I spent much of the morning walking to the Walk In Centre in the city, and then walking back. The Centre itself was emptier than I'd ever seen it before—just four people in front of me, and when I left, there was one person who looked as if she was waiting for a lift home.

Why, you are agog to know, why did I attend the walk-in centre? Because in the middle of the night I woke up literally gasping for breath. It felt as though my entire throat was clogged with something, and trying to haul in breaths resulted in little, noisy gasps and not very much air at all. Horrible sensation. Frightening. Anyway. I emerged with a prescription for penicillin to attack the infection in my upper airway and (possibly) right lung. Ick. Weird thing is how mostly-normal I feel during the day!

One thing it was really nice to feel, again, was how pleasant it is to be able to walk. I walked to the centre, sat for a few minutes, walked back home, nipped into the house to go to the loo, and continued on up the road to the pharmacy for my prescription, bought a bagful of stuff in Aldi, and walked home, and my hips are fine. Back before I got arthritis, I never thought about how good it feels to be able to walk, but it does, it really does.

Beast is out this morning for a Leads rehearsal.

So I took myself up the road for breakfast—an excellent bacon sandwich with coffee and orange juice. I am not sure why the bacon sandwich is accompanied by a pot of Doritos, but they are appreciated.

Along the road is a two-storey inflatable Father Christmas. Made me smile.

A double decker came down the road as I walked up it. Instead of the usual bus number and destination, the LED display on the front read Merry Christmas from [Bus company], with a snowman. This made me grin. No idea what manner of bus it was, as the usual ones that come down this road are single deckers.

And after breakfast, when I had wandered into Aldi for some mange touts and some chocolate to augment my nephew's Christmas gift, I found a Biggles omnibus on the charity table. So I now own four Biggles books in one giant volume. I first encountered Biggles when visiting my Nana as a child: for some reason she owned Spitfire Parade, a collection which may for all I know have been short stories*. After that I was hooked and acquired many more, though I gave them away long ago. Still. Biggles! To read! Possibly. When I have finished my Yuletide story.

* Edit: it was!

Yesterday I shovelled two tons of sand.

I just thought you should know.