Over the past few weeks, I’ve tried to take advantage as much as possible of what Wales has to offer, but I’m also trying to reconcile that with the need, and indeed my company doctor’s instructions, to relax and do less. Consequently, I afforded myself the luxury of an extra couple of hours in bed this morning. Over one shoulder, a voice told me to get up and be active. The contradictory voice over my other shoulder insisted I stay put and allow my body to rest. That second voice kept whispering that it was okay to sleep longer and that I was doing my body a favour by staying where I was. In the end, I found a middle ground that probably wasn’t listening to anyone. I ended up scrolling aimlessly on my mobile phone, drifting periodically in and out of consciousness. The net result was a sore, aching back. Worse still, my right-hand tremor was especially troublesome this morning, driving me to frustration. I just couldn’t get my right arm to relax, regardless of where I put it. It constantly felt like it was aching from being continually tense, as though I’d been trying to hold up a weight in my outstretched arm. Even though the shaking is happening autonomously, it’s still moving due to the ongoing flexing of my arm muscles.
Eventually, the frustration of my aching right arm forced me out of bed by around 11:30 am. We all discussed the possibility of doing another day trip, but finding the right location was proving challenging. Lisa wanted to avoid crowded places, which ruled out any towns or villages. Most places we considered were further ruled out because they were too far away or too strenuous for the dog. Between us all, we’ve effectively been everywhere there is to go already. In the end, we had to give up on the idea and instead make it a stay-at-home day.
Sandy had suggested I be on the lookout for some new pillows. Yes, they sell pillows in the Netherlands, but our household has two different pillow shapes. This is one of the quirks that has resulted from our emigration history. In the Netherlands, pillows are typically 60 cm x 70 cm, which is almost square. Joey and Jae, on the other hand, prefer the longer format pillows, which are more like those from Australia and the UK. Since I’m here in the UK, it’s a perfect opportunity to stock up on longer-length pillows for the kids. We try to replace all our pillows every couple of years. John and Lisa also thought it might be time for them to pick up some new ones, so John rummaged around in the loft to see what their spare pillow situation was like. Nothing here ever gets tossed out: everything finds a possible second life, so there were a bunch of old pillows up there still.
With a clear purpose and goal, John and I set off to Newtown to explore what the Tescos superstore and Argos had to offer. As I needed to refuel the car, we took mine. John, bless him, spent most, if not all, of the 10 minutes pointing out things he’d previously told me several times already. He mentioned each bend in the road, what the speed needed to be, where the church buildings were, which fields were which, and so on. It felt like a play-by-play of everything there was to see en route, as though he wanted to be in the driver’s seat. I nodded and smiled politely, resisting the near-overwhelming urge to tell him ‘I know’ every few seconds. He really reminds me of Dad: enthusiastically repeating stories we’ve heard over and again.
First up was the Tescos petrol station. By the time I had the handbrake on and made it to the pump, John was already there, operating it. Like the good big brother he is, he also insisted on half-filling my car at his expense. I tried to insist that wasn’t necessary, as British decorum dictates, but in the end it felt like I was giving him the pleasure of capitulating to that kind gesture, so I buckled and accepted. Since I had a lot more driving to do over the next few days, I decided to top up the tank completely on my own dime. I brought John to fits of laughter with my repeated attempts to stop the pump on a whole-round figure, but it kept reaching £XX.99 each time before rolling over to £XX.01. This happened no less than three times before I gave up, swearing at the inanimate pump in frustration.
Inside the Tescos shop itself, after I drove around the car park exactly as John dictated and parked in exactly the spot he pointed out, we found the bedding section. There wasn’t a huge selection, but I put three two-packs of medium-soft pillows and several two-packs of pillowcases into my trolley. Jae had asked me to stock up on a particular brand of strawberry-flavoured drinking water that she likes, so we found the shelf and emptied most of it into the trolley. At £1 per 1.5-litre bottle, it was quite cheap. Since I didn’t really have any space constraints, we came away with 16 bottles. Each time I visit the UK, I stock up on certain items we can typically only get here. I’ll probably do a big Tescos shop on my departure day, but since I was already here, I picked up some OXO stock cubes and a tube of Bisto beef gravy granules on Sandy’s request.
While wandering the aisles, I received an inquiry about whether I could design and 3D print something, so I tended to that, making a mental note to dive into that some more upon my return home. That’s now two possible custom orders I have awaiting me.
We left Tescos and made our way to Argos, once again following John’s blow-by-blow instructions on where to drive, how fast to drive, and where to park. Once again, I smiled and nodded politely.
They had a smaller section of pillows and pillowcases in stock, but I came away with another few bags of each tucked under John’s arm (he insisted on carrying them back to the car).
All afternoon, I was half mockingly telling John I planned to stop in at Greggs for a signature sausage roll—one of my guilty pleasures. After leaving Argos in the middle of Newtown, I was following John’s directions, navigating the handful of roundabouts, one-way systems and traffic lights. In fact, I had to assert myself when I realised we were heading away from Greggs. There were two sausage rolls and a bottle of ice-cold soft drink with my name on it, and I wasn’t going to give up on that without a fight.
By the time we made it home, both my sausage rolls were already history. I polished off the second one as we sat in the car waiting out an unexpected, torrential downpour— the kind that would do wonders for the garden—rather than make a dash for the house and get drenched.
With so much of the liquid gold falling readily from the sky, John leapt into action, ensuring his butt was completely full, as well as any other container he could find.
When the rain subsided, and I was finally able to get out of the car—still in a semi-comatose post-sausage roll state of euphoria—I parked myself at the laptop for an hour to write up the day’s notes ahead of me writing the blog later in the evening. Half of that time was spent diagnosing why my Apple Messages app on both my iPhone and MacBook was sending messages as SMS. This happens occasionally. It’s not a huge problem, as I have FB Messenger and WhatsApp to fall back on, but it’s a little annoying because I cannot send photos when this happens.
Somewhat at Claude’s suggestion, I gave up fighting the SMS problem and instead tried to go down for a nap. I never did sleep in the end. Between getting up later than normal and the persistent distraction of my twitching right forearm, I just couldn’t nod off. I ended up lying there contemplating my movements over the coming few days.
For tonight’s dinner, I defrosted and doused the remaining T-bone steak from the butcher in Rugby in garlic butter. For the second day in a row, I went with John’s now-famous potato wedges, which complemented the steak just lovely, thank you very much.
We finished the evening with more fun and frivolity over the LIJONG game board, once again testing the waters with a variation on the gameplay. I already have various ideas for LIJONG v2, which I will work on in my spare time over the coming weeks.
Several times today, I was reminded of how annoying my tremor has become. What has up to now been little more than a nuisance is becoming more impactful and harder to write off as just a simple tremor. I’ve found myself waddling around the house in small steps and movements, almost like my body is stiff and unable to move freely. It has been almost comical at times. It’s curious because I don’t feel ill, yet I am observing more and more how the disease is asserting itself over my body. At some point, I’ll no longer have the luxury of just shrugging it off. I’ll start levodopa next week upon my return to the Netherlands, and I’m now more curious than ever about its impact. Will I respond well? Only time will tell.