What fascinating details of my life can I share with you today?
None. It has been the usual saga of dog walking and more dog walking, although yesterday's afternoon dog walk fell victim to an afternoon session on the wii, which meant that I overshot the 4pm slot by a good three hours! Did my lad complain, or get agitated? No, he slept contentedly at my feet, and then looked disgruntled at the thought of more exercise!!!
Today I realised that the poor starving mite had no raw meat left in the freezer, so a trip to the pet supermarket was in order. Byron loves visiting there, not because he gets bought a bucket load of treats, though that too is true, but because we get to see the baby guinea pigs, the tiny russian hamsters, and the giant house rabbits, all of whom are not in the slightest bit worried by my lad's eye wandering over them. If the truth be known, they seem to quite like his inspction, and always put on entertaining escapades just for his benefit! today, three of the miniscule russian hamsters were creating a lot of squeaky noises which had him absolutely captivated - if he could have crawled into the cage with them he would have done, and they do not seem the least bit perturbed by the appearance of a large daft-looking animal who lays down beside their pen! The giant house rabbit, who is as large as Byron was at nine weeks decided to do acrobatic tricks with his cuddly toy today - the poor rather moth-eaten looking teddy was being unceremoniously flung around the cage by this large white bunny, and Byron was mesmerised! Maybe I should get him one as a pet! He did get very close to a baby rabbit at twelve weeks old, and when it froze to the spot as my lad approached, all he did was sniff it's back, and give it a lick. at which point it came to it's senses, and scampered off into the brambles!
Needless to say, he wasn't as impressed by a couple of bearded dragons, who simply didn't move around enough to warrant attention!

Nothing else has happened today at all, though it has at least been dry and sunny all day, if still very cold - oh for some heat!


 

On Saturday evening my fellow dog walkers, Ann and I had arranged to have a meal together in a local pub, the idea being that we would get to know each other a little better. For some strange reason, Ann decided to invite her son Tom, her niece Shelley, and five of her neighbours to come along as well. This resulted in the pub having to seat us in two different areas, and several of us having to sit beside and opposite people that we did not know, and with whom we had no shared interest. I had mentioned to Ann that her decision to invite people completely unrelated to dog walking was not a good idea, and that I felt that several of the dog walkers, myself included, would not be happy with her alteration of our plans, but she would not be swayed. Having met several of the dog walking fraternity since Saturday, I was correct in my observation, and the question has been raised as to why Ann chose to alter the arrangements without checking with everybody that the alterations were acceptable. Ann is now talking about arranging another meal, to take place in April, but sadly she will have no takers. We will indeed be going out together in the future, but it is likely that Ann will be excluded. Trouble and strife in the currently very warm and sunny Hythe!!
 

I am sitting here composing this on my desktop - thank god! It now has a new hard drive and motherboard, and is working fine, albeit outlook express does not want to work for some reason. It works perfectly on the flip flap, and I can access my emails from the talktalk website, but outlook express does not want to play ball. What I had completely forgotten is that I would have to reinstall my printer, adobe reader, system x etc etc, which is going to be a time consuming activity! The guy who has mended the desktop is polish, and is called aram swiatkowski. He lives in Chatham, and has his own computer repair company. As he knew exactly what he was doing I have given him the old hard drive, and he is going to get what he can off it for the sum of £40, which includes all the disks. Apart from my files, I want all my photos and music in particular, and if he can retrieve my address book that would be a great help. Obviously I can reinstall all the software I have, but none of the previous details will be on the the programs - to have potentially lost all my photos of Byron as he was growing, together with the photos of my dad, would be absolutely heart breaking. I can see that I am going to be tied to the computer for some time to come, and guess what I need to do is stock up on some snacks to keep me going!
 

Following on from my last entry, I have been informed by Dell that if you have the windows popping up with warnings about trojans from antivir like I did, you should hit control, alt, and delete, and not simply close the window. On the flip flap this enables me to turn off or log off, or to switch user, and I imagine that it is the same on all computers. Good luck with keeping your comuters safe - I would hate for anyone else to get stung in the way that I just have.

I have been told on many an occassion that dogs do not have a sense of time, and that they do not recognise the length of time that either you have left them on their own, or if you take them out later than normal. Not so in my experience. Byron normally goes out at 3pm for his main walk of the day, although we also go out in the morning, lunchtime, and last thing at night. Yesterday we were meeting Ali and his mate Arnie at about 4.15pm. At exactly 3pm he went to sit by the front door. When I didn't spring up and put my coat on he started to scratch at the door and barked several times. He was not desperate to go out to the loo as we had been out at lunchtime. When this didn't cause me to rise and start getting ready he came and pushed me off the chair that I was sitting on, and started to whine. This behaviour continued until 4.15pm when it was time to go and meet Ali. He raced up the hill dragging me in his wake, and if he ad been wearing a watch I am sure that he would have kept looking at it in frustration and impatience! I will not believe it in future when I read that dogs do not have a sense of time because Byron certainly does!
 

Greetings mes amis,
I am having a seriously bad time of it with my desktop computer. On Sunday morning I kept getting warning messages flashing up informing me that trojans were attacking my system, seemingly from an antivirus software company. Not believing the messages, I closed the window with the alarm messages in, and then ran the antivirus software that I use, to be told that there were indeed one or two glitches in the computer, but these were healed. Later the same day I realised that a trial version of something called antivir had been installed on my computer, and it would not uninstall despite my trying to do so. I then tried to do a system restore, but the desktop was unable to do it. I then phoned Dell, who ran a diagnostic test, and was told that the hard drive had been destroyed. I arranged for one of their technicians to come and install a new hard drive, and was hoping to be able to extract data from the old hard drive, though as of yet I have not tried. With the new hard drive installed, theoretically all should be well, but no. It would seem that a new motherboard is also required in order to get windows working. At the moment all I can get from the computer is a blue screen informing me that I have some terrible problems in the computer, and that as a result, windows cannot start. The new hard drive, with next day service has already cost me £189, added to which was the £29 for Dell to analyse my system. Dell have agreed not to charge me for the motherboard, or anything else that needs replacing because of the damage caused by this antivir software that installed itself on my computer without my wanting it to - sometimes being on disability living allowance has its uses,as does having got a laptop from Dell which I don't have to pay for until June! I told them that I would not be able to afford to eat if I had to keep spending out on the desktop! So, big warnings about antivir, though I'm not sure what you can do if it flashes up on your screen as closing the window didn't stop it installing itself.
 

Taking the boy out for his afternoon stroll yesterday was quite an experience - all of a sudden the blue sky turned grey-white, and we were subjected to a blizzard of the white stuff! It was impossible to see more than six inches in front of your face, and in thirty five minutes almost four inches of snow fell. Byron, being a beast whose origins are from the himalayas was absolutely delighted, but poor Bella, a cocker spaniel, was soon unable to walk at all because of the snow balls that cling to her coat. Trying to remove the snow balls is not an easy task, and the poor little mite had to have a warm bath to melt the snow when I managed to get her home. By this morning over eight inches of snow had fallen, and, as the gritters had not been out, Hythe was cut off! Very fortunately I had a delivery of coal yesterday (they could not have got here today), and have been luxuriating in front of an open fire all day!
My friend Claire was to have arrived onTuesday to stay for the week, but the fear of being stranded here has meant that she did not arrive. Claire works with handicapped young adults, and cannot afford to be unable to go to work as her clients would suffer immeasurably. All the schools in this area bar one have been closed, and the kids are enjoying an extra few days off before half term begins next week. There are five foot snowmen on every street corner, and igloos all over the place. The snow did not stop one little *** from throwing eggs at my windows last night however, so much of my time has been spent trying to get rid of it. If I had caught the *** I would have thrown them into the canal and left them to it!!!
 

At the end of last week one of Moira and Gemma's cats went missing. Last year Orchid, the youngest of their three cats, produced three kittens, and of course it was one of the kittens who had disappeared. To begin with Gemma was not too concerned as Bandi, the kitten, had proved herself to be a remarkable hunter, and although the weather was still cold, we had none of the white stuff hanging around.
By Tuesday we had contacted all the shops and banks to make sure that she had not been locked in the back of any of their premises, and I descended to the basement here to make sure that she had not been locked in here, although it was unlikely as no-one had beenin the basement for several weeks. Stretched out in the alleyway between our two premises lay Bandi, with her eyes wide open.
I can only imagine that she had been hit by a car, and was trying to make her way home, as no-one in the neighbourhood uses any kind of poison in their garden. This road is used by delivery trucks who are servicing shops, banks etc in the High Street, and despite the 30mph speed limit, and the number of cars parked on the road, Batholomew Street is somewhat of a race track. Her remaining brother and sister are very subdued at present, and are not wanting to play or eat. What do you do though for kittens who are obviously grieving for their missing sister?
 

Technology has been giving me a bit of a hard time. Actually I'm being very polite as my car is an elderly, beaten up heap, albeit one without much rust. Yesterday I had promised to take Gemma to a meeting at the job centre, and then to take her mum Moira shopping in Tesco. Having risen early enough to take the boy out for a decent walk, I decided to bring my car down to the flat so that when Gemma arrived we could simply take off. My car had other ideas however, and refused point blank to start. I have been with a recovery team for many years, ever since in fact I had to push my large motorbike for several miles, so I decided to phone them. Normally they arrive within an hour, but yesterday there were a lot of other folk also having problems, so a two and a half hour wait was in order, meaning that Gemma had to take the bus into Folkestone for her meeting.
Having finally got here, Graham managed to start the car, but having done a few checks on the battery, told me that it wasn't taking enough charge. In short, it was knackered! No problem I thought, I'll buy a new one. What I hadn't realised was that diesel cars require a much stronger battery, and therefore that it was going to cost me more than I had realised. £92 later, my car has a new battery, which fortunately is guaranteed for three years, but any other expenditure is out of the question for quite some time!! All I can say is that it is a good job that Graham took as long as he did to get here, otherwise I would probably have done some retail therapy whilst in Folkestone!!
 

For some reason my blood sugar is dropping during the night, meaning that I do not wake in the morning. I received a letter today from the hospital in Canterbury informing me that I am having needles inserted into my spine again on the 16th February, and that I have to have a pre-assessement check on the 28th of this month at 9.40 am. Fine, I just hope that I don't hypo during the night as there is no way that I will be in the land of the living to answer the phone otherwise! The last thing I consume at night time is a bar of chocolate, so there is no way my sugar should be dropping so low, but then my body never has been any good at doing what is expected, but right now it is bloody inconvenient!
 

I intended to start writing another missive here some two and a half hours ago, when the phone rang. My friend Sally, who I met in 1983 when I started working for BT in 1983 decided it was time that we caught up, and I have only just put the phone down - I am glad that I will not be paying for the call! Sally has just discovered that her first ex-husband has died, and is furious with herself because she is upset. She split up with Dave in 1985, and with no children to complicate matters, was divorced in just under a year. What she realised several years later was that she had married Dave because she needed a father-figure in her life - her own father having been absent since before she was born, and Dave, who was 12 years or so her senior, fitted the bill. He was a tall bloke who worked in the building trade, and who did not comprehend anything on an emotional level - in fact his answer to someone who was upset about anything was to take them down the pub, and join them in getting slaughtered. He did not understand the pleasures of reading a book that made you think, or anything else that involved using one's brain. Life to Dave centered around the football scores,and going down the pub. In total he had 5 marriages and produced 2 children, both of whom are now serving time. He did not heed the doctor who warned him that his consumption of alcohol was killing him, and died aged 62 last month. His death has resulted in Sally feeling a resurgence of the feelings that she once had for him, albeit she is also relieved that he has not been a part of her life since their divorce, and nor did she want him to be. Had he not have died, she would not have given him a second thought, but right now she cannot stop thinking about him. My statement that this will pass, and that it is just a part of the grieving process fell largely on deaf ears, but that too I think will pass. What she needs to do right now is to be honest with herself, and to accept that her emotions need time to resolve themselves. Then, and only then will she be able to move forward. What she also needs to remember is that she had a hysterectomy some eight weeks ago, and that her hormones are still trying to settle down. At least Sally has time, which is something that several of our mutual friends and acquaintances no longer do have.