Too Many Allergies
NICE thinks that too many children are labelled with food allergies, according to reports like this.
I might agree, as I think so many people these days have vanity or lifestyle allergies.
I don’t, as I am a coeliac, that was properly diagnosed at Addenbrookes, when I was over fifty. Since avoiding gluten, I’ve had no diarrhoea, no migraines, no joint pain and no chronic dandruff. I’ve also stopped biting my nails.
Probably about 1-in-100 are coeliacs like me, according to researchers at Nottingham University, Coeliac-UK and the NHS.
But I’ve had all sorts of cranks and quacks tell me that such things as homeopathy can cure my allergy. They are talking crap. But they are the same sort of people who imagine and test for all sorts of things in their children. Often, they are so stupid and paranoid that they don’t believe in vaccination and won’t allow their children to play outside.
But why are we getting so many allergy sufferers. With coeliac disease, a lot of the increase has come because, those born before 1960 are now being properly diagnosed. I was found to have a problem from a simple blood test, which showed I had a vitamin B12 deficiency. Remember that children with coeliac disease couldn’t be diagnosed until the early 1960s.
Also there is more awareness of coeliac disease and how it is passed on through the genes.
The Caruccio’s Stroke Recovery Index
Obviously it helps if I eat properly to recover from my stroke.
So when I’m in London, Cambridge, I tend to go to one of Carluccio’s cafes for lunch and have a plate of prosciutto and one of their delicious lemonades.
The prosciutto is not that easy to eat with a knife and fork, but I notice that I’m getting better. I also dribble less with the lemonade. As the staff are always very attentive and can help with an extra serviette if required, I doubt there is a better way to gauge how your recovery is going.
I note that since I got to London at 12:30 yesterday, I’ve had eaten three meals in Carluccio’s cafes; lunch in Hampstead, supper with my son and his friend in Islington and then breakfast in St. Pancras. Perhaps, it is not a cheap way of travelling, but I am alone and I know that everything I eat will be totally gluten-free and safe.
Homeopathy on the NHS
The most sensitive thing that you mustn’t criticise in this country is homeopathy.
But this government is actually allowing the use of this witchcraft (the BMA’s word not mine!) to increase in times of budget cuts according to the Daily Mail.
If fools want to be parted from their money, then it should be up to them to find their own quack, at their expense and not mine as a taxpaper.
Did Anybody See Top Gear on Sunday?
If you didn’t, it’s repeated tonight on BBC2 at 8:00.
They asked the team to buy three reasonably priced UK-built sport cars and Richard Hammond turned up in a Lotus Elan like mine. What he didn’t say about it, was that Elans are second only to E-Types, when it comes to pulling posh birds of a cerain vintage!
He was also unable to show, how it is still one of the fastest cars across country. Read some of my posts from last year about the car.
Interestingly, I am now driving the car again, in and out of its garage and round the yard. I can’t do this with my Jaguar as the clutch is too strong for my gammy left leg.
Perhaps, one day I’ll be back on the road! But it will be in the Elan!
Chelsea’s Gluten-Free Wedding Cake
Is Chelsea Clinton a coeliac? I doubt it, as she sounds like a faddy foodist or lifestyle-coeliac, who has gone gluten-free for effect! I’m sure if she was really a coeliac, she would have told the media. But she is having a gluten-free wedding cake!
It was funny that the bit about this pointless wedding on Radio 5, was just before Luke Harvey did his piece about the racing at Goodwood today. He talked about Hayley Turner , who had a ride on Barshiba in the Nassau Stakes, a Group One race at the highest level.
She actually is a coeliac and admits it in interviews and articles for the papers.
We need more open coeliacs like her and less like Chelsea Clinton.
An Affordable Breakfast With Style
When you are a coeliac and like me recovering from a stroke, you have to be careful where you go for a meal. You must be sure of the food and because you might get into a mess and drop something or even everything all over the floor or yourself, it is probably a good idea to go to an establishment with staff waiting at tables.
All of this was illustrated very well, when I turned up at Carluccio’s in Canary Wharf for a late breakfast or was it an early lunch?
It was sunny, so I sat outside and then ordered an Eggs Florentine without the bread and an orange juice. I’ve done this several times now in various of their cafes and no-one has minded, that I have modified their standard menu.
Gluten Free Eggs Florentine at Carluccio's
It was delicious and after adding cappucino, it cost me just £11.95, although I did add a generous tip for good service and such things like an extra serviette to make sure the mess was kept to a minimum.
I’m afraid that I tend to plan my trips around places where I know that I can eat well, easily and gluten-free. Unfortunately, not many places I hope to visit on my travels have one of Carluccio’s caffes. But it’s getting better as Leicester has no joined the list. But I suspect, I’ll be long gone before they reach Midlesbrough. They won’t be there for my trip in two weeks time.
Mind and Body Changes
In the previous post on Sudoku, I speculated how my problem solving ability was changing.
But this is not the only change that is happening.
Just after the second stroke in Hong Kong, my balance was not good and walking in a straight line was difficult. In fact when I went to physiotherapy or X-ray, it was always in a wheel chair. Incidentally, once in Addenbrookes, I was generally left to my own devices, after the first few hours. But that is in the main down to a difference in cultures.
But take what happened on my first day in Addenbrookes. I was taken to a kitchen and asked to make a cup of tea for myself. It tasted better than any cup of tea, I have ever made.
What that cup of tea taught me, was that you have to think differently and take in all possible outcomes, when you do something.
Now that I’ve been home for a few weeks and virtually looking after my cooking and personal needs on my own for the last three or so, I can see that my brain has developed new ways of doing things. As an example, I am sure, I’ve devised new ways of doing things to get round the problems I have, say with my left hand. But then I’ve done this before, when my arm was broken at school. For years, I avoided using it, as it didn’t work too well, So I sometimes used my right hand, when everybody else would have used their left.
Underneath it all, we all have several ways of doing things and when one is no longer available, we just use another one we know or devise a new one. As an example, how many of us are naturally left-handed, but have been made to write with the other hand. And then you have Ken Rosewall, who some would say was the finest tennis player of all time, but he was naturally left-handed and had been made to play with his right by his father.
The Sudoku Conundrum
In an earlier post I wrote the following.
Except for one curious thing. I do the Sudoku in The Times every day and have always found that the Super Fiendish were beyond my powers, unless I resulted to a process of elimination. That in my book is almost cheating.
But since the stroke, I can do these without problems in just a few minutes. I would never accuse such an august newspaper as The Times, of dumbing down, but they have just introduced a new section called Mind Games.
I should write to them.
I haven’t written, except to enter their Sudoku championships, where I did mention the fact that my prowess has improved.
I’m no expert on brains and how they work, but could it be a general improvement, that would have happened anyway. We all learn new tricks as we get older and have I just worked out other wheezes to find a solution. Possibly as my brain has had to relearn how to do things that it can’t do anymore, new pathways are being found or uncovered, that give my brain extra power in solving problems. On the other hand, I’ve always solved problems and that to me is almost a pastime in its own right.
Remember too, in hospital in both Hong Kong and Addenbrookes, I spent a lot of time doing the various puzzles in The Times. So it could just be a case of practice making things better, as it is by no means perfect!
Travels With My Stroke
Yesterday, I proved that I could undertake simple journeys by myself. Admittedly, I had lifts to and from home, but everything in the middle was done by myself, whether on train, tube, bus or by walking.
Did I have any problems?
Not really!
I thought about it afterwards and feel it could be a newspaper column, followed by a book. I could visit all of those places, I’ve never been before, stay in cheap hotels or with friends, travelling most of the way by public transport.
Yesterday, was the first trip, although I suppose you could could the return from Hong Kong.
I travelled up and back to London, by train from Cambridge, then used the Circle Line to get to my hotel and then used buses to get back to Kings Cross. This would seem a model that could be used for many trips.
My first planned trip will be to Middlesbrough for the first match of the season. My secretary will drop me at Bury St. Edmunds station on the Friday afternoon and then I’ll take the train to Middlesbrough, changing at Peterborough and York. I’m still trying to find a hotel in Middlesbrough for two nights, as hotels and especially near the Riverside Stadium appear to be very thin on the ground. Surely, places to stay should be one of the priorities of a council these days, as it attracts visitors, who spend money and thus create jobs.
The next weekend, I’m going to Edinburgh to see Jarlath Regan at the Gilded Balloon. Again it will be by train, with perhaps a rush back to see Ipswich on the Saturday.
I’ll see how it all progresses.
Getting Better All The Time
My left hand that is!
I just ate a whole baked potato and my left hand was so much better, than when I ate the last one a few days ago.
You can’t tell from this typing, but I’m now starting to use my left hand for characters like A, S, W and others near shift.
Could it be, that I’ve been walking around London today with a case in my right hand and this has somehow got the arm to sort itself out, as it’s not doing any work? I don’t know and don’t care, so long as the improvement stays and even increases.
The Anonymous Widower 