Hospital

We went to see the doctor today, at his clinic in Alton. He is now going to schedule surgery as he has an opinion from all of his colleagues: but we have to wait to get an appointment from the hospital. He can't book us in himself.

Irish Music at The Mill Tavern

Yesterday evening I met my brother at The Mill Tavern in Shottermill, near Haslemere. We had a drink and a chat together, then he played the violin with a group of people. I only stayed until 9 pm (they were going on until 11) as I had left "the wife" at home in pain. Back home I described the performance for her and showed her the pictures and video footage that I took. My brother doesn't want them published on-line though so I can't put them on here in full.  

In the morning I went to the Alton Executive group meeting - 3 of us turned up, so we are now merging with another group. About a third of the original group are now working, but I guess the others are on holiday.

Doctor meeting, Internet Explorer 8 and McAfee Security Center/BT NetProtect Plus, Earth Hour

We met with the Doctor on Friday. Good news (of a sort) he is going to schedule surgery to fix the problem and he has confirmed that it isn't cancer either. We now have to wait for the hospital to get back to us with the date of surgery.

Yesterday I installed Internet Explorer 8. I had been putting it off as the McAfee website says that it does not support IE 8 as it is beta software. When I DID try the Beta version of IE 8 I got a blank screen in McAfee Security Center which made it impossible to use, so I had to uninstall the Beta version. Recently however I downloaded BT Netprotect Plus which is the BT branded version of McAfee Security Center (without the Spam filter). BT's website also said that IE 8 is not supported with NetProtect Plus. This is despite the fact that BT/Yahoo are promoting IE 8 on their home page. When I checked on Friday on McAfee's website they said there was a problem with Microsoft's software and they would not support IE 8 until it is fixed.

I raised a support query with Microsoft. They came back to me saying they could not comment on third party software but suggested I installed the software in "safe mode".

I thought "huh?" and "why?" but I went along with the instructions provided. However after downloading the install package and trying to run it in "safe" mode I was given an error and told the installation could not proceed.

After restarting in normal mode I ran the install package again. It took only a few seconds to complete.

I checked BT NetProtect Plus/McAfee Security Center and it is working just fine. IE 8 is working fine too. It still doesn't load as fast as Google Chrome or Opera but the extra functionality is on par with these two if not better in some places.

When I checked BT's website and links today it appears that they have removed the warnings now! You can download IE 8 from Microsoft by clicking here.


I cooked (shop bought) crispy duck with pancakes, and an apple and blackberry crumble (home made). All seemed to go down well. The cats liked the left over duck!


Crumble Recipe
7 oz plain flour
1 oz whole wheat plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 oz unsalted butter at room temperature
5 oz dark brown (molasses) sugar
4 bramley (cooking) apples (about 2 lbs)
4 oz blackberries (NOT blackcurrants)
1/2 oz caster sugar


Cut the butter into cubes and rub it into the flour and baking powder until it looks like breadcrumbs. Then mix in the dark brown sugar.
Peel and slide the apples, add the caster sugar, stir and microwave until slightly soft.
Mix in the blackberries.
Cover with the crumble topping.
Bake in the over at gas mark 5 for 40-50 minutes

serve with custard

Last night was "Earth Hour" - we dutifully sat in near darkness for over an hour. Luckily we were only watching TV! We watched Housesitter with Steve Martin and Goldie Hawn and then part of Brokeback Mountain. We gave up on Brokeback Mountain as it was too difficult - they kept mumbling and had strong "southern" accents too.

Basingstoke North Hampshire Hospital

We've been spending time at the North Hampshire Hospital in Basingstoke this weekend.

We initially went to the "ThamesDoc" - our GP's out of hours service - at the local community hospital, The Chase at 8:30 on Saturday night as Maria had severe pain and her leg kept going numb or feeling "hot". She got sent to A&E by the doctor at about 9 pm as he said she needed an ultrasound scan. We got to Basingstoke about 9:45 and got seen by the triage nurse fairly quickly. I had managed to drop her off at the main entrance, park the car and then spent 15 minutes roaming round the hospital looking for the Emergency department. The Emergency Department is BEHIND YOU as you stand looking at the sign by the Main Entrance, so of course I went the other way :-). After having blood pressure and temperature taken by the Triage nurse we were then moved into another room, blood was taken and we were left to wait. After an hour her blood pressure and temperature was taken again. A bit later a Doctor came to see her. He said they didn't do ultrasound scans overnight so she should go home and see her GP on Monday, but he would request a scan anyway. We got home soon after 1 am on Sunday.

This morning, I'm over in Alton at 9:15 for a meeting. I've made an appointment for her to see the GP at 3 pm as well. Then Maria calls to say that the hospital have rung up and would like her to come in for a scan at 11 am. So I leave the meeting and head home, then then we go back to Basingstoke, arriving at 10:50!

They tried the scan at 11:10, but complained that her bladder wasn't full enough, so we got sent away to drink water for 40 minutes. When we got back we'd been elevated to seeing the consultant - Dr Green, and also testing a new ultrasound machine too.

They found the cause and explained the pain. Dr Green is going to refer her on to "Obs and Gynae" for treatment so I won't be going into any details here! So she rang the GP to cancel the appointment and to let him know what was going on.

Alton again

Went off to Alton to meet up with fellow members of the Executive team.

Meeting was more focussed than last time I think.

Missed the bus home by 10 minutes, so had to wait for the next one - which was over an hour.

Wandered round the shops a bit, bought a birthday card. Deep exceitement!

Tonight I have finally finished the third Christmas jigsaw too! Picture above! Only took a month!

Thursday and Friday: Career Development in Alton

I was on a career development course at the Job Centre in Alton on Thursday and Friday.

Some useful networking, plus we did some exercises on body language, expanding outside our core areas of focus, checking for key issues on applications. Not really trail blazing stuff, but it got me out of the house and meeting people which I think will be the best part of it.

On Friday evening we received in the post the death certificate for the person who MAY be my great great grandfather's father. There is nothing on it that helps at the moment. He is listed as being a "hatter" and dying of "delerium tremens" in what looks like a workhouse in 1849. So it looks like I may be related to The Mad Hatter.

Outpatient appointment

I got the bus to Alton today as I was due to see the Doctor. That went well, however on the way back I couldn't find a bus stop that claimed to serve the bus I was going to get back (the 272). So, stupidly, I thought I'd walk back. I did a mile or so before I found that the pavement disappeared, so I had to walk in the road and jump onto the kerb when a car came by. Then it got dark too. I walked on to East Worldham (and 2 1/2 miles in all) then called a taxi to go the rest of the way. I should have given up on the 272 and got the no 13 and walked from Whitehill centre. Got home about 6 pm.