Sunday

I borrowed a blood pressure monitor from the health centre but the "cuff"  you put round your upper arm was too tight for me. I guess my arms are a bit like Popeye's after a can of spinach. The cuff kept bursting apart as it inflated.

Anyway, we decided to invest in our own monitoring device which I did NOT order from Amazon! Instead I went to the "Boots" store at Heeley Retail Park. There were several to choose from.

As I was looking at them, I met a man who showed me which one he had bought. Some friendly chat followed and it turned out that he had only recently emerged from the hollow of "Long COVID". For three years he had been housebound - mostly languishing in bed but now he's up and about.

I said, "It must feel like being born again?"

He said, "You're right. I hadn't thought of it like that."

"Boots" is Britain's most famous pharmacy chain. At the prescriptions counter, a young shop assistant kindly opened the monitor box so I could see the size of the cuff inside.  Then I parted with some money after removing the padlock on my wallet.

Upon arriving home, I reopened the box and set up the blood pressure monitor. Soon, with the assistance of my personal nurse we were ready to go. The cuff was perfect and it squeezed my arm as if Bluto was gripping it. Unfortunately, both blood pressure readings we took were almost dangerously high - around 190/102 - confirming  the high readings taken at my health check on Friday morning.

The sooner I can get started on that antihypertensive medication the better.

In other Sunday news, I went down to Frances and Stewart's house to watch Hull City play Sunderland courtesy of Sky Sports TV. We lost by one goal to nil but our lads played well - especially in the second half. Their goal was controversial following accidental interference in play by the referee.

Stewart made the Sunday dinner which was a nice change for me and later I caught the number 88 bus up to Bents Green, meeting my quizmates in "The Hammer & Pincers". 

We were the overall  winners and would have scored 25/25 if I had remembered the correct title of the Christmas 1994 hit by East 17. It was "Stay Another Day" and not "Stay Now" as I had mistakenly recalled.  Such moments are not good for one's blood pressure.

Mugs

Considering that most of the time only two people dwell in this house, we have a surfeit of mugs. I am almost embarrassed to admit that we have twenty four mugs in our mug cupboard. We could serve tea or indeed coffee to two football teams.

Giving someone a mug is a common gift option but for me the arrival of a new mug creates an internal groan. We have enough mugs already! No more mugs thank you very much!

Our lovely daughter, Frances - now aged thirty six - has always had a penchant for buying lovely, thoughtful gifts so I was a little surprised when on the occasion of my recent seventy first birthday she gave me a cardboard box that obviously contained yet another mug! Oh no!

But when I opened the box I was delighted to discover this mug which she had spotted online:-

Immediately, this new mug surged up my league table of "favourite mugs" putting it just above the mug below which a few years back was also given to me by  The Beloved Daughter:-

I dare say that if you, dear reader, did your homework you could also purchase an "I ❤ Yorkshire"  mug or better still a "Yorkshire Pudding" mug.

How many mugs have you got in your kitchen?

Health

Throughout my adult life, I have been very reluctant to visit doctors. I suppose that in some regards I have been in continuous denial - as if believing that my health was so robust that I didn't need medical assistance. To illustrate this point - when I was twenty two I broke my left leg at university playing football but it took me two days to hobble to the campus health centre. There the doctor I saw concluded almost immediately, "I think you have broken your leg". Given the swelling, bruising and pain it may have been his easiest ever diagnosis.

At seventy one years old I am proud to say that I have come thus far without any kind of regular medication. Today, at my health check appointment, the bespectacled young doctor whose name was Rebecca asked when I had last had an eye test and I  said that I hadn't had one since I was in primary school - around the age of ten. She was flabbergasted.

By keeping my distance from doctors, I suspect that up until now I have always slipped through the nets of general practice healthcare but today I have the strong impression that they have finally caught up with me. The key concern is elevated blood pressure and as requested I have even borrowed a home testing kit to use over the next few days. Rebecca wanted to see if my reading might be lower when tested regularly at home.

I was making a late lunch after the health check when Rebecca phoned me at home asking me to go in next Wednesday for another appointment where my blood pressure will be tested once again. She had been in consultation with the senior doctor at the surgery after my health check. Alarmingly, she said that in the meantime I needed to watch out for headaches, chest pains and breathlessness and to dial 111 immediately if I experience any of these "symptoms".

I know what is coming just around the corner. I am going to be put on antihypertensive medication that will hopefully decrease my raised blood pressure and I will be on these tablets  for the rest of my life. There's also going to be pressure to take statins which I must admit I currently know little about. It is of little comfort to learn that the vast majority of British men over the age of seventy take medication that reduces their blood pressure and they take statins too.

I may have imagined that I was invulnerable - like some kind of superman  but the truth is that  I am as ordinary as anybody else. The game is effectively up. I want to get older than this - to see Phoebe through primary school, to enjoy more country walks, write more poems, see more places, read more books. Today was the first chime of a wake up call that my instincts had already predicted. It would be foolish not to grab the medication with both hands and take other sensible measures to reduce potential risks and probably lengthen my life.

Michigan

"Michigan seems like a dream to me now" - Paul Simon

The Yorkshire Pudding Spotlight of Curiosity falls today upon a rather ordinary little town in Lapeer County, Michigan, USA. It's North Branch  which has grown slowly since it was first settled in 1856. It now has a population of 1096.

Two years ago, it was visited by a YouTube contributor called Daryl Turcott. He mostly focused on the town's Orr Historical Museum and this was the six minute video he produced:-

By the way, I deduce that the little town's unusual name is derived from the fact that it stands on the north branch of The Flint River. For a while in the second half of the nineteenth century, it was known as Beachville  after Mr. and Mrs. Richard Beach who were two of the very first settlers.  I guess that Mr. and Mrs. George Simmons  - the other first settlers - may have objected.

I took a look around North Branch myself with the help of Google Streetview. It seemed a sleepy kind of place. Not much was happening and there was hardly anybody around - not much traffic either. But superficially at least, it appeared quite tidy and relatively affluent.

Above - Huron Street, North Branch - the centre of the town and below two businesses on Huron Street

North Branch Bar & Grill

The Open Door Hair Salon

Above - a small home on Saginaw Street and below a larger home on Spring Street

Below - when the Google Streetview car cruised around North Branch in August of this year there were plenty of banners hanging in the downtown area in praise of local men and women who served in the US military - including Jeffrey Swain:-

So, you might be asking, why North Branch? The town is set in productive farming country and one of those farms was the childhood home of David Godfrey who is the blogger behind "The Adventures of a Travel Penguin" which comes to us these days from Washington D.C.. But just like the rest of us, David can never forget where he came from...

David

Miscellaneous

1.

The opposite of a hypochondriac is most likely an "anosognosiac" - someone who insists they are perfectly well when that is not the case. Such people try not to visit doctors' surgeries or other health facilities, often pressing ahead with their lives even when they clearly require health support or intervention. That's kind of like me.

Oddly,  in the last week I have been a "customer" of the health service three times with one appointment still to go. Last Wednesday I had my prostate examined by a young doctor called Georgina with a chaperone present - a member of the reception staff. Fortunately for a man of my age there was no problem and Georgina dealt with the procedure very professionally. It was the first time I have ever had my prostate examined.

Yesterday, I went to The Royal Hallamshire Hospital to have bloods taken before tests happen and today I received winter flu and COVID vaccinations at my local health centre. On Friday I am going back there for a full health check to which the blood tests are connected.

My trolls may be disappointed to learn that death is not imminent.

2.

Above - for a year or so these messages have been appearing when I log into my hotmail account. At first I believed that they were from Microsoft so I started deleting hundreds of emails from the past  - especially those with attachments such as images. My clearance efforts made no impact  on the alleged percentage of storage used. Now I just click these warnings away because I believe they are spam messages that are trying to get me to pay for more storage when I don't need it. Has anybody else encountered this kind of messaging within hotmail or perhaps other email accounts?

3.

A rare picture of me with Phoebe - up on Stanage Edge last week. I appear to be squeezing out some people but that is merely an optical illision.

4.

And finally for all you poetry buffs out there and  as half-promised  yesterday, here's two recent poems by Bluto:-

Love Bluto

Olive, my darling, I dream of thee
When e'er I behold the briny sea

Thy limbs as slender as a deer's

And golden studs in thy shell-like ears.

Oh Olive - why did you pick Popeye?

Your cruel choice oft made me cry.

I would have given you everything  -

Upon your hand a wedding ring

And a little house with a picket fence

Where we could dwell in the present tense.

Such dreams have drifted away like mist

With memories of the times we kissed

Along the shore or under a tree

Olive, my darling, I dream of thee.

                     ⦿

Threesome

He was Popeye the sailor man
He was Popeye the sailor man
He went to the pictures
And pulled down his britches
He was Popeye the sailor man.

But me? Well, let's see...

I was Bluto the aid worker
I was Bluto the aid worker
My voice was quite gruff
And my habits were rough
I was Bluto the aid worker

And she?   Dearie me...

She was Olive the mum of four
She was Olive the mum of four
I loved her completely
And remember her sweetly
She was Olive the mother of four.

Bluto

You may have seen me in cartoons of long ago. My name is Bluto and I am a very, very old man now. I live in a nursing home in Connecticut where I am attended by some very kind carers. To be frank, they have lengthened my life for which I am infinitely grateful. From my room, I can see the ocean sparkling through the trees, reminding me of my youth upon the salt sea waves.

Some of you will recall that I was the arch enemy of Popeye the Sailorman and together we battled for the affections of  Miss Olive Oyl who we met on the harbour front in Boston. In fact, you might say that it was she who tore us apart for up until that time we had been crewmates and drinking buddies onshore. Ah, those were the days.

If you had a page devoted to you on Wikipedia, I am sure you would occasionally check it out - for its detail and its veracity. I guess that all famous people do that. When I first saw my Wikipedia page, I was shocked, stunned and hurt. This is what they have to say about me:-

"Bluto is a cruel, bearded, muscular ruffian who serves as Popeye's nemesis and archrival for the love of Olive Oyl. He usually uses brute force and/or trickery to accomplish his various goals. His voice is very loud, harsh and deep, with an incomprehensible bear-like growl between words and sentences."

You know folks, to read that, it was devastating. It was as if Wikipedia knew nothing about me and my complex relationship with Popeye and Olive. Effectively, it was a classic love triangle.

They neglected to mention my challenging upbringing  and how I helped my mother Florence to raise my six siblings after our father ran away with a Canadian floozy called  Gloria.  They also forgot to refer to how my life unfolded after my long years at sea. Through a correspondence course I gained a degree in International Relations and then spent several years working with the downtrodden citizens of Senegal and Bolivia.

And after Popeye and Olive were killed on the freeway just east of New Haven, it was me who delivered their eulogy even though Popeye had stolen Olive from me all those years ago. She was the love of my life and I admit that I never truly got over her.

It is easy and sometimes tempting to portray people as mere caricatures of themselves - focusing on the surface rather than what lies beneath. I may have conveniently seemed like a "muscular ruffian" with a "bear-like growl" but there was always more to Bluto T. Windass than that.  For example, did you know that I wrote poetry?  Maybe  one day, if I remain upon this earth a while longer, I will share one or two of my poems with you.

Kind regards,

Bluto

Quiztime

Are you sitting comfortably? Then let's begin. Today's "Quiztime" has no theme - it's  simply general knowledge. As usual, you can find the answers in the "Comments" section.

⦿

1. How many ribs does a normal adult human being have?

(a) 13  (b)24 (c)26 (d)34

2. What is the capital of Peru? (a) Quito (b) Lima (c) Santiago (d) Bogota

3. What is a young zebra called? (a) calf (b) foal (c) zebling  (d) zebedee

4. Which singer-songwriter from Cleveland, Ohio wrote "Fast Car"?

5. This painting by Sandro Botticelli is housed in the Uffizi Galleries in Florence, Italy - but what is it called?

(a) The Mona Lisa (b) Aphrodite's Shell 

(c) The Birth of Venus (d) The Glorious Renaissance

6. Who is this figure from twentieth century history?

(a) Charles de Gaulle (b) Benito Mussolini

(c) Neville Chamberlain (d) Franklin D. Roosevelt

7.  In which ocean is the island of Mauritius? 

8. Which fictional group had a big hit in 1969 with "Sugar Sugar"?

(a) The Rolling Stones (b) The Monkees 

(c) The Flintstones (d) The Archies

9. This is a picture of a very famous woman when she was a child but who is it?

10. What is Joe Biden's middle name?

(a) La  Fayette (b) Robinette (c) Limerick (d) Scranton

⦿

How did you do?