31 March 2012

Started yet another section of my blog diary today. There is usually a reason for the change. This time I got tangled up in a lot of tables which had been inserted to cope with all the photographs of the Queen and the American Presidents. These tables affected subsequent entries and although I could remove them it seemed just as simple to start a new section. When I started this blog I had no idea that it was going to be anything like the length that it is has turned out to be. The entries now are considerably longer than they were when I started out and buried in them is the information specifically aimed for the patients and their carers. I chose some time ago to widen the subject matter when I realised that blog that was entirely dedicated to how I felt when I got up in the morning (shades of Proust) and my progress through the day, which would be insufferably boring without some comment on topical issues. So I tend now to wrap up the true objective of each entry with something else of interest either of national or international nature.

For example, a the last two or three days have been dedicated to ‘ would they, wont they’ go on strike over the Easter period. This was the original threat of the oil tanker drivers which we seem to get all too often. To be honest I do not know what this particular strike is about, except pensions is one of the heads of claim and no doubt the others are to do with working practices or wages. As I understand oil tanker drivers earn in the region of £45,000 a year so I would not have thought that they had a great deal to worry about on that score. Bearing in mind the parlous economic state that the country is in, the last thing we want is strikes about wages when most people are just happy to have a job. It always makes me writhe when their trade union representative comes onto the television and claims that they do not wish to disrupt the public too much and then choose a time for the strike like the Easter or Christmas holidays which is going to cause the most disruption to the public.

So with this strike threat hanging over us the population they have been rushing around like lemmings, from one petrol station to another, sometimes queuing, in a long line of cars for two or three hours, before they reach the pumps, in an attempt to fill up before the strike begins including keeping a jerry can of petrol for emergencies. All of this even before the tanker drivers have been balloted about the possibility of a strike. Yesterday, the unions made it clear that if there was to be a strike it would not now be over the Easter period. The main reason being that until the union executive decide to ballot their members they cannot strike for seven days after the result is known. So the mass panic was, it seems, premature and, of course, the opposition are blaming the government.

I had another three-hour session with Paul’ the computer’, yesterday afternoon when, amongst other things, I believe he has now resolved how I will be able to link my laptop to the television if I want to show ‘my lovely’ some programme, film or other.

This is such a good idea as there is so much rubbish on the television between 6.30 and nine o’clock, when I am forced to go to bed, that if I can use ‘catch up’ on my laptop, I will be able to show Alice anything she might have missed, as generally the best programmes tend to come on at nine o’clock in the evening.

I tried to make my weekly call to my mother and Richard only to find that they were completely without electricity and that I was the first person who had managed to get through on the telephone for some time. Not a satisfactory state of affairs for two nonagenarians but, in the usual fashion, Richard is not perturbed. Sensibly he has left my mother tucked up in bed until the electricity and plus the heating comes on again.

Talking of the best happening after nine o’clock click here to see that that is not always an .advantage.

30 March 2012

I had a really bad night again. Both shoulders knees and hips at some stage or another and frequently at the same time. I really must get to the bottom of the cause of this and will speak to the pain consultant during our telephone consultation, next Tuesday We were pleased to hear from Richard […]

29 March 2012

All’s well that ends well. After that flurry of telephone calls yesterday morning, the last one I received, in fact the last two, confirmed that the pressure cushion had arrived and indeed was delivered to me late yesterday morning. I was curious to know how this was achieved without Holly wheelchair knowing anything about it […]

28 March 2012

I had a call first thing this morning from the local surgery saying that an appointment has been made for me at the Bishops Stortford hospital to have my cyst dealt with. No date but at least we can now organise It ourselves. Then later in the morning, a call from Papworth Hospital, confirming that […]

27 March 2012

Another glorious day with the temperature in the mid-20s, almost double the norm for this time of year again breaking all previous records. I was delighted to see that the warmest place in England yesterday, was Mildenhall, where my golf club is situated. Being a Tuesday I couldn’t wait to get there. Ollie arrived, as […]

26 March 2012

  The fine weather continues so I started the day by booking Ollie for the golf club tomorrow. As I said in an earlier entry, Englishman seem to adore commenting on the weather. Maybe it’s just because it’s a good icebreaker when you’re meeting a stranger for the first time. Anyway, the point I was […]

25 March 2012

Another beautiful day. The trouble is people are already beginning to wonder whether this is going to be like last year when we had our summer, so to speak in April and early May. Then, the weather was superb and relatively warm the time of year. After that early period of beautiful weather the rest […]

24 March 2012

Another bad night, basically because of pain in my hips and. buttocks. I am beginning to wonder whether it is possibly anything to do with sitting in the same position for around 11 hours each day as I am totally immobile and cannot even move a fraction in order to relieve the pressure at least. […]

23 March 2012

Continuing the saga of the pressure cushion, about which I wrote yesterday, I rang the manufacturers but they were not a great deal of help. They didn’t seem to think it was necessary to adjust the pressure in the cushion, despite the weight loss, although they did appreciate that a cushion in the wheelchair could […]

22 March 2012

Another uncomfortable night in bed with sporadic periods of pain in the usual places. By now I would have hoped that the injections, I had at the pain clinic in Addenbrookes, would have kicked in. I suppose the alternative, if these injections have not done the trick, would be to increase the dosage of painkillers […]