Tuesday and I wake up to find my partner still home due to a cancelled physio appointment. She brings me a hot water and then goes off to the gym to do an aqua session. I get up and make myself a muesli breakfast and take my morning meds. My muscles are aching after the last two days training so I take some time to update my journal and prepare it for the coming month. by late morning I am fully organised and prepared. I get into my training kit and wonder if I am doing the right thing, there is always the anxiety that if I over do it I might induce the dread blood in the urine but I am willing to chance it as the benefits outweigh the down side. The garage is cold even though the weather forecast said it was going to be in the 70s. I strap into the rower set the session for 20 minutes, put my ear buds in and tune into Sophie Elis-Bextor’s Kitchen Disco and get under way. It feels a tough session, my body complains but I realise at the 10 minute mark I am doing okay and might improve on yesterdays session. Being driven I pull harder and faster with the result that I do indeed exceed the previous sessions this week. This is a typical case of no gain without pain, not a view I necessarily agree within this case it fits the situation.

So my body was feeling rough but produces a session that is the best yet since I went back to training. I take that that to mean that there is potential to get back to a decent level of fitness. It provides the motivation to continue with my efforts, my diet and water only intake. I wonder if I will be able to row for an hour by Christmas? After a few minutes to recover I take a shower to refresh me and give my body a treat. Feeling refreshed and revived I take to the sofa and start the draft of todays blog. I have been looking on the internet at where my poetry collections get offered and I am surprised at how many stores say they offer it, a lot in America, I think. I am convinced the Americans I first dealt with ripped me off, I’ve never seen any royalties from there. Maybe nothing has ever sold, but I am suspicious.

I wander into the afternoon waiting for the return of my partner before deciding on which task to take up next. My partner returns and we decide to go for a bite to eat and a coffee. We go to a local garden centre that does good coffee and average tuna melts. Having eaten we drive to the garage next door to check my tyres but the air line was not working. I drive on and go to another garage where I check my tyres and to up my fuel tank. Once home I feel fatigued and decide to have a nap. Feeling slightly groggy I rouse myself and go and fil the bird and squirrel feeders. Between the birds and the squirrels they will eat me out of house and home. The light leads I had been waiting for get delivered and I set about making up one to put into the bathroom light that needs mending. By the time this is done its tie to eat and watch England’s football team beat a ten man team. I take my night meds early, watch the first episode of strange American thriller, The Crowded Room. I draft the blog, put the bins out and go off to bed feeling tired.