This is our staircase. Some time ago Son suggested(firmly) we get a second handrail.
It took a while for Hubby to find the style that would match our existing banister and of course it had to be ordered specially as it's a different size to those in stock and he wanted the finished ends. It arrived last Friday and it took Hubby a couple of attempts to find the right stain to go on an almost white pine as the colour also needs to match.
Son came Saturday morning and together they fitted it. Not as straightforward as they'd hoped. Apparently they started by measuring up from the stairs in a few places but that didn't exactly agree when they put the spirit level across from the banister. The bottom screws were going into brick wall but the wall at the top is a straw partition wall, which took drilling and filling with resin as well as the rawplug.
Sunday my foot was still really painful and as it had been four days I thought it time to ring the Oncology 24 hour help line. They were really helpful, said yes it was definitely a side effect of the drug. Rest with it raised, use a warm compress like hot water bottle or wheat bag and increase the paracetamol to all four doses a day or even add codeine. I queried the increase in pain relief as I have chronic kidney disease and can't check my latest blood test results. They checked and said kidney function result was good. We don't have a wheat bag and couldn't see how a hot water bottle would stay against my foot so we tried ('we' means my idea but Hubby had to do it) a wet tea towel rung out and microwaved for one minute placed inside a plastic bag and then inside a long very thin fleece to wrap around my foot. It worked and by Monday morning it had eased a lot. I had a follow up call on Monday from the help line and they said it will be reported to my Oncology team who may want to lower my dose. I spoke to the Oncology Nurse on Tuesday after I phoned her. She hadn't read her emails (and this was already 3pm) so I told her what had been happening. I told her I was about to run out of pills so she said she'd put a request into pharmacy (she'd said that last Tuesday and obviously hadn't). However she did prove helpful when I said I needed my blood test results and she scanned them and emailed them to me. Better than the reply I received from the consultant when I'd emailed asking for a copy of my blood test results and he said he didn't know how and it was probably something for the IT department, unfortunately he didn't say he would forward my email or give me any information on how I contact them!
We hoped to go out for a walk somewhere on Wednesday but then they forecast rain around lunchtime so we changed that to some necessary shopping as Hubby needed shoes and slippers. I took advantage and added slippers for me to his purchases.
As a treat we tried a cafe we saw built some time ago but had never tried. We both had a really nice lunch and bought cake to bring home for later.
The weather has certainly got a lot colder and Thursday morning we got up with our heating on, which comes on automatically if the house drops below 19°C. It did the same Friday morning.
There were two apples left in the fruit dish going a little rubbery so I thawed some pastry and made an apple and cinnamon thing to have with our afternoon tea.
Hubby got a message from Daughter asking to borrow the hedge trimmer along with the ladder and Hubby of course. As he had already booked an afternoon slot at the tip and needed to fill more bags at home to make it worth going, he helped Daughter first then Daughter and R came back with him and helped him here. They stayed for lunch too.
Definitely feels autumnal now and I'm so looking forward to the yellows, reds and golds of nature.
Have a good weekend.
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