I got very angry with the radiographer making a fuss about my weight and what his machine could stand. It wasn’t genuine concern for either my safety or his machinery, it was showing off in front of a load of female nurses – you could see that in his face. I had to be held down. My doctor later apologised for the behaviour of the technician.

New ambulance driver today. Made a change from the maniacal one of last week who was perpetually grumbling about how late he was getting home. I didn’t ask him to volunteer (they don’t get paid either) – if you don’t like a voluntary job, don’t do it for goodness sake. That said, today’s driver had to slam the brakes on a few times and that’s not a lot of fun when you are half-restrained sitting sideways-on in the back of an ambulance.

All of both legs is now bandaged and I’m supposed to endure this until tomorrow. We shall see. The pain is as bad as ever and I don’t hold out much hope for the whole thing now.

I’ve moved on to ultrasound treatment now. They smear my feet with gel and then run electrodes over them. It doesn’t hurt but it doesn’t seem to be doing a lot of good. The doctor was very depressed when I told him that.

They bandaged me up on Friday like I was doing the stand-in for some Hammer production – The Curse Of The Mummy’s Legs. It was supposed to last until this afternoon but I couldn’t take the lack of blood to my feet and we spent an unhappy 20 minutes unwrapping the mummy yesterday afternoon.

My left foot is more painful and is hurting me as I write this. I sometimes feel that only amputation will relieve the pain.

One slapstick moment (which I am sure will have repercussions) came on Friday. There is no proper seat belt in the ambulance for me (and not really any space, either). I was forced to tie the two mail ends of two seat belts together to give myself at least some semblance of restraint.

Unfortunately between Ancona and home, my body swelled up and we couldn’t get them undone. The driver, angry at missing his pasta lunch yet again, took our knife to it in such a way as to make me very nervous. He could easily have cut just one belt but, no, he had to butcher both.

I caught him grumbling in Italian to the nurse in the hospital about it and I told him off. I’d already offered to pay – I don’t need his malicious gossip as well.

I’m having to go alone as Mauro the kennel-owner is off on holiday so Damaris has to dog-sit. I’m not happy to leave them alone in the house for 5 to 6 hours and they just aren’t used to it.

I’ve now got a weekend off. Back to Ancona with Misery-Guts my driver on Monday. My feet are burning.

We’re going back on Thursday but it’s already looking like it’s hopeless.