Home & Away

We left France on the 3^rd of May.  We made good time along the French motorways, only being held up by the geniuses of P&O.  The 1^st thing we noticed about being back in Blighty (& we continued to notice it) was just how fat most people were.  Don’t get me wrong, nobody would mistake me for a bulimic, but I’m talking about proper fat, the sort of people who can no longer walk but waddle.  The rest of Europe just doesn’t do fat like we do.  We arrived home the way you should, floating towards the white cliffs of Dover & I would like to say that I was really happy to be home, but I wasn’t.  I couldn’t wait to see my family & friends & we received an overwhelming amount of generosity but I was depressed.  Not least because after 6 months in the mountains coming down to sea level & the country was in its full spring bloom the hay fever didn’t gradually come over me over weeks but slapped me in the face like wet tar forcing me to take tablets, hay fever tablets always bring out my dark side but I was a bit miserable.  I shouldn’t of been though, we were staying in a friends house for free whilst they were on holiday, another friend met us at 11pm to help me unpack & give us a carrier bag full of essential supplies, we was bought lunch, made dinner & got drunk.  After a couple of days & being the hero I am I stopped with the hay fever drugs & everything became fun again.  All be it in a very hectic & rushed way.  After meeting up with the family & seeing the progress of the parents new home, collecting our clothes from all corners of the county & repacking from winter to summer it was time to get back into the local pubs.  The wife was out with the girls so most of the men were forced to baby-sitting duties, all but 1.  He had to come out but the poor boy was grey, very hungover from night before it took him just over an hour to finish his 1^st beer.  Finish it he did though (it was touch & go for a while), he kept it down & we managed a good 12 hour session ending in a row of tequila’s each.  We can’t remember who was responsible but I do know it pushed me over the edge.   It delayed my sample production for another day!  Before we left to France in November I got the snip, we’ve never wanted kids & it was the sensible but painful solution but to be given the all clear my fertility needed to be tested.  As the old saying goes, ‘your either a wanker or a liar’ & I’m no liar but doing on command wasn’t as easy as you’d expect.   There’s so many rules.  These are the actual notes I was given; do not use the withdrawal method, it is not to be passed into the container orally, no lubricant can be used, no trace of soap can be left & the sample must be produce directly into the pot without contamination!  Add the fact that it had to be taken to the hospital within an hour of production & the necessary hospital was half an hour away & the sample needed to be kept in a pocket to keep it at body temperature the whole thing took on military planning.  I had to produce, pot, bag & deliver during a week day morning with the neighbours builders drilling & shouting out through the open windows, the wife stomping about downstairs packing & all the time the pot sitting there winking at me like Jabba the huts ugly sister.  Every time I got close & picked up the little plastic basterd the whole moment was lost.  There is jut no romance these days!  Anyway, job done.

We were at home for 2 weeks & we only spent 1 evening in.  It was a feast of food, booze & company. That was all great but the 2 weeks did make us both realise that as much as we have missed the people at home we still don’t want to go back there.  It took us the 2 weeks to finalise our plans to get away, not booking our accommodation until 3 days before we left, but the day to leave arrived so off we went.  It was 1 of the worst days travelling we’ve ever had & most of it was down to my own stupidity.

My parents were driving us to the airport & they arrived half-hour early, which I’m going to blame.  We made excellent time getting to Heathrow T5 in just under an hour so we had a good 3 hours to relax into the airport shops & bars.  Whilst enjoying a coffee before check in the wife, checking I had every thing, said got your injection, cause I had!  Oh fuck.  As you may know I’m a diabetic.  Not being 1 to over dramatise a situation without insulin I will die & as we intended to be away for a few months I had quite a lot of it.  It was left in the fridge round our friends house, my parents where carrying on to see some friends & the rest of my mates were at work apart from 1 hapless buddy who happened to be on the night shift.  I went into the airport Boots & they contacted my doctor who was able to give me an emergency prescription for a few douses but I needed the lot.  I woke the poor basterd up who then had to drive round Kent to get the keys, pick up the life saving insulin then hot foot it to Heathrow before check-in closed.  The irony of it is is that back in his single days & previous job (making drugs for a pharmacy company) 1 of his regular chat up lines was that he saved lives for a living!  He made it though & we were on our way.

1^st Stop Milano.  It was an easy flight & an easy train ride to Central station.  This was by far the most impressive train station I’ve ever been to.  Easily beating all the London ones (as great as they are) & even Grand Central Station NY.  We had a short walk to our hotel & that’s when problem 2 started.  We had been moved hotels without prior warning.  Granted we had been upgraded from a 3 to 4 star hotel because of it but it was another 20min walk in the sweltering heat with all our luggage (which in total consisted of 6 bags) to a more remote area back the way we had come by the train station.  As we all know, the train stations the world over attract the down & outs, vagrants & in this case 50 year old Chinese transsexual hookers.  We made it to our hotel with both our luggage & arseholes in tack & hit our 3^rd problem.  They had only booked us in for 2 nights instead of 3!  After what seemed like an ice age since we left Kent we were finally in our room, which, as we have no other address, would be our home. 

This blog is becoming  bit long now & I know some of you need to get back to work(?) so I will tell you all about it later.