The landlord and I decided that the amount of ivy on the wall was excessive and starting to become a hazard to the building and the outside wall of the garden. So, they got their gardener to come by to remove it.
This was a two stage process, as in between I had to go to St. Thomas’s for my month’s checkup for the lizard spit medication I’m now injecting for better control of diabetes. We sawed, we pulled, we used a hoe, he used a strimmer and hedge clippers to take the ivy off the walls. I went to the appointment and he went elsewhere to do another job.
The appointment was very short. They took my weight and blood pressure, and the nurse and I talked about the past month of injections. It’s been pretty uneventful. None of the promised side effects have materialised (nausea is the most prominent). We discussed disposing of the sharps box—Southwark has a service which will come and collect it and give me another box. Sometimes when I prime the injection pen (you turn a knob at the back end of it, then pull it out and turn it a little bit more) fluid drips out of the needle—once it actually spurted out in a stream. She didn’t seem concerned about it. Then I got my prescription for the high-test stuff (10mg dosage) and went downstairs to have it filled. And waited 50 minutes for that to happen. Faugh.
When he returned he bagged up the pile of ivy—we had eleven bags of clippings. He took away the bags and scraped some more ivy that had lost contact with its roots off the wall. I then mowed the lawn. He was also nice enough to trim two of the more predatory bushes out back. We now have more garden than we had yesterday (more space, that is).
Even though I did little, I somehow feel very accomplished, and the gardener said that he thought it was the nicest back garden he’d ever seen in SE1.
Got the bumpf for registration for my college reunion. There are still members of the Class of 1944 (that’s 65 years ago—they are in their mid- to late-80’s now) around! The program looks good and I’m very happy. In addition, one of my suggestions has been taken up: we have one event where the 1974 alumni of Columbia College, Barnard, and the Columbia School of Engineering all get together over a drink. I didn’t see any of the other two groups 5 years ago. We had considerable contact with them when we were in university because we took courses at Barnard (a lot of the Latin and Greek courses were over there because of the outstanding Classics faculty at Barnard) and the Engineering people not only took some classes with us, but they lived in the same dormitories. Hooray! Maybe I’ll see some of my old Barnard and Engineering friends too, along with Thom Chu, who was (I believe) 10 or 15 years behond me but who will also be attending the reunion and who is a friend from Integrity/New York days. Hooray!!!
I’m GREEN with envy. Still waiting for the snow to melt here.
Diabetic, eh? 🙁 Sorry to find out