Wednesday

Weight

My weight is still on a downward trend and this makes me feel good.

Breakfast

I had a bacon omelette this morning. It was nice to go back to my regular breakfast routine after a few days with my parents.

Work

I felt the need to look at my work e-mail today. I logged in mainly to send them a scan of the sick note but I got distracted by the lines and lines of mainly useless e-mails. I used my normal method of reducing them down to a manageable level. First I deleted all the information type mails. Next I scanned through anything I was cc’ed on. If it didn’t look important it was dispatched to digital heaven. At this point I stopped for a cup of tea to avoid peaking too early. Now that I had eliminated the dross I could deal with the important mails. In the end, there wasn’t that much that needed attention and of those only one required anything that resembled work.

Phone

Mum phoned me in the middle of the morning enquiring whether I would like to come back to her house for the rest of the week. In the end I agreed, I will be a long way away in a few months and completely unable to just drop in so it seemed only fair. We arranged for Mum and Dad to pick me up tomorrow, at least that way I’d get one more night without the telly blaring out all day.

Lunch

Today’s lunch was corn cakes spread with butter and apple jam. This was mainly because that was all of the readily available munchies that I had in the house. This may have influenced my previous decision to go to my parents for the next few days.

Dip

I slumped in the afternoon. Work didn’t hold my attention, since handing in my notice I’m a lot less invested in it. I also realised that no one from work had enquired about my health. I didn’t expect them too but if I was my line manager I would have sent me a text. I ended up playing silly games on my computer and listening to podcasts.

Spaghetti

Loved one had left me some pasta sauces before she returned to that big island far away. I had one on these with spaghetti this evening. It would have been nicer if we were sharing it. I have to wait a few more months before that will be a reality.

Evening

I settled on the sofa and into a book. I really didn’t have the energy for anything else. I think that is what being cooped up in doors for a few days does.

Tuesday

Alarm

The garage was going to pick up my car this morning to take it to be serviced. They had “helpfully” given a window of 8 till 11 to pick it up. This translates to being eight if I decide to take a lay in or eleven if I don’t. I decided to get up and be ready for an eight o’clock pick up knowing full well that I’d be waiting around for a long time.

Scales

I was pleased to see that the numbers were still going down, although they were not going down as fast as I would like. I’m hoping that a few days of preparing my own meals will help the situation.

Breakfast

I prepared a bacon omelette for breakfast, mainly because that was about all I had in.

Late

I left it until five to eleven until I called the garage. The first attempt was fruitless as I ended up listening to a recorded message telling me how important my call was. The next attempt was more successful and full of apologies. They were a man down so everything was going a little slower than normal. I had no issues with that as I wasn’t planning on leaving the house today but it would have been nice to know.

Lunch

The garage man came just before lunch. That left me some time to kill before it was officially lunchtime. I refuse to eat lunch before noon. If I did not have this rule I would eat all pack lunches before eleven. Lunch wasn’t that exciting, corn cakes and hummus, but at least it was lunch.

Tyres

The call that I’d been expecting came just after dinner. The front tyres were on the wrong side of the limit to pass the test. I suspected that this would happen but I was hoping that they would be right on the limit for the purpose of the test. I didn’t really want to have to fork out the extra cash but I knew that I would have to.

Finances

I had a man round to talk about my financial health this afternoon. He brought his you assistant with him. The assistant had a strange crease in his collar. We went through a mound of paperwork and I filled in forms. Some things looked good, some things didn’t. They took the pile of paperwork with them and promised to get back to me. I feel it was a successful meeting.

Dinner

I had homemade guacamole on corn cakes for tea. I had this for two reasons. The most pressing was that I had all the ingredients but given another day they would be beyond the point of eating. The second was that I couldn’t be bothered to prepare anything else.

Bath

I’ve been trying to work out how to have a shower and not get the dressing wet. It’s taken this long to work out that it would be easier to have a bath. It was glorious to be clean again

Stout

I finished off the day with a can of Guinness, it seemed only right

Monday

Lie in

That is something glorious about staying in bed on a Monday morning. Normally I would be in the traffic but today I had a note that allowed me to not work. I felt it was only right to stay in bed until start of work time. It would have been rude not to.

Kettle

I think my parent’s kettle is booby trapped. It boils like a normal kettle but when I went to pour the boiling water into the cup the lid flipped up allowing my had to be enveloped in steam. I feel that this is my parent’s way of telling me that I drink too much tea.

Stretches

The three times a day routine of stretches is starting to become a habit. On paper, it sounds like a small thing but it always seems to take up a lot of time.

Book

After a lot of procrastination about going up the stairs to get my glasses I finally got round to starting the book that I’d been studiously avoiding yesterday. I don’t know why it takes me so long to start reading a book, it just does.

Lunch

My reading was interrupted by mum with a pepper, tomato and anchovy thing. It had been grilled and tasted good.

Snooze

Mum and dad when for a sleep after lunch whilst I sat on the sofa and read. Eventually they surfaced and went to do some gardening. That was my cue to fall asleep. Doing nothing is so tiring.

Tea

We had cold gammon for tea, accompanied with a baked potato and some veggies. Yet again I was offered wine. I’m starting to wonder if I’m the odd one out by not drinking wine with meals.

Home

After dinner Dad drove me home. The cat was there to greet me. There was something nice about being back in my house, alone. Although it is nice to be waited on it’s even nicer not to be. I doubt I’m from a privileged lineage because of this.

Reading

I spent the rest of the evening finishing my book whilst fussing the cat in a quiet house. It was bliss

Sunday

Dawn

After a pain free night, I woke to the combined sounds of the dawn chorus and rain. One was much more pleasant than the other. I had no desire to get up so I went back to sleep.

Morning

I finally got up at about ten a headed to the kitchen to bombarded with breakfast options. I’ve not really done anything for the last few days so I didn’t feel very hungry. I settled for a bowl of muesli and declined all the other offers. It was all healthy stuff but I have an issue with the volume.

Stretches

I’d tried some of the post operation stretches last night. The sitting down one was fine but the standing up one had left me feeling a bit queasy. I tried them again today only this time I didn’t feel so ill

Lunch

Mum made a salad for lunch and we had it with prawns. It was lovely but again I didn’t feel I’d done anything to deserve it.

Reading

I spent the afternoon not reading a book. It sat closed in front of me whilst I actively avoided reading it. I’m starting to get a bit restless. This is the problem with not being at home, all my usual distractions and projects are not available.

Wine

I don’t normally drink wine with a meal or before a meal, so it was a bit of a surprise to be offered the choice of which wine to drink. I selected a red but had no intention of drinking it. It sat on the table in front of me unopened until dinner time. My mum thought that this was a bit odd.

Dinner

Mum had made a Sunday dinner. Gannon with onion sauce accompanied with new potatoes, brussel sprouts, peas and carrots. Gannon is one of my favourites, this is the upside of recovering at my parents’ house. The wine remained unopened.

Film

We finished the evening by watching a silly film together. I finally opened the wine and had a glass. It’s very rare for me to drink wine in the evening whilst watching television. I probably won’t be doing it again for some time

Saturday

Early

I woke at about 3:30 with a pain behind my knee. It didn’t matter how I laid it wouldn’t go away. It was a very persistent pain. Mum had left some painkillers downstairs. Eventually I got up and suffered a descent and ascent of the stairs in the quest for pain relief and sleep.

Tea

I woke up when mum tapped on the door and brought in a cup of tea. I declined breakfast. I wasn’t really that hungry.

Newspaper

A bit later mum popped her head round the door and asked if I wanted a newspaper, dad was going up to the shop in a minute. She seemed taken aback when I told her that I hardly ever read a paper.

Stairs

Eventually I summoned the energy to get out of bed and make my way down stairs. This time I used a walking stick to negotiate the stairs, this made it much easier.

Lunch

I finished my book just before mum brought in lunch, asparagus and a poached egg. I’m not used to having food brought to where I sit. It makes me feel a bit helpless.

Snooze

I fell asleep on the sofa this afternoon. I managed to fast forward two hours. I woke to the sound of my dad watching rugby.

Curry

Mum has made a lamb and chickpea curry for tea. I wish I could cook as well as she can.

Television

Dad controls the television, mum tells him what she wants to watch. I’ve no idea how it works but after lots of bickering they end up watching something they both claim to like. I tried to stay out of this battle, it was far too exhausting.

Friday

Alarm

I’d forgotten to turn the alarm off so I woke to the sound of the news. This was a good thing as it meant that I could have a nutritious breakfast of a cup of tea and two oranges before going back to bed. The doctor had instructed me that I should not eat for six hours before admission, that effectively meant no food until early evening. I have enough fat reserves to keep me going for that long so I’m not about to starve but my stomach is a creature of habit and does like to be thrown a morsel or two every three hours or so.

Lie in

I went back to bed after breakfast, it seemed only fair.

Ironing

Eventually I surfaced into the waking world. I needed something to distract me from the thought of food. The ironing proved to be ideal as it’s impossible or to eat an iron at the same time.

Hospital

I arrived a little before my admission time and started the waiting. First I waited in the waiting room and then I was ushered to a room with a bed. I’d decided beforehand that there was no point worrying about timings so I’d taken off my watch and brought a book. It is very rare that I get the time to just sit and read, I had almost forgotten what a pleasure it is. Every now and again someone would come into the room and ask questions. The surgeon popped in and drew on my leg. The anaesthetist came in and talked about blockers and locals. Finally, Vince came in and wheeled me to surgery.

Surgery

I was placed in a small room with the anaesthetist and his assistant. I told them that the thought of needles makes me wince. They seemed happy with that. Then they set about doing things with needles. I winced. At one point, they made my foot tingle, apparently, this was because they were near a nerve with a long name. Once I’d been suitably numbed I was wheeled into surgery. Everyone looked very busy.

Recovery

The next thing I remember I was being wheeled back to the room. They asked me if I would like a cup of tea. No I answered. I would like a mug of tea. I was thirsty and more importantly I was tea deficient. They brought me a cup and two one cup pots, a suitable compromise. After being re-tea-ed I tucked in to sandwiches that they had left for me and followed that with the fruit I had put in my bag. Then it was back to the book whilst eating FruChocs.

Standing

After a few visits from nurses’ I was told that I could get dressed. It was then that I found how painful my leg was. Everything was a bit of a struggle as I couldn’t quite extend it. The pain wasn’t bad but it was constant and irritating enough not to be ignored.

Sick note

My parents came to pick me up as I was not allowed to drive but we couldn’t leave until I had been issued with a sick note. This precious document was the key to two weeks of not working. Two weeks of doing things for me rather than them and of course to recover.

Care

In an ideal world, I would have gone back to my house, crawled under the bed covers and stayed there until I felt good enough to join the world. In this world, I went back to my parents so that my mother could look after me.

Stairs

My bedroom was upstairs. A nurse had given me instructions on how to walk upstairs, keep the bad foot lower, but walking up the stairs was a trial.

Beer

I’m sure that a didn’t read that alcohol after surgery was a bad thing. Almost sure. I had a beer anyway, it is after all beer and we all know beer is not real alcohol.

Sleep

Despite doing very little today I was tired. Yet again I had to face the stairs. It didn’t take long to fall asleep.

Thursday

Morning

The metallic taste was back this morning and I suspect that my voice was starting to deepen. This was a worrying development for someone who needed to be healthy tomorrow. The cold sweats were back as well. This was not a good state of being. I wandered to the kitchen via the scales, finding that I lost a bit more lard, and made some breakfast. I felt like calling in sick but that would have been admitting that I was ill. It will be find next week but not now.

Error

I made an error in a spreadsheet a few days ago without realising it. Luckily it got trapped before the error caused a bank of computers to be turned off without warning. I’m rather glad there was a bit of downstream error checking.

Motorway

The radio warned me of a tail back and so did the matrix signs. I should have gone the back way but I really couldn’t be bothered. Instead I sat in the tail back and inched along to my junction. It wasn’t as bad as the radio had made out.

Order

I had to have a shower, do the washing, cook dinner and tidy up. I spent far too long pondering the correct order of those tasks. Dinner was a baked potato so that had to go into the oven first. Then I had to have a shower so that I could put todays clothes in the washing to ensure everything possible was washed. Finally, I ate my dinner and did the washing up. I feel I accomplished all this I the most efficient way.

Paperwork

I used the time I’d one back to ignore paperwork before going to bed.

Wednesday

Taste

I woke up with that dry metallic taste in the back of my mouth. This was not an ideal state of affairs. I tried to drown it with tea and that partially worked. Even the news that my weight had started to descend couldn’t distract me from the fact that I was under the weather.

Work

I spent the day trying to persuade myself that I wasn’t getting ill despite all the evidence to the contrary. I tried to ignore the regular cold sweats and the aching joints but eventually I had to admit that I had some sort of illness creeping up on me.

Home

I did the laying on the bed thing when I got home in the hope that the illness would seep out of me. That didn’t work.

Dinner

I wasn’t feeling that adventurous so I ended up having a baked potato with cheese and sour cream. It tasted a little odd, I put it down to the throat lozenge that I’d had a few minutes before eating dinner.

Evening

I was next to useless this evening so I sat on the sofa and thought about reading a book.

Tuesday

Weight

I’ve been avoiding the scales for a couple of weeks but I could feel that I’d gained weight. It would have been hard not to with all the eating out I’ve done recently. The actual number was quite a shock. I may have uttered the phrase “I’ll never eat again” just before preparing a bacon omelette for breakfast.

Smoke

I was behind a van on the motorway that was issuing so many fumes that it was generating its own foggy micro climate. There was something very wrong with that van.

Meeting

We started the day with a corporate presentation that took two hours to tell us very little. It was an effort to keep my eyes open. All the old clichés about teamwork, collaboration and trust were trotted out in presentation after dull presentation as if this was a new shiny way of working. It looked to me like the same old stuff being dressed up with a few cartoons to me. I’ve heard this stuff all my working life and after a while it ceases to have an impression, it is just noise in the background.

Pastries

There were pastries after the meeting, it was a bribe to make us attend, I had more than I should and then felt instantly ashamed that I’d failed on resisting the temptation of sticky treats. This sort of behaviour will not help me lose the many kilos that I need to shed. Neither will the bucket load of fruit I had to that the sweet taste out of my mouth. I’m starting to think that fasting may be the only way forward.

Feedback

The feedback request about this morning’s meeting dropped into my in-box. I was still seething over the whole pointlessness of it all so I may have been more critical than the meeting deserved. At least the survey was anonymous.

Swimming

I went over to the lido at lunchtime to swim a few lengths and generally feel at one with the world. There is nothing like an outdoor pool to restore the equilibrium. I did feel unduly tired when I finished but that was countered by the feeling of well-being that always follows a swim.

List

I had a lot of little things to do this evening so I made list and diligently worked through it. That’s how the washing got done and a banana loaf was made whilst making urgent enquiries on the phone and installing a banking app on my tablet.

Taste

I had that taste in the back of my mouth that says cold. This might explain why I’ve been feeling a bit run down today. Having a cold now would be a bad thing. Hopefully I can keep it at bay until Saturday.

Monday

Aches

Yesterday’s swimming and cycling had taken its toll. I felt as if I was being held onto the bed by the weight of the covers. The inclination to leap out of bed was being held back. It took a herculean effort and a raging thirst got get me into the horizontal, washed shaved and out of the door. Breakfast was not an option.

Fruit

I raided the fruit box at work at about half past ten. I’m not sure if the volume of fruit I have eaten is actually a good thing but I have no doubt it will keep me regular.

Chat

My boss was back in the office today after his holiday, understandably he wanted a quick chat about my resignation. All he really wanted to know was if it was prompted by anything he had done. It wasn’t but it may have been prompted by the many things that he hadn’t done

Motorway

I left work at the earliest acceptable time as I felt too sleepy to carry on. I could feel the creeping tiredness as I drove home, I really didn’t feel safe. I was not sure that my eyes would reopen after each blink.

Bed

I got home and went to the bedroom to get changed, it took a long time to get changed and I woke myself with my own snoring. I did feel better for the sleep.

Tea

I finished off the apple crumble for tea. It may not be a healthy option but it was a very tasty option.