Chipolatas, roasted Mediterranean veg, mini roast potatoes; apple sponge and custard
As you all know, I have been looking for somewhere else to live but have been having trouble finding anywhere suitable. To illustrate the problem, I started collecting some figures.
Over the past week, I have reviewed all available properties on three property platforms: Rightmove, OnTheMarket, and OpenRent. This is a total of 130 properties that fit within my very basic search criteria: up to two bedrooms, under £1000 a month, anywhere on the Island. I have looked at flats, maisonettes (the difference between a msisonette and a split-level flat eludes me: I suspect there isn’t one), bungalows, houses, park homes, odd converted annexes to bigger houses… Anywhere that might provide shelter to a desperate blogger and their cat.
This pie chart (mmm, pie! 🥧) shows the first reason each property was crossed off my list. (Many properties had multiple disqualifying factors: this is just the first insurmountable issue I spotted with each one.)
As you can see, a full 20% are unsuitable because they have a bathroom that is not accessible to a disabled person, mostly because they have a shower over a bath rather than a walk-in shower. This is particularly frustrating when the advertising text calls it a ‘shower room’, only for me to discover from the photos that no, it’s not a shower room – it’s a bathroom.
So that’s 130 properties viewed online, six viewed in person, one offered on, zero new places to live. And one sad blogger still stuck in a spare room, being bullied by a confused woman who lashes out when she’s confused or in pain.
On which topic: today I called the GP as, with mum’s lichen sclerosus flare in full force and no relief in sight (the GP who promised to order more steroid cream didn’t, and now the pharmacy needs to “order it in”), mum’s dementia has seemingly progressed six months in just a couple of days. After waiting most of the day, the GP finally called while Lady Friday was here.
I described mum’s symptoms: advanced confusion, greater levels of distress (this morning she cried and called for me when the carer asked mum to put on clean underwear), more restlessness, reduced cognitive abilities, and the like.
The GP said it was probably a UTI. I pointed out that doctors keep saying mum has a UTI, giving her multiple courses of antibiotics that do nothing, then deciding that she never had a UTI at all. Mum is struggling because she’s in discomfort from her lichen sclerosus, and what she needs, imo, is just something to calm her restlessness until the flare is under control.
The GP did not take kindly to me challenging her remote diagnosis, and told me that she wouldn’t provide any treatment for mum because she just might have a UTI. Fair enough, that’s reasonable clinical caution, but the only way to confirm whether or not mum has a UTI is to call NHS 111 to arrange a house call. Not until after 6pm, though, as otherwise the 111 call handler would refer me back to the GP.
To insist they do their damn job, presumably.
As mum was slightly more settled after Lady Friday’s visit, I decided to put off the 111 call until tomorrow, if it’s still necessary. The last thing I want is to cause more trouble by bringing a stranger into the house late at night: we have enough difficulties already when it’s just me, mum, and Suki.
For dinner I decided to go for pure comfort food: chipolatas (Tesco Finest pork chipolatas: I would eat the whole pack if that wouldn’t be extremely greedy of me), roasted Mediterranean veg, and baby roasties. Then a microwave apple sponge with loads of custard, and now trying to be patient with mum until I can go and hide in a book.
I’ll see you all tomorrow.
