This week was very quiet. It started at the Doctors, who prescribed me more tablets and some gel for my swollen and painful knees. At the end of the week, I went to see the Los Alcázares Christmas tree lighting ceremony.
Monday, 28th November.
Today, I woke up around 7:45 am. I got a coffee and sat at my computer, working for an hour or so before getting ready to go to see the nurse at the doctor's surgery. My knees have become very swollen and painful recently, and standing from a sitting or lying position is getting more difficult.
The nurse sees me quite quickly and is pleased with the way the open wounds on my leg are healing. All but one wound is nearly completely healed, and the other is getting smaller. I tell her about my very painful knees, and she insists I see the Doctor. I could see the Doctor whilst I was here, and within 10 minutes, I was seeing the Doctor. He looks at my knees and prescribes me some gel to rub on my knees and some tablets for arthritic pain and swollen joints. I hope that I do not develop Osteoarthritis. I know that my mum had it and how painful it became for her to move around.
After I leave the doctor's surgery, I collect the tablets and 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 and then continued to Los Narejos and 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 asked if I was stopping, but as my legs were sore, I continued to my apartment after having a quick chat with him.
There were four football matches today and I watched bits of all of them but because of the pain in my knees, I took some painkillers and spent most of the evening drifting in and 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 and sit at my computer. The chair where my computer is is higher than my other chairs and is easier to get out of. I take my first lot of tablets and 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 them for long.
After working on my website till around lunchtime, I get a sandwich and prepare the pork joint for tonight's dinner. I then took a nap on the sofa before waking up and 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 delivered a walking frame that she could lend me for a few days. The tablets did seem to have eased the pain a little, and I was able to use them. I think it will be of most use in the morning when I need to use it to get out of bed before I take any tablets and 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 and then a third to kill off any chance that Wales had of qualifying for the next round. England wins the game and the group and 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 and 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, and though my knee does ache, and 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 and 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 and seems to cause me more problems than it solves. I have a look around the Joomla extension directory and found 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 and hoped that once I had it installed and set up correctly, it would help the performance of my website. I also found a new extension that helps me show archived articles and 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 watched the Poland vs Argentina football match. It was played at the same time as the Saudi Arabia vs Mexico game, and the games finished in a fascinating 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 and 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 and 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 the goalkeeper with the most saves, and 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, and although I needed to use the walking frame to get out of bed, it was easier than it had been for the last week or so. The pills are obviously helping, and 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 and menus. The new Joomla extension I am using is a lot better than the previous extension I was using and doesn't seem to be having any strange effects on my website. At 11 am, I stop for a bacon sandwich and get a pot of jasmine and peach green tea. After breakfast, I continued working on my website and typed 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 vs 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 and was quite quickly winning 2 - 1. This affected the other game, Costa Rica vs 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 and 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 vs Spain game, which could have been responsible for Germany not going through. Still, I was happy to see Japan go through for their grit and determination and 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 and made myself a coffee before sitting down at my computer. My knees are feeling much better this morning, and I was able to get 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 go shopping. This evening, I received a message saying 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 vs Brazil football match on the television. From what I saw, Brazil was the better team but couldn't score, and as has happened in a few games so far in the competition, the minor team scored and 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 and got a yellow card for his celebrations. Unfortunately for him, it was his second yellow card, which was quickly followed by a red card, and he was sent off. The result didn't matter eventually, but it could have been so different if Cameroon had gone through and 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 and 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 memories 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 balcony. I hope they arrive early so I can put them up and 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.
While I was working on my website, my friend George called me for a chat to see how I was getting on. We chatted for a while, and he offered 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 hung them on my balcony. They have to be charged before they work, so I am glad the sun is out in full force today. I wrap them around the balcony railing, rearrange some of my plants and then leave them to charge up.
I went to the local supermarket today to get something for my lunch. On the way back to my apartment, I noticed the chicken shop near where I live is open, so I popped in and got some lunch to save myself from cooking when I got in. When I get in, I unpack my shopping bag and eat lunch. It is chicken and ham in pepper sauce with chips, and it is very nice.
After dinner, I noticed a message on Facebook from my friend Chris. He was asking if anyone had an old laptop he could buy. I have a speedy laptop that I no longer use because I upgraded to a high-speed PC a while ago for my home use and 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 contacted him, and we agreed to make a swap.
This afternoon, my Christmas lights arrived, and I hung them on my balcony and attached the solar power collector to them. At about 6:30 pm, I got on my disability scooter and went to pick up a parcel at Euronics in Los Alcázares. After I had collected my parcel, I continued to the town hall to watch the lighting of the Christmas tree.
The tree looks perfect when it is all lit up, and afterwards, a great singer and Disney-style characters walk among the children, taking photographs. I leave the Town Hall and 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, and I would have expected at least one of them to be open. There are still people walking up and down the promenade, and as I pass them on my scooter, they all say hello. Los Alcázares really is a friendly little town.
When I got back to my apartment, I was ready to watch the Argentina vs Brazil football match. It was a good game, and it was 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 was also happy to see my solar-powered lights come on when it got dark. They are very good with different patterns and 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 and got myself a coffee and some porridge with blueberries and honey for breakfast. I then sat at my computer, working on some of the videos I had taken the previous night, editing them and posting them to my YouTube channel.
After working on my computer for a few hours, I remembered I had some washing to do and had to 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 I 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 bought yesterday and ate it as well.
As I got ready to watch the football this afternoon, Chris contacted me and 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 I had ready for him and looked at the collection of Orgones he had brought. He was pleased with the laptop, and I was happy with an Orgone pyramid with a lit base, which he offered in exchange. We sat and chatted for a while before he left to go home, and I settled down in front of the television for the England vs Senegal football match.
England won the football match relatively easily, 3 - 0, but I worry that now they have to face better opposition, and England's defence will be torn apart. It seems that Harry Maguire can`t make a tackle without grabbing, pushing and 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 forward 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 and then go to bed.