Day 8 and Dave comes to the dairy room.(Geordie Accent)

Wow, 8 days since chemo, what a roller coaster! I've got a partially collapsed lung which is a real pain in the arse because I think the good days would be so much more enjoyable without it. It was a lovely day yesterday, first one for a while and I went for walk with the dog in the field out the back. If you could have seen the look on her face when after 100 yards we turned back. Poor thing had to wait until the girls got home, by which time it was dark. I must say it was nice to finish the course of steroids and anti-sickness meds I was on, constipation phew what a nigthmare. It can't be good for ones Chi to be blocked like that for 5 days! But, on the other hand what a relief when it happens! The closest thing to child birth I'll ever experience. Tiredness is the main symptom/side effect I'm experiencing at the moment, I could sleep for Britain. I'm quite enjoying it though. When I was off work for 4 months after my leg op, I was in so much discomfort I couldn't sleep. With this (and Tramadol) it's like having narcolepsy. It's also a good blag when the mother-in-law comes over, lol. Lori, if you're reading this, Lance Armstrong's book turned up from Amazon this morning. After, getting through some other much needed reading I finally took your advice. I'm looking forward to snuggling up with it later. Although, I have to say with the tiredness thing, reading is a very slow process for me at the moment. I get a few pages under my belt and the eyelids start to droop. In fact, this may be of interest to others, I started downloading free audio books from Librivox http://librivox.org/ It's a great site. I'm listening to Walden by Henry David Thoreau at the moment, one of my favourites. I lived in Massachussets for many years and visited Walden Pond often. It's a place of much happiness and tranquillity for me that I thought I would be nice to relive those feelings at this, not so happy time. Plus, I think some of his and Emersons transcendentalist values wouldn't be a bad thing for us to incorporate in our consumer driven 21st century lifestyles. Sorry, I'll get off my soapbox. I had some great news the other day, my Dad's coming over from the States next month. Haven't seen him for a while and it's a shame he won't find me in the best of shape but, great news nonetheless. Ironically, he'll arrive just in time to see me with no hair, after spending most of my adult life hassling me to get my hair cut! A friend of mine whose a buddhist is giving me meditation lessons at the moment which are great for me and he's also given me a mantra from the medicine buddha. If you recite this everyday it has healing properties so I thought I'd post it and you can do with it what you will. TAYATHA OM BEKHADZE BEKHADZE MAHA BEKHADZE BEKHADZE RANDZAYA SAMUGATE SOHA It's in capitals because I copied and pasted from an email, not because you have to shout it. Dave