Pouring Rain

(Sunday) Poor Alfie! We couldn't possibly go our for our routine walk across Eaglestone Park this morning because it had been raining most of the night. I keep looking out of the window to see if there was any chance that it might clear, but, no, it didn't so he'll have to wait until the weather improves, but that doesn't stop him watching me like a hawk. I don't relish the thought of getting a soaking, the last thing I want is to come down with a chill of some sort and anyway, Alfie doesn't like getting soaked. He hates baths in particular. Also, he feels the cold and a soaking wouldn't help him either and he takes ages to dry, so it's just as well we didn't venture out.

I got home from the hospital at around 2 o'clock yesterday afternoon and the effect of the earlier flu-jab could be felt. Some discomfort in my left arm where the injection was done and I felt really off-colour. I slept for an hour or so and later at around 6.  I couldn't lay on my left side because of the  pain in the arm where the injection was done. Most of the night I felt fairly awful, and as a result I didn't go to church. But now, at 10.20 I can say I'm feeling a good deal better. From past experience of flu jabs I have usually felt off-colour for perhaps 48 hours afterwards, so this has gone off a good deal quicker than in the past, thank goodness.

The catheter which Carol had inserted when she was in A and E when she first came into Milton Keynes Hospital has come out. I'm not sure how it came out exactly, but we are waiting to see whether the doctors will want it reinserted. Hopefully she won't need it and this should lead to her recovery from the discomfort and pain. There should be results of various test back from the laboratory tomorrow so, when the doctor does her ward-round tomorrow morning we should hear something. Apparently the antibiotics are doing their job and the infection is under control.

It's been damp and miserable most of the day and by mid-morning the discomfort from the flu jab had passed. Not just that, the feeling of sleepiness and total lack of energy, but as I write this (3.5 pm.) I feel more or less back to normal.

When I left Ward 19 I walked out of the hospital and had to go to pay for parking at the machine which is near the entrance to the Cardiology Department. There was a man already there at the machine having problems paying. He had put his ticket into the slot in the machine but it kept rejecting it. The whole idea is that you put your ticket in and the machine calculates how much you have to pay. He did it again, infact several more times. I then said that if I put mine in it would show whether the machine was working, which I did and I had to pay the £4.50 indicated on th digital read-out. The man went off to the carpark with the ticket and he managed to drive out through the barrier using his ticket, so he got to park free whilst I had to pay. There is definitely something wrong with the parking ticket machine if he went through the normal procedure and his ticket worked the barrier without paying whilst I had to pay, somewhat annoying as you can't have free parking at the weekend because the Macmillan Unit isn't open to have your ticket clipped (that is, if you are a cancer patient or a relative.) Such is life!

'Flu Jabs and Wild, Windy Weather

It's that time of year when I have to go for my free 'flu jab. I knew it was coming up and eventually I discovered they would be holding the annual 'flu jab clinic at Ashfield Medical Centre. It would be held this Saturday and next between 8a.m. and 12 noon. I always want to be there as the doors open at 8 so as to get it out of the way as quickly as possible. Alfie was disappointed that I couldn't take him out for his walk around Eaglestone Park, but it wasn't light enough at 7.20 as well as a howling gale lashing the trees outside. I wasn't going to be able to get round the park and back in time to leave for the surgery at 7.45, so he was going to have to wait until I got back.

As I came out of the house and ready to drive off to Ashfield it was bright sunshine over the tops of the houses and a really amazing rainbow across the sky. It was a complete arc and quite unusual because you never seem to see a complete one, probably the end as it touches the ground, but this one seemed to arc over all of Milton Keynes. I rushed back into the house to find my digital camera and attempted to capture it, but it wasn't easy. I couldn't manage to fit the entire rainbow in but i think I got some of it in. Such a rare thing to see and it was gone very quickly so I'm glad I managed to get some of it before it disappeared.

I drove to Beanhill and got to the Ashfield Medical Centre carpark in good time and parked at the rear of the unit. (There is also a dental surgery as well as a Cox and Robinson pharmacy within the block of premises with Ashfield Medical Centre being the largest unit.) I prefer to park at the rear as generally there is more space and it's easier to park and get out than at the front.

As I got to the front of the surgery there were a few people gathering, one lady had an umbrella up because it began to rain. Thankfully the practise manager came to open the door up so we could go inside to wait. I really didn't fancy getting soaked so it was as well we didn't have to wait in the rain, although I don't think it lasted long.

They couldn't begin giving the jabs until 8 o'clock. Would it have mattered if they had? What reason was there to not begin? Some formality or other. I won't ask, being Ashfield Medical Centre. Anyway, they allowed us to register, or at least, report to the reception desk to sign in which would at least record that we were there. Then, to have to sit and wait until 8 before the flu jabs began. I wasn't bothered at all that some people went before me. Who cares? They had tea and coffee to drink before and after you'd been for your injection, but, to be honest, I wasn't bothered. Then the clock ticked over, 8 o'clock and bingo! People were called, or at least there name and which person was doing the injections and which room came up on the digital screen. You'd have thought it would have been in alphabetical order, but no, a sort of random name came up, although, now thinking about it, the names were probably just in the order of people being signed in. About ten minutes later my name came up on the digital display, to go to Room 4. One of the doctors. She asked my name and date of birth (which seems to be the standard way to identify you in the N.H.S.) and I sat on a chair and she administered the injection into my left arm, without me feeling a thing, which should be how it's done and I was out and driving on to Sainsbury's.

It wasn't 8.30 when I got to Sainsbury's store in Witan Gate and it was great to be able to move around the store easily without hoards of other shoppers. Having completed my shopping I returned home and because it had, by now, shown signs of being quite bright outside I decided to take Alfie for his delayed walk, much to his complete and utter happiness. It was quite windy and we came across quite  few bits of twig and benches which had been bought down by the wind. But by the time I came to leave the house to see Carol in hospital the skies opened and it rained, so there was absolutely no way I was going to walk, which was what I had intended. It is, after all, a mere ten-minute walk there along the Redway and it would at least mean I wouldn't have to pay parking (you have to pay, because the Macmillan Unit isn't open over the weekend so you can't get your parking ticket clipped which means you can't get free parking, which is a bit mean.) But by the time I'd got to the park park near Cardiology, which is where I generally park, and then walked in to Ward 9, it had stopped raining and the sun was out!

Side-Effects of Flu Jab and Strictly Saturdays

As I have mentioned in an earlier post, Carol had her 'flu jab in Sainsbury's on Thursday evening. Mine was yesterday morning at Ashfield Medical Centre. I was beginning to think that I was getting a slight reaction to the jab with some muscle and joint pain as we sat down to eat our evening meal whilst watching Strictly Come Dancing. (I'll mention that a little later in this blog.) Carol, though, has had quite a bad reaction this morning (Sunday) and as a result we didn't go to church. I went to Lidl on Oldbrook Boulevard. I was really surprised by how busy it was in there. The first Christmas products are beginning to appear on the shelves and as a result you can't always find exactly what you want. In this case, stuffing to go with this evening's roast chicken. I then went into the Tesco just over the road, one of those 'mini' or 'convenience' branches. I was surprised how few people were in there. I'm not surprised as Lidl is so much cheaper and I could not find any Paxo (stuffing) for the chicken. I looked up and down the aisles but not a single packet could I see. I purchased a Sunday Times, using a self-service till and then walked out. I drove to the shop in Eaglestone, and sure enough, I found a packet of Paxo immediately. This must say quite a lot about the current retail situation in Britain, with Tesco once upon a time being the strongest supermarket chain, and since the financial crash of 2008 such 'discounters' as Aldi and Lidl have changed the way most people shop for groceries, being around 15% cheaper than the four major supermarkets, Asda, Morrison, Sainsbury and Tesco.

As for Strictly Come Dancing . . .  as far as I'm concerned the novelty of seeing celebrities making fools of themselves on the dance floor is beginning to wear a bit thin. The show is over-hyped and it's all over the tabloids and Facebook. You can't seem to get away from it from early September until Christmas. There's nothing at all wrong with the dancing, it's the over-heated audience that gets me. They cheer and clap at the slightest thing, cheering and making stupid noises. And why do they insist on putting people in the front row of the audience who you can see clearly behind the presenters when they are talking, a woman was on there last night who was dreadfully over made-up and kept staring at the camera. A real distraction.  Can they not just fade them into the background? Do we really need to see these non-entities so clearly? Bruce Forsyte, who didn't actually do a great deal when he was on, is sorely missed. I don't know what it is but he did add a certain élan to the proceedings, even though his jokes were somewhat tired.  Those two women, Claudia Winkleman and Tess Daly really don't add a great deal. Never have, since this show began. How did the B.B.C. think that Tess Daly was a replacement for good old Sir Bruce Forsythe I can't think. She has all the talent of a shopping trolley. Though, in all honesty, there wasnt a lot for Brucie to get his teeth into in the first place, nothing to be 'hands on' as he would have been in the 'Generation Game' or 'Play Your Cards Right.' Lets be honest, an hour and a half of this is really far too much and Craig Revel-Horwood's miserable face is enough to put you off your rice pudding. Can he never say anything nice to anyone? I know he's been cast as the pantomime villain but it is wearing a bit thin by now.

The lighting and set design are really brilliant. When you compare it to the travesty of the revived Sunday Night At The Palladium, which has been done on the cheap and has all the atmosphere of a Sunday night at the local village hall, no expense has been spared. The way they can transform the set for each couple who dance is amazing. All done with lighting and digital effects. The moving digital  lighting which is used around the staircases is spectacular.

Greg Wallace got booted off the show. He deserved it. His dancing was like a flat-footed Teletubby. Judy Murray was not much better.  It must be very difficult when you are, in effect, in the shadow of a far more famous son or daughter, as she is. You can forgive her nerves, as most of the rest of the celebs should be used to the cameras, the audience and so on. But she wasn't much better. At least Tim Wonnacott made a brave stab at it, even though he wasn't a particularly brilliant. I don't expect he'll last much longer. Just have to wait and see.

Weather Changes and Flu Jabs

I had to be at Ashfield Medical Centre at 8 this morning as I had to have my annual flu jab. Because of having had a heart attack I am one of the 'at risk' groups who automatically get a flu jab before winter starts and there is a likelihood of being infected. It can be quite life-threatening if you have flu whilst having a heart condition, apparently. I arrived with around 15 minutes to spare and got the car parked and then stood in the queue which had already started to build up, with around 20 people standing on the steps outside the surgery door. It was all good natured and the rain clouds were building up as we waited and hence there was a possibility we might get wet. I did feel what might have been a raindrop, but I'm not sure. We got inside once the doors were open and then there was a wait of a few minutes before I got to the lady on the reception. She put my name in the computer database and registered me and I had to wait a further ten minutes or so before being called into the doctor's surgery. The actual jab was totally painless and I was out again within two minutes and driving home. Fortunately there was virtually no traffic as I drove back to Eaglestone.


The television forecast has been correct: it is now very much colder and wetter today than it has been for the past few weeks. The Indian Summer is now over. It's been raining, not particularly hard, but it's been raining nonetheless. We went to Staples to buy some computer printer ink cartridges and other items and it was reasonably dry and we went out, but on getting back home, having been to Waitrose, which is a mile and a half further down Chaffron Way from home, it was raining quite hard.

Irritating Cold and Cough

For the past week or more I have been developing a really annoying cold. Carol came home from the Academy with a cold so I suppose I caught it off her, but I expect she got it from some child at the school. I remember when I was at school, as soon as the autumn term started up, having been on holiday for around six weeks, and we'd gone back to school, I almost always came down with some bug or other, so it's to be expected, particularly when you're working closely with a group of people such as school children. The same happened with the time I worked in care, there is always the chance that you will catch something from those you are caring for.

The cold turned into a cough. The cough got worse and worse. Having had a heart attack I am always wary of getting flu or colds and this more than ever since the week before my heart attack in 2006 I had suffered with a really bad bout of bronchitis, so you can see why I was beginning to get concerned. At one point, having had a really bad coughing fit, whenever I breathed in I got something of a pain in my chest. Carol suggested making a doctor's appointment. It is far easier to get to the  Ashfield Medical Centre in Beanhill before the surgery opens at 8.00 a.m., rather than phoning. It can take something like 30 minutes to get through, so driving there and getting in the queue that forms outside the door is easier. So on Thursday morning we drove to the surgery and got there at 7.45 and stood and waited. Around half-a-dozen brave folks already there in front of us, but at 8.00 sharp the doors were opened and we went inside. I managed to get an appointment immediately and was seen by Doctor Hilmy at 8.10. I was very impressed as I've never been able to make an appointment so rapidly, thus preventing all the unnecessary and annoying waiting that you might otherwise expect, or getting an appointment later in the day and so meaning you have to return to the surgery. My name came up on the digital display and we went into the doctor's surgery and the doctor prescribed me penicillin capsules. He then said 'have you had your flu jab?' I said I hadn't, but was expecting a letter from the surgery telling me I was due to have one. As we walked into the surgery we saw posters and a display on the very same subject, so it was quite obvious that they were about to give those of a 'certain age' (i.e. myself, over the age of 60.) and with 'certain health issues' (i.e. such as heart problems.) Any I was expecting him to say 'you can make an appointment with the nurse for your jab as you go out,' but he did it there and then, which neither of us was expecting. I was more than impressed as it meant that it was at least out of the way.

We then left the surgery and went to Asda and had breakfast. Fried bacon, egg, sausage etc etc for £2.50 seemed a very good bargain. We had some other shopping to do and then got the prescription made up by the pharmacy and went home.