and what I’d managed to find, I ended up with just about enough music to make a programme. I’m not very happy with it, but there’s no other choice.

Anyway, all the music is remixed, re-edited, paired and segued, and I’ve even begun to write the notes for it. I could actually have finished the notes except that later in the afternoon, I crashed out. And it was a major one too – I was away with the fairies – although not in any fashion that would have excited comment from the editor of Aunt Judy’s Magazine – for about two hours. I was totally wasted and that’s another reason why I’m off to bed with no tea.

And that means “right now” because I’ve had enough for today. As I said just now, my chocolate cake and ice cream was delicious and just the job to round off a day of hard work. Tomorrow, I have dialysis, and I wish that I hadn’t. But there’s nothing that I can do about it.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about a bakery … "well, one of us has" – ed … I once knew a girl who worked in a bakery.
"What was she like?" asked a friend of mine.
"At first, I thought she was well-bred" I replied. "But once I’d known her for a while, I came to the conclusion that she was half-baked."

Tuesday 7th March 2026 – AND YET ANOTHER …

… night when I’ll be going to bed without any tea other than chocolate cake and some of the new batch of home-made chocolate ice cream.

And while I’m at it, I shall be hoping for a better night than the near-catastrophe that was last night, when I was so looking forward to a good sleep.

After coming back in here after my cake and ice cream last night, I wrote out my notes, did what else I had to do and then made ready to climb into bed. And by the time that I was tucked up in bed with my head stuck under the quilt, it was just a minute or so after 22:00.

And there I stayed, as snug as a bug in a rug, until all of … errr … 00:45.

At that point, I had to leave the bed for what seems to be the usual reason these days, but back in bed afterwards, I couldn’t go back to sleep, no matter how I tried. I definitely remember seeing 03:00 come around on the clock. I’m not sure what happened after that, but one thing that I do know is that when the alarm went off at 06:29, I was definitely asleep. And I wish that I’d stayed asleep too.

As usual, it was something of a struggle to rise to my feet and to head off into the bathroom. But I managed to sort myself out eventually and head, rather later than usual, into the kitchen for my hot drink and medication.

Back in here, I had a listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night. And it was, yet again, something of a disappointment.

There was a book publisher in Wales last night. His company was reviewing a whole pile of books in Welsh that had been written by Welsh musicians and was awarding some kind of prize for the best. He’d collected ever so many and read most of them. Some had been eliminated, but there were four left and they would find one more out of the ones they hadn’t read. But there was controversy over one of the four because apparently the author’s viewpoint was not that of everyone else. Some people felt that it was the wrong decision to include this, whereas others were in favour of free speech and the quality of the work rather than the quality of the opinions.

There are dozens and dozens of these sportsmen’s books written by ghostwriters “on behalf of” famous football players etc., but usually these days, they aren’t worth the paper on which they are written. And I’ve never heard of any written in the Welsh language except for one by that rugby referee Nigel Owens.

As for the dream itself, I’ve no idea from where it has come, because nothing about it rings a bell with me.

The nurse turned up after his week’s rest, telling me all about his week off and the home maintenance and cleaning that he did.

After he left, I made breakfast, back to banal toast again, and started my new book. It’s called THE CELT THE ROMAN and THE SAXON by Thomas Wright.

It’s uncertain why “The Celt” is included in the title, because it only mentions them briefly in passing, and then almost always in relation to the Romans. It’s a disappointment on that score. And seeing as the book was written in 1874, a lot of assumptions that Wright makes and conclusions that he draws are now long-outdated, as more-modern discoveries have moved us forward.

Back in here, I had things to do and things to tidy up, and then seeing that there’s no Welsh class today with it being the Easter holidays, I had another look at the radio programme that I started yesterday.

Despite the fact that the edits aren’t so good, I decided to leave it pretty much as it is because editing it will only make it worse. I’ve done one or two little things, but that’s about all. It could be better, but I’m not quite sure how I would do it.

After I’d finished, I sat down and wrote out the notes for it. I needed about one minute and fifty-seven seconds of notes, but without even trying, I managed to make two minutes twenty-eight seconds. I don’t mind being over. I prefer that and have to edit a few things out rather than fall short and have to add things in.

After my disgusting drink break, my faithful cleaner appeared. And the first thing that she did was to shoo me in underneath the shower. So now, I’m a nice, clean boy … "well, clean, anyway" – ed … looking forward … "he hopes" – ed … to a decent sleep tonight.

And the apartment is nice and clean too. I wish that it would stay like that, because I always seem to let it go out of control, and I’m not sure why.

Once she’d gone, I had a few things to do, such as to make a few ‘phone calls, more of which anon, and then I could crack on.

The next radio programme is going to be more complicated than most. It doesn’t feature any musicians (although, of course, there will be music) but a person associated a long time ago with the music industry.

And as he’s still alive, I shall have to be very careful what I say because he was an extremely controversial character back in those days and although a lot has been written about him that is not very pleasant to read, I have yet to find any substantiated sources for much of it.

Finding the music will be complicated too. His company disappeared well over fifty years ago, and the master tapes went with it, so I can’t rely on my “usual sources” to conjure up a hatful of magic. But I have various “connections”, and we shall have to see what they can find for me.

So far, I’ve tracked down a few bits and pieces and, to my surprise, I have some stuff here too, so all is not lost. I’m sure that I can conjure up something.

All of that took me right up to teatime, so I went for chocolate cake with chocolate ice cream. And Bane of Britain forgot to put the mint syrup in with the final forking. It’s probably too late now, regrettably. But never mind – it’s still delicious. Heating up half of the chocolate milk and adding the cornflour worked really well, but what I need to do next time is to start much earlier, heat up all of the milk, add the cornflour to thicken it and then let it cool for half an hour or so.

So right now, I’m off to bed, in the hope that I really will have a good night’s sleep before too long.

But before I go, seeing as we have been talking about having a shower … "well, one of us has" – ed … it reminds me of two girls from Crewe sharing a flat together.
One of them, who is in the shower, shouts to the other one "quick, can you bring me the shampoo?"
The other one replies "but I put it in there an hour or so ago."
"Yes, I know" replied the first girl. "But that’s for dry hair. Mine is sopping wet right now."

Monday 14th October 2024 – AT THE DIALYSIS …

… Clinic this time, with one of the usual nurses on duty, things went so much better today and she managed to avoid drenching the room and everyone in it with my blood.

Mind you, there’s still a few hours before bedtime so plenty of time to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory yet. I’ve told my faithful cleaner to stand by.

So last night was another late night – although it could, and should, have been an early one by the time that I’d finished what I had to do. However, the next two radio programmes that I need to do are also going to be celebrating special occasions and will involve a lot of work, and so the quicker I start, the quicker I’ll finish.

Consequently I put on my researcher’s hat and set to work. The preparatory stuff led to quite some progress so even if I did have to burn the midnight oil, it wasn’t wasted. And I’ll have to become used to it because I reckon that that’s how it’s going to be for a week or two.

And isn’t that a change from two or three months ago?

Once I finally made it into bed I didn’t need much rocking and there I slept until about 05:30. It was another phantom alarm call but I recognised it as such and was back to sleep quite quickly though – it hardly disturbed my rhythm.

When the alarm went off at 07:00 I fell out of bed and hauled myself off to the bathroom for a good scrub up and to apply the deodorant. I didn’t bother with a shave because I don’t think that Emilie the Cute Consultant loves me any more

Having washed my undies I came back in here to listen to the dictaphone to find out where I’d been during the night and see if Zero had come back. But no Zero last night. Instead, there was a strange dream about all of the women in our family being lined up and undressed. When they were totally undressed everyone stood in some kind of queue to welcome the arrival of the Roman legions. There was more than that in the dream but going back in the return of this dream is really all that I remember and I can’t remember anything at all about the actual dream itself which is a shame

In fact, no it isn’t and I’m glad that the dream stopped there because, had it carried on, it would have quite put me off my breakfast. If I’m going to be present when women are stripping off, I’ll choose them myself, thank you, not have them imposed upon me. Knowing my luck it will be a bunch of retired Bulgarian female weightlifters rather than the female members of an Olympic beach-volleyball team.

We had my white Passat estate and we decided that we’d put it back on the road. We went over it, made a list of everything that needed doing including the bodywork, bought all the pieces and began to clean it and weld it. It wasn’t as bad as we thought it was going to be and we did the most important parts. We found that we could drive it but the brakes were binding. I’d adjusted the handbrake but my father was going to climb underneath it. I said that it was either a 17mm or 19mm spanner. He felt it and thought that it was bigger than that. I noticed that he was trying to undo the void bushes so directed him to the correct area. Later on we were having a look. We’d done the rear of the boot but the sides of the floor needed patching so we bought some body panels for that and were busy measuring, preparing to cut out the old rot and fit the panels when the alarm went off.

Ahh yes! Good old Saltofix. A company in Oswestry that made replacement body panels and tailored patches for cars. The amount of stuff I bought for the Cortinas we were running must have kept them in business. There is still a stack of body panels and patches down on the farm that must be worth a fortune, especially the two rear quarters for a Ford Cortina MkIII in the back of the Luton Transit that are worth a King’s ransom. I wonder how much any body panels for the Vanden Plas in my barn would cost me these days. I should have bought them when I dragged the car out of that scrapyard in Belgium in 1998

Isabelle the nurse came along later. We decided (or, rather, she did) that we should try with just two plasters on my legs today. Like I said yesterday, I do admire her optimism. However she thinks that there’s a dramatic improvement already but I remain unconvinced.

After she left I made breakfast and read READ MY BOOK. Thomas Wright has now left Stonehenge and gone to look at the remains of Old Sarum down the road.

However before he left he made an interesting remark. Although it seems to be assumed that no archaeological excavations took place at Stonehenge until Aubrey’s excavations in 1666, he seems to be aware of an ancient book that states "in 1620 the celebrated Duke of Buckingham , King James’s favourite , did cause the middle of Stonehenge to be digged, and this underdigging was the cause of the falling down or recumbencie of the great stone there ."

Back in here later I made a start on my Welsh homework and in a mad fit of enthusiasm I worked my way non-stop all the way through two-thirds of it, leaving just one-third for next week. It’s not like me to race ahead of myself. usually I’m always struggling, miles behind relevant deadlines.

Having done that I carried on with my research into the next programme and I’m now beginning to choose the music that I want to feature. It should actually mean slightly less work because one track is over 17 minutes long and I’ve been waiting for an appropriate moment to feature this.

The cleaner fitted my anaesthetic patches onto my arm and stayed for a chat for a while. The taxi that came for me was the luxury car that’s usually driven by the boss’s daughter. However the driver was a guy who has taken me to Paris in the past and we had a really good chat.

Just five patients in the Dialysis clinic today. In fact the staff outnumbered the patients by about four to one. The young nurse who looked after me, Julie, is a self-taught pastry cook and she showed me photos of some of her creations. And I had to say that I was well impressed.

She was also quite good at wiring me up to the machine and I hardly felt a thing.

Emilie the Cute Consultant was there today, but she kept her distance and didn’t even come within my range of vision. I merely caught a couple of glimpses of her down the corridor.

Instead, it was the senior doctor who came to see me. "I have some good news for you" he said. "We can cut out one of the medicines that you’ve been taking".
However, without hardly drawing breath, he went on to say "but that will create a couple of side-effects so I’m going to give you a prescription for three more to counter the effects."

So is that now 36 per day? Or 37? I lost count a long time ago and quite frankly, I couldn’t care less. I’m sure that there are more medicines in this apartment than in the chemist’s shop in town.

As for the famous confrontation about the plasters and the compression socks, the doctor didn’t even bother. Julie the Cook took down (not “off”) my socks, took off the plasters, cleaned the legs with antiseptic and put the new plasters on. Exactly the same that the nurse does.

So I don’t understand any of this.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that the other day that I crowed about having driven the trick cyclist away. However it’s a mistake to underestimate your enemies. She’s made of far sterner stuff and was back today.

We had all of the usual pregnant pauses to try to provoke a response, so I showed her MY TRAVEL WEBSITE instead.

Because I don’t have a password to access the intranet I had to show her on a ‘phone instead of my laptop. And the result of this is that I now have a log-in and password to access the intranet. The World’s my oyster!

In recompense I suppose that I shall have to throw her a sprat and say how much I’m in love with my mother and how as a baby I had uncomfortable feelings about my nurse. She probably is a follower of Freud.

During the process I fell asleep – not a crash-out but a gentle slide into somnolence and a gradual fading out. And while I was asleep, Castor came to see me. She just stood there, at the foot of the bed without saying or doing anything, almost as if she was watching over me like a guardian angel. And I had a great wish to reach out to her but pipes and tubes in my left arm, a blood pressure brassard on my right so I couldn’t move. Can you imagine?

The unplugging was also painless and without complications and I was soon in the taxi to come home. In fact, it was the earliest that I’ve ever been out of there and after my cleaner watched me up the stairs (I managed seven before I had to use my hand to lift up my leg) I actually had some free time to myself.

My cleaner thinks that I’m much more motivated, much more enthusiastic and much more switched-on than I was before all of this started. If that’s the case, I wonder what I’ll be like in twelve months time.

Tea tonight was as usual, a stuffed pepper. Just as delicious as usual and with plenty of stuffing left over for the rest of the week. It was followed by a slice of apple cake with coconut-flavoured soya dessert for pudding. And nice it was too.

So bedtime now, ready for my Welsh lesson tomorrow.

Before I go though, seeing as we have been talking about psychiatrists … "well one of us is" – ed … I’m reminded of one particular person who went to see a psychiatrist
"And what can I do for you?" asked the psychiatrist
"I’m having terrible trouble" replied the man. "I keep on thinking that I want to kill myself. What should I do?"
"You should start" said the psychiatrist "by paying me in advance"

EPIC HALL

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

Tag Archives: thomas wright

Thursday 23rd April 2026 – HERE I AM …

Wednesday 22nd April 2026 – NOT YET ANOTHER …

Sunday 19th April 2026 – WHAT A NICE …

Saturday 18th April 2026 – I HAVE HAD …

Thursday 16th April 2026 – HOW LONG IS IT …

Wednesday 15th April 2026 – THAT WAS A …

Tuesday 14th April 2026 – I HAD NOTHING ON …

Monday 13th April 2026 – THIS EVENING, I …

Sunday 12th April 2026 – SO FAR, I HAVE …

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Monday 14th October 2024 – AT THE DIALYSIS …

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