28 February 2021 (Sunday) - End Of The Holiday

I was again woken by Sid’s shouting that he wanted to go outside, and again came down to a turd-free downstairs. I saw that as something of a victory.

Fudge came downstairs too, and then spent far too long bumbling round a cold garden before sitting next to me shivering for a while, He has lost so much weight recently he seems to be suffering from the cold far more than usual. I did wonder if he was shivering as a reaction to all the medication he’s been on this week, or whether he’s eaten something he shouldn’t, but the shivering eased a lot as he sat cuddled up with me. Perhaps he needs to wear a coat more often?

He helped me with some of the crusts from my toast as I peered into the Internet. There was a particularly nasty squabble kicking off on one of the local Facebook pages. The exact cause of the squabble was irrelevant, but some of the people spewing their bile on the matter (according to their Facebook profiles) lived in Birmingham, Aberdeen and Ramsgate. Why should they care what goes on miles from their homes if not to just have a good argument?

 

I then had a little look at the price of railway sleepers for my next garden project. Some time ago (probably in 2007) I dug up the edges of my lawn and put down decorative red chippings. I got a load of edging stones from Whelans to keep the shingle in place, put those edges weren’t the tallest and over time they have sunk, and as fence panels got replaced and the area tramples the edging stones have migrated. And (in all honesty) I doubt they went in very straight in the first place.

Now they are now barely visible over the grass and are pointing in all directions. Seeing that the fence has been made good, I have a plan to replace the lawn edges with wooden sleepers which I could paint to match the fences, and with sleepers in place I could get more of a depth of decorative red chippings. As always it pays to shop about. B&Q were charging twice the price of a garden supplier in Northiam.

Mind you it is all theoretical until such time as the insurance pays up for Fudge’s recent little episode…

 

I got the pressure washer together and spent a little while zapping paving slabs in the garden. The pressure washer does clean things up impressively, but it does leave a lot of water slopping about the place. Having turned the lawn into a swamp I decided it was time to stop, and not to carry on any more.

I then sat by the pond watching Fudge stalk the Koi. He’s still not right, but he was obviously feeling well enough to bother the fish. As I watched him so the seat of our garden arbour collapsed under me. I spent a few minutes fixing that.

 

We then got the dogs onto their leads for a little walk. Usually Sid isn’t keen on going for a walk, but he was today. So much so that he crapped himself in excitement (quite literally). Pausing only briefly to clear up the turds, we did the same walk we did yesterday. Usually when I walk the dogs on my own, I get out early and we have a better walk because we avoid the masses. Today the world and his wife seemed to be walking up and down the Greensand Way in Great Chart. I much prefer avoiding the masses as there are far fewer opportunities for Pogo to disgrace himself.

 

With walk walked and Pogo disgraced we came home and spent an afternoon slobbing in front of the telly. Slobbing in front of the telly is all very well, and is probably for the best at the moment what with my dodgy knee, but I do miss the long weekend walks.

er indoors ^TM” sorted a rather good bit of dinner which we scoffed whilst watching more episodes of “Upload”. Not a new idea in sci-fi; until I saw this show I rather thought virtual reality worlds had been done to death, but this is a rather good take on an old idea.

 

Back to work tomorrow… in another (non-COVID) plane of reality I would seriously be considering pulling a sickie and talking to my GP about knee replacement surgery tomorrow. But we are where we are… I might just give him a ring and ask to be put on a waiting list to see an orthopaedic surgeon.

I should also chase the ENT people too about the appointment I had cancelled for me a month ago…

27 February 2021 (Saturday) - Klabian Pelf

Yesterday Sid produced a turd the size of a cricket ball whilst he slept and (on waking) followed it with a medley of dung that exceeded the wildest dreams of even his most ardent fans. I woke to the sound of him barking at six o’clock and came downstairs expecting the worst. I was pleasantly surprised to see he just wanted to go out for a tiddle. I let him out and went back to bed.

My knee has been playing up over the last few days. When I got up to see to Sid it was fine. When I got up a couple of hours later it was really painful.

 

Fudge sat with me as I scoffed toast and he scoffed some of the crusts. I saw that as a good sign, but wasn’t too keen on his continually trembling. I sent out quite a few birthday wishes via Facebook, and then saw that I had an email. The nice people at the power company had got back to me to say that since they were taking far too long to deal with such a simple complaint, I had the right to complain to the ombudsman.

So I did.

I have a smart meter that they won’t fix, and they are charging me way over the odds. Let’s see what the ombudsman has to say.

 

I then took Fudge to the vet for a once-over. The vet seemed happy with him, and took some blood to check his renal function.

We came home where I took off the last of Fudge’s bandages (before he ate them) and I then spent a little while pootling in the garden. I pulled a lot of grass out from between stones and out of the gravel, then put my sundial to the right time. You wouldn’t believe just how much time the sundial gains and loses.

 

er indoors ^TM” and I then loaded all four resident dogs into the back of my car and we drove out to Great Chart where we did a little geocaching. Geo-HQ have created a new thing – a locationless cache. The idea is that you do a little tiding up somewhere in the Great Outdoors, post a photo of what you’ve done on-line, and you get the geo-smiley-face.

We just did our standard walk from the cricket pavilion up to the railway and back again, picking up rubbish as we went. A lot of the rubbish was bags of dog poo. This rather mystified me – why bag the dog poo if you are just going to leave it laying around? There were also quite a few beer bottles in the ditch along the footpath, several discarded face masks laying around, and copious amounts of general rubbish too. As we walked several people thanked us for doing the clear-up. Quite a few people commented on how messy it was, and one chap had a bit of a rant about the mess made by dog walkers whilst glaring at my dogs. Cheeky sod!

I took a few photos as we walked today. I haven’t done that for a while.

I can’t help but think that if everyone took the trouble to clean up (even if only once a year) just one of the stretches along which they walk, then the world would be a much tidier place.

As we walked so the vet phoned with the result of Fudge’s blood tests. His kidney function had massively improved since Wednesday. The results still weren’t what I’d like them to be,  but they won’t be - he's got renal failure...

 

We came home, and er indoors ^TM” went shopping. I slept in front of the telly for the afternoon until I was woken by a text message. er indoors ^TM” had written a shopping list and left it at home. Could I tll her what was on the list? I read the list out and got in trouble. I must admit I have no idea what “Klabian Pelf” is; I just read out the shopping list.

With shopping shopped er indoors ^TM” came home. I thought about asking of she’d acquired any Klabian Pelf, but thought better of doing so. She boiled up a rather good dinner, then we tuned in to the weekly family quiz night. We kicked off with three rounds of bingo (in which I won twenty quid), and followed it up with a frankly brilliant game of “The Price Is Right” in which my score was about ten per cent of that of the second-lowest scoring person.

It really is daft, but we see far more of family during lockdown Zoom than we ever did before Coronageddon.

26 February 2021 (Friday) - The Cone of Shame

I slept well, but I am reliably informed that er indoors ^TM” got up to Sid three times during the night. Fudge had a good night though, and he sat next to me as I scoffed toast. He was still sulking about having to have his “cone of shame” over his head, but he does himself no favours. He was obviously thirsty last night so we took the cone off so he could get a drink. Before we could do anything he was chewing at his bandages.

 

I rolled my eyes somewhat as I read on Facebook that the “Mr Potato Head” toy has had a re-branding. In order to appeal to today’s children the thing is becoming gender-neutral. My immediate reaction was that this isn’t to appeal to children at all but to pander to some politically correct agenda. But then I remembered a conversation with favourite granddaughter who told me there are several children in her class at school who insist on using gender-neutral pronouns for themselves. And there are also a couple of children who were little girls a year or so ago who now claim to be young men.

Don’t get me wrong - I’m not having a go at the trans community here. This is just yet another part of today’s society which goes right over my head.

 

Expecting the worst I walked down the road to the dentist. Being a hundred yards away they are convenient, but I do have issues with the place. I had an appointment with the hygienist booked for today as a prelude to an appointment with the dentist next Tuesday (as the dentist wants me to see the hygienist first). Late yesterday afternoon the surgery phoned me to say they’d had to cancel next Tuesday’s appointment, and could I come in to the dentist today *before* I saw the hygienist. I said I could *if* they could tell the dentist that seeing him first was their idea.

I saw the dentist five minutes earlier than planned. He was impressed with my gob, but intimated that I should have seen the hygienist first. I smiled. I then went back to the waiting room from where I expected to be immediately taken to the hygienist. My appointment with her was for nine o’clock. At quarter past nine she wandered through and asked me if I minded if she finished her cup of coffee before seeing me (!)

I finally got in to see her twenty minutes after my actual appointment time. She asked no end of rather personal questions, took one look inside my cake-muncher, and went mad. Mine was the worst mouth she had ever seen. It really was as though I’d taken different mouths to the dentist and hygienist.

The hygienist had a serious rummage about in my gob and issued me with an interproximal dental brush that I must use daily. I’ve used smaller emulsion brushes (!)

Once she’d finished, I could taste blood for the rest of the day.

 

I was only five minutes late getting Fudge to the vet. The vet gave him a once-over whilst I was there, and seemed pleased with his progress. Fudge didn’t seem pleased to be left there for another day on fluids, but it was for his own good.

I came home, and took Treacle and Pogo out.

We went to Kings Wood where we did the same walk as yesterday, but in reverse. Again not having Fudge along meant we got one so much quicker. Pogo and Treacle were incredibly well behaved, which was just as well. I think today must have been “National Keep Your Dog An A Lead” day. We met loads of dogs in the depths of the wood. All on leads, and the people with them all glared at me in a very pointed way.

 

With walk walked I went through my letter rack and found all sorts of old rubbish that I didn’t need or want. Bank statements from ages ago, raffle tickets for the goat sanctuary from Christmas, old premium bonds (are they worth anything?)

I then had another look at my household accounts and bearing in mind my rant about insurance yesterday I had a look-see at various insurance policies I have. I was spending eighteen quid a month on a policy which supposedly would pay for repairs to the washing machine. In the time I’ve had the policy going I could have used the money to buy two new washing machines. That policy got cancelled. I’ve also been spending seven quid a month on a policy for fixing my lap-top. The lap-top is now five years old and (according to those who know) now beyond repair should it go west. That policy got cancelled too.

Whilst I was obsessing with money again, er indoors ^TM” suggested I might have a look at creditkarma dot com. They told me my credit score was excellent. That was nice, but I can’t help but think the vet bill will sort that out… 

I spent the afternoon slobbing in front of the telly, then went to fetch Fudge. The vet said he’d been good as gold, and was hopeful. He’s got another appointment in the morning for a review. In the meantime he’s had his dinner, and is now sulking about having to wear the cone of shame…