A two centred busy week

Last Thursday we came into town as I had a doctor's appointment. She was lovely and prescribed three different tablets, which she said would sort my cough, noisy chest and other related ailments. When I got home I read the paper inside the box of the antibiotics and realised what folly this all was. She never asked what other medication I am on, although I have mentioned most of my heart and blood pressure medications as well my tendency for heart arrythmia, so she knew full well about them.  So, the antibiotic was apparently counterindicated in three cases relevant to me: 1. it wasn't supposed to be taken with a blood thinner; 2. it was also not supposed to be mixed with statins and finally 3. definitely dangerous if one is prone to tachicardia. Nice, I thought, she might have tried to kill me off, but I didn't let her.

A cute little choo choo train in Balatonfüred

Since then I have been to my naturopath who has doubled my probiotic dose, put me on traditional, old fashioned remedies, teas and several vitamins and dietary supplements, like seaweed and oil of milk thistle.  Vitamin D I now take in liquid form, carry on with my vitamin C and I think these are likely to do me a hell of a lot more good, than anything the doctor ordered. I know they are slower at helping, but at least they are less likely to clash with anything or have nasty side effects.

Milk thistle flower

View of the lake from the look-out tower above Balatonalmádi

Last Thursday I  had concert at the opera, namely Verdi's Requiem, which was excellent, but I was on my own, as Bozsa caught the current lurgy too and was in bed for a few days. I realised that while I knew the piece, I have never actually saw it live before.

En route to town we managed to make an agreement with a builders' merchant/fuel depot that they would let us know when their load of acacia wood was chopped up, so we can agree a delivery date for 3 cubic metres of it. Needless to say they never rang, so today I rang them, told them what I thought of their broken promises and surprise surprise they came up with the offer of delivering it tomorrow. Mind you, I believe it when I see it.

Autumn colours

The main event of this week was our visit to Monoszló to see Pityu and a few good friends besides. We went down on Friday, geocaching en route. Roy hates motorway driving, so we went cross country and started caching once we got to Lake Balaton. Almádi and Füred were the main towns we visited, then we went inland to a few church ruins, rockfaces and such like. It got dark for the last one, but we got to Pityu by 5pm.

Jutka was arriving by train in the evening and we had a lovely time eating, drinking and playing bridge. Saturday saw the big climb up yet another "witness moutnain", this time it was the turn of Csobánc. That mountain was magical. The old medieaval castle ruin was picturesque, the cache hidden very well and as a special show, we had dozens of parapenters flying about all over the castle.

Paragliders above Csobánc castle

After we descended we got called into a wine cellar to taste their wares and we had a really jolly time with some Germans as well as the guy whose vineyard it was. After Csobánc we only did one more cache, as it started getting dark much sooner than we thought it might.

The vineyard

On Sunday we visited Pityu's vineyard and ended up with litres and litres of wine to take home. Pityu always goes to town over feeding and watering his guests, but this was way above the call of duty, as they say. The rest of the week in town was spent doing chores that we have kept putting off for ages, plus a couple of concerts.

We sorted my new phone, which is now back in use, but because they not only put a new battery in, but also updated the software, nothing is the same as last time.  Especially not the brilliant, very loud ring it had, which is annoying. With the help of a really nice bloke in a little phone shop not far from the flat, I have now got both SIM  cards in (one of them works!), I can make and receive phonecalls, but can't access the phone numbers on the SIM yet. I have mobile data now and have WiFi capability, plus FB, Yahoo and Messenger. My good friend Laci is in London at the moment, but as soon as he is back I will enlist his help again to point me in the right direction re: maps, cynchronisation and such new fangled things that I am a bit too slow to master.

One of many ruined churches

I ordered and now fetched a cute little stamping machine for my geocaching, so that I don't have to fumble for my pen and spend hours writing in logbooks. With one movement it stamps my geocaching nickname and the date into the logbook and off I go to the next cache! Yippeeee!!

Monday's concert was Dezső Ránki and he was really good, as always. There were Haydn, Schumann and Brahms on the program, but we were all disappointed that he wouldn't give us an encore. I suppose all the pieces he played were very hard and exhausting, so he thought he had done enough.

Wednesday was busy, I started with my naturopath, who has piled so much stuff on me that I should get better soon, then I went to have my little computer sorted, but which was unsuccessful. Still, it works, so I will not bother with updates and such, just carry on using it. The next stop was the mobile shop, where my lovely friend was super at sorting at least some of my woes.

In Pityu's cellar

In the afternoon we visited Vera and Gábor, our good friends out in Buda. She showed us her old flat now that it had been done up and I think it will be perfect when it is fully finished. We managed to fetch our three pictures she gave us earlier in the year, as Gábor gave us a lift home, so that we didn't have to carry them on the tram.

The old cellar key

And finally today I am going to yet another concert in the Palace of the Arts, which is by a little known chamber orchestra and they will be presenting all Dohnányi pieces, which  will be totally new to me.

Some more autumn colours

We are off to the village tomorrow morning to get there in time for the wood delivery. If it comes, that is.