Tuesday and I am up early but not early enough to get my first call of the day. Its a muesli breakfast to start and then I head for the garden as it is unexpectedly sunny. I’ve intended to move some iris to the front garden for a while now so todays the day. I dig up all the iris in the back garden iris bed and take them to the bed that has been made ready in the front garden. Its had manure dug into it and now some compost is added as I replant the iris. It takes time but eventually I get the iris in. I’ve done my best with my grandfathers Irises, I just hope they survive. I’ve moved them into the sunny side of the house as their rhizomes like the sun on them, so I’m hoping for success.

Having moved the iris I now have an empty bed to play with in the back garden. So I give it a good digging over and add a bag of manure before planting it up with the weekends plant buys. It allows me to put a wider range of plants into the bed and experiment with what will grow in this spot in the garden. Its much easier to plant these plants as their root systems are not as dispersed as Iris. There is room to add more at a later date but I want to see how these go first.

I finish the new bed and I am dripping in sweat. Having put the garden tools away I head for a bath with one eye firmly on the clock as I am tutoring at 1:30pm. I am lazing in the bath listening to radio 3 and the composer of the week, Bartok, who apparently spent a lot of his life gathering folk songs from Transylvania. Could not make that up. As I laze in my bath I get a WhatsApp from a friend explaining that the reason for her quietness was that she collapsed on Friday and had to spend six hours in A&E. She is recovering but it has been a bit of a shock. As she said in our conversation there is no telling what will happen next. A lunch of coke and hot cross bun and I am in front of my screen and tutoring through till 5 o’clock. Our basic message is “preparation” but the technology fails so I do not get to play the participants the video I had in my presentation. Here it is just for fun.

https://youtu.be/wDG6uItd6FA

During this time the bird feeders I ordered yesterday arrive. The team have a quick debrief at the end of the session. As I walk away from my session I get a call from a friend who is on an inspection and ending her day at the hotel. These inspections can be intense so to get a night away in a hotel can be a relief. As soon as I am free I head for the garden and put the new bird and squirrel feeder up and fill them with fresh seed and food. Another step to prepare the garden for winter.

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I just get the feeders filled and its time for tea, I’m tired now and settle into the sofa to eat and watch some TV as I rest after the days exertions. I start the blog and hopefully will get an early night.

Another Monday and I am up and doing breakfast at a reasonable time as the boiler is being serviced this morning. I’ve just about finished my morning round of email checks and work checks and Mr Boiler arrives. Of course he gets coffee and I sit and read as he performs the magic. It takes him about an hour and he then presents me with my Annual Service GAs Safety Record with the observation that my burner gasket fell apart when he opened the boiler up so he has fitted a new one. This is good news as a burst gasket on the burner could be nasty, but now it wont happen. I get some unexpected work emails and I spend time arranging meetings. It looks like business is looking up. I read a bit more of What is Life and like the author more and more.

I go to the garden centre and buy compost, manure and bird/squirrel feed to go with the bird/squirrel feeders I ordered earlier in the morning. I get it back to the house, stow it and dig a bag of manure into my intended Iris bed in the front garden. A friend zoom calls me, its the first time in ages that I’ve actual seen them and it is really good to be able to chat whilst seeing someone. It is a rare opportunity to talk about previous correspondence and to clarify some of what I’ve written as I tend to be quite oblique and metaphoric when I write with pen and ink. There are times when I think what I write is the equivalent of a Pixie stamping its foot, or in clear language let my mind run out onto the page. Anyway we chat for a while until Tesco knock on the door, as everyone else in the house is work tied I get to take it in and then get back to my call. In the end the real world intervenes and we said adieu. I changed into my training gear and headed for the garage. Today needs to be an hour session to get the week started right. That’s what I do and it is an effort.

At the end of the session I change and settle into my evening routine of watching TV, eating tea and then watching more TV till I write the blog. This evening my eldest returns with her friend from a weekend away. He stays long enough for a drink and a bite to eat before heading back home. I take time out to book tickets for the local pantomime on the day of my next oncology appointment. It seems appropriate and I might need a distraction. I return to the blog. I need to change my evenings, I need to feed myself with better brain food.

Saturday and time for a lazy breakfast before making the effort to go to the opening rugby match of the season. It is a calculated risk but there is a limit to how long I can stay locked away in the house. Before I get going the post arrives and there is a letter from a friend in Scotland, its a delightful letter which I know I will reread several times. I watch my childhood football team Brentford beat Wolves and then get ready to rugby. So I drag out my Leicester Tigers shirt, sniff it and decided that I could survive. Its the old routine of driving into town, parking and walking to the stadium. Its more or less the same, cashless of course, and there is a larger restricted area around the player areas. We get in easily as the season ticket cards work and we make our way to our seats. Its a feeling I have missed and in that moment of utter silence by more than 17,000 as the kicker prepares to convert a try there is that sense of something special. The game starts and by the end Tigers have won. Its a good start to the season.

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At the end of the game we file out happy along with the rest of the crowd and make our way back to the car. By the time we are home we have no desire to cook so order Indian in. Its a lazy evening and of course there is Strictly to watch. Its a strange compulsion but reinforced heavily by the fact that Bill Bailey won last year. Of course football follows and then bed.

Sunday is another lazy start which culminates in a bacon bagel breakfast and a chat. However before I can indulge I weigh in. 94.5 Kilos a drop of 1 kilo this week. At last the effort is beginning to have an effect. I need to have a carb less week to speed things up. Its a lazy morning during which I do some work on my training presentation before going to the garden centre to get new plants for the garden. Returning home with a boot full of plants I spend time in the garden weeding out the beds and preparing the way for the new plants. I realise now just how much work there is to do to properly prepare the garden for winter and the following spring so I think I will be spending a lot of time over the coming two weeks in my garden I hope the weather holds up. The guy who comes to help in the garden is going to find himself with a long list of things to do.

My evening is pie and TV until I catch up writing the blog. Apart from a letter I’ve read nothing for two days and need to create some time for me to feed my brain and I have a couple of books to finish. Tomorrow our heating system gets serviced so I shall be up and about early. It is a period of the mundane but in my minds eye I see my oncology appointment etched on my internal calendar. There is that thread of needing to persevere at the discipline of diet and training. I need to add more activity out of the house over the next twelve weeks just to raise my level of engagement and activity. The biggest concern is not knowing what I can do beyond what I am doing to reduce my PSA level. More research required .

Friday and I wake at 10:15! All I can hear is the Hippowaste lorry picking our bag up and my partners voice from the office leading a work call. I clearly needed the sleep,which on reflection does not surprise me given how un anything I’ve been feeling this week. Bacon bagel time with coffee and meds. Its that time in the fortnight to fill my pill dispensers. A fiddly job but worth the effort as it keeps things simple and means I do not miss my meds. I get unexpected work emails that mean I need to do so me admin and then I settle down to write a book proposal. A rough draft on behalf of the Elders group. It is a crude document but I think I capture the basics of what the group intends. I send it off to the group before retreating to the Shed to write letters. Some time later I make the trip to the post box and return to train. Today its the bike for an hour. Its okay but I’m losing motivation to do it, I think its because my weight has crept up again. Its no surprise really as I’ve not kept to my strict diet and given into the deadly craving for Mars Bar ice creams and chocolate digestives.

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I record my session and run a bath. While I wait I notice the same young woodpigeon sitting in the tree outside the back bedroom window. He seems to be snuggling down and to have adopted the tree as his home. Nice to make him/her welcome, if it stays I shall find a name for it.

My evening will be rugby, Jesse Stone and Bill Bailey at the Royal Opera House. Tomorrow poses the prospect of live rugby as the Tigers pay their first game of the season at home. So I may be one of several thousand to brave the stands again. If I make the effort I hope the team raise their game from last year.

Thursday, its 8 o’clock, I’m up and its muesli (yep good old healthy muesli) for breakfast. I clear the kitchen, take my drugs and settle down for my first meeting of the morning. A meeting mainly about the timing of meetings, they happen now and again, all part of life’s rich tapestry. I go straight from one meeting to the next only this one is fun and is preparing for some delivery of training next week. It was fun, business like and relaxed. I came out of it inspired to upgrade my presentation. A quick fried egg sandwich for lunch, (note the less healthy step in my food intake) and I return to tarting up my presentations. I embed videos and add more pictures so by the end of version 4 I am nearing satisfaction. Time is getting on so its time to get myself into the garage and row for a session. A friend calls me and we chat about a busy world. I row, averagely, no below averagely.

I record my session and then change in to lazing clothes and watch a football match during which I eat tuna pasta. I blow any pretence of healthy eating by indulging in a Mars Bar ice cream.My eldest daughter is picked up by a friend and disappears till the weekend, I continue to watch football punctuating it with coffee and chocolate digestives. By now its obvious that healthy eating is out of the window. I write the blog flat. Its all a bit dull really, the wind is blowing.

Wednesday and I get up to empty bins and sunshine. A muesli breakfast, coffee and drugs follows quickly. I check my social media and emails, nothing there to lighten the self so I move on to planning the day. I will inevitably end up in the Shed. I didn’t. I ended up doing some work as some of my services actually want some stuff from me. Mid morning I slip out and fill the car, check the tyres and buy a paper. It also allows me to retrieve the emptied bins, which the garden guy will be pleased about. I return to find more work has arrived along with some post including a surprise present parcel from my sister.

I dip into the book and find myself drawn in quickly. A friend calls on her way to the golf course and we chat about how we are copping with things. In the conversation she uses the phrase “terminal illness” in relation to me. It is a stark reminder of my situation and how much I push this out of my mind. It is a useful reminder and will help me train later. At lunchtime the family go for a walk around the village and pick up a loaf. Once back I have a soup lunch and do a bit more work, mostly sorting out my diary and organising the coming weeks. Its time to train and I am struggling to get motivated but I eventually get into the garage for a half hour row, that goes reasonably well. My stomach is still sore from Mondays injection so the row was a bit more tiring than usual.

I record my session and then go to change during which I take a call from a friend and chat about life in the real world with its work and family demands. I change and watch an early football match until tea and then watch a really good European football match. I cave in and indulge in chocolate digestives before finishing the blog for the day.

Tuesday and I am up in time to make a bacon bagel for breakfast before parking my arse in front of the laptop to observe three hours of training on … This is the tricky bit because I’m not sure, its not that I did not know what the material was I was just confused how it was supposed to work with a group of people who do not meet, communicate or practice relational practice with each other. Any way it passed the morning and lead to an entertaining catch up telephone call with a colleague. Time for lunch and to train. I go to my wardrobe to select my attire for tonight, as I am going out, to find that the wardrobe rail had collapsed and jettisoned my trouser collection to the floor. I was not amused but stoically gathered up my battery drill, head torch and spare rail supports ( of course I have). I set to and empty my wardrobe before installing new support brackets and then rehanging my trousers. Having put way my tools I finally get changed to train. The Shed was welcoming and I clambered aboard the bike and ground out an average hour.

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I record my session and then indulge in a bath bombed bath. Although I like the purple water and the scent I am regularly disappointed that I do not emerge as sparkly as the bath water. Whats the point of sparkly water if you do not end up as sparkly. Hey ho. The water soothes me and I think of others who nurse scrapes and mishaps and count my blessings. I dress to go out but have time to catch a chunk of a football match. On the stroke of 7:30 I drive my partner and I to the next village where we take up our dinner reservation. We have a table up stairs next to four people out for the night who as it turns out are arseholes. One of them very clearly expressed the opinion that it was better when you could smoke on a plane as it drew in more fresh air. FFS this person has been voting for years. Of course people on benefits should be made to gather in the crops now that Brexit has robbed us of fruit pickers. I’m sure you can get my drift. Anyway when we eventually got a drink we ordered food, unfortunately they delivered salmon instead of sea bass, so there was a slight delay in the main courses as they prepared a fresh sea bass dish. In fairness the food was really good and the whole meal pleasant. My partner and I chatted sporadically between dumbstruck silences as the table next to us continued to enlighten their fellow diners with a good old fashioned common sense view of how the world should be. I did discover during the evening that Christmas was not a joyous time for my partner due to the double amount of effort she has to put in to make Christmas work for all the family so I suggested that she does one day and I and the rest of the family do the other day so she gets a proper days celebration. Determined to make that work. I drive us home where she retreats to bed and I write the blog. I have to say it was nice to dress up tonight, proper Oxford bags, matching shoes, crisp white shirt, bright pink jacket and my now long white hair left to flow.

Monday, I wake to find my partner busy doing yoga, my eldest preparing to go to work. I have time for a muesli breakfast and my meds before I run out of the door, and then run back in realising that I have forgotten my injection kit. I get to the GP surgery and get ushered into the clinical room immediately. This month is the right side of my gut and for good measure I get a B12 jab in the left arm. The actual jabbing goes okay but in the after chat I discover that my nice, considerate and thoughtful nurse is retiring and will not be there next time. This is a blow as my injections have been more bearable due to her careful administration. I just hope her replacement does not turn out to be a ham fisted javelin thrower. I drive home and immediately settle down to creating a training PowerPoint for some training delivery in a couple of weeks time. I beaver away all morning until my partner suggests a lunch time walk. We take a parcel for Shri Lanka to the post office and then wander around the village, bumping into my partners brother on the way. We chat for a while and then move on to lunch at home and a crossword to do. I prepare more training slides and send them off to the organiser and my fellow tutor. Its time to train so I change and head for the garage to row for half an hour.

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I record my session and then change before settling down for the evening in which “Only connect” and “University Challenge” will demonstrate my ignorance, although I do get an occasional synaptic out burst which produces a right answer. I shall spend the rest of my evening writing the blog and preparing to observe a training session tomorrow.

Saturday: time to breakfast and to organise, to do chores and to prepare to eat out tonight, but first there is a trip to the gym. Yes to the gym for the first time in over two years. I drive the family there so that my eldest daughter can have her hair done and I can spend time on a cross trainer. 46 minutes to shed 500 calories, not bad after such a long lay off. I spend a bit of time on a weights machine and then donning swimwear I spend ten glorious hot minutes in the steam room. A shower other than my own is a real pleasure and then its into the old club room.

Feeling fresh and clean we return home to prepare for our evening meal with friends. The meal is splendid and full of care and good conversation as it should be between friends. There was the slight distraction for a while of Radacanu the 18 year old wonder girl of tennis winning the US Open tennis championship. We chat until midnight when I drive us home to finally get some sleep.

Sunday, and I weigh in first thing. 95.4 kilos a drop of 0.1 kilos, I am so disappointed after this weeks efforts. I wonder if this is a test of some sort, but that way lay madness. A simple breakfast of eggs and then we make the face time call to our youngest daughter who is recovering from a cold but in relatively good form. Once done its time for me to climb into my “work clothes” and head for the garden with a Hippo bag. I spend some tine clearing the garden and the patio of all the unwanted old sun shades and seed trays before adding the ancient crockery sets and bed linen that is no longer required. With everything stowed that we want to get rid of I cover the bag and secure it. I return to the garden and begin to trim it for winter. I make a reasonable start. By the end of the afternoon, with beds freshly made, non garden kind, my partner adn I sit on the swing seat and watch the squirrels chase each other as a robin sits in the garden and sings to us. We return to our chores, I start to write the blog from yesterday and today. Today is a prophylactic paracetamol day as tomorrow is my 28 day injection coupled this month with a B12 jab. If things go as usual then I’m going to be sore for at least two days and not particularly chipper. I watch Harry Potter films to remind me that good wins in the end. Its a kind of magic of which, Dumbledore reminds us, words are the greatest of all.

Its Friday and it was another bed hopping night to try and get comfortable but as my partner pops out early to get a blood test I start a bacon bagel and coffee. She is back before my bacon is cooked. I dine in front of the TV telling me an 18 year old just got to the US open tennis tournament. I put my washing away and start to prepare some teaching materials. Thank goodness for Power point, in my creative hands its an art form. I beaver away till 11 o’clock when I have a Teams meeting with a manager of several services. It is one of those meetings that is a joy. Positive, constructive and productive. I come away with some useful things to do, an ally and a way forward at the next big meeting with senior managers. So I work till lunch time before taking a walk to the chemist to pick up my months drug supply. I am with my partner so we take a turn around the village and find a friend who had won second prize in the village scarecrow competition with his Gruffalo. We stand and chat to him with his wife for a while and agree to find a date to eat together. We return home, I have a light lunch and retreat to the Shed to write letters before I miss the post collection.

Its the moment in the day when I have to decide to get out of my clothes and into my training kit. It is this moment that at times trips me up. I make the effort and change. I get into the garage and set myself up to row for an hour at a reasonable resistance level so I know I’m going to be in for a tough session. I was right but it was made easier by a friend ringing me mid way through and by the miracle of blue tooth headphones I was able to take the call and chat for a while. An end of week conversation, ending the week and starting the weekend. I row through the conversation and when I’ve said goodbye the radio returns to my ears. Steve Wrights Serious Jokin’. I press on until that last few minutes that determine whether I break the 14 kilometre barrier or not. I push, I do, I ‘m knackered.

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I get to my sofa and record the session. I change into evening “lazers” and watch TV while my partner prepares pizza and wrestles with the aggravation of trying to sort out the bed of nettles that providing home care for her mother has turned out to be. More NCIS and then Jesse Stone while I write the blog. The weekend beckons, dinner with friends, perhaps the gym, the Sunday weigh in, perhaps some mattress shopping.