Wednesday and I am awake and sentient, so much so that I watch lecture two of the Harvard philosophy course before getting up. It Bentham and utilitarianism. The lecturer is really good and involved the students excellently, drawing out the arguments for and against and plotting out the questions to be examined in the coming lectures. With brain fed I get up for breakfast and my meds before taking my vitals (all good there) and packing for my night away seeing a Dire Straits tribute band tonight as a birthday present. I decide to train as my PSI score on my fitness app has dropped below 100. I get myself ready and go to the garage to row. I need 21 PSI point to get to a 100 total so I decide to opt for a 45 minute session. So I I row as ever cautiously for the time, burning off more than 550+ calories and managing 8795 metres, a bit below my usual normal of 9 kilometres. However it does the job as my PSI score rises to 127 and my fitness age drops a year to 51. That will do me at the moment. My personal best back in 2022 for the same duration and resistance level is a tad over 13 kilometres, so it is clear I am a long way off my peak fitness. It defines my struggle and fight, as a colleague of mine always used to say “the logic is in the arithmetic”.

After my session I record it in my journal and caste about for something to listen to before a shower and lunch. I end up with the Infinite Monkey Cage on radio. They are excellent adn funny as well as being informative. I also have a letter from a friend which I devour immediately. I love that moment when I realise I have a letter to read. I shower merrily and dry my now cascading white hair before lunch during which I indulge in another Infinite Monkey Cage episode. This one was on fungi and was quite an eye opener. With Daisy dishwasher packed my partner and I pack the car and I drive us off to Kilworth House about half an hour away to book in to the hotel. The plan is pre concert dinner in the Orangery before being golf buggy’d (exciting, reminiscent of Disney World car park) to see the show in the hotel’s concert facility in the grounds of the hotel. So before I get caught up in the whirl of excitement I draft the blog in anticipation of a reckless spoon spending evening. A good night out and ended in brandy so pictures tomorrow.

Tuesday and I wake to find my partner has gone to real work. A friend has emailed me a link to the Harvard University first semester philosophy course which has been been made available on line. There are twelve of them, so before I get up i watch the first one. Its very good and I plan to watch one each morning before I get up. I get myself up and cook breakfast and toast to be washed down with decaf coffee and my morning meds. So far so good, I’m feeling more human this morning. There are chores to be done after clearing the kitchen. I replace the light bulb in the bathroom and hoover out the dead bodies of wasps from the fitting. The light works and for now that is enough. I move onto preparing the boiler cupboard for the service guy to come later in the day and then move on to replacing light bulbs in the lounge light fitting. More success there, I am on a roll. I refill my drugs wallets for the next two weeks which will take me to the end of cycle three of Chemo II. All I have to to do is remember to have my bloods done on Friday in readiness for my next oncology review on Thursday the 7th and my cancer admin will be under control.

My philosopher friend also emails a link to The Good Place a comedy/philosophy show. From the moment it starts with the main protagonist being told she is dead and come to The Good Place by the “architect” (played by Ted Danson) I am hooked. What follows is many of the classic philosophical problems played out in comedic fashion. It is genius. I am so hooked that I manage to watch the whole of series one before tea time. There are three more series to watch so I have something that I can watch without feeling guilty and also learn stuff along the way. My partner returns from work and we later eat tea. I have some minor admin to do and I also daft the blog before settling down for the rest of the evening. I am out tomorrow at a concert and an over night stay at the venue, so I need to get a good nights sleep to rack up the spoons. Its the Sultans of swing for me.

Bank holiday Monday starts slowly with decaf coffee and a chat. Neither I nor my partner feel like cooked breakfast so we have cereals and more breakfast before setting off to see more scarecrows and visit my partners brother in the village. Here are yet more of the scarecrows.

We spent time working out family gathering details with my partners brother over a cup of tea before retuning home. I get home with a headache and try to read my way through it but it doesn’t work so I take some paracetamol and have a nap. I think I might have my hair on too tight. When I surface I read the gas and electricity meters and send my figures off and almost immediately get my account. Who needs a SMART meter? Tea time comes around and having eaten I feel much better and go into the evening feeling more human. This evening drifts by in a flurry of TED talks by people talking about the nature of consciousness, this is so much easier than ploughing my way through large dense books that seem to be written in a version of English that is almost incomprehensible. To be honest there are bits that are totally incomprehensible. I get to meds time, draft the blog and go to bed with excited anticipation of the boiler being serviced tomorrow.

Sunday and I wake up slightly groggy but lay in until breakfast time. My partner and I have breakfast and I down my meds. With a small break my partner and I go out to view some of the village scarecrows. I am experiencing a lot of fatigue and my walking round the village turns out to be quite a trial but it got me out adn about for a while. As usual there are some notable scarecrows and of course we visit the one by our friends who live in the village. One group of houses work on a theme of 101 Dalmatians, which they encouraged children to find and count. Others were just self explanatory. Here of some.

I return home while my partner gets some shopping and recover on the garden swing seat, where I am joined later by my partner bearing Danish pastries. We chat for a while and I then return to the sofa. I have a bad head ache and down some paracetamol and curl up on the recliner to doze for a while. The TV is on in the background with a combination of cricket, rugby and finally it drifts into end session of the world athletics.

My evening is going to be slow as I try to work my way out of this bloody headache. I suspect it is going to be an early night for me. I have a busy week ahead of me so I am hoping I get myself together quickly. There is a night away at a concert to enjoy and then a combined visit by my new grandson and my partner’s mother’s 95 birthday party to enjoy. So I need to be up to par.

Saturday. Its bugger all Saturday, the day I intend to do nothing and to recover. I make warm drinks for my partner and I and then we indulge in bacon sandwiches before my sports binge begins and my partner spends time with a friend at the village scarecrow festival and car racing at night. I settle into a day of athletics, football, rugby, more athletics, followed by yet more rugby. For a change there is a Bond film before the football highlights. Night meds and then bed. My one useful thing of the day has been to book the boiler service for Tuesday. Ta Dah, not quite bugger all after all, I need to work on it.

Friday morning, note to self: not a good idea to watch Deadpool till gone 1 o’clock at night. I wake up feeling decidedly crap. I do get up and manage some toast and coffee, but I am very off it. The morning is a mishmash of drugs, vitals, reading and the hint of chores. Most of the morning I sit around wondering if my gut will finally settle. I go to the Shed and write a for a while. I return to the house still feeling off and settle down to respond to some emails and do some admin. After a while I shift myself to go to the post box and to buy some fruit juice. Its only a short walk but I feel knackered. Its so tempting to just flop but I gather up what I have left and go to the garage to train. If I do not put some effort in then the chemo drug side effects will just get worse. I set the rower for 30 minutes and get going. Its bloody tough but I grind and fall just short of what I would normally expect in terms of distance and calories. It will do at least I’ve made the effort.

I record the session, dump the training kit and then relax a little in front of the TV. My partner feeds me tea and I dig into to watch more world athletics followed by a Jack Reacher film. I’m feeling knocked around by my drugs and condition at the moment so I am hoping the distraction of the village scarecrow festival over the bank holiday weekend will provide some gentle relief. I will of course continue to think about the thought experiment of zombies.

Thursday and I wake late to a decaf coffee and a phone call from a friend. An excellent way to start the day. We chat for quite a while as my friend makes her way to the the first chores on her to do list of the day. We are both battling in our own ways. Conversation over I get up, check my vitals, have breakfast and then wonder what to do, so I return to reading Chalmers book on The Conscious Mind. For anyone that has read it, I need a conversation about Zombies, yep zombies, apparently they are an important philosophical concept in the argument about the nature of consciousness. My reading is only interrupted by the post , which is renewal notice for mail redirection. I complete the renewal and return to the book and its zombies.

At lunchtime I go out and do business with my solicitor and then return home. I quick trip to the village shop and the café and its time to go home and relax. I sit in the garden chatting to my partner and then get on with nothing in particular. The garden guy arrives and we have a strategic chat about the autumn offensive on the garden. Part of the garden is going to be remodelled and some trees removed. I return to reading my book, this slides into the evening and world athletics, films and drafting the blog. By midnight my spoons are spent and I go to bed, with a sense of well being and a sense that I am getting over the side effects of my Monday injection at last. I’m looking forward to a good day tomorrow.

Wednesday and I wake up slightly groggy and tentatively do my mental check on how I am. How I am is still sore but maybe a little better, it still fills as if someone has stuffed my head like a teddy bear. I get up do my vitals, which continue to be good. I go to the kitchen and fix some toast and coffee and sit on the sofa so eat. I discover that the world athletics is on TV so watch the early 200 metre rounds and some preliminary field event rounds. I’m really waiting to see how my stomach takes the toast and coffee along with the morning meds. I think at times I have become hyper vigilant about my physical state, but of course this is all about anxiety. My partner goes off to see her mother and I drag my training kit on and go to the garage. It has to be another 45 minute session to be of any use to me.

I am putting on my ear buds when I realise it is lunchtime and bloody Jeremy Vine is on radio two so I switch to radio three and delighted to find a Promenade concert on. Its brilliant as the audience get to choose the component parts of the concert as a symphony. The conductor and the orchestra, Budapest festival orchestra, do not know what they will be asked to play. So the radio three audience chooses the introduction, there are then four movements to include Beethoven, Dvorak, Glinka, and Tchaikovsky. The other music is chosen by the audience voting for suggestions from selected audience members. It is a brilliant way to have an evening of classical music. So I row to Tchaikovsky and I feel uplifted and remember all those concerts I went to as a callow youth. So the session goes by with classical music in a really fun way. Its not my best row but I feel fed and “better” .

I retreat to the sofa and record the session. I then draft the blog with the concert still going on. I finish the draft just as the concert comes to an end. So by about 3:30 I am feeling renewed and up to going out tonight to have a meal with friends. All I have to do now is bathe and relax while picking out my dining clothes.

Ah the recuperative power of a long hot bath, its a delight. Bath bombed and a mug of soup to sip I relax and wonder why I do not do this more often. My partner returns from visiting her mother and we both get ready to go out with friends for a meal. Our evening is one of food and conversation as we catch up with our friends news and each others plans for the future. The pie was good as well. At the end of the evening we drop our friends off at home and then return to the World Athletic highlights and Live at Apollo. I draft the blog, take my night drugs and then get myself off to bed hoping that sleep will follow, I still have music going on in my head.

If music be the food of love, play on;
Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken, and so die.
That strain again! it had a dying fall:
O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south,
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing and giving odour! Enough; no more:
'Tis not so sweet now as it was before.
O spirit of love! how quick and fresh art thou,
That, notwithstanding thy capacity	
Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there,
Of what validity and pitch soe'er,
But falls into abatement and low price,
Even in a minute: so full of shapes is fancy
That it alone is high fantastical.

Tuesday and after a bad night I feel wrung out before I start the day. My partner has gone to work, so I get up and make breakfast. My injection site is sore, bloody sore and I feel like shit. I try to do bits and pieces of domestic chores but I just feel worse. I am not happy and down a couple of paracetamol. I potter about, drink soup and watch TV. The day drags into evening, athletics, football and finally drafting the blog before I go to bed having taken my night meds and more paracetamol. Usually when I have my jab in the morning the side effects kick in during the evening, having had my jab in the late afternoon seems to mean that I get the side effects the following morning and day. Thankfully I’ve booked my next injection for the early morning. Tomorrow is another chance.

Monday and struggle to wake but eventually do. I’m craving comfort food so indulge in a fried egg sandwich and a decaf coffee. I take my vitals and down my morning meds. The vitals are good, so the arithmetic on my life my life continues to be good. It’s not how I feel, but I’m not sure how I would accurately describe my current state but it feels that my meds are weaving their side effects upon me. Tiredness and fatigue seem to be top of the list. It makes me dissatisfied with myself and probably accounts for the blandness of the blog at the moment.

I retreated to the Shed to write letters for the morning. It feels like a while since I have been there and I wonder why that is, although life has been somewhat busy of late. Having written for as long as I could I close up the Shed and return indoors. There is a pastry for lunch, my appetite of late has waned. I idle time away feeling restless until it comes time to go and get my 28 injection. Usually it gets down early in the morning but today it is at 3:50. I post my letters, move the car so Tesco can deliver and head for the GP surgery clutching my injection pack. Once there I am quickly into the nurses clinical room and hand over my packet of joy. The nurse it good and hunts around my left side mid rift to find a suitable non lumpy spot and injects me. I book the next injection and also my next bloods prior to my regular oncology review.

Home is via the chemist and shop where I stock up on paracetamol and M&Ms. As I walk down my path the Tesco delivery guy walks up it. So there is a delivery to be put away. Early evening my partner goes out for a meal with a friend. I take my vitals again, all good, and change into my training kit. Its an effort to get changed there is a big bit of me that does not want to do this but I get my ear buds in and some music on and go to the garage. I make the decision to do 45 minutes partly because I have not changed in four days and partly because I can feel myself getting increasingly irritated with myself. I set my session time and resistance level and set off. 45 minutes later I am sweaty and aching slightly. I’ve continued to row in a controlled way at about 75% effort, the result being that I do not reach my usual targets but that is something to work back to.

I record my session and then change out of my kit. I am tired and my injection site is beginning to feel sore so I watch some athletics. My eldest daughter cooks fresh pasta and I continue to watch the athletics on TV. My evening drifts on till I draft the blog and take my night meds along with some paracetamol to ward off the after effects of the afternoons injection.