Louis, the Tiger!

Wake at seven to use the toilet, outside there is a beautiful sunrise on fields white with overnight frost, but I have no deadlines this morning, so pop back into my warm bed for another hour. By the time I get up again, I seem to have decided to fast again today, so limit breakfast to two small slices of rye toast with cream cheese and smoked salmon and my usual coffee. Once it is after nine o'clock, I phone Leslie's daughter, Margaret for news of her dad, William answers the phone and tells me that there has been no change. Leslie is effectively in a medically induced coma and whilst they are continuing to deliver antibiotics and oxygen, there is thought to be no hope for him. It is grim news, William is going to the hospital again this afternoon and will phone me if there is any change. After showering and dressing, I strip the bed and put a load of whites into wash, before setting off to drive to Cherry with Norman. Pip has left a note for me, to say that Dolly is in season, but the boys, who are both neutered, behave themselves in the car and we arrive on Newbald Road, shortly after ten o'clock, without a problem. I let Teddy off first today, not risking Dolly absconding into the woods, looking for love. It is a delightful morning, the sun shining brightly, but the cold northeasterly wind is back, and with a little more force today, to the east a bank of cloud is building over towards the coast. We have a look at Felicity's sapling in Telly Tubby Land, it is an Ash that she calls Yggdrasil, after the Norse Tree of Life. At the very tip of it's ebony black buds, a tiny pink shoot can be discerned, Fliss will be delighted with the news. Once we are out on the open common, where I can keep an eye on Dolly, I swap the terriers over and let her off the lead, making sure that Norman stays close by me this morning. Tomorrow and Saturday, I have Louis and there is also much for me to do today, but the fine weather is too good to waste, so when we arrive at Black Mill, we continue our walk all the way to the western boundary and the gorse bushes, which are showing large bursts of yellow flowers. From here we head North, up the hill and across Newbald Road, and on to Burton Bushes, where the four of us sit on a bench, out of the wind and enjoy the feeling of the warm sun on our faces. We sit for perhaps ten minutes, and then slowly saunter back down the hill towards the car. It is half past twelve when we drop the terriers in Cherry, and then drive to the doctor's surgery, where I need to book a blood test, which I forgot to do when I saw Doctor Martin on Friday. It is quickly arranged for the 25th of March, the results will be back before I see the urologist at Castle Hill hospital the following week. Sam lives just round the corner, so we drive there to arrange to see the girls, but she has gone out, so we drive on to Tesco where I buy some salad and a box of Bakers for Normy. We eventually return home around half past one, I feed Norman some of the Bakers, hang out the whites and then put some coloured shirts and socks into wash. When this is done, I make a pot of tea and take this into the garden with a plate of three oaties and my new book, which is about people's common religious experiences, across all faiths and none, over the last two thousand years or so. One of my great joys is to sit in my garden reading, whilst drinking tea and nibbling a biscuit. My oaties are made from oatmeal and sweetener, with a little olive oil margarine, so are about twenty calories each, I have saved two hundred calories for dinner, which will be a brown rice salad, with lettuce, tomato, cucumber and spring onions. My garden faces east, so I am well wrapped against the cold wind and have a travelling rug on my knee again. Normy lies in the sun, chewing on the last of his rib bones, until three thirty, when we lose the sun and return indoors and then meditate for an hour. I give Norman his tin at five o'clock, gather the washing from the line and then air it on driers on the radiators, before setting up the ironing board and working my way through a pile of shirts while listening to the news on radio four. An American Priest, who was Pope Benedict's Latinist, is interviewed and says, " what has all this hierarchy and ceremonial got to do with Jesus?" He wants a change of direction and hopes a younger Pope might deliver it, he actually calls the college of cardinals a gerontocracy. He is by no means alone in the views he expresses. When the shirts are finished and put away, I chop the salad and mix it with the brown rice that I saved from last night's dinner and then manage to eat only half of it, while listening to Jeremy Hardy, who is on aftervthe news, with a really funny program about power. Weirdly, the less you eat the less you seem to want to eat, I discontinued taking the Naproxen this morning and so far at least, the arthritis in my left hip is OK, although I can still feel it. A text comes in from Sarah and when I check, it is a photograph of Louis in a full Tiger's strip. I also have an email from Graham's wife, Liliane and forward Louis' picture to her when I reply. Will Louis be a professional footballer, a striker, like his dad? He certainly is likely to have the necessary physique and the competitive spirit, but we shall just have to wait and see if he has the talent and the determination. To bed for ten.