15:21 GMT

  Today is another very dull, and very cold day. There was a good frost this morning, and it will be 10pm before the temperature reaches double figures - a mere 10° C. Tomorrow may reach 11° C during the early afternoon, but it will come at the expense of some light rain. The weather icons at the time are the weird ones which suggest there could also be a few rays of sunshine, but I am not optimistic.

  There has been a big gap in this record, and the reason was I have had another stay in hospital from the 15th December last year until 9th January. I could have written something yesterday, but I felt too busy catching up with other stuff, and also rather tired to bother fighting my web server to generate a new year. A couple of good sleeps later and I have at least had the energy to get the web server up to date (I hope) and to write this. Thank goodness I won't have to do this again until next year.
  
  As I write this. my memories of the night of 15th December are getting quite vague. I went to bed, and I fell asleep for about an hour, but I woke up with cheat pains. I can't really remember what they were like. I don't recall they were very strong, but strong enough to tell me something was wrong.

  At first I thought it might be heartburn, and I took some antacid liquid as a precaution. Then I checked my blood pressure meter. The picture on the left shows what I saw. Very high systolic pressure, and even worse, a very high pulse rate. I knew something odd was going on, and that I needed some professional help.

  I already had a spare rucksack filled with some essentials for an occasion like this. I added a few extra pairs of clean underpants, and called 999. First on the scene was a nice lady paramedic who confirmed my blood pressure and pulse rate results, and also a 300mg tablet of soluble aspirin. I had already taken my own aspirin earlier, but she said another dose would do no harm. I am unsure if it helped or not.

  Incidently, the picture showed it was 3.43 am, but it was at least an hour before that (the clock is wrong on the monitor). In this case it was time that was the healer, but only to a limited extent. After a while an ambulance joined the party. They thought I must be in terrible pain, and offered morphine, but I thought that completely over kill. The pain was still mildly annoying, but was less than when I woke up, and that was far from terrible. As I say, it was enough to serve as a reminder that something was wrong.

  After a ride in the ambulance I ended up in Lewisham Hospital A&E - a place I am familiar with, and I am also familiar with how boring it is. There were long periods of just waiting interrupted by occasional bouts of intense activity. One such interuption to the boredom was a test I have never seen before. By this time I was fitted with a cannula so they squirt various drugs into me.

  One drug was supposed to (almost) instantly drop my heart rate right down. It was very unpleasant, and felt like I was dying or something. Fortunately the effect was quite short lived - good for me, but the doctor was not happy about it. I can't remember much more of my time in A&E - most of it was just laying on a trolley (in a bay rather than a corridor !) just waiting. Eventually it was announced I was going to a bed in a ward - Chestnut ward on the 5th floor. The higher the floor, the more serious things are.

  Chestnut ward has individual heart monitors, and you end up "chained" to your bed. Fortunately previous experience allowed me to unhook myself and to go and use the toilet. I'm not sure this was really approved of by the staff, but they allowed it. In fact it was quite handy in that it proved that I was able to do things independently, and so was less mollycoddled. This was essential for "opening my bowels" (as they say in medical places). I had no intention of sitting on a commode, and I can't use the silly cardboard pee containers without making a mess (don't ask).

  Tomorrow I will try and describe more of my stay, and include a few more pictures (I have just discovered I had a load more on my phone). I may even have the patience to describe how I "escaped" from the hospital twice to walk home. The second time was really hard work because by then I was suffering from Covid !! I'll try and say something about that too, tomorrow.








   857 words today.