DVT DAY 58

Well today has been a mixed bag of joy and frustration. After breakfast I did some serious and focussed tinkering with the laptop and to my surprise I actual managed to fix it, or so I thought. But as normal I retreated to the shed. There I wrote letters and intermittently returned to the house to check on the recovering laptop which was very slow at digesting its medicine. By the time lunchtime came around my letters were complete and the laptop appeared well, so confident was I that I packed up my IT computer repair case and put it away. My clinical supervisor and friend rings me to thank me for a card and we chat about a mutual colleague who has recently died and the current state of the COVID-19 world we live in. I also find a letter from a friend waiting for me and settle down to read it with a coffee. It is a long and thoughtful letter, which I know I will read again soon before replying.

A quick lunch taken with the family during which we order really bright cycle masks, and then I set to, to unwrap my Amazon packages. New blog covers for the hard copy, sticky hooks for the shower, which got put up. Then it was time to unpack the new electrical connectors and mend the fan heater, which obdurately refused to work even after I had rewired it. It turns out that the thermostat is knackered and there is no way to get a new one. Undaunted by my failure I take to the garden and clip the hedges along the drive way so that we can park the cares without fighting our way through three feet of hedging. Undaunted by the ache in my arms I set myself up in the green house and planted rose seeds. They were a gift in 2009 that I came across when clearing a cupboard out in the office. I’m intrigued to see if they grow.

Time to rest and check out the laptop. Bastard thing gives me the old BOOTMGR image is corrupt message. I start again to repair the boot manager. I write code into the tool, chkdsk c: /f. It appears to work, so here I am writing the blog post dinner and wondering where the time has gone today.

I will publish this and then run off the hard copies before getting an early night and spending some time reading. I have found that I have at least four unread books on my kindle, one of which is by Sandi Toksvig’s Between the Stops. So that is where I will start. Tomorrow I might get some more exercise.

DVT DAY 57 (13 days no injections)

Today was in danger of going well. I had risen from a relatively good nights sleep and negotiated breakfast without any mishap. I made it to the shed and set myself up to work, all was going well. I typed up a blog for work and started to make te materials that go with it, at this point I am ahead of the game. I write a couple of cards to people that had sent me letters. I use my last stamp and had to scrat around to find a Christmas second class stamp for one  of the cards. I am still feeling like I am ahead, so its time for lunch.

The household agree it’s going to be soup for lunch so I set to and prepare it, I even wam bread rolls in the oven. Delicious. Some where in here my partner picks up my little HP Elite Notebook and does not notice that the external backup hard drive is attached to it and drops it. I’m on my way to the shed to continue my day, check to see if he new solar pond pump is working as the sun has come out. It does, I’m chuffed. Over lunch we had identified somethings that we are short of that need to go on the Sainsburys delivery list for Thursday  so I go to my little Elite Notebook to log on and change the order while I remember. My little HP Elite is not feeling elite anymore and gives me the message that “Boot Manager corrupt. Cannot boot “.  The day turns to instant rat shit! Not even a card from a friend can cut through this. I get into the system and set it to diagnose the problem and check the hardware and the memory before doing anything else. That’s going to take 2 hours and 45 minutes the machine tells me. I go to the kitchen and cook. I chop vegetables with venom, and hack chicken flesh with glee. I wasn’t going to cook it straight away just prepare stuff but in the end I just got on with it and put it in the oven to quietly simmer away, a bit like me. Kitchen cleared  I return to the HP elite sorry for itself laptop. I try several things but it will not play, so I end up getting it to boot to a Windows 10 USB stick and select “repair my computer”. It whirrs, it loads files and goes blank…it comes back with options… I choose…it goes blank…it returns and says it cannot repair my computer. Not impressed, I continue my battle. This going to take all night I can tell it in my IT bones.

There will be dinner first , then more IT bollox and then if I am lucky I will get to go out with a friend for a drink, all via the phone or zoom or something. Which in fact happened. I end up my day having a very long conversation with a friend on the phone. The first proper conversation with someone outside the family that I have had since I started my lock down weeks ago. I guess I was garrulous because its been so long, but it was a real pleasure.

DVT DAY 56 (12 Injection free)

Its been a long dull day. Late breakfast, chat with youngest daughter, life admin and running off the back log of the hard copy of the blog. Long chat with my sister and then dinner followed by TV and a Wentworth Jigsaw. Tomorrow back to the shed.

DVT DAY 55 (No Injections)

Today I get up and make coffee and tea to take back to bed. This of course is my opening gambit to get a bacon sandwich for breakfast. After a chat, the sandwich is agreed and I go and clear the kitchen ready. Bacon sandwich and coffee is taken watching one of the many Saturday morning cookery programmes. I’m intrigued by cornbread but cannot find the recipe on the BBC website. Eventually after a version of Gumbo I get going on the day.

I open the greenhouse up and give the newly emerging peas sticks to climb up and assess the water needs of the rest of the seedlings. I check out the pond and find that the water pump is not working and cannot fix it. There is another on the way, which hopefully will solve the problem. I play car jigsaw and eventually get the Wolf backed in to the garage so that I have a space to use. I sweep and hoover the garage space and then move the new weights bench from the shed to the garage. This is followed by several trips to bring the bar and weights int o the same space and to set them up. A couple of bench presses just to make sure the set-up is solid and I leave the garage to return tomorrow for a work out.

Time for lunch and a tidy up.  Egg noodles and parmesan. I empty the bins, dispose of the cardboard mountain and then pack up the two halves of the Le cruiser pie dish that fell in half the first time it was used and arrange for those nice people at Amazon to pick up the pieces and give me a refund. So, all is organised as I field a couple of e-mails form a colleague and talk about how I generated the materials. Amazon deliver my new pond solar fountain and like an impatient school boy I go out and fit it into the pond. There is not enough sun to make it work properly but it tries. The old one goes into  a bucket and will be played with tomorrow. A breathing space at last so I sort out my gym kit and prepare to exercise. In the spare bedroom I set up my smaller laptop and set my beginners ballet class going. So, there I am stretching and bending, watching my arm and learning how to take silver swan beginners steps in ballet.

I go to the sofa and recover and fairly soon I am eating tea and preparing for the evening of films and writing the blog. So, all in all a good day and at last I am moving a bit. Tomorrow I check the new pond pump and take things from there. Must keep moving now I have made a start.  

DVT DAY 54 (No Injections)

It was a good night. Two blocks of four hours sleep. I actually feel refreshed. So a quick breakfast and I retreat to the shed and open up the greenhouse. I settle down to write letters. I’ve not put pen to paper for a while and it feels good to be writing to friends again. Apart from a quick coffee break I write all morning. At one point it throws it down with rain and hails, the noise on the shed roof is loud and strangely comforting. At lunchtime there is scrambled eggs and a surprise in the post. An old colleague and friend writes to me out of the blue. She had heard from a mutual friend that I have been ill and writes to say hello. Letters are fabulous things; such surprises are all the sweeter when they drop through the door and reveal themselves slowly on reading.

A few chores like refiling the soap dispensers and its back to the shed to write yet more letters. I finish the writing and prepare them to be posted by my Hogwarts Owl. So I pack up the shed, close the greenhouse and return to the house. I check e-mails and find there are some things that I need to download and do some work on. Unfortunately, the system I am trying to download from will not let me do it because of a security protocol. It’s a pain in the arse and all I can do is rail at the IT crew. Clearly time to fit the multiple USB port to the computer and tidy up the range of stuff we have laying around he desk in the office. I’ve checked that all the laptops and systems in the house have backed up. Success, we are good for a week.

We communally cook tea and eat it as the COVID update pushes out its latest messages. I settle down to watch a film and write the blog. I am missing the gym and the pool, it seems so much more difficult to exercise at home rather than go to the gym. I guess I will crack it soon enough.

DVT DAY 53

DVT DAY 52 (6th injection free)

https://youtu.be/NWqJCRBr5rw

DVT DAY 51 (5TH INJECTION FREE)

It’s been a typical post 28 day injection day. I’ve been tired and listless. It’s very difficult to get myself motivated so I’ve done the necessary but little beyond that. So this morning by the time I was ready for a bath the boiler decided not to work so I had to reset it and postpone the bath till the afternoon. I also had to delay my one to one with the director of the enabling environment programme. We eventually got to spend some Teams time discussing the work that is under way and the future plans. Most of the morning was spent researching various keep fit options and ended up watching ballet classes for adult beginners, referred to as silver swan. How can I resist that? I might just give it a go for a few days. When not watching people doing bendy things with their bodies I chatted with a friend who had braved the supermarket to shop for her family. Apparently it was not an uplifting experience.

Once I had completed my work I escaped to the bath and eased my injection site. By the time I had become wrinkly it was nearing tea time and I idled time away downloading my energy supplier app and trying to use it to submit my gas and electricity meter readings. I read the meters, entered the figures and the robot app decided that there was something wrong with my reading and wanted me to ring their 0800 number. I did not of course. I’m not having a blood phone app calling me a liar or accusing me of being so incompetent as to misread a digital meter. They can send a meter reader round and they can keep social distance and go through the anti-virus decontamination ritual that I will have invented by then. I am sure that smearing peanut butter on the chest and chanting meditation songs can be included in a good anti-virus ritual.

I begin to draft my monthly invoice for April and find that when I tot up the hours that I have done, I’ve discovered I have worked more than usual. It’s a function of working from home and generating new materials. I’ve never been so busy, so there is going to be a cost to that.

An evening of TV, good old Grayson Perry presenting his art club was a highlight. But now it’s time to put the bins out, have a sandwich and see if I can get a decent night sleep.

DVT 50 (4th without injection)

So it’s up and get ready for the GP stabbing fest. Of course I take a shower and wear real trousers and a posh T shirt. It’s a bizarre ritual but if after 28 days I am going out into the real world then I am determined to smell good and look reasonable. A quick apple and orange juice and then I climb into my partners car and get ferried to the GP car park, there I wait until I get hailed. In I go and wait for the nurse to mix up the injection and then there is the injection, left side. I return to the car and my partner takes me for a ride the long way round the villages. It was good to see the fields around the village and to have a brief moment of seeing the world.

Once home we all settle into our work spaces, partner in the office, eldest daughter in the back room and me in the shed. Coffee and biscuits and I settle down to write some letters. I also send some packs of meadow garden seeds to friends. It’s not an original idea as a friend mentioned to me that she had been sent seeds by a friend and had enjoyed the gift. I finished my letters and gave them to my daughter, who acts as my Hogwarts Owl. A quick lunch of soup and bread and back to the shed to try and record an enabling environment video.

What a performance this turned out to be. No sound, so I spend an hour on two laptops trying to get the microphone level up far enough to hear on the replay. I finally get the technology sorted out, and write some prompt notes and then play with the lighting to get my best side in focus. I start to record videos and I make the startling discovery that I am total crap at talking to video. I try several times and it just gets worse. In the end I quit and pack up the shed and stomp off to the house beginning to feel my sore stomach and a smidgen tired.

I tidy the kitchen and head to the lounge to watch the last two episodes of DEVS. I like it but at core it’s the old argument about single or multiple universes, one universe versus all possible universes in an infinite co-existence. I’m not a fan of the multi universe theory it seems too much of a cop out from the difficulties of this one. It’s too convenient to deflect into multi-universes as an explanation when the going gets tough. Dinner arrives, which tells me this universe is the one I like. During all this Mr Amazon arrives and delivers some more IT stuff so that I can ensure that everyone has a backup drive and a case to keep it in. So I set my new backup drive and let my machine begin to back, which being the first time will take a considerable time. I write the blog and watch the laptop back up. I expect that this is it for the night. Tomorrow I will master the art of video making, after my work one to one.

DVT DAY 49 (4 no injection)

I got up early again today as I am not sleeping long at the moment. So breakfast done by 7:30 and I am checking that my eldest daughters lap top has backed up. It has, I am a hero, her laptop is now fully functional, hurray!

Then onto down loading all the shared picture folders onto a hard drive so that they can be copied to my partners laptop. All goes well, but a lengthy process. Then it was time to load them up onto the laptop so they can be photoshopped. While all that is going on I clear the kitchen, replace light bulbs and open up the garden.

My partner gets up and we breakfast on bacon sandwiches (yes I know but there are times when a Hobbit second breakfast is essential). I check my Amazon orders and top them up to make sure we have all the IT drives and cases that we need. Along the way I find that it is now possible to buy Carex handwash in 5 litre cartons, I could not resist. Later in the day I check my orders and find I might have ordered two, not my intention but hey its not perishable. One last chore before getting out in to the garden, and that’s to organise the card board mountain that has collected in the hall. I take my box cutter to it and get it all into one large box, which I gaffer tape ready for collection. Now for the garden.

I set about clearing out some of the pots in the front garden with view to planting out some of the seedlings. Pots ready, I plant them up with a mixture of Cosmos and tomatoes plants. It will make a strange presentation when they all come to full bloom.

With the planting done I sit by the pond on my gardening kneeler and watch the pond for frogs and if lucky the newt. Surprise surprise there are two newts and they seem to be a couple. What are baby newts called, newtlettes or ewfts, I do not know, something to google in an odd moment. Fortunately, I have my phone with me and take a video of my new found gems.

I retreat inside and write materials for Enabling Environment commitments I have this week. It is strange writing things for people who are out there working on the frontline of the criminal justice system. It’s difficult not to sound condescending or out of touch with reality when the real desire is to try and be supportive and recognise the excellent work they are doing. Time to close up the garden, the greenhouse and summer house before dinner and writing the blog.

Tomorrow is the day I go to the GP for my 28 day injection to keep my cancer at bay. With COVID19 all about us, I have to be kept in the car park until the nurse is ready to stab me. It means that I shall have a sore stomach for a couple of days and will bathe regularly to relieve the soreness. So tomorrow I shall take it easy and be kind to myself. I may well spend time sitting but the pond.