Friday, a big day. It starts with an early start as I have to be at the GP surgery for 9am for a set of bloods. Thankfully my partner drives me to the surgery after a quick breakfast and my morning meds. I am soon called in and to my dismay the vampire nurse realises that she needs to take enough blood samples to monitor my apixaban medication. Happily it was one needle for double the number of vials. I leave with the nurse with the usual cotton wool cloud on my arm. My partner takes me to the post office so that I can post my letters, and then we moved onto the chemists, where I picked up my prescription drugs ready for my injection on Monday. Once home I settle down to complete the days cross words.

At lunch time thee was time to have a roll and then I am booking an Uber to take my partner and I to the Curve theatre to see our eldest daughter be presented with her doctorate. I chose to wear my cerise cord blazer and black dress shirt. On arriving at the theatre we are met by our eldest daughter who is now robbed up in her doctoral robes. She gives us or tickets for the presentation and then we wait for a while until its time to go into the auditorium. Before we go to the auditorium we go to the top floor where the photographers are and we have official photographs taken. Over the next few days we will order our preferences and wait for our photos to arrive. We take our seats and wait for the start of the ceremony. The ceremonies begin with an academic procession and is followed by the revealing of the graduates sitting on the other side of the stage. There are speeches by various dignitaries, musical entertainment and input from the Leicester poet laureate before a huge crocodile of students walk across the stage to collect their degrees. The crowd applauded well and at times was quite raucous. Eventually it came the turn of my eldest daughter to receive her doctorate. Of course whooped and cheered as I filmed her do her walk of achievement and collect her degree. At the end of the ceremony we meet up with our daughters PhD supervisors and took soem pictures. We hung around in the theatre café for a while and watched the various families celebrating their children’s achievements. My secret pleasure was the fact that my daughters robes included the floppy hat with a tassel. There were only five other people with them so I wander around thinking to myself “my girls got a floppy hat”. When the crowds have thinned and almost everyone has drifted away we call an Uber to take us home.

Once home I start to draft the blog and nibble chocolate biscuits while waiting until its time to go to the restaurant to celebrate todays achievement. It will be excellent food but at the end of the evening I shall looking out for my blood results and the data they will bring. Some where in there I will need to check the Tesco order that is due tomorrow. The reality turns out that my blood results do not arrive at midnight and I am so tired I cannot wait any longer and go to bed.