bank holiday Monday and I am awake and making my partner a cup of tea quite early because this is the last forecast sunny day for a while and that means its clean the pond day. So after a bit of lazing its up for breakfast and heading out into the garden. I open everything up and get to work on a very overgrown pond with a huge rooted Lilly thing that has not flowered for at least three years, if that. The pond is in a shambolic state and it is netted, which makes things harder.

It takes a long time to get ride of the old netting and the dead plants from around the edges before even trying to start on the pond itself and the giant root growth of the Lilly type thing that has completely taken over the pond. As I start to move the plants around and get rid of stuff I disturb the frogs, from the big to this years small ones.

I keep going at it until finally I have cleared away a lot of the giant root and and then I fill up the pond with water from the rain water butt enabling me to skim the floating debris off with a pond net. That’s about it, I can do no more, apart from letting it settle again and for the frogs to get homey once more.

After a short break I bite the bullet and paint the back of the Shed. Since having a new storage shed and getting rid of the old ones I have the opportunity to paint the back of the shed I’ve not had the chance to paint for over thirty years. I set to it, filling some exposed joints and then painting the back panels. By the time I finish and put everything away I am out of spoons. I retreat to the sofa and start to draft the blog before tea and an evening of the Berlin Station. I take my night meds and go to bed, looking forward to collecting the new car tomorrow. I am doing a lot because I am looking over my shoulder to see where my cancer is, I am bothered that it is another four weeks till my next oncology review and the next set of bloods and PSA measure. Until then I can only guess at what is happening to me, so I keep busy.

Saturday and I wake up and decide I need to scratch the itch that is whether or not I am going to get a new car or not. I know what car I am interested in but I will not die in a ditch if I am not happy. I am happy with my current car but I have hankered after a better driving position and looked at my option So I drive to a dealership with my partner, who is very an excellent negotiator. We wander around the cars on the dealership lot and are infuriated by the fact that the are no prices just blood QR codes to scan. A salesperson comes out to talk to us. I tell him what I am looking for, I’m very clear that I want an MG HS, petrol. manual and a 24 or 25 plate. We go inside to his desk where he pulls up some options. We selects two to look at and he goes off to get the keys. My partner and I sit in the first one and prod and poke what is prodable and pokable. We then look a second car and instantly do not like it so we go back to the first car. We start to ask questions about the car and get to the point where we return to the the salesman’s desk. I decide I want to test drive it so there is paper work to do to enable me to take it out, thankfully I have my driving licence with me. This process is taking time but eventually the car is out front and I hope in, listen to a few tips about the car. I’m not used to a car that has no manual handbrake! Very interesting. My partner and I drive off and find a straight stretch of road with some dual carriage way. The ride is smooth and the gear box good. Its a quiet and comfortable ride, clearly not as pokey as my Mazda 3 but that’s not the issue, I’m looking for comfort.

We get back to the dealership and my partner is hungry, so while the sales person is dealing with something else we go off to Lidl and buy snacks. Arriving back at the show room my partner tucks into her snack while I chat to the sales guy. The we get started, the sales person start to try and sell us extras and a load of financial shit we do not want and then my partner pulls her master stroke, she asks for a pen and paper and starts doing sums. It brilliant, I have seen her do this before and no seems to know what to do. Re run through the options, discarding all but one, and then the sales guy tries to slip in what he’s prepared to offer for my Mazda. At this point the pen goes down, we both sit back and give off ” you must be joking” vibes. I then tell him what I’ve been quoted from soem of the buying platforms and they are all more. There is some toing and froing and my partner nibbles her other snack while the sales person thinks. We of course we have budget and a price in mind and what is a good deal on my car, which I know is not at its peak performance. In the end he asks what we would close the deal and he is given a figure. I stalls and says he has to go and see what the best he can do is and whether he can get close to our figure. While he is a way I nibble a snack and discuss with my partner what we think he will come back with. We agree he will come back with a higher figurer than we suggested. He returns and to or surprise he says he can do our price including the one extra option we chose. We agree and start the paper work, its too good a deal to miss. I’m getting a late 2024 plate car with 93 miles on the clock. The model is the top of the range and has all the optional extras. Its a bit of a no brainer as the car is under a 7 year warranty or 80,000 miles. So I eventual drive home the owner of a new car.

The evening brings food and more women’s rugby followed by the rest of the available Wednesday series episodes. Night meds and bed slightly stunned by the days events and being the owner of a new car. The cars name is Elsie, as its plate starts with LC.

Sunday I wake up after a disrupted nights sleep, so I focus on admin before getting up and having a shower. Breakfast gets done and then I am organising insurance for the new car and going through the paper work. There is money to be moved and files to be sorted. Eventually I have all my ducks in a line and join my partner in the garden. My partner and eldest daughter go for a walk round the village scarecrow festival and I get on with some garden chores. There is a lot of leaf drop to rake up and some slabs to move so that there is a hard walk way to the second cold frame. Eventually I run out of spoons and need to rest. I take to the sofa and begin to drat the blog against the background of the last rugby match of the weekend.

The evening comes around with food and TV. Fatigue has caught up with me so I shall drift until I take my night meds and go to bed one night closer to collecting my new car. In the meantime I shall viewing the scarecrows.

Friday, and I am up quite early as I have a zoom meeting at 10 o’clock. So by the time the meeting comes around I have taken my meds and had breakfast. The meeting is very productive as the Ruler’s Wit team member takes me through setting up a new website specifically for my poetry. By the end of the the call the bare bones of the website is in place. There is also discussion about what the cover design could be for the upcoming anthology might be. At the same time the person who I have been lucky enough to get to write the Forward is working away on the words for that. So my projects are coming along. There was still some editing to do on the script which I got on with. As the evening comes around I cook the family a curry and uncap a beer as I settle down for the opening game of the Women’s Worlds Rugby Cup. So I watch England thrash the USA. With the excitement of the win behind me there are new Wednesday Addams episodes to watch. Finally I take my night meds and get to bed.

Thursday and I have a reasonable nights sleep behind me. I get up and get into my training gear and have my meds and breakfast. When I check my emails I am delighted to find that the person I have asked to write the Forward for the anthology has agreed to do it and I also find the latest version of the script, so I spend time during the morning editing some of the script. Once I get so far I set about filling my dosettes with my drugs for the next two weeks. This is a crucial routine in keeping me straight. I give myself a break and go to the garage and set the rower up for a half hour session. I go for it, wanting to get past the 6 kilometre mark. By the end of the session I have well over a thousand strokes and a good calorie count.

I record the session and then have lunch before showering. For me its back to editing the latest anthology script. I discover that a couple of poems are missing from the contents list and there is a poem missing. I put this right and then find that another part of another poem is missing. I finally get to the point where I have a version that is close to the final version. I send it to the publishing team and the person who is going to write the Forward. All I can do now is wait. Having got as far as I can get I then take up the argument with my shed suppliers over the replacement of the roof. I am not hopeful of a reasonable resolution to this.

My evening rolls around and as my partner is out I cook myself pasta and settle down to a football match and draft the blog. It is soon time for my night meds and then bed. There are Zoom meetings to attend tomorrow and some tricky technology to be faced. I am very tired but I hope to see some things coming to fruition.

Wednesday and I am still sore from Mondays jab so I take my time getting up, by which time my partner had gone to see her mother with her brother. I have a speedy breakfast and take my morning meds before making my way to the garage and my rower. I strap in and put the all night promenade in my ears and set up for an hours row. Its a steady start and as I listen to some unusual music I pull my way through to a passable outcome. At the end I am drenched in sweat and feel I have worked hard.

I record the session in my journal and then make myself lunch. With a change of clothes and the days crosswords done I head for the Shed and some letter writing. My partner returns and is soon in the garden planting out some of the plants we rescued from the garden centre. So at one point there was a very English scene in the household with me writing in the Shed and my partner potting out plants. To top it al the garden guy turns up to add to the picture. Having written a letter I pop over to the post box to send my letter on its way. On my return I find that my new publishers has sent me the first draft of the anthology that is being put together. After tea I settle down to edit the draft manuscript. I find a tittle for it and write a new preface and some new blurb. When I am satisfied with what I have done I send it back to the Ruler’s Wit team and then send an email to the chair of the poetry stanza asking if he will consider writing a Forward for the anthology. I will now sit and wait to see what he says. I turn to drafting the blog and taking my night meds before finally stop typing and writing. It feels like I am coming out the other side of my Monday jab, which is hopefully a good sign for the next couple of weeks.

Its Tuesday, the day after my 28 day injection. I was up in the night taking paracetamol to deal with the soreness and the shakes. My partner goes to the physio and onto the gym to bob about in the water for a while, so after breakfast I head for the Shed. It is where I stay writing letters until past lunchtime when my partner returns and takes me out for a milkshake and a tune melt at the nearest garden centre. It is a planned excursion so that I can buy birdseed and while we are at it we rescue some perennials that have been put on the cheap shelf. Once home I fill the bird feeders and return to the Shed and my letter writing. By tea time I am ready to wander over to the post box to send my letters.

My evening is full of disappointing football but perked up with the Great British Sewing Bee. I was hoping that the first draft of the anthology would arrive but it has not so I hope that tomorrow will bring it and I can get on with some editing, but for now I take my night meds and get myself to bed and hopefully sleep. I take some pre-emptive paracetamol.

Monday, jab Monday, so I am up early and into the shower, cannot see the nurse smelly! Post shower and preening I take my morning meds and head for the pharmacy to collect my prescription. Fortunately it is there and I move on to the GP’s surgery, where I clock in and it and wit to be called. It is my usual nurse so we get on with the business, she confirms which side its going in this time, its the right, and she gets on with it, trying to be as careful as possible. We both know that the right side is the worse side for the jab, we’ve been doing this for years now. As a an extra treat I also get my three monthly B12 jab despite the vast an=munts of Marmite I have been having lately. With my new drugs and a paper I return home.

I make breakfast and take onto the patio in cooler weather and crack on with the cross words. With the brain exercised and the belly fed i set about my puttering task of the day, namely to enlarge the holes in the patio table to take the pole of the sunshade. There is a period of rummaging in the garage to fish out the tools I think I am going to need and soon I am plugging drills and cleaners into the patio wall sockets. It takes an age to get the job done, but eventually I get the sunshade erected in the centre of the table. I give myself hero points but note that had I bought the right size diameter pole in the first place this nonsense would not be required.

I clear away my tools have lunch with my partner on the patio and then retreat to the sofa where I think about what to call my new anthology and the cover for it. I also start to read Guilty by Definitions by Susan Dent, it is full of old fashioned words and some newer ones to the English language, I am not far in but I am already reaching for my dictionary.

I do not read for long as I am starting to get my usual side effects from this mornings injection, chills and shivers like a cold turkey junkie. I’ve started to draft the blog now and may not get very far as I find it difficult to focus and not fall asleep. So at this point I take paracetamol and dig in waiting for a Tesco delivery, sausages and a mindless night before meds and more paracetamol and hopefully sleep. I’m trying to think of a tittle for the anthology but keep retuning to the myth of Tiresias, I’m not sure why yet but I guess my unconscious will get me there in the end, or not.

Saturday and I wake with the rolling sea in my ears for the last time this holiday. I’m awake early and shower, then its packing and loading the car. I find one of my tyres is low so use my portable compressor to top it up before breakfast and the rest of the packing. By 9:15 the car is loaded and the route plotted. My partner and I strap in and we set off for home having decided to go the A47 way home. This a road that almost runs past our front door at home so in essence it should be easy to navigate home. It turns out the the navigation is easy but the route is pitifully slow due to caravans, tractors and lorries. There is very little dual carriage way and lots of 50 miles per hour speed limits where there used to be none. It took over four hours to reach home with one very short pit stop for pee. With my condition the journey was a challenge. The pit stop we did make was inevitably a MacDonald’s, which was crammed and doing a roaring trade at its industrialised outlet. I suspect many of the people just wanted to use the toilets but they were at least clean and accessible as opposed to the soul less Starbucks we stopped at on the way to our cottage. It was the one where you only got the toilet code if you bought something, with stark minimalist furniture, bare walls and surly staff. As I walked out of that Starbucks I commented to my partner; “They might just as well spray paint, “give us your money and fuck off” all over the outside of the building”.

I had hoped to be back at home in time to go to this months poetry stanza meeting, it was too late to drive back into town for the face to face meeting in town. Instead I unpacked, through my washing in the washer and watched some athletics. I had a roaring headache, which is unusual for me so I downed soem paracetamol and opened my post. In amongst the instant recycling were two nhs global health insurance cards, which I ordered with one eye on a sortie abroad. One other potentially usefully bit of plastic was my free “get me into a toilet” card from Macmillan cancer support. There is no guarantee that waving it at anyone will release a burst of compassion and access to a toilet but it might be useful in times to come. So I have tucked into my useful card case for future comfort.

Also in my post was a postcard from a friend who had also holidayed in Norfolk extolling the abilities of her family to win things at the arcades along with the sea, sand, ice cream and chips. I continued to rest until tea time when I dined with family and then watched the latest in the Jason Bourne film saga. I cut short watching football highlights in order to get to bed and left my washing hanging on the line, it was night meds and bred for me still nursing a headache.

Sunday and I wake up feeling better after a good nights sleep. I check my messages, book a Tesco slot, pay the window cleaner and finally get up for breakfast. There is a quick trip to make to the local garden centre to pick up todays food. On the way back I check my tyres and fill my tank for future adventures. Back home I start to draft the blog and participate in the family single sock sorting. On checking my messages I find that a friend and her family are holding a funeral and wake for the family cat, Onion, who came to the end of her time a few days ago I was aware that the cat had been for its final visit to the vet due to her age and illnesses. At the time I had written a poem.

451
Farewell Onion,
you have gone
on the same day 
as Ozzy Osborne.
Both have run their course
and in their ways 
lived their lives to the full.
For one a domestic life
for the other a rock star,
but both meant so much 
to those around them. 
One quietly in the bosom 
of a family
the other in the glare. 
One sat gently purring 
the other roaring. 
Both were fun
both independent
but Onion never
bit the head off a bat;
a mouse perhaps 
after all that's what
cats do. 
451 23-07-2025

I watch part of a rugby league game but get bored so brig my washing and get it put away before I get into my training gear. Its 9 days since I trained before going on holiday so today it is an half hour session. It is a hot session and I am back on level four. I feel tired and “creek” as I start out on the session and I end up very sweaty and tired but really pleased that I have manged to hit my 6 kilometre standard. That will do me to get mem back into the training routine.

I record the session and then get out of my training gear and return to the blog. There is an evening meal and then, watering the garden and sweeping the patio. I settle down to watch TV before taking my meds. It is an injection Monday tomorrow so I shall need to be up an at the chemists to collect my drugs before going to the GP surgery. It’s also B12 jab day as well so I am expecting a rough couple of days from the afternoon onwards as my body reacts to the injection. I am hoping for slightly cooler weather so I can try and train some of the effects away. At the back of my mind is the last set of blood results, which bothered me and I am anxious to get to my next oncology review in mid September. Until then I am likely to be preoccupied.

Friday the last day of my holiday and I wake to sunshine. My partner and I drink warm drinks and then go down to Watsons café for breakfast. Today it is quite busy but the service speedy. Its good to have a hearty breakfast with no washing up to do, it means my partner and I can relax and meander through the meal. There are odd corners of this café and a table with an array of saleable goodies next to the book exchange shelf, its that kind of place.

We pay the bill and take a couple of scones with us. On he way back to our cottage we stop off at the village shop, grandly called a superstore, and gather up some odds and ends to make our departure preparations easier. Its late morning by the time we get back to FLIP the cottage. I set about the quick crossword in the paper and then continue to read Jim Harrison’s The Essential Poems. I am really taken with the richness of his descriptions of his experience of nature. It is nothing like a lot of what I call “hello birds, hello trees” British poetry, this poetry is a natural and as raw as Nature itself, is jam packed and bursting at the seams with nature and it’s inhabitants. I could never write this stuff. Yet over the years as he gets old the poetry becomes more precise and succinct. Its his more “bony” stuff that appeals to me, but then it would given my preference for stark verse.

So I read punctuated by the odd snack or quick chat with my partner, until it is time to walk the beach, or at least the tiny stretch that we can manage. the breeze is sharper today so we walk faster and our half way stop, were we sit on stumps of an old groyne to chat, is also shorter today. Once back we sit and recover in our shared courtyard be to interrupted by the woman who looks after the property. She is on the hunt for who owns the third car parked our back. I explain that the “tortoise” at FLOP have visitors. “Ah that’s okay then” she says and then tells us how people just park and then go to the beach as if it was okay to leave their cars on the drive way. She also tells us about the winter and spring sand storms. Apparently at these times the sea comes right up to the sea wall and sand is blown into all the properties. Not only that it does so with such force that it makes some of the seaside house shake every time the waves hit the wall. we then hear about her medical history and the quality and availability of medical services. It seems that the folk of Bracton cannot afford to be ill, and if they are not to expect any treatment quickly, she is waiting for a place on her heart management course but it will not happen until February next year. As she said, she could be dead by then. After she goes I return to Jim Harrison and read more of this amazing man’s poetry, stopping only briefly to order another book to read.

As the tea is put into cook I start to draft the blog until I have no more to say about my day. I have emailed my “publisher” and asked about a Forward for the anthology, it was a thing that I had thought about in the beach walk. I have no idea who would do it or who to ask but it needs exploring. It comes to the inevitable point where packing has to start and the checks on the car for tomorrows early morning departure, so I start to pack away my clothes and make sure I know where everything is.

The evening is full of Would I Lie to You and more packing and tidying before I take my night meds and get to bed hoping for a good nights sleep before the drive home tomorrow.

Thursday a hot morning and I settle on the holiday cottage courtyard to take my meds and to read Jim Harrison poetry. It is beautiful stuff and spans a life time. I notice amongst my meds today is my twice weekly vitamin D pill. It amuses me that in this heat wave I am taking Vitamin D, it prompts a short poem.

456
Sitting in the sunshine 
taking vitamin D pills
I wonder if I am being spooked.
Is this the wrong end
of a medical algorithm,
that has prescribed me 
a vision of health
outside my shorts 
and T shirt heatwave
summer.
These days I never know
if it’s man or machine 
that is my shaman,
feed me in,
out comes a prescription:
if I change my viewing habits
will I soon be
handling snakes, pointing bones
or divining from the guts 
of a slaughtered goat? 
After all medicine is
an act of faith. 
                                           456  14-08-2025

I am joined by my partner for warm drinks and we sit and chat for a while before getting ready to go for breakfast at Watsons café down the road. The place has a few people in but by no means full so we pick a window seat and wait for the waitress to take our order. Neither of us can face anything bigger than the small breakfast and orange juice. We chat and watch the other diners, quite a few have dogs and we inevitably have our dog ownership conversation, “nice idea but a big commitment”, we always end up on the “no dog” side.

With breakfast over we walk back to our cottage via the village shop for some essentials. Its hot now and I strip down to bare essentials and read Jim Harrison in the shade. What I read sparks another short poem.

457
Jim Harrison has me in one:
“an average poem destined
to disappear among the millions
of poems written now by 
mortally average poets”
as he weaves spellbinding
accounts of nature 
and its profusion in 
a way far beyond me.
Some have the gift, 
some read and wonder
and some blunder about
unseeing.
The one eyed man 
sees so much more
than I.
                                 457 14-08-2025 
                                  	Tim Harrison lost an eye aged 7 when a girl hit him with a                                            				                      broken bottle during an argument. 

I type the poems up and begin to draft the blog as I nibble the jammy fruit scone that was brought back from the café. So I spend my afternoon lazing and reading Tim Harrison’s poetry until its time to take a walk along the beach. My partner and I are almost on our own on the beach, we sit on the stumps of an old groyne and chat before making our way back to the cottage, the breeze from the sea has chilled us. I read some more until its time to walk to the village chippy. There appears to be a short queue but are instantly dismayed to find that someone has order 18 portions of fish and chips and the serving woman is not willing to serve anyone else anything till the 18 are done, its painful to watch and even more painful to wait. Eventually we get served and my partner and I leg it back to the cottage with our appetites enlarged by the wait and the walk.

After tea there is a Swedish thriller to watch and a travel show before I clear the kitchen and finish off the blog having taken my night meds. Tomorrow is our last full day in the cottage so hopefully the sun will shine and I might find more words to flow. Still I hear the sound of the sea as I settle down and I can see a bright moon.