CRYING MY EYES OUT - AND NOT OVER THE ONIONS

Hello dear reader and welcome to another Sunday at Chez Comb. It has been a bit of a roller coaster of a week for me and for once nothing to do with my dear Spouse. Yes indeedy, he is lily-white and in the clear. A friend of mine once said that I could cause bother in an empty house. Well, Chez Comb is not empty but I have caused bother for myself.

   For some years now I have been prone to leaky eyes - tear fluid constantly flowing. No doubt some of you are familiar with this pesky condition. At first it was diagnosed as 'dry eyes' and eye drops were prescribed to alleviate things.  But things gradually deteriorated and the eye drops did not seem to make much difference, to the extent that one evening last year when I wanted to watch a particular wildlife programme on the television, I could only watch it with the lights out and wearing sunglasses!! At this point I took myself off to the optician who, after a thorough examination decided I did not have 'dry eyes' but may have blocked tear ducts, a condition I may have to put up with as even though an operation would ease things, the effects might not last long.

  Stay with me dear reader, I promise you, this is not too shaggy a dog story. For another week or so after visiting said optician, I put up with weepy eyes and then had the bright idea of looking the condition up on the internet. As I am in the main a healthy person I have not had cause to seek out information on afflictions. But I am very glad I did. I went to the NHS website and looked up 'blocked tear ducts' and learned quite a lot more about them. Not only that but a simple massage of the area between the eye and the nose on a daily basis or even a few times daily helps alleviate the symptoms.

   Brilliant. Thank you NHS and the massaging worked. My weepy eyes were greatly improved. But - here is a weird thing. All in my little eye world is hunky dory until a bit of stress comes on the scene and then off I go again, eyes leaking like a tap. I have no idea what the connection is but there must be one somewhere and I hope someday, someone will enlighten me.

   I know dear reader, what a wimp I am and what bother I have caused for myself this week. It goes like this - I am planning a romantic comedy novel for next year, Walking Bertie. The principle male character is a crime writer and for the purposes of the book I needed an outline plot of a crime novel for him to discuss. I really enjoyed constructing this and getting to know my new detective on our Easter journeyings to and from the south of England. Arriving home bright-eyed and bushy-tailed I embraced the new week happy and dry-eyed.

   Until I randomly picked up a crime novel from my pile of  waiting to be read books by my bed. After the first few chapters my tears began to run, big time, as the uneasy notion stole over me that the plot in this book might unfold along the lines of mine.

   In between my domestic goddess duties at home, it has taken me the best part of the week to wade through the novel, eyes spouting copiously along the way, as I stressed as to whether I was going to have to think up an entirely new plot. My literary concerns were unfounded thank goodness, as this crime novel was a very muscular one, packed full of violent deaths in as many different ways as I could every imagine, but of course, I had to read right to the end to make absolutely sure.

   Magically dear reader, my eyes are getting much better now that I know i can sashay on my own sweet way with my lovely detective and - talk about teaching an old dog new tricks - I am surprised at how desperately I cared about the plot within the plot of  Walking Bertie - it may be comedy but it's serious stuff to me and at the dawn of this Sunday morning Chief Inspector Francis di Angeli is poised ready to make his debut in what may turn out to be Are You Going to Mulberry Fair? and I am one very happy Easter bunny. 

   I hope you have a very pleasant and dry-eyed week dear reader. The weather forecast for North Yorkshire is good and Spouse and I intend to start re-modelling our gardens. As this may involve the use of power tools I hope I will still be here to tell the tale next week. Happy Eastertide.