Viral Spain Blog 13^th January, 2022.

Our small electric clock in the kitchen ticks. Who cares? I do. It is the first time I have ever heard it. I have started a trial with hearing aids and it is one of a panoply of sounds I have never heard before. Actually I mustn't lie, it is the only new sound that comes to mind but I love that word panoply.

And I have had the hearing devices for less than 24 hours. In fact now I recall the weird array of sounds I heard in the car driving back from the audiologist yesterday. I hoped there was nothing wrong, there were so many new noises. No warning lights had come on before I got home so I guess it was okay!

What interests me is how different this trial is from the one I had four years ago. Sarah noted I already had the little devils in when I took her tea this morning. I am not so startled by new sounds. Either the devices are better, or better set up, or I have changed. Probably all three, they cost a bit more, the audiologist....well he comes over as less assured than the last one but seems to almost relish my questions so is pretty keen, and me?

I have reluctantly accepted that the time has come. I have got fed up with asking for repeats in conversation, of understanding so little Spanish, or English for that matter when people are wearing masks as I have to see a face to 'hear'. I am aiming to treat it as an adventure in sound and turn them up to full volume now and again to see what I can hear.

'Deaf aids' were what my Grandparents wore when they seemed incredibly old. So I still struggle with letting people know I am getting them. Last night at Bio Dance I had to steal myself to ask the leader if we might have the music at a lower volume due to my new aids. It was worse when I told the group. I saw it as a therapeutic act. No one screamed, ran out of the room, or the real fear (especially with a young and largely female group ) tried to avoid dancing with such an old man, well as far as I could tell.

Writing about them is not so hard. I know most of my readers are old or oldish and kind or kind-ish...well, no mean bastards detected so far! I still find the phrase 'hearing aids' difficult to use...maybe it is too similar to what my grandparents wore. I like hearing devices better, or even, note the link to my new years reso's, ' listening devices'. Perhaps that's a bit extreme.

Which brings me via this very strained link to the extreme 'Cards Against Humanity' game. It gives an idea of the nature of the game and its inventors that the person to start is the person last to have had a crap. For some reason my family just assume and I always start. We played it over new year and is more fun and less controversial than Monopoly but lasts almost as long. There is some controversy but more in the nature of one conclusion we found: 'Most marriages end with....throwing a virgin into a volcano'. It goes down better after a drink or two or even a puff or three as was my New Year's experience!

So it is coffee time here and I will end on a positive note. According to one expert and one very opinionated friend who describes himself as having read across a range of reputable sources, we are at the beginning of the end of the pandemic. The new strains will continue to be less potent. This means a virus survives longer in a host and therefore spreads better and becomes the more prolific strain, taking over from older strains, and eventually becoming more like the flu infections we have long known.

Go well my friends.