Arrived At Destination

Well, at last I have had my final treatment, so now I can start getting my diet and my life back to normal. Henceforth it's a matter of six-monthly checkups and hormone injections. Thanks for your support and prayers. I'll get back to the usual content from now on.

Will It Ever End?

Sometimes I doubt it. I began radiotherapy treatment on 3rd July, 38 sessions, delivered Monday to Friday each week, and so the last treatment would be 23rd August. Except, three weeks in and on the Friday as I left, I was told that my next session would be the following Wednesday, as the machine was being serviced. So that took me into the following week (this one) and a new end date of 27th August. Except, a national holiday came up and the department was closed for the day. OK, 28th August. Went in the following day and the machine had broken down. Last treatment 29th, then. No. This morning I got a phone call from the hospital to say I can't have a treatment today, come in the usual time tomorrow, and then (really?) final treatment on Friday. I'll let you know, but don't be surprised if......

Frigiliana Is Bouncing.

For those who would like a flavour of what’s happening, here’s a link to a YouTube site that gives a round up of yesterday’s activities: Today we are into the third day of the Three Cultures Festival and it feels even better than ever. People are streaming into the village all day, through the evening and on into the night. Extra car parking has been organised including a park and ride facility which swings into action when all the spaces closer to the village have been filled. Even so, when I got back from the hospital at five o’clock yesterday, I couldn’t find anywhere to park closer than half a kilometre from home. Now, however, I can leave the car there until I need it again on Monday, by which time everything will be over and life will be returning rapidly to normal - or what passes for normal in an Andalucian village. For those who would like a flavour of what’s happening, here’s a link to a YouTube site that gives a round up of yesterday’s activities: http://youtu.be/4R1nZIStDow

A Week Of Wilting In The Heat

Another week rolls by with very little really to report. We are well into August, and with it the temperatures are now really climbing. Yesterday in Málaga the temperature was 36 degrees at four o’clock - and that, of course, is the shade temperature. Here in Frigiliana it’s not quite so hot, but it still managed to get to 32 degrees, which coincidentally was the overnight temperature in my living room, as the aircon unit is playing up. Fortunately, the unit in the bedroom is working as it should, and so I can sleep in a comfortable 23 degrees; a temperature that, it occurs to me, I would have found oppressive for sleeping when I lived in the UK. At the beginning of the week we had quite a lively thunderstorm during the night. Lots of thunder and lightning but only a handful of fat blobs of rain. At this time of year that usually means only one thing, and sure enough the local newspaper the following day reported that a lightning strike had set of a fire in the mountains behind us that burned off three thousand square metres of scrub, before the helicopter crews finally extinguished it. That was only the second fire of the season; let’s just hope that it’s the last.