english weather & italian food - england day 8

the nasty little buggers inside my chest are still quite well, it seems. better than i am, at any rate. i've still had a bit of a temperature all day, and i tire easily. breathing is harder than usual, and the sounds that emerge from my chest area alternately make me chuckle and worry.

i took a short, very slow walk by the beach before breakfast, and after breakfast went to look at the sunny day from my window seat, watching the tide go out and, later in the day, come back in. i love, love, love the sea!

i edited some of the hundreds of photos i have already taken (probably a blessing in disguise, this sickness, huh?), read some poetry, talked to heinz, dozed off a couple of times. thicker clouds moved in by mid-afternoon. it was quite cosy inside, and i was tired, but nevertheless - sick or not - a girl's got to eat.

i'd been craving italian food for days, so i checked the area for italian restaurants on the www. shanklin! practically just down the road. so i dressed nicely and ventured out. it had been dry since morning, but of course, as soon as i set foot on the street, it started to rain. not very nice, so i didn't walk around much in shanklin, but made for the restaurant (mamma mia, run by actual italians). delicious food (veggie lasagna and a huge serving of garlic bread), and for entertainment i watched two of the young employees putting up the last part of a huge wall poster.

when i made my way back to sandown, it was pouring down ... though it has gotten worse since. makes it all the nicer to be in my neat little room.

i'm glad i decided to change my flight back, because i probably would have passed out from fatigue somewhere along the way from here to vienna tomorrow, what with the luggage and flying and all. better this way, although i am missing out on a long overdue meeting with a former business english class and the psychotherapy fair on saturday.

i hope to feel good enough to go out for a few hours tomorrow. nice as it is in my room, i am beginning to get cabin fever!


song of the day: mamma mia by abba.

naughty bacteria, the iron lady & a poetry acceptance - england day 7

so, a trip to the sandown health centre this morning for my 09:40 appointment. the verdict: chest infection. nasty little buggers in my chest had to spoil my well-deserved, much-needed holiday! for the second time this year i am on antibiotics. the last time i took antibiotics before 2013 was in the early 90s or even in the late 80s! crazy. apart from antibiotics - rest. i asked about flying out on thursday: not recommended. well.

pharmacy, breakfast, www to do something about my flight. eventually found a rather cheap flight back, cheaper than changing my ticket at any rate! so i will be here till sunday. i hope by the end of the week i will be fit enough to venture out for some hours or i'll get a different kind of fever - cabin fever!

i rested, then went for a 15 minute stroll before getting something to eat. the short walk and a trip to the shop left me more tired than my 14 km walk on saturday! but then, i still have a temperature.


broken sun


the good news of the day is that after a couple of rejection notes, i got a "yes" from red fez magazine, accepting my poem inspired by the element magnesium. i am glad it has found a home - and red fezes look stunning on poems. ;)

of course, the big thing everybody is talking about here is the death of the iron lady, margaret thatcher, who passed yesterday. there are reports of street parties, of people rejoicing in her death. i understand where some of them might be coming from (though i believe many of them are too young to actually remember, or were not even born back then), but i still think it is wrong. (i'd actually like to ask them a simple question: let's say your mother is a controversial public figure. or let's just say the neighbours didn't get on with her. let's say she dies after a long struggle with cancer or a demented old woman. how would you feel if the people in your street had impromptu parties, singing songs about the wicked witch being dead?)

the margaret thatcher who died yesterday was not the margaret thatcher of the 1980s, she was an old and very sick woman. and yes, thatcher steered the country into an entirely wrong direction, from my point of view - and obviously from the POV of many, many british people - but she did not do so single-handedly, and those who have come after her ... well ... they haven't exactly helped, have they, to put things right. thatcher might have started it, she might have messed up a lot of things ... scratch that, she DID mess up a lot of things for a lot of people, but what about her successors? will partying in reaction to the news of an old woman's death change anything, anything at all? 'fraid not. what it would take is for people to get organised instead. have they got that in them?

still, i had to chuckle at the typo on some media website: "margaret thatcher died after a strike". if it was a typo, that is ... it might also have been cleverly sneaked into the article ... ;) and - i don't believe in an afterlife, but ... if there happens to be one, perhaps margaret t. can get stuck in a neverending miners' strike. *g*

and okay, i can't resist choosing the following as my ...


song of the day: stand down margaret by billy bragg.