A Strange Day

Today has been a strange day.  I have had some highs, but rather a lot of lows.

This morning started with me waking very early (about 3.30am) but I managed to fall back to sleep and didn't wake again until almost 8 o'clock.  I knew that I had to get up as I was expecting a parcel to arrive this morning; I had ordered some sheepskin boots from Amazon and knew that they should arrive this morning.  The door bell rang at about 10.30 and there was the postman with my parcel.  It took me less than a minute to get the parcel open, all the packaging out of the boots, and put them on my feet.  They were wonderful, and even though I wasn't going out I just had to scrunch my toes in the lovely sheepskin and enjoy the warm toasty feeling that soon embraced my feet.  I did eventually manage to take them off, but they make the prospect of going out tomorrow morning to post some Christmas cards and a parcel something to look forward to.

I made an early lunch because I hadn't had anything for breakfast. I decided to have one of my favourites; bacon rolls.  I tucked into them as though I hadn't eaten for days, and really enjoyed every last mouthful.  That in itself is a bit unusual because I haven't felt like eating much over the last week or so and I have been existing on pretty basic food.

Then the doorbell rang again; it was the postman with some Christmas cards and a couple of small packages for me.  These packages were a knitting pattern for another shawl (a really intricate one this time that will take me months to knit as it is so complex) and some wool (samples for the new shawl pattern, and wool for two different shawls).  It was a bit like having early Christmas presents, although as I won't get any presents for Christmas, perhaps I shouldn't have opened them and saved them for Christmas Day.

This afternoon has been less agreeable.  I had a phone call from Mr Smiley telling me that he wouldn't be able to make our Christmas lunch tomorrow; it's become a bit of a ritual over the last few years that we have lunch together just before Christmas and combine it with celebrating whatever the latest OU module is that I have passed.

I also have a cold, which has become more aggravating as the day has gone on; it's mainly a runny nose, but it has made doing my knitting more difficult because I am constantly having to blow my nose.  And to make matters worse, the conjunctivitis that I was suffering from a few weeks ago seems to have come back and I have had to keep wiping the gunk out of them.  I suppose that because I am feeling low at the moment I am going to fall prey to any bugs that are going round, but I have to hope that I manage to avoid the vomiting and diarrhoea that is doing the rounds.  It' s bad enough having things like that when you have someone to keep an eye on you and to take care of your needs; it's terrible when you have to suffer on your own especially when you really don't feel like doing anything at all.

Still, I have had a double-dose of Doctor Who this evening (BBC 3 is showing repeats of Series 4 at the moment) and now I am watching a DVD, which will get me through until it is time for bed. I'm hoping for a reasonable night's sleep tonight and although it is likely that I will wake in the early hours of the morning, I am hoping that I manage to get back to sleep again as quickly as I did this morning.

The World Is A Little Clearer

I can report this evening that the world is no longer blurred; well not very much.  Although my eyes are still oozing all the time I am not suffering with having to look at everything through a thick haze.  I'm even able to do my knitting which is great as I have missed being able to do some whenever I sit down for half an hour or so.

I have been very low this week and having conjunctivitis which has curtailed some of my activities quite a lot has not helped any. Tomorrow, being Friday, is psychotherapy day.  Let's hope that it is not cancelled at the last minute again.  I really need to talk to my psychotherapist about some of the things that I have been doing over the last few weeks and how I have been feeling too.

Hopefully I shall be able to get back to my studying too.  I haven't been able to read for the last few days because of the blurred vision, so I have some catching up to do with my studying.  I might even have a go at answering a couple of questions on my biology TMA.  There are five questions, some with sub-questions, so there is a lot of work to do.

Things Are A Little Bit Clearer Now

Regular bathing of my eyes seems to have made a bit of difference.  They still keep filling with a lot of sticky muck, but my vision is a lot less blurred.  I can see to read things on the computer screen now, something that was impossible earlier today, and I have been able to do some knitting this evening too.  This is a good thing because it means that I have now been able to get back to the point where I was when I unfortunately pulled the needle out with the result that I had to start from scratch again.

I must remember to bathe my eyes just before I go to bed, although I expect I will have to prise my eyes open in the morning.  I might even be able to manage some reading tomorrow, which will be a good thing because I need to do some reading for my biology course.

Blurred Vision

This title could so easily refer to many of the proposals being put forward for the NHS, but it's a lot more mundane than that.  I woke early this morning (4.20am) after not having dropped off to sleep until well past 1am.  My eyesight is not what it was in my younger days, although I have always needed very long arms to hold books or to hold a needle and thread because I am exceedingly long-sighted.  This caused problems when I first told my mother that I had problems seeing the pages of a book, because at the age of four it was very difficult for me to explain to the optician what it was I could and couldn't see.  Anyway, by the age of 11 it was obvious what the problem was and I had to start wearing glasses for reading, usually something that happens when you get older.

When I got to the age of about 45 I realized that I was starting to have problems seeing road signs when I was driving, so further checks at the opticians led to me wearing glasses all the time, and varifocals have been my saviours since then.  This morning, however, when I put my glasses on I was still having problems seeing things.  My first thought was that it was just that I was tired and perhaps a bit more sleep would take care of the problem.  Unfortunately sleep wouldn't come and my blurred vision was not getting any better.  In fact, my eyes seemed to be getting worse and seemed to be filling with a sticky substance.  One of the problems of not being able to see without your glasses is being unable to look in the mirror to see what the problem is, and even with my glasses on I didn't seem to be any better off this morning.

Obviously a trip to see my GP was called for and the immediate diagnosis was conjunctivitis.  So I am having to regularly bathe my eyes to remove the muck that is accumulating in them and I have a prescription for some eye drops if they get any worse.  The problem with everything being blurred is that I can't read my course books, nor can I do any knitting.  So I have to hope that there is something worth watching on the television so that I can pass the time away.

(In case you are wondering how I am managing to write this post, I am using speech recognition software, doing a spell check and trusting to luck that everything is okay.)