Still burrowing down the rabbit holes

So many people talk about the post treatment journey, the camino you do on your own. It's like me continuing to dig when I'm already in need of a longer ladder, but it can't be helped. 

You need to keep going and, dare I be so brave as to say, you need to take responsibility for yourself. At 61, this is now your time to shine. To own your own mistakes, your shameful moments as well as those little glorious memories you've garnished, you've glossed, you've greatly embellished. Oh... yes, did I mention sleeping on the maternity room floor while Jackie screamed "No more" before Caitlin was born, or even Deadbeat, over time, these memories have been transformed.

Today, as I start week 12, I liken this part of the journey to the meseta, Burgos to Leon, because this is the more meditative part of the Camino Frances. It is part reflection, mostly recognition. It properly ignores the chronological order you might do the Camino in, unless you bus the Meseta first time and go back after Santiago to see what you missed.

If I look back to the beginning the analogy works for me as the start of any journey is in the pubs in the months before.

You've long since talked about doing the Camino, like when you randomly start the conversation that there's a lump in your neck. When the doc phoned and says "the cancer is real, here's your letter for the scan", well to me it is so like when you book your flights to Biarritz. It's clearly happening now you have cancer, you will be treated. You have a flight, yes, you're walking into the unknown.

When you get your scan it's like being in a long metal container, yes, a Ryanair flight. They are expensive equipment, scanners and planes but they don't have much elbow room. Both are taking you on joyous journeys but you've no idea what rabbit you're releasing out of your hat.

Next up is the tonsils as both them and your teeth are wheeked out. The treatment plan, yes the mask preparation, another scan, it's all crazy. It all happens so quickly you feel like you've spent more time floating above yourself watching it, like a voyeuristic looking while another part of your split personality has it happen.

You've done some of the hard stuff getting to St Gien pied du Porte. Who knew that by crossing the Pyrenees that by the time you reach Pamplona your body is prepared. The Camino Can'cerre is so aligned like the stars you follow on the Camino Frances.

The next stage of the Camino Frances is like the treatment phase on the Camino Can'cerre. You lump along to Logroño laughing one minute while complaining the next, how tough the Pyrenees was. You discuss with your new best friends how many aches and pilgrim pains you have. You all reach Logroño, have a pilgrim party in the tapas bars of Calle Laurel. You wonder why you signed up for this, while all the time knowing this is what you needed, physically, spiritually and emotionally. The end of week one on both the Camino Can'cerre and Camino Frances are beautiful. You encounter so many perfect people, who consider themselves normal yet all you see is their absolute perfection.

Next day the only thing you feel is your head. Your legs are on auto pilot and that's how I felt after week one chemo and radiotherapy. Week 2 was autopilot for sure. Get used to this, eat, eat, treat, repeat. 

Some days it would be Sleep eat, sleep, eat, sleep, treat, sleep, repeat. It was as this blog diary demonstrates a busy repetitive cycle and like the journey from Logroño to Burgos it becomes your pace of life.

Pilgrims, like the water flowing through Rioja, all moving together with regular bumps, always moving in a single natural direction, together. The odd fish moves upstream, we just all flow with nature, aided by the vino tinto, the red Rioja. 

As you approach Navarette you see a town on a hill. It looks magnificent and you stop to take photos. You don't appreciate the descent into the valley until you're out of breath climbing back up again. You've wandered through stage 3 of the wine production phase as the pickers pick the purple grapes. You've nicked a few and eaten them like you'd bite an apple. Like me going for ice cream every day to Cafe Gallo. I've got to eat more to keep my weight on, I'd laugh. Who knew the Camino Can'cerre could give me so much joy. Treat upon treat after every treatment. 

After a while I couldn't taste it was a treat but my head knew it was, so of course I said, "two scoops please", one would seem so slimming and this is all about maintaining weight, right?

As you travel through Rioja reaching Najera then Azofra, you arrive at a large 4 storey albergue with no dorms, just twin room dorms. You get allocated the next bed and it's single sex floors until the stragglers arrive and the last floors fill. I felt that way whenever I had an overnight stay at the Western, it was always great basic accomodation.

From Azofra you travel to Santo Domingo de las Calzadas and on to Belorado. I love the stretch after to Villaranca des Montes des Oca. Like week 2 and 3 on the Camino Can'cerre this is a fantastic rolling party. Some days feel so much easier than you were expecting. You realise you've been prepared better than you had thought. The NHS professionals have done a fantastic number on you. Add it to your family, friends, background research, intuitive nonsense and general living, you're feeling great. You climb the mountains, pass monuments to the 36-39 war, you reach St Juan de Ortega, you can stay there, at Ages, Atapuerca or do another hill and arrive at the peerless Santa Fe in Cardenuela Rio Pico before Burgos.

I need to stop for a moment and plug one of my favourite Albergues on the Camino. It has ensuite double rooms, twins, also, 5 and 6 bed, dorms. It's been my favourite since 2013 when I kicked the ball across the Camino. The wee laddie, son of the hopitalero Miriam, was probably aged 8 at the time and so insisted I play football not bask in the sunshine with my beer. That day we had so much fun passing a ball back and forth across a the lawn and patio. Simple pleasures of miscontrolling a ball with boots on, kicking the table with your beer glass, never mind kicking it into the Rio Pico and watching it float downstream. The communal pilgrims meal was superb, I had taken the double room, my sleep was divine. I would recall this moment later on when I was given one of the ensuite rooms reserved for the younger people with cancer at the Western. It was one of the rooms funded by the Teenage Cancer trust, a fantastic charity I'm always happy donating to. When I was admitted and there was no room on the ward I was given this room.

 It made me feel like I'd just paid €70 on the Camino treating myself to a little bit of luxury.

You wake up with a wonderful feeling. You go forward with a jaunty little step on your journey. On the Camino Frances that's a nice easy flat walk into Burgos for another night of tapas in several of the bars, not least Jackie's favourite restaurant. On the Camino Can'cerre it's towards the end of week 4 when the treatment starts to rack up.

In comparing the two caminos I'd say this is when you take a stumble in Burgos and twist your ankle. On the Camino Can'cerre week 5 sees the radiotherapy start to really bite and you have another overnight with the chemo. This was the night I stayed in the Teenage Cancer trust room with my fluid drip in all night. It was a great night but it was the start of the toughest and unknown to me the roughest part. Looking back now it's definitely something you can be prepared for in your head but still not ready for it. 

I won't bore you all again with the tales of weeks 5-8 as they are the tough ones and now I'm at week 12. My taste buds are returning while my weight is being maintained. I've never been under 100kg since my smoking habit went into remission along with the smoking ban. My love of the Camino has stopped me getting too obese, but I've rarely dipped below 110kg since 2006 except that glorious first Camino in 2007 when my waist went from 43" to 34".

Today though I'm puzzling like you do on the Camino or often after it, about what just happened. You try to relive moments along those physical, spiritual and humbling navel gazing experiences to understand what just happened. You know you achieved something you didn't think possible but it not particularly tangible so there's an element of ticking a box to say done it, whilst also saying how good you felt doing what at times felt brutal. Exestentialists would probably articulate better than I how that grotesque painting of Guernica is so beautiful in all it's brutality or maybe not. 

I do feel when I look back at moments on the Portuguese way when we stopped in Porto, how crossing a bridge with my vertigo was so nerve jangling and yet now I've had a free 6 week training course with a mask on receiving radiotherapy. 

I remember climbing the curvy bridge in Ourense when we did a section of the winter route from Ponferrade. I got so far before my legs went and I had to retreat.

I knew looking up was bad enough, but now as a consequence of the Camino Can'cerre I've improved. 

More details to follow later but I'll post this now and add the rest later.

I just realised that I've never mentioned the rabbit hole that I'd just disappeared down owing to a podcast. Alison Moyet has always made me chuckle at how superbly articulate she and her lyrics are. There's the thing about what pub conversation do you want to be invited into and the answer is the one where she is talking ten to the dozen. She's so full of wisdom, articulate and humble beyond belief. She has no obvious filter and happily lets rip in any direction but mostly in relation to her experiences. There was a stack of observations I loved but the one when in her solo career the record company just wanted more of the same please as she wanted to develop her range had me rolling in the aisles had I been in a supermarket.

I may be paraphrasing but she said I didn't realise I'd planted a flag and now I had to dance around it. That phrase will love a whole with me and was my experience of the A & R community in London during Deadbeat days. I remember taking the tape down and one guy saying we're looking for this sound as he played me the latest chart #1. I said yeah, Ive seen TOTP and there are a few bands like that I've seen in Scotland. In my world they're yesterday's sound. I was horrified but then I realised as it was on my bus back to Edinburgh that this was a money making racket not an Artistic and radical movement. It was unashamedly about making money that kept these boys and expense budgets in place.

My naivety in thinking this was about giving a leg up, producing a platform for performers to make the world a better place was wholly misplaced. The last thing I would encourage was going a deal with these people. The main thing would be to get a trustworthy manager to help you navigate it. 

Slowly, I lost interest in this aspect of life although being a Hibs supporter we persevered with putting the fanzine out, it just seemed to slowly grind to a halt. Something about the foundation feeling like a castle built on sand to borrow from The Only Ones remains springing to mind. With hindsight I do wonder whether they wanted the album out or whether some greedy greasy record company guiser saw an opportunity to milk one last drop out of the classic band.

Alison Moyet is such good value and her newest stuff is straight out of the same influences as Bowie had when doing his Low album to these ears. Her you tube channel had me down that rabbit hole for ages. I also had to relisten to "invisible" to understand why she wouldn't sing it anymore. Wow, it really was so derivative and must've been during that going around the flag again period. She had some great early solo stuff and I liked the Yazoo days but I hadn't heard this song for a long long time. It's not quite the birdie song but it's one I'd certainly keep buried when you have so many more worthwhile songs from the past and present.

week 11 - Like Hibs blog runs out of steam, unlike Scotland in Warsaw

It's funny but normal service is resuming. Monday is all about changing the water in my feeding tube balloon. I hasten to add the balloon with the feeding tube is doing ok at these technical challenges but making sure you have two 5ml not 2ml syringes will ensure a more successful change. Especially as I'm off into town today to see the sights.

After a flush I was ready to go. Not quite ready to go on the whirly gig but I was ready to venture through the tack of the Christmas market. I stared at the £7 for a pint of mines and gunn a touch too long. I knew it was too long as I was asked if I'd like a pint. Yes, several but not at the price your quoting was internal dialogue.

I walked down to the low level which was less busy and allowed me to enjoy the ambience from a safe distance. Unlike the beached whale impersonation that masks the fact I've lost so much weight. It's not a good look but I promised myself I'd include warts and all embarrassing photos. This one is bad but at least I've not got vertigo.

The big wheel definitely brings that on. I was early so popped into Avalanche in the Waverley market to buy a Deadbeat t- shirt. Still the only retailer stocking them.

Simon and I met Rich off the train and wandered down to the cask in Broughton. A Guinness awaited me along with some water before we headed to the Baillie. They regaled me with stories to match their pictures from the Camino Norte and I'm well up for a visit next year all being well.

Nothing like an early night and at 5pm it seems appropriate that I should warm up for Scotland's winner take all game in Warsaw.

It's more like loser loses everything but it's not got the same ring.

Thankfully we won for a change in the last minute and our 1973 (the last time I had a 34" waist) sibling selves did headstands to celebrate.

Let hope Hibs can start doing likewise and start scoring with the last kick of the ball. Here I am doing my finest Alex Cropley impersonation.

I loved a selfie back in the 70's, who didn't 😘

week 11 - sleepy heid - walking more - shakes are back

Quite literally too as I've started having the DTs! 

I think it's just the fantastic coffee beans from Cafe Gallo that I've been making again. Properly wired and I'm back having one protein shake again. I noticed my weight dropping off, so clearly I'm not eating enough despite stuffing my face every day. The problem with sleeping 12 hours and eating for 12 hours is surely self evident. They told me how long the radiotherapy continues to drain you which is why you need to take as many calories as you can. I've been trying to get my average back up nearer 200,000 steps a month rather than the 100-150,000.

The consultant told me to throw away the step count in mid October and I misunderstood my responsibility to myself. We all are statistical anomalies as well as being totally normal. I know my shoe size at 9 or 9.5 is so normal I never get bargains. My old waist/leg size of 40" by 29" never appeared on the cheap racks either. I did however find a 34" & 36" waist pair of chinos same as my 40" M&S pair with a 29" inside leg for only £6 in the Shelter charity shop in Stockbridge. 

Not before time, I thought , as I finally discarded the belt that had long since run out of notches. My belt had a notch for every week of treatment carved on my own chopping board. Perhaps one of the best and most successfully brutal diets I've ever been on. Obviously I rapidly reduced the drinking from 7 pints a day to 7 pints a week to 7 pints a month over the summer months, having drank my waning wine cellar dry in May. By the time treatment started I'd already started searching for my 38" troos and slammed the 42" clown trousers in the long term, aka 2026, storage.

I have a post Camino case full of the XL tops and 38" trousers while in the other case is the post Christmas XXXL tops that accompany my inactive winter months. I'd felt ahead of schedule after our January Camino mozarabe walking along the Spanish south coast. Flip channel to Www fatal-bananas.blogspot for the fun we had in Almeria, Almenucar, La herradura,  Torre del Mar, Málaga, Benalmadena and Fuengirola. 

It was an outstanding walk along the south coast, probably only 250km walking and as soon as the feeding tube is out I'll be back over with Jackie to rebuild my strength. The recent floods look devastating particularly terrible for the Málaga/Andalusian area now, just like Valencia has been hammered which just makes me want to go over all the more to either help out or just spend some cash.

Getting back to the consultant advising me to throw away the step counter it's one place where my body is an anomaly. During the summer from May, I dropped from 500,000 steps to just 100,000 in the last 4 weeks of October. Like my drinking it was a steady decline and according to the dubious "calorie count" on the step machine it says my calories used quartered from 800 a day to 200 during the period. I think the radiotherapy clearly uses 2000 and if high activity only consumed a few calories I'm better stepping up to 400 calories walking as that helps my body function, from generating an appetite to just getting air in my dodgy lungs. Incarceration clearly didn't work when I got the dizzy spells and postural hypotension. That was only one weekend of inactivity and clearly for me it wasn't good. I remember on my first day waiting at the Western, I read on on the notices that 8000 was a good average to maintain during treatment and that's where I'm heading back to.

The staff have all been very good with me and I've been hugely lucky that largely my body has taken to the treatment like a duck to water. All my issues have, with hindsight, been down to my stupidity. Twice it's involved a bit of dehydration after being out in the cold for too long, both 5 days after having chemo in week 1 & 5. I was too smug by far that I had coped fine with it, but it was clearly a delayed reaction. The second time resulted in the constipation and both times I realised I'd ignored the advice. Both Chemo weeks were downward shifts in weight that I had to fight hard to get back. I say fight hard, but pig out would be more accurate. When I look back I had 2 pints of Guinness in week 4 the night before the weigh in with the nutritional professionals. They were gobsmacked to see my weight had gone up, I could only smile and confess. 

The postural hypotension weekend was when I ignored my own advice to get fresh air. i sat indoors all weekend and watched the telly or slept. My body powered down and then the problems began.

Doctors can't know everything about you and although I was upfront about being an alcoholic and my 100-120 units a week. It made the notes page, while my other nonsense about how much exercise I need to keep my brain, weight and health straight was a little bit less scientifically proven. I did mention reiki/ reflexology and how important it was to me, but again to be fair, it's not scientific. My weight, alcohol and earlier smoking are highly correlated to potential success or failure, like the NPV and the Cancer they needed to treat. To venture off on the statistical anomalies of individuals renders science into a rabbit hole and it's where individuals have to take a wee bit responsibility for themselves. This reminds me of something in the paper last week.

I read some politician taking the piss out of the 'service' in the NHS recently and then using his tenuous or even fatuous claims as the basis for the crumbling NHS story he wanted to tell. 

He described how his elderly mother had a lot of carers and was in and out of hospital, sometimes staying in, bed blocking, when she didn't need to. On the second occasion that week he was advised that she had now been admitted to a ward from the reception where she'd been treated. He turned up at the ward to be advised she was not there yet so probably still over by. If he had said I just got advised 10 minutes ago then the nurse might've explained I'll just check if she's arrived. This particular gentleman clearly was a Jeremy Hunt and either was short on detail, impersonating Tyrell Hatton or possibly the nurse just sent him purposely on a wild goose chase. Having read his article I would definitely do that to him in the future. These people don't deserve to abuse people in this way and should be reported.

The worst aspect of this piece was it was built on the fact that he and his household weren't wise enough to take his mother into their house or put her into one of the fantastic care facilities available. He'd rather complain that she wasn't being looked after well enough by the state. As I got near the end of the piece I realised he was one of those people who had been in power for the past 13 years and believed if you keep hitting the NHS over the head they will like Baldrick respond with gratitude. 

I think that's why I believe strongly in talking up the fantastic work being done in our hospitals and by our GPs. I also believe strongly we are not very articulate if we feel there is some unique anomaly they should know about you. I'm delighted to know when I get a dizzy spell I need to go out walking preferably with sticks. I can take my blood pressure standing up to check for proof and then head out or I can just head out. 

Sunday tea is hotpot. With England and Norway both winning 5-0 at home, Scotland can look forward to heading to Poland having had a clean sheet in their last game, which also ended their winless run. Like me they've been a lot better than the results keep showing, ha ha.

I managed to have three tins of Guinness 0.00% at the golf club and nearly got change from £11. I stopped at Swanys as I meandered back and had a full fat Guinness, getting 10p change from a fiver. I think the latter represents more value. The best value was walking there and back. I felt quite charged and was back to striding out Camino style. It's hard to look back to week 1 and how I had the walking sticks to make sure I kept my balance as I tried to remind myself not to charge around, or fall over. I'm starting to feel much stronger even though the temperature has plummeted and I'm needing the under armour.

Tomorrow I get another walk when Simon and I meet Rich off the train for a stroll to Stockbridge. I'll also get another rummage on the Shelter shelves. 

As the clock strikes 8pm however I know it's time for bed. No point in watching any more of the genocide from Lebanon and Gaza. I find it hard not to wonder why we spend money saving people from Cancer, then sit idly by while Rwanda 25 years ago or the current Middle east genocide just trundles along unencumbered. Honestly, it makes me feel guilty to know all these care workers are being killed, never mind the children, football players or anyone else regarded as collateral damage.

It really is appalling.

Today's good news-Its Tuesday

Yes, today is indeed Tuesday so I've got two rounds of visits to the western.

I started with a shower and the daily turning of the feeding tube and the cleaning around the hole. It pierces through your skin and into the stomach so there's always a wee bit of snotters to clean away.

Prior to this at 6am, my dental delight with the flourine mouth guards, known as the happy hour by me. I'm still not meeting quota here but with the Western visit must come the "Yes, I did this morning for an hour but, I've been bad", aka the naughty step confession. 

After the shower came my double Weetabix and then off to the western via the pitch n putt. 

The seasons have come and gone on the Camino Can'cerre and it's one of the longest I've been on. It's certainly the most sober Camino ever. I've also got it down as the slowest I've ever walked too.

I'm feeling good today as I've loads of questions that I've saved up during the process. Many would ask as they went along but I felt most would get answered as we ventured along the path and the rest would probably be irrelevant. That's largely been the case so now I've only got a few to ask and none particularly urgent. They range from COVID and flu jags to products to stop the mouth ulcers singing so loudly. On the plus side when I do a cavernous yawn it doesn't hurt. I used to find that big yawn eye watering which was really handy if I got some grit iny eyes. It doesn't hurt now so eyes are as dry as my mouth, another reason to celebrate Tuesday.

So it's 9:15 for speech therapy, nutrition, bursingt and dental. Then it's 4pm for the consultant. During the rest of the day I can take in the bookies, badgers on the water of Leith or possibly my bed.

I decided to celebrate with a trip to Cafe Gallo where I had a coffee and a scrambled egg roll. I got such good feedback I'm off the shakes for the time being and happy to have my snacks and strolls. Stroll to a cafe and have a snack.

Stroll home and have some more. In this case, yes, it's now 12 so time for poor man's quiche, aka, the eggy bread rolls. Oscar put a bit of pepper in the scrambled egg roll so that was a good challenge that I met, so I tried to crisp up the second side of my french toasty roll. 

It's ridiculous how close it is to the texture of quiche, just lacking a firm base. The moisture level is off the clock so I don't need to worry about having a drink as I eat and it cools quick enough that I don't burn myself either.

It an absolute winner and another reason why I have learnt loads on the Camino Can'cerre as I told all the professionals at the Maggie centre today.

They were great and I can't thank them enough, so that's all I did. They told me I was doing amazing and I said I'm just a reflection of you amazing people. You told me to do this exercise and that. You told me about this and how to overcome that. If I had trouble eating use the shakes down the tube. The mouth guards and the teeth, well, I said, I've a confession here, I managed it this morning but I have been intermittent.

All in my weight was 99 kg which is below the 114kg I started at when I first started reducing my alcohol and then when I stopped altogether it was probably already down to 110kg. I got a chance to thank them again for encouraging me to present myself in the best way possible for treatment and my pre season training was merely a reflection of their advice.

To lose 15kgs is absolutely superb but I appreciate I'm only to put weight on until January, like that's ever been a stretch for me. I just need three nights out on the bounce and I'll be 104kgs. 

From my birthday weight of 16/10 I've seen me rise to 17/10 by the new year. The very first time I ever tipped the scales at 17 stone I said to Caitlin, unbelievable, I'm so over weight, and before the week was out I said, I don't need to worry about being 17 stone anymore, I'll be 18 stone tomorrow as I was 17/12 this morning. This is how sedentary I can be. It's also how greedy I can be if fully rocking and rolling with my favourite cheeses getting washed down with gorgeous Christmas wines. 

So after lunch and surviving the onslaught of school kids boarding the bus in Stockbridge I got on the scales at the western and was 100.55kgs. this indeed pleased the Doctor. All the examination also pleased and hearing me slaver a load of nonsense also left him smiling. My usual gratitude for the fantastic professional teams which I never tire of saying as I genuinely appreciated all the help they and others, not least fellow accomplices in the treatment cycle of throat cancer, like Stu or Alex have given me on the journey.

The next phase won't be in 3 weeks, rather it'll be in January with the scan. The doctor duly noted I was at week 12/13 in my recovery not week 10 so another check up would not be required.

We discussed the scan and what they'll look for and then end of January I'll get to discuss the outcome of the scan. Like a good fairytale I'll be willing my Camino Can'cerre to have a happy ending.

Happy Tuesday everyone and I think it's time for a pint.

Week 10 starts, did I say it's getting tedious

I'm sure I've mentioned how boring it can be. There is no doubt it's as tedious as listening to some of my songs from the 1980s and you don't get much more painful than that. 

You always know when a song is bad when even you can't play it again. 

When you change the lyrics every time you sing it because you're so embarrassed about the last a lot that you sang. 

I think I felt that way with "mountainous task". There is no doubting the herculean job required to turn that into a song, it was just much easier to give up music. There was one line in it which I absolutely loved singing yet the annoying part was it took a minute and a half to get to the good line by which time we'd emptied the stage never mind the auditorium.

Some bands know when times up long before their audience. We were definitely one of them. We'd been in audiences and left gigs, now it was our turn to leave the stage.

Our drummers were always giving up on us, but then they did have the worst of views.

I feel that way with the Camino Can'cerre treatment timeline. As I start week 10 I'm left listening to my tinnitus, something I get loads of time to do as I'm too tired to leave the house and get some exercise. I'm lying on my bed, listening to my tinnitus, it's like being in that audience or standing on that stage wondering why I was still singing "out of sight, out of mind". To be fair, by then I was singing Out of time, out of tune" which made me smile. I eventually started writing it on the set list, it was a lovely way to eject songs without being too confrontational.

If there's one thing I've enjoyed this week it's french toast. In trying to increase my calories I'd resorted to the 5 feeds a day, so when I discovered by accident that french toast worked for me that was that. I'd made some for Jackie thinking I could try a piece and it was fine. She likes it quite dry while I'm more a fan of a tortilla/souffle type. 

After discovering she liked the brown bread cardboard and I liked the sliced stale rolls we had a solution. After a week of it she'd had enough so this morning I used all the mix on just four thick slices of a roll. The results were astonishing.

The roll is more like a mould to hold the omelette in a shape. The absolute joy is in the eating. As you'd imagine chewing through lamb and chicken tikka kebabs last night was not my idea of fun. I slide it into small bits and no matter how much bread and yoghurt sauce I put on, it nips the roof of my mouth as the spices find the blisters like they know their way to the pain. I did this with the knowledge it would be over in 90 minutes. A meal like that is like watching Hibs being dismantled by St Mirren, uncomfortable at best and annoying...etc etc....at worst.

The french toast on the other hand is an absolute joy. I'm getting two eggs, butter, milk, a roll and one of my high calorie drinks to wash it down along with water. It's snack size, minimal chewing and delicious. It's day 9 of french toast and to be fair it's not as tedious as the tinnitus, and nowhere near as monotonous as "mountainous task". Yes "Monotonous Task" got written on the set list a few times before it was retired. 

The song was written about the time of band aid and Live aid. I was trying to get a concert together in Hunters Bog, a natural amphitheatre that I thought would be a superb venue. I clearly put the cart before the horse. I'd got some headlining bands who said yes without checking any of the logistics. During my many walks I've revisited the site and that moment in 1985 when I first thought it was a great idea to put a big stage up in a swamp. I hadn't given too much thought to people scaling the crags or Karen Peat our neighbour who fell and broke her leg when we were all kids. I just pictured this huge arena being a superb place, just not how they would go to the toilet when it was busy. In my defence there is a drainage ditch although with 150,000 there wanting to use the facilities even my skills in irrigation would be found wanting.

What I find amazing is I was 22 and honestly thought I could pull this all off. Deadbeat would suffer as these mad dreams and schemes would develop. This whole thing imploded in due course when I got a job. I never appreciated how much time writing songs, going to watch bands or do interviews occupied. I never appreciated how printing and distribution took me so much time as I worked around it all without thinking, drinking, not thinking. I'd often come back from a gig and start up the machine and print 2000 sheets which would be pages 4/17 on one side and they'd be able to dry waiting for pages 3/18 which might be a week later. The cover and back page was always last to get printed. The advert on the back page we tried to make as real time as possible. When I started working it wasnt as easy to get through to Glasgow, Perth or Dundee and it was an era where fax machines were still in their infancy. Mobiles were things you put above cots in a bairns room. E mail was a job you did at Christmas for a bit of exercise and cash for drugs.

Yes, logistics would change so quickly for so many things in the world of the fanzine and yet "plus ca change, c'est la memechose" springs to mind for me on this cancer Camino. It really is like living all your yesterdays. In my case getting the diagnosis back in May/June feels as recently as Imagination released, "just an illusion". When I relive "monotonous task", I just think of July, getting the tonsils and teeth out and then going walking every day to make sure I didn't lie down too much. When I think of September I think of the Camino Norte interspersed with visits to the western and in my head Paris during the 80"s and 90's.

When I think of November I think, yes, we're still doing this and if anyone tells me I'm so strong one more time I'm going to punch them and ask how strong I am. If you want to feel my pain, join in, I'm happy to share.

Did I tell you about my new song. It can be a bit of a rant at times, but it's all done with a beautiful smile.

"So happy to share"

What do I care , watdoicare...boom boom

So happy to share

Flashbacks on the Camino Can'cerre

Just like Leee's Imagination song of the 1980's I get flashbacks all the time on Camino, where 'happiness is just a state of mind'. The song has a little more resonance today. I also like the idea of "if you know your history", I grew up singing it on the terraces and living in past glories. As a Hibs supporter that included waiting since 1902 to win the cup again. No wonder we knew our history, Hearts supporters reminded us regularly about Buffalo Bill and the many characters from that era. On Camino I get loaded with music and images from the past. They just seem to randomly come to mind.

I started week 8 knowing this was probably the end of the climbing a hill and as I start week 9 I think we probably would be better calling it, descending into the bottomless pit. It's pretty grim down here and I don't recommend it. The throat is clearly going to take time and I'm coughing too much from my chest but nothing is moving. Difficult to say if it's a cough the chemo brought and it's never gone or if it's something to get used to. I'll mention it again but I did have an X-ray the other week when they were helping my bowel. There's a flashback we don't need, time I went back to writing nonsense.

My latest flashback on this Camino was resurrected more recently, as it related to my collapse in front of Jackie last Monday evening. I first collapsed in front of her in the Oxford Bar some 35 years ago after tripping over a bar stool. It was normal behaviour in the 80's albeit I'd had an afternoon in the pub and it was about 8pm. Somehow the busy bar cleared a path as I went down so I could hit the floor unencumbered. From my less than lofty position I tried to woo Jackie, a manoeuvre that didn't quite come off, but I'd persevere on a more sober day while my balance was still intact. It was a life changing moment as was the passing out and collapse on Monday.

We will see how life changing it is because I learn things and forget them in equal measure, but this journey will see me change for sure. I will reread this blog and see how many of the life lessons I've chosen to ignore a few weeks and years later.

I'll probably forget the blog and just sleep. The overpowering emotion is joy at nearly completing the journey. It's just like when you get to Sarria and you see all the people arriving to do the last 100k. You've just done 700k over 3-4 weeks and they come and serenade you for the last 4 or 5 days. The pace of the Camino slows down from Sarria onwards as you find the paths get really busy. It's when you realise one of your basic freedoms has just been messed with. One of those societal rules that you adopted years ago and shed on the Camino thus far has just been reintroduced. You've been walking to the sound of your own drum and that means nobody has made you walk faster or slower,  only  you. Suddenly you're faced with a traffic jam where you can elbow these people out of the way, be accepted in their community or accept them into your community. It's a real sense of ouch. I've had a lovely stroll for over 3 weeks and now I feel like I need a strategy. So often has the teachings of the Camino been wiped clear so quickly. You've all chilled after having the full walk, eat, drink, sleep repeat weathered into your liver and limbs. Your he'd is clear of the mosaic moths of monotonous city living. You feel you're ready to change your life forever then someone turns a coach in front of you and drops 50 people.

Over the years I've adopted different strategies to avoid the congestion, the best of which is stopping over in Ereixe, 8km before Sarria. It's my favourite last stop on the Camino. You have lunch and serenade the pilgrims you've walked with over the last 3-4 weeks. They walk by you as you quaff away offering a share of your food and drink in the Caminoside garden of the magnificent Cafe Ligonde. I sometimes make it my last stop on the Camino and start making my way home as Josef is such a great host. His picture is on the fatal-bananas blog most years since 2011.

The pilgrims all stop for a chat and a chip or some cheese then sally forth and on to their Sarria accomodation. The next day, if I continue, you walk on to Sarria and arrive about 11.30 so happily walk through and stay between 6-12k further down the road. This means in the morning you'll have a quieter trail before the 101 Dalmatians and their tour operator appear. 

Like the CAMINO Can'cerre if you're prepared for it you just roll along with it. It doesn't bother you and whilst answering the same question about "how was doing the whole thing" sounds like it might irritate, it often amuses. 'Tiring' can be the one word answer, or elaborate with 'thirsty work, nothing a good bottle of red couldn't cure', or you just relive some magical moments as you launch into a comedic storytelling of one of the many misadventures that ended hysterically. 

The trick when people ask you is not to work out what they want you to say. The trick is not to answer what you interpret their question to pose but to answer the story you want to tell. That's the beauty of this Camino too. Early on I got hung up on trying to work out how to answer instead of just talking my usual nonsense. I think it's probably the art of conversation and I've just never learnt it.

 I've watched many people not answer the question over the course of my life, I've listened as people regale us with their life as if I cared about the whimsical nature of a work colleague interrupting their PowerPoint meeting to go to the toilet. Those conversations which are just self justifying speeches about self importance, we've all heard them. So I've never really wanted to be that person but let's face it, we all have our moments, especially if you 'bite' easily.

I paid a bit more attention today when I got to see the doctor at the western again along with all the other support staff like speech, nutrition etc. We briefly discussed my weight being the same, more of that later, my struggle over the weekend as I focused on the burning neck and forgot to go out and exercise. I then got confused telling the story of the weekend and realised I'd not asked what I was supposed to, while the doc gave up and just got me to open my mouth and let her look at my throat. My brain seems to freeze with that conversation thing.

So it's not really the art of conversation where you listen to the other people and respond appropriately and invite them to discuss, like call and response in my songs. Maybe I should write lyrics for my next visit to the doctor. Much more chance of remembering my lines. A bit more call and response would work a treat for my memory.

I love the second verse of "Fall from Grace" for that reason. I sang both call and response but when I listen to it now it would be easy to imagine it was another member of the band singing it as it's quite a different voice singing the response. I tended to bark out the first line and had a choir of angels in my head while singing the response.

"Abraham Lincoln"

Such a fine old man

"Got some people thinking"

Heads out of the sand 

"Started a Rebellion"

In a troubled land

"All the rebels yelling"

That he didn't understand 

I loved the simplicity of summing up my 9-11 year old understanding of the whole civil war which still rages today on, in the USA.

Quite simply a whole lot of people realising slavery was wrong, while others believing slavery was right. You could hear the playground noises of fight fight fight.

The fact that it's so recent as being 100 years before the civil rights marches in the 60's tells you all you need to know about white male supremacy and how endemic it was in European culture and how it left our shores for the opportunity to carry it on as the European enlightenment curtailed some of our civilisation's worst traits.

I liked the idea of singing it with my childlike understanding of what I'd read when I was at school in Maryland. I think the words are distilled by my 9 -11 year old brain long before I'd heard about neuro diversity. I experienced people in my class of colour and the racism that took place in front of me. It always confused me telling my pal James Harris I couldn't have a sleep over or even play at his house and he couldn't come to mine either, but we could be friends at school and continue to be the best in the team at football. We were great pals but only at school. I just never understood why. I also never understood why so many people flew confederate flags and had them in their bedrooms. It was 1972-74, the Watergate years, I was very young and exceptionally confused. I liked to believe everyone told the truth and nobody told lies. I'm not sure how far down the good and evil route I went, I think I just had good and not so good in my head. If bad things happened there would usually be an excuse. Like when someone shot at my dad's car and a bullet lodge in the boot lining of the petrol tank. My head kept suggesting they were probably shooting at a rabbit when the car turned the corner and got in the way. I refused to believe it could be intentional. I've since come to learn that bad people can exist, not just because I may disagree with their cause, they just can. From silly little things like cheating at football through to the paedophilic PE teacher we had at school whose victims included whole year groups of young girls. I might not agree with his behaviour, he may have thought it was his right but I think there's a huge body of evidence that suggests diving for a penalty is somewhat different from sexual assault and rape. He eventually got a year for some of his crimes 25 years after. His victims had suffered at the time and for the rest of their lives. I remember crying in disbelief that having waited 25 years, these victims saw him sent down for only a year. Like Jimmy Saville, Cyril Smith, all the merry band of clergy, charity workers, teachers and other predators in positions of power over the vulnerable this is a crime we do our best not to lead to prosecution. We do our best to say it's hard to prove. Well here's a thing, how about, J'ACCUSE, how about publicly declaring someone is accused. Don't let them hide behind defamation where bankruptcy ensures it's a financial decision to accuse never mind get a prosecution. How about admitting our justice system has never been fit for purpose on these crimes.

It seems documentaries seem more persuasive and in "Until I kill you" there's no doubt Delia's book transfering to the screen will be very effective. It's a chilling way to get the point over and you hope people will understand this is what's happening throughout our world. The victims are not protected by the law, they're abused and tormented. I hope it succeeds like the post office scandal but I doubt there'll be the same sway. I think the more serious the crime on women the more they seems to be victimised and abused by the justice system. The irony of the guilty party being given Christmas Bail while the victim can't even leave the country to visit her family. My worry would be that people will see this as an extreme example and not a natural extension of all levels of abuse.

It's at the end of the road of what's normalised behaviour and it starts when somebody has wandering hands. These crimes might not fit the justice system as they seem to fall under the auspices of etiquette. They seem, like abuse of power merely deserve a reprimand in employment law.

I think the Salmond case was the perfect opportunity for the justice system to say to itself, yes it was right to prosecute and yes you've been found not guilty. There was a reason for prosecution and you've duly answered. I know there's loads of innuendo about how or why the prosecution took place but it's good that it did. What's really bad is the unique nature of the case. Another example I can think of is John Leslie's case or the current situation with the actor whose name escapes me but did house of cards in the USA version, Kevin the Spaceman, I think, but as I say they're pretty rare. These events appear blown up by the media because they don't happen regularly but we know sexual assault does happen regularly. These cases probably relate to 1 in 1m of the number of cases that should be prosecuted too. The justice system will say it's creaking so they just don't prosecute, while the police also hide behind resources and focus on easier gifts to tick their stats off, or as some argue, reinforce their prejudice.

Most of my male pals think it ridiculous that I can even make that argument on the basis that there might be innocent men put through an ordeal by being wrongly accused. I think there are probably a million victims every year who don't see any justice and are presumed to be guilty by the police or the CPS when they're told there's no case to answer. When they're told how the predator has apologiswd for any misunderstanding or just because you were tricked you did go to a hotel room voluntarily. When they're told that's not really a safe place to walk and there are no witnesses. When they say are you sure it wasn't just an over friendly greeting by your friends pal. It's just your word against them. There's the full list from diving for a penalty through to the sadistic percerted PE teacher. 

Some of it could be explained by generational forces but I can't help thinking this generation that I grew up with had a lot of strange ideas in childhood. Extrapolation from a child's experience to a population of 400m is fraught so thats why I like the simplicity of the words of the song so much. I'm not able to commentate on something I know nothing about but by using that wee childhood experience and my nursery rhyme, I liked the song.

Whether you thought abolition or not in 1860, those who thought it not, saw it as necessary and that view is endemic in some of their culture. A war never wins hearts and minds it rarely even tries. It seeks to impose as the people imposing usually believe they're right and this is the only way. History judges these leaders differently, Lincoln got shot and so never got a chance to win the peace. I doubt the long term security of the state of Israel for example is being well served at the moment and Ukraine will doubtless have a long life of civil unrest under Russian rule.

I've written endlessly about the 1920'a Russian economist who viewed the economic cycle on 40-60 years and how our current technology era is coming to an end. If you trace it back to the space race and computers, through to the VHS v Betamax video wars of the 80's to the Nokia, Blackberry phone wars of the 90's and the big tech of today, it's coming to an end as our behaviour has been massively changed.

We don't run home for top of the pops or out favourite show. We don't need to spend half an hour finding out what happened in the latest episode because repeats never happened. We might meet our friends at the cinema but even there, our film is probably on 5 screens.

Fewer things in life now involve being on time and that's one learned outcome from the technology age. Another would probably be that nobody has a phone in the hall anymore or in the case of my pals across the road locked on a room that only the parents had a key for. If you missed a call it meant you were out, no question of a dinner out with friends being destroyed by a what's app exchange interrupting the conversation.

How our attention span has moved with the technology age. Our sense of direction is no longer important it's whether the phone has enough battery to open maps.

I could go on for days on the cultural differences that each micro generation has experienced or not. Those in the sporting world chase marginal gains while my dad played with golf clubs from the 1950's. The 'Mobile phone tax' has been hiked out of all proportion to the television which technology improvements during the last century saw them get cheaper. 15 years ago I saw the price creep and marvelled at the economic nonsense that saw us pay an increasing 'tax' to stay in touch. During the building of the information superhighway in the last century it was going to be like the infrastructure that we'd be so proud of. We didn't realise we'd be taxed by mobile phone companies for tapping into it. In many places on the Camino in Spain there is free WiFi. Little towns or cities have decided it should be this way. Marketing however in all these companies know the power to sell for more and for us to pay, still very strong. Coupling deals with phone upgrades, with marketing hype, makes each micro generation sleepwalk into the newest gear. Legitimate business expense makes for less price sensitivity and so a phone can readily be sold for over £1000 as there is a queue of buyers leaping aboard to hold them at a gig instead of partying at it

. 

What a masterstroke, a business model masterclass even, but for how long. This now becomes part of the new poverty trap and how goes "food v phone" fight in the kitchen table debate. Do you spend £40 a month on your food or phone. What gives you more immediate and lasting pleasure. Surely good food, but maybe not as screen time rises in the necessity stakes.

So as I embark on another Camino I ask is my journey really necessary. What will be the next economic epoch. Obviously AI will if it's not already, standardised our existence and thinking. Our power to think for ourselves has been diminished as we've all been targeted into rabbit holes of habit. We don't go to a library and scan the shelves, we are handed our reading by the engines. We don't surf the racks of the Record Shak, we get handed our playlists, distracted by our sleep analysis. Our attempts to disconnect so we can discover more are thwarted to such an extent even our spelling is obligingly changed for us.

This is no more the Sci-Fi nonsense of Logan's Run or any of these films or books from our youth, it's not a fiction what is happening is now fact. 

Our TV in the west is dominated by sports and our culture has gone with it, particularly in the UK where Olympic endeavours are rewarded with lottery funding but artistic or educational rewards grow more difficult to find. They rely on the philanthropy of past beneficiaries leaving a legacy bursary, to fund places to learn or perform.

Our new amphitheatres are solely interested in selling sporting greatness, even when it's abundantly clear it's not great. Whether you watch a football player fail to clear the first player at a corner or you watch the tearful documentary of a hamstring tear in the run up to an Olympics, you can't help thinking we might have our priorities a wee bit askew. 

NHS and Housing, the alleged priorities for this government and what about poverty. What about the people working in the NHS. What's in it for them. Is that tax allowance moving to £20000 from the disgusting freeze put on it by Rishi Sunak? No, it's not and what's more is it continues until 2028 when they will do the big hand out ahead of the next election. That just feels fraudulent and not even old John Major Tory. It's certainly not Labour and when you know that the NHS is going to have to find all the money for the hike is NI, how can they afford to recruit? Well the good news there is there's nobody to recruit from the UK. Like the building industry there is nobody sitting around looking for work in the building industry. We're already at maximum employment there so unless you want untrained people building houses the plan can only come to fruition if we open the borders to people who have long since found work at home in Europe more rewarding.

There's a reason why bullies do a bit better than we were told they would at school. News just in, bullies don't always win but there's this thing called muscle which often does. Whether it financial, physical or just mental the things our phones keep saying to us, they become normalised and sometimes that is confused with true.