Sunday 22nd February 2015.
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| Finally on my feet - my first day with crutches - notice "the blur of Pippa who I am very careful not to step on |
Hi everyone,
Well this week
has been great. Five weeks after my
operation I am now semi mobile which is so encouraging and motivating. Also our adorable new puppy Pippa, a
chocolate coloured mini dachshund, arrived on Tuesday adding to the mayhem in
our household. The kitchen is full of
dog stuff, beds, water bowls, toys, old slippers and on my crutches it is
rather difficult to manoeuvre myself around the
kitchen. Also with crutches you cannot use your hands for anything so I have
taken to walking on the crutches but using my pc chair to move around in the kitchen
so that I can use my hands.
Going back to
last Sunday, I spent the afternoon with Olivia making litres of vegetable soup
for our dinners as well as a batch of perushki (Russian meat pies). We must have been cooking for more than 2
hours and I was exhausted after the effort and my foot was swollen and aching. However I had begun to feel useful again and
I must say the food came in handy for dinners this week. Otherwise we always
seem to have the same; salad with Gema’s brown bread and Spanish cured
ham. The latter was given to us by
Miguel and it is delicious and fast disappearing
Monday was my
dear friend Jackie’s birthday. Being a
Christian she would have been appalled at the big news that day that Isis had beheaded 21 Egyptian Coptic Christians
as the whole world was. They were killed
in Libya and Isis published a beheading video which I do not want to see. Just looking at the photo of these poor
innocent men about to be beheaded on a beach in Libya is enough to make your
hair stand on end.
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| This photo is now so famous it needs no caption |
The Egyptian
government immediately retaliated by attacking Isis fighting areas in Libya. Equally worrying was the news that the Ukraine
Russian ceasefire was not being fully respected. In my mind the two most dangerous issues
threatening peace in the world are these two and neither of them are easy to
halt with peace talks or without.
Monday was day
36 after my fall and again I spent most of it in bed working in the morning and
watching series such as Last Tango in Halifax in the afternoon. On Monday too I
bought the kindle version of Jane Hawking’s book “Travelling to infinity, my life with Stephen” upon which the film “The theory of everything” was
based. I was interested to read the real
story not the 2 hour summarized life of their 25 years together and it makes
fascinating reading.
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| Jane Hawking's book |
Tuesday was a
great day. In the morning my Betty’s
order arrived. You may remember me
entering a competition where one of the prizes was a St. Valentine’s hamper.
Well I didn’t win, nor did I expect to, so instead I ordered a hamper myself.
In a nutshell if you can’t go to Betty’s if you don’t live in Yorkshire, then
let Betty’s come to you; ordering their produce online. Their online page is very enticing for Betty’s
lovers, however that list is limited if you live abroad like I do as only a
certain selection of items can be delivered abroad. In any case both my 96 year old Father and I,
who were great fans of this lovely Yorkshire tea shop when we lived there, were
delighted with the hamper. Here is a
photo of my Father and I and the contents of the Betty’s order on our dining
room table.
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| My Betty's order |
But far more
important than the Betty’s order was the arrival of Pippa, our delightful new
chocolate coloured miniature dachshund.
When she arrived we immediately fell in love with her. This is one of
the very first pictures of her.
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| Pippa in her bed when she arrived which actually she has never used |
She is in her
bed which actually, after this picture she has practically ignored preferring
to hog poor Elsa’s bed, leaving the latter to lie down on the tiled floor.
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| Pippa prefers Elsa's bed |
Pippa took to
our home immediately although it was obvious from the beginning that, like a
baby, her preferred situation is sitting on my lap. In a way it’s like having a new baby and
Pippa is a little like a substitute for the grandchild we don’t yet have or
foresee coming for quite a while. But
that’s ok because both Eladio and I actually prefer puppies to babies. That’s a terrible admission but it’s
true. I don’t really like babies, far
preferring them when they become toddlers; although if the baby is mine or my
daughters’ then of course that would be an entirely different story and I would
be besotted with it. Meanwhile I am
besotted with Pippa as we all are, including Gema our home-help whom our new
puppy follows wherever she goes. Olivia,
who was dying to see little Pippa, had to wait until the evening when she came
home from work with Miguel. Here is the
first photo of her with the puppy. Again it was love at first sight.
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| Olivia meets Pippa |
The most
delicate moment was introducing Pippa to our dogs, Elsa our 3 year old Labrador
and Norah our 5 year old beagle. Elsa
was more worried and Norah totally ignored her.
However it didn’t take long for the three of them to be at peace with
each other thank goodness. At the beginning
we didn’t leave them alone together in the kitchen until today. I have a feeling that the boss will be little
Pippa in the long run but only time will tell.
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| The three dogs together |
I think the
photo below proves the harmony of the three dogs. Here is little Pippa sleeping on top of Elsa
in the kitchen with Norah on the left in her bed, the only bed that Pippa
respects for the moment hahaha.
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| Pippa sleeping on top of Elsa |
For the moment
as Pippa is only 2 and a half month’s old, she can’t go outside until she has
had her third vaccination on 10th March. I can’t wait to see the three of them outside
in the garden and to take Pippa with us on our walks, that is, when I am able
to walk properly again.
As she can’t
go outside, she can’t sleep outside either. She can’t sleep on her own in the
kitchen either because of the alarm. So I am very embarrassed to admit that she
sleeps with us; i.e. we are three in the bed at night. On the first night we brought up her lovely
new bed but when she saw us “climb” into our bed she kept jumping up on my side
of the bed and crying until I picked her and put her between us. That night and every night since, she has
slept with us, snuggling up to me or Eladio.
I have been told I am giving her bad habits but actually having her
sleeping with me in bed is a childhood dream.
Pippa’s favourite place is our bed and here is a video we took of her
this week playing with my slipper on our bed. I have always been a dog lover
and as a child was not allowed one. As
you can see I have made up for lost time in a big way ever since I got married
and made my own home which is now full of dogs and our cat Phoebe. As yet Phoebe and Pippa have not met. That
will be the next milestone in Pippa’s arrival haha.
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| My side of the bed where Pippa loves to curl up and fall asleep |
Tuesday was
Shrove Tuesday and when I realized it was I decided to make pancakes for dinner. Shrove Tuesday, Mardi Gras in French or
Martes de Carnaval in Spanish, is the day before Ash Wednesday the beginning of
Lent and a semi fasting period in the Christian churches. In England, it is more known as Pancake Day a
tradition I haven’t really implanted in our household but this year I did. I made loads of pancakes with whole grain
flour as there was no white flour but they turned out fine. I had mine with fresh raspberries and yoghurt
as well as sugar free maple syrup.
Eladio preferred his with honey. Here
is a photo of Eladio and I enjoying our pancakes. Oli and Miguel tucked in happily too. Meanwhile in London I was pleased to hear
from Suzy that she had also made pancakes for dinner.
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| Having pancakes for dinner on Shrove Tuesday |
Wednesday was
my big day. I had an appointment at the hospital
to see the orthopedic surgeon who had operated on me. He took one look and pronounced me ready to
walk with crutches, bearing weight on my bad leg, just 5 weeks after the
operation. I was worried I would be
clumsy but I actually took to it quite fast.
The good news was he said I would be able to make it to Barcelona for
the Mobile World Congress at the beginning of March and for my trip to Helsinki
just afterwards; probably with the aid of just one crutch. He then sent me to
the rehabilitation department to get an appointment. I was disappointed to be given an appointment
there for my first evaluation a whole week later, meaning I probably wouldn’t
even be starting on rehabilitation for more than 2 weeks, in fact after my trips
to Barcelona and Helsinki. So there and
then I rang an old professional friend called Amalio who used to be the
Director of Marca (Spain’s number one sports newspaper) who I had been in
contact with recently. When I had told
him about my accident he told me to ring him when it was time for rehabilitation
as he wanted to recommend me one of the best doctors in the field; Dr. Torralba
who specializes in sports’ rehabilitation and in whose hands many of Spain’s
top sports’ legends have passed. When I
rang him he gave me an appointment for the next day. I was very relieved as I
knew how important it is to start rehabilitation as soon as possible.
On Wednesday
afternoon I caught a snippet of Olivia’s programme. Just as I turned the TV on there she was
reporting live. It was about a 17 year
old boy called Richard who disappeared 10 days ago after a fight in Alcalá de
Henares in Madrid. How awful for his
family.
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| Oli reporting on the story of the 17 year old boy Richard who went missing 10 days ago |
On Thursday morning
Eladio drove me to Madrid for the appointment at the private rehabilitation
centre owned by Dr. Torralba. I would
have far preferred to drive to Yoigo on my own to be at my boss’ side during an
interview with the prestigious financial monthly magazine Actualidad
Económica. However, from a distance I
had organized everything including a briefing and knew that my boss would be in
good hands as he would be accompanied by Carlos from my PR agency. The truth is I would have preferred to be
there to hear every word of the interview but it could not be.
The rehabilitation
centre is called Imersa and is near Atocha, so quite a drive from here. It was at Imersa that I was taught how to
walk properly on my new crutches and I have been walking that way ever
since. It wasn’t easy to learn as I my psychomotor
abilities have always been rather lacking.
For example I can’t dance for toffee and am nearly incapable of learning
dance steps. But that day I did learn
finally how to use my crutches.
First you place them a large pace
away from you, put your left leg forward at the same level as the crutches then
place your right leg one step ahead of the crutches, so really, crutches, left
leg, right leg, crutches, left leg, right leg until it becomes automatic. You see it is not easy. After learning how to use my crutches I was
given a schedule of 15 sessions of rehabilitation which were to include
something called magnetotherapy; a technique used a lot in sports’ injuries.
After the
appointment at Imersa I was going to stay in Madrid as I had a lunch
appointment with my ex Nokia communications colleague Marika and her daughter
who were visiting Madrid this week.
However I had a sudden urgent request to write a brief for the Swedish
Prime Minister on Yoigo as he was meeting a group of CEOs of Swedish owned
companies including ours on Friday. We
rushed home and I wrote the 25 line summary of our company for the Prime
Minister after which I got ready again to go to Madrid to have lunch with
Marika and Claudia. Dear Eladio drove me
to Madrid again to the restaurant after which he drove to José Antonio and
Dolores’ house nearby to have lunch with them.
It was great
to meet Marika after so many years. I
think we must have bored her sweet and beautiful daughter Claudia who is a
medical student in her 5th year in Helsinki with our talk of the
Nokia days. It was at this lunch that
Marika and I agreed to host an ex Nokia comms mingle cocktail event with many
of our ex colleagues when I go in March.
I posted the event on FB this weekend and hope lots of people come. Being on the ground in Helsinki Marika will
be in charge of finding and booking a suitable location. I look forward to that. We had lunch at Iroco
in Calle Velázquez and it was my first outing to Madrid for a lunch or dinner
since my fall. It was very
enjoyable. I was happy to hear that my Finnish
friends had enjoyed sunshine every day in Madrid and were very impressed with
the city. As we stepped outside to say goodbye, Julia, who works at my events
agency, was passing by so I asked her to take a photo of the three of us
together in Madrid and this is it.
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| Lunch with Marika and Claudia on Thursday was one of the highlights of this week |
We parted ways
and I took a taxi to José Antonio and Dolores’ house to see them for a little
while before going home. Once home I had
quite a lot of work to catch up on but there was Pippa getting in the way
trying to bite at all the cables and in the end I had to work with her on my
lap using only one hand for my keyboard!
That night
Pippa had visitors. Friends of Olivia
and Suzy, “la manada”; Copi, Carolina, Elena and Dave were coming to see her.
Thus Oli and Miguel organized dinner which we had all together in the dining
room with all three dogs under and around our chairs and legs. As was to be expected they all fell in love
with Pippa.
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| A selfie of some of the members of the Manada who came to dinner on Thursday to meet Pippa |
Friday came
and brought with it the breaking news that British and American secret services
had hacked sim cards in 2010 and 2011 by stealing encryption keys used to protect
the privacy of mobile phone communications. Hardest hit was Gemalto, the Dutch
firm which is the world leader in the manufacture of sim cards; producing some
2 billion cards a year. Most operators
in the world, including us and our mother company TeliaSonera buy their cards
from them. I first heard of the news when I received an early morning email
from a Spanish journalist asking me our position on the news and how it would
affect our customers. He sent me the
article where the news appeared and which said the information came from the
famous whistleblower, in hiding in Russia, the now famous Edward Snowden. It was my job then to liaise within the company
to decide on a statement. Basically what
we ended up saying was that we were talking to Gemalto to see what had happened
and that our customers’ privacy and security were paramount to us and that we
were of the opinion that “all government
surveillance of communications should, in all countries, be in accordance with
the law and that the scope and method must be transparent”. Gemalto itself
issued a press release which you can read here and where they say the hacking,
if it had occurred, had happened without them knowing it. The laws of most countries state that if
authorities need to monitor a customer’s phone, they must do so via a legal
path and with a judge’s authority. If it
is true that the NSA and the GCHQ have hacked the cards, this means they have
broken the law and more worryingly they can now listen in to millions and
millions of phone calls.
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| The story of hacked sim cards by British and American intelligence was big news on Friday |
Friday was also
my first morning of rehabilitation and when I realized there was no mobile
coverage at the clinic I was a bit desperate.
The session ended up taking nearly 2.5 hours and I felt very sorry for
Eladio waiting outside. Next week we
have decided he will drive me there and I will take a taxi back. Once again I would have preferred to be at
Yoigo that day as I had called a staff meeting; what we call “Yoigo Mornings”
to present the 2014 financial results.
It was to be the first Yoigo Morning I had ever missed. Again, as with the interview with Actualidad
Económica, I organized it at a distance but felt frustrated not being able to
be present.
Meanwhile
Olivia had taken Friday off and was going to make a long weekend of it with
Miguel by going to Navacerrada to ski on Friday and spend the weekend at the
Cándido Hotel in Segovia. They had the perfect day for skiing. Here is a photo of them up by the “Bola del
Mundo” as this peak is called (top of the world).
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| Oli and Miguel went skiiing to Navacerrada outside Madrid on Friday |
In London that
day Suzy was spending the morning at London Fields with her Friends Chati and Mónica. Here is a photo of the three of them.
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| Suzy with her friends Chati (in the middle) and Mónica (right) in London Fields on Friday |
It was
on Friday that Suzy received her 3rd evaluation of the process of
registering with the HCPC (health and care professions council) and once again
the feedback is daunting. She has to
provide more evidence of adhering to their very strict SOPs (standards of
procedure). I have printed out the
documents and we shall have a long talk this afternoon about how to go about it. We will not give up until Suzy is a fully
qualified registered nutritionist with the HCPC although many a person in a
similar situation would have given up by now.
On Friday we
went out to dinner again. It was a huge
relief to do so on crutches rather than in a wheel chair. We chose Zurito in
Pozuelo. Just as we had sat down at our
table, we had a chance meeting with an ex Motorola colleague, Ignacio who saw
us as he walked into the restaurant. He
then brought his wife Monica and their adopted Russian children Anders, now aged
18 and Ana, now aged 14 to our table to see us. What a lovely family they make. I had seen
Ignacio many times over the years at various sector events, including ex Motorola
dinners, but I hadn’t seen his wife and children for at least 14 years. Wow it was lovely to see them. We caused a
huge disturbance at the restaurant and even the bottle of water and plate of
olives fell over on our table in the rush and excitement of the moment. Here is a photo of the 6 of us. We have agreed to meet soon and when I am
back from Helsinki I will organize a dinner.
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| The chance meeting with Ignacio and his family at the Zurito restaurant in Pozuelo on Friday night |
Saturday was a
quiet day and I didn’t do much. Olivia
occasionally sent us photos of her and Miguel having a good time in
Segovia. Of all the photos she sent,
this one of them jumping up in the air against the Roman aqueduct is probably
my favourite.
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| Oli and Miguel in Segovia yesterday by the Roman Aqueduct |
And today is
Sunday and they will be back for lunch.
I can’t cook anything complicated due to my limited mobility so it will
be grilled steak and chips followed by fresh fruit.
In the
afternoon I will be talking to Suzy to go over the HCPC papers but I shall also
be going out. We just heard this morning
that our friend Mari Carmen, the ex-wife of Eladio’s best friend Roberto, fell
down some stairs and broke her femur and had to have a hip replacement. Gosh I felt so sorry for her; what a spate of
accidents between the two of us! So, yes
we shall be going out, to hospital, but this time to see a friend. I hope she
recovers soon.
Next week I
shall be going to my rehabilitation sessions every morning and look forward to
my ankle getting stronger day by day. I
shall also be working on the final details of all our activities at the Mobile
World Congress which takes place the following week. On Tuesday afternoon I shall be having a
meeting with the teams from my PR and events Agencies and they will be coming
here for it. They will also be meeting
Pippa which I think is an added bonus.
There will be tea and coffee on the table as well as some of the Betty’s
cakes and biscuits, uum scrumptious.
Meanwhile my
friends, I wish you all a great week ahead.
Till next
Sunday
Masha
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