Yeah, long gap. I’ve had a persistent bug in my bladder for several weeks, making me feel tired, a bit feverish and with low energy. I’m on the second bottle of antibiotic, one which goes by the magnificent name of nitrofurantoin. It upsets the stomach somewhat, although I’ve felt worse.

Anyway, I finish the course tomorrow and will get a new test done on Monday or Tuesday to see if the little bugger’s gone. Then I see the urologist on Wednesday afternoon.

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Phew, heat! I believe we’ve reached a new record of more than 42 days over 30degC this summer, beating a previous summer in 197- something. And we’ve had “30 above 35”. Day after day the max is 33, 34, 35 or above, including that string of five days in a row over 40deg in January. It’s a hot summer. And until last night, no rain since some time in December. But last night, wunderbar, we got two showers of a few minutes each, hardly enough to wet the bitumen but better than nothing.

Climate change is real. Never has the divide between east and west sides of Australia been so clear, in my memory. The east side, on a long curved line from around the Kimberley in the far north of WA, down through the centre and everywhere east of that, is drowning in rain. Literally. La Nina floods and lives are being lost. While WA, one third of the continent, just gets drier and drier. We’ll dry up and snap off soon, I reckon.

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War, real war in Europe. I feel real sorrow for the Ukranians. I confess I didn’t know much about Ukraine until the last couple of years, but at least I knew where it is, unlike a lot of “Murricans”. I think I knew a few Ukrainians in school days, as migrants with funny accents and looks. Nothing wrong with their looks, I should say, especially the girls. Very attractive. But we didn’t mix much.

I have to stop myself from condemning all Russians. It’s just Putin and his henchmen, his fellow criminals, who are causing this war. The ordinary Russian soldier has to obey orders or the punishment would be very harsh. He probably doesn’t understand what he’s doing there anyway and just wants to go home. The ordinary Russian in the street is showing opposition to the war as well.

No, Putin will go down in the history books as a madman-dictator, who started this attack on Ukraine from a delusion that he wants Russia to be “great” again. Well, with any luck he’ll be tried as a war criminal one day. There’s nothing “great” about a country that invades, occupies and represses a neighbouring country.

The big worry is that a mistake at some point will make the Russians attack a NATO country, which will trigger article 5, “An attack on any NATO member will be regarded as an attack on all, and will be responded to by all NATO members.” That’s the worry. And tactical nukes. Uh oh.

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I’ve been watching the Netflix series Emily in Paris. Waaah, you say, what is he doing? Series 1 got terrible reviews: “cliched”, boring, lightweight and so on. A travelogue of Paris with no real meat to t.

OK, that might be true for people who are very familiar with Paris, but I found the cinematography fantastique! What an amazingly beautiful city. They use a lot of drone shots from high above the city, unfortunately speeded up, usually, but still magnificent to see.

There were 13 episodes in series 1 and yes, it was a bit boring and cliched at times, but it kept my interest. Series 2 got much better reviews and the story was quite interesting (if you find love stories interesting). I finished it last night and was a little sad that there was no more. I quite enjoyed the whole two series, and as I said, Paris, WOW! What a city. I’ve been there twice, first time in 1974 and the second time in 2008. I’d go again any day.

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My bladder troubles have made me repeatedly postpone getting a fix for the stuck boot lid on the Peugeot. I’ve seen a YouTube video clip where you stick a screwdriver into a small hole in the boot lock and clickez! Bingeau, it releases. That’s the good news. The bad news is that you have to do this from inside the boot. Yeah, you have to drop the rear seat back and squirm your way into the boot. Then get yourself out again. Too hard for me, I think. I need to get the RAC out for a battery for the Honda, so I’ll ask the guy to do it for me, assuming he’s small and lithe enough.

It’s interesting that the YouTube clip exists at all. Obviously this is not an uncommon fault with these cars. Have you ever seen a Japanese car with this problem? Jap cars use the key to operate the latch, of course. The French had to be too clever and use an electrical push button switch. Merde!

I must admit the love affair with this car is wearing off. It goes fast, and steers well, but there’re a lot of things I don’t like, such as the big, heavy, heavily sprung doors for one thing. I find it hard to get in and out. There are a lot of other things to dislike, but I haven’t got time to list them all now. It’s beer o’clock.

Long time since I wrote, sorry. I’ve been a bit busy. I’ll say why shortly.

Aaah, a beautiful day, 30degC, a bit windy. The forecast is for another hot one tomorrow, 38C, but going on past days it might even reach another 40C day, to add to the eleven we’ve had so far this summer (since 1 December), a record. And it’s about 45 days since we last had rain. No, hang on, it sprinkled a bit on Monday. Anyway … it’s a hot, hot summer.

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The reason for the title is that the boss of QANTAS Alan Joyce has doubled down on his comments likening WA, with our tightly controlled border, to North Korea. He’s highly critical of Mark McGowan for regulating the way people can enter the state, saying it’s damaging business and causing talent to leave the state.

He’s wrong for several reasons, but what really gets my goat is that if the border is completely opened, people will die because of it. Joyce’s only concern is QANTAS’s business and profits (and Joyce’s bonuses, of course). He puts that above the deaths of people. That is despicable, in my opinion. It’s typical of many business managers, profits before people.

He ignores the fact that the closed borders have kept WA largely COVID free, which has particularly benefited the mining industry, which generates 60% of Australia’s export income. If Joyce had had his way, that could have been crippled.

This makes me so mad that I think it’s time I cut my ties with QANTAS. I still have 120,000 Frequent Flyer points from years ago, which I never use because QANTAS doesn’t fly where I (used to) want to go, i.e. Bali. I also don’t see myself travelling any more. I may as well use the points in the ‘shop’ to buy some item and then bail out completely, making it clear to QANTAS why I’m doing so. It’s become a nasty company under Joyce. He cares more about money than people. Nasty man.

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I’ve had another stay in hospital, SJOG Subiaco this time. The urologist wanted to investigate why I was pissing blood a couple of weeks ago, so a cystoscopy was scheduled. No big deal and he didn’t find anything, so it’s a mystery (so far). I thought it would be a kidney stone, but he doesn’t think so (why?). I see him again on Friday so I’ll have a few questions.

I stayed an extra night because I was having trouble pissing afterwards. I’d driven myself in, as they wanted me there at 6.30am (!) and parked in the underground car park. My parking charge after two days came to $54! Still, that’s cheaper than a taxi or Uber.

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I’ve just got off the phone to HBF, about a program they’re running called Health Navigator. Obviously it’s in their interests to keep me fit, healthy and out of hospital, so this is some kind of coaching program. I don’t mind this, I like the idea, because like most people, I have trouble keeping myself up to setting, working toward and reaching goals.

One thing I’ll be able to show them is my brilliant progress to getting my diabetes blood sugars under control, at last. Due to changes in my medication since mid October, I can say that I’m now well controlled – 5.6mg/mmol this morning. That’s within the normal range of 4-6. Evening readings are a bit higher, around 7-9, but coming down. This is the first time I’ve been able to show this in nearly 20 years. My HbA1c was 7.3 a couple of weeks ago, and if we did the test again now, it would be below 7.0, I would say.

However, this raises the question: how come I don’t feel any different? I don’t feel any better for it. I still feel fatigue. My eyesight is still variable. I don’t feel any stronger (i.e. if the sugar in my blood is now reaching the muscles, assisted by the insulin, how come I don’t feel any benefit?)

I shudder to think what damage has been done by my very high (out of control) blood sugar levels for the past 15 years or so. I think luck has been on my side, as it usually seems to be.

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Dog! I know we need insects, but I’m being plagued. First, tiny black ants. Not too much of a problem, but I wish they’d go home.

Worse are small grey moths which love to attack anything resembling grains (e.g. oatmeal) in my pantry. Insect spray doesn’t seem to do anything.

And last are tiny black flies, less than a millimetre in size, breeding in my rubbish bags. They don’t seem to any harm, but again, insect spray is not working. I’m a bit tired of it.

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I did my grocery shopping today for the first time in a fortnight or so, and the gaps in the shelves are very noticeable in Coles. Shortages due to the break in the Nullarbor rail line, I mean. I didn’t have any trouble getting what I wanted but I can imagine if this went on for longer than a few weeks, it might be much worse. I’ve never seen this before in all my long years.