Sunday and a bit of a lay in before the Sunday weigh in. I get up and go to the bath room to set up the scales on the appointed square, and then I step up and hope.

92.2 KILOS !

Oh yes that’s more like it. The protein and fruit alongside the exercise regime has done its work and before time. I am pleased and look forward to a rest day. Breakfast follows and then there are things to be got ready for the trip next week. The first thing is for me and my partner to do is do a Lateral Flow Test. This was fun relatively speaking as we had got hold of some of the “up the nose only” tests. Fortunately we are both clear. then comes the tricky bit, reporting it on the nhs website, getting a confirmation email back and then forwarding it to the course organisers. This was more time consuming than anticipated, but these things always are. I sort my washing, top up the fish, fill the squirrel feeder and sort out the “to do while I’m away ” list for my eldest daughter. An Amazon deliver brings me a phone holder for the car so that we can use the three word direction app during the trip tomorrow. I spend time experimenting with it and finally decide to use the vent mounting . Yet more time goes by.We draw up a survival food list and go to our local Sainsbury’s to buy it. This of course maybe not necessary but my fantasy is that the food being provided on the course will be far from my protein and fruit diet, more plants and bloody tofu, a sort of tree hugging, good for you sort of menu. Of course this is a fantasy but there is no harm in having a bag of goodies to hand.

Back home its time to watch the Wales v Fiji rugby game and give my feet half an hour on the “Circulation max:x reviver”, cranked up to level 40 so my feet tingle. Just one of those why not things that seems to work for me. Then I wrote the blog so I could spend my evening finishing my preparations.

I go into the night knowing that as from tomorrow I will be out of touch, no internet and no phone signal with a group of strangers, sharing meals and the experience of the course. So this is the last you will hear from me for a week. I may write the blog while I am away and then post it en bloc as soon as I can when I return to a signal. I’m not sure how I feel about this isolation so I am intrigued to see how I respond and what catches me by surprise, although some things will be a constant. I cannot help wondering what I might create over the next week. But now its time to pack my mobile office back pack and start the journey into the desert, and see what whispers in my ear.

Saturday and as usual there is an early cup of coffee and discussion of what to do during the day. Of course breakfast follows along with filling my pill boxes, and then my partner and I drive into town to pick up her new glasses and to get cash from the ATM at my bank. Where we are going next week its a cash economy. We indulge in a stop in Costa, for me almond croissant and hot chocolate with cream. I think I might be blowing my weigh in tomorrow. We drive home and I put the washing I put in before going out into the tumble drier and get ready to go to the gym.

On route to the gym I stop off at the garden centre and stock up on peanuts and squirrel food for Squishy and Squashy. Having secured their food for the next month I stop off at the garage and ready the car for its drive on Monday, full tank and checked tyres. Then to the gym for an hour on a cross trainer. 701 calories burnt and 7.78 kilometres. Showered and spent I drive home to empty the tumble dryer and fold my clothes away. Then follows the England rugby match in which Australia were seen off and the Indian take away arrived. The family watch a film for the rest of the evening, before I set about writing the blog. Today has been one of chores in preparation for the coming week. Tomorrow will be packing for the week ahead trying to ensure that everything is attended to, nothing missed, no detail overlooked, no essential left behind, and of course the LFTs to be done. The fun never stops.

Friday, I slept poorly last night so I’m sluggish in the morning. I wake to find my partner has gone to the physio so I rummage through the kitchen to feed myself muesli and coffee. Then its time to get back to being in front of the laptop and doing a work meeting. I finish just in time to get a call from a friend and to chat about how the world is and my looking towards being away next week on the writing course. By lunchtime my partner had returned and was preparing to go to see her mother. My plan was to go to the gym but I fund myself doing admin and finding that I had a load of chores related to going away next week. Amongst the chores was sending a photo of me to go on a website. This was tricky. Hair up or down? In the end I went for hair down.

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The afternoon time seems to melt away as I put a meal into the crock pot and all thoughts of going to the gym gets lost. I finally cannot put the exercise off any longer, I do not feel like it at all. I get myself into the garage and straddle the rower. Its 30 minutes of effort, I’m still sore from Mondays jab but in a strange way it makes me work harder. Almost a personal best but not quite, I moss it by a measly 120 metres, but given that it is early in my cycle I am encouraged.

I change and return to the sofa to record my session and to open the Amazon parcels that had arrived. One of which is a circulation reviver for the feet. Its a present to my partner who has strained her feet on the cross trainer. We both give it a go as we watch the England match during the evening. Its a strange feeling sensing the mild electric current in the feet and calfs, we will see if it works over the next few days. The family retreat to bed and leave me to write the blog and put the house to bed. I also write the going away to do list, which will rule the next 48 hours. Faced with the reality of not being able to post the blog each day is somehow disturbing, I suspect that the disconnection is more perturbing than I care to think about.

Before I start on Thursday I just want to share a nugget from The Visionary; Epistle of the Universal Church Ministries. It is an interesting document full of the strangeness of America, religion, and advertisements for clerical impedimenta.

This pops into my in box on a monthly basis headed “Minister Roland” as I am in fact an ordained minister of this church. No big deal any one can become a minister on line, but I did also get a Doctor of Divinity out of it as well. Anyway an article caught my eye about the rumpus that was caused when an elementary school took their children on a field trip to what turned out to be a gay cafe. They had been doing it for years and no one noticed it was a gay cafe as it was intended to give kids the experience of ordering food socially and just acquiring normal social skills. True the place was very “Rainbowy” but the kids just thought it was pretty. What set the hare running was that some one noticed the racey names of some of the dishes on the menu. I’m not going to tell you all of them but this one was my favourite: “The Hellena Bun, a burger “tossed in Rosie’s own “Smack My Cheeks and Make ’em Rosie’ sauce. I bet the kids loved it, and laughed themselves silly. The adults were a bit more critical, one wrote “I certainly hope you get the wrath of God for this! The author of this post signed off with “And this coming from 60 year old Proud Lesbian!” Don’t you just love America, if only Alistair Cooke was still alive to write his letters from America.

Thursday, up and “mueslied” by 9 o’clock so I can be in front of the screen for a morning work meeting. There were only three of us there but is stretched to the hour with real work and then we reduced to two and I had the chance to chat to a colleague that I usually do not get to have much time with. So at 11 o’clock I indulged in more coffee and attended to some of the admin I needed to do. In a short space of time I receive two calls from friends touching base and seeing how I am. One of them is recovering from COVID and introduced me to the spoon theory, it a way of conceptualizing energy expenditure and regulating the energy you have in order to maximize your capabilities. The originator is Christine Miserandino and her story of how Spoon Theory started can be found at www.butyoudontlooksick.com. I’ve read it a couple of times now. My friend was able to expand when I asked questions like “what size spoon are they, tea, dessert, serving or soup?” Apparently you can lose spoons. The point is that as she is recovering from COVID the management of her energy is a very important issue as energy expenditure (spoons) needs to be considered as once energy is gone its gone. It reminded me of when I was marathon running, always it was abought pace as energy spent in sprinting could never be recovered and might mean not finishing the race. It also parallels the work by Loehr and Schwartz; which looks at energy management from a view point of training athletes and applying it to individuals and organisations.

I like the Spoon Theory is feels more human and derived from lived experience, which makes sense to me. For me it feels intuitive and fits my experience. For example today I had to choose between spending my energy by going to the gym or being in a space with TC people. I chose my physical needs over my head space needs, knowing that the gym would spend more spoons and mean I would have fewer spoons for the evening. The blog will just about spoon me out and then I will drop into Bill Bailey Power Save mode. So from a quite short conversation I am suddenly richer and have Spoon Theory to add to my tool kit of survival.

I have lunch with my partner and then I get myself ready to go to the gym, having decided to spend my spoons this day. I drive to the gym to find the bar/restaurant closed yet again but manage to acquire a large bottle of water before going to the gym floor and bagging a cross trainer. An hour later, 701 calories less, 7.73 kilometres further and a litre of water heavier and at least three spoons lighter on energy I shower and drive home. I record my session in my food and exercise journal and down load the Spoon Theory and read it. Its tuna pasta night, my favourite and as I wait for my partner to prepare it I start the blog. Pasta arrives as does NCIS on TV, although I continue to write the blog, my partner disappears to her singing lesson. I write more on the blog and then I am almost spoonless, I have one left to clear away the kitchen, plan tomorrow and prepare.

Wednesday and as my partner and friend drive off to a day at Chatsworth I get a call from a friend who is beginning to surface from a bout of COVID. So a chat to start the day with and then I am up and having my now usual flax enhanced muesli and coffee. I zip about doing some chores and ensuring the squirrels food box is full. As I check my emails I find that I have an Elders meeting at 11 o’clock that was not put into my phones diary. So I make coffee and settle down in front of the screen and spend the next hour and a half talking with friends as we try to make sense of what is happening to us and to our relational environments. COVID cuckoos and relational continuity were amongst the themes. Meeting over I down some chicken soup and do some Christmas preparation. Soon its time to train, so I get into the garage and row for thirty minutes. My jab site is still sore so rowing is not the most comfortable exercise but then nothing is. As it turns out its an okay session.

I retreat to the sofa to record my session and then change out of my kit. Back on the sofa I settle down to read The Cat Who Saved Books. It is a lovely book and I sit and read it to the end. It made me think about my relationship with books and why I read and what I read. I can definitely identify with the sense that my books are important and that they are powerful. It makes me remember the way the Jewish families that were part of my childhood and youth so valued education and food and that books were valued for the knowledge that they contained. For many of my Jewish friends knowledge was the their protection from their uneasy place in British culture,in fact any culture.

My daughter and I eat tea and I settle to read some more before succumbing to TV. My partner and friend return from Chatsworth fayre and in due course we all settle down to try and navigate the twists and turns of Shetland. After that its the news as I type the blog for the day.

Tuesday and I wake up feeling rank. I do not think I slept well and my stomach jab site is sore. I think I have woken up still in my withdrawing junkie state. Its usually like this for a couple of days post jab but will lease over the rest of the cycle. By the end of 21 days I am usually back to setting personal bests. I start with a muesli breakfast to which I now add flax seeds, part research and part hitting in hope. This morning I am on a mission to visit a jewelers and to take the bag of clothes that has been hanging around for ages to the charity shop. In order to get the jeweler sorted I visit my treasure box and find all sorts of stuff I had half forgotten about including a watch that I had lost track of. I get myself organised with the bag of clothes and gym kit and head off on to the world.

The charity shop is in the next village and has a reserved car space out front, which is handy. I deposit my bag of goodies, get a quick thank you and then I am back in the car. I pause and notice that the window display of Aged UK is pretty good, nice leather coat. I am tempted to go back inside but my frontal lobes intervene and remind me that I have more than enough clothes and that some are a bit tight so I had best get to the gym. The gym is empty apart from the unemployed, aged and fitness fanatics. I swear the day time lot are mostly there for the showers and the steam room judging by how many actually make it to the gym floor. I climb aboard a cross trainer, ramp up Rammstein and grind for an hour. It is a grind to start with but the effort eases as I get through the hour. At last I am done, 696 calories burnt and 7.55 kilometres traveled, virtually of course. I sterilise the machine and head for the showers. These days I do not bother to remember my locker number I just have a rough idea where it is and look for the pink padlock, it appears no one else fancies a pink padlock on their locker door. It makes me smile, men’s changing rooms are still so macho and image driven. Today the lounge bar is open so I indulge in Thai chicken soup and an americano. The soup comes with half a baguette, the dreaded carbs, but I succumb and indulge enjoyably. The gym is all very well but I’ve missed a call from a friend, which is irksome.

On the way home I fill my partners car and put the bins out before I park up. Once in home I pick up the watch that I had rediscovered this morning and got my “watch kit” from the garage and started to tinker with it. It was a present from my partner and has languished in a draw for a while due to it not working. I get the first old one working but the silver one takes more thought. At last I get into it and change the battery but find the retaining lever on one side does not retain the battery. I resort to my old friend nail varnish, a dab of my eldest daughters blue polish cements the bits in place and the watch works again. Just the back to wrestle back onto the watch and I am done. In the midst of this our guest arrives and Amazon deliver a few boxes, which seems to suggest that the rest of the family are getting ahead with their Christmas shopping.

By the time I’ve finished with the watches and started the blog its time for tea with our guest. There is conversation around the table and then I retreat to the blog before we all settle down to watch the great British Bake Off. I am feeling less sore for having trained and have a work free day tomorrow and a day when I shall have much of the house to myself as my partner and her friend are going to Chatsworth House Christmas fayre. Hopefully I can train, think about Christmas and read some more of The Cat That Saved Books.

Jab Monday rolls around again. A coffee and dish of muesli and its off to the GP. Its turned cold and the brisk walk does me good, or at least wakes me up. The nurse is cheery and on the ball so I am not in the clinic room long. Today is the right side, the side that tends to be more sore than the other. I walk home and take myself to the shed to write letters. I settle down to purple ink and pens and write. The morning goes by, my partner brings me coffee and then later a friend rings to chat. It is a very welcome call. Lunchtime soon arrives and my partner and I go for a walk to the post box and then around the village. By the time we get back my gut is beginning to feel sore.

After a kipper lunch I start to do odd jobs like replacing light bulbs and gas fire batteries. I while away time waiting for the Tesco delivery. It finally arrives and there is the usual flurry of activity as we unload the trays and stow the good away. I settle back to odd jobs and then close up the shed and retreat to my “soffice”. There is a flurry of Amazon ordering for boring things like light bulbs and data sticks. By now I’m tired and cannot face training so resort to Mock the Week and drafting the blog. I think tonight I shall try to sleep early and read a little after my self esteem has been dented by Just Connect and University Challenge. It’s shaky junkie time.

Sunday, which means a weigh in first thing. So that’s what I did with the result that I now weigh 92.8 Kilos. I have lost a bit of weight this week but not a lot. This is the start of the slow grind to shift the rest of the weight having shed the easy pounds last week by cutting out carbs. My partner and I take a walk to the village shop and pick more paracetamol for me to take pre jab on Monday, along with a paper and my weight loss treat, a bag of Whispa bites. Back home I read the paper and then set about doing some chores and cleaning. I spent some time using a wood reviver on our ageing sofa with some success. I also check my accounts to find a friend has moved money to me so that I can send it to our friends in Shri Lanka. I set up the transfer to the family and soon get a message from them to say the money has transferred. Hopefully they will send more pictures of the work they are being able to do on their house. To date they have been able to re-roof the house so that they are now able to keep dry during the rainy season.

I get to kick off time for the afternoons rugby international. I watch half the match but decide to go to the gym instead. My partner and I go to the gym and I cross train for an hour to burn off some calories. I listen to Rammstein to block out everything around me and spend my time thinking about my last four years, from a time of health and inspiration to the spiral of illness and isolation, much has challenged and changed but the most important things have remained constant. I remain able to stand and hold my ground in the cold light of day and the real world.

Back home my evening is mostly TV, and the joys of eating my weight loss reward, my bag of Whispa bites. There is of course the usual Sunday night Tesco order to do adn then onto the blog. Tonight I will do more drugs in preparation for tomorrows early morning visit to the GP and the dreaded 28 day jab and hope for a decent nights sleep.

Thursday and its a morning of work meetings. The the post arrived and in it was a jewel of a T shirt that a friend had sent me as an early Christmas present. It is very Van Gogh starry night and I love it at first site. With a light lunch done I go to the gym and spend an hour on a cross trainer. I use the forest trail application and traverse some Californian trails. Its a hard flog but worth it. I get out of the showers hoping for a coffee but the clubs bar and restaurant is closed due to lack of staff, this really is piss poor. I go home for my drink and a tune pasta tea before going to a Collabro concert at De Montfort Hall. It would not be my first choice of music, but they make a sound I cannot and they are clearly popular judging by the fans at the front stalls and the amount of tea towels that go sold in the intermission. Here are a couple of brief tastes:

The drive home took a while as Leicester were playing at home and turned out at the same time, but we eventually made it home.

Friday and I slept in till 10:30, I have a lazy morning reading more of The Cat Who Saved Books. The more I read this book the more I like it. Any one who likes books will be made to think by this book. I take some shed time to write some thoughts and record them. I have a lunch time walk with the family to collect my drugs for next week and to visit the village cafe for a hot chocolate and rolls. Once home I put a chicken one pot into the oven before heading to the garage and a hard 30 minute row at a high level; the result, a new personal best. It would appear dead man rowing is getting fitter.

By the time I am recovered from the row its time to eat and get ready to go to Leicester Tigers. This is the first evening match of the season at home and its the first time I dig out my thermals and knitted hat. We drive into town and walk to the ground and take our seats.

The game sees the Tigers win convincingly and the crowd is happy and entertained with fireworks and bhangra drummers and dancers. Home and too tired to write the blog, its been a busy time.

Saturday can be summed up as, mostly international rugby, a little reading, a good letter from a friend and an Indian take away. The only thing of note is that I resurrected my glass tea pot and brewed a pot of very berry brew as a change from coffee. I also introduced flax seeds in to my diet. In theory they are supposed to help stay healthy. My partner has been eating them for weeks and says that since starting her hot flushes have markedly decreased. I catch up with the blog. So its been an active time, mostly, but tomorrow starts my 28 day jab routine with me starting to take prophylactic paracetamol, the uncomfortable start of my 28 day cycle. It is also weigh in day and I am hoping that my efforts over the week pay dividends.

Wednesday and I am up fairly early for breakfast and a morning of mopping up chores and get ready for an afternoon meeting. There are calls to answer and make. By late morning I decide not to go to the gym but opt instead to get into the garage and row for an hour. Its cold in the garage and I settle into a rhythm, it goes well and thanks to blue tooth head phones I am also able to take a call. The session goes well, very well and I end up rowing a personal best. Not something I have done for a while.

I get myself back to the lounge where I find a letter waiting for me, its a real treat and I settle down with a coffee to read it. Such a treat, it reminds me that I have outstanding correspondence to write and think about time in the shed over the rest of the week. I change out of my kit and have lunch and then do some final preparation for my meeting. I dial in and spend time talking to one of my services and then picking up the admin that resulted from the meeting. Mr Amazon delivers a couple of parcels for me. The first is ear plugs. I very occasionally experience hearing what sounds like a computer trying to back up. I suspected tinnitus but found that if I put my finger in my ear it stopped. I deduct that I therefore do not have tinnitus but do hear some sort of persistent household noise, so I will give ear plugs a go next time this annoying phenomenon occurs. The second surprise package was a book, an early Christmas present from a friend. I was intrigued and immediately started to read it and was gripped. Books, Japanese culture and talking cat, right up my alley.

I read for quite a while and before I know it, its time for tea and background TV wall paper until Shetland. However for a while we thought we had lost my partners mother on her journey from the hospital that she left at 6 o’clock and had not arrived home at gone past 9 o’clock. As I was phoning ambulance services to try and track her down she happily turned up at home. It had been a long day for the 93 year old, there has got to be a better way to do this. I write the blog and drift into thinking about tomorrow’s early meeting, when I can get to the gym and the evening out to see Collabro. Behind all this is the awareness that this is a pre jab week and that on Sunday I will start to pre load with paracetamol in preparation for the jab on Monday. Must remember to collect the jab from the chemist.