This week was very quiet. It started off at the Doctors who prescribed me more tablets & some gel for my swollen & painful knees. At the end of the week, I went to see the Los Alcázares Christmas tree lighting ceremony.
Week 48 of 2022.
Monday, 28th November.
Today I woke around 7:45 am, I got a coffee & sat at my computer working for an hour or so before getting ready to go to see the nurse at the Doctors surgery. My knees have become very swollen & painful recently & standing from a sitting or lying position is getting more difficult.
The nurse sees me quite quickly & is pleased with the way the open wounds on my leg are healing. All but one wound is nearly completely healed & the other is getting smaller every time I see her. I tell her about my very painful knees & she insists I see the Doctor. I can see the Doctor whilst I am here & within 10 minutes I am seeing the Doctor. He looks at my knees & prescribes me some gel to rub on my knees & some tablets that are for arthritic pain & swollen joints. I hope that I do not develop Osteoarthritis, I know that my mum had it & how painful it became for her to move around.
After I leave the doctor's surgery I collect the tablets & gel that the Doctor has prescribed in the pharmacy next to the surgery before I go to the Mercadona store to get a few bits of food & then continue on to Los Narejos & the office to have a chat with Martin. After chatting with Martin for a couple of hours I head back towards the bars on Rio Nalon, I say hello to my friend Alan who is running a bingo session in one of the bars. He asks if I am stopping but as my legs are sore I continue on to my apartment after having a quick chat with him.
There were four football matches today & I watched bits of all of them but because of the pain in my knees, I took some painkillers & spent most of the evening drifting in & out of sleep. I finally went to bed at about 10:30 pm.
Tuesday, 29th November.
I woke up around 6 am today. I struggle to get out of bed because of the pain in my knees. I get myself a coffee & sit at my computer. The chair where my computer is is higher than my other chairs & is easier to get out of. I take my first lot of tablets & then rub gel into my knees. The pain subsides in my knee quite quickly but I am not a believer in taking painkillers, I would prefer to fix the problem that is causing the pain. At the moment though I settle for being pain-free for a short while.
After speaking to a few people via Facebook I find someone who can loan me a walking frame to use in the apartment for a few days. Hopefully the new tablets the Doctor has put me on, mean I won't need it for long.
After working on my website till around lunchtime I get a sandwich & prepare the pork joint for tonight's dinner. I then took a nap on the sofa before waking up & continuing to work on my website. Whatever else they do, all the tablets I'm taking at the moment do make me sleep a lot.
This afternoon Elaine delivers a walking frame that she is able to lend me for a few days. The tablets do seem to have eased the pain a little & I am able to use it. I think it will be of most use in the morning when I will need to use it to get out of bed before I have taken any tablets & they have had a chance to work their magic.
This evening I watch the Wales v England football match, the game was fairly one-sided with England having most of the ball but doing nothing with it. In the second half, England scored two quick goals & then a third to kill off any chance that Wales had of qualifying for the next round. England wins the game & the group & will face Senegal in the next round.
At 11 pm I turn on my computer to do a live photoshop training course from America. The organiser of the course is late, not a very good start. After watching the first 15 minutes I find the course very boring & go to bed, the person taking the course spent more time talking about what he was trying to sell than what he was trying to teach.
Wednesday, 30th November.
I woke around 7:45 am which is quite late for me. I slept well last night & though my knee does ache & I have to use the walking frame to get out of bed, my knees are not as painful as they were yesterday. Hopefully, once the pills I have been given to help the swelling go down begin to take effect over the next few days I won't have to use the walking frame anymore.
I get myself a coffee & begin working on my website. After about 4 hours I look for any new Joomla extensions that can help me with the canonical links on my website. The extension to Joomla that I currently use doesn't appear to be that good & seems to cause me more problems than it solves. I have a look around the Joomla extension directory & find a new one that appears to do exactly what I want without doing lots of things I don't want it to do. I purchased it & hope that once I have it installed & set up correctly it will help the performance of my website. I also find a new extension that helps me show archived articles & purchase that as well. The next few days will mean a few changes to the way my website appears to people using it but hopefully in the long run it will work even better.
This evening I watch the Poland v Argentina football match. It was played at the same time as the Saudi Arabia & Mexico game & the games finish in a very exciting way. Poland thought that they may be knocked out as they had lost but in the last minutes of extra time, Saudi Arabia scored to end Mexico's hopes of getting through to the knockout stages. At one point the difference between Poland & Mexico was only being split by the team's disciplinary record in the competition & Poland would have gone through because they had a better disciplinary record, by two yellow cards than Mexico. If the goal difference & disciplinary records had been equal, FIFA would have drawn lots to see who went through. What a shambles that would have been, a better idea would have been to put through the team with the most shots on goals, or by the goalkeeper with the most saves & if they hadn't been able to separate the two teams by these methods I could have picked the team to go through by judging which team had better-looking supporters.
Thursday, 1st December.
I woke around 7:30 am. My knees felt a lot better this morning & although I did need to use the walking frame to get out of bed, it was easier than it has been for the last week or so. The pills are obviously helping & I hope by the start of next week I will be able to return the walking frame so that it can be of help to someone else.
I work on my website all morning, adjusting the canonical links on all the pages, & menus. The new Joomla extension I am using is a lot better than the previous extension I was using & doesn't seem to be having any strange effects on my website. At 11 am I stop for a bacon sandwich & get a pot of jasmine & peach green tea. After breakfast, I continue working on my website & type up the story of my memory of the out-of-body experience I had in the hospital in 1990.
This evening I watched the Japan v Spain football match. The first half wasn't brilliant, Spain was the better team but only managed to score one goal. In the second half, Japan came out more attacked-minded & was quite quickly winning 2 - 1. This affected the other game, Costa Rica v Germany, at the same time, because it meant that Germany had to win by a big score. The positions of all four teams in the group changed throughout the game but because the Japanese beat Spain 2 - 1 & because Germany could only beat Costa Rica 2 - 4 it meant that Japan won the group with Spain second. There were some very dodgy VAR decisions in the Japan v Spain game which could have been responsible for Germany not going through but I was very pleased to see Japan go through for their grit & determination & for Spain to go through as it is now my home country.
Friday, 2nd December.
I woke to the sound of rain outside my apartment this morning. I got up & made myself a coffee before sitting down at my computer. My knees are feeling much better this morning & I was able to out of bed without the use of the walking frame. I will keep it until Monday in case my knees deteriorate over the next few days, but I think the pills the Doctor has given me are working.
The entire day was wet, the rain came down so I stayed indoors all day even though I needed to get some shopping. This evening I received a message to say that some medical plasters I had ordered had been dropped off at the Euronics store for me to collect but I will collect them tomorrow rather than go out in the rain.
This evening I watched bits of the Cameroon v Brazil football match on the television. From what I saw Brazil were the better team but just couldn't score & as has happened in a few games so far in the competition, the smaller team scored & won the game. In this case, Cameroon scored very late to win 1 - 0. Stupidly the guy who scored went crazy celebrating took his shirt off & got a yellow card for his celebrations. Unfortunately for him it was his second yellow card & was quickly followed by a red card & he was sent off. The result didn't matter eventually but it could have been so different if Cameroon had gone through & he couldn't play in the next round.
Saturday, 3rd December.
I woke up from a fitful sleep at about 6:45 am. I got a coffee & sat at my computer doing more work on my website. I can't remember what reminded me of it but I remembered meeting Barbara Windsor as a teenager this morning so I typed it up for the celebrity section of my website. I am waiting for a delivery from Amazon today, I have ordered some solar-powered Christmas lights to put up on my Garden Balcony. I hope they arrive early so I can put them up & let the sun charge them up so I can have my Christmas Light turn on, after the one I go to see at the town hall tonight.
Whilst I am working on my website my friend George calls me for a chat & to see how I am getting on. We chat for a while & he offers to take me shopping on Monday. This is good for me as I can hopefully get enough for a couple of weeks rather than just a few days if I go on my disability scooter. As we were talking my delivery from Amazon arrived so I said goodbye to George & after unwrapping my lights I hang them on my balcony. They have to be charged before they will work so I am glad the sun is out in full force today. I wrap them around the balcony balustrade rearrange some of my plants & then leave them to charge up.
I go to the local supermarket just to get something for my lunch today. On the way back to my apartment I notice the Chicken shop near where I live is open so I pop in & get some lunch to save me from cooking when I get in. When I get in I unpack my shopping & eat lunch, it is chicken & ham in a pepper sauce with chips & is very nice.
After dinner I notice a message on Facebook from my friend Chris, he is asking if anyone has an old laptop he can buy. I have a very fast laptop that I no longer use because I upgraded to a very fast PC a while ago for my home use & downgraded my mobile computing to a lightweight tablet that I can take on holiday a lot easier. I had thought about selling it but had not got around to it. I had also been considering purchasing one of the Orgone Pyramids he makes, so I contact him & we agree to make a swap.
This afternoon my Christmas lights arrive & I hang them on my balcony & attach the solar power collector to them. At about 6:30 pm I get on my disability scooter & go to pick up a parcel at Euronics in Los Alcázares. After I have collected my parcel I continue on to the town hall to watch the lighting of the Christmas Tree there.
The tree looks very good when it is all lit up & afterwards there is a great singer on & Disney style characters walking among the children having photographs taken. I leave the Town Hall & head back along the beach at about 7:30 pm. It is a real shame that every bar along the front is already closed. It is Saturday night & I would have expected at least one of them still to be open. There are still people walking up & down the promenade & as I pass them on my scooter they all say hello. Los Alcázares really is a friendly little town.
When I get back to my apartment I am in time to watch the Argentina v Brazil football match. It was a good game & great to see Lionel Messi score a goal, he really is a true genius when it comes to football. The Australians made a valiant attempt to recover from going 2 - 0 down but finally lost 2 - 1. I am also very pleased to see my solar-powered lights came on when it got dark, they are very good with different patterns & colours running through the string of lights. They were still lit until after I had gone to bed at 11:30 pm, so the charge from the day must last at least 6 hours.
Sunday, 4th December.
I woke around 7:30 am & got myself a coffee & some porridge with blueberries & honey for breakfast. I then sat at my computer working on some of the videos I took last night, editing them & posting them to my YouTube channel.
After working on my computer for a few hours I remembered I had some washing to do & put this week's washing in the washing machine. I then spoke to my sister's better half, Brett, for a while via messenger, before getting myself something to eat. I was going to make some spicy chicken fingers but then remembered I had bought two meals at the local takeaway shop yesterday so I had the second of the meals for my lunch. It was half of a stuffed aubergine with some chips. It was very nice but I was still hungry so I warmed up one of the Murciano pies I had bought yesterday & ate that as well.
As I got ready to watch the football this afternoon Chris contacted me & asked if he could come round to look at the laptop I had offered him & he said he could bring an assortment of Orgone Pyramids for me to look at. When he arrived I showed him the laptop which I had ready for him & I looked at the collection of Orgones he had brought with him. He was pleased with the laptop & I was happy with an Orgone pyramid with a lit base, which he offered in exchange. We sat having a chat for a while before he left to go home & I settled down in front of the television for the England v Senegal football match on the television.
England won the football match relatively easily, 3 - 0, but I worry that now they have to face better opposition the England defence will be torn apart. It seems that Harry Maguire can`t make a tackle without grabbing, pushing & sometimes even throwing his opponent to the floor. I think he must have dreamed of being a WWF fighter when he was a youngster. The defence is also so slow when they try to move the ball forwards that a team of snails could probably get to most of the balls they send forward. I hope I am wrong but I think the French team, especially Kylian Mbappé will have a field day against England's back four. I get myself a nice milky Horlicks drink & then go to bed.