Thursday 12th March, 2015                         1640

Late on Tuesday night I sent Mulan a message while she was in the next room. She had forgotten to lock the front door. Half an hour later she replied asking me why I had sent the same message eight times. I hadn’t of course.

On my way to class yesterday morning she wailed by text that overnight the same message had arrived another 62 times. Later, calls to China Mobile were of no help but at least she stopped getting my messsage. However, I discovered although I could make and receive calls and receive messages, the ones I was sending didn’t seem to go anywhere, including one I sent to China Mobile requesting a credit balance update. I feared all these texts to Mulan had dissipated my money.

I got through yesterday although now all four of my limbs hurt, the crutches and stairs having also taken their toll on my shoulders and arms. It is in fact not getting any easier at all and it may well be the case that I will visit the hospital at the weekend with Joan. Firstly I am not sure it is wise to remove the cast on Wednesday (and I assure you I really do want it gone) and secondly, after three and a half weeks my left calf is still twice the size of the other one. Something is not right and I am vaguely worried that I many have a DVT. In theory that should be a remote possibility considering the fact I take aspirin to keep my blood thin but whatever is wrong I think they need a second look.

Anyway, back to the phone.

Not having to get up early today, I stayed up late, too late really, but at 0300 I suddenly received a response from China Mobile with my balance. Over the course of a few hours my balance had reduced by over 50y. That didn’t please me (that amount normally lasts two or three months) but then to my great annoyance I started receiving texts stating my balance at intervals of five minutes. Wondering what the hell was going on, I switched the phone off and retired, only to awake this morning to another seventy-odd texts.

Over the course of the day I guess I received in excess of two hundred of these messages and as the day wore on I was getting angrier and angrier, envisaging possibly having to replace the phone and maybe having to change number. I still may have to. I then remembered that just before all this started, Joan had added me to some Chinese thing where they all get to send messages for nothing. That had to be the culprit.

After finishing today I got Joan to delete me from this application, emptied my phone of any form of message and great, the messages stopped. Unfortunately, I also seem to be back to being able to do everything with my phone except send texts. It will be interesting to see if the small hours see a repeat of the avalanche of messages. I can buy a cheap phone but I really don’t want to change my number.

Joan of course is feeling really depressed about causing so much trouble but of course she wasn’t to know (if indeed this is the cause) because all the students use it without problems.

Saturday 14th                                       1630

I was going to blog yesterday and post this entry then but to be honest I got so little sleep thanks to pain that I really didn’t feel like even trying to pretend to be cheerful.

Now I am sure some of you must be getting tired of my moaning about my aches and indeed I have rather felt at times (although it never stopped me posting what I thought!) that perhaps I was portraying myself as being a bit of a wimp. Not good, considering I don’t actually think I am one.

This morning however, Joan and I took the 29 bus to town. That was easier said than done because the steps up onto the bus ain’t ‘alf high Mum! It took a fair while for me to inch to McDonald’s once we alighted for a breakfast and then two hours for Joan to go and get my cigars, shopping and search in vain for a new SIM card for my phone. The latter was because she had listened to her friends who had said ID is not required in order to buy one. I knew it was but of course I was overruled.

Then it was a taxi to hospital. The visit was prompted in part by the still swollen calf (and as it turns out the foot too but I couldn’t tell as it was encased), the non-healing hip muscles and in great part because of Joan’s constant nagging for me to go. I know in time any damaged bone or muscle will eventually repair itself even if left untreated (albeit being deformed if not set) and the length of such is dependent on many factors. I am just tired of being tired because I can’t sleep.

In A&E they had a look at me and then packed me off for a CT scan (270y) and they took me on a bed instead of  wheelchair, in which I would have felt much more comfortable and dignified. Instead I must have appeared as someone with a serious problem. Poor Joan had to help the porter push the bed and amazingly the hospital has a goodly number of inclines. When I was wheeled back I managed to get my own way and got Joan to borrow a chair so I could go outside for a smoke until the scan came back and a nurse called me in.

I bloody knew it. You may recall that in my blog on the day of the accident I was worried I may have broken my pelvis? I sodding well did!

Needless to say I wasn’t too thrilled about only discovering this nearly a month later and then  only because I had gone back for a moan. At least now I knew that in fact I wasn’t being a sissy and it explained why it is almost impossible to find a painless sleeping position.

Ok, now what about the swollen lower leg? Would I agree to another “picture”? How much? 100y. Ok. For that the cast had to come off. Two nurses attacked the bandaging with scissors and three quarters of the way through one of them pulled back, waving her hand in front of her nose. It ponged. With indignation I informed them that yes, western people do tend to stink a bit when they haven’t been able to wash something for a month! I don’t think they were cognisant of the fact that westerners have some fundamentally different body characteristics beyond facial features and black hair.

Then the bed was off again, this time for a full leg ultrasound. No DVT thankfully but apparently high blood lipids (at the time I couldn’t remember if that was water retention or cholesterol but now I know) and I am somewhat bemused as to how this diagnosis could be arrived at on the basis of an ultrasound - I thought they had to take blood. That one is being taken with a pinch of salt I am afraid, although when I next go for a medical I will ask for proper tests to be done. I have always had perfect levels previously.

Back again to A&E where they put the plaster back on again and then informed me I should stay in bed for four weeks, no sitting in chairs or walking. Following their advice would almost certainly lead to the non-renewal of my contract if the school were entertaining doing so in the summer and let’s face it, these people told me it was nothing serious, only muscles when I went the first time!

So that’s the story so far, Usain Bolt can sleep easy for some time yet.