Don’t, whatever you do, put your hands into the water in the sink in the washroom. I’ve got pieces off the stove soaking in a strong solution of Flash. It would play hell with your psoriasis.
I will do the fridge and oven in the morning and clean under the bath. Must get bulk buy of bicarb. I gave Eleanor our last packet for her cystitis so I’ll use the box for your teeth and replace it, if you don’t mind?
I couldn’t get Garibaldi biscuits up at Flax’s and I couldn’t get Min cream. Mrs Venning says it seems to have disappeared off the shelves.
Met Mr Wilson up the hill today and stopped to ask after Mrs Wilson’s wrist. She is doing very well but of course he has to do the shopping for her and it hurts his poor feet. Anyway, we were happily passing the time of day when I noticed he had a little flower petal stuck to his cheek. So, without thinking, I put my hand up and picked it off. My dear, it was only a piece of pink toilet paper he’d stuck on a shaving cut. I was mortified.
Talking of toilet paper, I got much the cheapest buy at the International. Quite pleased with myself, and then I had to pay a fine on the library books. They won’t let you off if you are an OAP. They say they might if there were ‘special circumstances’. They say they are human.
Which reminds me, I’ve had to pay that parking fine after all. Don’t you think that’s MEAN?
Got Garibaldis at the International.
I know what it is, Gran. It’s Boot. She will eat spiders. Every so often she has an overdose and throws up on your bedcovers. It’s all arms and legs. I think she eats daddy-long-legs as well. It’ll be easy to wash out and we can freshen it up outside on the first fine day.
I hoovered under our bed this morning by the way. Found the following: one sock, seven pence, a dod of makeup-covered cotton-wool, two golf tees, one biro and a cardboard box of curtain rings.
Well, I don’t understand it. She seems all right generally, doesn’t she?
When she howls like that I can’t bear it. I’ve put a bundle of old Daily Mails in the broom cupboard so if she starts yelling try to get one under her.
She’s taken all the polish off the parquet in the hall and there is an ugly stain on the tiles under the kitchen table, which I just can’t shift. I dread her throwing up on the carpet. We will never get the smell out. Every time the car gets hot there it is again. The unmistakable Boot pong.
Actually I apologised to Mrs Wilson when I gave her a lift the other day and the smell turned out to be some Charentais melon she had in her shopping bag.
Drops for the last time tomorrow morning. We mustn’t forget to ask the doctor about the form for a disabled badge. He has to sign it.
Appointment 5.20 p.m. We’ll leave on the hour.
Actually, before we leave let’s write down anything you want to ask the doctor. We mustn’t waste our visit. All my symptoms fly out of the window as soon as I’m in the door.
Have you enough ointment?
Have you enough pills?
Are you still worried about your eyes?
Do you need any sweeties?
We can pass the sweet shop as we come home. Mrs Estherson says we won’t get coconut logs any more because the Scottish firm of Ferguson’s in Glasgow has closed down. She says she thinks she can get us Richmond Assorted.
Mother sends love. She says the ferry was off last week because a jellyfish got stuck in the works.
Well done, darling. Thank Heaven that’s over, and I expect you’ll feel the benefit tomorrow. He says there is no infection whatsoever and just a tiny bit of inflammation from the wax. Keep a wee bit of warm cotton-wool in it overnight. He says it won’t affect your aid, and you can go on using it safely. Apparently the wax has absolutely nothing to do with it.
Also, it’s natural for syringing to make you feel dizzy and a bit seedy. And it’s natural to be scared. He wondered if you ought to have a blood test you looked so pale but I knew it was terror. Also I don’t think the water was warm and he was so enthusiastic that he squirted it all over his suit. Serves him right, I say. Never mind, it needed doing. I held the kidney bowl under your ear and it was spectacular. Reminded me we ought to get the chimney swept this year.
While you were recovering there I asked him about deaf-aids and he agreed immediately to an appointment for you at the Royal Free. He says the box models are much easier for elderly people to manage because the controls are larger. It’s just circulation, I think. He thought we could stitch a pocket to your pinny on the bodice somewhere so the box wasn’t under the table when you sat down, but I think that would muffle the microphone. He said he would certainly sign a form for our disabled badge. He doesn’t keep them. You can pick them up at the town hall, he says.
We are getting one! When we get one I can drive you to the doctor’s and we can park in the Finchley Road, which means we won’t have to gallop across the road like that. Those traffic lights don’t give us half enough time to cross, do they? I remember I used to find that with the pram.
Oh, and by the way, he has had a very good wheeze about your pills. You can get the same medicine in liquid form, and he says he has an idea it works quicker. It must take ages for those depth-charges to dissolve in your stomach. No more choking them down or struggling to halve them.
The doctor said those large pills should be easier to swallow but Mother says Uncle Arthur keeps a hammer in his bedroom to smash his into little bits. He has trouble with his oesophagus, though. Not sure I’ve spelt that correctly.
The vet says it’s fur ball. Why should she suddenly get fur ball? I didn’t know ordinary black bring-you-luck type cats ever got fur ball. I thought it was only those fluffy Persian people. In fact, Dad and I paid £3 for a tiny bad-tempered Persian kitten from that pet shop in Parkway when something about the lecture we had on fur ball made us go back for a refund and buy Ms Boot, who was only thirty bob.
Oh, well. Change of life, I suppose. Apparently we have to brush her regularly. She is to be given a dose of liquid paraffin every day for a week, and then once a week as a general rule. Good grief. She seems quite to enjoy the brushing if it’s not too near her old scar but I don’t know how to get her to take the paraffin. I put one lot in her milk and she stepped in it.
I rang the vet and he says to squeeze her jaws at the corner when she will be forced to grin and then someone can fling it down on a teaspoon. Not much success so far. We’ve put the liquid paraffin in the cupboard above the fireplace by the way in case we get into a muddle—tho’, mind you, Mother used to use it for cooking during the war. She made a wonderful orange sponge with it when we were short of fat. Everyone loved it and it was beautifully light and airy so her cousin Joan ordered one for her baby’s christening, and all the baby guests loved it too, with very unfortunate results.
Funny to think of those days. It was 2 oz butter per person per week, wasn’t it? When we were staying at Granny’s Flora, the maid, would put our butter ration on little dishes by our places so as to be strictly fair, but Granny used to steal bits and give it to Major Reddick, an officer