Quick trip to Glasgow

Having let Dad settle in to Erskine (Flanders House, The Erskine Glasgow Home, 200 Dorchester Avenue, Glasgow G12 0BZ if anyone wants to write to him), I decided it was time to pay him a visit last night. I found him in great form, striding round the corridors and laughing and joking with the staff:


He was initially a little reluctant to actually go in to his room with me, and, perhaps, on reflection, it would have been better if we had stayed out in one of the common areas - but eventually he agreed and we had a little chat and a laugh, then I started to show him some recent photos of the family. After that, I switched his TV on and we settled down to watch a bit of the Holland-Italy match together. He seemed quite content and even displayed some interest in the football - something that he has lost in recent years.

He went to the toilet and when he came back, he wouldn't settle down again and started to put on his big cardigan and talk about going home with me. It wasn't too bad, however - he just got a bit confused and eventually he went back to walking the corridors (with his slippers under his arm!) and I went over to Helen and Barry's for the rest of the night.

This is a short video of his room, which is lovely and airy and very tidy:



I think it's an ideal place for him and I really hope he settles there - check the web site (http://www.erskine.org.uk/) to see what they do for ex-servicemen.

Barry was working late but I had a bit of toasted cheese and some apple pie with Helen until he came home from a school play. I tried out my new trick with the automatic "smile and shoot" feature I'd just discovered with my camera - do you think Barry's trying too hard here?:

Got up sharp this morning and headed off north east, stopping by Airdrie to pop in and see Dawn and Jordon, whose smile certainly made the camera work:

Still haven't got this feature to work with a female yet - but most are camera shy anyway, so I haven't pushed it! Dawn's got a new car:

Meghan got the results from her Masters yesterday - she got a 2:2 - initially she was a little disappointed, but when she saw what some of her friends got, she apparently cheered up a bit and is now looking forward to going ahead with her PhD.

Luca videos

Luca took great delight in using our brush to sweep the slabs at the back:

18 months of intensive coaching from his educated parents and this is what Luca can do now:

Did you notice what happened as Gary put Luca down - seen in the reflection of the window?

Glorious week in Deeside!

Blog's been neglected a little - partly due to the magnificent weather, but also because it's been so busy. The annual CAMRA beer festival is now over - didn't manage to put in as much work as I would have liked and, of course, we didn't have our usual bus in from Banchory on the Friday night - so Jo missed out as well. I worked behind the bar on Thursday evening and Saturday afternoon - I offered to take Jo in then, but she had too much to do and couldn't make it. This was me taking a short break on Saturday afternoon - wearing my Oregon Beer Taster hat!:

We strolled along to the golf club on Saturday evening and sat on the balcony (for the second week in succession) - it was lovely and warm - and Colin and Johanne joined us as we ate alfresco:

Ross came home on Saturday night (or should I say Sunday morning!) - but no car - it transpired that he and his buddies went along to the beer festival on Saturday night for the first time - and enjoyed it so much they had to taxi home.

The reason for me not organising our usual bus to the festival was that the organisers had had to change it from its usual November date to June - and this clashed with an outing to Blairgowrie that I was already committed to. It was another fabulous day there and all the photos are available on my golf blog - http://bsvgolf.blogspot.com/

On Sunday, Gary, Carole and Luca came over for a while - they had been at Crathes taking Luca on the short train run there. I discovered a new feature on my camera - if you smile it automatically takes 3 quick pictures. I didn't believe it at first, but it worked with Gary - then me - but I couldn't get it to work with either Jo or Carole. Jo was trying desperately to grin from ear to ear to make the camera take a photo - and Gary even forced his way in to the frame to try and help her out - to no avail:

We tried with camera-shy Carole but no luck:

Luca's laser spots are clearing up rapidly:


Videos to follow.

Medical

Oh - forgot to add that I received the written report from Albyn from my medical last week and I'm now scanning these reports and keeping them on my PC, with a comparison with previous results. Overall, looked OK - BP rising a bit - 136/83 now with a resting pulse of 85 - higher than I've been used to.

Overall cholesterol a little high, but lower than the last time; PSA OK at just 0.3 - so the only thing to concern me is the continuing Atrial flutter/fibrillation from the ECG results. I spoke to Dr. Morton, who did the medical, yesterday and asked if I could be referred to a different cardiologist this time - Steve Walton did the 3 (failed) cardioversion attempts a couple of years ago, and he does not perform the ablation procedure anyway. I'd like to hear somebody else's opinion anyway - I'm not keen to go back on Warfarin and if there's another route to go, then I'd like to at least consider it.

Sorry if this puts you off your breakfast!

Monday evening

After a game of racquetball with Richard, I went home for tea - Jo had bought some smoked mackerel - produced by our main competitor! - and we both agreed it was pretty c..p - never again - we both had stomach pains.

Anyway, Barry phoned to say Dad was successfully ensconced in Erskine - they had been advised not to go back for a couple of days to allow him to settle in - Barry said he seemed fairly content - time will tell.

The rain is due to arrive later on today (Tuesday) - I'm thankful I'm not golfing today. It's also the start of the set-up for beer festival, which has been switched from its usual November time to June. I'll pop along later and see if there's anything that needs doing.

Back to work

Monday morning and it's back to work. It's Barry and Helen's 14th anniversary today and it was Meghan's 22nd birthday on Saturday.

Today's also the day that Barry and Dawn are going to try to take Dad to Erskine - I wish them well - it won't be easy.

Ross is off work for 2 weeks' holiday and it appears he's already back to owl hours. The old blue Saab is supposed to be taken away this Wednesday - here's hoping!

Just finishing off another Eastenders Omnibus DVD for Lucy - been slipping a bit - this one's 18th May, so there's another couple of Sundays to be done this week some time.

Apart from that, nothing much doing - trying to have a fairly quiet day today.

The weekend so far

I played the second round of the Riverston Cup on Friday - and I had the trophy in my mitts as I stood on the 18th tee - I then sliced one out of bounds and finished with a horrendous 7 - I lost the trophy by just one stroke after this - as the footballers would say - sick as a parrot!

We had beers in the golf club and I then walked home past the War Memorial taking in the wonderful summer evening light - it was about 10:30 when I took this rather blurry photo - but it gives you some idea of how light it was:

On Saturday, I was up and off to golf before anyone else had stirred but when I got back, the house was empty although all the cars were there. I had lunch alone and waited - eventually Jo and Ross appeared - Ross had taken Jo to the supermarket in his new BMW that he had just bought - it had just one previous owner - the Duke of Sutherland!:

We had a surprise visit from Gary and Luca and we went out the back, where Luca was quick to run off and climb up to the highest point:

Back in the house, we placed a Skype webcam call to the Lesinas who were breakfasting. Gary said he would pop in to Tesco and buy a webcam himself - so come on Kelly and Craig - you can do it too!

It was a gorgeous evening and Jo and I walked over to the golf club and had beers on the balcony - Colin joined us but Johanne stayed home as she wasn't feeling so good. We walked home along the 1st and 2nd fairways in the warm evening sun - lovely!

Thursday afternoon/Friday morning

I have to be very careful with the titles to my daily blog - Jo got all confused last night when she read yesterday's posting, which was titled Wednesday. It was, of course, written on Thursday but was about what happened the day before (as well as plans for the rest of the day). "Why didn't you tell me last night what Luca was like?" was the remark that greeted me when I got home late from golf in beautiful Tarland - I had only just been to see Luca and Gary that afternoon!

Anyway, this what he looked like the day after his laser surgery - he was playing very happily with Gary when I walked up the path and knocked on the front window. He's fine and the bruising that Gary talked about had gone and been replaced by large red spots - a little unsightly but not at all painful apparently:

He was in good form and really enjoyed playing with his new indoor slide - the only problem is that he hasn't learned yet how to get up the two steps himself and has to be lifted on and off - incessantly! When Gary eventually stopped, exhausted, Luca started to sob - a sound I haven't heard too often from him:

Incidentally, Gary told me he's going to the doctor next week to get prescribed with pills to stop smoking! He's tried everything else he reckons and they've all failed.

Talking about health, my medical on Tuesday was a little bit farcical when it came to the handheld machine they use to assess body fat %. The result came out at almost 30% - I said it can't be, so she did it again - with the same result! When I was then taken through to see the doctor, she spotted that I had apparently "shrunk" by 3cms since my last visit there - yes, the nurse had measured my height incorrectly and this affects the calculation! Another measurement followed and this time it came out at almost 27% - I still felt this was wrong, but decided just to leave it.

Yesterday, I decided to check my previous medical records, plus the assessments I get at Bannatyne's, who do the measurement using electrodes fitted to ankle and wrist. Four separate assessments at Bannatyne's, the most recent being just last month, consistently came out between 23% and 24%. Indeed Albyn's previous medical report came out at 23.3%. Something wrong here, I think.

Wednesday midweek

Just missed Carole on the phone yesterday but spoke to Gary - and I've arranged to go out to Inverurie this afternoon on my way back from Fraserburgh - he's off work babysitting Luca.

Golf last night - a little damp, but not too bad - the rain from the south finally arrived and thankfully has passed through again overnight. Shot a net 69 in the 1st round proper of the Riverston Cup and I'm in the lead - can't wait until the 2nd and final round tomorrow (Friday).

Got home and spoke to Barry and then Dawn. Looks like they are going to try to take him to Erskine on Monday. I thought long and hard about whether I should be there too, but then remembered what it was like the last time we were all there - Dad could sense something was going on, but he wasn't sure what - and he ended up going in to his shell and went to bed and wouldn't get up again.

Barry and Dawn agree and so they will try themselves on Monday - it all depends if it's a good day or a bad day for Dad. Dawn made an interesting comment last night about Dad going in to Erskine - she agreed it was better for his safety, but would he be happy? She said he seems quite content just now - the dementia is getting worse and he just sits and laughs rather than chats now. So what's right? Is the priority now his safety or his happiness? Wish I knew the answer.

After Inverurie this afternoon, I'm heading to Tarland for a Deeside league match - lovely place and I'm looking forward to playing there again.

Tuesday/Wednesday

Haven't had a chance to speak to Gary or Carole yet, but Jo got a brief text from Gary last evening to say that Luca was a bit bruised and subdued after the anaesthetic and the procedure - hope he's OK - we'll find out more tonight.

I went for my company medical this morning - it's supposed to be annual but it's almost 2 years since I was there. I'll get the full report in due course, but Dr. Morton has already advised me that it would be a good idea to see the cardiologist again as it's been over 3 years now. She's not an expert, but she knows my heart rhythm is still irregular - she's not sure if it's flutter or atrial fibrillation - she'll leave that to the cardiologist - but she is strongly suggesting the use of warfarin again. I told her about my Mum's bad experience with this and how I really wanted to avoid this if possible. The last time I saw Steve Walton after the failed cardioversion attempts, he wasn't recommending that I undergo the same ablation procedure as Tony Blair had - he wasn't happy to recommend it at that stage, but things have moved on and that might be a possibility for me now. We'll see - I'm not ruling anything out at this stage.

Monday

Another beautiful day here although the downside is that I had to rush out and get hayfever medication - I couldn't make up my mind if I had a head cold or it was just allergies. Everything's growing so quickly (at last) and there's lots of pollens around - the ivy on our house has really started to sprout:

You'll note that Ross' old beat-up Saab convertible is still rusting away in our drive - hoped it would have been gone by now but I guess I'll have to be patient - again!

We spoke to Lucy last night for a couple of hours on Skype using the webcams - the quality of image was pretty good and there was no jarring or juddering nor delay - her lips were synched with her voice. It was Memorial Day weekend in the States and it's a big national holiday that typically signifies the start of summer. The boys were their usual boisterous selves - I threatened to cut back our stay in USA a bit more if they were going to be like that all the time we were there! Anyway - Kelly and Craig and Gary and Carole - not to mention Barry & Helen and Dawn & John - now all need to download Skype (free) and open an account (also free) so that we can all share webcams. This was a snapshot I took last night as Lucy was adjusting her settings:

Anyway, happy 35th birthday to Lucy today - no old embarrassing photos from her childhood - I'll save those for another day - just one of my favourite photos from our 2000 trip to USA:

Midweek to weekend - Luca arrives

Starting with Saturday when Gary rang our doorbell before 8:00 am - Carole was away on a hen party weekend and Gary had dropped her at the station then headed straight for Banchory. I think Gary only came over for a rest - he put Luca down to sleep for over 2 hours then when Luca awoke, Gary fell asleep on the couch for another 2 hours!

Luca's lunch consisted of Jo's soup, which as everyone knows, can be a little salty - I like it, but it's not to everyone's taste - and each time he was fed a spoonful, he pulled a face - that was until I switched the camera on when he suddenly stopped doing it:

I escaped to golf for a few hours - had another good round and got my handicap cut yet again - and, what's more, we had Betty Stogs ale from Skinner's in Cornwall on in the golf club again - the weather was nice enough to sit and sup it on the balcony again.

We had good fun watching the Champions League final on Wednesday in our house - hope Jo didn't mind the noise too much as Gary, Colin, Dave and I enjoyed a few beers in front of the plasma screen. Gary (Grant)'s only complaint was that I'd forgotten to get the crisps in to soak up the beer - he had to make do with Ryvita and oatcakes!

Thursday was a charity golf outing at Cruden Bay (won another prize for nearest the pin!) and Friday afternoon was a tie at Torphins. This time of year is crazy for golf with all the ties etc - but it only lasts a couple of weeks each year so I shouldn't complain about my sore knees and hips - just get on with it - after all it's only 4 weeks now until the Summer Solstice - and then it's all downhill!

Finished my audiobook of Philip Roth's American Pastoral - more observational than dramatic - but it evoked vivid images from post war America through the '50's, 60's and 70's mostly - eras that made profound impressions on us growing up. I was lucky enough to miss out (just) on conscription but Britain - and indeed Europe - suffered for a long while after the war with food shortages and rationing etc., whilst America moved in to an era of prosperity that we could only dream of. We could only watch and wonder at American films, music and TV - the so called Western (mostly cowboys and "Indians") movies were by far the most popular and the images of the American West were particularly dramatic and it was great to visit places like Arizona in recent years and see the red rock images and scenery that we had watched in the '50's and '60's.

My long hours in the car up and down to Fraserburgh are lightened by music and audiobooks on my mp3 player and one of my weekly treats is to listen to Sounds of the Sixties which I record from Radio Two every Saturday morning (when I'm out golfing). Recently I've also been recording Bob Dylan's Theme Time Radio Hour (Thursday nights at 11) - and this, too, is very evocative of things we heard about and grew up with from USA. Recent themes have been train songs (including childhood nuggets like Casey Jones) - going through songs from the American states and cities - from Chatanooga to Missouri. Last week, the theme was Tennessee - Memphis, Nashville etc.

I guess I had forgotten what a huge influence America had on us as we were growing up - it wasn't until the Beatles and Stones came along in '63, '64 that the trend was reversed and Britain actually was able for the first time to export music back to the States - much of it hugely derivative at first, but ultimately more creative. Barring a few exceptions, we've never had quite the same success with our film industry as we did with music.

Ah well, Sunday evening - it's been a lovely day - I actually had lunch out in the back for the first time this year. I've been trying to upload this video of Luca for a few hours now - I blame Ross and his online games, but he says it's the fault of our ISP. Hope I manage to get it done before I go to bed tonight - but if you see the text only, don't be surprised - I'll try again with the video from work tomorrow.

Kelly's birthday

It's a very happy 29th birthday to our Kelly, who's still training like mad for the 3 Fells hill climbs - run Forrest, run! Lucy's right about her changing hairstyles - here's one from 2000 with her pal Sophie and Ross lurking in the background:


Kelly's primary class in Banchory - even then, she had to be different:

and, in close-up:

More recently, with the hair extensions in 2005:

New camera Craig? Why? What happened to the old one? We had Betty Stogs on draught at the golf club last weekend - but only for one day - it was so popular that the cask was finished in 24 hours! Looking forward to our next trip down in July - how's the research going for the Trevose area?

Got so much golf to play this week, I'm feeling tired at the prospect - it's the busiest time of the year. I'm taking a night off golf tomorrow and have invited a few pals round to watch the Champions League final on our big plasma screen.

End of the week

We went over to Gary and Carole's on Thursday to meet Carole's Dad (Mike) and stepmum (Val) and have a bite to eat. We had a nice time with them and Luca was as good as gold as usual - he enjoyed the breadsticks:

Granda Mike plays with Luca:

Luca and I played "peek-a-boo":

Apart from that, it's just been golf, golf, golf - although I did manage to finally get the back cleared of leaves today - with a little help from Ross. Incidentally, he's sold both his Saab's - the blue wreck will finally be out of our driveway in the next week or so, and the brown one is going in September - to a guy in Somerset - to whom he has to deliver it!

An invitation to a wedding was popped through our letterbox this afternoon - from Mr. & Mrs. Hepburn for the wedding of Peter and Theresa - cue much scratching of heads - eventually I sussed it must be Peter Fitzpatrick - and Gary confirmed this - we're away in USA then anyway.