Egyptology comes alive.

Another rainy start to the day. Monday housework after breakfast. While trying to decide what to do with the rest of the day, Clare had a call from Kay Saunders, saying she had an appointment cancelled and was able to fit her in, early afternoon. I cooked pasta for lunch, then we drove to Newport. While Clare had her treatment, I went for a walk in Beechwood Park nearby. 

Unfortunately I slipped on a grassy slope which looked more stable than it was and pulled a muscle in my upper right leg. It hurt but the injury wasn't so bad that I couldn't walk. I ended on my back and jarred my hip joint. My rain jacket and trousers were covered in mud generated by my slide.  I limped to the cafe nearby, cleaned up, had a coffee and rang Kay while I recovered my composure. 

When I got back to Kay's place, she examined me and set my pelvis right. Fortunately my knee and ankle joint escaped injury, only my right quad muscle was over stretched and painful. I was truly grateful to be able to have this injury examined straightaway and reassured that I hadn't done anything really serious. It reminded me of leaving Mallorca to take the ferry to Ibiza in March 2020, when I did a similar slope slide on a greasy pavement and injured my left thigh, which still bears the marks, though I don't remember that it hurt much at the time. Hopefully I'll recover from this with the passage of time, but it was a shock right out of the blue, and could have been really life-changing. Such random occurrences can happen even when you're totally prepared and being very careful. Real life intrudes on the most careful plans laid.

We drove home, then I went to the shops, as there were a few things I hoped to buy on our way home, to see if I could walk without too much pain or loss of movement. The important thing however was a dose of arnica, pills and ointment rubbed into the thigh. I coped, but rested as much as I could afterwards. 

After supper I watched a programme on BBC Four called 'Eternal Egypt' one in a series telling the story of Egyptian civilisation in a way that interpreted the Egyptian dynasties' own historical record written on its walls and monuments in hieroglyphs. It was presented by Egyptologist Joanne Fletcher, visiting professor of Archaology at York University. It was wonderful to see her narration accompanied by annotated images of hieroglyphs highlighted when referred to in her narration. Not only that but her visits to sites rarely seen by the average tourist, plus stunning photography. In her hands the four thousand year history of ancient Egypt came alive as if she was reporting on current political and social events in today's world. I now need to watch episode one on iPlayer. Then I watched another packed puzzling episode of 'The Blacklist' and turned in early.