There And Back To See There And Back

Sorry to have taken so long to write about my day out with There and Back last Friday. I have no excuse other than that I really haven't felt like writing anything, but tonight I am forcing myself to write a few words.

My train left Waterloo on time and I arrived at my destination just a minute late. The arrangement was that I would meet There and Back at the station. She had a doctor's appointment and hoped that she would arrive at the station in time for the arrival of my train. We exchanged a number of text messages while I was on the train and I knew that she would probably arrive at the station a couple of minutes after my train arrived, and that is exactly what happened.

I saw There and Back walking towards me as I stood near the station entrance so I started to walk away from the station to meet her. And when we actually met there was a minute or two where we just stood there hugging each other and saying how lovely it was to see each other again. We had already decided in our daily emails that we weren't going to do anything too exciting, but rather just take the opportunity to sit and chat about whatever crossed our minds.

So, we headed off for a coffee for me and hot chocolate for There and Back. While we were drinking and talking I gave There and Back a few little presents. There wasn't anything really special, just a few bits and pieces that I thought she might like. I gave her Hat No 1 (well a girl really doesn't need three hats that are similar), a small piece of rock with amethyst crystals embedded on it, a small coaster made from a slice of purple agate (purple is There and Back's favourite colour) and a really cute, baby diplodocus cuddly toy (it was only about 4 inches in length and really cute, and as a vegetarian dinosaur it was the perfect gift from the Natural History Museum for There and Back who is also a vegetarian).

Then we went to a department store so that I could buy some tapestry needles and once they were purchased, the pair of us went to another area of the shop to drool over the knitting wool. I have to feed my knitting habit and There and Back has become a real wool junkie since I bought her a book on crochet and a crochet hook for her birthday. After a bit more wandering while chatting away we headed for the shopping centre's food area and made our way to Pizza Hut for our lunch.

We found ourselves being taken to a table, our drinks order was taken and we opted for the lunch-time buffet. This meant that we could eat as much as we wanted of the pizzas, salads and pasta on the buffet, but more importantly take as long as we wanted over our lunch. And we did; both of us having two platefuls of pizza and salad. We finished off with a visit to the ice cream machine.

After lunch we went for a walk to the park and sat in the sun on a park bench for about an hour. At this point I gave There and Back the other present that I had for her; the afghan that I had made once I knew that I would be seeing her. She was thrilled with it and I knew that she would like the colours because she had commented on how much she liked the photograph of my afghan that I had posted on the blog when I was knitting it some months ago.

When the sun disappeared and it started to get a bit cold, we headed back to the coffee shop where we had enjoyed our drinks earlier in the day. We had the same drinks again and chatted some more before heading for the station so that I could catch my train home. After having spent something like five and a half hours in each other's company we parted with a big hug and a goodbye. We had both enjoyed the day and are looking forward to meeting again in the coming months; it will be in London next time with the probability of a visit to a matinee performance of one of the musicals that are on in London.

Psychotherapy And Lunch

Friday, psychotherapy day, and I was awake long before dawn. For the last few days I haven't been able to stop sleeping, night or day, and yet last night sleep was something that was difficult to come by. But no matter, because I knew that today should be easy enough to get through.

As usual, my mind and tongue seemed to lack the ability to work together. I knew that I could, in fact I should, start the session by talking and yet it seemed so difficult to actually achieve. And then, after a super-human effort I managed it. I started to talk about how I was sorry that I hadn't had a session last Friday for it would have been nice to talk to someone about how my lecture had gone the day before.

Having got started, having made that extreme effort, the session seemed to go quite well. There were moments that were difficult, when tears flowed easily, when I had to admit to wanting things that I knew that I couldn't have, things that were impossible, but as we moved on and talked of other things the tears stopped and I started to feel almost calm. I talked about the adrenalin high that I experienced for about 48 hours after the lecture and seminar, and how my life seemed to tumble into the abyss again once this period was gone.

Talking about it this morning I realized just how disappointing it was not to have someone who I could talk to about the event immediately afterwards. Yes, I blogged about it, and you were kind and sent me lots of lovely comments, but it's just not the same as having someone there who you can talk to about it and who can ask you questions and who can feel the same sense of achievement as you have felt over the experience.

When the session was over I left the hospital to catch a bus; not home but into the centre of London. I was meeting Mr Smiley for lunch and just for a change he was early. Mr Smiley operates on a different time-scale to the rest of us; we call it Smiley Time. Lunch was great, and we had a long chat covering all sorts of things. All too soon it was time to leave and we went our separate ways.

It was only when I got home this afternoon that I realized that I have only spoken to three people this week. Loneliness is a terrible thing, and I know that I really must make an effort and get out more. Perhaps when the weather improves I might manage this. In the meantime, I will keep knitting and reading and find lots of other things to keep my mind active, and try to get out for a walk every day so that I can keep my body active too.

I've Had A Pretty Good Day

Today has been the best day I've had for quite a long time. I got up this morning, knowing that I probably wasn't going to be doing any work on my TMAs, but I didn't care. I was going out to have lunch with Mr Smiley and I would be having my first real conversation of the year. I have been avoiding going out over the last week because it was so cold, so I have been on my own and I haven't quite got to the stage of having a conversation with myself, although sometimes I am tempted. I think that blogging helps, because writing posts, and commenting on other blogs is like having conversations. At least that is what I tell myself.

Anyway, I left the house and walked up the road to catch a bus. Unfortunately just before I got to the top of the road, a bus stopped and then set off again before I could get to the bus stop. Still, it wasn't too much of a problem because buses on the particular route that I wanted run about every 10 minutes, and it was nowhere near as cold today as it has been this week. So after sitting at the bus stop for about 10 minutes a bus arrived and I was on my way to Trafalgar Square. I arrived in plenty of time for my lunch date, but I had intended to because I wanted to have a look in Waterstone's. I had a Waterstone's gift card for Christmas and I was going to see if there was something that I really wanted. I gave up in the end because I couldn't make up my mind.

So, I took a walk to the pub where Mr Smiley and I were going to meet and found a table where I could wait for him. We had an excellent lunch and a good chat. Even though we communicate almost daily by email, it is so much better to be able to talk face to face. We had an excellent pasta dish served with garlic bread, and we were both naughty because we decided to have a pudding. Chocolate cake with ice cream for me, and sticky toffee pudding with ice cream for Mr Smiley. We finished off with a coffee, and more conversation. Then it was time for us to go our separate ways.

I didn't have to wait too long for my bus home, and after the usual slow journey to travel what is actually a relatively short distance in miles, I arrived home. I switched on the computer to check for emails and to see who had been blogging and found an email from Lily at The Student Doctor Diaries. After I had written the post about possibly doing some posts on 'How to Knit' she had got in touch with me and we had been corresponding about what would be the best thing for her to knit. Well, she has found a pattern, and she was going to buy some wool today after doing her exam, so I was going to give her some hints and tips, and see if there was anything in the pattern that she would find too difficult. So I dealt with that, and now I am having a restful evening before going to bed to read for a while before trying to get to sleep.

Tomorrow is psychotherapy day so I probably won't sleep too well tonight. It's not a conscious thing, I try not to think about it, but I seem to start getting anxious on a Thursday afternoon, and this means that I don't sleep properly on a Thursday night. Let's hope I don't have a problem tonight.

The Thief Got More Than He Should Have Done

I have to admit that I wasn't entirely successful yesterday, and that old thief Procrastination did rather well as a result.  However, all was not lost, because I did manage to download a lot of my course resources onto my new netbook (my Christmas present to myself) and this means that when I go to the library to do some serious studying, or when I go away anywhere, I have all the materials that I need to continue studying and they are all on a computer that will fit into my handbag.  Admittedly, it will have to be one of my larger handbags, but a handbag nonetheless.

Some work on the TMAs did get completed so I am nearer completing one of them, and I have an extension for another, which is good because although I have done much of the work for that TMA, I do still have a long essay to write and as it is a Science Course it is more complex to write than an essay for a Humanities Course.  So it is going to be a busy weekend as I try to get everything back on track again.

Today, I am having a trip out.  I'm meeting my friend Mr Smiley for lunch; we haven't seen each other for ages as our last three arranged meetings have had to be cancelled owing to illness or changed working priorities.  It will be nice to see him again and catch up on the news about his lovely grand-daughters.  And lunch will probably be quite nice too.

In The Vicinity Of Trafalgar Square

I went up to London today to meet a friend for lunch. I set out early as I intended to visit the British Museum before meeting my friend, but as is so often the case with intentions, I had a sudden change of mind and decided to visit the National Portrait Gallery instead.

I love history, and I love to see the faces of people who played a part in the making of this country. There are kings and queens, dukes, marquesses, earls, viscounts, barons, baronets and knights. Some wielded great power and were good; for some it would require an extremely charitable view to allow them to be described as good, yet they still played their part. Richard III, the last Plantagenet king hangs alongside his deposer, Henry VII, founder of the Tudor dynasty. There are three portraits of Henry's granddaughter, Elizabeth, the virgin queen and last of the Tudors, and a magnificent portrait of Charles I, which almost certainly shows him larger than life, for he was a short man.

There are politicians of every political hue, scientists who were so great that their fame was acclaimed even in their own time outside of this country. Doctors, surgeons, judges, magistrates, explorers, soldiers, artists, architects, actors, writers, musicians and sportsmen. All are represented on the walls of the gallery in paintings, sculptures, drawings, photographs, film, and in one case, by their DNA.

After viewing the great and the good, I walked to Trafalgar Square. I needed some fresh air and a moment or two to rest my feet. The sky was laden with low cloud, low enough for the aircraft on the flight path to Heathrow to disappear at times before reappearing somewhere further up the Mall. Trafalgar Square was busy, but not crowded. Visitors to London were keen to photograph the fountains, Nelson atop his column, and the iconic red double-decker buses. And to the north of the square, in front of the National Gallery, workmen were busy building the staging ready for Thursday's celebrations for Team GB's Olympic and Paralympic athletes.

I had a little more time to spare before meeting my friend, and it was quite chill outside, so I walked to the National Gallery and sought out the Sackler Room. In this room are paintings by some of Britain's greatest painters of the 18th and early 19th centuries. Joseph Wright of Derby's magnificently atmospheric painting of an experiment involving a bird in a vacuum jar hangs alongside one of Thomas Gainsborough's superb portraits.

But my particular favourites are by two other great British artists. John Constable, the master of painting the British landscape is well represented in the room including his Hay Wain, but my favourite is his view of Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows with its towering storm clouds and rainbow over the cathedral. The other artist is Joseph Mallord William Turner, whose Rain, Steam and Speed - The Great Western Railway 1844, and the Fighting Temeraire tugged to her Last Berth to be broken up, 1838, are amongst the most magnificent paintings of their time and are a real contrast in style to his earlier works and those of his contemporaries. To say that I can contemplate these paintings for hours is no understatement, and yet I understand little about the technicalities of the paintings, I just know that they strike a chord with me and are a joy to behold.

Having spent half an hour with my favourite paintings I went back out to a grey day in London and a rendezvous for lunch. I met my friend, we ate, we drank a glass of wine, and we talked of many things. Eventually it was time for us to go our separate ways. I enjoyed my day around Trafalgar Square.

I'm So Stuffed I Can Hardly Move

This morning I wrote about being unable to have any breakfast because of having to have a fasting blood test. The problem was that the appointment wasn't until 10.50, so as I ate my last food at about 8pm last night, I was rather hungry. I went to the surgery armed with a small Mars bar, ready to eat as soon as the blood had been taken.

I am quite lucky because I have a vein in my left arm that makes itself available very easily whenever something has to be put into or taken out of one of my veins. The whole procedure, from entering the room, to leaving again minus a significant amount of blood (well it always seems that way) took a grand total of three minutes. Pretty good, I thought.

I was lucky that it was done so quickly because I had to catch a bus to go to the centre of London. And I really do mean the centre of London, because I was meeting my friend, Mr Smiley, for lunch and our meeting place was Waterstone's just a few yards from Charing Cross station. Charing Cross is the point from which all distance measurements are taken, so when you see a road sign that says X miles to London, what it means is that it is X miles to Charing Cross.

Mr Smiley and I have been friends for 35 years, and he is one of the people who has helped me to survive the last 10 years. The lunch was to celebrate my birthday earlier this week, and although Mr Smiley and I correspond almost daily by email, it is about two and a half months since we have seen each other.

We went to a restaurant which is part of a franchise that can be found in a number of locations in London, and while it is hardly gourmet food, it is more than acceptable for a lunch date. We decide to partake of their lunch-time special which allowed us to choose an appetizer and a main course for a reasonable sum. I settled for some garlic bread with melted cheese as my appetizer and a jacket potato with cheese and beans and a side salad as my main course; Mr Smiley had the same appetizer but a different main course. We had both ordered a Diet Coke on being seated and decided to have a glass of red wine (well it was my birthday lunch) too. After we had eaten this Mr Smiley decided to have a dessert, and somewhat foolishly, so did I. We rounded off the meal with a large cup of coffee.

Conversation flowed easily and covered many different subjects; it was a truly enjoyable couple of hours. Then it was time for Mr Smiley and I to go our separate ways; him to catch his train, and me to catch my bus. I only had to wait a couple of minutes and then it was just short of hour later that I alighted from the bus to walk the relatively short distance home. Having managed to drag myself down the road, and get in the house, I sat myself down and exhaled deeply.

My lunch today was the largest meal that I have had in weeks ( I may not even need to eat again today), but I think the dessert, delicious as it was, was just a bit too much. That's why I am saying that I am so stuffed that I can hardly move. Thanks very much Mr Smiley I thoroughly enjoyed it.