Visitors and Sunshine

Yesterday morning (Friday) Carol's friend Pauline visited. She's another science teacher and works with Carol in the science department at Milton Keynes Academy. She left to work at another school but returned to work at the Academy. She visited Carol several times when she was in hospital. She bought Carol a lovely present of Clarins moisture-rich body lotion. She was telling us about how the fish that lived in her pond in her garden have been eaten by some strange night visitor, possibly a heron. They found evidence of something that must have been the culprit, because remains of some of the fish were left beside the pond and there was a splashing about in the water at around 2 a.m. one night. Neither Pauline or her husband or son have found out what animal it was took the fish. Possibly a fox or even a heron.

It's been sunny for the last couple of days. I did two loads of washing and couldn't decide whether to put it out on the line in the garden, but put one load on the airer in the kitchen. The second load went out in the garden, at the time that Pauline arrived and it was virtually dry within two hours.

We'd contemplated whether we should buy a new mower, or perhaps a Strimmer. The grass has got so long that the mower would struggle to cut it as it's got too long, basically because of the 'on/off' weather, one day it rains, then it's sunny. It's absolutely hopeless trying to cut it when it's wet. It's hard work as it is. We then thought a Strimmer or at least one of these hand-held gadgets that has a spinning fishing line in it might perhaps be easier, and after it's cut down to a reasonable length, use the mower to cut it even shorter.We went to Bunnings (which used to be Homebase) at Winter Hill (where we bought some plant pots a few weeks ago.) We looked at several machines, including cordless models. We ended up buying one which doesn't use fishing line, but has a cutting blade similar to the Qualcast mower we already have. It's cordless and requires charging for about an hour, and, having put it together successfully, and waited for the battery to charge fully, gave it a try-out. It takes some getting used to, but it turns out to be far easier than at first thought, although I didn't manage to complete the whole area of grass (I still refuse to term it a 'lawn.') The machine cost a good deal more than we'd anticipated, but if it does it's job successfully it's worth it. It's an Ozito, a brand I've never heard of before. Because it's cordless, it means you don't have to bother with the confounded power cable, plugging it into the reel of cable, you just pick it up and carry it out and get on with the job and don't have to think about the cable getting in the way all the time.

From Bunnings we went to Morrisons, which is just over the road near the railway station. Carol was determined to get a coffee to drink. As Morrison's has a café it seemed reasonable to go there to have the aforementioned coffee. I sat at a table and Carol went to queue for the coffee. She'd wanted a latte but she soon returned to me at the table empty-handed. It turned out that she couldn't have the latte after all as the machine that made the drinks was out of order. We've been to Morrison's café before and there is always a problem, a long queue which takes ages to move, or they've run out of something or other. What is it with these places? Don't they want customers? All they are managing to do is annoy their prospective customers who will merely go elsewhere for refreshment. 

Tenth Chemotherapy Cycle

So, we didn't get a telephone call from the oncology department yesterday evening, so Carol's tenth chemotherapy cycle will begin today, thankfully.

We've put two bags of bark chippings on the weed-resistant material. It's fairly easy to spread, but it won't cover as much as we thought so we'll need to get several more bags to finish the job, so it's another outing to Bunnings.

We went to the oncology department for 11.30 this morning. They'd managed to sort out the problem with the computers. It was just as well we decided to go early because when we got to the usual carpark behind the cardiology department, there was no space, so we thought we could park in the new multi-storey carpark, but when we drove round it appears to be just for staff at the hospital. Considering that there is a street level carpark behind the main block you'd have thought that if staff used the new facility there would be more than enough space for visiting patients. We drove right round the inner ring road and tried to find a space in the carpark at the front of the hospital, but it was entirely full so we drove back round to the oncology department, with the intention of me dropping Carol off and then going on my own to find a space, even considering returning home and then walking back into the hospital campus, but fortunately we found that someone  was driving out of the first carpark and we were able to take their vacated space.

There's not a great deal else to record about the day, which was fairly uneventful.

12th Anniversary of Heart Attack and Consultant's Appointment

I forgot that yesterday (Thursday) was the 12th Anniversary of my heart attack. I can't believe it was 12 years ago. I have to say I feel fine. It's unfortunate that we're visiting hospital more than ever, dealing with Carol's chemotherapy. I haven't had any dealings with the cardiology department for a couple of years now, although we enter the hospital through that department to get to oncology.

It's yet another mild and sunny day. We're currently putting wood bark chips down in the garden, near the house. We've put down weed control fabric first and then the bark chips on top. We bought four bags of this in Bunnings yesterday. There's a possibility that we're going to need a couple more bags to complete the job. This has been planned for quite a while, so it will be good to complete it whilst the weather if fine. After all that work the grass needs cutting again. 

Carol had a consultant's appointment arranged for this morning at 11 o'clock. Being fine, it seemed a good idea to walk. Only about a ten-minute walk to the Macmillan's unit at the hospital. There were few other people waiting, but we got there in plenty of time but were eventually called into the consultant's office at around 11.20. There wasn't actually a lot to add to what was said when we visited Churchill Hospital in Oxford two weeks ago. He told us that it was quite usual for a patient's blood test to show a low count of the antibodies that fight infection, which was why the last two chemotherapy cycles were postponed. He says that the prognosis for a cure are excellent. The chemo sessions should continue until all 12 are completed.

Alfie has been keeping an eye on our neighbour's cat. It has been coming into the garden more than ever, no doubt because of the warmer weather. It has the habit of sitting on the roof of the shed and then staring imperiously into the house, just to see whether Alfie is watching. He has had the habit of sleeping on the sofa or at least sitting and not taking any notice or just looking in the wrong direction. It amuses me when he does see the cat and then starts up barking and then rushing out into the garden but the cat sits in such a position so he can't possibly see it when he gets closer.

Sunny Trip To Olney

It's a sunny but bright morning, but it's chilly. It's supposedly the astronomical start of autumn. The autumn equinox, apparently, when the hours of light are equal with those of the hours of darkness. Or so we were told on BBC Breakfast this morning. The trees are rapidly changing colour. Carol's mum visited us last Tuesday. She also visited us the week before. The last time she came she bought Carol a present of some bulbs, I think they were hyacinths or crocuses, but not sure which. We have a large round earthenware planter in the garden which we bought at Norfolk Lavender when we visited my brother who lives in Norfolk, several years ago. It hasn't been planted so it seemed the ideal place for the bulbs. We went to Bunnings, the company which has taken over Homebase, and bought a bag of potting compost and Carol has now planted the bulbs, so that's something to look forward to for the spring.

Some mornings there is mist or fog. How do you distinguish between the two? Mist is a sort of drifting cloud, thin and elusive whilst fog is denser and all-pervading. It usually disperses once the sun comes out.

We went out this morning. Carol had been almost pain free and needed a change of scenery. We haven't been out and about as much as we would have normally done over the summer and as it was a bright and sunny day I suggested going to Olney, one of our favourite haunts, and about a 20-minute drive from Milton Keynes. On the way Carol needed a loo, and we were near  garden centre called Alban Hill. (Actually a nursery, but what's in a name? What is the difference between a garden centre and a nursery?) We've driven past on numerous occasions and seen the sign but have never visited and were surprised by the selection of plants and other items on sale. There is a café within the grounds, which we didn't visit on this occasion, but we will have to visit on a return visit. Carol wanted to buy a couple of plants to put in the pot where she put the bulbs which she managed to find and we browsed in the bird food area and then drove on towards Olney. A really great place to visit as it's got lots of antique shops and really quirky buildings with a history. We parked in the area near the Co-op and walked into the centre of this village. We have never visited the Cowper Newton museum which is situated near the centre but must return for a visit at some time in the future. Lots of places to eat, coffee shops, restaurants and a very good fish and chip shop we have patronised in the past. We returned to the car park and did some shopping in the Co-op and then drove back towards Milton Keynes. We looked for somewhere to eat our sandwiches and drove into the village of Emberton which is on the road between Olney and Milton Keynes and found a place to stop near some allotments and then drove home once we'd had our break.

Heavy Rain

It's been fairly sunny and warm for the past few days. As I write this the sun is out. We went to Bunnings, the new D.I.Y. store in Winter Hill, Milton Keynes. It was Homebase but they were taken over by this company.  Sainsbury's took over the company who owned Homebase and Argos and presumably sold on Homebase to Bunnings, which I had never heard of this company but it's no surprise really as it's an Australian company and have only recently opened stores in this country. We just had to go and have a look and I must say I'm quite impressed from what I've seen. They have a cafe which Homebase didn't have. When we were there we heard this most amazing sound and could't work out what it was. It turned out to be the heaviest rainstorm and the sound was the rain on the roof of the building. Absolutely pelting down when we walked into the garden area where they were handing out umbrellas to customers.

We drove the short distance to The Range which is just over the road from Bunnings. Carol needed the loo so we went upstairs. On the way in we had to pass a display of hallowe'en rubbish. The usual crass stuff, stupid grinning skulls with bright red lights for eyes and some of the most pathetic ghoulish stuff imaginable. I can't believe people want to buy such stuff, but I suppose companies know that people will buy anything such as this. It's amazing how they start putting this stuff out for sale earlier and earlier each year. The we saw Christmas decorations. We went to Frost's at Woburn Sands yesterday and they had a lot of Christmas stuff already on sale, most of it tat. Lots of space being made for all this stuff. We went upstairs on the escalator at The Range and for some reason we noticed that as you got on the thing it got faster. Did I imagine it? I don't think so. More Christmas stuff upstairs which we attempted to ignore. We had a good browse around the store and looked in particular at the range of Regatta clothing, for example, decent fleeces at good prices which interested me. We would have gone back to the car but at that moment the heavens opened and the rain fell again. We just risked getting a real soaking as we ran to the car in the carpark and drove out. Unfortunately there was an huge queue of cars coming in and out of the road back onto the grid road and it took a long time to get out of Winter Hill.