Berlin, Thurs 11th September

Yeah, I know it's the anniversary of THAT September 11... but for me...

A day off.

Sleep; plunger coffee and decent muesli. More sleep. Air-conditioning!! Reading English papers (The Independent, The Guardian, and the (American) Herald Tribune). Lavish showering with all the unguents unpacked and to hand. More lots of Gucci.

Sitting around while M sleeps, after he went out to find and then consult an English-speaking doctor nearby. He’s had his blood test and immediately bought himself a bottle of white wine! Heh. He’s been counting the days since we left the Russian clinic... let’s hope his remaining dodgy liver levels are now ok. Ditto blood pressure and heart health.

Massive efforts by me, whose legs feel as if I walked here, not came by train, to go out a few blocks for dinner. An excellent paella and some Rosé. Tottered back drooling over the YSL/Chanel/Gucci/Bvlgari/other top end designer shops with luscious, impossibly gorgeous shoes... M fainting at the prices! I told him about how one buys a pair for umpteen dollars, then amortises the cost over the next 25 years of wearing them, to make them a REAL bargain buy. He seems strangely unconvinced ... I think I’ll have to demonstrate so he can see how it works. Selfless, I know.

Both of us have huge headaches. I cut my finger practically in half getting the plastic cover off a CD. My feet still hurt. M is trying to be his usual saintly self but is pretty crisp around the edges. We need to do our washing and sort out our dang mobile phones and make phone calls and get his suit dry-cleaned and I need a haircut and some beauty salon rescue activities... it’s all too hard.

Tomorrow, tomorrow ... I think we’ll start with a physio appointment for me; then go to the Bauhaus; and then we’ll see. I’m looking forward to cooking our dinner, if I can remember how. And I’ll get the password for the hotel’s free WiFi so you can all catch up with us and vv.

Posting must happen soon. I must buy presents for my family in Freiburg, having inadvertently sent home the carefully-chosen gifts I found in Riga, in the massive pre-flight posting in Vilnius. [I looked at the few photos I took in Vilnius, and I can hardly remember being there. That was a tricky 36 hours...]

I feel I need ... things. Stuff. Goodies. I’m not sure why, but I read in The Guardian today that a scientific/medical link has been made between healing times and the amount or lack of patting and stroking the patient receives. The article was published with a photo of a baby, but I read it thinking of all the self-patting I experience via the constant unguentification of an impurrfect princess. I’ve always thought of the application of body lotions and such as a simple form of administering a little ‘there, there..’. Now I am proven right! This is not an excuse, it’s a scientific process of self-care and symptom-management. I love it.

Goodnight. It’s gonna be the big pain-pill bomb tonight; the last resort uber-drug for hed of dethness and rampant fatigue and sore leggies. Pardon me if I drool....