Tuesday 10th April 2018

I know Sunday was, in effect, a day of leisure, but it did involve getting up at half three, driving to Heathrow in driving rain, catching a packed flight at half seven, then a route march in summer-like condition. Followed by Monday;s trial by meeting, evening flight back, and driving back to Dover in driving rain. And driving back at nine in the evening, a snatched hour with Jools before bed.

And then the morning come round, I have work as usual, or would have if I did not have the hore car.

And a doctor's appointment.

So a plan formed, to drop off the car first thing in the morning, and then walk back along the cliffs, arriving at the surgery in time to see the nurse for my blood test. Perfect.

Jools leaves home at half six, and I follow suit, still red-eyed at seven, driving to the docks parking the car and dropping the car keys off. Notice I fail to mention checking what time my appointment was, this will become important later. But in mitigation I will point out the follow up appointment next week is at ten past ten.

Anyway, once the keys dropped off, I walked over the car park, through the lines of waiting trucks and up to East Cliff, past the last phone box in England and up the narrow path up the cliff.

I pass many flowers forcing themselves through cracks in the pavements, and huge bushes of Alexanders growing beside the path, the rock samphire was yet to show on the rocks above.

It was OK up to the flyover carrying the traffic on Jubilee Way, and then the path ramps up, heading up the cliffs to the National Trust place. I have to say, with my allergies in retreat, I did OK walking up the slope, and only stopped to take snaps.

Through the gate and a scramble up the last part of the cliff and I was at the top. Laid out below from the cliff edge was the eastern docks, lines of trucks waiting to get on a ferry, so doing a trial run for Brexit.

I take my time down the path to the Cliff Road, looking for the spikes of Early Spiders, but I saw nothing at all, but the season is still early of course, but it would have been wonderful to find a spike, better still a flowering one. But there is always next time.

Onto the Cliff Road, and the sounds from the port below are muted, and I find myself walking along in a bubble of clear air about 10m in circumference, but knowing the way to go.

I pass a cyclist and a dog walker, and that is all, just us hardy sould out in grim conditions. I see no more flowers in bloom, and my hair becomes damp in the fog, but it is great being out, pushing up and up the cinder road to the top of Langdon Hole before striking back for the cliffs. Looking down I cannot see the rocks below, just the sound of the waves breaking.

I climb over the five bar gate at Fan Bay, thus avoiding the heavy loamy soil mixed with chalk that turned my boots last time I did this into huge clumps of mud.

I could not see the lighthouse, but I knew it was there, I also knew the way, taking the right hand fork in the road, and looming out of the mist were the outbuildings, and just visible behind, the lighthouse. And from there it was down onto the Foreland estate, across the grazing area and down Lighthouse Road, as the restricted way signs are at the other end. Anyway, I notice a right of way sign beside the unfriendly warning signs once I reached the end, through the houses of the great and good. No one said anything, just a dog walker who wished me a good day.

From there it was just over the main road to the surgery where I said my appointment was ten past then, knowing I had a 50 minute wait. Nothing more was said. Ten past ten creeped round and nothing. At twenty to eleven, the woman who had an appointment at twenty past was shown in. I asked why i had been forgotten, your appointment is at half past I was told.

Oh.

I am shown in at eleven, and all was frosty as I had apparently given out what sounded like a sarcastic cheer when my name was announced.

But that thawed and I had blood taken, still red. And was given a blood pressure machine to wear for 24 hours. Only they had no working or charged batteries. 20 minutes the nurse tried to get the machine to work. In the end I said I would put fresh ones in and was shown how the machine worked, so was allowed to go.

Back home I put the machine on and put in fresh batteries. The first one is the hardest I was told. The machine woke up and pumped up and up, turning my arm red then blue. And just as I was about to rip it off, the pressure was released.

So back home, having had lunch, I begin work, and there is fires everywhere.

The day continues with me writing mails and the machine tries to wrench my arm off. SOmetimes it comes u with an error message and needs resetting. So the day turns to evening.

I make pasta salad, and once Jools lets me know she had left work, slice, salt egg and breadcrumb aubergine.

There is football on the radio in the evening; Citeh v Liverpool in the CL, and Citeh needing a 3-0 win to draw level. They score in 2 minutes and the race is on. But they fade in the second half, and Liverpool score two late goals to cruise into the semis.

I have to try to find a way to make the machine work when I was in bed. It was going to be tough. First time it bleeped and cycled, it came up with an error, and being tired, I rip it off and throw it to the floor.