The Art of Catching Lobsters

If you ever get the chance to watch this film - do so. http://www.cornwallfilm.com/Article80.htm - it premiered this evening and I was gripped as soon as I started watching it. the "emotional baggage" that goes with cancer isn't all about yourself. The people around you, friends and family and more so your partner and your children go through a life changing event themselves.

You know that they are going through it but you can only watch and if you are rubbish at saying things (like I am) you don't let on you just beat yourself up that you - through your thoughtless actions of getting cancer - have upset everyone nearest and dearest to you. This IS what it feels like and you get a guilt complex about that too. Such is the grip of a nasty disease that not only are you fighting to get well you are also fighting the fact that you are making other people's lives a misery. That is how you feel - I don't think that is the reality.

I so have to choke back the tears when I see my daughter's first photography project around cancer and smoking - set in grainy black and white and half - way through the words "My Dad has Cancer" - there - I'm having trouble writing it.

The film deals with the affect a stroke followed by cancer has on the family and the aftermath of the terminal nature of the disease. It is heart wrenching stuff and, as you would expect, evokes the sort of response these films normally do until you realise that it was the wife who made this film and bares her soul for us to see the pain and solitude of the situation. Time heals all someone said. I just enjoyed the honesty of the film and as you can imagine I was hit many times over with the fears that we all with cancer feel in our hearts and minds. See it if you can.

Now - where's the Kleenex?

Sense of Humour needed

It is difficult to make a blog "sound" the way you meant it to. For example the last one was some of my sense of humour which is oblique to say the least.

:-) You can prefix or suffix stuff with a smiley I suppose :-) either that or I need to word things a little more carefully and not as they spill out of my head and onto the blog.

Anyone who knows me can understand that some of the stuff I can come out with can take a while for everyone to get and so please do read this blog with the realisation that not all of it is serious. In fact, the best thing you can have when you have any sort of ailment is to combat it with humour if you can.

Wow - Magic Day

Fantastic - massive progress in where I am heading and a big leap forward in my attitude. I am so confident and so assured and I feel really good about myself.

I'm flying at the moment and I'm in demand. I'm useful and I'm helping people and I am doing all the things that I am really good at.

Tonight - work wise - I am on top of the world.

And yet. Deep inside myself, there is that nagging feeling that there is still more collateral damage to come.

I am a Myers Briggs INTJ personality. That is very rare - perhaps 1 in 100 at best. We tend to be visionaries and what worries me is I can see two outcomes. They are binary outcomes. Armageddon or I turn out to be Bill Gate's benefactor!!! Oh go on - I'm allowed to dream.

The New Me

Well it isn't really the new me at all of course. It is the more positive me. A more aggressive outlook and a more focused use of my effort and attentions.

I am determined to claw my way back to being me and trying not to concern myself too much about the past and concentrate on the future whatever that may hold.

I've made a conscious decision to really tackle my weight and exercise regime in such a way that I can mix work and exercise and not have one cancel the other out. I am also determined to get fit and to re-commence my eating regime. For all sorts of reasons and rightly or wrongly I haven't really done anything in a routine since the BCG treatments. First it was the party then the holiday and then full on with the job and other things and all else went by the wayside.

It is easy to get out of a routine. It is far more difficult to get into one. To do the things you are comfortable with is a human trait. It is doing things because they are outside of that zone which will be setting me my challenges - John F Kennedy's We Choose to Go to the Moon speech pops into my head to do things because they are hard, because they are a challenge and because they push the boundaries. Without setting goals and then achieving them are key elements in the fight back to normality and stopping the roller coaster.

My mate K was there tonight and I have to thank him again as it was his idea that I start this blog. It is everything and more I wanted it to be and it allows me to get stuff off my chest, tell people that it is normal to have whatever is happening to you in your cancer journey and it allows me to look back and realise just how far I have come in 11 months since the blog started and 15 months since I was diagnosed.

So I've had a good day and good evening and I hope that I can just build on that over the next few weeks. I'm used to being the manager and getting my own way and having everything just so - because it isn't has thrown me quite a bit - to get back to "old" (although I don't want old for the sake of it) ways is important as it is my baseline.

Out With the Lads

Went rather well - a bit of a bizarre evening as the sat nav took me to Rochester High Street and Not Chatham High Street. Eventually got where we needed to go and went to the pub and found our mate from Canada already there.

"What beer have you got?" "Sorry we haven't got ANY beer!" "Umm OK what about Guinness then?" - I think they squeezed one out. They had no Cider and some of the lagers were off and the lights in the toilet didn't work. However, that broke the ice and there was plenty of banter going on which was fun. One of the lads had a Video that was 27 years old!! It was made at our old school and is a very early black and white video recording. It is - well - rubbish but has some priceless moments in it, especially a thunder flash that exploded taking the camera off its tripod, deafening the cast, breaking two lamps and two windows in the process. How no lasting damage was done to people we do not know to this day. So the pub sat aghast whilst the lads reminisced about the play, the video, the damage and so on. The guy from Canada and I looked on blankly as we were not in it and were sitting open mouthed at the production quality. We are deciding whether to put it on You tube - it could be the only negatively rated video I feel.

We had a great time and were almost in tears reminiscing. Some hadn't seen each other for 35 years and so it was amazing how we all jelled back together, laughed like drains about the school days and forgot our standard stories or exaggerated them or both!

What a great evening and I thoroughly enjoyed myself - I didn't drink as I gave a lift to one of the guys and it was just a good crack with a nice curry and all for £20 a piece beer and food - not bad.

YOU have control

That is what they say to pilots taking over the controls (especially learners).

The previous blog touched on something that I really hadn't considered recently but did early on. That is that you have no real control over what is happening to you after you are diagnosed. You have Yes/No choices (there aren't many maybes that I was aware of).

So consider that ride - I called it the Roller Coaster that you couldn't get off. As a cancer patient - you are in the hands of a series of people - you have no control over them saving you, your ongoing treatment as, unless you happen to be an Oncologist or Urologist, what would you know about it? The only things you can do are PMA (positive mental attitude), do what you are told and take your medicine and treatment. You can do other things as well, within your power to do, life style changes in diet and exercise and so on, you can get other bits fixed (heart in my case) and so on but these are minor things when compared with everything else.

Now, it has dawned on me that my life was entirely in the hands of other people and that is a bit scary. I had no choice but to do what they said, I took a kick in with losing my job and had the anxious wait for insurances and the like to be reviewed.

All these things are not the way you live day to day - I suppose we all know that we really aren't (if the truth be known) entirely in charge of our own lives but we like to think that we are free and can make our own choice and are in control of our lives.

Well - I haven't been for 15 months now and I think that I'm just beginning to realise that. It is time for me to take charge now. I cannot second guess the outcome of next week's tests but if it is good then life takes a new path. If bad it takes another path but whatever it does, I am aware of what I need to do, I am educated about my condition. I know what effects it has on me physically and what I need to do now is to step up to the plate (as our cousins say).

Step up to what? Well - how about leaving behind the baggage of cancer and making another path for myself? How about stop thinking too hard about it and getting on with it. Stop worrying about what a decision may lead to and go and find out? Lots of things like that perhaps - get control back over my life and live with the knowledge that I have survived a very serious illness and I may never (or I might) fully recover from that. So it isn't that bad. I still have all my limbs, I still feel good, I have my brains (some would argue that), my wit, my eyesight and so on so really there are a lot of people far worse off than me and it doesn't stop them doing things.

I'm not sure how I am going to be "this" positive about this all the time, I feel that I have to break this "victim/survivors syndrome" and get on with life. All the time I stay introverted is time missed from what is left of time here.

Grinding away

Today is one of those days were I am getting stuff done but it is a progression of small mainly boring things that need doing. Each on their own is hardly worth the effort but taken together they will get rid of this pile of junk around my desk and a backlog of things that - unlike me - I have just left on one side of the desk.

I will have to get into serious time management mode once I get out of Hospital next week. There is a part in that which no one likes particularly and that is to throw stuff out that isn't important. I used to be good at that and for some reason, recently, I am putting stuff into piles to "look at later". That pile is driving me nuts and when I look at it now - I could have binned most of it.

The worry is that these things just get left and build up and really I could be so much more efficient, like I used to be. My friend also has the same problem with getting things done - perhaps it was the weeks off work or perhaps something else, certainly the body goes out of equilibrium and perhaps that may account for it.

I need to get some control back again. Up until the illness I was in control and then I got on the Roller Coaster. It probably isn't going slow enough to jump off yet but perhaps I can start to exert some control over this whole thing - perhaps that is it?

The week ahead

It is amazing how quickly all these things creep up on you and how your emotions ebb and flow. I was a little better than I have been at these assessments but even so - the stress was obvious in the raised heart beat and high blood pressure. I'm OK now but feel a bit strange. That is most probably to do with this detachment defence mechanism that I use. This works by saying these things aren't really happening to you.

Now in the main this worked last year because everything was traumatic and pretty horrible and (please let this be so) what I am about to have - if the same as last time isn't quite so bad. Not nice (could it ever be?) but you get used to it. Anyway, I tend to go very quiet and become very inward and yet I was putting on a very brave face and laughing and joking in the assessment clinic.

I don't know - I'm OK - I am preparing myself for next week and tomorrow I'll be all bouncy and my normal self - tonight - I'm a little subdued and a little thoughtful which is no bad thing either.

With that - to bed - goodnight.

Well that's over

Phew!

It took ages this morning as the Doctor was held up in the torrential rain and I arrived soaked.

Blood pressure was high but settled down. I must tell them to take the blood test first and then I'll calm down :-) Everything OK and due in 1st October. At least this time the time is right (checked that) and I have permission to drink so keeping myself hydrated after the awful time I had before. I was suitably impressed that I had remembered to bring a urine sample with a test kit they gave me 3 months ago - I followed the instructions to the letter and you have to make it the 2nd pee of the day. So I was somewhat amused when I got there that they wanted another one. As luck would have it - the delay allowed me to brew one up for them after all :-)

I'm getting an old hand at this - unfortunately.

I am just going to dry out a bit and then dash off to the Post Office. I think I also deserve a small bag of Wine Gums or perhaps Pontefract Cakes.

Assessment looms

Yes - so it does and I'm OK with that - a tad nervous if the truth be known but I should be OK. I won't make the mistake I made last time of almost running there and then wondering why I was in a bit of a state :-)

It is at 9 a.m. so that will give me plenty of time to walk home and take the rest of the day off quietly calming down.

I actually - again - have a lot of work to do and I have procrastinated all weekend. Mind you I was out most of Saturday and got on with a fair bit today so perhaps I'm being a little bit hard on myself with that. But I do need to hit some targets as I am out Monday night, Tuesday up in town, back here, out with some old school chums - some I haven't seen for 5 or more years and then I have some more work kicking off later in the week. Phew - so much to do before 1st October! I'm away for part of the weekend as well.

Oh well - no good rattling on here about it - I ought to be asleep and be up early to get assessed!

A Year Ago

I was not too clever of course and I was a bit of a wounded soldier and was curled up for quite a while not exactly feeling great. Wasn't to drive the car for 4 weeks and all that so I missed going to my Friend's installation meeting. Well a year later and I was able to this time and I met up with a friend who I hadn't seen for some time. He had a heart attack the time before I was meant to meet him and so it was great to meet up and catch up with our "conditions", diets and medication - see I'm getting good at this stuff now. We are like a bunch of kids although I'm not sure if having a bigger dosage of a tablet actually means that your condition is more serious than the next?

On a sadder note my cousin is in hospital with heart problems and another Friend is awaiting some tests as he isn't well either. So I wish them well.

Another old friend was telling me about his recent bladder infection (and later kidney infection) and what they had to do to him - a flexible cystoscopy - when I explained what I had done to me and quite how the treatement is instilled regularly and that I'll probably be getting a couple of them a year for the rest of my life I reckoned I'd made my point..

Finally I saw that Marcel Marceau died this morning - the web site isn't reporting his last words though.

Thoughts on just another step

You can understand when people say that they no longer want to have treatment. I can see that it can get to that point. They just want to say that is enough, I've had enough and that is it.

I feel that way now in a way - but I know that actually I need to do what it takes to get well. I'm young enough and mercifully fit enough to keep doing what needs to be done. However it is the stress for me more than anything else - and I hate Hospitals. I'm quite good in that I can now rationalise about this or be philosophical but it isn't nice and it isn't how people imagine it.

When you talk to someone who has been in Hospital all the "yuk" bits are skipped over - we talk about the food the cleanliness the nurses anything but that there was some bugger shoving a lump of plastic into my hand or worse.

Oh well that is a week and a few days away if I get through pre-assessment - just to think last time I went I had to have blood tests, pills and lord alone knows what... Fingers crossed that it doesn't happen again.

Middle Aged Rage

I am still fuming over this idiots e-mail to me. I thoroughly dislike being set up , I hate someone firing rhetoric at me. Now that it is found that it has absolutely nothing to do with me - have I got an apology? Nah!

Some people in high places - as my friend said - have no stature. Perhaps he is right. Maybe I have to hold the high ground and see how I shape up against him.

Life is too short already for this nonsense.

Anyway, I am off out tomorrow and I am looking forward to that and then I can have Sunday at home and Monday in for pre-assessment - yuk!

Oh well, that is just "another step" as someone told me. Each of these things are...

The Return of the Black Dog

My friend and I had a long chat this morning he calmed me down when the Numpty in the previous post had quite simply called my integrity into question. Probably the one thing you should never do to me is to question that.

Anyway, I was telling him that the Black Dog had a visit last night - no doubt caused by all of this and for the first time in a long while it occurred to me that I might not get the answers or result I want out of this next lot of biopsies. That was a shock moment and one that I hadn't got to thinking about recently. Last year - well it was all about survival, if I'd have had to lose my bladder well that was it but now, we have come so far, it would be a shock if things hadn't moved in the right direction.

To combat that, I thought the good thought - that it was clear and I wondered how I'd react to that news. I wasn't expecting to feel quite as emotional about that either. Of course, I can't predict the future or the outcome or indeed my reaction and so it was a bit of a waste of brain power really but that is the Black Dog for you. When you least expect it up it pops and the brain runs riot.

I like talking to my friend - we understand each other when we talk about our mood swings and our hopes and fears. It is really good to hear that it "isn't just me" going through this sort of stuff. The physical side of things is really the thing I can't quite take in. I am no where near as fit as I used to be and it transpires that the body reacts differently in the way it handles this and you handle it. I am intrigued and I will learn more about this but - basically - what used to happen before when your body was "in balance" isn't happening now and there are a number of things that need to happen to get everything functioning the same way as it used to.

More when I know more about it - it does sound intriguing though.

It isn't meant to sound like this but if you have had cancer, it is often difficult to explain some of the more subtle things that have happened to you. Having someone to talk to who has had the same - and is having the same - experiences as you is really helpful.

The Man's a blithering idiot

I have just spent 6 hours trying to respond politely to an e-mail from some blithering idiot who has near as damn it accused me of being some sort of Muppet. I'm not best pleased, I had other things planned for my time and this utter drivel and unsubstantiated accusations have not only upset me but left a very bitter taste as I have been trying to sort out a problem not of my making and suddenly it is my problem and my fault it happened in the first place.

Some people - anyway they have an offer to retract the e-mail by the morning now as I have written a War and Peace response.

Okey Cokey Internet

Has been driving me mad overnight. In, out, on, off, intermittent, mail works then doesn't, web works then doesn't.

Virgin Media are to the Internet business what Enron are to Accountancy and Audit firms!

No matter how much care you take

Some amateur can undo all your hard work. Like a barrack room lawyer some dick has trashed some work I have done and all hell broke loose when I got home this evening! Strewth

Heads will get cracked and arses kicked tomorrow. The trouble with this sort of customer is that they believe everything some raving lunatic tells them and I end up having to go and sort it out. If half (no make it more than that) if 90% of the people actually stopped and thought about things before shooting their mouths off and creating a crisis out of nothing things would be a hell of a lot better.

Planning

Started already, lining up things for the week I am going to be knocked out for.

So many things I have on at the moment and I need to make sure that I have all areas covered properly!

Close to the edge

Not only a brilliant track by Yes but also a close resemblance to the way I feel.

I could say on the brink but let's say close to the edge. Of what you may ask?

Tears - constantly I feel and have felt very emotional and perhaps for the past year or more. Things that never upset me before, wipe me out these days. So sad things, early death, parents grieving for their children, starving people and that sort of thing now tend to get me "close to the edge". I have always managed to brass out any such emotion as it is important (in the way my personality works) to be the steady hand and the emotional rock. However; since having all this happen to me, I am as likely to blub as to be able to explain what is going on, how it affects the world and all the diagnostic and analytical stuff I used to do.

Part of the territory? It must be, stuff triggers me these days that would never have upset me before. I have to walk out of rooms or hide my face even for film endings where I know what is happening and I've seen before.

Long Day

Still at my desk and I have to be out early tomorrow. I'm mindful that I mustn't overdo things, I'm also now firmly of the opinion that I need to shed even more of my voluntary workload stuff. Frankly I should have dumped some of this years ago but no one else would do it and perhaps now is as good a time to find replacements. I really can't do everything and I expect that now the job has ramped up, I won't be in a position for a year or two to do as much as I do.

I pretty surprised that I somehow managed to continue to do it through everything else really. Crikey, I hadn't really thought about that. I missed doing some things this time last year - I am reminded only because this year I am doing them. Organising things and sorting out accounts and admin stuff really are beginning to give me trouble as I don't have sufficient time to do them. I'm sure I am missing something along here :-) like an appointment or some such thing.

Probably for the first time in my life I am having to plan more than I ever did as for some reason, recently, I just appear to forget things like dates and meetings although - so far - I haven't missed any - I just keep getting this "out of control" feeling. I hope I fix that quickly I am normally extremely good at remembering what people say and keeping appointments and doing actions.

The trouble I am having

Getting stuff done is just crazy. I have a pile of things to do here and I did reasonably well today getting most of them done but there are just so many distractions to cope with. I've noticed that I can get things done when I really put pressure on myself to do them but I cannot do what I used to do prior to all of this - which is just blitz through work and give myself thinking time and space.

Everything just seems to drag and take longer than it should and I think it because I haven't worked properly in an office environment for a while and also that this job has some many facets.

Anyway, I made a good start today and I hope that I can give a bit better tomorrow but I have a meeting screwing that up first thing in town.

Tension rises

I'm very conscious that it is just one week to my assessment and two weeks to my "procedure" as these things are called - it is still an operation as far as I am concerned - if they knock you out and cut lumps out of you what else can it be? No don't tell me, it is if they have to cut you open you can call it that I suppose.

Anyway, a year ago I was getting ready for biopsies when they redid the resection. Since then I've had the BCG treatment and another operation and some more treatment and so this is the next 6 monthly one. I really hope that this is the last one though. It is just one of those things but I don't fancy having this every 6 months from now onwards. Of course if results are good then it does mean a change in the way things will happen. Again, not sure if the alternative is any nicer, just quicker and I have had it before and whilst the after effects aren't particularly nice - I think I know how I could deal with them. The other thing is that the treatments gradually take longer and longer between them meaning that you don't have to screw up your short term plans.

So 1 year and it is interesting to reflect back on how stressed out I was then to how I am now. Don't get me wrong I still have a lot of respect for what I have/or had - it can kill you let's not forget that. The difference now is that things are under control, I am being monitored and if we find that it is licked now - then we can really go and celebrate. I'm still not convinced that everything is exactly as it should be and perhaps this time I can get the answer that I want and that means I can get on with things.

Hope I can stay awake

Off to my Friend's 50th party tonight - luckily I am not driving or I think I'd have pulled out - I am absolutely knackered after last week's training sessions up in Scotland. Just more proof to me (if no one else) quite how much all this has taken out of me. Tuesday is the anniversary of the 2nd operation which could be called by some to be a re-bore of my bladder they scrapped so much of it away.

In fact that was some period during my life when I think about it, I really did take a battering then. Anyway - it isn't happening in a few weeks - I will have to look back to my blog and see what I was thinking might be happening to me in a year.

The Journey Continues

Entering the countdown for the next milestone in my journey and it is just coming up to two weeks to go.

The "nag" at the back of your mind says this will carry on - treatment, biopsies - until a decision is made, the hope part which is much larger reckons that this will be the proof that we can move on to the next stage of the treatment.

I don't mind saying that I really hate going into Hospital and all that stuff - it has to be done but I'm always amazed how some people treat it so matter of fact and work wise, sat there reading their newspaper and just getting on with it. I hate every minute of it but then I've had my fair share of Hospitals when I was a kid and in those days the stuff they did to you was enough to put anyone off.

Right - back to work - I'm not getting paid to talk to you lot :-) Oh of course, I'm not actually getting paid anyway!

So Who Won?

Traveling in my own country I need a passport, I have to be fully x-rayed, my laptop checked, my shoes scanned, my belt has to go through separately. Check in needs to be a long time before the flight as it takes an age to get through.

Of course I don't get this on the overground or underground (despite the attacks a few years back) and yet the airline industry must be losing passengers to this extra security and their inability to check you in and out fast enough. The train (which is now so over priced you cannot believe it) takes almost as long to get where I went and you can plug in your laptop and actually work on that.

So 9/11 - who won - everyone flying and there are millions of journeys give a constant reminder of the day where we said we would fight these acts by carrying on life as normal.

Yeah - right!

Other than this I had a great time.

Marking the beginning of the venture (proper)

It has been three months since I started the job and this week the whole thing has started to gain some momentum as we all head up to Scotland and get the partners trained in rolling out the service. We have a gala awards dinner in November which we are sponsoring part of so that we can start to get national exposure, more partners are signing up and customers are wanting us to get going as soon as possible.

There are still a few things to be put in place so that we can get going full steam ahead. It is getting very exciting now with the prospect of getting the service out there, some national exposure and a controlled ramp up of the business.

So I'm off to Scotland a little later today so that we can start the training and get everyone using the systems.

I doubt I will have internet access up in Scotland so it could all go quiet here for a while.

Surrounded by Lovies

You know - marketing types this morning. Trying to organise sponsorship and awards ceremonies etc. It was quite interesting.

Not sure I'd like to be in that market myself as it was all a bit artificial.

Mind you the Bucks Fizz was pretty good and the food was exceptional so it does have its upside - I imagine the diet is blown but it will be anyway this week as I will be at a Hotel. Who can resist a cooked breakfast?

Superstitious

I am flying to Scotland tomorrow.

11th September!

Oh well not to worry eh

I wouldn't normally do last minute

But tonight I suddenly realised that I am out tomorrow morning off to London and hadn't even printed off my notes or addresses!

Just doing that now at 1 in the morning.

Oh the fun of it - I'm normally very good at doing this sort of stuff too. Just recently have I become disorganised.

Getting nearer

It is getting nearer and nearer. The thought about going back into hospital again is not a good one but I am nowhere near as bad as I was about this before. I think the session I did with my Hypnotherapist really made a massive difference. I'm not getting as bad as I was about this last time and in fact I believe that I might even be looking forward to the opportunity that this will be the last hospitalisation.

The results of the tests, if clear, will mean that the next time they need to check me - it will be under a local anaesthetic. OK that isn't pleasant and it stings a bit for sure! However, it will be preferable to the trauma of Hospital and it shouldn't involve all the other stuff - like injections and cannulas and so on.

It has been a funny old journey to this point. Strange that I have hope that this is a turning point coming up. Hope that I can get on to maintenance no matter how grizzly it sounds to have the BCG treatment or how the side effects kick in. You'd rather have that than the alternative.

I spoke to a friend who has 12 tablets a day and he asked the Doctor could he possibly give some of them a miss - the Doctor replied "If you want to die, yes".

We agreed that this was a pretty compelling reason to take the tablets! Even I - who hates any drugs at all - now take my tablets.

Reflections on the week

Well it was a good week - I suppose anything would be compared to the last few weeks. Things finally started to come good and so work looks a lot better. I'm away later this week off to Scotland for a few days which will be interesting as it marks the launch of the business into the public domain.

This should also mean that I start to get some cash flow into the business as well - always useful.

However - the downside is that I am so tired. I had been out 5 days out of 6 and so that probably didn't help things. So overall I am getting far more positive (despite the fact that it is less than three weeks before I go back in for biopsies) but I am feeling quite tired.

I am surprised (still) how much it has taken out of me.

Tired

I've been out to Dover and back today and last night I was with another perspective partner for the business.

I am as tired as you like this evening. I had a few minutes snooze earlier - an early night is in order.

I'm still surprised quite how much stamina I have lost. I can't keep going for long periods of time working as I used to nor can I recover as quickly. I'm hoping that keeping well will help and exercising just add to that.

Out with the old school chums

Last night, that was good except we have a new barman who put brandy in a scotch glass and vice versa. That made for an interesting first taste!

A good evening - I do get really tired these days - it never used to be like this and whilst many have less sleep I appear to be sleeping longer.

So how do I tell someone

To go and stick their asinine problem where the sun don't shine.

You go and do a batch of voluntary work only for some idiot to start digging you out.

I can't believe this guy - I've sorted out bucket loads of problems for him/them in my own time and all he can do is wag the finger at me. I ought to break that off and shove it up his - oh well you get the picture.

Never teach a pig to sing - it takes ages and upsets the pig :-)

Just like a Pro

Met up with some "older" folks at the Jazz night (as you do). We were chatting about how they haven't seen me since April and what had happened etc.

We were rattling off drug names, side effects and Mg taken etc., like no ones business. Gee it is going to be great getting old as long as you can pronounce (or even remember) what medication you are on, how much you are taking, what the side effects are, how you react to them and how many doctors you know.

I couldn't compete - in a drug filled Olympics for how many tablets consumed in a day I am just a young upstart a mere amateur! LONG may it remain so.

An evening out

On my own - well with some friends - but on my own (without the family).

Off to a Jazz night - I used to be a regular but missed a lot of these because of the treatments.

Looking forward to some decent beer and music - in that order.

The Okey Cokey ISP

In - out - in - out.

All day long the internet is there and then it isn't - what a way to run a business.

Another 2 hours worth of mucking about and finally I am re-connected.

Back to Normal - almost

Wife and girls out of the house. All quiet, no shouting up and down the stairs, no opposing music styles being played in different rooms.

Finally peace and quiet and what happens? Yes, the internet ups and dies and I've spent the past couple of hours sorting that out again.

Virgin Media - pile of poo more like...

Jane Tomlinson

When I said a few weeks back that my friend and I were sitting talking and using the word fraud about ourselves and how we had survived our cancer, I hadn't got an example but today with the sad news about Jane Tomlinson's passing - you might better understand what I mean. This was one feisty lady when told she hadn't got long to live - she spent her last years cramming in a lot of fund raising and awareness work.

Her obituary is HERE. An ordinary mum and housewife who went on to do extraordinary things and to raise over £1.5M.

Looking up

This week has been a little better than I could have imagined. At last some movement on the partners for the business.

At last some people who are actually aware that they have got to put some work into an idea to get some money out the other end.

Signatures going onto paper and after all is said and done a healthy number of enquiries as well.

You know you are getting old when

Your daughter calls you in the morning to tell you that she just passed her driving test! Good grief - she has just dropped her mum off at work and is driving home on her own - brave girl. I wouldn't have fancied doing that (driving solo) less than an hour after passing my test.

A New Week

Let's see how we get on. Businesses should be back at work this week, kids back at school or college.

It has started already so perhaps I'll get some work done after all.

See?

1:30 in the morning and I can't say I'm wanting to be awake but I am. I'm thinking of nothing much in particular. I've decided to get up rather than disturb and I've found my way in here to see that one of my PCs has seized up - only the one running an overnight batch job (of course) so I'll have to do that another day.

I'm annoyed about some of the petty things that happen in life and I guess there is a bit of me realising that the kids are growing up - oldest has her driving test on Tuesday!

I'm just getting old and don't want to. I also am having the mid life bit - you know - I've probably lived for longer than I'm going to live :-)

I have a very bad brain for that sort of thing :-)

Anyone want to say pull yourself together or anything equally crass - get in line!

What the hell is wrong with me

Having got the last bit off of my chest - perhaps I ought to get back to the reality of the situation and that is I am beginning to use the "D" word and recognising that I am actually quite depressed at the moment. The euphoria of being out of imminent danger has worn off. The huge life style change hasn't really happened.

Nothing is quite as I want it to be. It is all somewhat of a let down at the moment. Don't give me any of the old, your lucky, you survived and all that as it isn't that. It is a whole combination of things and events all happening at once. It is the realisation that things move on. That I probably won't change the world. That so many things that may have appeared important actually no longer are. It is the realisation that perhaps I've taken a turning off of the road that my friends and family are travelling along and I'm now lost somewhere.

Whatever it is - I know I'm here and I know when to ask for help, the trouble is it is very personal. It is also a spiral thing in that you get worse when you try to pull yourself out of it. I'm not in a bad one, don't get me wrong, I'm just having difficulty keeping everything together, in some sort of perspective and in some sort of order based on how "really" important or urgent each of these things to be done or sorted out actually are. It is also to do with the next hospitalisation and how inconvenient that is.

I also believe that you'll only understand this if you have gone through something similar - it won;t make sense if you've had your tonsils out or some such thing,

Things that make your blood boil

I have a guy at the moment who wanted to know about partnering with my new business. Now - remembering that this is a business that has been invested in for 2 years by a number of people who haven't seen a return yet and are therefore - what I term - real entrepreneurs. This arse is upset that I've sent him a document where he actually has to invest some capital to get money out the other end.

I am SO looking forward to this "entrepreneur" calling me tomorrow. As you can imagine I will be my charming and considerate self.

OK - maybe not. There is no such thing as a free meal. People who think that they can make money by not putting in any effort need to go back to their day jobs. It is a sad fact that 80% of the people I meet who call themselves entrepreneurs don't even have standard Employers and Employees and Public liability insurance. None of them know about basic health and safety at work, legal and statutory requirements or anything else but have the damn right audacity to tell me that they are entrepreneurs. I wouldn't trust many of them to sit the right way up on a toilet (thanks Rowan Atkinson).

There are so many people you meet who are just a total waste of Oxygen. Unfortunately what I'd like to do to them is illegal but a Vet would get away with it if it were an animal!

Getting towards "that" time

Almost a year ago when I was told I'd have to go in again. That was about now but the Op was 18th September I think. That was the one where I should have been in for a day and when I woke up they'd turned me into RoboCop :-0 well, maybe not.

That was the one that prompted this blog but, if I am truthful about it, that was probably the defining operation and meeting as it showed that the cancer was limited to the bladder, showed the kidneys were OK and the operation got rid of nearly all the really nasty stuff that was in there. I then had the treatment, the next operation and this last lot of treatment. It is amazing to me that a year has gone by already and that I am going to be back in for yet another operation. It seems a lot shorter time than that but the dates don't lie.

So heading towards anniversary two - that operation was a complete surprise to me but - it is standard practice so I understand to re- do the area and whilst I was somewhat beaten up after that - at least I was given every opportunity to survive. You can't ask for much more.

I'm nowhere near as worried about going in this October. I'd rather not but there is no option. It now becomes a matter of fact going in for operations. If anything, it gets slightly easier because you know the worst is over (unless they find something nasty you wont have to go through the hell of the first two ops). There's still the stress to deal with but that is probably manageable now and again, because you know what to expect, you can work your way around that too.

It will also be fun trying to find out what "rules" they will apply this time before they let you go home! I must remember to ask what the rules are so I can cover that one - they changed each time so far depending who was in charge. Inevitably, once I do get home I'll be laid up for a week anyway but let's hope that it is good news and this is the last time I need to go in under general anaesthetic. Mind you - having this sort of thing done under a local is no fun either.

Having said all this - you do start to get stressed out a bit as you get nearer the date.

Same old same old

Had my mum phone up yesterday saying that I sounded a bit down on Thursday - which is true. I'm a bit better now than I was but it is a combination of things that are working all at once.

Not enough time - but when I do get time it gets wasted on trivial things like PCs which are still irritating the hell out of me especially as I can;t get pictures off of my video camera onto the PC - heaven alone knows what is going on with the PC as I can hear it whirring away and there are no programmes active! Then there is the unofficial help desk - another friend needs their PC sorted out - that takes time and I don't say no often enough.

Somewhere along the line I have got to put my foot down and also drop off some of the things that I am doing.

At least some good news on the job front with my first partner signed up on Monday and with a bit of luck my second later in the week. That will be a relief.

I may be repeating myself repeating myself

I had a long chat with my mate again today and we were commiserating about our current lack of physical and mental strength and the things we are doing to pull that around.

It isn't crushingly depressing or a feeling of being totally wasted. An imbalance perhaps we felt, listlessness and tiredness. Then there is the get up and go - which has done just that and got up and gone :-)

He is getting a lot of physiotherapy and nutrition assistance. I'm not but it is interesting nonetheless how similar we are feeling and when you consider that we both went through our procedures within weeks of each other, it makes you wonder whether there is a pattern to surviving or perhaps comabtting cancer. We are in a similar state time wise but he had far more radical surgery than I did and he no longer has to worry about whether or not he will get cancer back as there is nothing left there.

And our conclusions? Well - We went through the experience and we have changed (a lot) but no one else around us has changed. It is difficult to carry on as normal when normal is no longer normal to us. It is like entering a very slightly parallel universe. Only you know you've moved slightly out of synchronisation with everyone else (like a badly dubbed movie).

It is a most peculiar thing to explain but it does feel as if day to day there is something not quite right about things - perhaps we feel we shouldn't be here or worse still - we felt we may be "frauds" as we didn't have all the hair loss and bag of bones looks so many people seem to believe that you should when you have cancer?

Anyway - it gives us plenty of reasons for talking and going down the pub so that is alright then! :-)

Further exploration of the dark side

The Black Dog - as my friend explained is now called Toby. The Black Dog visits every now and then and I suppose is his version of the black or dark cloud or the grim reaper or some such thing.

When the Black Dog turns up you can:

• Burst into tears for no reason at all
• Get all choked up watching emotional stuff on TV or Cinema
• Get all choked up when you see someone achieve something (like an athlete winning) you know what they went through in a way
• Go very quiet and hide away from people
• Have to get out of rooms quickly when you get all emotional
• Act less than rationally when confronted with something slightly out of the norm
• Get horrible dreams about things that happened, haven't happened, aren't likely to happen
• Wake up in the middle of the night and cannot get to sleep - then wonder why you feel so tired when you are at work the next day but you still can't sleep when you get home
• Start to worry about what may happen when it hasn't happened and may not be likely to
• Worry that any ailment whatsoever is cancer of whatever area of your body is suffering at the time (this can get tiresome). Have a cough or a sore throat or your arm hurts or you get an ache and immediately it is cancer (I kid you not when you are in this sort of mood everything is like this)
• General malaise

I'm sure there are lots more and the level of these emotions goes from mild to extreme. They can come and go with alarming speed. The Black Dog can get you when you least expect it to.

It happens less these days of course but you get occasional visits which can take you unaware and shake you to your core.

My recent nightmare? I'm being led out to the scaffold to be hung. Preacher and guards and all. My crime? Apparently I survived - that is it. That's a pretty shaky one to wake up to and I've had this one at least 4 or 5 times this past month.

You don't really need that sort of thing but your brain decides that you probably do and torments you with it anyway.

I'm certain that it is quite normal for survivors to go through this sort of stuff and so I'm not worried about it but it is worth saying it happens and it is something additional to watch out for.

On a lighter note

At least the internet hasn't gone down for 6 days now!

Exploration of the dark side - revisited

It was strange talking to my friend last week about how work was running us down and that we weren't as fit as we thought we were. To look at us you wouldn't notice but long term things like stamina both mental and physical aren't there.

It is easy to drop into a state of "being the victim" which I know sounds crude but is meant to be the state of mind you get into sometimes. I think people survive things because they believe they can and there are documented cases on that - not too many on those that just played the victim though I guess. Things like the job the lulls and the disappointment - yes disappointment of getting back to work. Things no longer meet your expectations and that includes work, family, friends, and just about everything else. You've gone through loads of stuff, you want and deserve better. That is what coming out the other end does to you as well. The only person that actually got you through it was yourself (sure there was support - but did you take the shots?).

I said before that there was a lot of "Self" in fighting the disease, a lot of me, me, me and the combination of all these things. It is strange that I'll be beating myself up for not meeting my expectations and I'll be feeling down because something didn't happen as I wanted or expected it to.

This stage of things is quite strange and I'm in this sort of no mans land at the moment. In a month I'll have my pre-op assessment and 5 weeks away is the next operation so I'm beginning to see that looming large on the horizon. I'll have to take it easy all over again and then wait for the results. Those results are pretty important this time as a positive result will get me onto maintenance. We don't want to know what a negative result will bring do we :-) So there's doubt there as well to contend with.

Will all this change the world? Probably not - so it isn't worth worrying about really!

An Interesting Web Site

Recommended by a friend of mine

An alternative take on your health

Mercola

Bladder Cancer Bioinfomatics Research in Australia

Perhaps some hope for future sufferers?

One to grind out I feel

This week that is. I'm a bit better than I was yesterday. It is like walking through treacle at the moment. Business is so slow but it is peak holiday time and so it is to be expected but it would be good to get some momentum going and get something achieved.

It looks doubtful that it will happen this side of the weekend and so I'll keep plodding away and perhaps next week will be better.

So how am I feeling?

I'm not feeling particularly confident or my usual buoyant self this week. There just seems to be so much to do and I really cannot be arsed to do it. I'd be quite happy to take the rest of the week off and start again next week.

SO far just about everything I have touched has turned to poo :-)

I'll probably feel a bit brighter in the morning.

Slow slow week

Some people still on holiday and some back but catching up on what has happened whilst they have been away. It makes for a long hard week of little or no contact, people not wanting to answer phones or call you back.

It is going to be one of those weeks I am afraid.

Crossroads / Decisions / Future Directions

Yes - it is that time already.

Almost three months are up soon and that is the decision point I set myself on this new job.

I need to make and take some key decisions soon as I ought to be thinking whether I want to have an easy life, an exciting one or just "retire" now :-)

Procrastination sets in already and I'd like to give myself a further month because of all the time I lost with the treatment and the loss of Internet service.

Do I need to convince myself, those around me, you or all three?

That sounded worse than it was

The previous post that is. It wasn't meant to read quite as depressed as it did.

I'd had one of "those" days when I wrote that and was on my own most of the time. Today that won't be quite the same as we are all going out later to a friend's barbecue.

I suppose it did expose some of the frustrations of everyone else getting on with their lives around you and sometimes no one knows what you went through. That's my problem by the way - not anyone else's.

The Importance of being Me..

I realised more today than for a while quite how "lonely" I am. I'm far more insular these days than I was whether by design or accident. I long for some attention but if no one understands what to say or how to say it to me then it may prove difficult.

Friends are fine and are great to be with, not being with your family for hours at a time is not so good. I'm normally happy with my own company but today I could have benefited with a few more minutes of seeing the family.

Saturday

Bored stupid today. Everyone doing their own thing, I've given up getting the PC to record a video properly - I have no idea what has happened to it - it used to work fine. I really cannot be bothered to do much about it or to fiddle with the settings yet again.

It is too nice outside to be in so I suppose I could go and sit out there and read a book. It has been one of those weeks I think, I've taken a lot out of myself and I don't really want to do anything at all and yet I've this nagging voice at the back of my head chastising me for having a lazy day.

Further thoughts on the dark side

Strange as it may seem, I tend to get quite long periods of feeling down and equally long periods of being very upbeat. What I also get, and this is the more disturbing, are random thoughts and almost taunting, cruel thoughts at any time of the day or night, without warning.

The darkest and nastiest being things about how that little cough is probably lung cancer or throat cancer or how I've somehow let somebody else down or treated someone bad or that sort of thing. It doesn't sound like much when I write it down but these thoughts are made up in my own head and you'd have thought that I was cursing my worst enemy the stuff I think about.

I think we all think things that are critical of our behaviour or things, that with hindsight, we could have or should have done better at - but this is nasty stuff. Down to "you cheated death" and that sort of level!

I don't know if beating yourself up mentally is part of the normal territory - I think it probably is. It works on many levels of course and flash backs and re-living things is one, putting stuff out of your mind is another and this taunting is another. I'm sure I'll think of some more stuff as well.

Somewhere there is an upside which is the relief at getting over some of the horrible stuff. I'm also feeling that more now than I did at the time, either I need to as I shut it out or I've heard so many people telling me what horrible things happened to me I am beginning to believe it :-)

I'm glad I only did people and work psychology. All this stuff may mean that I need a shrink :-)

You don't get counselled

My friend and I were chatting about this and whilst he was told a lot about his condition and what was going to happen he had plenty of information about the procedure and the recovery but very little about the emotional side. His cancer would produce perhaps a more emotional response as it would affect his life and activities. I had an inkling what was going on but I learnt more afterwards. I was told enough to know what I had and what was going to be done in my TURBT operation and also the IVU. So neither of us received a "here is how this will mess with your brain" talk.

At no point though did anyone one talk to me about "living with cancer" or what it means to me or what I ought to be aware of. It is different to other things you get as I've mentioned before, it isn't as if you have one operation or two and that is it. There is something far deeper going on. The dark side (OK I sound like Darth Vader) but there is a lot of mental stuff to deal with. It isn't like those movies you see. There is the healing process of the body and the mind. However, you just get on and deal with it. In fact - I'd have liked to have known a little more. I knew enough to know what I was going through at the time but not what I'd go through afterwards. All of my knowledge has been gleaned from the Internet and downloading some very good NHS and other pamphlets.

But nowhere have i found the bit to deal with how you react to this yourself and how you affect others around you by your behaviour.

It is almost as if it is an elitist club - unless you have had cancer you have little idea what someone has actually gone through. I couldn't imagine what it would be like to have gone through what my friend had but some parts were common and not nice. To have had any of these things happen is bad enough but to experience the dreams and thoughts and dark moods are a part no one tells you about.

I've always viewed "counselling" suspiciously but having now been forced to sit on the other side of the fence I can see why it can be useful.

Here we go again

The Internet went down again last night and I eventually managed to get things restored about midnight. The disruption this causes is amazing as so much of my work centres on having a stable IT environment to allow me to do my work. Whilst I have a number of PCs which I've logically separated into various businesses and personal the effect of not having the internet on the way I use my applications and the way not having the internet destabilises those applications does make me acutely aware of how much we or perhaps I rely on technology to be able to do my job.

Maybe I should pack it all in and go back to being an electrician? Mind you I'd probably need digital test equipment and a PC to do the work there as well :-(

It could be an interesting deterrent for people - if you do anything wrong they would take away your satellite TV and PC connection and mobile and land phone!

Cheered a little

I went out with a friend who also had surgery for cancer at about the same time. He is still recovering from the actual operation but has no cancer now.

It was a nice lunchtime meeting in this dismal weather but I was interested that he is also having a bad time at the moment, dreams and nightmares and lots of concerns and worries.

It must be something to do with cancer and how last year we both refused to believe or worked out that all the nastiness was happening to someone else. Perhaps now - it is dawning on us that we had pretty serious things happen to us which were a lot more than we made out.

We also concluded that we were quite different people now, less tolerant of stupidity and time wasters and less worried about things in general. The trouble was that we were probably beginning to show that to people and were becoming quite dismissive of some of them.

We sort of concluded that you probably wouldn't have thought like this unless you had been through the stuff we had. Expecting anyone who hadn't had cancer to understand what we were feeling was quite difficult.

Not having the greatest week

I have to admit to being somewhat down in the dumps these past few days. I'm concerned that the job isn't going as well as I'd like it to but it is holiday season and people aren't around and no one wants to make a decision.

Additionally I'm sure that the sheer frustration of my PC problems and also the phone went on the blink yesterday also contributed to a pretty dismal August - the weather isn't helping either.

Getting things done is like walking through treacle at the moment. A bank holiday weekend coming up and so perhaps I should just abandon all of these problems for a few days and come back "refreshed" ready to sort it out on Tuesday?

6 hours

It is 2:30 or so in the morning and I have been waiting 6 hours for my PC to burn a DVD - that is not how long it took to put the stuff into the program it is how long it has taken to encode it and finally burn it. However, feeling the heat coming out of the fan I decided that I couldn't let it run unattended.

I hate IT sometimes.

Who would have thought

That in this day and age it would be so difficult to get things done? So far today it has taken some 6 hours to download 40 minutes of digital (digital) video, convert it and burn it to a DVD. I have enough computing power at my disposal to tackle most thing but (apparently) digital video manipulation is different. I've had codecs interfering with converters and I've got AVI and MPEG files all over the place.

I'd like to tell you what the DVD actually looks like but so far it has taken an hour just to encode it!

You certainly don't want to hold your breath on these. It used to be easy with VCR - plug in the camera, turn on the tape - job done. DVDs need chapters added and encoding and converting and all that good stuff.

It never ceaes to amaze me just how difficult we can make easy things. Perhaps it is the IT industry doing a "Jobs worth" on us?

The little nag at the back of your mind

I think this is something to do with the "territory" that once you get something like cancer and you (kind of) get away with it - there is a nag at the back of your mind that suggests:

1. You are susceptible to getting cancer so you could get some other form
2. This will come back
3. You are more likely to get something else serious
4. Your life will be shortened.

Yes - I know - but that is how you think. I know that I cannot have this particular cancer spread and that I am monitored more now than I ever have been. It is just one of those things, like the sword of Damocles.

It sort of worries me but not enough to keep me awake at night, it just nags away when I have too much time to myself.

Getting back on subject

Has been pretty difficult these past few weeks. The trials and tribulations of the network problems are just about beginning to shake themselves out and slowly things are returning to normal but ever so slowly.

Today - two weeks on I am still having to run utilities to clean up the PCs.

So I hope that after today the blog can get back on track a bit.

Nothing is ever easy

Still I am messing around trying to get my PCs to behave themselves. It has been two weeks of messing around that I could have done without and I've had to undertake a number of re-boots and rescans. I've almost had to rebuild my main PC.

I#m hoping that tomorrow I can get back on with some work as the disruption has been marked these past two weeks and with the holiday I have lost a month's effort almost.

So - I need no more trouble with my PCs from tomorrow onwards.

Catching up

I have been trying unsuccessfully to sort out the photos and videos from the holiday. The PCs going on and off have totally scuppered attempts to capture videos, change them to the right format and to burn them to DVD.

The worst thing is you have to wait so long and often the results are variable to say the least. Silly things like an e-mail coming through or opening up an application can throw the recording and so you have to leave the PC to go and do its own thing. Then the PC decides to hibernate and the next shot is ruined.

I shall keep persevering, the videos and photos look great - getting them onto external media so other people can see is the difficult bit!

Some Drink

Wow.

Well - it is gone midnight! There is very little money in my wallet. I have just had to have cooked myself:
A Toasted Bacon Sandwich, with grated cheese, tomato sauce and just bordering on the crispy side - back bacon.

Now that IS a great night out n'est pas?

Cheers K! I wish my wife would come and pick me up from the pub at chucking out time - you don't know how lucky you are. It was also very civilised of you to give me a lift home even though I said I would walk :-)

OK - Who's next?

Hic!

Off down the pub

Well it seems like the only civilised thing to do on a Friday night after the two weeks of chaos I returned to. I've had 4 or is it 5 blue screens from one of my PCs today. Each time that is a full systems check to make sure nothing is broken (software wise).

So a friend phoned and said did I fancy a pint. I nearly ripped his arm off - do I ever fancy a pint. I'm off in 5 minutes

Yippee.

Two weeks trials and tribulations

I hope have now come to an end as the internet has behaved itself for 24 hours now. I had a look at some of the forums online and many people were suffering problems. Some reckon that it is all to do with the new upgrade to super-speed broadband coming later this year.

Whatever it is - it is a damned nuisance as my productivity has been at best a few hours a day and trying to catch up when all you have are crashing PCs and various stuff in a state of being powered up or down has been tiresome to say the least. Today, finally, I have been able to get a few hours of uninterrupted work done. With a bit of luck by this time next week I will have run far enough, fast enough to have caught up.

At least it keeps my mind off of other things I suppose :-)

The song in my head

Finally we tracked it down. On the Ship they did introductions to your ports of call and there were slide shows with nice photos and "this music" that just seemed appropriate and fitted with the scenery and the "mood" of the holiday. I think the holiday can be said to have a mood or a feeling about it.

Anyway, we had been racking our brains. Id heard it before and A had taken a snip on her mobile phone so we managed to pull out a few lyrics. So it snapped yesterday that I thought it sounded a bit like Enya and I played a bit of Caribbean Blue and Orinoco Flow. We then looked it up and our "theme for the holiday" turned out to be......

Enya and "Anywhere Is" - so with one of my birthday vouchers we purchased "Paint the Sky with Stars" or Enya's Greatest Hits and now we have played it to pieces.

However, it really does still bring a bit of a lump to my throat and makes the hairs stand up on my arms when I remember the photos of Iceland set to this music - Cool!

F1, F1, F1

Or as the IT types might recognise Help, Help, HELP.

This morning it finally looks as if the internet is back properly and the past few day's worth of e-mails are happily downloading and I can actually get in to see this site and a number of others which appear to have remained hidden.

Looking at the service page there appears to have been some very serious outages and some areas lost their TV as well as their Internet. The disruption - almost two weeks of it has been incredible and it worries me that I am quite as reliant on this technology for communication and work as I am. What are the alternatives? Well we used to do fine with letters, phones and telex, no mobile phones, bleepers, PDAs, PCs or anything - now I am sounding old - I can even remember all gathering in amazement around my mate's desk when he bought his first calculator - it was a week's wages and was brilliant. Now you can pick these up for a few pounds.

I must stop this I am obviously getting old - which reminds me - don't the policemen look young. Doh!

Short of

Bolting a thumping great copper cable to some server - I can't see that my internet chums - Virgin Media or NT Hell are doing that well. Let me see it is now 10 days of disruption and I have no e-mail and I've been without the internet for perhaps 6 hours or more today.

I'm resigning myself to the fact that this will probably continue for a little while longer.

Short of pinging their server every few seconds I'm not certain how else I can keep the connection from crashing and making me go through a now - well rehearsed routine or routines to get service back.

"Our engineers are aware of and working for a resolution to this problem" hardly seems reassuring. A glance at their web site shows massive outages all over the country. Lord alone knows what other NT Hell and Virgin Media customers must be going through.

My blogging activities are being seriously curtailed - sorry about that. If you would like to complain about that - then I have set up a premium phone number that you can ring and pay an extortionate amount whilst I slowly take your details, check your account, ask you some stupid security question and then take you through all of the steps you've already been through (because you aren't stupid are you?) and then at the end of that I might agree with you that your opening statement was in fact correct!

Getting Started

It is really difficult to get myself motivated to get going. I had two meetings yesterday which were very good, a bit longer than I wanted them to be and so another day went begging.

Today I am trying to catch up on the lost production of last week and the difficult thing is prioritising it. Last week it would have been quite easy to sort out as all I needed to do was to tackle things in order and get one out of the way at a time. Now - well everything needs to be done at once. Oh the fun of it all. The fall out from the IT problems is also that I have been fiddling around with the IT settings to ensure that firewalls and the like wouldn't block getting me reconnected. Now I have had to reset all the settings and to learn a few new skills especially now that I have a remote firewall.

All good fun :-) NOT.

I beginning to feel a lot better as well now. I've lost almost 1 kilo this week and sensible eating and a bit of exercise seem to have helped. Anyway, I can't keep on chatting to you all day - back to work!

Health Update

I appear to have 'gotten over' last week's dizzy spells and just not feeling me - "A Change in the Water" as my Mum would have me believe!

I think it was getting my land legs back and the massive change in eating habits. You really can eat for your country on board. I also have had it confirmed that the ship shouldn't have been that bad and vibrating as much as it did - which I'm certain is the root cause of all of this.

So other than that I've realised it isn't too long to go until I get back into the swing of things and get my next lot of tests. I haven't done my exercises since I've been back but I intend to change that in the next day or so. I've cut back my food to what I used to eat before the holiday and so now I need to get back into the routines I had before.

That is about it for now. The Internet has been up all day so far and let's hope it stays that way. I'm hopeful of actually getting some work done tomorrow.

And on the seventh day

He was still re-booting PCs, routers, cable modems and reviewing the status notices which still do not mention this particular problem.

Seven days! So apologies for no real meaningful posts apart from those aimed at keeping me sane.

I hope that this will change this week..

Still Having Connectivity Problems

Sorry folks,

I am still having intermittent disconnection problems with the ISP. So far today we have suffered about 10 outages. I am DEFINATELY going to have a sense of humour failure tomorrow, I've worked hard for it, I need one and I just deserve it. After all - I believe that NTL or Virgin Media should have the benefit of my experience of being a customer of theirs.

Hopes for a calming weekend

After a week of battling with minor officialdom and people who are not paid to use their initiative and with businesses who upset their customers I think that I ought to take a calming down weekend.

Frankly I lost the whole week to having no real IT and I have written that off ready to start on Monday. It looks to be set fair for the weekend so beer and barbecue would appear to be the order of the day.

I'm going outside now - I may be some time!

Faroe Islands, Iceland and Norway

Wonderful destinations and each different. Of all though Norway was how I thought it would be, steep fjords and waterfalls. The Faroe Islands were just enchanting - very quiet and peaceful and a nice quiet place to go. Iceland was by the far the biggest surprise. I'd expected all the geysers and boiling mud etc but it was a land of huge changes - almost every turn or valley took you to a different landscape. You could be driving through a green valley, pop over the hill and be confronted with miles of lava fields or perhaps some geysers letting off steam. I'd love to spend more time in all three places but as an independent traveller next time.

Dodging the tourists would be the difficult bit in Norway - in the Faroes and Iceland I reckon you could easily dodge them all day.

Could it possibly be

That the internet has been up all morning and that the problem is now fixed? Am I tempting fate?

I can hardly believe how much this has affected my work this week. It is now Friday afternoon and I cannot claim to have had one substantial call or conversation or to have managed to get more than a few minutes work done at a time. What with re-booting the complete network and getting all the PCs working - then finding that the internet had gone down again and having to keep on re-logging in and resetting everything I have had a total sense of humour failure this week, no work done and I am going to write off this week entirely.

Ho hum!

Owww - Cramps

2 am. One leg and then the other, fell out of bed in agony! It still hurts this morning. It has been threatening all week and I have been feeling my calf muscle twinging but blimey did that ever hurt. I haven't had that for years and years.

It could be related to this cold/flu/dizzy stuff or perhaps the Statins which apparently have cramp as a side effect :-(

Anyway - I suppose the better news is that the internet is back working and I am not having to spend all day booting and re-bootings PCs, Routers and Cable Modems! Will have to see how that goes on today.

Peculiar

Still feeling quite peculiar - still a little dizzy and disorientated. I'm sure the IT issues haven't helped but I'm sure this has to do with finding my land legs again.

I hope so I sure don't want to feel like I do at the moment for much longer it is quite disturbing as when sitting you can feel your body shaking and when standing moving from side to side, almost imperceptibly but you can definitely feel it.

NT Hell

What an utter nightmare the last few days have been. Trying to resolve what should be an easy issue. Finally, we got somewhere today and had to "bite the bullet" and pay 25p to report the fault. This after having checked the service announcements (looked at the service announcements online - helpful but if you can't connect a bit pointless).

After dealing with whoever from Mumbai - it turns out that IT IS NTL/Virgin Media's problem after all - it isn't on their announcements on the phone which I have diligently checked. The Internet is back on line now (not sure for how long though they expect another 48 hours worth of trouble).

To say I was getting irate would be an understatement - some-body's head was going to get chewed up the way things were going and no one was interested - customer support is now outsourced at 25p a minute, reporting a fault - 25p a minute - what is that all about.

Luckily they have decided to refund the cost of my phone call - bit it was a known fault and frankly it was driving me utterly mental trying to solve it as the acknowledgement page said that all was OK and yet after re-booting PCs, Modems and Routers (all in sequence) the same provisioning screen kept turning up and then every now and then the Internet would come back and I'd re-boot the PCs around the house and re-set everything only for it to go down again.

I am one very unhappy camper. You'd have thought Branson and his army would have brought some sense and sanity to the customer service department - perhaps some over ambitious number crunching, greasy pole climbing spotty Herbert after consulting his life coach made an executive decision to screw up the people that pay for the service. Perhaps I should go back to BT? Now there's something I never thought I'd say!

Holiday

The holiday was great, no doubt about it I am 3 Kg heavier :-(

There is a lot to be said for cruising and - possibly because we have always independently travelled - quite a bit that we didn't particularly like as well.

The stuff we didn't like included:

Excursions - a necessary evil to give you a flavour of the places you are visiting - you are at the mercy of the other 40 odd people in your party.

Lots of people - we are used to staying in remote farm houses or on board our own Canal Boat or in an RV or something similar. We are not used to so many people being around us. Not that the ship was crowded just lots of people.

The Ship was a "bit tired" it shook and rolled more than perhaps a larger or newer vessel.


Stuff we liked:

The ports of call were fantastic

The food was good

You were made to feel special

The scenery came to you at a slow pace.

So where did he get to?

Well.......

My Internet router died on Sunday and I could just about use the Internet as long as I was three inches from the wireless antenna!

On Monday we got a new Router and then my trouble started:

1. I really haven't felt well since I got home - I felt a lot worse on Monday and yesterday
2. My provider (not recognising the MAC address of my new PC(s)) wouldn't let me connect
3. When I did manage to get connected it wouldn't let me set up the router and I had to go through the re-connection process again ( a BIG pain as it demands renaming PCs, re-entering Pins and passwords and all that, re-booting PCs, Modems etc.

So finally today I used my old PC and set that up downstairs and managed to sort out the router, the pcs and now I am back to where I was on Saturday afternoon/Sunday morning trying to catch up with 1500+ e-mails.

I'm feeling a bit better but still quite dizzy and with a sore throat. A friend reckons that the dizziness is having come off the Ship and getting used to being back on land - which may well be right. I remember that even when we have been on Canal boat holidays.

I could do without the swaying which I am still doing now!

Back on Dry Land

Trying to get used to this sun and heat here. We had a great time. No time to put too much on here now -more as the week goes on as we are off to a birthday party now - my friend's 60th!

Needless to say - had a great time, fascinating places we visited and things we got up to.

The Quiet Blog

See you all soon - cruise awaits.

In all the excitement

I'm not sure I actually said what I meant to say at the end of my party.

At the end I said that I had been diagnosed exactly a year before and that I'd got the clear about 10 weeks ago. I think I said how glad I was to be there and celebrate that with everyone.

However, what I don't think I said and I had planned to was to thank everyone for "looking out" for me and being there and sending e-mails and calling me and taking me out for a beer and all the good things they did to help me out. It was very important to me then and is important to me now. I think they know and I'll thank them individually when I see them as well.

Sense of Humour Required

As some may know we are off on a cruise tomorrow.

Tonight's film on TV was..................


Titanic

:-)

What a great night

Twas my 50th Birthday party and I shared that with an old chum of mine from school days.

What a brilliant evening. I had a great time and celebrated my birthday in style surrounded by family and friends and I didn't get too squiffy :-)

I got some great presents too - people are really imaginative about such things - I wish I was sometimes.

Right - that is enough from me for the moment - I hope to spend the rest of the day doing next to nothing except packing.

1st Anniversary

By this time last year I knew that I had bladder cancer and was probably reading the leaflet the gave me. I had by the early afternoon a phone call giving me an appointment on the following Tuesday. Those days were a blur. Explaining to my Mother that I had Cancer wasn't easy. I remember using all the soothing and upbeat words and actually thinking the opposite of what I was saying.

So tonight - should I wear the "I'm not dead yet!" Tee Shirt? I think I should.

Curious

I've been looking at this label and - is it me - or is this just plain obvious?

Bizarre!

Sleep - As evasive as ever

I didn't have the problem I normally have on a Tuesday night (there's a clue then!) as I didn't have treatment on Monday.

Tonight though I'm yawning away but can i get to sleep! No chance. I think I have done the usual and worked all day long on the PC and that has just meant that my brain is too active doing figures and answering e-mails.

I have no doubt that I will sleep Saturday night and in to Sunday!!

Some sort of anniversary

Tomorrow - when I have my birthday party with my friends it will be a strange old day.

By 10 a.m. on the 21st July 2006 I knew that I had Bladder Cancer and my journey began. It seems a strange quirk of fate that Lynne's memorial service will be tomorrow and also that my party will be on the same day. The next anniversary is the 25th July when I had the operation to take out the tumour. My the year has flown by really and it hardly seems possible that all the things that have happened to me - actually DID happen to me.

Anyway, I shall try not to dwell on that but rather on enjoying my party tomorrow.

Winding Down now

I really have had enough now and I have a few more work tasks to do and then I am going to get on to the personal ones.

Tomorrow is going to be hectic. I want to enjoy my party but the organisation and logistics make it that I'll probably be knackered by the time it starts.

At least Sunday should be good as I can relax with the F1 Grand Prix, the Open and Tour de France (unless it is a rest day).

Treatment fades into the distance

But quite surprisingly I can still feel how tender everything is. I should have remembered from last time that it took a good few weeks to slowly build myself back to my exercise regime.

The Ship has a fully fitted Gym and so I am planning to spend a little time in there slowly building myself back up to fitness. Although I will only be going very slowly as I can feel pulling now when I walk up and down stairs especially.

It is quite frustrating having to wait for things to get back to normal - it just seems to take so long.