MND can get in the sea

There hasn't been much Teddy the cat talk recently in this blog, mainly as he has settled into a summer routine of finding some shade to snooze, prowling the neighbourhood, interacting with other cats until dusk, and sleeping indoors overnight. No naughty antics like getting stuck somewhere, biting our visitors, or running around the house in the middle of the night. There has been no news to tell really, but this week he has been back in the headlines.  He brought a vole indoors one evening, and after a game of hide and seek around the house, the poor little rodent managed to get behind our fireplace, with Teddy trying to sniff him out. Alice wasn't going to go anywhere near the action, and I am absolutely no use from my wheelchair, so we had to call Matthew and Fin to come over and rescue the petrified vole. It took them over an hour to get to our furry little friend, with Alice screeching out orders, me listening from another room, and Teddy waiting outside impatiently, read...

#mndcangetinthesea went on a cruise!  Alice and I spent a week in Spain, Portugal, Guernsey, the Atlantic and the English channel aboard P&O's Ventura. The weather was hot, and we ate very well, enjoyed the shows, quizzes, talks, and late night rhubarb bellinis in the piano bar. We didn't get off in Vigo as we have already been there so we took advantage of the quiet ship to visit the spa and sunbathe on the deck. Lisbon was nice, if a little urban, St Peter's Point was much like many other sailing towns, but Porto was beautiful, and by far our favourite. The banks of the Douro are dotted with red tiled white houses, and the cable car up to the bridge, gave us amazing picturesque views up and down the river.  Unfortunately we couldn't book an accessible room, so we had to take the manual wheelchair, which didn't fit through the cabin door, so Alice had to help me in, then go and fold up the chair and bring it in. S...

Alice and I were delighted to attend and present the trophy at the annual DB Cup football game between members of the hospital team that I started over 10 years ago. The reds beat the blues 6-3, after being 4-0 up, before the blues brought it back to 4-3, only for the reds to seal it with 2 late goals. I presented the silverware to the winning captain João, who was playing his last game before moving away. The players raised over £500 for our JustGiving page, and we celebrated with an Indian meal out. It's been 2 years since I had to give up football and the line up has changed with players who have since joined who I don't know. Despite this, they all came over to shake my hand and thanked me for starting the group which was very kind of them.  Thank you Adel, Rich, Graham and all the other boys for organising.  I've had two hospital appointments since the last blog. The first was a biopsy under local anaesthetic, on a spot on my nose, that I've...

One of the things that I had always wanted to do throughout my life, was to walk the beautiful, scenic and rugged coastal path of the Isle of Wight. I remember many family walks after school or at weekends over the downs and forests, and usually to gather fruit or flowers for dad's awful home made wine. Gorse, quince, dandelion even!  I always fancied walking the 70 mile coastal route around the island and Alice and I had planned to walk it in our retirement, over a week, staying in hotels or B&B's on our way around, but unfortunately, my MND diagnosis scuppered that plan.  Prior to my diagnosis, Alice and I had completed many inland walks using the book that my parents had used, and we added our comments the to those that they had written twenty years previously. Some signposts and paths had changed over the years which made it more like orienteering at times, but it was a pub walking guide so they all ended well with a meal or a drink.  ...