Saturday was one of those that was a hotchpotch of indulgent going out for breakfast, watching international rugby and seeing a TV drama series to its conclusion. As usual the TV drama started out on a reasonable and rational premise and descended into unlikely and plain silliness. In this case a sort of rural welsh county lines meets Breaking Bad by accident. My two tasks of any meaning was to fil my Dosettes for the coming two weeks and to perform my physio hand homework every two hours. I now have my phone clock set for a repeating two hour countdown so that I am sure to to do my 10 hand star jumps, ducks and hooks every hour. So another mundane day but one that need some effort to keep my hand and cancer routines going.

Sunday and I get up to breakfast and little to do other than book a Tesco slot, watch the last international rugby match of the weekend. I feel like I am marking time until my stitches come out of my right hand on Thursday at the hospital and I see my hand therapist on Friday. In the meantime I need to write a bit and find ways of taking exercise to ward off the worst of the chemo side effects.

Amongst my emails today was one from the Chair of the poetry stanza I go to. He has sent a proposal to the The States of Independence event organisers to suggest that the Stanza do a 45 minute slot as a celebration of the Stanzas 17th year. If it is excepted it would mean that I might get a a three minute slot to say who I am and to read one of my poems. There are two issues in this, 1, what do I say about who and what I am, and 2, which poem do I choose to read. I think I can hone the first one down to a very bony “this is me” but I am not sure how I choose one poem from the 122 that I published last year and the 20 plus that I am readying for this year?

I feel that it should be from one of my Cancer Years Collections as that is why I self published and why I continue to use poetry to contain the ongoing fight, however I am drawn to one that is about the feeling of being published for the first time and holding my own book in my hands. Its a competition between that “Ye Ha! moment of joy of first holding my first collection in my hands or something that is more painful and direct that reflects the issues around having cancer. My head says the latter my heart says the former. So I expect I shall be self indulgently re-reading my collections and trying to decide which poem to choose. It would be nice to learn it off by heart and just do it, but I am not sure I am up to that. If I decide to try I shall appear to be quite mad as I wonder around muttering to myself as I try to cram it into my brain, but first the choice must be made. If anyone has suggestions I’d like to hear them.

So my Sunday is set for poetry reading and Rugby until I realise that this is Super Bowl night. I’d really like to watch it, as the game itself is a true American spectacle but there is so much crap wrapped around so little actual game that I know I will only manage the first half before I get bored with all the non essentials hype and meaningless stuff around it and go to bed disgruntled and having my prejudices confirmed about American culture and addictions.