Friday and I seem to have slept well and my vitals are good. I check my messages before my partner brings me a hot a water and then I get up and get into my training gear and go down stairs. Unusually the postman has been and there is a letter from the cardiac consultant with the out come of my stay in hospital and the tests. It appears that everything is tickety boo and I am discharged from the cardiac services. See below.

With this piece of confirmed good news I head for the garage and set myself up for an hours row. I pop in my earbuds and put Mark Steel on and get on with my row. I am trying to keep a steady pace through out but as I get to the end I put a bit more effort in and I am rewarded with a best yet since having Uluru removed.

I record my session, down a Red Bull with a sandwich and start to draft the blog while the window cleaner gives me funny looks as he goes about his business. So I go into the afternoon with a shower and a spring in my step. I sort some life admin and eventually prepare a snack to se me through to the evening. The return of my partner from her pamper day coincides with the arrival of the garden guy who sets about giving the bay tree a final end of year trim.

The choice of evening meal is an Indian take away. Although the delivery time is always about an hour but without fail the food arrives very quickly as the restaurant is in the village. I dine and settle down to get comfortable for this evenings rugby match and an episode of Have I Got News For You later on. While I wait for the rugby to kick off I update the blog draft. Today has in general been a good day so I am hoping for a good nights sleep as tomorrow it is the face to face meeting of the Poetry Stanza. It will have been quite a while since I have meet the group in the fresh and I am looking forward to the experience. Not just meeting them but making the effort to drive to the venue and to be out and about. Depending on my decision on route I might get to drive past one of prisons that I worked in, which always prompts memories.

Thursday and the first day of the week I can rest properly. As a result I rise late, do my vitals and make breakfast with my morning meds. My son messages me and asks if I am free for a chat so at the appointed time we have a long chat over WhatsApp about all sorts of family matters. Its a long and complex conversation but hopefully constructive. It neatly lead into a lunchtime bacon sandwich and some thinking time.

The Americans are ready to publish the latest collection and I was thinking about what I am going to do in the future. I think five collections in one year is quite enough and so I will have a break unless something comes along out of the blue to inspire me to publish anything else. I take a stroll over to the post office to send a letter and then return to spend time in my daily routine of doing the days crosswords. It was a good day, no Google required. As I finish reading the paper I become aware that an ambulance has parked across our drive and then I notice police cars arriving and more ambulances, the big type not the first responders. I go up stairs to get a better view, but I see my neighbour shepherding her son and scooter in home and then driving off somewhere. In the meantime police direct traffic, ambulance staff appear to load someone into the back of their ambulance and slowly all the emergency vehicles disappear and the village main road returns to its usual evening rush hour. So what actually happened to cause such a conglomeration of blue lights and uniformed folk is a mystery but I expect it will all be round the village in no time if not the local newspaper. After so much excitement I return to the sofa and start to draft the blog, feeling sluggish.

The evening feels like a challenge, I am not sure why but I need to find something to engage me, perhaps its lack of inspiration that is sapping me, although I have bought Nadiya’s latest cook book and made an attempt to plan next weeks menu to the extent of ordering some of the more niche ingredients in next weeks Tesco order. But for tonight I shall conjure up my baked egg tortillas once there has been a quick trip to the shop. This is all part of my trying to get engaged with cooking again and to tempt my appetite.

The evening is tortilla filled followed by a lazy evening of TV and planning. From cars to pressure washers and fantasy private planes there is lots to consider. The evening ends as always with night meds and a sandwich to keep the dugs settled. Tonight is a super moon.

This Wednesday and I am awake quite early because this is oncology review day, a day for hugs and to train. So I check my vitals, which are all good and then get up and into my training gear. I down my morning meds and head for the garage. My session to day will be 60 minutes which means I can listen to two episodes of Mark Steel’s in Town. So I set off at a sensible pace and get into a steady pull. The hour goes quite quickly and I am soon taking a photo of the monitor. Ten kilometres plus and over seven hundred calories burnt so not a bad session at all, not my best but good for a post jab session.

I record the session and make a late bagel breakfast before checking that I have all the things I want to explore with the oncologist at this afternoons review. Satisfied that I have my arithmetic sorted I go for a shower. Feeling crisp and new if a bit achy I sit and start the draft of todays blog. My oncology call is due about 13:45pm but they have started giving two hour time slots so I could be siting here for quite a while. I wonder at what point I should tell them I have acknowledged their efforts in the acknowledgement section of the next poetry collection that is coming out fairly soon. Perhaps I will just send them a copy or two. I’m not sure I have shared the cover for the new collection but when it comes out it will look like this:

To my surprise the oncologist rings on time. He tells me that he can see the results of my heart scans and that there is no sign of ischemia and no reason to do anything more. He asked how much medication I have left and we agreed that he would prescribe another cycle and he would see me in eight weeks. I noted that the blood test would also be for a check on my heart. We discussed the rise in my blood pressure over the cycles and he noted that I would only need to take a week off the meds to effect a lowering of blood pressure, he also said that if my blood pressure really did rise to a level of concern he could increase the medication specifically for it. So when all was said and done it went to plan, brief and concise but moves things forward. With the excitement of the day done I have lunch.

In the afternoon I write letters adn scribblings before an evening of lone football watching. Night medication and then I retreat to bed. to sleep perchance to dream.

Monday its jab day and I need to be at the GP surgery for 9 o’clock. I am up early, shower and out the door having had time to take my morning meds and a couple of paracetamol. I check in and I am called in to the clinic room straight away. My usual nurse prepares the injection and has trouble finding an area that is not lumpy from previous injections. We get the stuff in and I leave to return home via the village shop to pick up a paper.

Once home my partner and I go to the gym where my partner trains and I sit in the lounge and eat bacon rolls while doing the days crosswords. I have time to think about a to do list and think about the coming days and my oncology review. I’ve still not heard from the cardio boys and girls. My partner and I go to a nearby garden centre for a late lunch before going home where I crash out, my injection site is getting sore and I need more paracetamol. I nap and stay napped until its time for tea and my partner has her singing lesson.

While my partner is in her singing lesson I watch Dune 2. It is my way of switching off before taking my night meds and more paracetamol.

Tuesday and after a reasonable nights sleep I find myself alone as my partner has gone to work. I take my vitals which are good and then get up as there are things I need to do but as I get out of bed my injection sight reminds me that I am sore and tired. I take my meds and then organise what I can before go to the local pub for a full English brunch. When I get home there are chores to do in readiness to take in the Tesco delivery. On cue the delivery arrives and then I am free to go to the post office to get a paper and send a letter.

The bulk of my afternoon is spent editing the final final draft of The cancer Years: Breathless. It appears that the collection is now ready to go to publication. I now wait for the Americans to get the mechanics rolling. With that done I select a poem to take to this Saturdays Poetry Stanza. I go for something less cancer driven than usual. I run off copies and as this coming Stanza meeting is a face to face one. I share the one I have selected.

409
I misheard “Titanium skull”
for “New soul” and thought,
I’m up for that . 
How relieving it would be
to recycle the sins of the past
for an empty virginal one.
Do new ones have a distinctive 
Smell like a new car/
Do new borns sniff the world
And take in the aroma of innocence?
If I ever had one
It’s been mislaid along the way,
Dropped somewhere along the
Grey brick pragmatic way,
a sort of wizard of Oz
without a Dorothy  and her 
red, take me home , shoes.
Fly my pretties fly,
I hear myself call
And wonder where my 
journey will end.

							409 03-08-202

Having done all my poem work I turn to getting some rest and fall asleep for a while until my partner returns from work. Tea follows and the Great British Bake Off but I am distracted by drafting the blog and an increasing awareness that my injection site is getting more sore and I am running rapidly out of spoons. I take my night meds but I resist the temptation to take pain killers. Tomorrow is my oncology review. I have spent today updating my blood pressure spread sheet and reviewing my blood results. I need who ever I talk to, to listen to what I have to say and take it seriously as I do not want to go on taking the chemotherapy to the point where the side effects make me so fatigued that I stop to function, which is one of my hypotheses. The other hypothesis is that I got a bout of COVID. My guess is that the oncology boys and girls will prefer the COVID hypothesis. My guess is that they will let me finish the current cycle 17 and go onto cycle 18 and then see me again. I will find out soon enough.

Sunday and I will keep this simple as it is the preparation day before my 28 day jab tomorrow so my priorities are to train hard and long, rest and be organised so I can cruise for the next two or three days as I work through the injection side effects. So I take my vitals, which were good, and I get up and get into my training gear.

I have a brief toast breakfast and take my morning meds and then I head for the garage and the rowing machine. I strap in and set myself up for 60 minutes. I choose to listen to two episodes of Mark Steels in Town. Once I started I just ground away at a steady pace, trying to push myself a bit. At the end of the hour I am surprised to find I had gone 11k+ and had burnt 700+ calories, my best hour yet since I started training again.

After the session I record it and then rest for a while before getting my washing in. I watch a rugby match and go for a walk with my partner to the village to pick up a paper and some goodies. I go back to resting, watching rugby and football until its time to eat in the evening. It all sounds very lethargic but somewhere in me is a poem fermenting called “People Soup” an extension of my thoughts about “Seminal moments” in life, but at the moment I cannot grasp it enough and neither will it just flow from me. Along the way I gather up my washing and get organised for tomorrow. The evening is spent with my partner watching TV until I take my night meds augmented by paracetamol in preparation for the side effects of tomorrows jab. I draft the blog. I focus and prepare.

Saturday and I wake up late having stayed up last night to get my blood results. The outcome was a good one with my PSA reducing slightly. My resulting sleep was filled with some very weird dreams of Kafka like Turkish hotels and mislaid luggage. I finally get up after a long chat with my partner and make a late breakfast. There are chores to be done, like de-hairing the Hoover and then Hoovering through the house and having a general clear up. With the the humdrum stuff of life done I watch a rugby match and eat an early lunch in order to have my afternoon free to shower and prepare to go out to the theatre in the evening.

As is usual, now I and my partner, and I with our eldest daughter, got an Uber into town to the theatre. The conversation with the Uber driver was enlightening as he talked me through everything I needed to know about hybrid cars. By the end of the circuitous route he took to get us to the theatre which enabled him to show off the prowess of his hybrid I was open to the idea of owning one. After a small morsel of lemon drizzle cake we took our seats and watched Ghost the musical. It was a very good production, however by the end, even with a half time ice cream, I was Rom Com’ed out for the week. We Ubered home and I resisted another conversation about hybrid cars. Once home it is Blog drafting time, toast to settle my stomach and night meds. Tomorrow I prepare for jab Monday with some pre-emptive paracetamol, it’s that time of month.

Friday, its a big day, blood tests day and a day to train, so I am up early and breakfasted ready to trot down to the GP surgery to have my bloods taken. I take my morning meds and then head down to the GP. Once I am in the surgery I am called in quickly and find my usual two nurses, one takes stuff out of me and the other puts stuff into me, sharing a clinic. There is banter and I am soon a couple of vials short of blood. It was not till I was walking home that I realised that I had not pre loaded with water, which means some of my bloods results might be down a bit.

This is a big deal, these bloods. Todays bloods will tell me if the half cycle I have taken has stopped the rise in my PSA, or slowed the pace of the rise. If it has then the strategy of me going back on the cancer chemo pills is working and will also justify me not taking any of the other drugs that have been prescribed me, especially the angina (friendly angina! clearly a medical madness) medication. This is a crucial time.

Once home I do the days crosswords and then I fill my drugs wallets for the next two weeks. Come lunchtime I and my partner and eldest daughter go for lunch at one of our favourite garden centres. It is a pleasant break before returning home to find some presents that I had ordered for my eldest grandson in Sweden had arrived. My first chore was to repack the goods and get them to the post office to get them on there way.

With the chores done it is time for me to train. I really do not want to but I can feel myself slipping back into an inertia of inactivity so not training is not an option. I get into my gear and go to the garage and get on board the rower. I am tempted to do just 30 minutes but I know that is not enough so set myself up for a 45 minute session. With another Mark Steels in Town episode in my ears I begin. Once I make that first pull I am committed and stopping cannot be an option. So I get on with it and in the end it turns out to be a reasonable session.

I record my session, change out of my gear and eat tea with the family before watching a rugby match, some TV, including an Aretha Franklin concert in black and white, what a singer she was. As I listen to her I start to draft the blog and my partner goes to bed knowing that I will not be gong to bed until my blood results come in. They get posted at midnight when the hospital does its up load. So now its about filling in time while I wait and wait.

The results are in and I am relieved. My PSA has dropped, not a lot, just 0.1 but it is a drop after only 17 days of this cycle. This is good news, my strategy is good and the way forward can be positive. My bloods are not perfect, Urea is still above normal but dropping and my platelets are below normal (due to dehydration) but that is it. I am holding my own, I stand.

Wednesday and I get up late to not much to do having done my good vitals. My morning is spent sorting out the Amazon deliveries for the garden and carrying out some admin tasks. While my partner is at work I and my eldest daughter go to the pub for lunch. We have a good first course and a chat and we both go for a pudding. I, in my innocence, selected the Mars Bar Brownie. That was a mistake, I never thought it was possible to pack so many calories into a rectangular block that could fit on a plate.

On the way home I picked up a paper and some stuff from the chemists. The crosswords keep me busy for a while until the evening rolls around when my partner goes out and leaves me to watch a Batman film I’ve not seen before. Inevitably I reach night meds time and the equally inevitable grope around in the dark to remove the various instruments and contraptions from the bed while my partner snoozes blissfully. My last act is to stick my nose strap on and settle down.

Thursday and I wake up late, I had planned a great deal but now I am buggered. By the time I have checked my messages and up for my morning meds its nearly noon. So I have a a quick breakfast and then I head for the garden. For the next four hours I beaver away erecting a new willow screen, planting new camellias, putting the new bird feeder up and stowing the bird seed in the mouse proof bin. Then the newly delivered compost needed housing in the greenhouse and the garden furniture put under cover for the winter. Eventually I had no more spoons of energy and returned to the house. Suitably refreshed I fill my drug wallets for the next two weeks and begin to draft the blog.

The evening will be filled with, hopefully food, and England football team taking on Greece in some competition or other. Along the way I found myself writing a poem but I am not sure what I am going to do with it yet. I am still waiting for the Americans to come back to me for the final final draft of The Cancer Years: Breathless. I’m getting itchy to be moving the process on.

Tuesday and I wake with my partner having gone to work so I take stock of how I am. I seem to have slept okay but feel I have few spoons today and so it turns out. After a breakfast I set about what I can do with the spoons I have, which is as follows, 1. clear the kitchen, 2. put the bins out, 3. Edit the final draft of The Caner Years: Breathless, which the Americans still have not got right much to my frustration. 4, take in the Tesco order and squirrel it a way, 5, train for 45 minutes and 6, finally organise my eldest grandsons birthday present.

I have nothing left by the evening so it becomes Rom Com night. Two unashamedly Rom Coms in a row that the household watch back to back while nibbling After Eight mints. All Rom Comed out the family go to bed while I draft the blog before downing my night meds and have shower. At last I get to bed and hope f or more spoons tomorrow.

Monday and I wake up after a good nights sleep and fairly soon I am up and getting ready to accompany my partner to the gym, she to do sensible exercise and me to have breakfast and sit in the lounge and write letters. On arrival I order a bottle of water and a bacon brioche bun to be told that they have run out of brioche buns, I can have sourdough bread toasted or not. I opt for sourdough untoasted with brown sauce on the bacon. When it arrived I discovered that I know sod all about sourdough bread. One I should have had it toasted and two I should have chosen something else altogether. My consider opinion is that sourdough bread is an aberration and a baking abomination. It is tasteless pap that is beyond bland and tasteless, it is a pointless food best suited to being used as blotting paper. I can’t believe it has become a “thing” amongst a certain group of people.

While a chewed my way through the sourdough wedge I wrote a letter on my laptop to a friend up north. While writing I also listened to another episode of Mark Steels In Town. So this is what I do until my partner reappears, showered and ready for lunch. We go off to one of our favourite garden centres that does the best food in their restaurant. On arrival we discover it is “Golden Monday” where anyone over 60 can get a cheap meal and as a consequence it is pact with people who look like they are on an outing from either A&E or the care home. My partner and I eat and before we leave I buy two camellias to finish off the garden master plan.

On returning home my partner goes off to the dentist and I finish my letters. There is of course a quick trip to the post office to send my letters and to pick up a paper and a box of Tunnock’s tea cakes. Back home I do the days cross words and then sort out some life admin like ordering my usual monthly drugs. With the return of my partner and the evening coming we dine and my partner then goes off to do her singing lesson while draft the blog. I have Mark Steels in Town in my earbuds as I draft the blog nibbling a Tunnock’s tea cake. With this done I take to Amazon and order the goods I need to undertake phase one of project 2 in the garden, so by the end of the week I will ready to go, the only the weather is likely to throw a spanner in the works. This strategy means that I can devote tomorrow to training and further letter writing. While I draft the log I get a message from m y friend who is still recovering from long COVID to say she has caught COVID again, it is such rotten luck. So the evening will pass to the point where I take my meds and go to bed hopping for another good nights sleep. Tomorrows excitement will be the Tesco delivery, which I must remember to update before going to bed.