Merry Christmas :-)

It's a good Christmas -- as usual :-)

Catching up with my brother, with Deb's sister, and their families. Always enjoyable, always exhausting... I'm not a sociable person!

We start with the immediate family exchanging gifts. Extra fun this year with *two* little kids helping with the unwrapping :-) Doesn't matter what's inside, as long as it needs to be unwrapped.

That's Christmas Eve. Deb says, now there's nothing for Christmas Day :-( So I'm up at midnight gift-wrapping some rocky road chocolate that we bought while we were away... Top present!

That's one thing that I miss: driving to the shops to buy a weird / surprising present.

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Today, finally, I go for a run... mostly a walk. I spend too much time just sitting. (I no longer have an excuse. Just lazy.) I'll be struggling on Sunday's 5km trail run. Oh well...

Dr Nick Lethbridge / Consulting Dexitroboper

...        Agamedes Consulting / Problems ? Solved

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Stay cool but stop at frostbite" ... per Ginger Meggs

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Dying for you to read my blog, at https://notdotdeaddotyet.blogspot.com/ :-)

a real holiday

a few days in Balingup... remembered highlights. well... whatever i can remember.

saturday 11 december 2021. we drive to our misty view cottage, balingup heights.

very comfortable. we sit on the verandah enjoying the view over paddocks and valley. Later deb tells me that the houses we can see about 1km away are part of the town, balingup.

Driving down we stop at pinjarra, a favourite, for scones.

then another favourite, may gibbs cottage near harvey for lunch.

quick stop at gnomesville. there is no cafe lol

dinner at the exchange hotel in greenbushes. i have pepper steak, deb has lamb chops. all good.

sunday 12 dec. we buy fruit and some supplies at kirup. cherries are good. days laterthe apricots and nectarines are not yet ripe.

balingup has a couple of cafes, we have lunched at each. one very ordinary pie, one a rather nice blt. there's a balingup tavern, closed since a fire in the kitchen.

we take a day drive to pemberton. we walk round big brook dam, a few very pleasant km.

another day drive to nannup. walk round a bit. lunch is healthy organic, i try the vegie curry. it's food.

coming towards balingup we find a few geocaches. the official gc app is roughly useless.

the accomm includes an old cherry orchard. deb and i pick and eat some. i walk back by myself and spend 20 minutes completely lost. deb finds me and guides me home.

we drive to the top of dearle street... the family lived there when i was born.we kept the house and holidayed there a few times over the years... my memories are limited :-) i took a photo of what may be "our" old block, the house is long gone.

we visit the old cheese factory, now a craft gallery. i have one memory of a visit there when there was a full vat of coagulating cheese.

nostalgia is dangerous. we spend a day chasing dim memories. all my memories of balingup are pleasant, of course i was very young.

next morning i wake up and remember various places i have lived (as a child) and enjoyed and... left. i still dislike living in crowded suburbs. remembering childhood locations... all past and gone... and i become miserable.

can never relive the past. it can be dangerous to even remember.

Nick Lethbridge    /    Consulting Dexitroboper
Agamedes Consulting    /   Problems? Solved.
   ===


As Conan says: What does not kill you
does not kill you

me and Elton

This blog is written entirely for my own benefit. I write then feel better for having got it off my mind. (Whatever "it" is.

Yet I know that other people read the blog. Other people who may care about how I am feeling. Someone who does not read it (as far as I know) is my GP. But I do know that my GP is upset when I make a casual joke about my impending death. So, with the GP I try to avoid the death jokes. Which is fine because she deals with my day-to-day health. She has no special focus on cancer. I feel better after a chat with the GP when, for example, the topic is getting a covid inoculation. In a similar way I sometimes -- in this blog -- dodge round the issue of my being terminal. I get the benefit of posting but, I hope, not adding too much worry to readers.

It's all false!

Well, no, it's not all false :-) But sometimes it takes me a while to document things which may be difficult for a reader. Also difficult for me. It can take me a while to decide how I want to write something. Because how I write is how I think... and that affects how I feel.

Okay, the subject of this post is "me and Elton". I'll get to that... eventually. This is a touchy-feely post. Which takes a lot of words :-)

I have this vague hope that this blog may help another person who has terminal cancer. Or, more likely, help a person who knows someone with terminal cancer. Let them know that they are not the only ones. Help them understand that there are ups and downs.

Mind you, one book that I read that was written by a man dying with brain cancer -- it really annoyed me. He was an idiot. That is, his attitude to his impending death was... very negative. (Yes, I know, that sounds like a rather stupid objection.)

Anyway... I'm awake and thinking... thinking that I have not posted some important stuff from the last couple of weeks. Stuff which is hard to write because it was not happy thoughts. (I wonder if I cover the difficulty by using lots of words?)

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What makes me suddenly think of this is... I suddenly feel a lot better :-)

Deb has a bad cold. I think that I have a weak version of the same. Tiredness, fuzzy mind, general low feeling... All of which makes me feel a bit miserable. Which comes out as feelings of impending death.

Suddenly... I feel as though I have shaken off the cold. I can feel the difference. And I can feel that impending death is suddenly not an issue. Really. I can feel that my mood has lifted. Physical improvement leads directly to emotional improvement.

===

So, that feeling of impending death... More a conscious awareness that, yes, I will be dead. Not an expectation. A feeling that time is running short. That there are things to do... and less time to do them.

Now... that feeling is gone. Nothing I do other than shaking off a cold.

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Oh yes: Today the brain surgeon shows us pictures of my brain. Still some possibly excess fluid but no blood. So we wish each other Merry Christmas and hope to not meet again :-)

Here's a quote from Chuck Norris: You can always tell a person's real character and personhood by those who closely surround him, especially if they're family. By which standard... I have a really terrific character :-)

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So, Elton John: In his biopic there's a scene where Elton is having a really bad day. The lights go up... he walks out onto the public stage -- and he makes a visible change. From miserable... to the full-on smiling entertainer. Sometimes, that's how it is. Doesn't matter how I feel... with other people -- I will be smiling. It's not fake. With those other people -- I am happy. But it does take a conscious effort to switch from personal angst to public cheer. It's worth it -- the shift is actual: if I look happy, I am happy. I hope that it was an actual shift for Elton John.

Dr Nick Lethbridge / Consulting Dexitroboper

...        Agamedes Consulting / Problems ? Solved

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There are no disasters, only opportunities. And, indeed, opportunities for fresh disasters." ... Boris Johnson

===

Dying for you to read my blog, at https://notdotdeaddotyet.blogspot.com/ :-)

short holiday and a good scan

Another CT scan... CT is the scan that shows (or not) blood on the brain... where blood on the brain leads to several days in hospital with a drain from my brain. No official results yet but:

Our Deep-ENT says that the CT scan looks "good -- nothing exciting". And nothing exciting is just what I want :-)

Over the weekend I test the brain , with a trail run round Yanchep Lake. I run carefully, do not fall over... I want to be sure that normal activity does not cause damage. Seems okay :-)

The run starts at 7am. So Deb & I stay at Yanchep Inn. A short walk from the start. Pre-race preparation includes a "Christmas Dinner" at the inn... giving extra weight to carry on the run :-) Dinner includes Christmas crackers and -- absolutely amazing -- the crackers include paper hats which actually fit on my head! Yes, I have a big head :-)

A very pleasant weekend, very relaxing (except for the run :-)

Now I feel more confident that my brain does not need cotton wool... so it's back in training for the Cradle Mountain Run. Ha!

Dr Nick Lethbridge / Consulting Dexitroboper

...        Agamedes Consulting / Problems ? Solved

===

There are no disasters, only opportunities. And, indeed, opportunities for fresh disasters." ... Boris Johnson

===

Dying for you to read my blog, at https://notdotdeaddotyet.blogspot.com/ :-)

what a clever scan

Deb & I see the cancer doc... the latest PET scan shows no sign of cancer in my gut :-)

So that's the spreading testicular cancer taken care of. Okay, it may come back but... it was never expected to be very bad. Slow... and treatable. Treated and now, for now, under control.

I'll have another PET scan in twelve months. Just in case.

The brain cancer is still the real danger. The August MRI scan was clear. The surgeon poked around, found cancer cells (as expected) but no visible tumour. So no need for another MRI -- the cancer doc says -- for six months from the last. Which puts it into Feb 2022. So I'm fit and well till then :-)

The cancer doc only cares about cancer. So does not mention the other finding from the PET scan... I get this from our deep-ENT:

The PET scan shows signs that indicate that I have tonsilitis!

Which can explain why I am constantly tired and feeling a mite poorly. Okay, tonsilitis and age :-) I do feel that I have a very mild cold. Tonsilitis sounds much better. I'm amazed at what can be seen on a PET scan !

I blamed our granddaughter for a cold. Now I blame her for passing on tonsilitis. I don't think she affects my age :-)

So for now -- as usual -- all is good :-)

Dr Nick Lethbridge / Consulting Dexitroboper

...        Agamedes Consulting / Problems ? Solved

===

There are no disasters, only opportunities. And, indeed, opportunities for fresh disasters." ... Boris Johnson

===

Dying for you to read my blog, at https://notdotdeaddotyet.blogspot.com/ :-)