DVT DAY 53
AS GOOD AS IT GETS PHASE DAY 38
AS GOOD AS IT GETS PHASE DAY 36
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.
AS GOOD AS IT GETS PHASE DAY 35
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.
AS GOOD AS IT GETS PHASE DAY 34
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.
AS GOOD AS IT GETS PHASE DAY 33
DVT DAY 48 (3 injection free)
By the Powers what a day! Avast yea, not only is it “speak like a pirate day” me heartys but it is also “found a NEWT in the pond” day. Blow me down in Davey Jones Locker a newt lurks. The knave was too quick about the deep to capture in picture but I will Nessie hunt the beast till I has a likeness.
What’s more landlubbers my jolly heave ho weights bench arrived so I can once again weigh anchor and set my jib to ripple. Furthermore matey, listen up scurvy tar, I be gettin’ my sea legs back by parading the unicycle down the gang plank. The suns up and the tide right for a spot of seafarin’.
Back in the binnacles eldest wench daughter an’ I did surf waves and harpooned ourselves a laptop fishy for few doubloons so that eldest can pull up anchor and rove da seas with all her learning cargo on board. This luckless slinger not dun bad, no hornswaggling here.
Well my scurvy knaves and salty dogs tis’ tot time as sun sets over the yard arm to eat and hornpipe gaily. Pass me the grog till I’m squiffy. Aye Aye its time to batten down the hatches.
AS GOOD AS IT GETS PHASE DAY 32
DVT DAY 47 (day 3 of no injections)
Another early day with a quick breakfast and then a retreat to the shed to write letters and continue to write Enabling Environment maintenance materials. My partner brings me my monthly injection for Monday. A quick lunch and then I mow the lawns front and back and return to the shed to write more stuff for enabling environment. Tap tap tap away until it’s time to cook dinner, pie. While my creation bubbles away in the oven I unpack the new hard drives and search for the instructions. After dinner I plug my 6 Terabyte in to the main PC in the office and leave it to get on with backing up the system. Tesco delivers and then it’s TV and write the blog.
If you get the impression that I am bored, you’d be partly right, but I am more tired from my days efforts than anything else, so I am probably entering a semi-comatose state.
AS GOOD AS IT GETS PHASE DAY 31
DVT DAY 46 (no injection day 2)
A day of production and nice surprises. I woke early and knew I would not go back to sleep so I got up and had an early breakfast and put on some laundry. Breakfast is eaten in front of the TV news, no surprises, apparently there is still COVID 19 going on and no sport. Its only a matter of time before X Box launch their latest game, Virus. A chance to battle a deadly world pandemic and make a fortune suppling PPE. I find an e-mail letter from a friend and I take my time reading it and have a second cup coffee so that I can take my time over the letter. I check my e-mails and find that e-bay are going to reimburse me the cost of my weights bench that has not arrived. I impetuously go to Amazon and find that suddenly there is a plethora of weights benches available, I buy one as it appears it can be here between Monday and Wednesday. I can feel some serious getting fit coming on once I have shifted my Enabling Environment work for the next week.
I go to the garden shed and start to write more material for the Enabling Environment resource that we are building and of course keeping my time sheet up to date. I write until about 11:15 and retreat to the house to do a meeting on Teams for which I need the reliability of the house WiFi. It’s a long meeting and goes on till almost 1 o’clock. I have time for a hot cross bun and a coke before I am back up on screen hosting a Forum for managers. My partner delivers a sandwich lunch part way through the forum, which I watch during the forum. Once the forum is over I fall on the sandwich and devour it with relish.
It’s time to get back to the shed so that I can write up my notes and take a phone call. Its back to the practical then. Taking in this morning’s washing, putting clothes away and setting up for the evening. I insect the pond to see if the water levels have gone down or not. It appears stable and I wonder if the drop in the level yesterday was due to the solar pump getting misaligned and in effect pumping water out of the pond. It’s a distinct possibility. Hopefully this is the explanation. So, I eat dinner and get on with the blog for the day. I’m flagging and hope for an early night to catch up on what I lost last night.
AS GOOD AS IT GETS PHASE DAY 30
DVT DAY 45 (From injection to tabs)
Today has been one of aggravation, it would appear that the pond liner maybe punctured, my eldest daughters laptop appears to be ill, and the rate at which I can get through the EE work is slow because my internet keeps dropping out. But on the plus side is the fact that today I did not have to self stab. Today was my first pill day! What a relief, I am eternally grateful to my oncologist ( He who made a pact with the devil) for suggesting the alternative medication format. I cannot express adequately the relief I am feeling.
So today I have worked, and worked some more and butlered through the day. I go to bed to sleep on my latest IT challenge, having ordered a new back up system for the family’s main computer system as I get more and more paranoid about losing our data. I am fortunate in that I am able to deal with my isolation, the experience of spending a month in a Jamaican hospital last year and my natural ability to occupy myself without any pressing responsibilities for children is a blessing. I am full of admiration for one friend in particular who not only continues to work from home but also manages to keep creating education and engaging activities for her three and five year olds at the same time. It puts my isolation in to perspective.
AS GOOD AS IT GETS PHASE DAY 29
DVT DAY 44
Up to an early breakfast and an early trudge up the garden to the shed. I open up the greenhouse and have a chat with the seedlings. I spend a bit of time writing a letter and preparing a work hour record sheet before setting about pricking out more seedlings. I get engrossed in the process and work away till lunchtime, with the odd visit to the house to get a Wi Fi signal that is reliable. I weed out the patio pots, weed out the front garden pots and then I’m ready for lunch, scrambled eggs and salmon. My garden is giving gifts everyday and keeps me sane, more or less.
I have a meeting at two o’clock I dive into the shower to freshen up before I go video! The meeting opens up and I observe the it, taking notes and noticing the processes that look similar to the other groups that I am part of. By four o’clock the meeting has ended, the debrief done and the notes made. After couple of hours of listening I needed to do something physical so I found some hard wood tiles to mount the swing seat on and put one of the raised garden beds on. That done it was time to strike the tent and end the festival camping in the garden. By the time I had struck, rolled, and pushed the tent into its cover it was time to eat dinner.
I return to the house and find my daughter has returned from her exercise walk via the chemist. On this walk she delivered my new perscription to the chemist who actually had the stuff in stock. This is a big deal as it means no more daily injectuions. Two pills a day and I am off the needle, my day just got great! Heaven knows what the side effects are potentially but I’m beyond caring that much, I am just happy not to be self stabbing everyday.
I tentatively try getting onto my website from my notebook and to my great surprise I get in. I have no idea how it has corrected it’s self so I beaver away to write todays blog. As for tonight I have no idea. I’ve blown Killing Eve as I have already watched the most recent episode. If this goes on I shall have to get back to reading.
