Thank god for aspirin and cough mixture

But then again, if we do that we better thank him for the viruses, bacteria, illness and death as well. Instead, let’s thank the scientists who develop the cures and the doctors who administer them.

Since we have been away, over four months now, neither Susana and I have suffered any form of cold, flu or illness. You might attribute this to luck or god’s blessing, I think it is more likely the fact that we have not been in close contact to anyone. The workplace, the tube, the train seem to be breeding grounds for all sorts of infectious diseases, and this is somewhere Susana and I have not been frequenting.

However, socialising over xmas and the new years break has brought us into contact with many friends and family, and the inevitable has happened. Don’t get me wrong, we don’t blame them, and they could probably just as rightly blame us. First I came down with a cold, and then Susana was struck with a horrible cough. This has delayed our departure south, towards Portugal and the south of Spain.

Our late departure has allowed a little extra time in Guisando, which Susana spent partly in bed. For me it meant a few more jobs that never usually get completed have been accomplished; our video player finally gave up life, making our video collection redundant. The VCR found a new home no doubt in a landfill site, whereas the videos have found a home with Rober to help him improve his English. Good luck on some of them though; Peter Greenaway and other artsy stuff.

Touching up some paint in the back room, replacing a cracked tile in the bathroom, cleaning the windows and scrapping off the excess paint, pruning the vine and securing it properly to the wires with flexible rubber bands, a present from Luis. It has been most therapeutic.

While we were in Guisando we also had a major IT disaster. Two hard disk failures. One in my laptop, and the other, a fairly new portable external hard disk, which happily Samsung replaced free of charge. Luckily we were able to save the data. I think we both would have been heart broken if we had lost any of those recent photographs related to this trip.

In replacing the laptop hard disk we were able to increase its capacity, so that we can now back up the external drive onto the laptop. It only cost €50, an absolute bargain, especially as it was over €80 online, it appears you pay extra in Spain for online convenience. It took nearly two days to reload all the data and software back onto the two machines.

Another long term task has been to sort through all of our backlog of photographs from previous trips. We have been deleting the not so good ones, editing the videos and renaming and filing everything. Very satisfactory and has bought back many memories from past journeys, maybe we will share a few of these with you in the future; India, Tanzania, the Ice Hotel.

Anyway back to health. Before we began wandering I had a lump removed from my eye back in the UK, a chalazion, but this has reappeared and was quite uncomfortable, especially towards the end of the day. The lump would put pressure on the eye causing it not to focus properly. So while we were taking a break from our break we took the opportunity to sort it out.

This highlighted a very different cultural attitude to health. While in the UK, this was a small procedure undertaken in the doctors consulting room. A local anaesthetic is injected, the eyelid is turned inside out, a small incision, the lump is removed, a wad of cotton, for twenty minutes then off home.

In Spain, this is taken more seriously, both medically and by those around you. The ‘procedure’ becomes more like an operation. You have to strip off, don one of those classic green gowns that expose  your bum, and trot off to what looks like a minor operating theatre, all very dramatic. The procedure took the same time as in the UK, and I was home within an hour.

Now I didn’t tell my English family, english stiff upper lip and all that, but well wishes came in from all parts of Spain, which, don’t get me wrong, I am very grateful for, just not used to.

The other aspect is the advice. ‘You shouldn’t drink while taking antibiotics’. Something I was taking after the procedure. Now I am not a great fan of antibiotics, knowing how gradually the bloody diseases are mutating so that the antibiotics are  becoming useless, but if a doctor prescribes than I will take them.

It is a question I had previously asked my doctor, and he categorically told me the antibiotics I was  taking were not affected by alcohol. Now this is beginning to sound like I am an alcoholic…well I will let you judge, I prefer to think it is more down top sceptical attitude and wanting to know the truth.

Of the many hundred types of antibiotics, only a few are affected by alcohol.

It is an urban myth that all antibiotics are affected by alcohol. Some people believe that taking alcohol with antibiotics will render them useless, others believe that they will cause side effects.

What is really interesting is where these myths might have started. Now this is an internet trawl, so is it reliable? Who knows, but both are fascinating.

The first is that many antibiotics were initially used to treat STD’s. Doctors are  quite judgemental, and as a punishment for their patients incorrectly advised not to take alcohol.

The second is that antibiotics in WWII were in short supply. They had to be recycled. They were extracted from the urine of those that had previously taken them. If these soldiers were drinking, far more urine had to be processed to get back the antibiotic. So they told the soldiers not to drink while taking them. I really like this story. I really hope it is true.

And talking of truth, I cannot understand how, when you walk into a farmacia in Spain, alongside proper drugs, tried and tested scientifically proven remedies they can sell the sugar coated placebo sweats know as homeopathy (Homeopatia). It beggars belief. But maybe that requires a separate post…

Note: A photo of Farmacia Del Prado of Talavera de la Reina, although we initially had permission, has subsequently been withdrawn by the request of the owner . We chose this pharmacy because the photo showed this establishment advertising homeopathy directly adjacent to the counter, and was obviously trying to sell unproven remedies directly adjacent to scientifically proven medicine. However we confirm that the prescriptions were dispensed with courtesy and professionalism.

GDR