Sunday 6^th January, 2019 2200

I would love to start with something happy but I can't.

I'd love to say good things have happened since last time but I can't do that either.

And I won't say why I have been somewhat depressed all weekend.

Except to say that it is not nice to have it implied that you are something you are not and by someone you thought much better of.

I thought I was of an age where everything rolled off your back, it seems it does not. I am depressed, disappointed and to an extent angry. Sure, in an attempt to make someone feel better when they were ill I was perhaps misguided and inept in my efforts but the response was not what I expected at all. I fear a friendship has been lost forever.

I shall get over it, I always do, it merely makes life difficult here now for the next five months. It also makes the Chengdu trip “uncomfortable” if it remains unresolved but I am going regardless with Alice – everything is prepaid. The coming week will tell me more.

Now you all know I have friends in Shanghai, one of whom goes back nigh on forty years. No names, no pack drill but I was stunned to find that my friend had life-saving emergency surgery since we last communicated.

All my time in China (well, since I started having major traffic incidents, hospital time and arthritis took hold!) I have envied their health level. Now I thank the Lord for mine. I am hardly the world's healthiest specimen but I have never had anything removed (ok, bones taken from elsewhere to plug into other areas but not thrown in the bin) and I couldn't run a hundred yards or step into a boxing ring with Amir Khan, things I could have done (without being too embarrassed) thirty years ago.

So far though, whatever injury has befallen me, my body has always shrugged it off even though the shrugging period seems longer these days than ever. At sixty-two and a half, the aim these days is not to actually break bones any more. Every time I fall now I break instead of bouncing so it makes sense. I need to replace a fluorescent tube in here and two years ago I used to do it myself by dragging the table across to stand on. Sorry, my balance hasn't been good for a while and I am frightened. I fell twenty feet once and it nearly cost me my life. Four feet now terrifies me! I must email Brenda before the shutdown to get a workman with a stepladder. Bloody ridiculous. If my tenure here was assured then maybe I would buy my own ladder but bugger all is certain here. The only sure thing right now is there is a pair of crutches leaning against my desk from the last incident – they are handy for turning the light on and off or pushing the door further closed!

So what happy things can I write? Well, two and a half weeks sees the very excited Alice taking to the skies. It could also see a resolution for my problem, which is not actually a problem inasmuch as what I may be thought of, I know I am not and never have been. I can ignore it but should it become a rumour you never know.

This week will tell all. I'd like to say I don't care but I am pissed off with the very thought anyone could think it. Oh and just to clarify, no students are involved!!!!

Watch this space.