18 February 2010
Being half-term, daughter Chloe came down with my three little grandchildren whom I had not seen since Christmas. Up to now I’ve made it my business to visit them every six weeks or so, in London, but with a journey time, there and back, of around five hours, is now becoming a bit of an effort, so I suspect that, from now on, they will make the journey to see me.
We went to Gluttons, in Saffron Walden, for lunch. There was some talk about going to the Museum after that but as they still have the Henry Moore sheep exhibition running and the children had seen it before, we spent the afternoon at home.
13 March 2010
I must say the daily hand massage in order to reduce the fluid, and the arms stretching, certainly seems to be doing some good. I have even introduced a new bed exercise of raising each arm in turn towards the ceiling and circling clockwise and anticlockwise ten times and then repeated a further 10 times. This business of keeping the joints moving makes a lot of sense to me and I cannot think why I was not told to do so earlier.
Yesterday a magnificent reclining chair arrived, courtesy the NHS, apart from being really comfortable, I am able to tilt the seat electrically to a point where I am almost standing up. Although I can still rise out of the chair with a bit of an effort, as my legs are undoubtedly weaker, this is obviously going to be immensely helpful in the near future.
Son, Smiler, drove up from London today to have lunch to see me before I go off. It was nice to see him as his visits are not as frequent as they were before he got married.
Easter Monday 2010
Chloe, Karl and three grandchildren came to lunch today. Fortunately the weather is on the mend and the children were able to run around in the garden. It was great to see them particularly as I now find it more difficult struggling all the way to East Dulwich where previously I always tried to go to visit them, about every six weeks, to keep in touch, particularly with the children who seem to grow up at an alarming rate. Before I know where I am the boys will be shaving and going off to university!
9 April 2010
My brother and sister-in-law, John and Anne Garton–Jones came to lunch to see how we were, having trekked all the way from the other side of Shrewsbury in Shropshire. It was very kind of them particularly as John bought me a rather splendid bottle of 1975 Warres port. It was a beautiful spring day and we were able to have drinks in the garden, lunch inside and then back into the sunshine for our coffee. The in-laws were both in pretty good form particularly my brother-in-law, who is now knocking on 80. I am happy to say that they are still leading a very full life which is keeping them young at heart.
I had a fright during the night when I got up to have a pee. I can manage to get out of bed by rolling over and hooking one of my feet under a heavy armchair,, by the side of the bed, and thus levering myself up to a sitting position. In the bathroom I caught my toe on the skirting board around the bath, pitched forward and banged my head against the wall. Fortunately however, I was saved from completely falling by the WC system casing., but it did give me a fright so much so that I determined that I would not venture out of bed again without the portable radio wrist alarm which the NHS has provided for me.
Mark Cato
