I was escorted to the pre-op room. My anaesthetist and her assistant were waiting for me and I was invited to hop up onto the operating trolley. I said my goodbyes to the friendly theatre assistant who’d accompanied me and lay back on the bed. Feigning calm, I answered the same set of questions for the third time while the anaesthetic nurse stuck electrode pads to my chest. I noted the monitor as I beeped into life.

The room was new. It was clean, tidy and bright. So very bright. My anaesthetist was relaxed, with a happy, confident and caring demeanour that helped to ease my growing anxiety. My left arm was held by the assistant as a cannula was inserted into the vein in my hand. We chatted for a short time as the procedural checklist was followed item by item.

“So what is it you do?”

“I’m a research manager at the university. It’s actually quite a nice job and I like my academics. Most of them. They’re psychiatrists, a lot of them.”

“Oh. right! Right, well, we’re ready here. I’m going to inject some anaesthetic into your vein now, it will probably sting a little bit, but then you’ll fall asleep very soon afterwards.”

“OK”, I responded. “Thank you”.

It always feels icy cold. Whatever gets injected through a cannula feels icy cold. This was no exception.

I looked up at the bright light above me. This would be absolutely fine, I thought to myself. If it all goes wrong and this is it, then this would be lovely. Just let it go. Like an old television set, the blackness engulfed me… the little white dot… then nothing.

I was expecting pain, but not there and not like that
“Ok Cristina, you’re all done now and absolutely fine. Jane is going to look after you in recovery”.

I was moving! Opening my eyes, I saw my anaesthetist disappearing from view as I was wheeled into the recovery suite. We came to stop and I noticed the clock on the wall: 3.50pm? 4.50pm? Definitely 3.50pm. Nearly three hours in theatre.

There seemed to be a lot of activity around me, my nurse was talking to me. “How are you feeling, are you in pain, do you feel sick?”

“I feel a little bit nauseous. I feel like I’m getting a really bad sore throat and chest infection.” It must have been the tube they stick down your throat, I told myself, while remembering all the other things the anaesthetist had told me could happen with the insertion of said device. I checked my teeth with my tongue: all present and incorrect. It was then that I could feel the restriction of the bandage around my neck.

“I can give you something for the sickness and I’ll put some paracetamol into your drip. You had some morphine just before you were woken up, so that could make you feel quite groggy.”

Within seconds, the mild feeling of sickness had disappeared. What was this miracle drug? Why can’t I stockpile it for Saturday mornings?

Suddenly, all the nursing staff vacated the area while something happened to the patient on the trolley next to mine. Ahem, hello? Don’t I need to be moved too? What if it’s like something out of Alien and I, as closest in proximity, am next to get the octopus from outerspace on my face? By the feeling in my chest, maybe I already had one growing in me.

It’s just an x-ray, Tina. They’re just doing an x-ray.

Everybody returned and I heard one of the nurses answering the phone on the reception. “Yes, she’s fine”, she was looking at my nurse and nodding, “tell them that we’re moving her over to you now.”

And with those words, I just knew that she’d been speaking to a staff member from the ward I was going to, and that particular staff member was acting as some sort of medium for my mother. In the days before people used mobile phones, I could tell who was on the other end of the phone from its ring. Oh god, it’s Mother.

Within minutes, I was being wheeled down the hospital’s corridors on my journey to the ward. I always find it odd that this is done in public. You’d imagine that there’d be some sort of private corridor system for transporting patients from theatres to wards, but no, there you are trundling past the great unwashed (and washed) of Salford.

Seconds later, I arrived at my bedside and, lacking any diginity, I flopped myself from the trolley onto the bed. The theatre staff made me comfortable and said their goodbyes as the lovely nurse Tabitha introduced herself to me by performing the first of the hourly observations for blood pressure, temperature, oxygen saturation. She didn’t ask me if I was hungry though, since, well, I’d not eaten for 24 hours. Starving, actually. She did ask, however, how I liked to be addressed and what the most important thing to me was. “Please call me Tina. The most important thing to me is my family… and world peace.”

I familiarised myself with my surroundings, checked for fire exits and toilets, noted the cooling breeze from the open window behind me, and fell asleep.

So it happened. After eighteen months in which I’d experienced seemingly endless blood tests, hospital appointments, scans, genetic tests – and not forgetting my lost weekend held hostage at my local A&E – I finally had surgery to remove the growth that had caused few physical symptoms, but which might have resulted in problems in older age.

Nobody wants osteoporosis or an increased risk of kidney stones if at all avoidable and more acute problems were also a possibility, as borne out by my visit to A&E with an “I think she might be having a heart attack… oh no, it’s indigestion” episode. An episode which alerted the medics to dangerously high calcium levels and resulted in me having burning hell water fed through a drip into my veins.

Of course, hyperparathyroidism and resultant hypercalcaemia hadn’t left me completely symptom-free and was a likely contributory factor to the depression and general fatigue that I’d been experiencing for a couple of years.

On 4th of June, the day arrived for me to go under the knife for the removal of a parathyroid adenoma that had been detected by ultrasound and radiolabel scanning.

One flew over the cuckoo’s nest
The six hours between arriving at the surgical admissions lounge to being escorted to the operating theatre are lonely, boring and peppered with increasing levels of anxiety.

As I sat at the side of my bed in the day surgery unit, wondering when I should change from my clothes into my hospital gown, I noticed that exit from the unit was only possible with a key card via the door in which I’d entered, or accompanied by a theatre nurse through the other doors that led to the operating rooms. You don’t need to be mad to be here, but any wrong moves and we’ll lobotomise you.

“A radical feminist lesbian would be professionally offended by this!”
I’d met my surgeon and discussed my operation, signed the consent forms. I was second on the list, so should be going to theatre mid to late morning.

The anaesthetist had also visited, described what would happen, discussed pain relief and asked me a series of standard questions.

A nurse came by and asked the same questions, followed by “Is there any possibility that you might be pregnant?”

“No, absolutely not”

“Oh, well, because of your age, we’re going to have to do a pregnancy test. We only need a wee sample.”

And it was this that sent my heart racing. Nil by mouth since the night before with only a sip of water that morning, I’d had a nervous pee at the first opportunity, there was no way I had anything in me for the requisite sample. I explained, “I’m gay, I’ve never had sex with a man and that, honestly, I don’t need a pregnancy test.”

But of course I did. Patient safety, risk management and all those things meant that I had to have one. Rational me knew this, but anxiety was taking over. This anxiety had me arguing with myself, what about respecting diversity? I should kick up a fuss, tell them what for! How DARE THEY! I am offended by this!!! Who can I complain to?

The simple fact of the matter was that I was only experiencing this faux rage because I couldn’t pee. I took my little pot to the toilet, and try as hard as I might, nothing, not a single drop. I was gowned-up by this time and I shuffled forlornly back to my bed. There’s something about wearing a hospital gown that transforms an otherwise normal person into an institutionalised shuffler.

“Nothing?” the nurse asked sympathetically.

“No, I’m afraid not”, I replied, slumping into my chair, pulling up my surgical pop socks. Why can’t they just take a fucking blood sample? Or my word for it! Cocks.

I shared my rage on Facebook, via text message, almost tweeted my rage directly to the hospital. And then, when all seemed lost and I was certain that I would have my operation cancelled for the sake of an arid bladder, I decided to give it another go. I shuffled back to the toilet, little pot in hand. I sat on the toilet, leaning forward to put pressure on my bladder and then it happened. I did it! Miraculously, my aim was true and I managed to collect a sample of sufficient volume to perform the test.

I returned to the nurses’ station with a spring in my step, a beaming smile on my face. This felt like the biggest achievement of my life. Not pregnant? Nailed it!

To infinity and beyond
And so the wait began in earnest.

The lady in the bed next to me was having the same procedure and was first on my surgeon’s to do list. She’d been gone for only an hour and I knew there’d be at least another two before my time came; it was 10.30am. I was bored and I was hungry. I watched people come and go, some tried to engage in conversation with me. Some came back, bandaged up and groggy from the gas. I was tortured by their post-operative coffee and toast.

As time passed, and as 12.30 came and went, the tingling in my stomach grew stronger. I knew my time was coming. And then the cheery theatre nurse arrived at my bedside. “OK, your surgeon is just grabbing a sandwich and then she’ll be right with you. Are you ready?”

I was asked the same questions that I’d been asked by my anaesthetist and the unit nurse. My wrist and ankle ID bands were checked and double-checked. I sent a quick text message to my sister and then started the short walk to the operating theatre. My institutionalised shuffle had well and truly returned.

One of Radio 2’s DJs, Jo Whiley, is coming to the end of a gruelling 26 hour challenge running and walking on a treadmill without sleep, breaking for just five minutes each hour.  It’s all for charity.  This will be a commendable achievement, but it’s nothing compared to my walk up to my local railway station last Friday evening.  It’s uphill all the way, on a slanted pavement and as you near your destination, you’re faced with this:

I’m not referring to the impending attack by the mother and pink-clad toddler.

On reaching what seems to be the summit, there are these:

Then a long ramp with a steep incline up to the platform itself.

So, Ms Whiley, if you think your exploding knees and feet are bad, you should try this shit.

I’m listening to the final two hours of her challenge and watching on the internet, she’s something else, looking as fresh as a daisy, if a little deranged.  Gok’s with her, and OH MY FUCKING GOD, Nigella has just turned up.

It’s all in aid of this year’s Sports Relief, so a pretty good cause.

My days of taking part in sporty challenges for charity are far behind me.  In fact, apart from running a mile for Sports Relief ten years ago, my only sporty charity fundraisers were sponsored walks when I was in school.

Oooh! My hair is the same at the moment, not much else is.

I don’t really do physical activity, not since the “skiing incident” wrecked my hip a few years ago.  My left leg is very weak these days and if I tried to run, I’d probably end up going round in circles.  I still have gym membership, but I stopped going because, well, I’m lazy and it really hurt and I found that I couldn’t use the equipment because of the imbalance in strength between my lower limbs.

I wouldn’t even run if I was being chased by an axe-wielding murderer, it’s just not worth the indignity, and next time I catch a train, I’m parking my car at the station.

My charitable work is now restricted to making regular donations to things and living on £1 a day for five days to make a point about people who whinge about not having enough money for food in this country  live in extreme poverty in the developing world.

These aren’t adjectives I’d use to describe myself, not all the time anyway, but my favourite soup that I can’t make in the whole world.

I love it.

I LOVE IT.

Sisterly (as in sibling, not sapphic) duties had me participating in a mock training session on infection control that was delivered by my sister this evening. The little dog and I, Mr Sister and Mrs In-law gathered in her living room and took part in a basic, interactive session that covered all the types of infections, how to prevent them and how to treat them. We were asked to recall a childhood infection and describe it through the medium of coloured felt-tip pens. My picture of me suffering with an ear infection and being treated with banana-flavoured antibiotics was a work of art. There was a section on STIs; she threw in “dental dam” for my benefit, I feel.

Anyway.

There was an evaluation form, which took me back to a previous life in which I delivered training sessions for a living. “How could this session have been improved?” always brought the response “coffee and biscuits”.

Foxtrot romeo oscar.

I eventually changed that question on my evaluations to “with the exception of refreshments, which cannot be provided because of Trust policy, how could this session be improved?”

“More group work”

I’m sure a lot of my participants had different learning types and abilities; some liked to be told what was what so they could get out of there asafp, others could only learn things if I delivered the sessions through the medium of interpretive dance, it being the NHS.

I’d not had the chance to eat before going out and my sister had to nip over to mine anyway, so I asked to bring me hot and sour soup – two portions – while reconfigured an old iPhone that I was giving her. “Get it from the one on the precinct, it’s easier”, although my preference was the takeaway further down the road.

The soup came and I ate the lot. And now I feel a bit sick.

What I love about the stuff is the variety that you get depending on the source. There’s the thick gloopy one that’s basically sweet chilli sauce watered down with vinegar with bits of char siu pork, chicken bits, prawns and whatever they fancy throwing in (this was tonight’s, hence the unwelcome gurgling in my duodenum). “The one down the road” offers a different recipe – less synthetic, less gloopy, much hotter, more garlic, but with the same bits of meat and prawns thrown in. Then there’s the Thai one, tom yum, which is out of this world once you get used to the bits that you aren’t supposed to try to eat. I do have the unfortunate coriander reaction to tom yum though.

I yearn for the day when Heinz start producing tinned hot and sour soup. I can feel a consumer champion letter coming on.

Mindfulness
I’ve started to read Ruby Wax’s Sane something or other… hang on, I’ve forgotten what it’s called… Sane new world: taming the mind book. I say “book” it’s the Kindle version.

It’s all about mindfulness and cognitive… I’ve forgotten again… mindfulness-based cognitive therapy. I haven’t read much of it yet. Because instead of reading it, I’m doing other stuff, obviously.

Anyway, I’m going to practise mindfulness when I’m stuck in the car on the way to work tomorrow. Instead of getting to the point of wanting to leave the 40 minute traffic queue by simply getting out of my car, locking it and walking to the nearest bus stop so I can get home, I shall be mindful of my sense of being.

I am being killed by this.

How do I feel? Let me start with my head, I hear loud screaming in there and my brain is pounding. My eyes are being destroyed by the low sun. My nose is dripping a-fucking-gain. My mouth is dry. My teeth are clenched to the point that I can feel my jaw breaking.

Moving down, my shoulders are hunched and tense and aching so much, my heart is pounding, my hands are gripping the steering wheel so tightly that they might leave marks in it. I am hungry. I need the loo. My back hurts. I forgot to adjust my seat after wearing pumps yesterday and I am too close to my peddles.

I’m not breathing. I’m NOT BREATHING!

And Chris Evans has spent the last 20 minutes complaining about the sound of the new Formula 1 cars. AGAIN!

But back to the book, I don’t know what to expect from it. If I managed to read it to the end, but my track record over recent years isn’t encouraging. This statement has no bearing on the books that I choose, just my ability to concentrate or maintain interest in anything for the past few years.

I regret buying the electronic version now. This is the sort of book that should be read as a book, something to sit down with, or go to bed with and read by turning proper pages, breaking the spine, escaping from screen time before trying to get to sleep.

Tonight though, I don’t think it’s my late use of this electronic device that will result in poor sleep, rather the sugary, vinegary, fishy, meaty gloop that is sloshing around my poor abused insides.

I am clenching my teeth still. I’m not sure I’ll be needing a dental dam, but maybe a gum shield might come in handy.

I was laughed at today, several times. I was laughed in a nice way though and I don’t mind that one bit.

After spending the morning trying to force out aldehydes from my bloodstream by pumping in pints of Ribena, I became almost recognisable as a human by 2pm.

This was one of those days where’d have been tempted to laze around and do nothing, but I had a date at the restaurant with my family. The company was fun; we were accompanied by my sister’s sort of in-laws and I managed to sit near them and away from my folks.

I adore my parents, but they irritate the fuck out of me, especially in restaurant situations. They’re both hard of hearing, as are their two friends who were also with us this afternoon. My fragile being could not cope with the usual confusion that stems from four partially deaf people (one Italian) talking over each other and having to repeat things ad infinitum because, unlike a lot of a lot of people who’s hearing isn’t what it was, they don’t seem to make any attempt to listen.

So I took a gamble and sandwiched myself between my niece and the in-laws. Little Con got scared by a langoustine, but once her mother had removed the flesh, the alien-like head thing provided much entertainment. Oh, we teach good table manners in our family.

At one point, I turned to my sister and asked if she might cut my hair for me. Mr in-law looked at me in horror, “You’ve just asked her to cut your hair??”

“Yes”, I replied

“But why don’t you just go to a hairdresser?”

“I don’t trust them”, I said. “They get on my nerves with all that faffing around they do, and then they don’t do it how I like it, so I might as well have twenty minutes of pain letting Anna do it. My hair still won’t be how I want it, but at least I won’t have to pay, and it always grows back anyway”.

I must learn where punctuation goes relative to speech marks.

I didn’t say that, but I’ll throw that in next time it goes quiet in the snug.

Anyway, I’ve been hacked at tonight. I think I look like something out of Les Mis. She uses the dissection scissors from the rat brain experiment when I was at university. Not quite sure how she got hold of them. I mean, stole them from me, rather than how she picked them up and used them.

My hair will grow, all too quickly, and maybe I’ll pluck up the courage to let a proper stylist loose on it at some point this year. They’ll throw in the snide remark, “So, who cut your hair last time?”. They all say this irrespective of whether you’ve had it cut by a professional or some maniac wielding a sharp object that was used to snip open a rat’s skull in a former life. I’ll probably entertain them and say it was the rival salon over the road… or “You!”.

I discovered Morcheeba in… 1998… ish. Their song, Let me see, featured in that TV programme, Cold Feet, a major hit at the time.

Here’s a digression. That particular series was very “in” at the time with people my age group – late 20s – who were sort of professionals. It was particularly nice because it was set in Manchester and it made Manchester look good. And then came the property asylum seekers from London, but that’s another story.

Anyway the telly programme featured lots and lots of contemporary music. There were even Cold Feet compilations that you could buy on CD, compilations that featured all the music that appeared in the programme.

I LOVED this programme and was so thrilled when the DVD box set was released that I didn’t mind spending quite a lot of money to buy it. I remember receiving it and settling down to watch all those wonderful moments again. Within a few minutes I noticed that something strange had happened, the music had been stripped out and replaced by some generic studio crap that bore no reflection that which had appeared in the transmitted programme. I couldn’t watch beyond the first episode of that DVD collection and was pretty annoyed. How could they market a whole load of CD compilation albums of music “based on the TV series” then take all those tracks out of the DVD?

Because they’re a bunch of fucking arseholes, that’s why.

The same happened with Titty Bang Bang.

Anyway, back to Morcheeba. Their music was wonderful company for me when I was living alone in my flat in Sheffield from 1999 to 2001. It was a time when I was still actually enthusiastic about music; I sought out new stuff, knew what was what, talked about the intricacies of particular tracks and the flow of albums. I had a tape in my car: Big Calm on one side, Becoming X on the other. It played on loop for 18 months.

Then things happened and music became too associated with life events; I had to let it go.

One thing that I’ve never let go is my inability to get dressed unless a particular pattern is followed. I just tried to put on bed t-shirt right arm first and my head ended up coming out through the arm hole. I can’t put trousers on unless I have my socks on and then, I have to put my left sock on first – same goes for shoes. If I start with my right sock, I find myself pausing to analyse what has happened and deliberate whether I need to remove the sock and start again. It takes superhuman effort to tie my laces. It often takes two or three attempts to button up a shirt or cardigan and doing up the buttons on the cuffs of sleeves just doesn’t happen without the help of a third party.

I do remember my childhood, all of it, but I must’ve been off from school the day they had the “getting dressed” lesson. Maybe the cosmos is just trying to tell me to wear pull on-trousers, a vest and slippers.

The children’s TV character Worzel Gummage was a scarecrow who could swap his head to match any particular occasion.  “I gots me thinkin’ ‘ead on.”  “I gots me singin’ ‘ead on.”  “I gots me ‘andsome ‘ead on.”

Most of Worzel’s transformations were quite scary, but the visible signs that he’d changed from one character attribute to another were nice and obvious.  Everybody could see which Worzel they were dealing with and limited their expectations to each particular one.

When we encounter people, unless they’re displaying extremes of emotion, we can’t tell which head they happen to be wearing at that moment, well I find it difficult sometimes.  I’m not one to externalise my emotions, not generally, but I think everyone could pick up that I had my “I’m in a foul mood, don’t talk to me” head on.  Because of what that particular head made me do yesterday, I’ve been wearing my “thumping head” today.  This is the one where, inside, I am punching myself in the head continuously; like those machines at Ikea that used to kick bits of furniture years on end.  Mobelfakta, that was it.

I’ll be wearing my thumping head for quite some time I think.  But at least it’s me who’s doing the punching and not somebody else.

Silly games

I’ve been playing an online Scrabble game for a few weeks.  I’m shit at Scrabble, but this is good because I can’t have arguments with people about the validity of their words – the game decides for you.  It’s a bit odd because words like “OK” and “jew” aren’t seen as valid, yet those such as “xi”, “qi” and “ae” are.  Even my spellchecker doesn’t recognise them.

I’d been enjoying a high-scoring game with another cheat opponent for a couple of days and today, they messaged me: “Before I start flirting, are you male of female?”

Another instance that would normally elicit a roll of the eyeballs had me dealing another crashing blow to my temple

“Err, I’m female and I’m gay,” I responded, thinking that my opponent was a bloke.

“Ha! So am I!” came the response.

“ADRIENNNNNNE!!!!” the blood was oozing from multiple lacerations on my head at this point.

“Lol, you top or bottom? I top”

KNOCKOUT!

Deary, deary me.  Anyway, she thrashed my 60 points and we’re having a rematch.

I’ve been threatened with a rematch at Lego Lord of the Rings on some games console thing next weekend.  I played this last week, didn’t have a clue what was going on, so kept turning myself into Gandalf and killing my teammates.  Much more fun than hunting for clues and solving riddles.

Vietato fumare

I think that’s Italian for something.  I don’t think it’s Italian for “can I have a go on your tits” because they have signs with that written on them up all over the place over there.  Then again, who can tell with the Italians?

I’ve been smoking myself stupid, drinking too much, not eating and not sleeping for a few weeks.  All this has got to stop. Starting now.  The thing is, the great thing about smoking is that it gives you the opportunity to go outside and look at the night sky, which has been beautiful recently.

It hasn’t fallen in, not quite, there will be others.

I’ve decided that relationships aren’t for me.  Well, I’ve had it decided for me, but I should’ve always known this.  Nobody actually deserves me anyway.  That can be taken in a number of ways.

From now on, I shall be avoiding all romantic encounters and the advances of women unless there is no pretence about what they want from me.  It’s all very good being witty, intelligent, caring and a decent cook, but that novelty wears off for people after a while.  Clearly.

I’m going to get a t-shirt printed with: “I just want a go on your tits”.  I shall wear it in Chorlton and risk arrest for being offensive.  It’s a great way to meet new people anyway.

People, the bane of my life.  I’m sure they just exist to irritate and disappoint.  Best avoided.

I have no positive thoughts.  None whatsoever.

Current status = big, massive PFFFFFFFT

I had a phonecall from my surgeon’s secretary today, enquiring as to whether I’d been to see the genetics consultant. Yeah, yeah, whatever. She’d been prompted to contact me by the surgeon herself. Should I be concerned that the surgeon is actually being proactive; wanting to find out my test results so she can plan my surgery.

Maybe I should be flattered with the attention.

But it’s got me thinking that maybe I should be taking some actions to prepare myself for going under the knife. Things like, getting healthy, losing some weight, cutting out the ciggies, stopping the booze. Well, my thoughts on surgery are, if there are complications, please let me go. I can’t think of a nicer way to die: drift off to sleep under anaesthetic; surrounded by people and not alone; painless; totally unaware. I’ll be having words with my anaesthetist to the effect of, please if something goes wrong, don’t make any effort to save me. Given the choice between an easy exit over a long-term brain injury, I know which I’d prefer.

In terms of preparing for my surgery, I’ve no idea what to do other than prepare for what’s going to come after it:

How to deal with the pain
How will I shower?
Will I bleed
Did I mention the pain?
Who will look after me and, more importantly, the little dog?
Can we do this when the weather is nice so that there’s some prospect of me convalescing in sunshine?
What about the scarring?

I think I’ve sorted thing in terms of the scarring issue. Once the wound has healed, I’m going to be sporting one of these for a few months until the scarring is less obvious:

I can’t think of anything finer. And to distract people’s attention, I also plan to wear a set of badly fitting wooden dentures. I’ll be the talk of the town.

Le pub quiz
I’m almost a regular at a pub quiz. Well, I’ve been twice, so it’s as good as. The competitiveness of people is quite astonishing; some even cheat by sharing answers across two teams. They have proper quiz team names and everything.

But I like the quiz that I go to in the sleepy Lancashire village of Dobcross. We have a meal, lots of wine, and then it starts. Maybe our merry band of three would do better if the quiz started before the third bottle of wine, but we do OK and could’ve been the top scorers last night, but for an error on my part.

I will never mistake Sophie Dahl for Sienna Miller again.

So I spent most of the day, hanging out in the Lancashire/Yorkshire hinterland. It’s an odd part of the world where, despite it DEFINITELY being in Lancashire, many people consider themselves Yorkshire. Fucking weirdos – why would you even do that? People think that Crimea is a hotbed of separatism, they need to get themselves to Saddleworth.

I love the beauty of the hills, the away from all the crap feeling that the area gives me, but I really don’t understand the awful broadband and lack of 3G mobile signal there. It’s as if the mobile companies and broadband providers have the area marked as “potential war zone” and so are limiting investment.

Could I get used to this? Well, the places are pretty, the pubs are great and the company is always very welcoming. But no, actually, I couldn’t.

None shall sleep
I snoozed from 6pm to 10.30pm this evening. It’s now 2am. Tempted as I am to take one of the white tablets, I shall restrain myself and let my natural state of slumber consume me. I think my genetics tests will show that I am part sloth.

I am incredibly envious of those lucky people who do not have to work. Three days out of the office and I am relaxed; the prospect of the morning drive to work still far enough in the distance that I can shrug my shoulders and not worry about it.

I’ve come to realise that the drive into and out from the city adds so much stress to my day that it’s actually the major thing that makes me resent going to work. The job itself is nice. When I work from home, I’m refreshed, productive, and I can easily put in at least three more hours than I might consider while sitting at my desk in the office, so that makes four hours.

The little dog is happy, I’m happy, we’re all happy.

But this week, what have I been up to with this precious time off?

V
E
R
Y

L
I
T
T
L
E

Oh, those extra hard returns have worn me out and I could do with a snooze, but I have stuff to do in the kitchen soon. Following on from the fun of pancake day yesterday, I figured it would be a good idea to put the remaining eggs and milk to good use and make some batter for toady hole. No rush though, I can take things at my o w n p a c e because I am enjoying my freedom from the constraints of time. Unfortunately, there’s an ominous rumbling in my stomach that won’t let me leave things too long.

Still, I have some time to ponder stuff, such as, why does the little dog smell worse after I’ve bathed him? He’s sitting next to me, licking his nether regions and smelling of, I can’t even describe it. I’m going to contact Molton Brown and ask them to start a hypoallergenic pet range.

STOP. LICKING. ME!

Are your passive aggressive tweets intended for me?
Twitter is a funny thing. Actually, it’s a pretty dumb thing and I use it mainly for looking at posts about poor driving and parking, and swearing travel updates. I pretend to be bothered about politics so I follow some boring politico hacks who fill up my feed with “1 of 400” tweets instead of just writing an article and linking to it. Then there are the luvvies who use Twitter to tweet @theirmates and to show the rest of us how amazing they are with their 500,000 followers while they only follow people who’ve been on the telly.

And then there are those who you don’t follow, and they don’t follow you, but you have history, so you check them out on occasion to see if they’re still unbearable twats. This makes you an unbearable twat for doing it in the first place, but there’s such a sense of satisfaction in reading confirmation that they are, and will always be, the biggest cunt on the planet. They post little snippets that you suspect are to dig at you and sometimes, when life is a little wearisome, they get the bile rising. Most of the time though, all they elicit is an audible roll of the eyes.

Anyway, time to get the oven on and those bags o’ mystery cooking.

I do hope there are no avalanches or terrible accidents in the French Alps next week.