SHERINGHAM DIARY No 75 - Movements in the Cough Perpetual

There is a window cleaner somewhere near Kings Lynn, who calls their business Mr Bit.

Movement 146 in the Cough Perpetual' is a very very very slowly easing. I am being reticent about calling a victory rally just yet. I still have the cough, a raw throat and nasal passage in the morning. All of which suggest caution, as I've been here before, and the bastard re-formulated itself and came back worse than ever.

Jnanasalin finished our self assessment tax return yesterday for 2021/22 and submitted it to HMRC. So that's it all over for now. We're planning to carry on inputting the current tax year 2022/23 and be ready to submit early.  We need to break our cycle of leaving it to the last minute in January. Which only adds to the stress of it all. Also, I suspect in the coming financial year 2023/24 we'll need to be a wee bit more on top of our expenditure.

The shop is open two days Fri/Sat at the moment. Time and space are luxurious for a few more weeks yet. Its our sole opportunity to take a break from the constant demands of the business. There is always a balance to be struck between relaxation and preparation, Somethings we do need to do regarding the shop during this time.  Next week, however, we have six days penciled in to be completely off. What we are going to make of that time has yet to be decided. I expect a mixture of visiting favourite places, a bit of culture, depending on what we feel like, and whatever the weather presents an invitation to us to do.

Movement 154 in the Cough Perpetual. After forming a stiff diaphragm of phlegm in my upper throat that nearly asphyxiated me during the night. The 'cold' has now begun bunging up my nose and throat and running like a rather gloopy tap. As ever I am optimistically seeing this as its final flourish in a rather wish fulfilled whim. After six weeks of this surely it must come to an end soon? Whether this has ever been 'a cold' in a traditional sense has been called into question. If it is a 'viral infection' apparently, the mucus will be transparent -off white, anything else will produce varying shades of sludgy green. So I have coloured coded it as onyx green.  Whatever it is, I have reached the point where being tired through coughing all the time, has become a state of existence.

After completing our tax return and paying what we owe before the Jan 31st deadline for submissions, we are feeling like the veritable saints we are. Particularly with all the threats and shenanigans going on with our former Chancellor Nadhim Zahawi's. Whose 'carelessness' over a few undeclared millions is a lesson in the HMRC's finely drawn use of language. We have learnt the albeit miniscule difference between Tax Avoidance and Tax Evasion. The former is legal but occupies a grey area, and the latter is for the really bad boys in the naughty corner. And though the former is legal. it is morally corrupt. I have one, no doubt, overly simplistic solution to this gap between legal and moral rectitude. Turn everything we currently call Tax Avoidance into Tax Evasion, make using any method of hiding, obfuscation or misrepresentation of your wealth and income wrong. Demand complete transparency. There, that's that all cleared up then.

Movement 160 in the Cough Perpetual. On the first day of the seventh week, we ran out of Lem Sip. So unable to sooth the throat and cough before bedtime proved to be a bit of a wah wah wah. My nose orifices so bunged up unable to breath through them. Forced to mouth breath using an extraordinarily over sensitive phlegm lined throat. After half an hour without a glimmer of its unproductive ruttling and heaving easing off, I got up, for who knows how long. By which time things had seized up sufficiently for sleep to be at least feasible. The Husband says my snores sound like the sort of thing you'd discover residing in on old cupboard in a horror movie.

Five hours later, awoke congested everywhere in my face. The morning routine has not been an unalloyed joy. Throat phlegm thick and intractable, tried a bit of hot steam inhalation. Helped - ish. Have blown my nasal orifices as raw as a fog siren on heat. Three hours later comes the first signs that last nights accumulation of phlegm might now have largely been blown out, leaving a soggy bin full of crumpled paper tissue squares. Am I being a bit of a drama martyr? Oh, we are well beyond all that.

Movement 166 in the Cough Perpetual. In scary movies you generally know something is not right when a child or adult open their mouths wide and a thin creepy muttering tone emerges from within their throat. Softly wailing incoherent syllables without any effort from the zombie host. Well my phlegm lined throat has developed that quality. I form an oval shape with my mouth and out comes this wheezy fluctuating whine. As if some demon is now whispering from within me. I have been possessed by a mucal incubus that will never ever let me go.

This was the oddest experience I've had whilst using a Public Toilet. The loo in the town centre of Dereham are down a side alley. Faced in bright ultramarine blue tiles with equally intense orange coloured toilet urinal furniture, hidden behind a cloaking wall. The only sit down toilets are separate lockable cubicles. After you've entered you press a Lock The Door button and a red light goes on above the door. Whilst you are remaining seated doing your thing, it plays a short sixty second orchestral snippet of Greensleeves over and over again. Interrupted only by a woman's voice saying 'The Door Is Locked' between each sixty second cycle. To say this felt a bit unnerving is an understatement. I left swiftly before the Toilet changed its mind.