Already on Sunday I was getting nervous about Tuesday. It was a sunny day, quite pleasant. Des brought some compost round for Dot and wanted to borrow the sack trolley, but I couldn’t find the garage key (later discovered on the floor in Dot’s room). Cleared up the house and looked at material for upcoming retreat, but wasn’t feeling too well after lunch and slept a bit till Dot came home and woke me up. She had had tea with people she met at Assembly House concert – Bridget, David, Howard and Phil. Anna was too ill to play – migraine. Watched quite a bit of television – good cricket match between Australia and NZ, then football and two episodes of Dark Hearts and one of Six Four. Wrote supportive email to the Altmans, and got a nice reply from Joan.
Monday was autumnal but dry and quite pleasant. Dot did some work in the garden, and I helped a little. But felt unwell enough in the afternoon to take paracetamol. Head very hazy and body itchy. Dot prayed for me. Watched cricket and football. England lost to India at cricket, and the Netherlands beat Bangladesh. Spoke to Ray on phone, but neither of us made much sense. In the evening Cake and Compline people came round – all except Vicky. Mostly went well, but P was quite aggressive about Palestine, which upset me. So hard to find people in Norwich who agree with me on anything nowadays. Other than Dot and Kim, of course.
Very misty start on Tuesday, but we were up early to go for my hospital appointment. Quite pleasant later, but rainy towards evening. Had a very bad night, but we got to hospital OK and parked in the multi-storey as usual. Was seen quite quickly and discovered that I had a urine infection. The specialist gave me a fairly cursory examination and prescribed some antibiotics. He said I was down to have a general anaesthetic cystoscopy, which was quite a relief, except that it is some time in the future – “hopefully within the next two weeks”. This is so that they can remove scar tissue if necessary, which is what he thinks is causing my problem. He doesn’t think I have anything sinister, but of course my CT scan hasn’t reached him! Why would it? It was only five days ago, and it must be – I don’t know – a few hundred yards.
Waited nearly an hour in the pharmacy for my prescription, then drove home after buying sandwiches from M&S outlet. Felt quite relieved – I had been expecting a painful operation without general anaesthetic – but during the afternoon and evening I had a little pain from what I presume was the infection (“normal with catheter”). Dot sent round a general update on my situation, and Mary/Neville Thrower rang; so had a chat with them. Cooked veal steak for supper. Dot had long conversation with Angela after speaking with Richard yesterday. Spoke to David on FaceTime to give him an update.
Wednesday was milder and mainly dry. Getting a bit of pain from infection, and feeling rather below par. Bridget came to clean. Got message from pharmacist about my statins. How was I getting on? Amazed they were interested. Spoke to Paul H on phone: he is in the middle of moving and has just had a last-minute two-week delay. Helped Dot cook sausages after a short sleep. Then she went to orchestra while I cleared up then mooched around feeling under the weather. When Dot got back from orchestra I noticed her phone was on the A47. After some panic we contacted her colleague Catherine, who had picked it up and taken it home to Lingwood. So we drove there and fetched it – not the easiest journey, with road works, though the projected storm had not yet arrived. Dot drove, of course. I felt a bit better when we got back.
Thursday – The promised storm Ciaran wasn’t very severe in Norwich, but extremely bad on south coast and in Jersey. We had lots of rain overnight and during the day. I didn’t sleep all that well. Dot insisted that she’d take the car up to be serviced, which she did, and the new service manager, Tracy, gave her a lift back. She was home within 40 minutes of leaving. I had taken the bags out of the car and found the locking nut. Lethargic again during the day, and watched a lot of TV. Mark came over to get Dot to witness a document and he brought us some tins of tonic water he didn’t want. He would have taken Dot to fetch the car, but Tracy had already rung and arranged to pick up Dot tomorrow morning. I lay down for a while after lunch, but helped cook supper. Think I feel better, but still getting one or two painful spasms in the urethra. Not halfway through antibiotics yet. I’m writing this at about 8.30pm while Dot is at the Greens for handbell ringing. She walked there but hopes to get a lift home with Bridget. Still pretty wet outside.
Meanwhile I have just had a good FaceTime talk with Oliver, who seems to be getting on well, but has a bit of a cold. Nice to see him. He seems to be doing really well and is on a committee that liaises between staff and scholars. Naturally he represents computer science.