This week was a fairly quiet week again, it began with a coffee at the Las Claras Centre coffee morning & ended with Sunday lunch at Campbells bar in Roda. In between, I had an appointment to have MRI scans done in San Javier.
Week 6 of 2023.
Monday, 6th February.
I woke feeling pretty good this morning, the cold is slowly going & I seem to only have a small cough left. I have a coffee & then work on my website for a few hours before heading to the Las Claras Centre for a coffee & to talk to anyone I know at the coffee morning there today.
When I arrive there are only a few people at Las Claras, I buy a coffee & sit outside chatting with my friends Steve & Mandy for a while. When I have finished my coffee I head to my friend Stuart's house. Many years ago he bought some wine glasses for me, they are a joke from him to me. He was the first person to start calling me Sharky & helped to start off the story of my being bitten by a shark. The glasses have a shark on a stem in the middle of them, as you drink your wine the shark will appear as the wine goes down.
After I have collected Stuart's wine glasses, I head to the Mercadona store to do some shopping. Outside the store, I bump into my friends Jacqueline & Michael & have a quick chat. After my chat with them, I head into the store & get my shopping before heading home.
It is quite cold out today & I am glad to get in & put my heating on to warm me up. I spend the rest of the day under a blanket keeping warm & watching films.
Tuesday, 7th February.
I woke up around 8 am today. I got myself a coffee & sat at my computer to work on my website. I got carried away with what I was doing on my website & didn't stop until my friend Sandra sent me a message at about 3:30 pm. Realising how late it was I stopped work & got something to eat before sitting in front of the television for a couple of hours.
At around 8 pm, I went back to work on my website, finishing at around 11 pm. I looked up the weather for my upcoming cruise & because it is going to be cooler in some of the places I am visiting & as I only have shorts that fit me very well, I went on Amazon & ordered myself two pairs of trousers for the trip. I ordered two pairs of trousers from the same place, but in different colours, both are in stock & being delivered by Amazon but the two pairs will be arriving on two different days. I have no idea why & if I try to get both delivered on the same day they want to charge me extra. I will be home anyway & settle for two free deliveries on different days.
Wednesday, 8th February.
I slept well last night & didn't wake until around 8:45 am, for me that is late. I worked on my website for a few hours in the morning before attempting to make a couple of chicken & mushroom pies in the afternoon.
The pies were fantastic, I ate one & kept a second one for my lunch tomorrow. It rekindled my love for cooking & I intend to do a lot more home cooking this year, it will however have to wait till I come back from my cruise now as I am trying to empty my fridge & freezer before I go away.
My friend Jim came around today to borrow my tuxedo. Luckily for him we are both very fit & have similar sculptured granite bodies. When he tries the tuxedo on it fits very well & very much like myself when I wear it, he looks like he could be auditioning for the next James Bond. Your Welcome Jim Bond.
Thursday, 9th February.
When I woke up this morning I got a coffee & started to work on my website. The update I have been working on is nearly complete & I will soon be able to concentrate on the content rather than the navigation. At around 12:30 pm, my friend George comes to pick me up & take me to San Javier because I have an MRI scan appointment.
I am used to having MRI scans but it must be quite a nerve-racking experience if you haven't had one before. They make you strip off, put on a paper gown & then lay on your back on a table with your head in a neck brace. They put earplugs in your ears, give you a tube to hold & press if you have a panic attack & then they put, what I can only describe as a hockey mask, on you. The machine then slowly moves you into a small cylinder that is very tight, both of my shoulders scrape the side of the machine as I am manoeuvred into it. Then, even with the earplugs in you are subjected to loud beeping, grinding, whistling & screeching sounds as the machine slowly moves backwards & forwards a little bit. I had the scan & was back out within half an hour & told I could get dressed & pick the results up tomorrow.
I look for George but he has disappeared. I begin to wonder if what I thought was an MRI scan was actually an alien abduction & if I had been released into a parallel world somewhere. George could not be found & he would not answer any message I sent him. I went across the road to the Mercadona store & pondered my next course of action. Whilst I pondered & wondered how long the aliens would keep up this pretence for, George returned. He had gone to check on an order for a new car as he hadn't realised I would be out so quickly. Apparently, I hadn't been abducted by aliens & my story became a lot less interesting.
George dropped me back at my apartment & said he would take me back tomorrow to collect the results of the scan. One of the pairs of trousers I ordered earlier in the week is delivered by Amazon in the afternoon. Annoyingly it is again the wrong size, the only problem with buying from Amazon is you can not see that the labels on clothes are incorrect before they arrive. I immediately arrange to return them.
This evening I go to bed early, the alien abduction must have kept me longer than it appeared as I find I am very tired.
Friday, 10th February.
I woke up just before 9 am today. The alien abduction yesterday must have worn me out more than I thought. I work on my computer this morning before George picks me up to take me to collect my MRI scan results from yesterday. It does seem strange in Spain that when you have a test, the results are given to you, not your Doctor. It makes a lot more sense to me, I can't remember the number of scans, tests or xrays I have had in the UK that I have never seen the results of.
After collecting the results we stop of for a coffee at the Cafe Pyramide in Los Alcazares. As George & I sit drinking our coffee a German man sitting next to us starts to talk to us & I recognise his companion. The Spanish man with him has at some stage in his life lost a large part of his right arm & I recognise him from the beach. When I swim during the warmer weather I often see him swimming at the same time as me. In my pigeon Spanish I mention to him that I have seen him swimming but he doesn't recognise me. He tells me he swims at Plaza de Espejo & I tell him I normally swim & then go to the Chiringuito El Lobo for coffee. After a little while he looks at me & asks me, by using gestures if I normally have a shaven head & no beard. I laugh & tell him that I have indeed grown a beard & let my hair grow & he now realises who I am & I now have a new friend.
After George drops me off at home I realise I am getting cold & because I do not want to catch a cold again before my upcoming holiday, I climb under a blanket on the sofa & put the heating on. I look online at George of Asda & order some more trousers & a couple of shirts for my holiday. They should be delivered before I go away, only time will tell if they get them sent in time. After today's excitement, I again have an early night.
Saturday, 11th February.
Not surprisingly after going to bed early yesterday, I woke at just gone 5 am today. I eventually get up, get a coffee & work on my website for a while before I put my washing in the machine. Once the washing machine had started I decided I better clean myself as well & take a shower.
After taking my shower I go out for a ride on my mobility scooter. It had looked very dark & out earlier & I didn't think the rain would hold off long enough for me to get out but it did. It was however very cold & the wind that was blowing felt like it was driving icy spears through me. I went along the beachfront, looking at the dark storm clouds, before turning back towards home after I got to Club Nautica. I had thought about going for breakfast but it was too cold to sit outside.
I stopped at the pharmacy on the way home & got double the amount of tablets I normally get for the month. I like to take two lots of tablets with me on holiday, one lot in my case & one lot in my carry bag, in case I lose one lot. After getting my tablets I continue to the Economy Cash supermarket to get some bread. When I leave I quickly head home to get out of the cold.
My second pair of trousers from Amazon arrived this afternoon. I can't believe that they delivered them as the order had already been cancelled. Their measurements are incorrect. This pair is even a different size to the pair that arrived earlier in the week but allegedly were the same size, they will all be returned.
The rest of the day is spent wrapped up in my warm apartment. I watch Arsenal grind out a 1-1 draw with Brentford. The VAR decisions were farcical again, the VAR admitting afterwards that he was wrong didn't help my bad mood. I then binged watched Homestead Rescue on television. I do love looking at the various places where people live off the grid. Some of them make me think how wonderful it could be to do it, others just make me question people's sanity.
Sunday, 12th February.
I woke up around 5 am but get back to sleep, waking up again at around 9 am. I get a coffee before working on my website for a while. I then trim my beard which is getting very wiry before taking a shower & getting ready to go out for dinner at Campbells in Roda with my friend June.
Dinner was fantastic, I had roast beef with all the trimmings, washed down with a couple of glasses of red wine. After we left, June stopped at the Lidl store so I could get some ice cream & then dropped me off at home.
The evening was again spent binge-watching episodes of Homestead Rescue before going to bed at around 10 pm.