Rain, rain, go away!

(Wednesday) It's been a mixed weather day. No rain when I took out Alfie his morning. I didn't intend going out as early as I usually do, hoping to have a bit of a lie-in, much to Alfie's concern. We eventually got out at around 6.45.

Odd goings-on in the garden later in the day. The bird feeding station has become quite popular since I replenished it. It's taken some time to get a regular lot of birds visiting because it has been neglected since Carol was diagnosed. But there are other visitors who seem to enjoy the food which is in the various feeders. A rather fat and incompetent pigeon attempts to get food out of the round peanut feeder. This is probably easy enough for the smaller birds to negotiate, but a large pigeon cannot balance on the thing in order to feed off the peanuts it contains. Then it was visited by a squirrel, which manages to climb up the central pole that supports the bird feeding station. It has a rival, which came into the garden and sat on the grass nearby, looking cute, flicking it's tail and obviously intending raiding the feeding station.

Thursday. A bit of a disaster this morning. In my bedroom there is a built in wardrobe. Probably it's better to describe it as a hanging space for clothes. There is a shelf. I don't know who put that in, but it has always been in there all the time we've lived in the house. Also, a hanging rail. Also probably not part of the original cupboard fitting. Actually not intended as a hanging rail. I think it's just a cheap length of dowel rod and a former tenant put in. I have been hanging my clothes on it for I don't know how long. Carol used to hang her clothes on it. Whenever I iron a shirt it goes on it because the actual wardrobe, one of those flat-pack IKEA jobs, doesn't have sufficient space. But this morning I was about to take out a shirt to wear before taking Alfie out for his morning walk, the entire rail collapsed. I imagine the weight of the clothes was too much, but I had to pick up everything and attempt to put it in the IKEA wardrobe. As a result I was not feeling exactly on top form when I was walking around Eaglestone Park. I will now have to get something sturdier and more suited as a hanging rail to replace the one which has collapsed.

The collapsing hanging rail isn't the only broken thing in this house. One of the doors on the kitchen cupboards fell off the other morning. The side of the bath needs refining. The cistern in the upstairs bathroom toilet needs the mechanism which makes the water fill and then stop needs replacing because it doesn't stop filling. This was replaced around two years ago. The cold tap on the bathroom sink is loose. It needs tightening underneath. The seat of the downstairs toilet is loose but needs tightening. The entire seat needs replacing. The floor outside the bathroom has been in a parlous state in all the time we've lived in the house. I had someone look at this and to put new floor in would cost in the region of £300. We had to replace a large section of the garden fence several years ago and our beloved landlord has never repaid the cost, somewhere in the region of £250. I could describe more, but I think that is enough at the moment.

Phil and his son Robert have come back to sort out the garden. They've done a good job on the front of the house, getting rid of the weeds and grass which have sprung up between the paving slabs. I have the cordless grass trimmer for them to use. Not actually a'strummer,' but actually better. The only problem is that the thing only runs for around 20-30 minutes and then needs recharging, but it's easier than a corded machine because you don't have to manage it getting tangled and getting in the way and the danger of actually cutting the cable.

A Few More Things To Mention

Since Carol's death, the bird feeder which we had set up in the garden has been neglected. She was very keen on wildlife and enjoyed watching the birds that came to feed on the hanging arrangement of different feeders on this metal 'tree.' We enjoyed visiting Whipsnade Zoo, and had membership which meant we could visit as many times as we liked without having to pay entrance costs and later, because she was a science teacher, she became a fellow of the Z.S.L. (Zoological Society of London) . I went there as her guest. Several times Carol did the yearly bird count for the R.S.P.B. and we would spend time watching the different species of birds that would visit the feeder. We had a few problems with squirrels, one in particular actually managed to jump the relatively short distance from the neighbour's shed roof onto the bird feeder, narrowly avoiding implying itself on the rather sharp finial on the top of the feeder. It then proceeded to climb down the metal central pole of the feeder and gain access to the food in several of the hanging baskets which contained nuts. It could be quite a feat of athletic prowess when it hung upside down to get at the nuts in some of the feeding baskets. It even managed to climb up the central pole of the bird feeder which was quite amazing to watch.

Because the bird feeder has been left neglected for so long, I decided to restock the various feeding baskets on the metal structure, some of the baskets had disintegrated due to being left outside in all weather conditions. I went to The Range to stock up on food and bought two new feeding devices. Anyway, the various feeding devices are now full, except one, which needs peanuts which I will have to go out and buy tomorrow at some point.

I have been considering replacing my mobile phone. My current model is an iPhone 5S. It doesn't quite enough memory to put on all the apps I would like, so I decided that I would go for an iPhone 7 next. Carol had one from Sky, which I have since paid off and it is now redundant. With Sky Mobile you pay so much a month but you don't loose the data you have left unused at the end of the month and it rolls over to the next. Also, you have the option at the end of your contract period to trade your old model in for a newer one, so at least you have the latest model with the newest operating system. My old iPhone will not upgrade because Apple is slowly withdrawing older models which can't be upgraded with the latest operating system. I had a phone call from Sky Mobile to give me information about their range of offers, and to let me know that with their tariffs your data rolls over into the next month. I wasn't sure whether I wanted to have a new mobile at that time, but they rang again yesterday and I've set up a new contract with them with an iPhone 7 as my choice of new mobile. As it's £19 a month it seems like a good decision. At present I have an O2 'pay-as-you-go tariff on my old iPhone 5S but at the end of the month I loose what data remains. I also want to keep my telephone number which I will be able to do, transferring from the old to the new mobile. The new iPhone will arrive in via courier this morning some time. I will get a text message to tell me when the parcel is likely to arrive, so I will have to stay in to make sure I receive it. I think this is a good offer, because at present I'm on a pay-as-you-go tariff and it's £10 a month which you have to top-up with a voucher or go on line to pay and it's somewhat annoying and you loose the unused data at the end of each month. So, for £19 a month I get a brand new iPhone and none of the annoying topping-up as well as not loosing the unused data at the end of each month.

Later. I'v now had a text from the courier company, DPD, to inform me that the iPhone will be delivered between 2.30 and 3.30, which means I can at least leave the house to do some shopping.

No birdies as yet visiting the restocked bird feeder in he garden, but I expect they will come sooner rather than later. I think they have to make sure it's safe before taking the plunge.

We've been piloting a project at church, started set up by Worldvision. It's called Matthew 25. It runs for a week and you have to do several things, related to what Jesus says in this scripture. The involve making and eating a meal of beans and rice, going one day only drinking water, sleeping one night on the floor, a day when you only wear what you wore the day before (ie. two days wearing the same clothes.), iterating with someone who has a problem, ie. homelessness, illness or whatever. I have done the different activities, apart from sleeping on the floor. Today I went to Waitrose and outside there was a lady selling The Big Issue. I bought her a coffee (no, sorry, it was free, because I have a My Waitrose card.) and I bought a copy of the magazine. I'm always sorry for these people, standing outside the railway station or the shopping centre. People walk past and ignore them. I don't know how many magazines they manage to sell, but I don't imagine it's many. I don't expect many people stop to talk to them. Anyway, whatever the result, I did make some effort to do this particular activity. I don't actually come across many people who need support in the community, although I often see people who presumably are homeless, outside the shopping centre. I'm not sure what their situation is, but it's difficult to just walk past without being involved with them in some way, even if it's to stop and chat or buy them a sandwich and a cup of coffee or tea.

Later. The new iPhone arrived. A good deal quicker than I had expected. I have been having real problems with installing the SIM card. I had a similar problem with the old iPhone, but with a bit of patience it can be done, but I have had to get Sky to send a new one and I will have to get someone who has far nimbler fingers than me to put it in the little drawer. There's no indication as to which way it's supposed to go in that minuscule drawer, or whether it's upside down or whatever. I had to ring Sky and they're sending out a new one. It should be here in a couple of days. Frustrating, but there's nothing much I can do. If my stepson, Daniel, was here, he'd have no problems doing this. I have got all the apps from my old iPhone transferred to the new phone because they are on the cloud and miraculously moved to the new phone. One thing I don't have to do, because it will work using wifi which is successfully set up on the new iPhone. I have put the new phone back in it's box and it's on the desk upstairs in my bedroom and will remain there until the new SIM card arrives.

'Mission Impossible' Squirrel and Blood Tests

A far more relaxed Monday morning. Carol is now at home, so none of that walking along that interminable hospital corridor on my way to Ward 20.

I was sitting on my own with Alfie on my lap, giving him some attention early this morning. He's been quite confused over the nearly three weeks with Carol in hospital. He usually sleeps on our bed, but with Carol sometimes finding it far more comfortable on the sofa downstairs, the poor little dog has had divided loyalties, spending half the night upstairs but then trotting off downstairs sometime in the wee small hours. But even more confused with her not being here at all. He's been following me around the house when I've been here on my own, almost being like a shadow, even when I got to the toilet or have a bath. The other day he was looking really depressed, laying on our bed, in the place where Carol would have been, and downstairs on the sofa, laying in the corner of the sofa where she would have been. It's been quite sad really.

Anyway, returning to what I had intended to write on here. As I looked out of the window towards the garden (which isn't a fair description if it as it's just grass and more grass with a few trees over-hanging the fence and a tatty shed covered in bamboo screening because it looked so awful. You can get into it as the door is hanging off and it's full of some previous tenant's ancient and mouldy mattress which you could see through the cobwebby windows, enough to put anyone off, so totally useless for us as a place to store anything, such as a bicycle.) As I sat in the lounge I saw a squirrel on the top of the shed. It was twitching it's tale, which I believe means a threat. I think it was aware that Alfie was nearby. Perhaps it could see us through the window. Alfie wasn't aware of it and was looking the wrong way. Then the squirrel ran along the left-hand fence, down the fence and onto the grass and then up the central pole of the bird feeding station. Quite amazing that it could climb this metal pole. It than began to climb onto the cross-pieces and eat from the nut-feeder. At one point it hung upside down from the top-most branches, a bit like someone out of a movie like 'Mission Impossible.' Even then Alfie didn't notice what was going on. It was certainly quite entertaining. Then it climbed back down the central pole and shot across the grass, up onto the fence and away into the trees behind the fence. I could see it leaping about in the branches of the tree. It came back a couple of times and then flew across the back fence and off.

When Carol was discharge from Ward 20 last Friday she was told that she would need to have a blood test and that she would need to go to the Maple Centre at the hospital to have one done. I still can't see why they couldn't do it on the ward, as the phlebotomist was always coming to her room to take blood. Not exactly a job for me because needles and blood for me don't go together. Well, of course, they do in order to take blood from a patient, by my propensity to pass out when I give blood.

We drove back to the hospital, fortunately living only a short distance, it's not far. We parked in the ground-level carpark and I managed to park virtually opposite The Maple Centre, so it wasn't far to walk. On arriving at the reception desk, we asked the receptionist about having to come in for a blood test to be told that the blood centre wasn't open on a Monday. So you can imagine our annoyance at being told to come in when we left Ward 20, but were soon told we had to go to another part of the centre, the Emergency something-or-other department. We waited in the obligatory waiting room, with other people. I have to talk everyone I meet, wherever possible, and I spoke to this lady who was there with her daughter. Pity I had to open my mouth, as she had to tell me absolutely every detail of her daughter's illness. Some rare disorder, part of which was being managed by the hospital we'd been to on Friday, The John Radcliffe. Some people seem to make a full-time career of their illnesses and relish telling anyone who will listen the ins and outs of their illness, the therapies they have to use, even their medications, operations, all the details that, frankly, you don't want to hear. I couldn't get a word in sideways, and it was just as well they left for their appointment, otherwise I think I would have gone slightly doo-lalley.

Then Carol was called in to have her blood test. She was gone about ten minutes and when she came back she said that the results would be known in about an hour. We could stay in he unit to then get the results but we decided to go home, as it's only a short car journey away. So we decided to go home and await a telephone call with the results. We had to go through the ticket-machine routine once more. One machine wasn't working, and the other one had a queue of people using it. Fortunately we didn't have to wait long and managed to get home quickly.

We did some house work, changing the bedding (duvet-changing is my least enjoyable task. Putting a duvet cover on is difficult enough, but a king size one is perhaps even more difficult, and we couldn't find all the matching sheets and pillow cases, but we eventually found them and the job was done.

Almost on cue the phone rang. My mobile. But, on running downstairs and almost breaking my neck in the process and finding my mobile in the lonuge I wasn't too pleased to find out it wasn't the hospital, but someone attempting to sell electricity and gas or something. I have to say I gave the man on the other end of the line a piece of my mind, wasting our time and effort.

But then the call did come from the hospital. They wanted us to go back as the doctors wanted to see Carol and have a word with her.

We drove back, I dropped Carol outside the Maple Centre and a parked the car and then I walked back into the unit. There were several more people in the waiting room, but one man, who was there earlier, was still waiting. I have to say I was somewhat sad for him, having to wait patiently to be seen.

It was excessively hot. It's the old thing again, which I couldn't but help but notice on Ward 20. The heating was turned up far too high. It might be November, by why run the heating at full blast? In the ward we had to have a fan on full-time and the window open, to reduce the heat. But in the Maple Unit I was beginning to get really hot and beginning to wilt like a lettuce. More like the temperature you've expect in a hot-house, ideal for growing tomatoes or the more exotic fruit such as pineapples or oranges. Surely the N.H.S. can ill afford such profligacy and it might solve a lot of their financial problems if they cut the temperature in such places.



After some considerable length of time Carol was called in to see the doctors. Not just one, but several, together with a nurse. One was sitting working on a computer and I wasn't entirely sure whether she was part of the consultation. One was doing all the talking (a doctor) whilst another was standing at a sort of metal stand writing notes on yellow paper. It would appear, from the blood test, that Carol's kidneys weren't functioning properly. No surprise considering all the medication she has to take. They wanted her to come back into the hospital, but we weren't happy about this, considering she'd only been discharged on Friday. For me, the thought of having to keep coming in, walking all that way to the ward, would have been too much, but they said it would be O.K. for her to go home so long as she drank plenty and she came back tomorrow (Tuesday) for another blood test so they could keep an eye on her kidney function. So that is what we agreed.

Thankfully we could go home and on the way we went to the Coop in Netherfield, just over the road from the hospital, to buy some few items for lunch and our evening meal.

So, Carol has to drink plenty of fluids for the next 24 hours. Then we have to return to the Maple Centre tomorrow morning and they're going to do yet another blood test to find out if her kidney function has improved. I just hope so as I don't want her back in hospital. I know they have to get on top of all these things before the chemotherapy begins, but that place is a nightmare.

Acrobatic Squirrel

We've had a  visiting squirrel giving us some entertainment over the past couple of days. It has come into the garden and run along the top of the fence and then it stands and stares at the bird feeder from the left-hand side of the garden, Garry and Shelley's side. We re-installed the bird feeder a few weeks ago and used a thing in the ground which has four 'spikes' in it which you push into the ground and then put the central pole of the feeding station into this and lock it in place using the butterfly nuts and, considering the wind we've had blowing through the garden recently, the thing seems to be working successfully. It has stood firm and hasn't moved. I'd suggested we move the entire thing further away from the fence because of the fact we had a squirrel actually jump from the fence onto the bird-feeding station. Quit a feat and actually could have impaled itself on the finial which tops the feeding station. Amazed when I saw this with my own eyes. This new squirrel has managed to actually climb up the pole and hang upside down from the bird feeders, and climb down and change direction several times before running away into the long grass near the fence and then, somehow or other, climb back up onto the fence and was last seen running away along the branches of the over-hanging trees. And throughout all this, Alfie was asleep on the sofa and totally oblivious of all this going on outside the window. I did manage to get some photographs of this incident, but unfortunately the results are not as good as they might have been.

Alfie came in the house and there was a really bad smell. We couldn't find out where it was coming from. Had he rolled in something stinky? Dogs have a habit of doing this. It's not nice. So we had to stick him in the bath, much to his displeasure. He currently looks like a drowned rat (although I've never actually seen a drowned rat.) Running around the house shaking himself and rubbing himself against bits of furniture. But it's as well to do this as we couldn't spend the rest of the day with that awful stink.

Alfie and the Squirrel

We've had a visit from an extremely cheeky and crafty squirrel to our garden over the past couple of days. This might explain why Alfie, our little Yorkshire Terrier, keeps on disappearing into the garden. He spends quite a lot of time in the rather over-grown area near the fence at the bottom of the garden and near the shed (a polite way to describe the wreck of a shed as it's totally unusable as it is.) The squirrel has been seen actually IN the garden, darting about in the long grass. It has been on the shed roof and flicking it's tail about in an agitated fashion. It then climbed about in the over-hanging branches of the trees and then on the fence to the left. It seems to be keen to find a way to get at the food on the bird feeding station. A couple of years ago we had our feeding station a good deal closer to the shed that belongs to our neighbours, Garry and Shelley. A squirrel actually JUMPED from the roof of this shed onto the bird feeding station and managed to perch on the thing, and at one point hung upside-down on it in order to eat some of the food. It's a wonder that this crafty squirrel didn't impale itself on the pointy finial on the top of this thing! It even managed to climb the metal pole of this feeding station. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw all these acrobatics. This latest visitor is so cheeky, it even stares at the house to find out if Alfie is about before venturing further. 

Birdfeeder Returned To It's Rightful Place

We've had a birdfeeder in our garden for the past couple of years (if you can honestly describe the space to the rear of our house as a 'garden.' More like a mere oblong of grass, brambles and other indescribable vegetation.) I bought Carol what they term a 'bird-feeding station' a couple of Christmases ago in Lidl, which consisted of a central pole which you stuck in the ground and it had metal arms which fitted onto it and you hung fat balls and other feeding material onto hooks on these arms. It's didn't last too long, probably because of the weather conditions and it was difficult to keep upright and so it got removed. Earlier this year we bought a new one. I think it came from Amazon. A good deal more durable, and it had a set of feeders to put peanuts and other food into and place on the arms, similar to the old one. This was a success up to a point, until we had some strong winds and it began to lean at a somewhat precarious angle. I removed it completely a couple of weeks ago as I had to mow the lawn as it was quite difficult to do properly with this thing in the way. We decided we wanted to reinstate it at some point but the problem was keeping it from falling over and so finding some form of solution which would make this possible. We had visited a Wyevale garden centre in Bicester some while ago and saw a device which you screwed into the ground and then put the upright pole of your bird feeding station into this screw-device which was designed to keep the pole in an upright position and hopefully prevent the thing falling over or at least getting pushed over at an angle. Last week we went to the Wyevale branch in Woburn Sands with the intention of finding this item but without success. We eventually found something in Frost's, also in Woburn Sands, a four-pronged thing which you fixed to the upright pole and the four prongs acted as sort of legs for the pole and allowing the pole to be far more secure. We purchased this thing and it is now fixed to our bird feeding station, and with new feeders as well as footballs and other items which birds seem to love. We re-sited it a good deal further from the house and not too close to the neighbour's shed roof as we don't want a repeat of the squirrels jumping onto it as we have had in the past.

It's taken a while to get birds to come back to feeding from the feeding station. I think it may just be that they need to trust that they won't be eaten by either cats or our little Yorkshire terrier, Alfie. He does have a dislike of any cats who tend to congregate (if that's the best way to describe two cats.) on the roof of the shed and saunter along the fence. He can't reach them, which they are fully aware of, but it gives him something to amuse himself, chasing up the garden barking madly and they peer at him with a look of disdain down their noses. The last time we had a feeding station set up we also had a couple of squirrels who came and did their party pieces by leaping from next door's shed onto the thing, managing to avoid being impaled on the spike-thing on the top of the feeder.

I recently purchased a tripod for my Canon digital camera. Again, from Amazon. Quite good value I thought for £35. I have set this up in the kitchen and, along with the zoom lens, trained it on the bird feeder with the hope of catching some good shots of some birds on the bird feeder. It's taken a day or two before we got a regular visit from one or more blue tits to the feeder. With the camera set up and focussed on the feeder and me sitting in the lounge and watching for any birds that visit, I have to then get to the camera before the birds fly away and attempt to get some reasonable shots without frightening the birds away in my attempts to get to the camera. Not an easy task.

Acrobatic Squirrels and Stalking Yorkies

We have had some real entertainment in our garden  regarding the bird-feeding station which we set up fairly recently. We keep replenishing the various hanging feeders which are on it. We got four feeders which came with the set (purchased on Amazon) and have since added a round wire peanut feeder as well as half-shell coconuts. We get a variety of birds visiting the feeding station, mostly starlings, blue tits and some unidentified birds as well as a couple of pigeons and even a very large crow which sat on the thing briefly as well as a magpie. There are two more bits of the feeding station which I have since removed, a water bowl which fits onto the upright of the station by means of a circular arrangement which clips on to the stand as well as a wire bowl which has a similar attachment and is meant for seeds or other types of food which don't go on the hanging feeders. I took them off because we had a couple of pigeons which visited and sat on these bowls and hogged the entire feeding station. The pigeons seem to have given up attempting to eat the food since these items were removed. Then the other day I went into the lounge and looked out of the window into the garden and saw a squirrel sitting on the feeding station. It was a surprise as I couldn't work out how it got onto the thing. I was soon to discover when I saw one of the other squirrels (I think there are three living around here, possibly with young in a nest (dray) somewhere in the trees and bushes which fringe the Redway which runs behind this house.)  I was really shocked to see a squirrel climbing up the metal support of the feeding station! Then at the weekend, when Carol and I were sitting in the lounge, no doubt watching television, a squirrel came and sat on the shed which forms part of the dividing fence belonging to our neighbours to the left (Shelley and Gary). Then it did a spectacular leap right onto the feeding station! It's a wonder it didn't impale itself on the finial on the top of the feeding station, and then it proceeded to do a wide range of acrobatic stunts, hanging upside down at one point and scrambling all over the thing. Quite amazing.

The bird-feeding station, minus birds

Starling on the bird-feeding station (taken with my newly-acquired macro lens.)

 Starling eating from coconut shell

Acrobatic squirrel climbing DOWN the pole 

from the bird-feeding station!

Alfie, our Yorkshire Terrier, about whom I have mentioned in many of my blog posts, has quite a thing about the cats which come into our garden. Mentioned repeatedly that he and Poppy, our other dog, don't really like pussycats and particularly those who drift into their territory and sit on the shed roof and walk along the top of the fence. Quite pleasant and friendly in their way and totally oblivious to the fact that the dogs are barking furiously at them. But the other day Alfie showed a particular behaviour which I have never seen before. He went out through the patio doors from the kitchen and stood staring at the cat which sat on the shed, diagonally from him at the door. Then he moved very slowly towards the cat, almost in slow-motion, stopping every few feet and just staring and standing with one forepaw raised (a bit like a Pointer.) He did something similar a few days ago, just standing, stock-still, with a forepaw raised and just staring at the cat. Really odd. I suppose it's terrier behaviour and would have been instinctive as Yorkshire Terriers were bred to hunt down and kill rats and mice in cotton mills in Yorkshire. We've seen how good he is at dispatching vermin when we lived at the house in Crownhill, when we were inundated by rats and he managed to kill one, a good deal bigger than himself, one morning. The way he shook it (similar to the way he plays with his toys, by shaking.) was quite startling and very surprising.