Saturday, it seems so long ago and its only Sunday so I guess it was a day of inactivity apart from a brief veg restock and a scone at the garden centre. It was also the day I restocked my drugs wallets for the coming two weeks. I know I did not train and apparently sitting on my arse watching TV drama box sets is not a way to get fit or loose weight. I also remember chocolate and late night TV so Sundays weigh in is doomed.

Sunday and it starts with a coffee in bed and a chat. I then weigh my self. I am 97.2 kilos, I have put back on this week what I lost the week before, I am disheartened not with the weight but with my own inability to train consistently and my tiredness. This is followed by a bacon bagel and a lot of general tidying and trying to ring our youngest daughter. So my partner and I prepare to go to the gym. I drive us there and we hit the gym floor, me grabbing a cross trainer. I really do not feel like it today but then its becoming more difficult to motivate myself as time goes on. Nevertheless I set the session to 50 minutes and my usual 11 level and off I go. It turns out out okay as I have Rammstein loud in my ears.

Spurred by my disappointment with myself on the weight and exercise front I decide to do another 30 minutes on a recumbent bike. What a waste of time this is, it must be the most inefficient way of burning calories. I work at a steady pace and only burn an additional 100 + calories. I wear my Fitbit on my foot to try and get some sort of score from the exercise. It does not work very well as I am still trying to understand how I access all the features of the new Christmas Fitbit. I walk the gym floor and finish my 750 cc of water and then go for a shower.

My partner and I have coffee in the lounge and then head for home. Damp kit gets sorted and I settle down to follow the football scores and to start to draft the blog for the last couple of days. We ring my youngest daughter who replies this time and we chat. She points out that we have been talking about a new sofa for two years and she is bored with hearing about but is proactive when it comes to a new lounge rug. Within minutes she is sending us links to appropriate rugs from various sellers. I continue to draft the blog while my partner prepares tea and makes her daily call to her mother.

Tonight is a bonanza night of TV. Country file, His Dark Materials, Midwifes, Happy Valley and then football highlights. Tonight I shall slob in front of the TV unashamedly and tomorrow I will try again. Try again to discipline myself to eat right, sleep right and train right, whilst pursing the limited goals in my life of publishing my poetry and maintaining my correspondence with those people who I have written to over the years. At times it seems that the more I try to simplify life the complicated it becomes.

Friday, up and breakfast with meds. Then its on to a domestic morning of clearing the kitchen, putting washing in and replenishing the bird feeders. Outside the gas pipe folk are relaying large bright yellow pipes so in teh next few days it will be our turn to be without gas for a couple of days as they run the new plastic pipe into the old pipe system. There is time for a bacon sandwich for lunch before my partner goes of to see her mother and I go to the gym for a touch of warm environment training.

Its a real luxury to be able to train in the warmth, wander around and choose a fitness machine and then indulge in a warm shower. The session itself is on a cross trainer for 50 minutes followed by some weight machine work. I am still wary of the cross trainer as it was the machine that was more likely to induce me to piss blood after using it. This session goes okay with no after effects and I get to burn off 500+ calories.

Post session and post shower I relax with a large coffee in the lounge and check my messages and then drive home feeling achy. I get home and walk down to the village shop, which houses the local ATM. I draw my monthly cash allowance and buy a paper before returning home. My Fitbit is confusing me as it uses a index called PAI which is supposed to monitor fitness progression with a basic target to reach each day of 100. The tricky bit is that as time goes on and you get fitter it gets more difficult to win the PAI points. Over the past few days I have been cracking the 100 mark easily but today I find myself struggling and so have have only managed 97. Once home I settle down to do the crosswords, tea and drafting the blog before watching Leicester Tigers take on Claremont in a European cup and then Death in Paradise. Tomorrow is going to throw it down with rain so I’m predicting a long lay in in the morning.

A friend emailed me early this morning to ask if I was okay because my blog did not appear to have been written. I answered her, It was nice that someone noticed and enquired after me, it was very much appreciated. I still have to sort out why the blog page is not updating.

Wednesday and it could have been a bad day but was not, Why I hear you ask. Well as my partner recovered from her hospital visit the day before I got into the office where the family PC lives. It holds all my passwords for the important sites I need and today it was “settle with the tax man” day, so having the right access codes was important. I’m expecting to be a couple of grand lighter by the end of the session. I follow the instructions on my tax office threatening letter and go to a new page that I have not visited before called my “current position.” I stare at the screen in disbelief, according to this page I only owe the HMRC a measly £132 pounds including an amount on account for next tax year. I’m bemused and go to another new to me page called payments and receipts for the tax years. I check this new page to find I have already paid about £2000 in payments on account over the tax year in question. So being paranoid I check them all again adn run of hard copies of the pages from my tax account that I have just viewed. I then pay my £132 by BACS and rejoice happily. What a good day this is turning out be. I’m giddy with my new found wealth. It is rainbow time.

The day goes on getting better as a friend messages me and tells me her sister and wife have been approved by the adoption screening panel. Another friend messages me with frustration relieving content, which I think is an excellent thing to have done. So a very good morning. I put an evening meal in the crockpot slow cooker and then my intention was to train but I made a fatal mistake. I got involved with a jigsaw, a small jigsaw, with very small pieces of strange shapes and illogical fittings. I have previously sworn never to do jigsaws again but here I am with all my combative and obsessive traits engaged. That’s me all evening and night till I down my night meds and fall into bed past midnight a tired but jigsaw competent person. The film on TV passed me by as did everything else as I head wrestled the fiendish tiny part into the shape of a bee. I go to bed frustrated that I got caught by a jigsaw and did not train. Good for head bad for body, which at the moment is the more important.

Thursday and I wake up to the sound of the gas pipe replacement workers digging hole outside the house. It will not be long before they are knocking on the door to tell us to switch off our boiler and other gas appliances. I check my social media and find a friend has sent me a link to a call for poets and spoken word artists to apply to perform at Glastonbury this year. I am tempted to apply as the Poetry Coyote, but I am not sure I’ve got enough performance videos to apply with. I have until March to decide. Its a long shot and I am an unlikely contender. Post breakfast and morning meds I catch up with drafting the blog. Friends tell me the blog is still slow in coming up or updating but I can find no obvious reason why that should be unless the size of some of the content is slowing it down. The actual site itself is responding quickly and saying it is posting the new material straight away. It is possible that the servers in America, where the site is held and administered, is being slow. My goal is to train today and get a bit of Shed time in so I can reply to some of the unexpected mail I have had over the last couple of weeks.

The Shed is quick to warm up once I am in and settled. I set about writing replies to the letters that I have received recently. I am using my new stock of writing paper that was a present at Christmas. A friend calls and we chat about the message she sent me the other day during one of those times when it fells that nothing is going right. We chat for a while and only stop when the “wet room man” turns up to look at one of the frustrating problems besetting my friend. Its all part of the teething problems of moving into a new home. I continue to write letters until I get hungry. Back in the house I have a late lunch and write an email to my sister. I pop out to the post box and take the opportunity to replenish my partner’s chocolate stock after eating last night whilst wrestling with the bee jigsaw. Time to train, I really do not want to and its difficult to get motivated to go for it, however I get changed and make my way to the garage. I set the rower for a thirty minute session but up the resistance to a work level. I set off slowly and it takes time to warm up, however by the second half I have warmed up and I am able to make up the lost distance and calorie burn from the start. It ends up a reasonable session as I burn 400+ calories.

I recover from the session and record it in my journal before stripping off the training kit. My partner and I eat tea before she goes to the office to have her on line singing lesson. I settle down to an evening of word counting and preparing some bits of writing. Tomorrow I must go out and train in the comfort of a warm gym, I’m concerned that the Dark and Tricky is circling close by.

Tuesday and its the day my partner goes to the hospital for her colonoscopy so its a slow start. My partner has been up since 5:30 to follow the pre procedure process prior to her hospital visit. I have breakfast and then the post man delivers my tax demand for the last tax year. So its not a day that is filled with joy. My injection site is red and sore but I have to say it could be worse so I think training yesterday helped. Either that or the prophylactic paracetamol is working.

So the afternoon sees me driving to the local hospital and dropping of my partner to face her procedure. I try to go to the local café and await the call from my partner but it is closed. On further exploration I find the local Costa and settle into a large hot chocolate and a bacon roll. There are very few in and so I do what I always do when I am waiting in cages, hotels and restaurants I write. Its never anything much and is often just a to do list or a check on the last one I wrote. Today I scribble a couple of brief “poems”.

What do I do 
I write,
I garden.
I clean the house, 
Something missing?
Like an alcoholic
With no kidneys,
A diver
With no lungs.
Its just a construction,
Impressions 
synapsed together
In a process,
Welded with transmitters
Cell by cell. 
On or off,
It either is or isn't,
Like life,
You either are or aren't. 


All I ever was 
Was a wordsmith,
Dyslexic silver tongue
Who knew the shapes
And colours of symbols. 
Always trying to tell others,
This is how it is for me. 
It aroused no interest
so I go on
Seeking the moment
That says clearly
This is me. 
That instance
When another's eyes light
and there are two of us,
Same place,
Same time,
Same understanding. 

I watch people come and go, children slither and fidget next to me and people while away time. I think about another drink and decide its time to move as I am having a hot flush and need to cool down. Out side I spot the local shopping centre. Its dead, half the units are empty the rest are looking abandoned or ignored. The only store with people in it is a Greggs. Its trying to be a restaurant with its comfortable eating spaces, however the sight of people tucking into their pasties from the paper bags they were serve in belies the attempts at refinement. I return to the car and check the time and decide to wait. My partner rings me at 5 o’clock to tell me she will be ready in thirty minutes. I go to the hospital unit and get in to wait with her. She is having her vitals checked and then she is allowed to leave with her paper work. The good news is that there was nothing found. It is a big relief.

We drive home and my partner goes for the solace of toast and a warm drink. I eat and settle down to draft the blog to the back drop of a film. All I need to do is to pay my tax bill and get into the next few days when I can train and count poetry words. It sounds simple but for some reason it never seems to turn out that way. With the gas company beginning to dig out side I have a feeling that the daily routine is about to be disrupted. It will be an early bed time and night meds for me tonight.

Monday, awake early and coffee in hand contemplating the day, including the fact that a friend has now got underfloor heating in the new bathroom and I find myself envious as I contemplate the first journey to the bathroom and my cold tiled floor. I get up and dress, breakfast quickly, down my morning meds and some prophylactic paracetamol, before walking down to the GP surgery to have my 28 day injection. Its the left side of my gut this month which is less lumpy than the right and tends to be a better experience. The injection goes okay, and then I book next months with the nurse. While I am at it I book my “bloods” for Friday the the 20th for my oncology review on the 24th. I walk home collecting a paper on the way so that when I settle down with another coffee I have crosswords and puzzles to do. I contemplate how well I am and wonder if I am being too reticent in my life style and whether I should just throw caution to the wind and go to Spain for a holiday, I crave the sun. Once I am done with the up coming oncology review and my partner has the results of her endoscopy then perhaps is the best time to seriously consider a bolt for the sun, providing I can find some affordable travel insurance, which allegedly the government do.

I clear the kitchen and collect the camera from the garden to check what has been wandering around in my garden. I am disappointed to find that the camera has continued to not take night pictures so all I have is pidgeons, cats and squirrels on camera but none of the potential interesting beasties that tend to roam the night. I reload the battery compartment, adjust the settings and replace the camera back in the garden but in a new position. I email the Apeman techno support team and ask about night vision failure but I have little hope of a useful response. In a surreal moment I think perhaps I’ve not fed my camera enough carrots. While I’ve been playing with my camera the post man has delivered and amongst the usual instant recycling crap that comes in every post there is a letter for me. My expectation is that it is from one of my usual correspondents but I am surprised to find it is from someone that I have not heard from for years. They have moved on from their old address and found a new partnership in their new environment. It sounds very happy and productive. I shall reply in due course, but for the moment its time for a lunchtime coffee and an indulgent chunk of Christmas Panettone before the afternoon training session.

As I nibble my way through my Panettone I notice just how crumby the carpet is, this will not do. As a result I hoover the house. Job well done, not an escaped Christmas tree needle to be seen anywhere. I take a break and another coffee during which a friend rings. We haven’t spoken this year and it was good to catch up. As usual she was up to her ears in the Real World and on her way to collecting one of her children from school. I guess the new year has well and truly kicked in for everyone now. My injection is kicking in and my gut is feeling sore so I down some more paracetamol and go to the garage to train. I find that it is important to make the effort otherwise its easy to sink into waiting for everything to be right and it very rarely is. Its colder than I bargained for and add an extra layer before I set off on the session. I set the session for an hour at my cruise level, as I have said before its important to show your body whose boss. Its a rugged row this hour but I get to the end of it reasonably satisfied. I’ve burnt 800+ calories so that will do.

I record the session and then move the car from the drive so Tesco can deliver later on, after which I change into my casual evening lounge attire and catch up drafting the blog. My partner is fasting in preparation for her procedure tomorrow afternoon so it is going to be an early night for us as she has to get up at 5:30 am tomorrow to start downing copious amounts of the pre procedure meds. Its going to be a long day for everyone tomorrow but longest for her. It is a reality of this blog that although it is about my cancer journey, inevitably it is also about the fact that my cancer is not a thing in isolation, my family get ill as well and that is all part of the juggle and the fight.

Sunday and it is a lazy start to the day with coffee in bed and more time to chat. Time for the Sunday weigh in. I get up on the scales and peek downwards the display. I am satisfied as I see 96.0 kilos come up. This is a loss of 1.3 kilos over last week. I am pleased give the limited training and the a end of my cold. I have 15 days to make more reductions in my weight before my next oncology review. So despite tomorrow being an injection day I need to make an extra effort to maintain my fitness and diet regime. Its the only life style influence I have. Once up its time for breakfast, plain and simple with coffee and morning meds. It did afford me the opportunity to use my newly acquired honey spoon, and very satisfactory it was. There was an attempt to make the usual Sunday call to our youngest daughter but there was no reply so my partner and I go off to the garden centre to buy vegetables and bland food for my partners pre endoscopy procedure on Tuesday. We gather up our food requirements and then search Lakelands for a ceramic cooking dish to discover that Lakeland only sell plastic, actually plastic and electrical cooking gadgets. The only ceramic object in the entire store was a Tagine which was hideously over priced. I am Lakeland disillusioned.

So back home its tidy up Sunday, with bins to empty, beds to change and the house to tidy, however in there is some TV football, and a bloody minded printer that will not print the required documents and insists on churning out copies of my tax return. I eventually manage to get it fixed and my partners required documents printed. Its back to football and a face time call with my youngest daughter. It feels like a very disjointed day. Somewhere in the afternoon I book ticket for my eldest daughter and I to go and see Stewart Lee. So already there are two or three cultural outings in the new years diary. The evening is TV based, His Dark Materials followed by Happy Valley will see me through to an early night, night meds and the prospect of tomorrows monthly injection first thing in the morning.

Saturday, and I am brought a coffee in bed and my partner and I then spend a couple of hours chatting and wondering about the future. It seems that this Saturday morning ritual is becoming our usual catch up and planning time. Eventually we get up for brunch. Today is the anniversary of the end of chemotherapy for me. This time three years ago I was bald with ridged nails and all the other joys of chemo. The chemo was supposed to give me an extra 18 months to add to the 8 months that the survival curves for people with a Gleason score of 9.5 gave me. By reckoning that’s 26 months, and here I am 36 months down the way from the end of chemo. That’s 10 months beyond prediction. Every day of my life now is a free gift of time. That’s quite something and something to hold onto as I get into 2023.

Brunch is something my partner can eat on her pre endoscopy diet. Between now and Tuesday she is eating a specific diet, so we dine and then slowly get ready to go to the gym. The post arrives and brings my son’s Christmas card. The kitchen gets cleared and sport gear gets organised as we ready ourselves to make the effort. We drive to the gym in clear weather as the rain has abated for a while. The gym floor is busy but I get a cross trainer. I set a session for 45 minutes and plug into the TV function so I can watch Leicester Tigers get thrashed by Newcastle. I get myself going and try to get into some sort of rhythm. It seems a long 45 minutes but when it does arrive there is a 5 minute warm down to do on the machine. I photograph the display and then walk the floor to cool down and finish my bottle of water.

I indulge in a long warm shower and then head for the members lounge and a large black americano. I watch some rugby while waiting for my partner to arrive. We both have coffee and chat a bit more about our up coming brushes with the medical profession. The journey home is in driving rain, in which we navigate the road closures in the village. I find my eldest has discovered that Amazon Video has Rammstein available so watch for a while once my kit is sorted. Amazon has delivered my new stainless steel honey dipper. An addition to the household implements that I discovered we needed when forced to use a jar of honey rather than a squeezy bottle. There is football to watch and tea to eat as I start to draft the blog. Tonight’s film is The Girl in the Spiders Web. The evening meanders to its conclusion with me taking my night meds, tomorrow sees me start my prophylactic paracetamol in readiness for Monday’s injection. At the moment my social media is full of jokes about a prince, sometimes I wonder about whether speaking ones truth in public is a good idea as it seems kindness is at a premium. Having said that some of the humour is witty and sharp. Its an ethical conundrum.

Friday and I get a letter from a friend that tells me there are issues accessing the blog. I too have experienced some difficulty to get into the latest entry at times, I’m not sure what the difficulty is, but I have found it is possible to get in if I go to search on the page and type in the latest heading. So for example today is ROCKET 67. If you type that in it should come up. I’ve also found that if I go in and type prost8kancerman.co.uk in a fresh time that this will sometimes do the trick. On my phone pushing the forward arrow repeatedly on screen sometimes brings up the latest entry. So if your having trouble and reading this, well done for getting here. If you are having trouble consistently leave a comment and let me know. Alternatively if you have found an easy and reliable way of getting into the updated blog then please leave your secret in my comments and I will share it on the blog. Thank you. The figures for people visiting the blog have gone down post Christmas so it is either that fact that people are having trouble getting in to the blog or its the post Christmas slump in interest. I guess this is all part of my headline journey into advanced cancer and dyslexic blogging. There are bound to be hiccups along the way, this maybe one of them.

As usual my day started about 9 o’clock and moved to a breakfast of coffee, panettone and morning meds. Most of my morning has been life and blog admin but I am now sorted for 2023. My bank accounts up to date, tax assessment sorted and Tesco order done, there is little else to disturb me apart from my brain. So its time to move on and get my arse back into training so its off to the garage and the rowing machine for me. I’ve realised that I’ve stopped feeding myself, as I’ve not read for a couple of days nor created anything, nor planned any cultural input over the next few weeks, so I need to get myself back into this. But for now its rower time.

It had been 12 days since I last trained, Christmas Eve in fact. Since then the cold I acquired for the festive period has prohibited me from training but there comes a point when it becomes unbearable to feel the weight go on and the degradation of of fitness. So I approach my return to training with my usual rugged approach. Sometimes you just have to show your body whose boss and to tough it out. So I get into the garage all psyched up to go for it, get the ear phones on, don the trainers and gloves and press the console button to set the session and the screen goes blank! The bloody batteries have died so I have to unscrew the console to fit new batteries and reset the display, then I can start. Now I can set myself for an hour at my cruise level. So finally I get underway, watching my stroke rate, pull wattage and calories burnt. I grind at quite a high pace for the hour. The result is good for a first time out after 12 days and I am feeling fairly good, I think making the effort and raising my body temperature helps counter act the cold.

I get out of the garage and record the session before heading to the bathroom for a luxury bath bomb bath. Its good to lazy and soak for a while until finally its time to join the rest of the family in the lounge for the evening. Pizza tonight and I guess Death in Paradise. During a quiet moment in the day my eldest and I hunted for ballet tickets. As usual Swan Lake was sold out so we moved onto alternatives eventually settling on Coppelia. So the family will be settling down on a Monday in March to feast on live ballet where you can hear the patter of block shoes across the stage and the occasional grunt of a missed timed lift. We are also looking at comedians but that is a bit more tricky so find someone who ticks the boxes for all the family. So that’s it for today, my monthly supply of drugs has been collected including Mondays injection so at some point I will start taking prophylactic paracetamol to ward off the nastier side effects of the injection. Messages during the day tell me that my letters are starting to arrive and others show the fruits of labour to the tune of a new bathroom. I myself receive a letter from a friend who, like me, is experiencing the relief of the festive season being over. So there is life out there going on. Perhaps I will join in. Tomorrow is likely to be a gym day in preparation for Sundays weigh in.

Thursday and I wake up and rise before 9 am. I do breakfast and coffee before getting trapped by a crime programme on TV. Basic mistake turning on the TV in the first place , need to stop doing that. I go to the Shed to write letters and there I stay till lunchtime writing away with my new glass dipping pen, a Christmas present. As I leave the Shed to get a lunch time coffee I note that the Shed door has come adrift at its lower hinges. I am not amuse and alarmed that my Shed (haven from the world) is in disrepair. I immediately spring into analysis mode. Clearly the screws are to small and short. I consider the age and state of the wood to take bigger screws. I calculate that I need to increase the Shed frame depth to take take longer screws and provide good anchorage for the hinge screws. This is a project requiring my particular skills. I’m good at mending stuff, as witnessed by my Mr and Mrs Mickey Mouse restoration of a few days ago.

I return to the house and gather up the tools and materials I need and return to the Shed foregoing my lunch. Time is of the essence in these times of decreased day light. I cut a reinforcing wood block and screw it to the inside of the Shed door frame. This will provide additional depth and strength to screw into. I test out some new screw lengths and settle on two inch ones to replace the old ones. I dowse the hinge with WD 40 to ensure it actually moves as it should the reset the door in the frame so the hinge is lined up correctly. It is then a case of screwing in the new retaining screws and making sure they anchor properly in the newly reinforced frame. All goes well and to my great pleasure the door is back in full working order. Time to put the tools away and indulge in a late lunchtime coffee and a chunk of Panettone.

I return to writing letters until my first round of new year correspondence is completed. I pack up the Shed having first Hoovered it thorough as an early Spring treat, and return to the house. I pop out to the post box and send my letters off into the world. On my return I realise that I have not got ant fresh past for tea so go off to the village in search for some. Todays lesson is that none of the shops in the village stock fresh pasta. I settle on a bag of dried pasta and a paper. My walk back was longer than I expected. The gas pipes in the village are being upgraded and replaced, which means that today the gas company have started to dig up the road block off the pedestrian pathways. Whilst I was in the Shed the gas replacement representative took my partner through what is going to happen when they get to us. We will lose gas for two separate days in the coming week and have been provided with a heater and a single ring cooker plate. It all sounds plausible and doable but having read the information package they gave us there are some possible tricky bits but I guess I will find out in due course.

Evening arrives and my partner makes our Thursday traditional tea of tuna past. Tonight there is to be no singing lesson for my partner so there will be a quite evening of viewing. I start to draft the blog and look forward to an early night. It’s beginning to feel as if I am recovered enough to start training again. At the back of my mind is the approaching oncology review and I am like a dissatisfied athlete who has not been in training and has a race to run. Still at least I got through my first wave of letters for the new year.

Wednesday and it feels as if this is the start of my year as the Christmas decorations have gone and the other household members have gone back to work. So they are awake and closeted in their work spaces around the house and I can hear the conversations as the screens show meetings going on and documents being worked on. I have breakfast and coffee followed by my morning meds. I order my monthly meds after checking my calendar. After a bit of clearing up I go off to the Shed to write letters.

By lunchtime I’ve completed a single letter, which reflects my sluggishness and the effects of the cold that I am finding it difficult to shake off. Chicken soup is the obvious choice when I have a cold, so I settle down to a warm dish and the lunch time news. I continue my letter writing through the afternoon interspersed with playing Tim Minchin songs. Eventually I have to pause my writing to welcome the Tesco deliver and get it squirreled away. As I am putting things away I notice that there are two squirrels in the garden. I watch them and do not move until I have seen both of them lift the lid on the squirrel feeder and successful access the food. I return to the letter writing but whilst checking my social media I noticed a post from a colleague from the Therapeutic Community community. He had reposted a very powerful performance from someone I had not heard of. It certainly gripped my attention and hopefully I can find it to add to the end of the blog so that you can see what you think of it. I continue to write letters until my partner returns from visiting her mother. Just before 5 o’clock I leg it to the post box outside the chippy and post office and breathe a sigh of relief when I find that it had not yet been emptied. Later I am to return to the chippy with my partner to collect our fish adn chip tea.

My evening starts with the drafting of the blog against the background of news, which includes exploding candles. At last my bank has caught up with my standing orders and my monthly movements of money have finally arrived where they should, which is a relief. Although I had forgotten that I had booked a holiday in June/July and also forgotten when it needs to be paid for. I finally find the right app on my phone and find I can stay cool until the end of April. So I set out into the evening with the intention of ending up at the football highlights before doing my meds and getting to bed. I have promised myself to try and get up early tomorrow morning as I feel I am slipping into the habit of not getting up before 9 o’clock. I’m constantly aware that I am not “Rocketing” as I wanted to and my oncology review is edging nearer. Its the feeling of not being in control or at least not doing what I can do to make it as good as it can be. A friend reminded me that my screen saver at work was “Under no circumstances buckle”, I do not think or intend to buckle but I feel I might have bent a bit. Still its the heat of the forge that straightens the steel.