Sea change

I've been back from England for a couple of days. I landed three weeks ago, and then bounced around, until we flew back on Sunday. We flew not knowing if our flight would be pulled when we got to Newark, every weather report hinted that it would. Other people had already rebooked their flights for the following day, so that if we got stuck, we couldn't get out of Newark for at least 2 days. It does make flying in a lot more exciting.

We got delayed a bit, ordered food using the iPad thingy they now have set up, like Blade Runner, but a lot more shit, and expensive enough to bring a tear to your eye. Apparently the chicken sandwich is made of gold.

Fantastic time at my mum and dads houses. Don't drink Bombadier....don't ask. Amazing wedding of two of my best friends, Becky and Reid. You don't see a day of such pure joy that often, I feel privileged to have been there.

The sea change is that I decided to wake up early and walk everyday. Today I was out really early as this day and those following this week, are going to fry.

I spent years believing that the MS meant that I couldn't really walk. Turns out that I was wrong. 2 miles a day, not bad.

Re-repair.

My happiness with finding all my old tunes on my old computer became somewhat dulled when it fell on its arse and refused to come out to play. I spent the next couple of weeks lamenting the loss of all those tunes I had found again, and moved over to streaming Radio 6. However, last night something struck me. I cannot quite remember exactly what tmy inspiration was, but whatever I did, means that I'm now sitting happily typing very badly, listening to all my old tunes, on the newly resurrected Itune sound bank. Am I a computer genius? Am I fuck. Cool tunes though....

Kill or Cure.

There are often reports that MS can be cured. Usually once I check into them, they turn out to be bollocks, pitched by a snake oil salesman, or by a deluded well-meaning sort, who,
" Really has got a hold of this beast!" Bless.
This is why I don't ever get my hopes up. However, the clinic trial in Canada does look very interesting. All the reports I've read about it say the same thing. If it works its amazing, if not, it can kill you. Its an ultra aggressive course of chemo therapy, where your immune system is destroyed, and then replaced with one built from your blood which hasn't yet been affected with MS. One person has died doing it. The infusion regime I do once a month has killed a lot more people than that. The fact that they admit just how dangerous it is, makes me think that this really might work.
Its like a greasy spoon thats been shut down a few times. So what if they got caught out, you know that it will taste great, and you can't fault them for effort. Does this mean that I'm now taking the top bacon sandwich approach to health? Well, I've tried everything else.

Shopping.

Beth and I decided to do our food shopping n the worst afternoon of the week. We entered he Friday fuck-fest, full of people hoping against hope that this time it would be a much better party than the last. No crying. no sirens, no permanent wreckage.This afternoon is often followed by buggered brunch sunday, where a table of the surviving friends try to peace together exactly where it all went so wrong. The tipping point usually has a name, which will be sneered into dust over over-priced eggs.
But, today I found a jar of dry roasted peanuts. The firat one I ate took me back to a New Years Eve in the 70's. Kev and I were at my Nan and Grandad's house, playing a game called Knightmare on our 48k ZX Spectrum! We drank cokes.  ate peanuts and cheese, it was great. I think our friend Stuart Bradley's sister was banysitting.  She was really cool, and we played records, you know, on a record player! Top memory, cost me a peanut.
So, if your party kicks off,go home and eat something you haven't had for ages, Little Debbie maybe? Cheaper than frowning, hung over a slowly decaying  Sunday platter, that you can'r remember ordering in the fist place....

The joy of books.

Our new library is now open on Parsons Ave. Its around the corner from our house. I joined it yesterday. I hadn't been in a library for far too long. There is something about being surrounded by books that I adore. I could look through them for as long as I wanted, then choose something that caught my eye, but that I knew nothing about, and then sit in a comfortable chair and read for a while to see if I liked it. I really did.

The book is by an author I'd never heard of, Antonya Nelson, her short story collection Funny Once. I was halfway through the first story when I knew that I'd been taking her book home. I get to keep it until the end of June. Her writing is excellent, I don't think i'm going to need that long.

The library is a modern take on the old staple, there is a lot of space, a lot of computers, and you check out the books using barcodes on terminals near the main desk. The library was full of people. A lot of kids doing projects the library had set up, adults frowning in concentration at computers, doing work they were trying to get their heads around. And, there were people just sitting around reading. Perfect.

MS stopped me from reading properly for years. Optic neuritis blurred everything into a mangled mess. This began to sort itself out a few years ago. While my eyesight holds up, I will be visiting this little slice of heaven a lot.

i think that I said it before, my kindle is great, but it's not close to the experience of reading a physical book. This was something that I couldn't do for a long time, see mangled mess comment above. 

We ended the day by going to the House of BBQ and Blues, a food truck on Parsons, If you get the chance, go to the library. If you're as lucky as I am, you'll get to end your day with fantastic BBQ.

Post soundtracked by Radio 6.

Food Folly.

I think i was inspired by the Play post of this morning. Beth and I went to an excellent Vietnamese restaurant on Bethel Road. I decided to push it a little. I don't know if you've ever had shredded pork skin. My advice? If you know whats coming. and that  you are not going to sit there looking at a perfectly good dish, whilst it slowly dawns on you  that shredded pork skin is a little to on the nose  a description for you to handle what is coming? Have at it. I tried, but the description defeated me. My fault entirely. Still, nothing ventured....No. I should have known better. Sod it, I did know better, and I ordered it anyway.
Great dessert....

Play.....

LBC radio is currently running a program on how kids are being molly coddled, and not being trained about some of  the risks of out and about. The show's premis is based on how many times we should have been killed when we were kids.
 I had a bit of a think. My number of narrowly avoided deaths is quite high. Do I think these were valuable lessons? Well, sort of. I still make potentially fatal mistakes every now and again, but I do spot them coming a lot quicker. I wouldn't try and build a treehouse out of rotten wood from the garden again. I still have the scar on my left wrist as a salutary reminder. Is that the worst thing I ever did? No, not even close.
Did I get knocked down by a double decker bus? Yes. Was it my fault? Yes.  Did I nearly fall in a lake in the pitch black at midnight last weekend? Yes. Was that my fault? Hell yes! Come to think of it, I'm not a great safety mascot, though I am the poster child for the.
"Have fun, you never know!"crowd.
Is that a soubriquet I wanted? No. But, would I change anything? I could do without the MS. but other than that? I don't think so. I am a terrible example, but I do know this, be comfortable with yourself, let no one tell you who you are, throw away the rotten wood in the garden, and you will be fine. Don't bounce it up with a Double decker bus either, I still have no idea how I walked away from that one.....