A better way to shorten a t-shirt

Ok if you want to cut a piece of a T-shirt in order to shorten it the best way is not to attack it with a pair of scissors as I did the first one. A preferable method is to get a rotary cutter and a cutting board and a ruler then you have a much better chance of getting a nice straight line. Eat your heart out Sister Veronica aka my needlework teacher.

Tennis finals and t-shirts

Well we had two amazing tennis finals didn't we! When it came to the men's tennis I really didn't know which one of the 'big three' I most wanted to win. I wanted them all to win really.

So there's now a bit of an empty space in my life in the afternoons. I have been filling it up this afternoon by cutting up t-shirts. This is because some of my t-shirts are annoyingly long. I didn't cut the first one very straight though.

Don't know what my needlework teacher would have said. Well yes I do actually.

Today didn't really get off to a very good start. I woke up feeling bleh... P bought me some Weetabix and two mugs of tea in bed. These were on a tray. I ate the Weetabix and drank one mug of tea. I got up. I sat down rather bouncily on the bed to do my hair. Tea everywhere! This was a bit frustrating as we had changed all the bedding last night but thankfully we had a waterproof mattress cover.

In fact I'm still feeling bleh so I'm now resting instead of hacking t-shirts to pieces.

Come on Konta

So here I am waiting for the Konta match to start.

 P is at the maze ("Do you want to come with me?" "Nope").

 J is still at uni. I miss J. 

I am feeling tired and my fingers are aching.

Part of the reason for the relapse with my fingers was massively overdoing things when clearing out Mavis's house.

Almost a year ago Mavis was walking down the garden path to take her rubbish out (which she didn't need to do because the bin men would come up her garden path for her). She fell against her fence and broke the upper bone in her arm. She was in hospital for several weeks. She needed surgery but it would have been a long operation and they felt her heart wasn't up to it so sadly she is in the position that her arm will never fully heal and she will have to wear a brace on it for the rest of her life. She was discharged to an old people's home where most of the other residents had dementia. They had a policy of allowing the residents to eat as much as they liked because most of them hadn't got very good appetites. As a result of this Mavis, who was already very large, put on a huge amount of weight. This put a strain on her knees, decreasing her mobility further. She is now in a wheelchair and because of her size it is very difficult to take her out. She has now moved to a nicer home but she had to permanently give up her house and we and some others from her church had to clear it out although we did actually get a house clearing firm to do the bulk of it.

So one minute Mavis was walking down her path and then she was never able to go back into her house again. So sad for her.

We put Cyril her cat in a cattery for a while but eventually it came to the point she had to let him go. Thankfully the cattery owner's brother had fallen in love with him and took him in.

Visiting Mavis and sometimes having to battle to get her the care she deserves (and sometimes not actually succeeding in getting it for her) has taken up quite a lot of our time and energy really.

Anyway on with watching Konta...

 

Hello again

Well this is me back again after a long break.This was partly caused by not being able to get into my Google account because I had forgotten I had changed the password. And also because life has not always been easy and at times has been busy. And also because my paws have been painful - as in the arthritis flaring up. I'm mostly using 'voice type' to do this - I speak it types. Mostly it understands me.

So here I am sitting doing what I normally do at this time of year - watching Wimbledon and thinking how amazing Federer is and can Dan Evans possibly turn it around?
Tomorrow I'll try and have a bit more of a catch up.

Another week gone by

So how has a whole week gone by so quickly?

P was on a First Aid course on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and I had plans.

What actually happened though was that in the middle of the sermon on Sunday I started sniffling. On Monday I woke up and thought 'I don't feel very well I'll have a bit of a lie-in' and woke up in the midde of the afternoon. I felt quite a lot better on Tuesday and on Wednesday was well enough to go out for lunch with a friend.

Thursday morning we went to a Christmas Fayre (!) where we bought just a couple of presents and got in lots of peoples' way with the wheelchair. Thursday afternoon I made a load of tuna pasta bake and veggie sausage rolls for J. 

Friday morning it was German again and discovered that the two new people have both done a lot of German before as in she has a degree in it and his mum was German but they say they've forgotten a lot of it. Both seem very nice. 

Then it was home for lunch, four hours in a traffic jam and a visit to J. We were staying in a different B & B and we had an annexe with a living area and kitchen as well as a bedroom and bathroom. Luxury!

Only problem was the bed. We spent the night feeling like we were each sliding down a slope into the centre. This was because that's exactly what we were doing as we disovered in the morning when P realised the central spine supporting the slats had collapsed. I hadn't had much sleep.

Of course just because a student's parents have spent the cost of a B & B, several hours in traffic and exhausted themselves making pasta bake is no reason for that student to get up early. After our continental breakfast, checking out of the B & B and hanging around in the uni coffee shop J finally got up. 

We headed into town and discovered that the route to our usual parking place was blocked by a road closure. At this point my satnav had a brainstorm and led us several miles out of our way. Finally we found a parking place and had lunch in our favourite café. I had vegan shepherd's pie because I am trying to be healthy. This is to do with my cholesterol level apparently being sky high (!).

Then we tried to navigate to an outdoors shop, in order for J to buy some walking shoes, guided by P's satnav. Only slight problem was that it hadn't picked up on the fact that the shop closed down two years ago. Never mind.

Journey home was good.

Then we went to a quiz in the village and we were on my friend Becky's team which is good because she's brilliant at quizzes. P got quite a lot right as well and I did ok-ish really. Anyway we won which made me feel ridiculously excited.

(Fact to remember for the future: the smallest state of the USA is Rhode Island).

My brain having been activated so late in the evening was reluctant to switch off and go to sleep - as in I got to sleep about 5.30.

Somehow I got out of bed this morning in time for church which was good because it was all about trusting God to keep His promises to us. Which is something I really need to do.

First day back at German

This is me blogging again after six months. Quite a lot has happened and not all of it has been easy. Some of it has been really difficult. I can't really talk about most of it though.

Anyway here I am on October 5th 2018 and today I went back to German for the new academic year and P didn't. He's given up. Feels he hasn't got time. To my surprise three of the others have also given up but two new people are apparently going to join us.

P dropped me off with my scooter and I managed fine, with the others holding doors open for me. The first day we have to do lots of assessments to see where we are at. The teacher said I am doing well with my speaking because even though I can't always remember what changes at the end of the word I know that something does change. Actually (don't tell anyone) she's going to give me some extension homework which she isn't giving to the others. Wow. To be honest though I do work at German. Could work even harder really; perhaps I will.

It was nice to catch up with the others anyway.
 
 P picked me up afterwards, we had a quick lunch then went to visit Mavis. There is a bit of a long saga to do with Mavis. Been a bit stressful. May write about it later.

Then we went to the tip to get rid of a few bits and pieces. Then we had a lovely 'walk' along the river in the sunshine.

Digestive issues

Sorry haven't blogged for a while.

Quite a lot has been happening but it's actually past my bedtime so I'll just write a little bit for now.

Well the ultrasound appointment came through really quickly. It was in a private clinic - our GP surgery seems to have a contract with them. There's not much to an ultrasound but I had to keep holding my breath which wasn't easy. They didn't tell me anything but at one point the sonographer called out to the woman sitting at the desk "Can you write these measurements down" and called out several figures. The only thing I could think that they might have been was gallstones and when I went back to the GP she said yes they were so she would refer me to a doctor at the hospital to decide what to do about them.

Then I had the endoscopy. You get a choice with this - a local anaesthetic and a tube down your nose or sedation and a tube down your throat and you're not so aware of what's going on. I've had one before and went for the down the nose option and it was fine - not much to it at all really although the anaesthetic didn't seem to really work very well and I could feel it go down my throat but it was just a moment's discomfort. Apparently that feeling does make some people panic though.

There was quite a long wait - about an hour which made me feel a bit nervous really. Anyway the staff were all really nice. Nurse put some stuff in my nose to dilate it a bit. Waited a bit more then taken into a room and told to lie on the trolley. Then the doctor said he would squirt some anaesthetic into my nose and throat and it would sting a bit but it stung a LOT. In fact I would describe it as acutely painful and I think it was actually the worst part of the whole thing. He spent what felt like a long time exploring my stomach during which I wished I'd gone for sedation but I was confident he wouldn't find anything cos gallstones is enough to be going on with but then he said:

"You have a 5 cm hiatus hernia."

I have a what???

Totally not expecting that.

Apparently it's a bit of my stomach which is moving up into my oesophagus through a hole in my diaphragm. The problem is that my stomach contains acid producing cells so I now have acid at the base of my oesophagus which can very easily travel upwards causing acid reflux symptoms.

Usually they don't operate for hiatus hernias and often they don't cause problems but it seems that mine is. It's a matter of 'lifestyle management' ie working out which foods trigger symptoms and taking drugs to reduce stomach acid and avoiding lying down or bending after eating and not eating very large meals or less than three hours before bedtime and some other stuff I can't remember.

On Saturday I saw a doctor at the hospital who said my gallbaldder isn't inflamed or thickened - it just has gallstones floating in it. He thinks the hernia is the main cause of my symptoms and it's impossible to tell what effect the gallstones are having. He recommended a low fat diet and other lifestyle changes plus medication.

So that's where I'm at. A low fat diet isn't all that easy really but I'm trying to get to grips with it especially now I'm back from my holidays.

More about the holidays to follow.