home

So I'm home now, and white rather than yellow. On Friday the poisoned blood apparently improved so rapidly (or was it that I was beginning to interview hospital bigwigs about the catering?) that they told me I could go! Plying me with a sickness letter, an appointment letter, a sick note signing me off work "for at least two weeks", two kinds of antibiotics, painkillers, anti-emetics, and five large bags full of all the stuff I had accumulated in there, they sent me away in a hospital cab and forgot all about Ms Baroque.

(I know they forgot: when you get wheeled off the ward the nurses don't even say bye. The nurses, on the whole, have far worse interpersonal skills than your average MacDonald's attendant. However, that was made up for by the rapturous farewells of my bedmates - the porter was joking that he might as well have a sit-down - with waves and blown kisses following me out. Even the dreadfully ill Sri Lankan woman who had done nothing but sleep all week suddenly sat up, smiled a beatific smile and said how wonderful that I was better! She's been in there a month. But she's getting out Tuesday. Valerie, the charming elderly lady in the bed opposite me, turns out to live in one of N16's beautiful listed Goeorgian houses and is going to invite me for tea when she gets out. Hurrah!)

So I arrived home in my free cab, heaved myself s-l-o-w-l-y up the three flights of stairs, and collapsed onto the couch under a duvet. It was like being a Loony Toons character after they've been flattened. The stalwart ex-Mr B, bringing up rice, a chicken and some fruit, took one look at me and laughed. And there I lay, in much the same condition, till oh about 15 minutes ago. Drained of colour, drained of energy, drained of food, feeling distinctly nauseaus, while a troupe of respectful girls filed past my bed asking, "how are you feeling, Kate?" "Ill." "Oh..." (crestfallen); "Well, if you need anything, call my mother! I hope you feel better soon!" (I'm in here like a flat thing, they're all in the bathroom getting ready to go to the Holloway Odeon. The perfume was choking even half an hour after they'd left.)

And that's it. There is very little more.

The visions were fascinating, the first three days, and the way that whenever I closed my eyes everything rocked. It was like being on a boat. A boat with strange things to look at. There was a theme to the visions - they mostly turned out to be, in some form, babies dressed as baby animals. There was more to it than that but it's hard to make out.