Father Christmas, a chub, and an ambulance ride

The headlines:

1. I was allowed to put the Volvo into reverse
2. I met Father Christmas
3. Paddy caught a 4lb 6oz chub
4. I dialled 999
5. I rode in an ambulance
6. Daddy hazelh is now safe in hospital

The detail:

This morning Mummy hazelh took me out for my second Volvo driving lesson. I drove the same route as yesterday with two changes: (1) I was allowed to take the wheel from the very start of the trip and thus negotiated both the drive and the right hand turn on to the narrow road; (2) when we returned I had a go at inching along the drive in reverse.

Mr hazelh and I walked up to the Christmas fair at the village hall this afternoon. There we: ate mince pies; drank mulled wine; lost at tombola; bought cakes, fudge and perfume; talked to a couple of people that we recognised from our recent riverside walks and bus rides to and from Newcastle; and met Father Christmas (extra).

Meanwhile in the south of England my nephew Paddy, who has inherited the role of chief family fisherman (and is next in line for Daddy hazelh's 98 fishing rods) caught a chub on the Oxford Canal (second extra). Daddy hazelh was most impressed when I showed him the photograph on Facebook.

The conversation about the fish was Daddy hazelh's last lucid interaction of the day. If it turns out to be the last one of his life, it will be most fitting for a man who has been obsessed with fishing since a boy. (I often say that I did well at university interviews because I was a well-read teenager, and that was only because all our family's 'free' time was spent on the riverbank where - if you weren't fishing - the main entertainment was reading.)

The ambulance ride came at the end of a very difficult day for Daddy hazelh, during which he became much weaker, both physically and mentally. It began with hallucinations about guns and drugs. At one point he sent me and my mother out of the room so that we would not be harmed when he shot himself... He has also been asking for 'number 3' and 'half of number 3'. We have no idea what this is, but when I gave him a green plastic beaker of water, this seemed to meet his request (although I refused to add the 20 pills that he wanted to prescribe himself). By this afternoon he was so weak that he could not even stand up unaided - yet since we refused to fetch him a gun or his medical case he decided that his best option was to try and fling himself out of the bed onto the hard parquet floor.

When the nurse visited this afternoon she advised a hospital readmission. She made arrangements for Daddy hazelh to be taken by non-urgent ambulance to Haltwhistle hospital - the place he stayed over the summer. Daddy hazelh slipped into unconsciousness while we were waiting for the ambulance, and it was at this point that I dialled 999. Our case was then upgraded to urgent, and not long afterwards a paramedic arrived in a blue light car with lots of equipment (blipped), followed by a large ambulance two hours later.

Although we waited a long time for the paramedics (and it has to be said that our case was non-urgent at the start), they did an amazing job when they arrived. They stabilised Daddy hazelh, then very carefully carried him from his bed through the obstacle course of my parents' drawing room and hall, and settled him into the back of the ambulance. I rode with him to the hospital, with Mummy hazelh and Mr hazelh following in the Volvo. 

We left Daddy hazelh in Haltwhistle safe in bed under the care of the expert medical staff who remember him from his summer visit. Mummy hazelh, Mr hazelh and I ended our day with a midnight feast of cheese and wine at the dining room table, then baths and bed.

Exercise today: walking (12,344 steps).