Clueless with Wireless - and CT sickness

‘It’s simple,’ said a friend. ‘All you need is a wireless router and ten, maybe twenty minutes tops, and you’re hot to trot.’ (‘Hot to trot’ is a phrase that’s been excised from my vocabulary. ‘Tepid to totter’ might be more appropriate.)

Ten minutes. That’s what the instructions said too. Who are they kidding? After several hours (including a nap) I was still struggling with jargon and thumping my forehead with a clenched fist. If I couldn’t even locate the ADSL configuration information or place the USB Adapter Cradle, how on earth was I going to connect the Ethernet cable?

I admitted defeat - why hadn’t I done that five hours ago? – and called in an expert who had everything up and running in half an hour. Still more than ten minutes, but no quibble. So here we are, wireless-enabled, with excellent signal strength, and feeling mighty damn smug and state-of-the-art.


If only the CT scan had gone as smoothly. I drank the horrid orangey stuff with the bitter aftertaste for an hour beforehand, undressed and donned a hospital issue dressing gown (not a good look, believe me), and lay on the couch while it moved within the scanner. At half-time I was injected with a contrast medium, a dye that shows up against the orange juice. It gave me a horrid metallic taste in the back of my throat and a warm feeling spreading beneath me, a bit like wetting the bed, only without the mess.

Then I disgraced myself by vomiting loudly, messily and copiously. Huh, typical!

Still, the scan is over. Just the results to look forward to next Wednesday. Send me good vibes.

The Maiming of the Shrew

Since arriving back in Newcastle (cats perfectly behaved on journey, hardly a peep from either of them!), Lucy has reverted to her feral ways. Last night she brought a tiny shrew through the catflap, disgorging it in the kitchen, where she chased it in that sadistic way that cats do. Meanwhile, I climbed on a chair (in that silly girly way we learn from cartoons), shaking a tea towel and hissing, 'Out! Out, damned cat!', to no effect whatsoever. This morning I found it - deceased, naturally - encased in tuna, having been gobbled and regurgitated by Lucy in the night.

Cats, don'cha love 'em?

Cats, collapses and Friday Sundaes

Mmm, a super comfy apartment

Scarborough's fabulous Harbour Bar

I cheated chemotherapy again last Wednesday - hoorah! – because I have to have a CT scan next week to see how the monster is doing, whether it’s progressing or shrinking. Then the following week I get the results from dear Dr Pedley. I’m guessing, but I think the options could be: 1) the chemo hasn’t worked so we’ll try again with different drugs; 2) the chemo hasn’t worked, we’re very sorry but we have nothing else to offer. In other words, enjoy being chemo-free but best get your affairs in order. Of course, this could be unduly pessimistic on my part. Time will tell.

So I’m here in Scarborough, in my niece’s lovely spacious flat on the Esplanade, sinking in sumptuous sofas, surrounded by sea views. Oh, and I brought the cats with me which could have been disastrous, but has in fact remained incident-free. They love the sheer bigness of the place, perfect for paw-thundering chasey-chasey games, and the comfy windowsills where they sprawl like queens of Sheba, following the sun.

The weather is gorgeous, bright sunshine and just enough of a nano-breeze to tempt me into the outside world where I totter with the aid of my silver bling stick like a frail octogenarian, pausing occasionally to rest on the benches with sprightly pensioners. Yesterday I overdid the walking and my legs turned to marshmallow. I hobbled back to the flat and collapsed in the hall like a badly assembled deckchair. I think I’ll restrict my al fresco moments to the garden in future.

Today my nephew Simon and his girlfriend Nikki turned up to whisk me off for lunch followed by my absolute favourite treat, chocolate Horlicks at the famous Harbour Bar, which is a definite must-see if you’re in Scarborough. Could life be any sweeter?

Big Dipper takes a downswing

Your days will be up and down, you'll feel like you're on a roller coaster, they said. Well, today was a down day. Woke up feeling knackered, looking haggard, with spinning head and wobbly legs. The kind of day you can't form words, a day you know you're going to have to write off. Tried a slice of toast, but it felt like eating an old flannel. Thank goodness for EnSure, milkshakey things from the doctor, sipped through a straw. Meal replacements, chew-free nourishment, easy to tolerate, quite tasty too.

Still, I feel as if a Sumo wrestler is clamped to my shoulders, so I'll say night-night.

Aunt Alopecia pays a visit

Hair loss, one might imagine, is the least of my problems, but it knocks the confidence. Where once I'd moussed, gelled and spat on the wispy bits, now the hair coats my pillows and floats in the air like, er, floaty hair. They say it will grow back when the chemo finishes. We'll see, but in the meantime I've ordered several bandanas to see me through the thin times, and some wacky wool to knit myself a No-hair-day-chemo-soropti-cap . If they fail, it's looking like a buzz-cut.

Pic on right is me with hair. Can't quite bring myself to snap the new baldy me at the mo.

A sharp tug on the mortal coil

Into every life a little merde must fly. My wee parcel jetted in on 7 January 2007 when I was diagnosed with cancer. Actually, I think I took the news rather well, but through naivete rather than stoicism. It was hard to digest in one sitting: Cancer, bowel cancer, metastasised to liver, also hurtling unimpeded through lymph nodes. Inoperable. Incurable. Not a gift-wrapped parcel, then.

During the following months I've embarked on the chemotherapy journey, experiencing most of the side effects: diarrhoea, mouth ulcers, nausea, oral thrush, hair loss, and debilitating fatigue. When the exhaustion wave washes over you, it's best to surrender and take a nap. I've been in a hospice and three different hospitals where I've been treated, amongst other things, for neutropenia (an infection coupled with low white blood cell count - quite dangerous, I'm told), and fed antibiotics which gave me an allergic reaction and anaphylactic shock (can be fatal in minutes if left untreated). Scary stuff.