Silly Title For A Blog Post!

I can't think of a better name to put in the title of this blog post. And why not? I may think of a better one, but it doesn't really matter.

Wednesday. 10.55 p.m. I was sitting waiting to go out after 9 o'clock this morning and as I waited, the telephone rang and it was the renal unit at Milton Keynes Hospital. My appointment with a consultant there is cancelled. This is a relief to me as it must be due to the consultant there looking at the results of my recent blood test. I was advised by the nice lady I spoke to that I should contact my GP at Central Milton Keynes Medical Centre to discuss where my care will go next. Just a relief that nothing suspicious was discovered.  I then drove to Aldi in Bradwell Common to do a top-up shop. 

I attempted to telephone Central Milton Keynes Medical Centre this afternoon. I could not get through, even after around three attempts. You get through to the appointments line after you get the 'menu of options, but after being held with nothing but a voice telling you which options to select and that you can make your appointment online, I just gave up. Well, I did attempt to make an appointment via the online facility, but for some reason, it has been blocked, so it annoys me that they tell you it is an alternative to the telephone system. I shall just have to have another attempt tomorrow morning.

Thursday. 12.20 p.m. It's a strange sort of day weather-wise. It started out dry and mild, but as I write this the weather has changed for the worse. It's howling a gale outside (just as well not inside!) and I reckon it will rain before the day is over.

At long last, after around half a dozen attempts, I have managed to get through to Central Milton Keynes Medical Centre. I will get a phone call from my doctor on 11th June between 2 and 6 p.m. 

I have bought a food processor. I have spent vouchers I earned from doing online surveys, one of which is something I have been on for around 10 years, where I have to log anything I buy, books, CDs, clothing etc. As you log your items, you earn points and then, when you have enough, you can cash them in for vouchers The site is called Consumer Pulse. The only way you can get involved is to have an invitation, which I did. Over the years I have been able to trade my vouchers in for a Panasonic Freeview box, a Hitachi HD television, a Panasonic microwave oven and several more items. I got most of these items from Argos, and recently I bought myself a new electric kettle, toaster, kitchen knives and more recently the Bosch food processor. I am with other online survey sites, each earning points which can be converted into either cash or vouchers. If Amazon points, it allows me to buy books and virtually anything on their site. I have today ordered a digital kitchen scales which I intend to use to do some baking. I have also done some market research where you chat via Zoom (which is convenient since we were in lockdown at the time.) and earned considerably more than doing the straightforward online surveys. The cash from those has gone into my savings account. I would like more similar surveys.

Later. 2.30 p.m. The post came at around 1.30. I picked it up from the floor after it came through the letterbox. One envelope, with an address window in it. An appointment has been made for me at Milton Keynes Hospital on 21st June. Wait a minute. Didn't I have a telephone call from the hospital to tell me there was no need for the appointment and that it had been cancelled? What is going on here? No wonder the NHS is always in such a financial mess, with this sort of craziness going on. It just seems a waste. A definite case of the left hand not knowing what the right is doing.

Wild, Wet and Windy

(Tuesday)It's a wild and stormy day here in darkest Milton Keynes. Storm Brendan is battering the United Kingdom from the west and, going out with Alfie as I did early this morning, it took all my time and effort to remain standing upright. I took Alfie out for a second time at 1.30 and the wind was a good deal stronger. It's dustbin-day in this area and people had put their rubbish out for collection and some of it, mostly boxes and bags of rubbish, was being blown into the road. Someone along the road has obviously bought a Hitachi HD television (a smaller version of mine I have reason to suspect, along with a Henry vacuum cleaner, as indicated by the remaining wind-blown packaging. The other day some bright spark had dumped an old television in the side entrance to Dexter House. Could it be the same person who purchased the Hitachi television and dumped. More like, fly-tipped. the carton in the road? I think there may be a connection.)

Walking around Oldbrook Green there is paper and goodness knows what else being blown about by the wind. As the day has gone on, the wind seems to have got a good deal stronger. I took out Alfie again at around 1.30, but I don't think he appreciated the weather and tried his hardest to return home.

I didn't go to Camphill on Tuesday because I didn't feel 100%. A rather shaky feeling when I got up and horrible tingling in my feet.  It was rather like an electric shock, although quite mild. I don't know what's caused this, but probably some side-effect of the medication I'm on. I didn't think I was safe to drive the car, so I stayed in the flat. I need to discuss this with either a doctor, cardiologist or pharmacist.

(Wednesday) It's not so wild and wet outside this morning. The wind has dropped, thank goodness, and the rain has stopped.

I've been to put fuel in the car at the Shell station in Grafton Street. I've done well, because the last time I put in fuel was on Christmas Eve, on my way out of Milton Keynes, driving to Worcester for Christmas. It just shows how economical the Renault Captur is, being able to drive to Worcester and back as well as driving around Milton Keynes. Then I went to Sainsbury's and did a fairly large shop which means I have enough meals for a couple of weeks.

Went out with Alfie as soon as I'd unpacked my shopping and put it away. It was almost spring-like as we walked along Strudwick Drive. I have mentioned the amount of litter which has accumulated around the area, most around Oldbrook Green and, in particular, the litter bins. I did mention that this had been removed but today I again saw a couple of Council employees litter-picking, and one had a wheelbarrow with a black bin bag in for the litter. Why on earth people have to fling their litter on the ground I can't think. It seems it's usually the younger generation who do this, unfortunately. I always assumed that the youth of today were more environmentally aware than, say, my generation, but it would appear that this is not the case.

I went out with Alfie at around 2 o'clock this afternoon and no sooner had we got outside and in Dexter Avenue, walking towards Strudwick Drive, than the sound of a siren could be heard and within a few seconds a fire engine could be seen, moving, at great speed, towards Oldbrook Boulevard. I couldn't walk fast enough to get to the crossing onto Oldbrook Green, but I could see it turn left along Oldbrook Boulevard but by the time we reached the crossing it was well out of sight. No sign of smoke, so it was impossible to know where it was going. It could have been going to a fire, of course, but you have to remember that the fire service can go to other incidents, unrelated to fire.

As I walked along with Alfie, I followed a man in dark clothes carrying what looked like some sort of camera, with a sort of digital screen attached to it, rather like a smart phone. When he got to the green, near where men and boys kick a football into a goal, he put down the back pack he had on and it was clear that the device wasn't a camera, but the radio control of a drone. A few days ago I was again walking towards Oldbrook Green and I heard this high-pitched noise. It would be difficult to describe, but rather like something moving at speed, a bit like a sort of mechanical sound. As we got closer, I saw the small drone the man was operating. It flew up high into the sky and made a sort of insect-like sound, rather like a mosquito. It flew vertically and was quite scary and I don't think Alfie liked it. This afternoon it was being flown again and, as we got to the green, there was a flock of seagulls sitting on the grass and they flew up into the air and were scared off by the drone. We did our usual circuit of the Green, and by the time we got back to the crossing, I heard a sort of clunk sound and I think the drone crashed into the ground. Whether it got broken or not, I wasn't sure, but the speed it was going, up and down and then horizontally, I can assume that if it came down too quickly and the operator mis-judged the height,  and it must have crashed into the ground and therefore got broken.

I'm using my newly-acquired and up-dated Fire TV Stick. It has Alexa voice control built-in and 'she' will work if you press the button on the remote to operate the gadget. You have to wait for the blue line to appear at the top of the screen before 'she' will answer and do your bidding. You can call up apps which you download, such as YouTube, or else, if the thing is set up properly, play music from the Amazon Music store. I used to pay a monthly fee, but I cancelled it and now only have the free service which comes with Amazon Prime. Alexa will also play voice activated games, some based on television gameshows, such as Pointless, Deal Or No Deal or The Chase. But some of these only go so far and you can't complete them unless you pay a fee (which I haven't.), which means they can be a bit frustrating as you don't get to the final (if you manage to answer questions correctly.

Another Sunny Day!

The warm weather continues. Milton Keynes in the sun is a great place.

I've been doing on-line surveys for a good number of years now. It's turned out to be quite a lucrative activity. I can't say you can make a living at it, but if you find the right survey sites that offer either vouchers or cash, then the points or cash can soon add up. One such site is called Consumer Pulse, which you have to be invited to join, as I was, some 10 years or so ago. This company wants you to record what you buy, not grocery items, things like clothing, CDs and DVDs, books and so on. I have already managed to purchase quite a few items using the points that I have a accrued and these can be converted into  variety of vouchers for well known stores, such as W.H. Smith, Waterstones, Argos and Currys. We purchased a steam iron, electric kettle as well as put a large amount to the cost of our Hitachi HD television set. I had got quite a good balance of points on Consumer Pulse. Well over £140 and decided that I could use them to purchase a new microwave. I got rid of the old model we had a few months ago because it wasn't in a fit state to use. It had gone rusty and it hadn't been looked after very well. If food is spilt inside when something is cooked and isn't wiped clean, then eventually it will fester and this is exactly what had happened to this model. It just wasn't hygienic, so I took it to the tidy-tip. For a replacement I intened getting one that, hopefully, would be better constructed, and wouldn't rust as quickly. Let's be honest here, many products aren't made to last. They have a sort of built-in obsilescence because the manufacturers want you to buy the latest model. This seems the case with such things as computers and mobile phones. You have to up-grade the software they run on frequently and then, when there are no further up-grades, you will want to change the model for a newer one. I had to decide which model I wanted and within the budget I had set and to then decide which retailer I would order the vouchers for, up to a value of £140. I chose Currys and duly went on the Consumer Pulse website and ordered them. You can only have them in blocks of £10, and I knew, once ordered, it would take around a week before they arrived at my door.

I was pleased when I got the delivery of the Currys vouchers in yesterday's post (Wednesday) because I was expecting them to come by Friday at the latest. I had to sign because the postie knocked on the door and I was expected to sign on a sort of digital device that it's difficult to write on and produce an at least half-respectable and legible signature.

I was hoping to use the vouchers in the nearest branch of Currys, but when I went to their branch and found the model microwave I wanted, I was told that they didn't have it in stock. I discovered that it was in stock at the Bedford branch, but when I asked if the required item could be bought to the Milton Keynes branch for me to collect I was informed that this was not possible. I could purchase the item on-line and use my vouchers to buy it and have it delivered to my home. So, this is what I attempted to do. You have to scratch off the back of the voucher and then put the long code into the website along with the P.I.N., which is the number on the back of the voucher and under the scratch-off area of the voucher. Having done this for five of the vouchers (each vouchers was worth £10, so there were 14 in total, making a total of £140.) But after the fifth voucher, the software told me that no more than 5 vouchers could be used per transaction! As you can imagine I was somewhat annoyed, but I went into the Currys branch in Milton Keynes and they transferred the 14 vouchers onto one voucher and this I eventually managed to put into the Currys website and order the microwave, to have it delivered next Friday.  Thank goodness thats over,

Meanwhile . . . I was told that my MacBook would be ready on Thursday, and that someone would telephone me to tell me if there was a probem, possibly after 12 noon. Nothing. No call, or anything. Just annoying. I forgot to take the charging cable when I took the computer in for them to look at it, so I took it yesterday when I was attempting to get the microwave sorted out. I just hope I get a call tomorrow and that it's ready for me to collect later in the day.

At the beginning of this blog post I wrote that it was sunny and warm. As I write this, looking out of the lounge window I can see that it is definitely not sunny. The wind is quite strong and it's moving the trees about. That's all I need to tell you at this moment in time.

Doing This and That

I had a telephone call from Theresa, who is part of the Family Support group at Willen Hospice. She spoke a lot to Carol when she was in Willen. She was ringing to discover how I was getting on since Carol passed away. She said I might like to have bereavement counselling, which I agreed. She said that she would pass on my name and try to find someone to come and see me. I got a call a few days later from a lady called Hilary and she came out to see me last Friday morning. I was told that there was a group of people who met in the  John Lewis restaurant on a Monday morning. Hilary was there when I arrived at 10a.m. I was introduced to the group and it was a pleasant time just getting to know people and having a chance to chat. They have outings and also meet in a pub for a meal somewhere in Milton Keynes. I believe it's called The Barn, somewhere in the City centre.

I've recently bought a soundbar for my Hitachi High Definition television. It's made by Goodmans. I got it because it was on offer in Sainsbury's. I had some fun setting it up. It will connect using Bluetooth, to my Kindle as well as my iPhone. I have the BBC 'Sounds' app on the iPhone and you can listen to radio, podcasts or download broadcasts, such as comedy or drama. I had a problem getting it to connect to the television. In the manual which came with the device they suggest that for best results to use the 'optical' connection, but a lead for this did not come with the device so I had to go to buy the cable from Currys. I attempted to connect it to the sounder but it would not work. The actual plug just wouldn't connect to either the television or the soundbar. I tried this several times but almost gave up. I then decided to use Google and I found a YouTube video. Low and behold, it suggested removing the plastic covers on each end of the cable. No? Why was this not in the manual or other places? So, I took off these clear plastic covers, and would you guess? The lead fits perfectly! I assumed these clear plastic covers were part of the lead, not there to protect the end of the lead. Why is no mention of this in the manual? Then I followed the instructions in the manual and now the thing connects perfectly and boosts the television sound considerably!

I was in the kitchen, preparing my evening meal. I just happened to look out of the patio doors and, lo and behold! I see it's snowing! Quite heavily. Alfie was wandering about and it looked as if he might need to go out into the garden. I slid the door open and he stuck his head out. He had one look at the falling snow, and withdrew into the house. I can hardly blame the poor little dog. He doesn't like cold and he wasn't going to venture forth. He's currently curled up on the sofa, in the bundle of blankets he likes very much.

(Wednesday) I put the rubbish out for the bin men early this morning and I was more than a little surprised to discover we'd had a fall of snow. Not a lot, but enough. When is there ever enough snow?

A bit later . . . I've discovered a load more of Carol's medication in one of the kitchen cupboards. I put it all together in a carrier bag and took it to Lloyd's pharmacy in Sainsbury's this morning. I have also thrown out no end of part-used packets, bottles and jars of stuff from one of the kitchen cupboards and as a result there's a good deal more space in that cupboard. It needed doing. It's all gone out in black plastic bags and now taken away by the bin men. I was surprised that it had all been taken away when I got back from Sainsbury's.

The sun is out and it's quite warm now (11.00 a.m.) Now sitting in the lounge writing this and resting after the exertions of going to Sainsbury's and then emptying the cupboards. It's quite therapeutic. I think that's the word.

Next Wednesday I'm booked to have my second stent fitted at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford. I had a telephone call from one of the nurses there to find out if I was alright. I told them I wanted the think over and done with. I'm on the morning list and may be there until about 5p.m.