I had forgotten about my blog. Why? I still blame the pandemic

 Three years on from the pandemic and those fucking lockdowns and the other restrictions which the governments, both federal and states seem to love so much. I'm in Surfers Paradise where I came to escape the loneliness of the lockdowns in Sydney to join my brother Mick in Surfers. No sooner had I arrived then he left to go to Sydney then overseas. He comes back and forth, stays with me, stays with our other brother, Neil, then heads to Asia again. If only I could do it! I'm a stick-in-the-mud! Too many exclamation marks.

I've been in Surfers for two and two thirds years, since January, 2022, and I came for eight months from July 20 to Mar 21 after the first lockdown. Where should I be? I'm not sure. Is Sydney home? Is Surfers home? Is Southampton home? If only I could do all three. Triple S like my footy club - Spurs, Storm, Swans.

I have a feeling that I am depressed again, perhaps not as bad as I was in December/January when I was eventually admitted (too late in my opinion) to Orchid the mental health unit at Gold Coast hospital. I mean I think they should have admitted me in December. I twice went to A & E and twice they kept me in overnight then sent me home. Once at GCUH and then at Robina where I went with a referral from my GP. 

Why did they say no both times?  I don't know. Did they have no spaces in the units? Did they think I was OK? I was fucked up that's for sure. Eventually, one of the acute care team at Southport arranged for me to be admitted in January which saved my life. I felt better from the moment I went in on the Saturday morning after a night in A & E.

I don't know what is up with me now. I feel OK in the evenings when I go to the Surf Club for dinner and usually 3 drinks, but in the day, at certain times I feel a shadow or a black cloud hanging over me even as I try to keep doing stuff.

I'll see how I go. I don't think I'm as bad as I was but I am still scared......

Are we all sick of the virus yet?

Actually, I'm so sick of it I don't want to write about it but:

I did 14 days of self isolation

And carried on to day 23 or was it 24 before having a beer.

The Big V aka Captain Trips aka "don't mention it by name"

Each day I take a photo of the headline in today's Herald and paste it into my diary app on my phone. Each day those headlines seem ever more horrifying, which though awful is excellent exposure therapy for my hypochondria. So it's an ill cliche?

Things still seem normal here in Surry Hills. I get a coffee and sit outside the cafe on Elizabeth Street. Only the occasional passer by is wearing a mask and there is plenty of bog roll in the corner shop. Why aren't the panic buyers descending on Surry Hills?

Another year, another tooth problem

Actually, it's the same tooth but a different problem. After the successful root canal I was eating a muffin on NYE and the crown fell off. Luckily, I did not swallow it. I found an emergency dentist in Botany and saw  him at 6pm that day. There was no pain because of the root canal but I did not want to leave it exposed for a few days until my appointment today.

The emergency dentist put a kind of temporary filling over the tooth as he could not refit the crown. $150 so not bad for an emergency appointment. The other day part of the that temp filling fell off too.

Today I started fitting for a new crown, or perhaps it was the filling that I knew I needed before the crown is fitted or rather measured?

I have three diaries going now, "proper" notebook, phone app diary and this blog.

Cricket, more cricket, and more and more cricket, and then football, and even more football

I watched the Boxing Day Test from the MCG, Aussies v NZ from 1st ball till lunch time then went for coffee at Mika on E Street (band!?), then more of the Test up until almost the end. 80,000 fans too, a record for the Boxing Day test for a non-Ashes game.

Now South Africa v England 1st Test is on which started as soon as Aust v NZ finished and there's the Big Bash too but I've turned the TV off. 1130pm is the first EPL game, Spurs v Brighton which I shall watch as I'm a Spurs fan. Maybe stay up later to watch one of the other games. I'll see.

I was half tempted to go to the beach after such a lovely swim at Bronte on Xmas Eve but I think I've left it too late, tho' I've been down late in the evening. It was the same on Xmas Day, umming and ahhing then doing nothing.

I went to Bondi Beach five years ago to experience my first Xmas Day there. My second Xmas Day in OZ was at Palm Beach in 1979 with my brothers and mates from the private hotel we all lived at in Neutral Bay. The Royal Hotel, RIP, expensive apartments now. I should have bought one. We had cheese and ham sandwiches and cans of lemonade for Xmas Dinner and it was great. We should have bought an Esky and some grog the day before but nobody thought of it.

We never thought of things like that either. I lived the Royal for a year and it never occurred to buy an Esky or even a bar fridge or just keep a few bottles of water. So, hungover, I would go down to the communal bathroom and cup my hands under the tap for a drink of water. My brothers, by then living in a flatette around the corner in Lower Wycombe Road, lived on cans of stew and they had one plate and a saucepan lid.

Later on, living in an old unit on the corner of Ernest and Miller Streets, Cammeray, we had no cupboards and no fridge. We used to keep our clothes in heaps on the floor, sorted heaps mind you. We weren't savages. Once we had a rat in the kitchen so Neil bought one of those "Tom and Jerry" traps, baited it with, yes, a lump of cheese, and in the morning, I did not believe those traps actually worked until I saw it.

Christmas, 1980 and our parents made their first trip to OZ to see us. They were so pleased to see how excited we were to see them. They did not stay with us but with a family friend in Castlecrag who lived in one of the Burley Griffin homes.

They came down to our flat straight off the plane and started organizing things. Cardboard boxes for pants, socks, vests and I think a broom stick supported by two other "sticks" to make somewhere to hang shirts. They bought us a fridge. And the garbos refused to pick up our rubbish as we did not have the right bags or bins. Solution? We had none but Mum and Dad put the rubbish in small bags and distributed in the street bins.

A few years later I was studying at UNSW and enduring two hour lectures sitting on the hardest and most uncomfortable seats I'd ever experienced. Twenty years later I was coming back to Rozelle one New Year's Day and I got off the ferry at Darling Street where people had watched fireworks nearby.

One woman picked up a tent from among the rubbish strewn about and I got three fold up cushions which I put in my car. Every time I went to the beach I had something soft to sit on at Neilsen Park where there was hard concrete. Why did I not think of that when I was at UNSW?

They are all gone now, not the cushions, which are still in my garage somewhere, but Mum and Dad and the lady from Castlecrag.

And so this is Christmas......Merry Xmas Everybody.....Lonely This Xmas.....I Wish It Could Be Xmas Everyday

I rushed round Bondi Jn looking for the PO and just made it by 457. Using my phone as a Sat Nav and when I'm driving it's no problem but when I am walking I am completely stuffed up. It sends me all over the place telling me I'm 50 mr away 40 away etc, wrong wrong wrong. Head up Oxford St but it's on Spring St. Eventually guy in con store told me where it is.

Congratulating myself on getting everything sent to UK by reg post $27 and then I found I'd left one important page in my bag.

Say no more about the least best clerk in Sydney.

Lovely Xmas Eve swim at Bronte tho.

Diary of a hypochondriac

No more toothache (I hope), three appointments now completed but need one more to put a filling in over the crown, or into the crown. I can eat on the right hand side now for the first time this year so perhaps there really was a problem even before the real pain.

I've been worrying about kind of vague pain in the pelvic area which I've naturally investigated - blood tests, urine tests, ultrasounds - and my GP recommended no more investigations. Good advice as usual. He thinks it is IBS which is very believable.

My blood sugar is up, the only thing found on the blood tests so I might need to get serious about keeping that where it is if not down. New Year's Resolution # 1. Drinking - there's another NYR no doubt allied to blood sugar control?! Maybe do more to get fitter, even go to the gym? NYR # 3? I'm doing plenty of walking mind, mostly with Tosca.

Now for some work on my OU course - Writing the Short Story - which I'm enjoying especially whilst I continue to malinger from work.