Wednesday and I wake up knowing that this Wednesday is two things. Firstly it is the last day of Cycle 25 of my chemo and secondly I have to collect my next cycle of chemo pills from the hospital pharmacy today. So as my partner goes off to see her mother with her brother I get up and get ready for the trip. I have breakfast and my morning meds and then I start to get my partners car ready to do the trip. I change the battery in the car key fob and fill the washer reservoir. I then drive into town and park up at the car park by the central hotel and undertake the walk down to the hospital pharmacy. Its a fair step and the weather is humid so its not long before I am regretting loading my shoulder bag with a journal, a book and a charger pack for the phone.

I trudge onwards discovering that I am not the fast walker I used to be but I keep cutting along till I get to the hospital. The pharmacy used to be useless and a inept but since rebuilding it has become quite efficient. I show my appointment letter wit my detail to the receptionist who confirms my date of birth and then calls me Ronald! It happens so often I think there must be a cultural glitch with the the name Roland. I correct her and she scuttles off to find my drugs. I had no sooner got my bum on a chair in the waiting area thinking I was going to get a rest and even a chapter of the book read when one of the approved dispensers calls my name, checks my date of birth and shows me what she is giving me. I agree its my usual stuff and she hands it over. I read the 2013 NICE report on my drugs and was interested to note just how much it cost, one cycle in 2013 cost in excess of £2,700 and a more recent report suggested that it is the equivalent of £100 a day. That is seventy two and a half thousand pounds over the two years I have been taking this chemo. I have to say I think I am worth it. That’s about £12,000 a poetry collection, that’s well worth it. The walk back to the car park at the hotel was slow and by the time I had paid for my ticket and got in the car I was knackered.

By the time I got home I was just about cooling down, I grabbed a 0% lager out of the fridge and sat in the garden doing todays crosswords. I was joined by my partner who made us lunch. After finishing both lunch and the crosswords I retreated inside with the garden camera intending to see if our resident hedgehog had shown up recently. While stowing my new cycle of pills away I realised I had not taken my vitals this morning so I lay down, asked Alexa to play me meditation music and promptly dozed off. When I woke up I took my vitals, which were a good set to end the cycle on and then returned to garden camera. I am pleased to say that the hedgehog was still knocking around at the end of March when the camera batteries ran out. I shall replenish the camera in due course and see if the hog has made it through to June.

The family eat tea and and I start to draft the blog. The evening drifts by towards Race Across the World and then it will be time for me to be taking the last dose of cycle 25, popping on my finger splint and getting myself to bed. Tomorrow has to be a training day if I am to keep myself fit and to fight the side effects of the coming Cycle 26.