Radioactive Tuesday.

We wake to a brighter day, around seven thirty, and after letting Norman into the garden, I fry two kipper fillets and make some brown toast and butter to accompany them. As a reward for baby sitting Teddy during his recent holiday, I give Normy half a kipper with some toast crumbled in with it, which he accepts with gratitude. After coffee, I shower and dress, before walking Norman round the village, it doesn't feel quite so cold this morning and the wind seems to have moved to the north and eased a little. As we pass the primary school it starts to snow again, large fluffy flakes drift down from dark clouds and I wonder if there is more to follow. After making sure there is fresh water left out, I drive to Castle Hill hospital, where I am due for the first part of my bone scan at eleven o'clock. Parking at the hospital is a nightmare, and there are also roadworks along the way as well, so I have allowed plenty of time, but in the event I need all of it, as the car parks are all full when I get there. Eventually I park illegally, outside the medical records centre, and walk to Nuclear Medicine, arriving a few minutes before my allotted appointment time. There are five of us in the waiting room, two couples in late middle age and myself, outside there is building work going on and a man with a jack hammer is breaking through concrete just outside the window, making an unholy din. I have brought a sudoku puzzle book to pass the time, but concentrating is difficult with such a racket. Fortunately a nurse comes to fetch me after fifteen minutes and takes me into a room where she inserts a cannula into the vein in my left inner elbow and injects the radioactive dye. It takes less than five minutes, I am told to drink plenty of fluids and return for the bone scan at 3:0 PM. I ask if it would be OK to swim and she says that would be fine, so I drive back home, collect my swimming gear and then make my way to the leisure centre. It starts to snow again as I walk to reception, but when I enter the pool after changing, there are two lanes free, presumably the cold weather has deterred quite a few people. Today, I revert to last week's program and swim 400ms each, on back, breast, and freestyle, followed by 4 x 100m Individual Medleys and then 200m each on freestyle and backstroke to warm down. My swimming feels good, but the extra butterfly yesterday and the effort it took, means it is prudent to have a less strenuous day today. Tomorrow is Leslie's funeral and so I won't be able to swim and my body can enjoy a rest day before I resume the Medley sets on Thursday. After changing, I drink tea and eat a few oaties in the cafe and chat to John, the centre manager about making a promotional video to aid fund raising for the Marie Curie Swimathon. All forms of photography are forbidden in the pool and changing rooms, but John says that we can shoot the footage at half past nine on Saturday evening, just before the pool closes, when the place is empty. My granddaughter, Alice, will do the shoot and then edit it and post it on Facebook for me. She is a whizz at that sort of thing and hopefully, that will help to raise sponsorship. At half past two I drive back to the hospital and in a stroke of luck, am able to park a few feet from Reception, Nuclear Medicine is just along the corridor. When I arrive I am shown in to the scanning room after five minutes, asked to remove any metal objects, glasses, wristwatch and phone, and then asked to lie on the bed that transports you through the scanning machine. It is a large grey hoop and looks exactly like a CT scanner, in fact it may be a CT scanner. Pillows are placed under my knees and head and a belt is fastened around my feet in order to hold them in place and I am asked not to move while the scan takes place. The bed is very comfortable and as soon as the radiographer retires to a safe distance, the machine starts up, with a low whirring sound. After the exertion of swimming, I would have paid for a lie down, and so meditate for what seems like ten minutes, but is actually nearly forty. The radiographer tells me the results will be with my consultant within the next two weeks, I thank her and then return to my car and drive home, calling at Morrisons for bread, milk and some humus. I arrive home for four thirty, let Norman into the garden and then open a tin for his tea. I am having a Mezze, Aubergine Salad, grilled Haloumi cheese, humus, with garlic tomato and mint yogurt dips and salad, with hot whole meal pitta bread. It is very, very, tasty. After dinner Andrew phones as he is driving back from a meeting in Wakefield, to enquire about the scan, I tell him I won't know until I see Graham Cooksey in a few weeks. He tells me that Huby Nana's funeral will be on the 22nd of March and that her brother, Friedl, will be flying in from Germany. Later, I ring Felicity, who says she is feeling a little under the weather and may not make the Poppy Seed in the morning. I tell her that I am also doubtful, as I have to take Dolly and Teddy out tomorrow and then change for Leslie's Funeral, which is at 1:15 at the Queensgate Cemetary. It has been a busy day, so I turn in early around ten.