Today went as planned

Whew, hard work though. We got the 11.24 into Burton, scoffed a sub at Subway each and did a bit of other shopping before catching the bus up to the hospital, getting there in very good time. It made sense to sit reading our books in the comparative comfort of the OPD waiting room rather than mooching round a very chilly Burton.

I had a thorough hearing test, first the normal type, then a repeat of the right ear with white noise masking in the left, then all that again using the bone conduction headset. A bit of a wait was followed by an interview with a very good consultant. The answer is yes, I have asymmetric loss, no, I wouldn't get benefit from a hearing aid yet and I should have an MRI scan just to eliminate the very, very small chance of an acoustic neuroma. (This consultant has seen four in his entire career.)

It's not urgent to have that – even if I have a neuroma they are slow growing and neither invasive nor malignant. The usual treatment is called W&W, watch and wait. So unless an appointment comes through very quickly (highly unlikely), I'll put it off until the autumn.

On the way back we tried walking back into town and ended up actually running to catch the V3 which fortunately was a few minutes late, or we'd have been hanging around for another hour and a quarter at that time of day.

All this means that, weather permitting, we can plan to start cruising next Tuesday, again.

OK, OK, I know, brace yourselves, guys, for something dire weatherwise next week…

/wahaha