Diabetes, life and all that - personal diary

It seems that it has hardly stopped raining since we returned back to Cyprus.

This has made going on my walks considerably harder.

Yesterday I decided to at least go for a drive out in the countryside as I could no longer stand being stuck at home in Nicosia. An as yet not tried out new camera was also adding to my frustration.

One advantage of the torrential rains is that streams and rivers that are usually dry were now full of rushing water, making for very attractive if unusual scenery.












Pavlos

Weather on the coast is much milder than in Nicosia in the center of the island, where it is both hotter in the summer and colder in the winter.

I had to visit the coastal city of Limassol today to attend a board meeting so I exploited my lunch break for some walking by the sea. Of course I remembered to take my camera along:







On the way back I made a detour for some more camera work at the Kourris dam







Pavlos

Went back to Athalassa Park today.

My excuse, if one was needed was to walk amongst the greenery. The real reason is I couldn't wait to take some shots of the lake with my new camera





Unfortunately I do not know how to upload the full resolution photos, so these set copied from my Facebook account will have to do.

Take care

Pavlos

Original planned for today was a day trip to the snow covered peak of Troodos mountains.

Unfortunately, my son spent the morning taking a three hour mock exam for the school entrance exams he will be sitting in March, put a stop to that idea.

The following photos posted by a Facebook friend ( and old schoolmate) only served to highlight what I missed out on.





Maybe next Sunday!

At least I spent an afternoon enjoying the charm of real fire in our sitting fireplace. We do not have an opportunity to light this too often, which is a real shame,



Pavlos

lizdeluz said:

Had a power cut and fierce gales on Friday night, explosions and blue lights to accompany. (The heroes, (electricity engineers) turned up and battled in the storms and rain, poor things, and had the electricity back on, back off, back on pretty quickly, within 21/2 hours!) So we put the (Christmas) candles everywhere, and I lit the Rayburn (wood and coal) for warmth and to heat the water, to boil water for our tea and coffee and cook the supper. A real fire is very welcome at this time of the year!

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Wish I had remembered about the timber we had stored away for use in the fireplace, when on returning back from Dubai last Sunday we found that there was no central heating fuel left in the tank. It always seems to run out on Sundays when no fuel can be delivered. Temperature in Dubai had been about 26c. Temperature at home was 6c.

Still at least I leave in the Central plain. On the mountains temperatures went as low as -12c.

Bright sunshine today though.

It's just gone ten past three in the morning as I write this.

I am at the Accident and Emergency ward of the Nicosia General Hospital by my sleeping father. I have been here since six in the afternoon. My dad has pneumonia apparently and has been kept here until a bed can be found in the proper ward; something that is not expected to happen until tomorrow.

My mom was with me earlier and she was refusing to leave but I convinced her that my dad would be ok overnight and that we should both go home and get some sleep so that we can come back to look after him this morning.

I did not tell her that my intention was to come back to the hospital after dropping her at home. She would never have agreed to go if she had.

The doctor that examined him, a lung specialist, was very clear about the seriousness of his condition. My dad is eighty and his body is weaker by a number of other health issues. Now he has to fight pneumonia as well.

I do not really believe, or do not want to believe, that his condition is immediately life threatening. If I did, I would not have tricked my mom into leaving his side. But my dad has problems communicating after his last stroke and so it is important that he has a familiar face next to him. An accident and emergency ward is a pretty chaotic and confusing place at the best of times.

I am not sure how the doctors and staff here are able to do what they do. To me they seem super human.

They need to be able to cope with all sorts of people, we seem to have had drunks, prisoners under police guard, even a young girl of no more than two who was unconscious as she arrived and must have been in a very bad state as she was immediately put in intensive care and a whole team of doctors was rushed to look after her. The parents were understandably very distressed.

I think it's the emotional toll of the work would find very taxing, although I expect one gets battle hardened with experience.

My dad just woke up!

He looked around him very puzzled.

I hope he was not scared to see me instead of my mom. I explained that we had to come to the hospital because of the fever he had been having and as my mom was tired I took her home but came back myself to help him communicate with the hospital staff.

He seemed reassured.

I hope the old boy will be ok, I am not ready to let him go yet!

lizdeluz said:

I feel for you and your Dad and Mum, and wish you all well. Things seem a lot worse at night too, and all the waiting around in A&E is exhausting. Take care and I hope you can get plenty of rest tomorrow.

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You are so right about things always seeming worse at night. I went out to stretch my legs just as dawn was breaking. The coming of the light is making my thoughts a lot brighter.





I am still optimistic. I think there is an element of the doctors covering their backsides by preparing us for the worse eventuality.

I am waiting for my wife to give my mom a lift over and then I will go home and catch some sleeping

My mom will be of a lot more use to him during the day than I can be - she is after all his primary care giver.

I just hope she was able to get some sleep last night.