Category Archives: health & happiness

lunch at manolo’s

29 Tuesday Jun 2010

Posted by in cancer, death & dying, food & drink, health & happiness, hope, hospitals, restaurants, sevilla

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Manolo Leon’s restaurant/bar is about half-way between the hospital and my place. In fact, it’s right across the street from where Susan (aka Pipocas) used to live. And some of you may recall that it was where I went for the post prognosis party back in October 2008, when I was – mistakenly! – told that my cancer was untreatable and I had maybe a year to live. On that occasion Nog, Pablo and I splashed out on a gorgeously decadent lunch and later on met Susan for cocktails at a smart little bar across the street. So it seemed appropriate to stop off there on the way home from receiving my GOOD NEWS yesterday …
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scanxiety

28 Monday Jun 2010

Posted by in cancer, health & happiness, hope, hospitals

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After ALL THAT WAITING it’s finally time for the next PET scan today. My appointment is for 8am, which is very good as it means I will be the first one in. Had one 3pm appointment last year and ended up having to wait two hours just to be put in the comfy chair to have the FDG injected (after that it’s about a 3-4 hour process). Also, it’s crap waiting all day at home to go for the test – much better to just get up and go in the morning and look forward to having that first coffee after the first scan has been done (they usually put me through twice, though last time it was three times).

I’ve had pretty bad scanxiety this time. I really don’t think I could cope with having to go on chemo again, though of course that’s not even the worst case scenario. I worry they might find tumours in untreatable places … the walking time bomb feeling  just doesn’t go away. And of course it gets worse as it gets closer to scan time. So I’ve pretty much been a nervous wreck this past month, though I’ve mostly been able to enjoy myself, especially these past couple of weeks. Until yesterday.

Gaelen, I know that your strong thoughts will be there with me.
Jed, make sure those wonder twin powers are fully activated, okay?

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I love it when a plan comes together…

21 Monday Jun 2010

Posted by in cancer, food & drink, friends, geekiness, health & happiness, hope, internet, juggling, life stuff, photos, sevilla, work

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… or in my case, several plans.

I didn’t realise what a turning point the trip to Málaga would turn out to be. So again, thanks to everyone who made it possible for me to go without racking up more credit card debt. In the end I only spent money on train fare and two lunches out, so it was a fairly cheap trip, but very rich in experiences. I think it also helped to have a couple of days on my own – and being by the sea certainly helped!

Anyhow, these are the various projects I’ve been working on since I got off chemo last summer: tapas tours, Seville website & blog (with forum), social media management, the Sevilla Store, and English classes (specifically for restaurants). So far the only ones bringing in a bit of income are the tapas tours and social media stuff – my private English classes, such as they were, finished last week for the summer. But it does look as though things are coming together…

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waiting…

15 Tuesday Jun 2010

Posted by in cancer, health & happiness, hospitals, summer

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Ever since my oncology appointment on May 24th I’ve been waiting to hear when my next PET scan will be. I’d been told it was going to be sometime during the first half of June and, frankly, I’ve been a nervous wreck all month. Then on Friday one of The Team told me the PET would definitely be this week and the hospital would call me on Monday (yesterday) to confirm. And well, they did call. But I was told my PET would be on Monday June28th. Two whole weeks away. Which I suppose won’t make much difference in terms of my health (if there are tumours it’s doubtful they will grow significantly in two weeks) … but dammit. I’ve been trying to get my work organised and the summer planned and had hoped to know at the beginning of June whether I was going to have a cancer-&-chemo-free summer.

Now I won’t know until July.

This sucks.

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sled strikes again…

18 Tuesday May 2010

Posted by in friends, health & happiness

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Remember back in January when Sledpress sent me a fabulous birthday care package full of wonderful things to help make me feel better? Well, she’s gone and done it again, except this time even more so … and it isn’t even my birthday!

I’d just spent most of yesterday morning (after getting home from yoga class) dealing with landlord Pepe and the 100-year-old carpenter he’d brought over to “fix the doors and windows that don’t close properly”. Which are, well, all of them. And I felt so sorry for the old carpenter, who told me that if he’d known the state of things beforehand he’d never have accepted the job – he could see that all the doors and windows in the building were beyond repair and he didn’t like doing work that was “futile”. Anyhow, he managed to get the livingroom balcony doors so that they won’t fly open with every gust of wind, but there are still huge gaps that he said are impossible to repair because the doors are totally warped. He’s coming back on Thursday to tackle the rest of the doors. And in the middle of all this the postman rang up and said he had a package for me…

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