THE GREEN DIARY :                                                             All Change

Tonto & Pedro : an imagining in the style of Piero della Francesca by Kath Lees!

The summer has not panned out how we planned at all. I write this really as an update and to thank so many kind Friends who have been asking about our health.

Covid dogged us on our trip to the US – like dominoes : friend Judith came down on the Queen Mary, Tony came down with it in New York and in Boston it was my turn. Not a pleasant strain; apparently a new one in the States, now running rampant. No-one these days takes it very seriously and no-one asked us to wear masks or isolate or any of those things we all had to do a few years ago. This doesn’t mean it is any less nasty!

More than one of our friends observed that since the Queen Mary crossing was postponed by Covid in 2020, perhaps we were never meant to undertake it in the first place. In the light of what happened after we returned, perhaps they were right. Six of us had a walking tour planned in Albania in 2020 too and that had to be cancelled as well. Vouchers flying everywhere! We rebooked for Albania again this coming September, though this time changed mobility circumstances meant no walking in the heat of the Albanian Alps, rather motoring around old-fogey style!  This too has now had to be cancelled – or at least, Tony and I have had to pull out leaving only four friends to explore the delights of Albania without us. They leave on Saturday the 31^st. Have a wonderful time everyone; we shall miss you.

We had to pull out because suddenly in mid-July I had a perforated bowel – a sigmoid diverticular incident – and was in hospital for a week, narrowly avoiding surgery. UCHL managed to treat the condition conservatively with massive doses of intravenous antibiotics and, 26lbs thinner, a week later, rather shakily, was discharged. The Consultant said there was no question of going to Albania with its dodgy, almost non-existent medical infrastructure, and we had to pull out of the proposed Albanian Fellowship.

It’s taken several weeks to recover from this unpleasant experience and there are to be some follow-up procedures to check that the system is up and running properly again.

In the meantime Tony, who in the same week had a routine biopsy as part of the wait-and-see procedures followed by our NHS, for prostate cancer. It was not pleasant. There were complications but the upshot is that he has to have it out and he is now in a queue waiting for this procedure, complicated by the fact that they are reluctant to operate until they know the outcome of neurological tests to establish whether he has Parkinson’s or not. It is all rather nerve-racking and has been a nasty blow to Tony’s morale. All his tests and appointments are immediately up-coming and this of course truly meant that Albania was kyboshed.

So we wait: in Mistley, where we have been hunkering down while all this dust settles; and we have cleared all our decks until next May 2025!

So very many of you have asked about us both and I write this as a sort of round-robin update and a thank you for your kind concern. Believe me, it is very touching and we are most grateful.

There was a window after the U.S. and before these events when the Summer looked full of promising excitements, better weather and lots of friends.

We visited the Palladium with Friend Laura T. to see Imelda Staunton rocking the West End with her brilliant Dolly Levi in a lavish production of Hello Dolly! that satisfied us on every level. Nothing in this production disappointed us least of all Imelda Staunton who once again surprised us with her gutsy, brave performance. One never thinks of her as a West End musicals star but by god she certainly is!

At the Gainsborough House and brilliant Museum in Sudbury with Friends Lindsay Hoyer-Millar and Jane Rimington-Foster.

It was when we were driving her down to Eastbourne to stay with her brother, Peter, that I was struck down by “the incident” managing to enjoy a wonderful evening with them all, a celebratory re-union, before a nasty and painful night.

“Looking Good Houston!”

Thanks Friends!

PEDRO

STOP PRESS

The 16 year battle with Mr. Parker and his TWLogistics Limited stevedoring company in Mistley continues. 

The Fence has still not come down but citizen action was taken at the weekend to remove the offending fence, to no avail. It was put straight up again. 

The campaign has been re-invigorated.  Maybe before hell freezes over or, with climate change, the ice caps melt drowning Mistley all together, the little man may perhaps win against vested interests!