Weekend Round-up

Do you want to know how I got on at the optician?

Do you really?

Like, really, really?

Ok then you've twisted my arm.

Let's begin at the beginning. I met with L as arranged and we caught a bus without a problem and arrived early enough to squeeze in a quick coffee. Then to the optician. Which is where is started to go downhill. I was not impressed by the optician himself, he didn't really seem to want to test my eyes (and L who has high interocular pressure had to ask him for a pressure test - standard practice in the UK and Poland). He did this thing where you look into binoculars and a black star on a green background moves in and out of focus. Then I sat in the chair, with my glasses on, and he asked me if the chart projected onto the wall was ok. I said I could read the bottom line and he was satisfied with that - don't know if he trusted me or couldn't be bothered to check. He then asked me what the problem was and on hearing that me vision gets blurred/double after reading for 15 minutes (along with soreness and itchiness) his response was that this was to be expected at my age!

Finally he put some opticians frames on my face an asked me if I could read a card - and I swear he wasn't paying attention to what I said - before putting some grubby lenses in the frames and asking if that was better. He didn't even check how far I was holding the card from my eyes although he did suggest I tried reading without my glasses (only possible if I hold the print about an inch from my face). Finally he told me I'd should have got new glasses two years ago (my current glasses are about 18 months old) and wrote a new prescription. Total time in there 10 minutes. Not impressed. From there things got worse - it took us three buses and two hours to get back to Belgrano, every bus we got on started taking us home then veered off in the wrong direction.

However the day ended well. L and I went to the cinema to see Copying Beethoven. A film I thoroughly recommend, it is centred around the music rather than anything else and I can imagine copies of Beethoven's Symphonies flying off the shelf (or being downloaded). I'm lucky in that I managed to legally download all of Beethoven's symphonies (except number 2) from BBC Radio 3 last year.

Saturday afternoon was spent trying to sort out the weekend in Iguazu - it has been a nightmare and is getting more and more expensive for no added value - in the end we deferred it until Sunday. Saturday evening was spent around U's watching Dr Who, making brownies and chatting about nothing in particular. She's just had two wisdom teeth out but isn't looking particularly hamster-like. I put on a green facepack and she got her camera out, so Dad, your wish will be answered with a couple of photos of me.

Finally, on Sunday, L and went to an airline office to try and buy tickets (which necessitated a long bus ride). In the end we didn't buy any because the price was too high, however L is trying Plan D (that's how far it's got) and is going to try to get bus tickets on Tuesday. We'll see.

It's been raining all day and I've got yet another sore throat and running nose. I swear I'm allergic to this country. I've spent the evening in, cooking and watching television as well as surfing the net. My connection has been a bit iffy over the weekend but I'm keeping my fingers crossed.