But on the plus side, life cannot be lived through a blog alone…
We have had very mild autumn weather here which I am enjoying with Archie and two new Norwegian walking poles, replacing the old ones which were second-hand and fell to pieces a couple of weeks ago. The new poles are lighter and have the benefit of encouraging the swinging of both arms which is important after a stroke to try to regain a more even, balanced walking style.
I have also discovered Magloc, which was featured some weeks ago on Dragons’ Den – I don’t think the Dragons invested, but I did, as I could immediately see the benefit of the device for stroke survivors with weakness or paralysis in one hand. Attaching a lead to a squirming dog is a two-handed operation and the Magloc allows you to attach the lead to the dog’s collar by means of an ingenious magnetic locking device, which simply requires you to point the end of the lead at another small magnet fitted to the collar. The magnet is not powerful enough to cause the dog to leap towards you (I wish), but it makes the whole operation a lot easier. It is suitable for dogs up to 40 kilos, which means it is probably suitable for all whippets.(Archie has peaked, hopefully, at 14 kilos).
This is a short post, but it ends with an invitation to any followers of this blog likely to be in Edinburgh on 24 November 2015. At 6 p.m. on that date the Alliance is hosting an event entitled Reading, Writing and your Health: Journeys in Self-Management in the Scottish Story Telling Centre in Edinburgh’s High Street. This event is part of Scottish Book Week. Together with others who have used writing or blogging as part of self-managing a health condition, I will be talking about this and reading from Man, Dog, Stroke. I will be delighted to meet any followers of this blog face to face on that evening. You can get more details by clicking on the link above.