Little blue pouch

I recon I could probably write a blog completely based on bus journeys and the bus travellers, 'The fascinating world of the bus journeys' it could be called. I swear I am attracted to drama, this week as I was standing at the bus stop a old man came and stood beside me and started chatting about the fact that he had mislaid a ten pound note, he felt sure it was in his flat somewhere but he has searched everywhere and checked his wallet a thousand times but he just couldn't find it, so he walked to the post office in case it had fallen out of his coat pocket when he went to buy his news paper this morning, but he couldn't see it. Clearly the loss of the £10 was really bothering him so I sympathised and agreed that its really upsetting when you loose something. Anyway, this meant that the old guy was going into town to the bank to with-draw £100.....Don't ask me why loosing £10 means you need to get £100 cash to replace it, but, hey, its none of my business. The bus trundles to our stop and we get on, I go to my usual spot, always toward the back of the bus, up the first step and the first row to the left...the old guy took the seat at the front. Off we go on the journey and I tune into a lady's conversation who was sitting in the seats in front of me with her mate who was sitting a couple of seats down, she was announcing to all who would listen that her husband had a stroke and couldn't be left on his own, and what an awful time she was having, bla, bla, bla.....the then points her thumb toward the old fella sitting next to her and says...yeah, I have to bring him everywhere I go now!! I felt my jaw drop open, the poor old man was slumped against the window, and his limp arm kept sliding off his lap and then he would spend five minutes trying to reach the limp arm with the good arm, as his Mrs sat happily ignoring him, I couldn't help wondering how many years they had been married, and my heart felt so heavy for him, I was so preoccupied with feeling sad that I didn't notice that the old fella from the bus stop had made his way up the bus and had sat next to me, saying....You'll never guess what my love?... I just took off my cap because it felt itchy and you will never believe it, there was £20 in it!!! So it wasn't £10 I had lost it was £20 and I hadn't lost it, it was in my cap all the time. He nudged me with his elbow and chuckled to himself all they way back to his seat...that it, where the hell do you find those magic caps that turn £10 in to £20?
By the time we had got into town and I had all this extra information floating around my head, I had no idea why I had gone in the first place, so I wondered around and brought some bread then caught the bus back home, walked through my front door and remembered I had gone for dog poo bags!
Last Sunday, I was desperate to go to disabled swim. so armed with my cane and my youngest daughter we braved it. I am so glad I did, I met a lovely group of people and it was a really relaxed atmosphere, we managed 20 lengths, which for me is really good and after I felt like I had done some quality exercise, this week its cancelled due to a swimathon, and everyone was having a right moan as they should slot disabled swim in else-where, I felt I didn't really have the right to give my view as it was my first time at the swim, so I left it to the others.
My Daughter and I went again on Monday morning but only managed 15 lengths as it was too busy. I have spent the rest of the week eating the calories I burnt off swimming!
Next week I have yet another trip to the Royal Albert Hall courtesy of RNIB Connect. Symphonic Rock, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, in return for a review. I brought my train tickets today, and now have a handy little blue pouch to put my ticket in, apparently according to the lady in the booth at the train station, I shouldn't loose my ticket if I am using the pouch...we will see!! Its a 3pm performance so going home will be rush hour(s) so Mum and I have decided to go to eat afterwards and let the commuters commute their way home without me getting in their way and cracking their ankles with my cane...kind ent I?
My poor little doggie has really struggled this week with the weather, Thunder terrifies him and he gets really stressed. We've had two really big storms which resulted in Ralph being shut in his crate with a blanket over it until he stopped shaking and panting, he has been a miserable bugger ever since and seems to be spending a lot of time curled up in his bed, following me around like a lost lamb, or standing on the patio outside looking up at the sky watching the clouds, however, he is eating much more than usual, comfort eating its called in humans!
This week I have started to ease myself into a regular familiar routine, and am finding it really frustrating. Thursday I was on a complete high and came home full of energy, walked Ralph, did some washing and ironing, cooked tea and my brain was still functioning well enough to have an intelligent conversation with the family...Friday things were completely different, I came home feeling absolutely exhausted, Ralph assumed as soon as I walked in the front door that we would be marching off on a lovely long walk, peeing up every plant that he sees and exploring the marvellous variation of sticks one can find on a dog walk, he was in for a shock when I plonked myself straight on the sofa with my coat still on and fell fast asleep, when I woke up an hour later, the rain was thundering on the conservatory roof and I felt awful, my limbs felt heavy and if I didn't know better I would have said I was coming down with flu, for the rest of the day I dragged myself around the house, falling asleep every time I sat down, I couldn't make a simple conversation make sense so I gave up talking and went to bed. The next day I felt just as bad except I had a stonking head ache to go with it, I wish more people understood how exhausting life can be when your sight is poor, in fact I wish I could swap with a few people for a few hours so they see what I see, and feel the emotions that float around in my head each day, understand how exhausting concentrating is and feel my frustration when my brain freezes and blocks any other messages from anywhere because its still trying to make sense of the job I was doing two minutes before I started the next task or conversation, my brain and eyes are constantly battling against each other and a couple of times this week my brain has projected an image that isn't there, this is the first time this has happened for 'real'. I have heard of this happening in some sight conditions, and a long time ago I wasn't sure what I was seeing and dismissed it, but this week I had definite images of things and people that were definitely not there, which isn't so good when you are standing at the train station watching a train come in then you glance away, look back at the train and its not there, firstly it made me jump and secondly the feeling of sadness and foolishness is overwhelming, but most of all, how can I trust my brain to project truthful images? and what happens if it decided to remove images, what happens if I go to cross a road and my brain decides not to detect a lorry barrelling along, of course, my ears and hearing will counter out that possibility I suppose but its all a bit scary. A few times I have sworn that I have seen Ralph or one of the girls in the same room as me when they are actually not, and a peculiar thing happened in Asda that I still don't fully understand now, my brain seems to be pulling up images from years ago and plonking them in front of me, some of them seem to be connected with familiar smells others are completely random, and as there standing in the middle of Asda was my Dad, the mans been gone for 21 years, but there he stood, donkey jacket and all. Asda is having a revamp and everything is moved about so I wondered if that was what triggered the image, either way its all very odd.
Well, I am off to prepare and organise myself for the week to come, and will let you know if the little blue pouch helps to keep my train tickets from getting themselves lost!!