Tea or Coffee and Cake. It's Entirely up to You!

In a different life I lived at Carthew. It was here that I took on a biggish project. I was probably slightly out of my depth but I bought, a not quite, tumbledown cottage. It was here where I decided to turn down almost all social activities in favour of focussing on my work on the house. It was hard work but I was young. Abandoning all social activities for a year or two no doubt took a toll on our relationships but friends and family were always welcome visitors for tea and cake, however we generally stuck to our plan of getting our work done.

Things aren't that different now. We’re involved in a biggish project and we need to focus on what’s important. While we’re not about to abandon all social activities we definitely need to consider them carefully. Friends and family are still welcome visitors for tea and cake but we need to manage our time well. I’m not re-building a tumbledown cottage I’m trying to manage my tumbledown self.

Depending on how I sleep I’m generally OK in the mornings, not too bad in the evenings but pretty tumbledown in the afternoons. It's in my nature to say yes to an invitation but I still need my post meridian snooze. My night time sleeping is good at the moment however I do still need my afternoon shut eye.

I look tired now most of the time. It’s my accidental good fortune that my glasses are a similar shape as my baggy eyes so I don't look too bad. Similarly each year I take on a healthy glow. I tan easily. With the advent of BST I seem to change my skin colour by a shade or two. So in the spring I acquire an air of healthiness.

In the last few weeks I’ve realise that I’ve created an illusion of being OK but my decline is irrevocable. On Saturday I had my most recent scan, this coming Thursday I’ll hear the findings. I have a choice, travel to Treliske for a face to face consultation or take a phone call at home. I opted for the latter but needed to assure my consultant that Tricia would be present. One thing I’ve learnt over the past 3½ years is when it comes to bad news there’s no pussyfooting around. I’ll hear at least two things, the extent to which my cancer has developed and proposals, if any, for treatment.

There’s a battle raging inside me between, my now longstanding protagonists, team cancer and team chemo. Team chemo has just been holding team cancer at bay but I’m not sure if that’s still the case. The results will be out on Thursday. Spoiler alert........ ultimately team chemo will abandon the battle. In my case team cancer will prove to be unassailable. In the meantime the battlefield is becoming more knackered.

Now that I’ve steered the post around to being knackered. I can miserably report that I’m still knackered from my walk last Thursday. I’m not sure if that’s as a result of my recent escapade of flinging myself to the ground, the temporary withdrawal from the copious amounts of drugs I normally take or the disease taking hold. I may need to accept that the walks, at least in their original format, have come to a conclusion.

But I have a plan ...... all is not yet lost. I'll simply plan the destination. How you get there is totally up to you. My next proposed chemo day is the 17th May, next Monday when restrictions begin to lift further. So on the following Thursday that’ll be the 20th I’m thinking I’ll have tea and cake at 11am at (TBA).

Here’s some of the places I have in mind.

The Tea Shed at Trewithen,

Miss V’s, St Just in Roseland,

Woods Café, Cardinham Woods

Behind the Bike Sheds, Wadebridge

Whatever day I choose it can’t be a Tuesday because that’s the day I host our Coffee Club. Drop in why don’t you!

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Or simply go to www.itscancernotcovid.com and join from there.