hIn last blog the daughter was ready to move out and taking those cats that we had come to love. Well they have moved out, the cats have gone and we missed them. For weeks after we would get up in the morning and expect to see them by the bedroom door. You would catch out the corner of your eye and think it was one of the cats. Shutting all the doors before going to bed, having to get used to using the front door again. It was not long before we made a decision about the future, but then as normal life stepped in and things went on hold.
mum in hospital, to holiday or not
Mum was admitted to hospital again with breathing issues. I have lost count on how many time mum had been hospitalised since her emergency operation 5 years ago. Each visit is worse than the last and this time was no different. The doctor & nurse told us it was 50\50 at the start but each day the odds were slowly slipping away. We had a trip booked and had to decided should we go. We decided to go a head and go as other family would be visiting mum in hospital. I have four other brother and sister and other relatives that would be visiting mum.
The wife and I had a discussion on the way to Barry (Cardiff), what should we do if mum passed away while we were away. We decided that should the worse happen we would stay and come home on Sunday as planned. This sound a little callous, I know but coming home early would not change anything. As it was nothing happened.
hospital visits are never nice
We continued to visit mum in hospital but things were not going well. Mum was being stubborn about treatment. All these visit were bringing back memory of my dad and and my father in-laws last days in hospital. Memory I would prefer to forget. We visited her in hospital on Monday evening 4th September, she was sleeping but muttering incoherently. 7 hours later I received a phone call from my brother, mum had passed away in her sleep.
The next few days were a blur with sorting things out and we had to decide should we go on our holiday. My youngest sister was due to fly out the day we lost mum, she decided to go, I had a few days before I was due to go, I could cancel and get all our money back. Dues to local issue in our area we were not able to book mum funeral until after I would be back from holiday. We decided to go on holiday.
cardiff GP
We had a great weekend in Cardiff even though the wife tripped over a raised paving slab and twisted her knee. Fortunately when she tripped she was behind my and saved herself from hitting the ground. We stayed out of the city centre in Barry at a nice Premier Inn in Barry. Unfortunately the same can’t be said for the restaurant next door. The food was ok but limited menu and a magnet for large families with screaming kids.
Traveled by bus to Cardiff and by Train back to Barry. The bus picked up those less well off from the council estates. I respect everybody but I don’t walk around with my previous weeks meals showing on my t shirt. A local group men on the train had had a little to much to drink, all were a little drunk, couple worse than others. There were 6 of them and drunk and there was only me so I decided to shut up, if you know what I mean.
On the whole a great weekend, took 5.5 hours to get to Barry Friday evening. Only 3.5 hours to drive home on Sunday, a great Speedway meeting and a good view of the track
Waiting for the racing to start
the holiday
We had booked a hire car for our holiday for several reasons. I had booked a Ford Kugar but having worked in the hire car industry I knew that might change. I wanted to try an SUV type vehicle as I am looking that way when I get my next car. Secondly, when we had holiday in the Norfolk area in the past it had always been in a hire car, so it seemed right to hire again. Thirdly being self catering, we had a lot of stuff to take with us and Fiestas are small.
I collected our VW Tiguan Automatic (knew I would not get a Kugar) on the Sunday lunchtime before leaving on the Monday. The car swallowed all the gear we had take with us. I had concerns about having an automatic and fuel consumption, I should not have done so. We choose to avoid going via the M3 & M25 route, instead going across country. 280 miles and keeping to 70 when possible we averaged 41 mpg, I was impressed. Other than self braking down to 35mph while in cruise control mode on the M1, the car performed perfectly throughout the holiday.
The drive to the Suffolk coast was wet, very wet. That was fortunately the worst weather of our holiday. We had a couple of days with light showers but the remainder were dry with sunshine and windy. We were looking forward to visiting Norwich again, but to be honest I would not recommend it now. To be perfectly honest we found it a dump so many empty shops, street strewn with rubbish and vagrants. We won’t be rushing back anytime soon.
back home
It was nice to get away, I would of hated to be at home while we waited for mum funeral. Back home we decided to keep the hire car for a couple of extra days. This allowed us to take my daughter and boyfriend to the funeral, the Fiesta would of been to small. Once the funeral was over it was time to think about going back to work and other issues.
My younger brother had been mums carer, and now he had the threat of being made homeless. We helped him with forms and seeking advice about being rehomed. He had to sent and application for Discressational Tenancy has he had lived with mum for 40 years and payed the rent for the last 5 or so years. It was with much relieve that he was granted discressational tenancy. Now he just need to find a suitable council place.
medication, exercise and health
In my last post I mentioned not being able to get me medication, well things never improved, it was a further three weeks before my prescription came through. I spoke to the pharmacy and they said they would not be able to guarantee when the next delivery of the medication would be in. So I decided not to bother restart taking mine, I will recheck the situation in the new year.
I finished my course at the Bournemouth Hospital Gym, my end result was good, cutting my HbA1c by 25% and a good weight loss to go with it. Unfortunately with all the issue going on I have not been to the gym for a month now, got to get back into it. Blood test later this week to recheck where I am with my HbA1c (it a measurement of Blood Glucose in your blood).
cats
After the daughter had informed us she was moving out and the cats would be going with her the wife and I decided we would get our own cats. We decided that we would get a rescue but decided to wait until after our holiday. We contacted a couple of local cat charities and kept an eye on there web pages. The in late September one of the charities was looking to rehome an older cat as a house cat due to illness. We asked about him and eventually offered to take him, we felt well prepared having had the daughter 2 cats.
He ended up with the Charity after being left behind by his previous family, the local Vet took him in hoping that his family would claim him but it became obvious that he had been abandoned (probably due to his illness), the cat charity stepped in to look after him.
We collected him early Saturday morning, one noisy cats and a few belonging and additional cat bits from the charity. He meow very noisily and make other funny noises. At times it sound like he has a swallowed a bee hive he purrs that loudly. He has a thyroid issue and the charity provide the medication for his treatment. He is quite thin at the moment but after a recent Vet check up he has gained a Kilo in weight since August. We Kept the name the Vets gave him when he was handed in as a stray, Domino, he is thought to be about 13.
He is very affectionate and has fitted in to family life very well. He lets the whole house know when it is feeding time. The rest of the day he can be found sleeping in several different locations around the house.