Camp America/Australia 2007

Since I got the good news and the roadtrip ended, life briefly slowed down, and I was enjoying the relaxing feeling for a while! Had a great night out with people I used to work, and a few of us were quite sloshed by the end of it, and I've been out trying to take a few more photos during the summer sun. Went out to the Dogleap Rally near Limavady for one of the stages but didn't quite go as smoothly as I had hoped. There was no sign of a stage map on the internet so I headed down to the service area first hoping to find one, but with no luck and no one to ask, I drove to the forests named in the stage timings to see if I could find them. Luckily I met some of the cars driving between stages and followed them. Got a few great photos and had good fun, even chatting to a few of the other photographers. At one point when I was looking through the viewfinder waiting to time my next shot, I couldn't see that the driver had lost it slightly on the straight and entered the corner wide, wiping out one of the signs, and sliding much closer to us than expected, spraying us with debris before tearing on around the corner. Unfortunately I made a rookie mistake and at the end of the stage I let my stomach lead me, and instead of following the other photographers, who knew where to go, I left and headed to McDonalds for lunch, even though I had enough food in my bag to keep me ( and probably some of them!) going. So when I returned I again had no clue where to go and just had to wait at the start of the same stage, waiting for them to return. Next time (at the start of September!) I'll be arriving much earlier with a packed lunch!

One night with a clear sky, I headed out to Greenan Fort, a ruined fort on top of a hill, to take some star trail photos, which are very long exposures that show the movement of the stars across the sky as streaks of light. It was my first attempt and I checked all my gear was charged and clean before leaving and was pretty raging to find that, even though it had been working at the house, the remote that allows me to take multiple long exposures automatically, died as soon as I plugged it in. Luckily I was alone at the fort so no one was offended by my language. I managed to set something up anyway and sat down for a few hours of boredom. Unfortunately the photos aren't great, but I learnt enough that it will work much better next time!

Had another appointment at the hospital at the start of August so that they could work out how often I need checkups over the next 5 years, and to tell me roughly what was gonna happen. I still have to go back for the scan that they use to actually decide my schedule, apparently it was too easy to arrange it all for the same day, but hopefully from now on I will only have to return about every 6 months.

Mum took the caravan down to Bushmills on the coast for a week of peace and quiet, and Joanne stopped down for a few days so I headed down to keep them entertained! It was quite good fun, and we went on the tour around the Bushmills Distillery, which had restarted operations since I visited with Lindsey and Danica, meaning it was a bit more interesting to see the place actually working. Out for dinner in the evening then I headed home after the obligatory ice cream from Morelli's in Porrtstewart.

By the middle of August it was time for the annual Big BBQ, which is a bbq at our house (it used to be held at the caravan oon the coast until we sold it) for friends and family, and between Camp America and Australia, I had missed the last 5 years. During the day beforehand I headed up to Irish Street to watch the Apprentice Boy's Parades, celebrating one of the pivotal moments in the history of our city. It had been far long than 5 years since I had seen the parade and Iw as surprised how I excited I was to be back watching them again. Around 15,000 people in probably hundreds of bands marching through the city was an impressive sight, although the huge lambeg drums didn't quite rattle my ribcage as much as they did when I was 7!

The BBQ was good fun, with the usual motley crew turning up, and everyone seems to have matured as there was no throwing clothes lines and knives at each other, selling food to the local kids, 'borrowed' signage from elsewhere or marshmallow based endurance games but it was still a good laugh. The tradition is that by around 9pm the 'young ones' head out on the town, but our numbers have been dwindling and even with my little cousin James, who is 10 years behind us, old enough to hit the town, he had other (probably cooler) plans so Neil, Joanne and I went for a few quieter drinks in one of the bars across town.

Tuesday after the Big BBQ Neil and I headed down to Belfast to see Kasabian, supported by Northern Irish band Ash, perform at a week long music concert called Belsonic. We had also hoped to see Florence and the Machine on Thursday but I didn't know if I could afford either concert and my dithering meant she was sold out by the time we bought tickets. But we drove down and after not realising that my window was still wide open and getting caught at a petrol station 'discussing' how a guy managed to even get into the car of a girl so far out of his league she may as well have been playing a different sport (I suggested the only answer was that they were related), we then tried to get into the wrong (thankfully empty) house after getting Cod's address wrong, before finally we met up with a few of Neil's mates and headed to the concert. It was a great night, with quality performances by both bands, but sadly we afterwards we got separated as I was a bit drunk and strode out of the arena at top speed, insisting that Neil catch up rather than me waiting, and by the time we rejoined, he had lost his other mates so we tried to get into a club which was predictably full, so we found a bar and had a couple of drinks and headed home. The next morning we met up with Neil's friend Janet who now has a 6month old kid who took one look at me and started laughing! I'd feel offended except babies usually cry when they see me so it was an improvement.

Next weekend I'm bacl living it up and heading over to Edinburgh for a few days at the festival and catching up with a few friends, including Jo, who I stayed with a few days in Oz outside Perth.

After the events of last night we decided that we needed some help talking our way out of uncomfortable social situations, so we headed off to Blarney Castle to hopefully gain the gift of eloquence. The romance of kissing the Blarney Stone and ticking off one of the apparently 99 things to do before you die is lost a little when you have to queue up for about 25 mins first. What a lot of people don't realise is that the stone is actually low down in a gap, so to kiss it properly you have to lie on your back, bend back even further and kiss the bottom stone, the actual Blarney Stone, and avoid kissing the stones above it as they're just rubble, which sounds obvious but most tourists I saw (ok, three, but I only watched four people kiss it) got it wrong. After the castle we wandered around the poisonous garden in the grounds, with a selection of plants with a variety of negative effects on the human body, including foxglove (yep, poisonous!), absinthe, marijuana, and poison ivy.

After lunch in a little village called Fastnet (after a fishing net, not some geeky homage) we headed down to Mizen Head, which is the southern most point of the Irish mainland. The visitor centre was pretty interesting but unfortunately the 100 year old bridge across to the actual point was being rebuilt and so we couldn't get down. Next stop was Killarney and after driving through some pretty rugged (and wet) landscape in the national park, we were up early the next morning for a walk through the park. Starting at the Torc waterfall, where I showed Joanne how to take some long exposures of the falls, we headed through the park, down to the edge of the loch and then to the quite impressive Muckross House. Unfortunately the damp weather meant that the views weren't too impressive although we found an enormous tree which was probably a few hundred years old.

Next stop was Ennis, where we were spending the night and in the evening we headed down to the coast hoping to see some dolphins off the coast but with no luck we headed back home through probably the worst rainstorm all trip. The next morning we headed up the coast to the Cliffs of Moher, which are in the running as one of the new Natural Wonders of the World, and although the cliffs are very impressive, we were hoping for a few walks along the coast but there wasn't much to see once you have seen the cliffs. Apparently they are much more impressive, and you can appreciate the height much more, by going on one of the tour boats but we hadn't planned to do that. The visitor centre is quite cool as it is built back into the hillside and is very eco-friendly but is almost hidden, and definitely looks far smaller than it actually is. Back on the road and we stopped off at the Poulnabrone dolmen, which is another passage tomb and is basically one huge flat rock sat on top of two vertical rocks, situated in the Burren, which is another incredibly rough and rugged terrain, strewn with rocks which have been put to good use in the hundreds of walls separating the various farmlands. But onwards to Rossaveel to catch the ferry across to the largest of the Arran Islands, Inishmore. The largest of three small islands off the west coast, they are one of the few places left were Irish is still natively spoken and has lends its name to the famous wool. After a quick wander around the very small town we decided to have a few drinks in different bars before deciding where to eat. After settling for the American Restaurant (a lot better than it sounds) and choosing our dinner, Joanne went up to order it and, after taking the option to pay before dinner rather than after, we hit a problem. The bar could only take cash payments, which normally wouldn't be a problem, but we didn't have enough cash and the only ATM on the island was in the Spar, which had already closed for the night. After Joanne clutched at straws (“Do you take sterling??”) we carefully counted our pennies and discovered we had enough for one meal but as Joanne wouldn't recognise rule 9 of the International Rules of RoadTrips (“Paper, Scissors, Rock” decides everything), we both had to do without. And again, Joanne decided that even though we had enough money for us both to eat at the fast food place, we didn't as “We don't do fast food.”. Luckily (for her) rule 3 (“Don't prevent Mike from eating.”) was nulled as I was instead able to drink on an empty stomach, though my humour didn't do her patience much service as she dragged me back to the hostel for Super(!) Noodles. As the sun set we headed back out to the small harbour so that I could help Joanne take some long exposure photos of the boats and beach.

Up early next morning to a surprisingly sunshining day and after a quick breakfast we went down to the village to hire a bike from one of the numerous bike vendors. Joanne wanted to try a tandem bike but after we tried those in America, and even though we had a great laugh out there, I was pretty sure that it wouldn't work that well with me and Joanne. But she insisted so the guy let us take one for a quick spin and our feet had barely left the ground and she was squealing that she didn't like it at all!! So with a map in hand we set off on our separate mountain bikes along the coast road, though technically the island is so small every road is a coast road. Our first stop was at a seal colony about 4 miles down the road but we were just slightly too late and the tide had come in, meaning the seals had gone out. At this point I realised that we had nothing for lunch and our route took us nowhere near somewhere that we could buy food so Joanne sat at a picnic table while I cycled back in to town to get some food for lunch. As its been years since I've been on a bike and I've lost a bit of fitness in the last few months, I pushed too hard on the bike and had to stop for a while so I could get my breath back and hopefully not pass out! But cycling around the island (at Joanne's pace!) was quite relaxing and we stopped at the Seven Churches ruins, a beautiful beach, went to the furthest tip of the island and back to town for a quick ice cream before jumping back on the boat to the mainland.

Back on the road and we headed up to our final city, Galway, and after some desperately needed showers we headed to quite a smart bar recommended by the hostel After a great dinner we started our own pub crawl, stopping in a number of bars ranging from a very small snug to a surprisingly large bar with a very good live traditional Irish band. The next morning we had a wander around the centre of Galway and then headed off to Salthill, part of Galway right on the coast. On our way there we decided to walk down a long causeway and check out the little island on the end of it with a lighthouse on it. After walking for ages along the causeway we reach a big sign and an even bigger gate that won't let us past, which didn't impress either of us. As we walked from the causeway to Salthill, I suddenly realised that I hadn't “said a word in such a long time” and Joanne was visibly disappointed as she realised that the last 10 minutes of blissful silence had abruptly ended. But Salthill was a nice little area, if a little bland, and after lunch we got a bus back to town and stopped at the Spanish Arch, the last remaining piece of the wall built in the 1500's to protect the town's quays.

Unfortunately the rain started again so we were back in the car and this time Joanne was driving to Westport, again through some pretty wet weather. As we were due to meet mum and dad in our final stop at Westport, they had agreed to pay for a night for us in the same hotel they were staying in. Between roadtrips and caravan trips this was the first time I had actually seen mum and dad since I got the good news from the doc, so it was good to see them again and to celebrate they took us out for dinner at a really good seafood restaurant, Mangos. After a few drinks at the hotel we all headed to bed pretty early as we were all shattered, me and Joanne due to the day cycling and pub crawl the previous night, mum and dad as they had climbed Croagh Patrick the day before and were still recovering. The next day Joanne and I had a wander around Westport town before meeting up with mum and dad and jumping on another ferry across to Clare Island this time, another small fishing island off the west coast. Dad frequently goes fishing off here so actually knew quite a few of the tiny population and we went for lunch in the pub, stopped at the wreck of one of the old ferries that grounded on the island during some really bad weather. Back in to town and Joanne and I headed to a hostel for the night (mum & dad's generosity didn't quite stretch to two hotel nights!) while they headed back home. That night was looking like a good sunset so we headed off in the car to see if we could get a good photo of Croagh Patrick in front of the setting sun but as we had no idea where we should be going for a good shot we pretty much failed, however, we did stop at the famine memorial as Joanne wanted some shots of it at night. Built to commemorate the numerous “coffin” ships that left during the famines in Ireland, usually 2/3 of the passengers on these boats died before they reach their destinations in Europe, America and Australia. It is quite a grotesque statue, a sailing ship made of the pained and screaming bodies of the passengers who died, but probably a fitting representation of the horrific conditions on board.

That night I heard possibly the most disgusting snorer ever, he wasn't excessively loud but he made this horrible gurgling noise that actually turned my stomach slightly. I managed to doze off but between him and a guy snoring in the bed next to Joanne (the bed was next to Joanne, not the guy) she didn't get to sleep any time soon which didn't improve her mood for the next morning. Normally I wouldn't care but today we were due to climb Croagh Patrick, 722m (2,533ft) of harsh mountain that legend says in the 5th centruy St. Patrick climbed and spent 40 days fasting at the top, building a church before throwing a silver bell down the side of the mountain, knocking the she-demon Corra from the sky and banishing all the snakes from Ireland. To commemorate this pilgrims (or lunatics?) frequently climb the mountain barefoot (see? Lunatics.) and then recite various religious prayers at the top. We had no plans on doing anything like that, but mum and dad had built it up as quite a difficult climb and insisted that we buy walking sticks from the “entrepreneur” at the bottom before heading up. I christened mine “Mr. Stick” and after much insistence, Joanne named hers “Piglet”. As this was going to be difficult slog, I nominated myself as “Morale Officer” and attempted to keep Joanne's morale up. I failed. Apparently, seeing how many words you can say in one second is strictly a single player game, singing Hokey Cokey using the words “Croagh-y Patrick” doesn't impress her, nor does any of my singing, apparently “100 Green Bottles” is now a silent song and I am to always “talk inside my head.” But we made it up to the top and enjoyed the slightly misty views before heading back down before the rain arrived, though descending required even more concentration trying not to slide on the loose rocks. I tried to be a gentleman and give Mr. Stick to an American girl who wasn't really enjoying coming down, though apparently saying “Its ok, I'm not really using it.” is patronising to her, according to Joanne. Either way, Mr. Stick came home with me.

But arriving back in the car park marked the end of our hike and our entire trip, as the only thing left was to drive home, and have another much needed shower. It was a great trip and contrary to popular expectations we barely fought at all. Ok, a little. Ok, just a few times. Ok, pretty much all the time, but her navigation sucks!!! But we survived and both were glad we had chosen an Irish roadtrip over a tacky booze-fuelled holiday in Turkey!! Though it has been great to get back home, to our own beds, and more importantly not having to spend hours together in the same car!!

Next year we're road tripping around Scotland, England and Wales, easy!!!

29.07.10

We survived the roadtrip, and had an awesome time to boot!!! Twelve days cruising around Ireland taking in the sights and scenery of the Emerald Isle. Left early on Sunday morning and our first stop was at the sight of the Battle Of The Boyne, one of the biggest battles in Irish history when the Williamites fought the Jacobites, with a museum in an old stately house and a horse riding display and musket demonstration (where we learnt where sideburns got their name from, soldiers grew them so that when they got too close too someone else's musket who was firing beside him, the hair on their face singed as a warning!). After lunch we headed down to Knowth and Newgrange passage tombs, which are about 5000 years old and took decades to build, just to put dead bodies in. They are pretty impressive though Joanne didn't sound overly impressed when she described it as “looking like Telly-Tubby Land”.

But on to Dublin for our first of two nights in the city, and after dinner in the Hard Rock Cafe we went for a wander around the city and up O'Connell Street (widest shopping street in Europe) but I was suffering from pretty bad hayfever so it ended up an early night. This meant we were up early for our bus tour around Dublin before sushi for lunch (woo!) and then to our free 3hour walking tour around the city. With our overly clichéd (freckles, fair skin, red hair) but entertaining tour guide Chris we headed around the city to learn about Dublin castle and Kitty, who masterminded a (slightly incompetent battle by both sides) gun battle resulting in the death of 200 British soldiers and who was then shot in the head after she pretended to be a damsel in distress in order to escape but was then sold out by her “comrades”. A quick explanation of the “imcompetent battle”: the Irish planned to attach various strongholds on Sunday, but cos everyone drinks and talks, it wasn't a secret and the British were ready, but the guns were late being delivered (seriously!) so the attack was abandoned. But then the Irish decided to attack on Monday after the guns arrived the next day, but by then all the British soldiers had taken the day off given that they had lost their usual Sunday off, so the Irish almost literally walked into the castle and captured it, but got scared that it was so quiet that it must be a trap and then legged it out again! But unfortunately by then the whole Kitty story had unfolded and after the British lost 200 soldiers they attacked back with much more force and overwhelmed the Irish rebellion.

One design feature about Dublin castle that the locals resent is that as it was built by the British as a safe haven from the Irish attackers, the statues of Justice and Fortitude face inwards, with their backs to the city and is another constant reminder of why they dislike the English so much.

Oh, and the Irish have lost their own crown jewels. And the gates to the huge park in Dublin city, Phoenix Park, (far bigger than Central Park) were removed for a massive religious event and promptly lost.

But after that Joanne and I headed to the Guinness Storehouse which was very good, but as you don't see any of the functioning sections it was slightly disappointing, but the free pint of Guinness did make up for it, especially from the “Gravity Bar” with the views of Dublin. It is the first time I've ever had a Guinness and I actually quite enjoyed it, though Joanne wasn't quite as enthralled. After a needlessly long walk home, cos I thought Joanne knew where she was going, we had dinner in town and met up with Soky for a few drinks. For our last morning in Dublin we headed out to Kilmainham Jail, notable as the rebels arrested for the Easter Rising were executed here, including one man who was so ill from his injuries that he had to be tied to his seat as he couldn't sit up to be shot, which turned them all into martyrs among the Irish people. Some little kids provided some amusement with some of the hardest questions most of us had heard including “Why did they kill the people instead of making them stay in jail longer?”, “Where do the bodies go?” and “How did they evacuate the jail if there's a fire?”, ending with the memorable “This is the best day evvvveeerrrr!!”

Next stop was Wexford, a small fishing town with very little to say about it, except that it was very wet and when we walked into the bar the few locals inside turned and stared at us. But the next day we headed to the Irish National Heritage Park, which had various recreations of settlements dating as far back as the Stone Age. Next stop, after a quick Guinness in Tipperary, was a hostel that was a long long way, umm, from, Tipperary, but was probably the strangest and best hostel we had stayed it. It was literally in the middle of nowhere (we had to drive along a grass covered road to get there) and was a huge house that was probably only about 4 years old, and we had the place to ourselves for the night. The landlord was good fun, stereotypical friendly old Irish guy who had enough stories to keep you entertained for about a week.

By now its Thursday, day 5, and we head to the Rock Of Cashel, a massive ruined building on a huge hill consisting of a round tower, chapel and cathedral. The oldest part dates from the 1100's and one of the legends is that Guinness was 'discovered' here when Arthur Guinness' dad was asked to make some beer for an important religious figure due to visit, he accidentally burnt the hops and the son took the idea to Dublin where he signed the famous 9000 year lease. They are slowly falling apart although the Irish government is now trying to stop the decay, although they wont restore it. After Cashel we headed to Cahir Castle, which was in a much better state although didn't have a guided tour so we couldn't learn too much about it, and then it was onwards to two nights in Cork!

Luckily there was free parking on the street outside the hostel, and after what can only be described as a demonstration of perfect parallel parking by yours truly, we headed into town for a rain soaked tour of the city. The guy doing the tour talked very quickly and had the strongest accent I had ever heard and we both spent so much time trying to understand just what he said that it was hard to follow the history. But he knew his stuff and we learnt plenty about the city (Did you know that Cork used to consist of at least a dozen islands, the waterways were slowly filled in through history.) Seeing as it literally rained for the entire 3 & ½ hour tour we headed to the pub for a traditional Irish dinner to warm up, Irish stew and veggie soup, washed down with some Guinness and cider.

The next morning we headed out to the Jameson Distillery after a quick stop in the English Food Market which had an impressive selection of pretty much anything that is bought fresh. The guided tour around the distillery was really good, and after seeing the largest pot still in the world and watching Joanne ring the signal bell, we volunteered for a guided tasting, comparing Jack Daniels (American - single distilled), Walkers Black Label (Scottish – double) and of course Jamesons triple distilled. The JD was like water compared to the others, but I quite liked the taste of the Walkers, although the Jameson's had a better aftertaste. At the end we were given certificates to prove that we are now “Whiskey Connoisseurs”!! After a slightly tipsy lunch (4 shots of whiskey on an empty stomach kick in quick!) we headed back into town and headed to the Shandon Bells, a church in town where you allowed to ring the bells, and they even provide cards showing you how to play various songs. Unfortunately they didn't have the A-Team so I had to make do with “I Just Died In Your Arms Tonight” and Joanne played the “Final Countdown”!!

After a stop in the Butter Museum, which was thankfully free, and another pointless walk around town looking for a church that Joanne had seen the night before and “loved” but couldn't remember what it looked like or where it was, we headed to meet Lisa (from the Western Exposure Broome - Perth) in town. Total coincidence while we were waiting for her one of the Aussie gus that we met during the whiskey tasting walked into the same bar, so the four of us headed to dinner and then drinks in a few bars. And then the night descended into mini mayhem. After leaving the club at kicking out time, we headed to Macca's and although I was sensible and avoided eating there, Joanne threw a strop when she couldn't have Smarties with her 2am McFlurry and had to settle for Crunchie pieces instead. Then we met Kevin. Well, technically I met Kevin's drunken hot lady friend, but turned out there was four of them (and she wasn't single) and they were heading to his place for a few more drinks. But by the time we got close to his place it was only Kevin (who drew comparisons to a hairy ginger hobbit) with me, Joanne and Brydon (the Aussie guy) and I knew this wasn't gonna be fun, so I legged it down the street when he look away, hoping the others would follow. They weren't so smart and after getting an angry phonecall from Joanne I returned and we headed up. The apartment was like a 1st year student's apartment, which he wasn't, and had a selection of old books, comics, an ironing board and some toy figures of robots. I excitedly and drunkenly thought they were Optimus Prime and Megatron at first, but was quickly corrected by Kevin in a long explanation about who they really were, but I stopped listening as soon as he started talking, although I swear he used the phrase “robotic bum sex” at one point. Turned out that the “party” was a bottle of red wine and after he disappeared to the loo we started discussing leaving, quietly of course. But Kevin's “Hobbit -sense” must have detected the suspicious quiet and shouted out “Are you all leaving??”, which we took as our cue to leg it out the door, down the stairs, out the front door, down the street and around the corner!

I DID IT!!!! I BEAT CANCER, I WON!!!! Such a relief, and still taking time to sink in, but it feels fantastic!

But anyway, before I got my results back I met up with Lindsey and Danica from Perth to take them for some sightseeing around the Northern Irish coast. Had a pretty good day, though the weather sucked, especially if you were an Aussie girl visiting with no trousers. The wind at the coast was pretty strong and they were both pretty cold but hopefully they had fun anyway! Took them to the Bushmills Distillery, Giants Causeway (and told them the legend of Finn MacCool), Dunluce Castle, skipped the rope bridge and then headed into a few pubs and cafes around Portrush and Portstewart. It was a good laugh and great to see them again and hopefully I repaid their hospitality for me in Oz.

And now back to results day, Friday 9th July. Started as any normal day, yadda yadda yadda. Headed down to Belfast and had to wait ages outside the room before it was my turn, walked in and shook hands with the doctor who was the most deadpan and unexcitable person I had ever met. He was giving me good news, great news even, and sounded like he was ordering a chinese takeaway! But he said that the lymph node was only dead flesh, which was the best result as it meant the chemo had killed all the cancer in the first place, but had killed the lymph node too. I remember letting out a huge sigh and leaning back in the chair, putting my hands behind my head and waiting for what else he had to say. But that was it, he was just waiting for me to leave! He confirmed that that was it, it was all over and apart from check ups for the next 5 years, I was free! The whole meeting took less than a minute and I was back outside, head spinning and grinning like a loon!!

I had to sit in the car park and contact everyone and actually tell them good news for once!! Mum and dad were a bit speechless (but delighted!), as I expected really, and I had to text my sis as she was working and couldn't answer the phone. Then I headed into town for lunch with Sandi before heading off on possibly the longest drive ever to get home!

Went out that night for a few drinks to celebrate with Cod and his friend Steph, and met up with Joanne and some of her friends. A few drinks turned into going back to Michaela's house and playing on the Wii and drinking vodka until 6am! Felt pretty rough by Saturday and we have decided to leave on our Irish Roadtrip on Sunday, so loads of organising and packing to be done, which I cannot bear to face. But nearly 2 weeks travelling around Ireland with my sister, should be great craic, as long as we don't strangle each other!!

“Successful keyhole surgery. My new 3 favourite words!! Bit sore, but all seemed to go fine!! Bad news is I can't eat for the rest of the day! Thanks for ur support!”

The message above is the group text I sent on the afternoon on Monday 21st June, still slightly tanked up on painkillers and very very happy have had keyhole surgery.

But back to the start and people who have been paying attention would remember that I had been told by the surgeon that keyhole was very unlikely, due to the location of the lymph node between my major arteries. But a second surgeon, who was the one who would actually be doing the operation, looked at the scans and because the nodes were infront of the arteries, rather than directly between them, decided that he would attempt keyhole. He said it was a 90% chance of success but he would first go in with the cameras and check it out, but if he wasn't happy he would come out and just go straight into the open surgery.

So I went into surgery not knowing what would happen, but confident of success and hopeful for keyhole. This time I was knocked out by injection so there was no giggling under the laughing gas and when I woke up I remember the first thing I asked the nurse was whether I had keyhole surgery. Pretty sure I was happy when she said yes as I remembering insisting that she high-fived me!! Don't really much else in the post op and by the time I was wheeled back up to my ward my mum was already up there anxiously waiting for me!

As always the nurses and doctors were great, with an ample complement of hot nurses and a couple of students too. The ward was pretty uneventful up until the last night, when an old guy moved into the bed next to mine, but had problems sleeping. At first I was wide awake until about 3am when I decided to go for a walk (no easy feat in my state) and get some painkillers from the very hot (and engaged) night nurse. Finally fell completely asleep until I was woken by the old guy, Henry, standing beside my bed complaining about the pigs. From here there followed the usual drama of two nurses trying to convince a scatty old man to put on the hospital gown (“I'm not wearing that, I'm not a fruit, thats a woman's dress!”) and stay in his bed. It was quite amusing but he was also a bit scared sometimes when he forgot where he was and was asking for his son, so felt a bit sorry for him as well.

The doctors had said that even though I was in pain, the more I moved about and left my bed the quicker I should recover, but as soon as I left my bed the pain increased and unfortunately peaked just after I lay down again before slowly dissipating. Strangely the main source of my pain didn't seem to be the cuts but was actually my shoulders, which apparently is somehow related to the gas they injected into my body to allow the keyhole surgergy. It was almost funny that even as I lay in bed writhing with my shoulders in agony, I had a smile on my face as I knew that no matter how sore it was, it was many times better than getting open surgery! I was allowed to leave the hospital on Wednesday, after only a few days inside instead of the 10 days in bed, plus another 6 weeks recovery that I was expecting from open surgery.

Being at home wasn't much different except that I was able to watch more TV and the food was better, I still had people waiting on me and was still in pain, though I was starting to learn tricks of how to ease the pain, seemingly putting my arms above my head while lying or sitting did the trick for a while. Finally on Saturday evening I just knew that even though I was still sore there would be no more lying down in front of the telly and since then I've been pretty much back to normal and its been great!!

Apart from that its been kinda quiet, unfortunately my family had to cancel their trip to France and if we had known I was having keyhole surgery we could all have gone, though the drive down would probably have been sore on me. My sister has finished her first teaching year and is now qualified but now has to find a permanent job and is home for most of the summer. So now we are all at home for three weeks and no one is working, I can see plenty of odd jobs being done around the house!

I thought it was going to be quite a quiet summer with me spending most of the time on the sofa but now I can get out and do stuff!! Still not sure what the plan is, but some people are hopefully visiting here and I hope to visit some people in Europe, as well as me and my sis taking a trip somewhere for a week.

But this may all be moot by Friday 9th July as I will get the results from the lymph node biopsy and find what was wrong with it. As far as I know it could be basically one of three things: most likely a mature teratoma, which means its cancerous but benign; or its just dead flesh or a small chance that its an active cancer, though the blood tests don't seem to have indicated this. If it is the last option the doc will probably recommend more chemo, which would obviously suck, but if its the other two then I think (and hope!) that should be it all over!!

Here goes!!!

Its the night before I head for my operation, starting to get a bit more nervous. Surgically its a simple operation, they slice open my front from below my rib cage, around my belly button and stop a few inches below. Then they lift out my stomach and maybe some other bits, chop out the three lymph nodes, chuck everything back in and stitch, or maybe staple, me back up. Then I face about 1-2 weeks in hospital, depending on how quickly I feel I recover, and then plenty of relaxing time around the house, with them predicting that I'll be almost normal (Normal, ha!) after 8 weeks in total. I plan to knock that down to 6, at most! But I've got plenty to keep myself amused, as I still have emails to reply to (sorry!), videos to edit from ages ago (again, sorry!) and I've been out taking loads of photos recently so that I can sort through and edit them. Of course this all falls apart if I'm too sore to sit up! But as always I've got my family around me and they've been great so far, even though I know my sis has hated being so far away from me, and I still don't think they realise how much I appreciate having a home to come back to, even if we do sometimes (frequently!) drive each other mad!

There's the usual risks from what is major surgery, so infection is probably a biggy, and there's a chance they could cut nerves which may leave certain, umm, mechanics affected. And for the same reason that they can't do keyhole surgery with the specific nodes between my two most important arteries, there is a chance they will cut my vena cava or aorta, though that's probably not too bad as I'm already open for them to fix that immediately.

And of course there is the other risk, though it is minutely small and tiny and little, of the other, ummm, final thing. As you'd expect I've thought a little about what would happen in the worst case scenario, not just from the surgery but all of this saga, and what would I do and how would I handle it, and I still have no clue! I try not to think about it too much, its too negative for me, but I do wonder if I hadn't been diagnosed with such a successfully treated cancer how I'd handle it.

Y'know what, since uni my life changed so much I had no idea, I never planned to go travelling, or barely leave the UK, I planned to settle down with a well paid and probably slightly boring job, get the house, the car(s), the wife, all because I thought that's what I should do. And for those that have done that I'm not knocking it at all, I still want most of that life eventually, but I don't wonder what would have happened if I had got all that after uni. It had to all fall apart before it was rebuilt and I have loved every minute of it since then, and I don't doubt that everything I have seen and done, and the people that I have met since them gave the me the strength and confidence to get through all this with such a positive attitude, knowing that there is so much out there to still enjoy. I'm not gonna name everyone here because there's too many and I still have to clear my room and pack. But I think most people realise the influence they had on my life, and I'm grateful to them. I've met some amazing people who have really helped me realise my own abilities and have pushed me to be even better.

So. I've started on the path that I never knew was perfect for me, and even now with it looking like I'm settling back in Northern Ireland for the near future even though the only thing I planned was to leave here, I am really happy. I have bugger all money, no house, not really a car, dunno how long it'll take to find a wife, but I'm doing a job that I love on my dream career. Sounds patronising but life isn't all about the job and money, but if you can get paid to do something you really enjoy, then that's fantastic. And I don't believe the adage that if you plan to ruin a hobby, take it up as a job.

But anyway, what I now believe is that the only person that can honestly judge your life is yourself, and to paraphrase a song, when the day finally comes you take out a piece of paper, write down everything that you have achieved, everything you have done, everyone you have met and everything you have seen, and you have to be happy with that list. And I'm pretty sure I would be happy with most of my list, (still haven't bungee jumped!), and even though my list isn't finished, isn't that the point?? Or else you wake up one morning and realise there is just no point in getting out of bed.

Anyway, it all doesn't matter, I'll wake up after the op, cancer gone and everything all good, hit on the nurses excessively and blame the drugs, struggle to eat the hospital food, get home and watch too much TV for 3 weeks and then be back on top form, ready to take on anything, including bungee jumping!!

See yous all soon!!

Mike

“I'm not entirely sure what happened after the bus, but there was a club, there were shots, there was a bouncer, there wasn't a girl, there was an ambulance, there was a pizza and now there isn't 40 quid. awesome nite, congrats on the wedding!!”

“I like that text, its a good text! I'm keeping it.”

Those two texts I barely remember sending the morning after Chris and Ruth's wedding, clearly the shots still had a strong grip on me! But the wedding was a great day, everything went well and no one said the wrong name or sprinted out the door.

The wedding was in Ilkley, just outside Leeds, in a church that was slightly unusual in that the main room was upstairs but the service was great and they left happily married. After some photos on the grass outside the bridal party headed off for photos and everyone else headed to the reception in a marque in the Yorkshire Dales, a beautiful location in the hills and even had a river running past it!! And during a brief “band malfunction” a group of us were out skimming stones, though thankfully all still too sober to think swimming was a good idea!! The speeches were good, even considering they were all by accountants! The cake was impressive complete with a cricket theme though I did have to ask Chris what he sacrificed for the wedding to persuade Ruth to let him do that!

After the meal and the speeches the couple had their first dance, interrupted briefly when the sound system somehow electrocuted itself, and after that everyone got stuck into the free bar! Wasn't too much craic but was a good laugh chatting to everyone. Was good to catch up with Suzanne, that Chris and I lived with in our final year at uni, as well as meeting a few other familiar faces that I'd met while I knew Chris. Had a brief chat with his mum which I mostly remember, but I think I should have probably talked to her earlier in the night!

I managed to get the bus back ok and was determined to keep the party going so due to a lack of support and a stubborn determination I managed to find the nearest club and some more people willing to do shots. As the text said it was all getting very blurry by now and I had managed to find a very rough bar but I got out safely and after stopping for pizza and watching some guy getting thrown in an ambulance (it should have been a cop car) I staggered home in the daylight.

The last week has been a bit all over the place really with work, mainly as its the end of term and everyone is winding down but some schools are trying to squeeze last minute and end of year photos. Monday was a great day though, I drove to a school on the coast for about an hours work and then spent a few hours on the Giants Causeway taking photos, and then drove home, pretty much all on business petrol! Really sunny day as well so I stopped by the famous Morelli's in Portstewart and had another great ice cream! Paid for it on Tuesday though when I had to leave the house at 6.30am to be at a school and it was a pretty hectic day as we had two group studios set up in one room, with Philum and Fred doing vista photos (casual group shots with props) and me doing the more traditional groups. As always it was good fun but definitely the noisiest day so far!!

The coming week is pretty quiet, only got two days of work so far but that's pretty good as my next and final op is Monday 21st. Pretty major surgery this time, they have to slice me open and lift out my insides to get at the lymph nodes behind my stomach. Then they chop out the sick node, plus each one above and below it just to be sure, stick everything back in and then stitch me back up, complete with huge scar! I might be in hospital for up to two weeks recovering, and then maybe another 6 weeks till I'm really back on form, though I'm hoping to take at a week off that time!!

Anyways, hoping it all goes well and I make it out the other side, but if not, well, isn't that the way to go out, leave the audience wanting more!!!

Thankfully the epic trip to get to St. Ives was completely worth it, as I had a great week at the training. The laboratory is a really impressive place, it looks like an old stately home and is absolutely huge, and it has to be as it handles thousands of photos every day for half the schools in the UK.

There were two other English women in the training with me, one was a school photographer the same as me, and the other was working with early years, so kids and babies too young for school. We spent a lot of time setting up our studios and taken photos of each other, as well as meetings with various people and departments learning about the company and what we would have to do. We even had morning tea with Mrs. Tempest, the wife of the founder, on our last day and she was a great lady, sort of person who could keep you amused for hours with plenty of anecdotes.

St. Ives is a really nice town too, very quaint English coastal town style, though the streets in the town are a nightmare, some are one-way, some aren't and most are cobbled and very narrow. We ate in the hotel most nights as the company was paying (three course meals every night!) but Tempest took us out one to a restaurant in town which was another great meal and a good laugh. On the last day we headed out on one of the tour boats to have a look at seal island and if we were lucky see some dolphins as well (we weren't lucky) but seeing as it was only the three of us and the boat captain with his mate we sat in the bay just relaxing in the boat, enjoying the tranquility.

On Saturday I headed back up to Bristol for my flight home, but because I headed back into St. Ives for a few photos in the morning I was a bit pushed for time and when I arrived at the airport the supervisor closed the check in just after I arrived, never managed to cut it that close before!!

By the time we got home my company car had already arrived! Ford Focus at the minute until I choose my next car, bit of a limited list but I'm thinking its gonna be a 207 estate. All my equipment arrived a few days later and I've been out with Fred most week days since. Its good fun with the kids, though we've had a few difficult ones who refuse to look anything other than grumpy, as well as the obligatory screaming toddlers who wont pose beside their older sibling. We've been doing some group photos where the kids pose with various props and are a bit more informal than the usual group shot as well as being a bit more fun and creative.

Last weekend I headed paintballing with Sandy and a load of other people for her boyfriend's birthday. Had a quality day and even though everyone was worried it would rain the whole time (it didn't) the wet ground meant that we could do some quality slides behind barricades. I got a good few people, though got killed in almost every game as well, along with taking about half a dozen headshots, including one to the back of my head which really hurt! Also managed to get the flag briefly in capture the flag but the wet ground through me off balance and into the side of the barricade instead of behind so I got shot in the ass as I tried to scramble to safety. Think everyone counted themselves lucky they weren't the guy who received two sore and bloody headshots at point blank range after he tried to sneak up one our base from underneath.

That night Paul had a party at his house and we all just generally had a laugh and a few drinks. I was pretty well behaved, although by the end of the night I was creating cocktails that were basically every alcohol I could lay my hands on mixed with a splash of Iron Bru and Redbull! They were actually better tasting than expected, even though my first attempt ripped my throat apart and they were so strong they were all nicknamed “Rohypnol”.

Back working again this week, and even been out to a few accounts on my own, which was a bit nervous but was all good (hopefully, have to see if the powers-that-be get back to me saying they weren't good!). This weekend I'm heading over to Leeds for Chris' wedding, should be good to catch up with a few ex-uni mates!

Been pretty quiet since my last update, everything has slowed down for a while until I get my date for my surgery. Again its another waiting game as I'm hoping its scheduled later so that I can get more time working at my new job before the summer holidays, but I also want it earlier so that I can get it over with to enjoy the end of my summer and be ready for the busy time of work in September. Pretty much resigned to the fact that I won't be leaving Northern Ireland much for the summer, much less outside the UK, although I'm hoping that whenever the operation is my family are still able to go to France. Normally I would threaten a house party, but this time I think its gonna be difficult if I'm so sore I can barely sit up!

Started my new job as a school portrait photographer on Wednesday, and had a really good first day! Thought it would be quite a slow day, as most first days are, with me just standing back watching everything, but I was able to do more than I thought and the kids made it much more fun! Second day was more of the same but still good fun and learnt plenty again. Once the training in England is finished I should be able to start work properly, looking forward to seeing how well I handle it!!

The North West 200 motorbike race was down at the coast this week and is Ireland's biggest motorsport event, so of course I planned on heading down! I had hoped to go down for the practice session during the day on Thursday but as I had to work I headed down on Tuesday evening instead for a few hours. It was bloody freezing but really quiet too so plenty of space along the trackside. At the end of the night I kept up the unbreakable family tradition that whenever we go to Portstewart on the coast, we have to buy a Morelli's ice cream, even though it was so cold the ice cream actually helped to warm me up!

On Saturday I jumped on the 8am train down to the coast with Colin and Emmy for the main race. The entire track was absolutely jammed but we had great day just wandering around and enjoying the races, even though we had no clue what was going on! But Emmy's brother told us how to sneak into the back of the paddock (security isn't quite up to F1 standards) so after two fences we were in wandering around the paddock, checking out the various teams working on the bikes between races. It was just as hard to get back out of the paddock so we had to break out again and weren't the only ones, leaving with seven other people! By about 6pm we were shattered (and a little drunk) so we headed back home on the train for a quick shower and change and back out to the pub for a few more drinks with a few more people. A very long but pretty great day.

On Sunday morning I was supposed to wake up and fly to my training in southern England but unfortunately the infamous Icelandic volcano with the unpronounceable name has sent another dust cloud over the UK and my flight was cancelled. After much checking of boat and train websites it was arranged that I would set off on a slightly epic trip at 5am on Monday morning, driving to the harbour for the boat across to Troon, Scotland and then board a train (well, actually 3 in total) to travel south to St Ives, a massive 17hours of travelling! I'll miss the first day of training but I can catch it up during the week, and leaving it any later also increased the chance of my surgery getting in the way. No idea yet if I can fly home yet, but hopefully the return trip will at least be shorter than this!!

From Facebook on 29th April, a.k.a. Results Day: “Today is the day. No matter what paths I have chosen in my life, where I have been, who I have met and what I have done, everything would always have converged on this point and, for one brief moment, everything stops, I hold my breath and...”

True? Totally. Deep? Yeah. Over the top? Entirely!!

But straight to the point, sadly on Thursday I didn't get the result that I (and seemingly everyone else!) were hoping for, but it wasn't all bad news either. Basically the chemotherapy shrunk the tumour, but not enough that the doctors are happy and so now I need surgery to remove the tumour, which hopefully should be the final step and the axe on the cancer. The good news is that my blood markers show that the cancer is not 'active' (its a mature teratoma) which means that typically it shouldn't spread elsewhere but will continue to grow where it is once it has recovered from the chemo. I will be having weekly blood tests until the surgery and I guess that if they indicate that it is becoming active something will happen very quickly, probably the surgery. At the minute my surgery is urgent, but not top priority, and I have to wait for a letter from the surgeon confirming my date. I'm guessing within 8 weeks but no idea really.

The other good news this week is that I got the photography job!!!! My new boss's boss rang on Tuesday to say that the unanimous decision was for me and that I would be starting training in England for one week on 17th May!! So proud of myself and can't believe I actually have a job in my dream career!! Plus I get a free car, cameras and studio kit which I can use any time myself which are some definite perks, along with getting all the school holidays!! I have since spoken to them about my results and they still definitely want me to work for them, which is a relief! Hopefully surgery will not affect my training and I think their main interest is that I'm good enough to work in September, the busy time.

The doctor that told me the results was, as always, great and explained everything and anything she couldn't answer she said the surgeon would explain. As soon as she started talking she seemed to be hovering a bit too much over what would happen if it wasn't the best news and that was when I realised that the meeting wasn't gonna go as well as I hoped, but like I say she was great and really explained everything she could, and sat patiently through all of my questions!! I asked her if I can delay the surgery until July so that I have my summer holidays to recover and not affect work, she said it may be possible but basically whatever the surgeon says goes, so just have to wait and see.

Needless to say, I am disappointed, but I knew this was the next stage and I always knew it was possible and had been preparing myself. I did some research way back at the start about the surgery and I have never been looking forward to it, and sadly I looked into it a bit more on Thursday night after the results and its not going to be a fun time. Keyhole surgery is possible but very unlikely so its open surgery with a few risks that, well, to be honest, do scare me a bit, and a foot long scar which is why the recovery time is probably about 8 weeks. That said, chicks dig scars!

As always, I am continuing to be incessantly and blissfully optimistic and I have bounced back pretty quickly and will face this head on as I always have. We're heading out for a night out tonight as I still want to celebrate my birthday and getting the job and I don't see why this should change that. Unfortunately it has pretty much screwed any travel plans for this summer, I think if I am able to go anywhere I probably wont be able to afford it anyway with the amount of time I'll be off work. But it will give me plenty of time to sit around and get caught up on the various videos of my travels that I have still yet to edit, and I plan to take loads of photos before the op so that I can edit them during my recovery time too.

My mischievous imagination hasn't been dented either, as for my sister's birthday I designed a card for her from MoonPig but when I saw that you can print a short message on the front of the envelope I saw an opportunity not to be missed. So I addressed it to the school where she works and printed in a very official looking serious black font in the top corner “If undelivered please return to Glasgow Family Planning Association” I thought it was pure genius!! Her (and dad) not so much, but kept me and plenty others amused!!

Finally got the website finished for the Three Peaks Challenge (www.scaredownthere.co.uk) and now have to really put the effort into getting it organised asap. Check it out and feel free to donate money or sign up and join us in August!!!