Double Vaccination

 Back in mid October or so I got a message from my primary care centre about booking time for the seasonal flu vaccionation + a booster dose of updated covid vaccine. The premises across town where they used to coordinate all vaccinations during the pandemic were closed after last year's flu season; and this year they are instead using premises in close connection to my primary care centre in the town centre (within walking distance for me). It seemed they were keeping the same time booking system as during the pandemic though, and as it worked fairly smoothly back then, I expected it to still do so now, even if in another place. So I booked myself in on the first day available (=today), at 2:10 pm, to get it over with. 

It was raining in the morning, but the rain stopped around noon, and I went for a 20 min walk into town, arriving at the health centre ten minutes before my allotted time. There was no queue outside - "so far, so good"... BUT when I got inside, I found the waiting room absolutely crowded, and chaos seemed to reign... The poor nurses at the reception desk kept explaining that somehow too many patients had been booked into each time slot, so they were running behind... And we were all told to "sit down and wait", even though there clearly weren't enough seats for that... Most of us were over retirement age and there were also quite a few people in need of canes, crutches, walkers or wheelchairs + someone to accompany them. The registration process did not seem optimised to run smoothly either. The nurses on duty were no doubt doing their best under the circumstances - I'd say the fault was in the overall planning... (And I have to say that did surprise me, considering all the experience they ought to have gathered from organizing things during the pandemic!)

 

The main difference between the (AI generated) image above and today is that I think I was the only (!!) person in the room actually wearing a face mask. I'm not really fanatic about that in most contexts now - but as soon as I saw how crowded the waiting room was, I immediately chose to put one on (I had one with me). They also had some at the reception desk, but no one was told/asked to wear them (as we always were during the pandemic), and I saw no one else using one! - neither staff nor patients.

 

While I was booked for 2:10, I had to wait until nearly 3 o'clock until it was my turn. I found an empty chair after a while though (and even a bit to the side), so at least didn't have to stand the whole time. 

 

Once I got into the nurse's cubicle (I think they had three of them) the actual procedure of getting my two injections went smoothly, though. I've never had both vaccines at the same time before, but I got one in each arm this time. 

 

 

I did not manage to get AI to draw exactly the image I had in mind (an octupus injecting itself) but I kind of like the facial expressions on these two above... ;)

 

Just after 3 pm I was out of the chaos; and as it was still not raining, I had another fairly pleasant 20 min walk back home - where I settled down with a cup of tea and a piece of cake in front of the TV to relax for a while... Phew!

 

Remains to be seen how I'll be feeling tomorrow, having had both vaccines at the same time. I have absolutely nothing planned for tomorrow except a day of rest, though! On Thursday I have the laundry room again; but I can move that booking if I don't feel up for it. And on Friday I have a delivery of groceries coming, but I don't have to go anywhere.

All Saints' Weekend

 

We had a wet and grey All Saints' Weekend. On Friday afternoon (All Saint's Eve) there was a break in the rain, though, and I manged a walk to the nearby cemetery and the one family grave we have there (my maternal great-grandparents), to light a candle.

 

Larch trees

"Weeping birch"

Giant horse chestnut leaf
stuck on a bush beneath the tree

Empty playground...

I got out for short walks on Saturday and Sunday as well, but for the most part, it was a weekend to just "stay in and read" (cf. my previous book review post)... 

Not a whole lot of interest on TV either, so I've picked up what has almost become an annual tradition of mine this time of year: Re-watching Gilmore Girls, a favourite American TV-series of mine from 2000-2007 that since a number of years back now runs on Netflix. (I also have it on old DVDs, but on Netflix it has been adjusted to modern flatscreen TV format. There's also a 4-part sequel from 2016.) I never really get tired of it because it's so full of quirky details and characters and clever repartee - and hints and references to like a million classic books and films. (It also goes totally overboard in making fun of American small town life - but in a very loving way.)

Have you got any favourites like that to which you keep returning over and over...?

The Turn of the Screw (Book Review)

 I decided to give another classic ghost story a go, while "in the mood" (sort of...)

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James (1843-1916) is one of those classic book titles familiar to me ever since I studied English at the university back in my youth. I could not recall if I had ever actually read it, though. Now I think I can safely say that I probably did not read it before.

"a turn of the screw" (idiom):
an action that makes a bad situation worse,
especially one that forces someone to do something
(Cambridge Dictionary)

 

The Turn of the Screw
by Henry James (1898)

Audio book narrated by Emma Thompson (+ Richard Armitage)
4 hrs 40 min

I also downloaded a text edition (costing "next to nothing") to my Kindle library. It wasn't auto-synced with the Audible version, but I still read them both simultaneously, keeping my eyes on the text on my Kindle while listening to Emma Thompson reading it on my tablet. Her reading was excellent; but I still found it difficult in this case to follow the story by just listening...

It's a strange story, and even having finished it, I'm not sure what to make of it. It did keep me in suspense in a way that made me want to continue reading to find out "the truth" - but at the same time it felt rather tedious because of so much just "hinted" at along the way, rather than the narrator's suspicions being clearly explained.

The narrator is a governess who gets hired by a man to look after his young niece and nephew who have been left in his care after the death of their parents. He takes no personal interest in the children - he himself lives in London, but he also has a country house, where the girl (Flora) is now living, in the care of the housekeeper, Mrs Grose. The governess is employed primarily for little Flora, as her brother (Miles) is away at a boarding school.

However, for unknown reasons, Miles is expelled from the school and comes to live in the country house as well. Miles himself never speaks of what he had done to get himself expelled, and the governess hesitates to enquire. To begin with, both children seem extremely charming and well behaved, both towards each other and towards the governess and other staff. They like the governess and she likes them, and they all get on very well. 

Then the governess begins to sometimes see spooky figures of a man and woman whom she does not recognize. It also seems they're not seen by other members of the household - but possibly by the children... She learns from the housekeeer Mrs. Grose that the previous governess, Miss Jessel, and another employee, Peter Quint - now both dead - had had a close relationship both with each other, and had also spent a lot of time with the children. The governess becomes convinced that the apparitions she keeps seeing are their ghosts, and that the two children are also somehow in communication with them.

The situation keeps escalating and the governess is no longer convinced of the children's "innocence", as she discovers that sometimes they seem to be covering for each other getting up to mischief (as in leaving the house when they should be in bed at night). She suspects that the former governess is after the little girl, and the former manservant the boy. She questions the children in connection with various incidents but the answers she gets are ambiguous. However, she also manages to get Mrs G on her side about the presence of the ghosts and that the children are in danger from them (even though it's unclear whether Mrs G actually ever sees the apparitions herself). 

Without going into details of how it all ends, I would say that even the ending is still ambiguous, depending on how the reader decides to interpret things!

Personally I hesitate to call it a "must-read" - but as it is a classic, perhaps worth the time anyway! 

And I did like Emma Thompson's reading of it.

The Turn of the Screw was first published in the magazine Collier's Weekly,
serialised in 12 installments (27 January – 16 April 1898).

Illustrations copied from Wikipedia

 

Better Luck Today

 

(Sequel to yesterday's post)

I had another battle with the washing machine today - but this time I won! 

To start with, I was lucky in that no one had booked the laundry room in the morning, so I could start at 10 instead of waiting until 12. The display on the machine was back to normal, so I assumed all was ok, and put in my first load (=rewashing the items from yesterday).

However, coming back down an hour later I did not feel so lucky after all, as the exact  same thing had happened again that happened yesterday: The washing machine had again stopped before centrifuging, and the same error message as yesterday was showing on the display (suggesting a problem with the water hose). 

At first I just groaned "oh no..." But felt a bit braver today, so decided to see what happened if I turned the main switch (on the wall behind) off and on again. That did make the error message go away, and the display returned to normal. I decided to assume that the full washing cycle had been performed, and fast forwarded the program to just centrifuging (which would not require any more water added, if that was indeed the problem). That worked, and I could then move my towels etc to the tumble dryer as usual.

The display was still on normal, and I decided to try my second load as well (some clothes, but not a whole lot); this time going down to the laundry room every 15 minutes or so to check how things were proceeding. That way I could see that it did both wash and rinse (and seemed to have no problem with the water supply). I expected it to probably stop before centrifuging again - but this time it completed the whole program problem-free. Phew!

After I was done with it all I called the landlord's office again and told them all of the above. She said someone had been to check yesterday; and as my last wash now had gone ok, probably no use sending someone over again right then - but to call again if the problem recurred. But as I'm not planning to use the machine again until next week (but several other people are) I offered to leave a note on the machine with a brief warning/explanation, and that prompt. So I did - and now, for my own part, I'll try to forget about it until next week! :)

Not the Best Start to November

 

I do my washing in a common laundry room in the basement of the building where I live. There's one washing machine, one tumble drier and one drying cabinet, so one books the room for a 4-5 hours at a time (and is then supposed to have it to oneself). I prefer the afternoon time slot (starting at 12), as I'm not an early riser, and also don't like being down there in the evening. Usually it works out ok, even if now and then there are irritations with some people forgetting to fetch their laundry on time etc.

Today everything was ok when I got down there at 12 and put my first load in. However, when I got back down an hour later, there was a message on the display on the machine indicating that something had gone wrong with the water supply and that the hose needed checking. I was able to open the door. My things (towels etc) had obviously been washed - the washing powder had been used up, and everything was wet. Actually too wet, though - it had not been centrifuged. And still warm to touch, which indicated it had probably also not been through the full rinsing cycle...

I called the landlord's office to report the error. The lady who took the call said she'd treat it as "emergency" and try to get someone over asap to have a look. I still had 3½ hours left of my time, which meant I had a choice: either just leave things as they were for a while and hope someone would turn up to fix the machine in time for me to re-wash that load; or else try to put those heavy, soaked towels to dry as they were...

I started with the optimistic alternative and left things as they were in the basement and went back up to my flat for an hour or so. I kept a lookout through my window for service cars, but none turned up. After an hour I went back down and moved all the wet heavy towels to the drying cabinet (which seemed somehow safer than trying to put them in the tumble dryer in that state). Went back down again after 1½ hour. No repairman had shown up (my own sticky note was still on the machine)  and everything in the drying cabinet was still very wet. I gave the drier another hour+. Got back down again around 17:15, and by then someone else had actually put their laundry in the washing machine, and my note about it not working was gone. Someone must have turned up to fix things at last after all. I got my now semi-dry things out of the drying cabinet, and up to my flat, where they're now hanging on a foldable (unfolded) drying rack in my living room.

The 12-17 time slot for tomorrow happened to still be open on the booking board, though, so I snatched that. Fingers crossed I'll be able to get my towels etc properly re-washed (and re-dried!) then - and my other intended load of clothes as well...

If anyone is wondering why there are rats in my AI illustrations, that's because on my next to last visit to the laundry room, I saw a big fat brown rat running along the basement corridor, and disappear in under the bottom of an anonymous door next to the laundry room. (I have no idea what's behind it.) The landlord's office was closed for the day by then, so I sent them an email to report that...

I've lived 15 years in this building and never seen a rat here before. And nowhere else that I've lived either. Back in my childhood, we sometimes got mice from the woods in our loft in winter; and once my mum also managed to catch one in our laundry room in the cellar. (She caught that one in a towel or something and carried it out into the woods nearby.) But what I saw today was bigger than a mouse.  (Makes me wonder about my own storage rooms downs there. They have different kinds of doors, but it's never occurred to me to consider whether rat-proof or not!! I'll save checking on that for another day, though...)