Whale is due to come home tomorrow afternoon.
CC and Jay are planning a ‘welcome home’ meal for him so Bear is going to be grumpy.
Today has been spent at the dentist’s and eye specialist’s for Bear. He had a ‘loose tooth’ which started playing up a couple of weeks ago and the receptionist was most apologetic that there wasn’t a vacancy until today. Inevitably, the tooth was no longer painful but after she’d poked and x-rayed it the dentist said there was an infection and a problem with the gum, so, after a week of anti-biotics it will have to be extracted and his denture adjusted for the gap. After consulting her computer she gave us two appointments for July 27th and 28th.
We had lunch in town and then made for the eye specialist’s surgery just before half past one. They have the rather illogical system of booking several people at the same time but as the surgery is closed from 12:30 until 1:30 there didn’t seem to be much point in arriving too early. Bad mistake; we were third.
By twenty to two the waiting room was full and very airless so I opened the window. Despite the heat outside we appreciated the slight breeze that made breathing a bit easier.
Our opthalmologist is reputedly the best in town. There are only eight in the local phonebook and only two of them carry out operations. This means that some send their patients to Reims for surgery. An appointment with our Dr. C. can often involve waiting over two hours but he’s worth it.
Bear’s name was called and we were put in one of the two consulting rooms to wait. The great man appeared, shook hands and examined Bear’s eyes. He always seems to cope with Bear’s English pronounciation of the letters and even tries to speak a few words of English in return. He decided that he would have to deal with the cataract in his right eye but, because of damage to the retina, he couldn’t guarantee that the result would be as effective as the left eye.
Bear has to go into hospital at the begining of August because his diabetes is not well stabilised. He may have to go on insulin. After that, Dr. C is going away on holiday and so the operation has been booked for October 1st.
The ten minute appointment cost 55euros (more than twice as much as seeing our GP) but we were out by quarter past two: much sooner than we expected.
sablonneuse.wordpress.com 
July 21, 2009 at 8:24 am |
Hope you enjoyed the break whislt it lasted.
Jay and CC are very thoughtful children. It must be a blessing having them around to counteract Whale and Bear.
Let us know how the return home goes.
Thanks Tracey, new post on the way.
July 21, 2009 at 10:16 am |
I have a confession to make; I have a sort of dyslexia about names and try as I might I find it very difficult to distinguish between Bear and Whale. The more I concentrate the more confused I get. The picture I get is of two irascible , demanding, selfish men. Am I being unfair?
Well, you can only paint your pictures from what I write, pat, so if anyone is going to be ‘unfair’ it’s me. They are not really alike but both can be irritating at best and b****y awful at worst. Bear is extremely selfish and intolerant much of the time but he can be charming and even kind of generous in rare moments. He is absolutely a Jeckyll and Hyde character.
Whale, on the other hand, was always a very aimiable soul, who would do anything for anyone provided you asked him. He never was strong on commonsense or practical matters, concentrating on academic research most of his life. Since his illness he has become rather inward looking and a bit of a hypochondriac. Without intending to, he annoys everyone with his demands for unnecessary things and his demands to see a specialist for little problems like his warts (even after the dermatologist told him plainly that they are not cancerous and removing them is purely aesthetic). OOh – I could go on but I’d better stop there.
July 22, 2009 at 6:36 am |
It’s a shame you can’t get them both in together, say for a month!
Yes, that would be great – except for all the daily visiting.