OMG it's 2020

I had totally forgotten about this blog I admit.
I shall endeavour to write again.

Moving forward to good health

I had a phone call last Friday. Could I get myself to the heart hospital by 11am Tuesday?
Yes I could.
I spent a couple of hours extra waiting time because some emergency cases had to be dealt with.
   I feared they'd send me home as time went by but eventually, with apologies, I was wheeled into the 'Lab'. The team set up the monitors and arranged me comfortably under the scanner as the consultant and his registrar chatted to me about what was going to happen.
 I had a sedative to muffle the discomfort and they pushed the catheter into the right arm's artery. I wasn't able to see the screen but could feel how it was going. I was warned about pain and so I wasn't frightened when it came. I started to get visual disturbances and headache from the blue radioactive dye as I did last time but I'd expected that.
 It didn't hurt too much and as they'd decided to do only one stent it was over quickly. As the procedure was finishing my teeth started chattering and my hands and legs started twitching too. It was weird and I couldn't control it, even clamping my hand over my mouth didn't stop my teeth from sounding like a Fred Astaire routine.  A nurse asked if I was cold, I wasn't so they told me I was reacting to one of the drugs they'd used during their 'fantastic voyage'. I didn't bother to ask which one.
It took about 15/20 minutes for these side effects to wear off, all except the headache which stuck around for another hour or more.

I was treated to innumerable cups of tea and jugs of water over the next 3 hours. I had a pressure band on my wrist to prevent any arterial bleeding and I had a sandwich and snacks once I felt up to eating. Periodically the wrist band would be loosened and my bp checked. I also had 2 ecg's.
I'd been in the unit for 7 hours by the time I was deemed ok to go home.

Everyone was wonderful. They were all cheerful; although the nurses were extremely busy they came to chat often. The registrar came to talk and I had lots of opportunity to ask questions.They had chosen not to do the 2nd stent because it was borderline but said they might do it in 6 months or so. 'Oh gooodeee' said I.

I am on blood thinners now and so can't have my breast op for one month, but today I can breathe freely and I felt really well when I woke up. I'm tired now but I'm on my way to better days.

'Two Hospitals' Part, the second

'Kay bringing things up to date  ( nuffin' happened today. I just got guilty).

As you may have guessed, there was no blip. I do have a teensy weensy spot of cancer and some gummed up arteries. I have had an angiogram to confirm the cardio stuff and a breast biopsy to confirm the cancer.

Breast biopsy is no big deal; quite interesting, as you can see it all on the ultrasound. It didn't hurt at the time, the local anaesthetic was very good. However it can and did hurt over the next couple of days.
 I do wish hospitals would explain that there's the possibility of discomfort/pain/ localised 'ouch'. It would save a lot of nervous Google surfing !

An Angiogram isn't much fun. I had one before, years ago, where they went in through the groin, that was a bit dire and all greek to me. I thought this time would be nicer, but then I'm foolish.
It was a Saturday production line of diagnostic angiograms. As one patient/client/victim was wheeled out of theatre the next was wheeled in, seemingly for hours at a stretch. An overworked cardio consultant sat behind a shield staring at his monitor while I was dosed with radioactive dye and scanned. The catheter administering the dye felt unpleasant going up my arm but 'unpleasant' went to another level when the nurse said 'breathe' as she whisked it out after the procedure.

Then I had a reaction to the dye. This doesn't happen to everybody, but as I was wheeled back to the day-case unit I realised I couldn't see clearly. Soon I had castle battlements dancing before my eyes. Sounds crazy, but...... it's intriguing. It's a kind of visual migraine. First you get the light show then you get the killer headache.
I was sent home a couple of hours later by which time I felt normal again, but tired.

Now I wait. It seems there are swathes of people in the UK with dodgy hearts and there are too few doctors/beds etc etc perhaps our caring government hopes a few of us will die waiting. The breast list appears to be shorter but that can't be started until the heart is sorted, just in case I have a quick coronary on the table.  The breast guy has written to the heart guy to ask him to move things along please.

Next installment.....soon?

This year is getting 'interesting'

Somehow I had a feeling this year would be busy with new experiences.
 I didn't know how, but it is certainly starting to rock now.

Without too much tedious detail I'm going to tell you a 'Tale of 2 Hospitals' this year.

Last year my gut was going through a restless stage  and my GP, lovely woman, was throwing everything at the problem to improve things. As part of her quest she sent me for a CT scan of my Aorta. Somewhere around the turn of the year the results came back.
'Good News' she said 'there's nothing wrong with your Aorta'. I would have waved a flag if I wasn't waiting for the other shoe to drop, 'However' ( luv that word) 'however there is some problem in your heart'. Being a curious creature I asked for more, but she had no details, she said I'd need to see a cardiologist to find out.

Time passes and I get an appointment for a Monday afternoon cardiac clinic at the nearby and well-regarded heart unit. On the Friday before the clinic I get a letter with NHS stamped on it.
It says my recent mammogram on the breast screening programme has flagged up something and I need to visit their clinic at a different, but also good hospital and the appointment was for the morning of Monday. The same Monday.
At this point I stopped and did a quick appraisal of my future prospects. Then I decided I couldn't have 2 medical problems coincide like that and the breast thing was obviously just a blip on the screen.............

I know it's just a date on the calendar....

.....BUT I want it to be the 1st of January 2017.

My own life has been a tad troublesome this year, but fades into nothing beside what has happened in the world outside.

I hope, but don't expect things to be better next year. Many people seem to be waking up to the need for social change. I think it could be difficult.

The chinese curse 'May you live in interesting times' seems appropriate for life today, but the Chinese may get through the year ahead better than some of us.

I'm learning to fret less but that has made me withdraw from many things.Somehow I need to be active but with some detachment, not easy.
I'm not making any resolutions because that seems guaranteed to make ideas fail.
I shall take optimism as my watchword, but fill the sandbags just in case.

I'm bored with writing this twaddle so that's it for now.

The End of 2016 ....Hooray

I doubt I'm alone in feeling happier now this year is fast fading.

The second half of my year was: July bad, August appalling, September bad, October and November slow and steady improvement, December a bit wobbly.

I don't want to remember this year so mentally I'm going from 2015 straight to 2017, not passing 'GO' on the way.

Seasonal Felicitations.
See you on the other side.

Haven't written.....oh how surprising

Not a thing. My 'creative' brain, if I possess such a thing, has buggered off somewhere along with  my sense of self worth. Serves me right for putting all my eggs in the one basket.

I've been on the slide again. For a long while I was busy with politics, totally absorbed more like, ever since the run up to the General Election last year. At that time I was full of optimism and was sure that rewards come just because you exert effort. I pushed lots of effort at the EU debate. I thought of almost nothing other than Europe for several months and talked and talked and talked.

Then came the Referendum result and I could NOT believe it, for days I wandered around this foreign land that used to be my country. It felt like those awful centripetal fairground rides they used to call 'The Wall of Death' where you spun round inside a big wooden drum. You'd go faster and faster then they dropped the floor away and you were pinned to the wall with emptiness below your feet.

Now after a lot of angst, big depressive waves and panic attacks I am coming round to deal with the new order.
I'm not giving up. I've invested a lot of emotional capital in this 'experiment' that Labour mps seem to think doomed to failure. Well it isn't. Mr Corbyn is still there and others like me are still supporting him. I still believe we can make good changes in this country; maybe our chances will even improve once the fairy-dust falls from Brexit eyes. Everything is up for grabs and it may yet all turn out for the best. But I need something else as well.

I must start writing again. I need my inner world functioning and giving me strands of ideas to play with. I need the discipline and the accomplishment of small goals.

So come back please Creativity, I have need of you and I'm truly sorry that I pushed you out of the door.
I will start some words this weekend. Dunno what yet, but I will stare at paper and try to see shapes form.

Some steps forward despite several backward falls.

This blog's gaps show how much my state of mind affects everything else. The battle to think clearly and imaginatively while walking a tightrope continues.

I won't bore anyone with the negative details. I'll only mention the positive stuff:

I had some, free sessions with a mental health worker that helped because she seemed to think that I'm a reasonably nice person. She might have been saying that because positive reinforcement is part of her job but it did help.

 When the sessions stopped I felt bad again, but told my family that I have ongoing mental health issues. They didn't run away screaming so that was ok.

Out of spite my IBS returned, but I'm dealing with that and mostly staying healthy.  

I'm trying meditation which is helping when I remember to do it.

Berst of all, I re-wrote a short story from a few years back and I've entered it in a competition. It won't even make the shortlist, but the real success is that I actually submitted something and I still feel good about it.

If only Summer would get here....................

I have a great need of poetry

The Sunrise Ruby

In the early morning hour,
just before dawn, lover and beloved wake
and take a drink of water.

She asks, "Do you love me or yourself more?

Really, tell the absolute truth."

He says, "There's nothing left of me.

I'm like a ruby held up to the sunrise.

Is it still a stone, or a world

made of redness? It has no resistance

to sunlight."

This how Hallaj said, I am God,

and told the truth!

The ruby and the sunrise are one.

Be courageous and discipline yourself.

Completely become hearing and ear,

and wear this sun-ruby as an earring.

Work. Keep digging your well.

Don't think about getting off from work.

Water is there somewhere.

Submit to a daily practice.

Your loyalty to that

is a ring on the door.

Keep knocking, and the joy inside

will eventually open a window

and look out to see who's there. 

Rumi




Sometimes the words I need to hear come when I look for them. In turmoil these last few weeks, today I found these words of Rumi that are new to me. I think I will be re-reading these a lot.

'Time flies when you're having fun' or when you've become totally obsessed with the state of your digestive system.

'Time flies when you're having fun' or when you've become totally obsessed with the state of your digestive system.

It's the latter for me. I've been under the weather or downright unwell since last Christmas but am now getting things under control.

It'a sticky hot day here and I'm writing because I have nobody interesting to talk to, this is not unusual.
  The most intellectually stimulating time I have lasts 15 minutes on alternate Tuesday mornings when the Library van comes around. The rest of the time I talk about the weather and other trivia with my elderly neighbours. 
   I don't mind the lack of talking most of the time because I have ..............                    The Internet, hooray, huzzah, yip yip etc.
May divine blessings rain down continually on Tim Berners-Lee. He is my greatest Hero!

I don't mind solitude much either because the alternative is too ghastly to face and anyway I have the dog. He is no conversationalist, but he is a Presence. I only mind being alone when I feel ill and having felt ill a lot recently I have had some bad days.

Now I feel healthier my mind has returned to important stuff like this blog and my writing which has also languished.
  I don't feel guilty about the writing inactivity because I couldn't work up the energy to do anything at all. I wasn't out partying, unfortunately.

In other news:
     My grandaughter became a happy Bride and I was duly weepy.
     My Grandson found himself an excellent job and seems happy.
     The rest of my family are ticking over nicely too. I think.

....................laters.

Happy New Year Blog

Happy New Year to my lonely little Blog and to anyone straying here accidentally.Christmas celebrations and poor health are my excuse for not writing here, well just the ill-health actually.

I'm being dogged by chronic complaints; there must be something about Winter that brings all this stuff on me, I haven't felt good since the Solstice. We have sunshine today which has fetched me out from my cave, it's about the only thing that can stir me at the moment. The sunshine has also started me thinking of Spring so I've bought some seeds. This year  I'm trying Snapdragons, Stocks, Echinacea and Poppies. I've never grown any of these from seed before, not even the Poppies, so the challenge will hopefully spark some determination in me.

There is lots to look forward to: I'm going to a festival for the first time in 25 years, I hope it stays dry this August. I have a grand-daughter getting married, I have lots to do to be ready for that.  Then there's all the political shenanigans of a General Election. I'm looking forward to heated exchanges, nowadays the only chance I get for a good row is to start one about 'Who's going to win?' although I'm not sure many voters care one way or t'other this timre around.

Time for my tablets!

I should be writing but...........

But....... today I have migraine
     .......yesterday I had migraine
     .......last week I had Christmas shopping
     .......before that I had the miseries.

Day of the Triffids is still Creepy

I watched the first 2 episodes of the 1960's BBC tv series of 'Day of the Triffids' tonight.

I do remember watching it when it first came out and I'd already read the book. It's still the best version, even though or maybe because it's so period now.
It has the painful kind of realism of 60's drama. The acting is wooden, but that also helps to make it feel like this awful thing is happening to ordinary, boring people. The sound effects help. I dunno if the BBC radiophonic workshop was involved , but I think it may well have been.

I shall be tuning in to get the next helping.


I have also seen the 1960's cinema version and the recent modern tv adaptation. I'm rather geeky about John Wyndham and John Christopher, they were my favourite SF writers in my teens.

Aaaah! Nostalgia

Only 42 days until 2015

Keeping my chin up despite Autumn blues.

This is my least favourite time of year, even when the sun shines. There are too many stale bread days, days when everything is past it's best, curling up at the edges and growing mould. The next event on the horizon is Christmas. I've disliked Christmas ever since my mother died, she died one December and my father and I went away for Christmas, it was terrible. We were miles from home, I was 10 years old, shy and missing my mum. I remember my father drinking too much and being grumpy. I hadn't known real loneliness before but I became well-acquainted with it over that holiday.
I don't feel lonely in the same way now but I think about all the people in horrible situations during the 'festive' season so I'm glad when January arrives no matter what the weather.

I've bought most of my Christmas presents. I do enjoy finding things that I think will really please someone, but I would be much happier if my family would agree to a no-gifts Christmas. I suggest it every year, but somebody always has a reason why we have to do it one more time.
I give money to charity whenever I remember how well-off I am in comparison to most of the world's population. I know it's only a drop into the oceans of inequality,  but it may help just one person get a chance at a decent life. I get all hot under the collar as the money wasted on tinsel and gift wrap increases and I feel more and more like a hamster on the treadmill.

Then there's the over-eating. So far the only luxury I've bought myself is a small bottle of balsamic vinegar with added fig juice. I shall not buy mince pies or Christmas pudding this year, because they taste terrible and end up in the bin. I'll try not to stuff myself at all. I just have to stop shopping. I could live on the tins in my cupboard for a month anyway!

Never mind....only 42 days until 2015

Still alive but not doing much

I haven't left yet, but I've done nothing fit to record recently.

I'll try to do better.

New Story

I'm not totally comatose and hunkered down for Winter yet.

There's a new story on t'other blog. I've aimed this at  Young Adult readers, but I'm not sure I've got the tone right.

One small moment of enlightenment.................

It has dawned on me that I lose interest in writing my novels because they are boring.

They are boring because they are history tomes with a few fictional characters thrown in; the history takes centre stage and the characters and minor incidents are incidental.

I realised this because I find writing my short stories exciting.....and that's because I'm making them up as I go along and they have only a tenuous link with reality.

Soooooo I have one Hell of a lot of re-imagining to do. I'm not depressed by this I feel liberated because I've given myself permission to invent stuff.

Now, let's see, when and where did I last see my  imagination? I might have left it on a bookshelf somewhere or possibly in my trinkets box,.
 Gotta go and hunt it down.

Writing and Volcanoes

It's proving hard to tear myself away from my pc and write short stories; as for the novel, it languishes.
I'm completely absorbed by Bardarbunga and check web-cams and earthquake data a dozen times a day. It would disrupt any routine but when you're trying to get a story straight in your head and onto the page it becomes a real bugbear.
I'm not sorry to be so taken up by something extraneous. I have been drifting along on the foamy billows for too long. I am still getting short stories done but whether they're readable is another matter.

I should be getting the garden winterised too!

I confess to an addiction

Over on 'Whatever Comes' there's another dazzlingly brilliant short story.

The novel is proceeding at a snail's pace, but you can't have everything, especially when I've been glued to webcams watching Bardarbunga.

 There are times when I love technology and this is one of them. I'm getting an almost continuous stream of data on earthquakes, displays of lava flows and conversations with vulcanologists; short of actually being there this is marvellous. I'm in Heaven!

Paddling furiously

I look nothing like a swan either literally or metaphorically, but I feel akin to one in the amount of effort it takes me to stay on top of Life.

I become aware that things need 'Doing' i.e. they require some active involvement on my part, this is often triggered by the realisation that I need to prod somebody who promised to do something for me and hasn't, but I'm always reluctant to do that;  so I think of all the things that I promised to do and haven't completed or possibly started. There generally aren't too many items on this list, so once they're ticked off I look for other things to tackle............

Now there is the issue. I look for things to keep my hands busy because my mind is empty.It's full of trivia and fretting but empty of ideas. I cannot write or so I tell myself so I must be useful instead. I must do important things in the way of living comfortably. It's all crap because I'm only thinking of cupboard tidying or weeding the garden or  cleaning the shower all of which I can happily ignore for a month of Sundays.

All this busy-ness is a smoke screen for the real problem that's dogged me this Summer.
I have not been writing much or indeed anything, hence I've been scurrying about for weeks, stacking up lesser tasks and working through them so that I cannot be held culpable for the failure to write!


So I've said it now. I've confessed. I need to write to regain some self respect and to get away from the bloody housework. I shall proceed to the labour of  artistic creation forthwith !!!