3 August 2026 (Monday) - 800 Kilometres Done - 224 To Go

Once I’d hung out the washing (and gathered dog turds) I made toast and had a look at the Internet. Some woman had posted a photo of her new garden pond and was asking advice of one of the Facebook groups. Having spent a small fortune she was rather disappointed to end up with a small hole in the ground surrounded by loads of gravel. And as is always the way with the Internet there were far more people dripping sarcasm than were offering advice.

I Munzed, Wordled from “loads” to “reply” in five goes, and got ready for the off.

 

We drove up to the woods a tad earlier than usual. With another warm day forecast we wanted to get round before it got too hot. We walked round the woods and had a rather dull walk. No episodes with the normal people, no rolling in muck… As we walked my phone beeped. In January my “Map My Walk” app asked if I’d like to join the “You vs The Year” challenge in which I had to walk a total of one thousand and twenty-six kilometres (in mapped walks) over the year. Today I got past the eight hundred kilometre mark.

 

We came home. I made a cuppa then popped to the vets to get the flea treatments. I’d ordered it yesterday and had got some verbals from them that I shouldn’t phone to order the stuff before eleven o’clock. I must admit I wasn’t impressed when we found that dog the other day and they refused to scan him for a chip and insisted I drove out to the emergency vet. I went there expecting attitude, and was pleasantly surprised to find smiles. Mind you I had to wait an age for them to come out with the flea treatments. They always do that. You’d think that the idea of ordering the stuff the day before was so that they would get it ready for you to collect, wouldn’t you?

 

The dogs didn’t seem to want their flea treatments, but with that done I went and had a pootle in the garden. On Saturday I saw that the smallest water feature wasn’t working. That was a pain – the pump is underground. I cleared stones and scraped away shingle and eventually got to the pump. I can’t imagine what I was thinking when I put the thing in place (over twenty years ago) but I’d only allowed myself about six inches of slack cable. I got to the pump, cleaned it as best I could, and it started working again which was a result. I cleaned out as much of the mud as I could from the underground reservoir, and put it mostly back together. If it is still working tomorrow I’ll put all the stones back.

I took down the event shelter and put away the extra chairs. I cleaned out the pond filters and topped up the ponds.

I had a left-over bread roll for lunch, then realised I was knackered.

 

I spent the afternoon dozing, reading my Kindle and playing Meowdoku before realising that I’d been outside for too long and had caught the sun.

I came in and wrote up some CPD. The American Society of Hematology and the European Hematology Society both do little quizzes on their Facebook pages over the weekend, and it is the work of two minutes to copy and paste the html coding into the Blogger software. It looks incredibly impressive to those who think that copying and pasting html coding is difficult. Personally I’d be far more impressed if the American Society of Hematology and the European Hematology Society learned how to spell Haematology (the letter a appears twice!).

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up pizza and then went bowling. I watched a couple of episodes of “Stranger Things” as the washing machine had a go at my undercrackers. Monday night is “wash the smalls” night. There’s never a dull moment in my world…

2 August 2026 (Sunday) - A Birthday

I slept well… not surprising really after the ale that got shifted yesterday. I made toast and rolled my eyes. Ex-Home Secretary Suella Braverman was ranting on-line about that which she did nothing about when she had the chance when she was in power. I’m amazed that the masses vote for her… 

Several people had clicked “like” on the photos of yesterday’s little session in the garden. It was a shame that we clashed with so many other things, but it’s August, the sun is out and everyone is busy…

I Munzed; inviting Munzers to join the Guild for this month’s Munzee Gauntlet Games. A posh phrase for scanning bar codes stuck to a lamp post, but it keeps us occupied. I Wordled from “after” to “penal” in five goes.

 

“er indoors ^TM” went off out for the morning. I watched an episode of “Stranger Things” then had a little tidy-up. Washing up went in the dishwasher, bottles and cans into the recycling, and I then had a little doze in the garden until the birthday girl returned.

We had thought about a fish dinner at the Pilot or a Sunday roast at the Woolpack. Sadly being a glorious Sunday in August we would be sharing the place with all of the normal people. So we opted for a quiet afternoon in the garden. “My Boy ^TM” and ”Auntie Chel ^TM” popped round with a birthday card and pressie and we had a lunch of bread and cheese and pickles. And shortly after father-in-law called in.

We had a rather good (if lazy) afternoon.

 

There had been talk of a late afternoon walk, but it was still too hot to take the dogs out. And a combination of loads of visitors yesterday and today and the heat had worn them out anyway.

Instead we had a rather good lamb shank and a bottle of plonk which we devoured whilst watching a film. “Wicked” was rather good even if (like so many films) it went on for about an hour too much.

1 August 2026 (Saturday) - A Drink in the Garden

 

As I scoffed toast I peered into the Internet and saw that so many people were off on their holidays. Loads of people were posting photos from airports. Part of me was jealous, part not. I hate going on holiday. I like *being* on holiday, but the “going” bit is just hours of arse-ache.

I saw that despite the predictions, Reform UK had their arses handed to them on a plate following the Manchester Mayoral elections and despite the odds, the Labour candidate won. Is this good or bad? I must admit my Labour MP has turned out to be an utter disappointment, but I’d rather have someone in power who was a bit rubbish than a bit nasty. Talking of which the row in Hastings continues.

As I smurfed the net so Treacle came down. She made a half-hearted attempt to come to me but I could see the look in her eye. I told her that it was all right and that the back door was open, and she flew out like a bullet from a gun.

 

I Munzed, Wordled from “their” to “slush” in four goes, then strained my brain. Steve was on the radio doing the “Guess the Lyrics” competition. “She’s a PhD in I told you so. You’ve a knighthood in I’m not listening”. No? -  It was The Beautiful South – Don’t Marry Her.  Sometimes I’m amazed at what trivia is stuck in my head.

 

We went round to Repton and Dog Club. Over the last few weeks there’s been a rather timid dog who brings out the worst in Morgan so we took his muzzle along (just in case) but that dog wasn’t along so all was well. Morgan did tiddle up someone… but that is another issue.

 

As we drove home Steve was doing the Mystery Year competition on the radio. A big Royal Wedding, Kate Bush sitting in your lap and a guy working down the chip shop… 1981.

We had a cuppa then I tidied up the garden and it wasn’t long before people arrived. A lot of people were away on holidays or had prior bookings, but a few of us gathered in the garden and had a rather good time.

It was good to catch up with friends… even if things did get progressively more and more vague as the afternoon (and evening) wore on.

I took a few photos…

31 July 2026 (Friday) - Litter Pick

I woke feeling profoundly miserable for no reason that I could fathom. I got up, cracked on and it soon passed.

I made toast and had a look at the Internet as I do most mornings. Trivia and petty backbiting abounded, but what really boiled my piss was the Reform UK leader of East Sussex County Council. His bunch have made the decision to stop giving out free meal vouchers to children. The owner of the Grumpy Cook Café in Hastings has carried on giving children free food (at his own expense), but yet again no good deed goes unpunished. Barry Ashley, who runs the Grumpy Cook café in Hastings, and the local Labour MP Helena Dollimore have both been told by the Reform UK leader of East Sussex County Council Andy Woolley that he plans to contact the police about them. He’s got the arse that they named him in criticism when the council he runs decided to stop dishing out school holiday meal vouchers. He feels it unfair that he should get stick for the decisions he and his underlings make.

Meanwhile the head honcho of Reform UK gets a five million quid bung and they are quite happy about it.

Am I missing something here?

I had an email. A new geocache had gone live on the way to Maidstone. There seems to be something of a conspiracy in that new geocaches in the Maidstone area only go live on days when I’m not working there.

I Munzed, Wordled from “wrong” to “purse” in five goes, and got ready for our walk.

 

As we drove to the woods the pundits on the radio were talking about the state of the country’s water supply and interviewing Feargal Sharkey about it. It was pointed out that no new reservoirs have been built in the UK for thirty years. It was also pointed out that new reservoirs cost a lot of money and don’t have an immediate financial return for investors. There was talk about why nationalising the water companies would just cost the country a fortune…  Feargal Sharkey said that ninety-nine per cent of what the water companies are spending this year is coming from the increased water bills (the implication was that all the existing money goes to paying dividends to foreign investors) so it’s going to cost us anyway.

It strikes me there are two obvious things to do. Desalination plants (like they have elsewhere in the world) and pipes across the UK. Gas gets pumped the length of the nation; why not water?

 

We got to the woods and had a good walk. As we walked I gathered litter. For some time I’ve been noticing the litter on our walk. The lager can at the half-mile point. The Haribo wrappers at the three quarters of a mile point. The old helium balloon. The discarded trousers (seriously!)

I got quite a haul of rubbish.

The woods were quite busy today; we met loads of people.

 

We came home. I made us a cuppa then nipped to Tesco to get some odds and sods. I hate supermarkets. Usually I go before work, but at mid-day (like today) they are heaving with normal people. Not one of them look where they are going; not one of them has the slightest idea that there is anyone else in the supermarket. And pretty much every single thing has been moved from where it was the last time that I called in.

 

With shopping shopped I then pootled in the garden for a bit. Sweeping up, puling weeds, generally tidying up. Whilst I’d been shopping I’d got some Belgian buns. We had them with a cuppa for lunch, then I effectively wasted the afternoon by alternately read more Kindle and played Meowdoku.

 

“er indoors ^TM” sent me a WhatsApp. If I phoned a certain number I could enter a prize draw for free and have a chance to win a million quid. That would be nice, wouldn’t it. So I entered the prize draw.

It would have been nice to have won, wouldn’t it?

 

We had a bottle of the three quid plonk with dinner. As we scoffed and guzzled we watched more “Bake Off: The Professionals”. I find myself more interested in the presenter rather than the baking. Woof !!!

30 July 2026 (Thursday) - Not At Work

I slept through till half past seven this morning. That was an improvement on the last two nights. I made toast and had a look at the internet as I do every morning. A friend was posting pictures and videos from her Cornish holiday in which her daughter seemed to be spending an inordinate amount of time jumping into the sea from harbour walls. I once did that in Hastings. Someone was posting to local Facebook pages offering to sell aerial photos of people’s house taken from his drone… sadly he was posting anonymously so no one could contact him.

And the world was up in arms because Nigel Farage hadn’t been invited to the cross-party talks about social care. All sorts of conspiracy theories were being thrown about but no one seemed to realise that now that Nigel Farage is no longer an MP he was not eligible to attend. He stood down from being an MP in the hope that he'd avoid scrutiny for the five million quid bung he received from Christopher Harborne. (that blew up in his face, didn’t it?)

I Munzed, Wordled from “slept” to “flume” and took the dogs out.

 

We drove up to the woods where we had an average walk. As we walked we saw where something had been chewing the bark from the trees (squirrels or deer?). My bird app thought it heard a merganser… which is a duck and there’s not many of those in Kings Wood. We saw deer in the distance – too far away to bother chasing them. And we met a woman on a horse… As she came toward us through the woods (on a supposedly “no horses” path) I grabbed the dogs by the collars and held them till she passed. She thanked me for holding the dogs, then made the snide comment that dogs are usually on leads. I smiled sweetly and thought better of telling her that horses are only allowed on the gravelled tracks.

And Bailey rolled in fox poo. Twice.

 

We came home for a bath, and I made us both a cuppa. I spent an hour marking a trainee’s work on thrombotic disorders. I wrote up some CPD. I put some washing in to scrub, rounded up all the dog turds that I could find, then voomed round the front and back yards with the bionic burner. Five minutes with that sorts the weeds.

 

“er indoors ^TM” went shopping. I made some toast for lunch and thought about my old lecturer and mucker Pete Chopping. Pete was chief biomedical scientist at Orpington Hospital forty years ago and in the evenings he used to lecture us at Bromley College of Technology. He was *always* banging on about what he called the “Tea & Toast Brigade” by which he meant pensioners who lived off tea and toast and with such a diet usually ended up with macrocytic anaemias (anaemic with really big red cells caused by not eating properly). He maintained that the “Tea & Toast Brigade” brigade were responsible for ninety-nine per cent of all the low folate results we saw in the lab (we measure folic acid every day). Pete would have laid an egg if he saw what I eat for lunch most days when not at work.

Pete was that rarity – he knew absolutely everything there was to know about haematology and could explain and teach so well. And he always got the beers in. He liked a bottle of White Shield. Such a shame that he’s gone…

 

With toast scoffed I ironed the shirts I’d washed earlier and ironed the rest of the ironing too as I watched an episode of “Stranger Things”. I managed to put the ironing board away without disturbing the dogs, and Treacle was asleep when I announced that I was going to “FEED THE FISH”. She leapt up squealing in excitement.

With fish fed I voomed round with the watering can, then sat by the pond for a bit and read my Kindle.

 

Over dinner we watched this week’s episode of “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds” which started well but the writers clearly wrote themselves into a hole from which they couldn’t get out. Half-way through “er indoors ^TM” asked how our heroes were going to get out of the pickle they were in, and sadly rather than resolving the plot the writers effectively said “sod it” and just ran the end credits. Such a shame.

We followed this with more “Bake Off: The Professionals”. Who would have thought that making a Battenburg was so complicated.

And we are now watching the Claudia Winkleman show. Apparently there won’t be a second season for which I am very grateful.

29 July 2026 (Wednesday) - Another Day At Work

I had another bad night. I got up at five o’clock, made toast and watched another episode of “Stranger Things”. This one was a full fifteen minutes shorter than yesterday’s one. One major difference between telly and streaming is that all the episodes of a series on the telly are all exactly the same length. There’s no two episodes of a streamed show that are the same length.

 

I Wordled from “early” to “valve” in four goes then had a look at the internet. There were quite a few posts about pubs re-opening of Facebook this morning. The Halfway House in Challock is to re-open. Having been taken over and re-named The Stag it soon went belly-up as the owners were targeting drivers of classic cars and motorbikes. Not only is this something of a niche market, it is also the very people who don’t spend out on the pub’s key product as they are all driving.

Ironically this is a mistake that the new owner of The Peacock at Goudhurst is looking to make as they are currently refurbishing and looking to target the biker community.

And the Kings Head in Wye has just re-opened after a refurb allegedly costing over a million quid despite there already being three other successful pubs within a five minute walk of the place.

Bearing in mind that (on average) two pubs close up every day in the UK, there’s some rather confident wannabe landlords locally.

And some chap was posting to the local Facebook groups whinging about the state of his food waste bin. It was rather disgusting (as food waste bins are) and he was getting rather aggressive about why the council aren’t going to clean it out for him. He said that he pays his taxes so why shouldn’t the council come clean his bin?

This chap is allowed to vote…

 

I set off to find my car. I'd had to park some distance from home last night. As I walked I found myself somewhat distracted by the young lady walking down the road in front of me. Perhaps I'm an old puritan, but she might as well have been stark naked for all that her "clothes" were keeping hidden. Perhaps she'd forgotten to get dressed this morning? After all it as only half past six.

 

I got lunch from the co-op. There was a minor delay as the chap at the front of the queue wandered off to get a cup of coffee from the self-service machine half way through paying for his stuff. He suddenly realised there had been a queue behind him at the counter and that he wasn't the only person on the planet. He then got into a panic as to whether he should finish paying for his shopping or finish getting his cup of coffee.

Sometimes I wish I didn't have this idiot magnet.

 

Yesterday I had to take a major diversion between Tenterden and Biddenden as the road was closed. I checked Google Maps before I left home and it told me the road was open. It lied. I got to London Beach to find the road still closed, so I took the same diversion I took yesterday. But bearing in mind Google said there were still road works on the A21 I bypassed those and went the way I'd come home last night on that part of the journey.

For all that I prefer working where I am now, the drives to and fro can be problematical.

As I drove the pundits on the radio were talking about FIFA - the world's governing body for football. Following meetings at the recent World Cup, FIFA's head honcho is looking to sell off the rights to its major events (including the World Cup). Amazingly the company which looks set to make most money out of the deal is run by the brother of Donald Trump's son-in-law.

Is anyone surprised at that snippet?

 

Despite taking a rather convoluted route to work I got there far too early. As I walked in I could smell the scent of brekkie wafting on the breeze and I fancied a plateful. I've smelled that before; it is invariably a disappointment. But despite my better judgement I went to the canteen, got a plateful of the cooked brekkie and was again disappointed. It wasn't bad; just nowhere near as good as it smelled.

 

I went into the lab and did my bit. At lunchtime I had a rather eerie episode. I've been reading a book - a post apocalyptic story set in southern England in which a plague had wiped out most of humanity. Our heroes were in Sevenoaks and needed medical supplies.  One of the characters pointed out there was a hospital on the outskirts of Tunbridge Wells. The author perfectly described the roads I drive down, the hospital drive, the hospital foyer, the corridors I walk down... but all described as they would be after a world-ending plague.

It was all rather unsettling

 

With work worked I came home. Google said the A21 was still slow so I headed cross-country via Matfield and Horsmonden again. It also said the road between Tenterden and Biddenden was open, and unlike this morning it was.

As I drove I listened to more Adrian Mole MP3s. It’s far more entertaining than the evening news.

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up hot dogs and chips which we scoffed whilst watching the first episode of the new series of “Bake Off: The Professionals”. It was rather good. As was the hot dog and chips.  

28 July 2026 (Tuesday) - Diversions, Duck's Feet

I woke at ten past two feeling full of energy and raring to go. I then lay dozing before finally getting up at five o’clock. I made toast, watched an episode of “Stranger Things” then had my usual look at the Internet as I do. It was still there, and rather dull at six o’clock. No one was kicking off about anything, so I sorted the undercrackers that I’d washed last night, put some of them on, and got ready for work.

A couple of months ago I saw the boss had made a minor boo-boo and had put me on leave this week. As I got ready for work part of me wished I’d kept quiet and just taken the week off.

 

I had something of a "drive from hell" getting to work this morning. As I approached the turn-off to the A262 I saw the road was closed. There was a diversion sign pointing west-wards, but as I went west-wards there were no other diversion signs. That was helpful (!) I followed the back roads that I knew would take me to Sissinghurst and hoped that would bring me out past whatever had closed the road. It did, but it wasn't long before I joined a two-mile tailback on the A21. After forty minutes I got to the traffic lights which were causing the hold-up. You'd think road works which were clearly so disruptive would have people actually working on them, wouldn't you?

And then there was another major tailback caused by people struggling to get past a three car smack-up which had happened at one of the busier junctions.

 

As I drove the pundits on the radio were talking about the company Johnson and Johnson who were facing legal battles about their talcum powder. It was alleged that the stuff caused cancer. Does it? I don't know. But it turns out that if a court declares that it is carcinogenic, then it is only carcinogenic where that court has jurisdiction. The stuff might cause cancer in America, but until such time as a UK court gets involved, the stuff is heigh, ho pip and dandy over here.

One lives and learns.

And there was a lot of talk about ex-servicemen who had been involved in atomic bomb testing in the1950s and 1960s. They were after compensation because the atomic bomb testing had given them cancer. Bearing in mind that anyone who was in the armed forces during that time would now be well into their seventies I must be missing something here.

 

Pausing only briefly to get lunch from Tesco I went into work. A colleague was just back from a safari holiday in Africa. Travelling all over the place in Tanzania and Mozambique... seven flights in twelve days. I'd like to do that... if it wasn't in a malarious area.

And there was talk of voluntary redundancies. Well, not actual redundancies, a voluntary "Mutually Agreed Resignation Scheme". I thought about it, but I'd only get a year's money which wouldn't last long, and I quite like going in to work on a part-time basis. 

 

As I did my bit we had a phone call from one of the places to which we refer some specialist testing. The person on the other end of the phone was someone with whom I worked years ago. The last time I saw her was in a pub in Lyminge when I was part of a "rent a mob" supporting a friend's band and she was part of a hen party. I got her and the hen party to heckle the singer which was rather entertaining.

 

Bearing in mind the debacle I had this morning I checked Google Maps before heading home. I came home via Matfield, Brenchley and "Earl's shortcut". "Earl's shortcut" involves taking the back lanes between Biddenden and Bethersden and for all that it is half a mile shorter, it actually takes longer as the roads are so narrow. I'm not keen on taking it as the first fruit of my loins once went that way and ended up in a ditch, but with the main road closed I didn't have much choice. Ironically the bit where “My Boy ^TM” had ended up in a ditch was closed because of an accident so I had even more of a diversion to get round that bit.

 

Once home I found that the duck's feet had been delivered. Some time ago the doggy dentist lady had recommended that crunching chicken's feet was good for the dogs' teeth so we've been getting bags of those from Amazon. But Bailey had gone off of those. Bearing in mind she'd had the thumbs-down from the doggy dentist lady last week (and brushing her teeth takes some doing) we needed to sort something. Last week the doggy dentist lady mentioned duck's feet. All three seem to like those (for now).

You really can get a bag of duck's feet from Amazon. It’s a shame we forgot to cancel the standing order for chicken’s feet…