An Unusual Task

Fifteen or so years ago my phone rang.  "Would you do me a favour and pop over to the house. I've something I'd like you to do for me. Just ring me whenever you manage to get over."

"Okay. It'll be early afternoon. Is that okay?"

"Absolutely."

My friends were in the South of England visiting their old stomping ground. Hence they were unable to fulfill a request from their daughter somewhere miles away.

The daughter had been invited (if I recall correctly) to a formal ball somewhere. She had a dress but needed some special accessories.  When her daughter asked her to ask me, her Mother had whether it was appropriate, to which she got the reply "It's only Graham."

So once I was at the house I made contact and was duly asked to go up to the spare bedroom and in a particular drawer I would be asked to look for something. The 'something' turned out to be a very exclusive black set of slip, bra and knickers. Apart from having never seen such a massive array of underwear before (and, yes, I was once married!) I'd never seen anything quite so exotic, alluring and obviously expensive.

The underwear (and possibly a pair of high heels) was duly despatched the next day and that was that. Until something was said recently and I realised this was something I was never going to live down. So I decided at least to get a blog post out of it!

I should add that the "It's only Graham" has since turned up a number of times in my life. I'm still trying to work out whether it's a compliment

Absent

This is just a quick post of explanation because some have wondered why I wasn't responding to comments in my last post (which I have now done).

On Saturday evening as I was getting into bed my chest tightened up and I got pains and was having difficulty breathing.  At this point it becomes hard to decide whether one is having a heart attack or that the body has gone into panic mode unnecessarily.

I'm not, by nature, a pannicker so I concluded that the rational explanation was heart related. I had had a heart attack many years ago before Blogland existed (I blogged about it here) and I had an 'incident' some years ago which was pronounced a 'false alarm'.

I decided to call an emergency ambulance. It was then that I discovered that my house phone wasn't working. Heaven knows how long that had been the case because I only keep it for emergencies (ironically). Anyway I had my cellphone (which is, I discovered, registered with the emergency services because I've used it before in an emergency).

The outcome was a couple of nights in the High Dependency Unit of the local hospital. We are so fortunate in having a hospital with brilliant care (and no 10 hour queues in A & E).

I was then discharged fit and well again.

However I have to confess that for a while I was a more than a little apprehensive.

Sauna and Swim

Below my house in Bayble Bay there is a beach and a pier and a little working marina for fishing and pleasure boats. All of these facilities are well used. 

At the end of December I also mentioned a rather more unusual facility and today I investigated.

Despite the temperature being in fairly low single figures the sun is shining and down at the beach it's been quite busy with the usual dog walkers. There have also been some of the more hardy wild swimmers who have swum here in the winter for a good few years. Now, however, we have a relatively recent set of users: those having a dip after coming out of the sauna. Yes. We have a sauna at the beach.  

The Middle of the Night

Why is everything so much more concerning if one wakes up in the middle of the night?

I usually wake in the night these days but it's momentary and I'm back asleep before I have time to think about it.

A couple of nights ago I woke up at 1am (ish) having only been asleep a few hours. I went back to sleep but it wasn't 'good' sleep. I was awake again before 3am. This time I couldn't get back to sleep - I was properly awake. At least I felt fully awake.

"Why?" I wondered. In the past if I woke properly there was a discernible reason: usually I would have had rigors which indicated the onset of sepsis to which I am exceptionally prone because of my uretic stent. However it's several years since I had an 'attack' and, so far as I could tell, I felt fine.

But the mind plays silly-beggars at 3am. What if I wasn't okay? I have been known to wake up and been delirious. It's difficult on the phone to the emergency services when one is delirious. Fortunately the emergency services can see my phone number and therefore my  history on their screen. They even know the code for my front door. There is usually an ambulance here quickly. The magic word that scares medics (and me!!) is 'sepsis'. 

I've only had full blown sepsis once and I happened to be in hospital at the time.     I came around from my operation and by the afternoon I was delirious. About  three days later I came around. Of course I just thought I'd been asleep for an hour or two but I was puzzled as to why I had so may tubes all over the place . I felt washed out and woozy but I was fully conscious.

The nurse who happened to be taking readings when I woke said "Well, Graham, good to see you. You've been a bit of a worry." Apparently, according to the doctor, that was a masterful understatement. 

Had I gone to sleep in the middle of the night at home I might not have wakened up at all.  

Anyway after worrying for a short while I went back to sleep and, as you can tell from this post, I woke up again full of life.