On Monday and Tuesday I was at work at the London Chamber office in Ashford, but I still needed to coordinate preparations for the trip. On the Monday I got confirmation that the GP had authorized Albina's order for 3 months' supply of her repeat medicine. Brent Pharamacy would still need time to consolidate that medicine ordering in anything they would be short of. In the meantime Albina had her teeth finally checked at the new dentist in Brentford, after five years wiithout any examination. Luckily she always had good teeth and there was no need for any work, other than a good clean and a little whitening. She also went round againt to Williams Travel Clinic to obtain the written record of our tropical disease jabs, as they had failed to send them to the clinic.
On Tuesday I rode to work through a heavy mist, with whole areas, especially around Osterley and Hatton Cross, enveloped in a milky whiteness. As it was also half term and the morning traffic was low, I felt like I was driving alone through a dream landscape with no way in and no visible exit. I last experienced this spooky feeling when I was crossing through a heavy sea mist along the long causeway across Lake Pontchartrain in Louisiana, which brought on a mental panic. It was a nightmare vision of eternity and loneliness. Luckily, the morning mist began to clear as I approached Ashford and I was able to park safely in the station car park.
Things began to improve as I was able to scan over the vaccination summary to my clinic and they confirmed that they had made a record of them. Also Brent Pharmacy confirmed that our repeat medicines were ready. That evening I got to the pharmacy just before they closed, encumbered with two massive plastic bags full of our medicine war chest. I also bought a couple of packets of sea sickness pills, just in case.
When I got the two bags of our medicine home I found that Albina and her friend Marta had been busy that morning piecing together the various items I had listed earlier for them to pack for the journey. It included all the things one might forget, such as telephone cables, UK and EU electric plug adapters, a torch, a telescope (Stefan's gift during my last birthday), a couple of Asian guide books, a handbook on the stars and planets visible this year, a thermometer, specctacle wipes, a sun hat, spare AA and AAA batteries, swimming trunks, and a whole lot of other paraphenalia. Most of the items had been dutifully collected and laid out on the bed in the spare bedroom. All in all, Marta's presence had been most helpful, not only in helping Albina to begin the process of packing but also in encouraging her to get some dresses and smart clothes for the trip, when she had said all along that she would boycott all the public events on the ship. Marta was horrified when Albina said she would go so far as to refuse to attend any invitation to the captain's table on the trip. I winked at Marta and said that was only right. Why should Albina have to eat with the staff?!
I was sorry Marta was with us for only a few days. That evening I drove her to Shepherds Bush to join the family with whom she would be living for the remainder of her stay in to England. When I got home again, I sat down to pack all my medicine into six pillboxes, three of them with 3 months' worth of morning pills, and three of them into 3 months' worth of evening pills. That whole exercise took me four whole hours and at the end I was exhausted and went to bed.
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