A bad day...

Today was a bad day all round - it started when I encountered what remained of a tarantula on the lounge floor and now, on reflection, we are wondering if this is what bit Boris and caused us to rush him to the vets later on this afternoon.  A couple of days ago Boris appeared to have a dot shaped bruise on his ear which he had scratched and made sore but it didn't seem to be anything sinister and he had let me bathe it and put some iodine on it and some new skin.  It didn't seem to have affected his temperament nor his appetite and he didn't seem adversely affected in any way.  This morning the ear was read and a bit raw but I bathed it again and re-treated it and he ate his breakfast and went on his way.  This evening however when we returned from Emba his ear was shocking - it was black and there appeared to be a massive laceration and a big weeping hole.  There was nothing for it but to race him down to the vets - the only one I could find manned was Dr Inna's down at St George's which is a good 20 minutes away at the best of times - she closes at 6.00pm and it was gone 5.30pm and the roads are full of sodding tourists.  I nearly broke the sound barrier getting him there and he howled all the way.  Dr Inna was concerned because the flesh around the wound had become nectrotic in such a short period of time.  She said he would have to stay the night and be operated on in the morning to see the extent of the damage and to see whether he would recover from whatever it was that had bitten him - we hope it was not a scorpion but looking on the internet sometimes a bit from a tarantula is pretty severe.  Poor poor Boris - he will hate being at the vets and, if he is to come home will hate having to wear a collar and be confined to a cage until it heals.  We will know more tomorrow.

We had a spate of powercuts this morning, scheduled to last until 1.00pm but it just kept going on and off and we resorted to getting out the little gas burner and the stove kettle so we could have a coffee.  Not the best start to what was to turn into a nightmare day all round.

I went down to Pickleball with Diana - what a bloody debacle that turned out to be when Tom and Jeff couldn't wait 'a minute' for Marios to disable the alarm and so set it off and the alarm next door, Marios was furious and as I had phoned him because neither Tom nor Jeff had working phones I got the brunt of his anger.  Whilst we sat outside waiting for the all clear we noticed Tom had a puncture in his loan car so that was all he was concerned about and because he didn't have a phone it was a right old palaver to get someone out to sort it for him.  Marios forgot to let us know we could go back in and so we lost 30 minutes of our playing time - not that that really mattered as it was so hot today and therefore like a sauna on the court.  I was really cross that the men couldn't wait and were seemingly unconcerned about upsetting Marios.

Mum and I returned home after a brief shopping trip which was to make up for the fact that Mum and Dad have the decorators in tomorrow so John will take Dad to Limassol for his eye check up and Mum and I will have to stay in to keep an eye on the decorators rather than have our girlie shopping morning as planned.  John was already waiting for me, having gone to Badminton, done his knee in good and proper and could hardly walk.  As he well knows sympathy is between shit and syphilis in the dictionary and he really should have been resting it but wont and he really should have it looked at but he hasn't - well he has no choice now something will need to be done.  He couldn't help me with Boris when I needed to get him to the vets which didn't help my mood and I know I should have been more sympathetic but that was the straw which broke the camel's back.

We are having to postpone our Droushia Day Out this week as, if all goes well for Boris we may be able to bring him home and I want to be here and make sure he is settled.  He was such a gentle sole I don't want this experience to change his personality.  He hasn't been to the vets for 2 years since he was neutered.

The one bright bit to the day was that I have the most beautiful gladiolus flowering in the garden - it came from a bag of bulbs which Mum brought me at some point and which has taken until now to spring to life.  The flowers are unusual in their markings and add a lovely splash of colour to the front garden.

By the time I got back from the vets, had done the watering at Ollies and gone to Bassam's, cooked tea and sat down, most of the evening had gone.  We have a relatively early start in the morning so once John had skyped his Mum and had a long chat with her and made sure she was ok we decided it was probably a bit of a good idea to get an early night.