No photography today. Must do better tomorrow

 My camera 📷 lay unloved in the cupboard today ☹️ I try and use it almost every day but today was my first full day home from hospital and I was weary. My visit had been very eventful for all the wrong reasons. I discovered I had a Pulmonary embolism a cyst and I even developed Pneumonia in there. Thank goodness I was in there! Photography to me is a very special therapy. It allows me to escape away from the trials and tribulations of everyday life, it’s pure escapism. I love slowing down and waiting whether it’s trying to get a photo of a bird out of the window, I have a wheelchair and there’s steps down to our garden so window photography it’s then for me. Heather gets me photos of the flowers she grows form. I play around with them, I just crop or convert to black and white. I don’t like photoshop as in my mind it’s messing up the photo.

Just had a few days in the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery UCLH London

The UCLH (University Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery Hospital) is some place. I under went spinal surgery 17 months ago (see previous post)
My visit was to sort out dosage and ensure the catheter wasn’t leaking. The marvellous staff at the Molly Lane Fox unit were there to care for my every need and the food weren’t bad either.  My visit would’ve been sorted in clinic normally but then COVID-19 reared it’s ugly head and as with the whole world 🌍 things got sidelined. 



During 2020 I came to clinics to have my pump refilled and dose changes. Medtronic makers of the pump have made an amazing job. It’s done by placing a reader over the pump and then my nurse could read the amounts used etc and more importantly for me make any changes in dose. 
Back to the reason why I am posting and that is to give a big thumbs up 👍 to staff and nurses on the Molly Lane Fox unit who cared for me. The unit deal with all sorts of brain 🧠 surgery and I have met people who have undergone some marvellous marvels of modern surgical techniques. All cared for a in a ward with a history dating back into the mid 1800’s when a woman sought brain surgery for a family member. That woman was Molly Lane Fox. She was a one of the founders  of The UCLH (University Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery Hospital) here endith tonight’s lesson on the history of brain 🧠 surgery it may not be the perfect historical reference you will ever read but ‘twas written with love ❤️ for the care I have received and the marvellous things that happened at the UCLH .

Sorry not been posting Multiple Sclerosis and life got in the way.

My last post was pre COVID-19 so it is ages ago but with all of the lockdowns and waves etc it seems an eternity since I last posted. Much has happened, I have finally got my Stoma done it’s a Colostomy and has transformed our lives. I’m no longer sitting on the commode for four or five hour’s everyday. Son in that respect life is better. Because of Heather changing the Stoma bags the bed needs to be moved which involves relocating the ceiling hoist and that’s due to happen next week 👍 . My other major news is that I now have an intrathecal baclofen pump. I had it inserted last February prior to the first lockdown . To find out about Baclofen Pump click here 
This pump is a brilliant piece of kit. Inserting medication direct into the spinal cord via a catheter from the pump inserted in the front of my stomach. 
 So lots going on but I haven’t wanted to share this with the 🌍. Now I have shared it so maybe more posts to come.





Article from The Guardian about Earth day


 Today is Earth Day, which should provide us with an opportunity to pause and confront the awful predicament humanity faces. We eat microplastics, breathe pollution and watch other life-forms decline to extinction. We face intersecting poverty, health, climate and biodiversity crises. Our global predicament is that consumption by the wealthy is driving us towards planetary disaster, yet billions live in poverty and need to consume more to live well. In this cycle, any version of “success” only hastens catastrophe.

Solving this conundrum requires much more than merely reducing the impact of high-consumption lifestyles. Similarly, if we focus on increasing efficiency this tends to increase resource use: make cars cheaper to run and people drive more. The core of any response that truly rises to this challenge will be interlocking policies that drive society on to an equitable and sustainable path.


Flowers blooming bulbs growing

 We have had loads of daffodils blooming for what seems an absolute age but as they start to recede other bulbs are appearing. First off it was the Snakes Head Frittilary and now it’s a question of what is going to be next? This is a voyage of discovery as a few weeks back we (Heather) planted 200 spring and summer bulbs. 






Anyone see Kate Bradbury and her pond on Gardeners World tonight?

 One of my guilty pleasures is Gardeners World, an hour of pure escapism on a Friday night. Being in a wheelchair 🦼 I can no longer garden as I would like but those of you who know me will remember my description of how Heather and I garden now : I supply the brains and Heather supplies the brawn. Heather is a reluctant gardener and I am a reluctant disabled man! Recently I bought a special offer from Sutton seeds of 200 summer bulbs 💡 as you can imagine Heather was delighted 😁  Well let’s get back to tonight’s edition of Gardeners World. Monty Don has taught me almost everything I know about gardening (not strictly true) and I try and watch Gardeners World whenever it is on.  

Tonight’s episode (yesterday’s episode now 🤣) had Kate Bradbury on talking about her Brighton garden in lockdown. Kate is passionate about wildlife gardening and I can recommend her books as great places to discover the joy of gardening for wildlife. The first of her books I read was https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/the-bumblebee-flies-anyway-9781472943125/

I loved her honesty and her helping ways to invite birds and insects into what began as a wildlife desert. She is a wonderful writer and has written some other books about ways to enable the birds and the bees 🐝 visit and establish homes in our gardens. One of the absolute best ways to encourage insects and birds into a space is a pond! I know that can sound kinda scary it I’m not talking about the Serpentine in Hyde park but any kind of container from an upturned dustbin lid or a semi submerged washing up bowl up to a full on deep hole dug with different tiers and a beach, or anything in between. The RSPB in their adverts say “if you build it they will come” 



I know it is true because the more wildlife stuff I build in my own garden some creatures move in. Kate has recently written a book about how you can build a pond or should I say dig a pond? Kate has been promoting ponds in gardens for years. I discovered some YouTube videos Kate did a few years back and when learning about the pond videos I discovered that she has just written a book RHS How to Create a Wildlife Pond 

As I said earlier providing a pond is possibly the best thing to do to bring wildlife into your garden so I recon reading Kates book will be the best thing you can do if you want a pond . Good luck 🤞 👍



Second jab done

 I lied in my last post and said our jabs were booked for the 14th! Wrong it was today, a whole day earlier 😇 so my apologies for my wrong information 🧐. Since our last jab a new hub has opened and the old Saga offices has been press ganged into the job. Talk about a slick operation 👍👍👍 they were on the ball and I would estimate about four hundred people being inoculated per hour in the one section that we were in. My congratulations and heart felt thanks to the army of people involved. 



Re use Repurposed Recycle the new three R’s

 I just googled what’s the three r’s What are the 3 R's stand for? reduce, reuse and recycle The 3R Initiative aims to promote the ...