The Perfect Diagnosis

They give you an appointment to give you the results. Then they rang to check I was attending and bringing someone with me.

Then we had the appointment. With the same doctor who I'd had all along. And he was there with two other people. One sitting down and one standing. There was a little bit of small talk. And then the nice doctor said 'I'm sorry to say but the lump is malignant.' And they let us ask a load of questions. The doors were locked to stop us being interrupted. And he said I probably wouldn't remember much of the conversation as it's shocking news so we could just go home now, tell the family, and come back next week to discuss the treatment plan. And then the person sitting down introduced herself as the breast cancer nurse who would be the main point of contact, she gave me her pager details and a load of leaflets - about breast cancer, its treatment and alternative treatment at the breast cancer centre. And that was that. As perfect a textbook diagnosis you could ask for.

But God help you if you get dementia. Chances are (50%) you or your relatives will never get a diagnosis. And the diagnosis is never perfect. The so-called 'Nice' guidelines recommend not to tell you if they think you don't want to know. There is nobody applying the sorts of standards of Cancer Care to dementia. Nobody will ever discuss a treatment plan with you, mainly because there isn't one, because the care slips through the gaps between personal care (social services) and health care. It's a long, difficult death, lasting 20 years but you won't die at home or in a hospice. They're all for cancer patients (95%).

I won't be cycling round the world I'm afraid. Or doing a triathlon, or in fact anything where some poor souls have to sponsor me. Cancer patients are well served. And they have plenty of people, dead and alive fighting for their corner. I don't know whether to crack open the champagne or cry for 2 years over the death of this Cancer Superwoman. I prefer Cherie Booth to be honest.

But if I help a quicker and better diagnosis for even one dementia patient I'll be a little happier. If I stop one doctor writing 'Old Age' as the primary cause on one death certificate I'll be a little happier. And I will be very sanctimonious about it indeed. As sanctimonious and victorious as the next cancer superwoman. And if anyone writes poison pen letters telling me to vote Tory, euthanasia works, have chemo once a week, stop reading, stop studying, worship Madonna, stop eating out, sell my engagement ring or some other thing that I don't want to do in a million years I won't be dignified. I will tell them to piss off.

Is 'All you need is Love' the best song ever composed?

There's nothing that you can write that isn't written.

But that wasn't a line from the song.

Anyway we've had a lovely weekend, despite my husband not forgiving me for booking us into the worst hotel in the world. He recorded me a video of it for posterity to make us laugh if ever we get depressed. We had an overlap with Yorkshire rental arrangements where it meant he didn't have anywhere to live for 2 nights and this 'Lodge' was my answer.

And then we moved him into this cottage near York - friends renting it to us. And I got thinking about friendship again. Would I be friends with my relatives if I wasn't related to them? And some friends are like relatives anyway. You've grown up with some of them. And like relatives, because you're friends with them say for example because they're friends with your mum, you don't really have that much choice. And neither do they. You have all this small talk business. Are you enjoying work? Did you watch Supernanny? But I still love em. All of em.

I'm just about to celebrate 20 years of friendship with one of my friends. It was actually last year (the 20 year anniversary date) but we both had too much on. We've been through everything together, sort of. And a lot not together. And we're probably quite different now. We went to Donnington 88 together and nearly got crushed in the Guns N Roses push. She introduced me to good music and nice people. I made friends with her friends, she made friends with mine. I became part of the family for a while. She was always beautifully dressed. She had a few boyfriends and so did I. She got engaged. I moved to London. She got married. I moved jobs. She became a teacher. I became a preacher (not). And she came to my wedding and stayed right to the end. When I treasured my 'Shortcuts to Bounching back from heartbreak' after splitting up from Silly-boy, I wrote inside 'What is a friend?'. That's one.

Anyway the answer to the question is possibly.

Advo-cake

Someone, who will remain nameless, has asked me to write their business plan for a 'dragon's den' application for an innovative bakery idea they've got up their sleeve. Anyway to make a short story extremely long, I've been trying to think of how I would make their innovative cakes (I haven't been let on to the actual invention so I could be totally wrong on that to start with) fit in with my business ethics. This happened to coincide with a meeting I attended in a professional capacity. What I learnt (well, more reinforced what I already knew) at this meeting is that care is absolutely shocking for those people with 'complex' needs at home. What happens if you have multiple scelorosis, motor neurone disease or Alzheimers is that you're effectively fending for yourself. Nobody, for example is prepared to feed these people, apart from their relatives. The District Nurses are (allegedly) only willing to replace bandages, Home Care workers do the hoovering. 'Feeding' is part of the grey area between personal care, health care, domicilliary care and home care. Money isn't the issue. It's just how it's organised. I was suitably livid after discussing this for a while and was thinking of how I could possibly persuade the Dragons to give me loads of dosh to solve this problem and combine it with my friend's application. And I came up with 'Advo-cake'. It would combine advocacy with cakes. Poor people would be able to get a home-delivered cake in return for a nominal sum (say £1) a week. Then they could upgrade if they wanted to a sort of Car Breakdown Service for themselves where they get an emergency advocate to see them if they get a 'long term condition'. For the £1 a week service we'd be able to keep an eye on people and slip in the odd leaflet informing them of how the system works.

Anyway, business was never really my strong point. Or cakes. I might retract the business plan idea, especially as we've got so much on at the moment.

Offer accepted

The offer on the house has been accepted. So only another four months of stress and juggling about eleven balls to go. Except it's more like a year as it's only then that the MA is over. I'm resorting to read Richard Rorty on my lunch break. Good distraction. There's a good poem in there too. My problem is I seem to discover these academics I like, just when they've recently died. Like Roy Porter. He died about six months before I tried to contact him. And Richard Rorty wrestled with the reaper of grimness two months ago. I give up on this poetry lark. Rorty & Porter would approve.

Blogging on the train

GNER is quite amazing, certainly compared to MEGABUS. In fact slicing your knuckles with a blunt razor blade is quite good compared to Megabus. Anyway, they've got wifi, which my wonderful husband managed to sort out for me before I departed. So here I am typing aware on the World Wide Web publishing to the 'world'. And it's a bit of an experiment. I'm quite pleased it's a little experiment I seem to have beaten even Blaglady to. You can survey the scene and report back to your 'readers' or 'market' or 'friends' or 'self'. Anyway there's a couple in their thirties sitting at the table down and to the right. They're married. I've clocked the rings. She's Asian he looks northern. They look like teachers and I'm wondering if they're coming back from the Leeds Festival. And basically that's what everyone who's on this train looks like they're doing. So it's not a very interesting or exciting experiment. The married guy with glasses married to the Asian lady is now asleep. That says it all really.

But I bet Tony Blair is now regretting he didn't do a journal when he was in office. I'd hate to have to try and remember all the interesting bits 10 years from now that happened today. We saw my cousin and her fiancee for example. They showed us how they've converted a garage into a bedroom, and they've got two reception rooms in this new house. They recommended that we didn't live in Halifax. And then we had an afternoon nap. It's all these titbits of information that just get lost in the melay. Although ironically today ten years ago of course Princess Diana died so most people remember a lot of detail about that day as it's etched on our memories. I remember that I was in London staying in this awful place near Turnpike Lane, which had mice, with my Ex. Radio One was playing non stop funeral music which I woke up to thought it was weird, then they said why. I was doing my post-grad diploma in journalism and had this brain wave of building on the anti-media backlash that occured by burning loads of tabloids in the streets. But I never sorted it out. I still think about what a missed opportunity that was. I hated the media, it was a stupid idea to do a vocational course in that area. I failed the diploma. The rest, as they say, is history.

Ten Amazing Things (to do on holiday)

1) Watch Kate Nash perform (on telly)
2) Kiss your husband
3) Make sure you bring your slippers, especially if you're going up North. In fact come to think of it don't bother otherwise
4) Read GErmaine Greer's article on Princess Diana in the Sunday Times.
5) Then have a heated debate on the defammation laws with your husband
6) And then look them up on his phone on Wikipedia
7) Then moan about the internet on his phone - ie you can't read it. Hopefully distracting him from the fact that you've lost the debate.
8) Go for at least one amazing meal per day. Like The Durham Ox near York.
9) Try something like Beetroot Souffle.
10) Then start saying things like 'Is it me or are people at festivals getting younger?' And Look at the sky out of the window. Thanking your lucky stars you're not actually at a festival, getting dirty/too hot/cold/bored/annoyed/stuck in traffic. And finish your wedding thank you cards.

Excited about the 'new', postmodern history of dementia

There's so much going on at the moment, hardly got time to breathe. We've put an offer on a house in Leeds - 2 bed semi in Chapel Allerton £150k. I'm supposed to be doing all the research for my course which starts in October. We're renting our flat out, moving to York temporarily, applying for jobs left right and centre, trying to make friends with my brother's friends in London so we're not Mr and Mrs Billy-no-mates up there. Fitting in work around that and the usual being a quite frankly pathetic friend to all my existing friends in London. Then there's all the financial rubbish linked to this - sorting out a loan to put as a deposit on the second house, trying not to think about the stock market crash, how much debt we're already in.

Anyway I'm still happy, most excited about my MA. I just think that with house buying 'property' is so much about luck, I know normal people would be most excited about that. But in many ways the more you own the more you have to worry about. Doing an MA in the history of dementia is a totally different kettle of fish. There's an element of luck, but it's much reduced.

I'm narrowing down my field. It's going to be called 'The Forgotten Forgetting: The deaths of a generation in the 1990s, a post-modern history of dementia". I'm going to link the rise in age discrimination which I will prove occured in the 90s with increasing, untimely and unreported deaths from dementia, hand in hand with a reduction in real terms expenditure on treatment of the disease. The documentary with Barbara and Malcolm Pointon supports this, plus the report from the National Audit Office a few weeks ago. I feel vindicated. Like Dementia's Joan of Arc. Perhaps not a brilliant analogy. Anyway...

I'm about to email my (brilliant) tutor and ask her how many death certificates she thinks I should look at - 100 or 1000? I'm trying to cram in all the primary source research before I actually start which is a tad ridiculous. It worked when I was doing my undergrad stuff though. Then you effectively concentrate on writing up for the next 9 months.

The other problem is I can't decide whether I'm a postmodernist or not. They're all a bit weird. And the modernists seem to write better stuff. What I think is that we're in the postmodern era. The era when infinity seems as weird and wonderful as it really is, when people talk about nonsense. Progress seems a distant era, perhaps when our parents were growing up. So we're all postmodernists now, whether we like it or not. I prefer postmodern to 'new' as it conjurs up 'new' labour images which make me feel a bit sick. And the 'neo-philiacs' in Private Eye. But the 'neophiliacs' manage to distance themselves from the postmodernists just by putting that word in front of themselves. I don't think they can escape.

How long before I stop wearing a coat?

I've come to Leeds for the weekend to acclimatise before we move here. The thing you easily forget about up North is how about 1% of the population wear coats, even if the temperature is about 10 degrees below Zero. But the fascinating thing is I USED TO NEVER WEAR A COAT EITHER. Back in the day, when Northern cities really were run down, I never wore a coat out, in January. So the moral of the tale is that non-coat wearing is a purely cultural phenomenon. I won't be able to get Northerners to wear coats, they'll infiltrate my softie southernised culture and persuade me not to wear it, in their subtle, influencing ways. But how long will it take?

A two star review of 'Hope and Glory Britain 1900-2000' by Peter Clarke

Another of the stupid IT things which annoys me is Amazon book reviews. Blaglady introduced me to this hobby a few years ago. But unfortunately for them I give them detailed, negative reviews and those ones they don't publish which really gets on my nerves. But now, this is critical. One of the things about studying & writing is that you have to try and write every day. So you can get feedback, improve your style, find your niche, get confidence, improve spelling and so on. So I'm going to start publishing my negative reviews on my blog. This will also help with my MA, where summarising books is a good skill to have, obviously especially if they're relevant.

So here goes:

Yes, the Spectator and the Telegraph rave about this book, but for most of us, who have to read it anyway as it's a core text on a reading list, we struggle to give it three stars. In fact the three stars it's getting is just in case any of the professors who have contributed to it and will be marking my work shortly might read this review and spot who I am. Anyway to cut a long story short, if you enjoy watching the History Channel (which incidentally in our house is called 'The War Channel') if you like Newsnight, Dragon's den, subscribe to the Economist and want to be a Merchant Banker when you graduate, then I suspect you'll devour it in less than 2 hours, and give it 5 stars here.

For me, it's a bit too much like nineteenth century historians would write about the twentieth century, for example on page 53 'Asquith stepped effortlessly into the premiership in 1908 and looked the part immediately'. You know what? I don't care about Asquith. That was under the 'Fiscal Crisis' by the way if that whets your appetite.

As it proceeds through the twentieth century it gets quite hilarious,as the book tries to stay up to date, almost as if the publishers want you to have it as a coffee table book and as if you'd pick it up to remember what was going on in 1992. So on page 414 there's a footnote 'It was not known that Major himself had had an affair in the 1980s with the Conservative junior minister Edwina Currie until the publication in 2002 of Currie's memoirs'.

It's not so much history as politics. The twentieth century is treated in the standard way of a progressively improving place with good chaps leading the way. Boring, turgid and ridiculous. And who, by the way, was the Metric Equivalents of Imperial Units Chart on page 6 published for? Some French metric historical political enthusiasts who might have picked up the book by accident? I wonder how many times the owners of this book have thought - ooh, how many hundredweights are in a tonne, I might pick up my Peter Clarke history text book to check?

I did like the prologue, where he looked like he was going to talk about interesting stuff like married women having 10 pregnancies, but actually the whole book is more like an instruction manual to the mood swings of prime ministers and imperial heavyweights.

Tamoxifen advice

They're being very strict with me about taking Tamoxifen and finally I'm getting used to it thank God.

Fed up with Facebook

Facebook is all well and good, but the problem with the real world is the rain. You never think 'Oh, I can't be bothered to switch on the computer because xyz might happen'. Yet tonight, with a nice invitation to go out and because I might, God forbid, get slightly wet and go to bed later than 10pm, I'm thinking 'I can't be bothered'. Yet I can be bothered to look at random photographs of strangers plus people I haven't seen for fifteen, twenty years and realise that on Facebook's stupid options you don't have 'sister' of friend or dare I say it, neighbour. I suppose in America people don't make friends with their neighbours because they're all rednecks.

If I sound bitter, that's because I am. We had another meeting this morning - me and xyz. Another friend of mine from a few years ago said 'Never cry in front of your enemies'. At the time I took this very seriously - ended up on medication for a while. Z said something similar this morning 'You've got to be dispassionate, forget the emotion, look at the legal intricacies'. I did a politician-esque speech in response to this saying that passion creates politics and politics creates the law. Yet, with superb irony and quite hilariously my voice broke half way through (through emotion of course) and I couldn't finish the speech, with tears in my eyes. So Z and my other friend from years ago are right. Of course.

Tony Blair's final speech had an impact on me, “If it is on occasion the place of low skullduggery it is more often the place for the pursuit of noble causes" about the houses of parliament. For me, belief is not science, because if I don't agree with something I WILL find the evidence to support my view. And that's what most politicians are like. Belief comes from passion not from science. And science comes from belief anyway - belief in something has to trigger where you're getting your so-called facts from.

People say, you've got to de-politicise xyz. I think, Politicise. Let's introduce 'neighbour' as an option on Facebook. It'd be a good start. Make friends with the Rednecks. Easier than doing an impression of Tony Blair at a meeting.

We're moving to Leeds

Yes, sorry to disappoint all our London fans, and much in the same way that Posh and Becks have gone to LA, we're going to Leeds. Husband has got a job there, I've got family there, we can buy a castle, what more can I say?

Homerton hospital is back on course for its privatisation plans, the people using our drive as a toilet for both number ones and twos can carry on in peace, Leeds Bicycle Users Group are quaking in their boots, and my employers have cracked open the champagne.

Tatton for Governor

I'm standing for Governor of Homerton Hospital under the combined banner of the Green Party and Keep Hackney NHS Public. Against cuts and privatisation and for expansion of services. Anyway there's a postal strike today so because I posted my form yesterday means it might not get in. If I do get in to the contest, it's the first contested election I'll be standing in. I have stood to be elected before for things, but when nobody else wants to do it, so I've always got in.

I've decided already that if they try to do anything I don't like then I'll resign, so if I do get elected I might not keep the post for long. The other problem is that next year I'm likely to be very busy indeed. Doing my MA which I'm even more enthusiastic about than ever because of the National Audit Office report on dementia, this governor thing, which may not take off of course, and the job which I'm wanting to keep to as many hours as possible for financial reasons. And I'm enjoying it which is quite unusual for me. And my wifely duties, which take up much more time than you think.

Three Amazing Things (TAT)

1) I managed to get almost all my points across at an important meeting
2) My bank account is not overdrawn
3) I now have 36 friends on Facebook.

I do feel like it's draining my energy though - I know that's not an amazing thing, but I just can't keep it up. There's only so much time you can spend looking up your brother's school friends on Facebook, before the TV license man comes round and locks you up. Time I could be spending actually seeing or speaking to my real friends in the real world, in the new, fresh air pubs. Or paying the TV license. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if they used this blog in court on that issue. Or the other. In fact I'll just save all that time management nonsense and just hop over to the police station. Except I can cycle now. Ha ha. You see the fourth amazing thing pops up and we're back to FAT all over again.

Overtaking Men

My new bike is absolutely amazing, not only can I almost do wheelies, but I can stop quite quickly, I can go at what feels like a hundred miles an hour, the bike doesn't click when you push your foot down, and you feel like you're flying. And this morning I overtook two men. Just to clarify that amazing fact, I have NEVER overtaken anyone on my old 'KingCYCLE' bike - even the disabled, obese and children (sometimes all three in that category) would overtake me. And this morning, as I was zooming down Kingsland Road, which doesn't seem the death trap it seemed on Friday, I overtook two men on my way to work, as if I was in the Tour De France or something. And the fact that I was heading for a car door didn't faze me, I touched the brakes and hey presto, nearly over the handlebars, but yes, stationary.

Tatton Mayhem

There is an event on the mountain cyclists calendar called 'Mountain Mayhem'. My equivalent, which incidentally doesn't raise that much for charity funnily enough is called 'Tatton Mayhem'. It involves driving round North London with a lot of rubbish in your car, following policemen with Thai Brides taking you to fields. My husband lasted about 4.5 nano seconds. Then you spend what could be 5 lovely hours, but instead you're the inspector of some mobile toilets for the Royal College of Nursing, without any clinical wipes, literally sitting around. Your husband meanwhile has run off with the Thai bride, and her girlfriend, a phillopeno woman, selling off all your clothes for five pounds. And I'm not joking.

Welcome to the world of Carbooting. A bit like Dogging, without the celebrities. Anyway, to cut a long story short, we made about thirty quid, which considering we were selling off ten grammes of mould was quite good. We came back. I made a roast, we moaned again about friends on facebook not being categorised on 'carboot' level, then put Paolo on facebook and Phil is watching 'Coming to America'. Paolo is still on Facebook, but at least he's quiet. But Police Academy 2 is better - and we should know because we watched it about 2 minutes ago.

Tatton, Queen of the Elves

I'm sitting here trying to concentrate on blogging/facebook whilst Lord of the Rings is on. And just about getting away with it. It looks like I'm an enthusiastic minute taker of the dwarves of Gondor. Husband is none the wiser as the DVD is laced with a tasty combo of crack/cocaine/heroin. At least I think it is as I haven't got any other logical explanation for the clinical signs of addiction in this room currently.

TO be honest, I think actually watching a video of people going on their home computers and facebooking/googling/blogging is more interesting than this pap. The skulls of Gondor/Mandor/Horses/summoned dead/Endor/Condorman are on the screen now.

I'm thinking about my new bike (Specialised Hard Rock) and the carboot sale tomorrow. We're selling garbage to bargain hunters. We've done our research on Ebay and a lot of crappy shot glasses just go unsold, so we're banking on the normal Tattontastic 3pm 5p sale phenomenon that's shocked Holloway Road into elvish submission recently. They love it and last time lapped up mouldy, rusty crap at 5p a time. No doubt my Dad will get on to me about laying into my readership/clientele.

Call it arrogance, call it a sense of humour, but I think the Elves will reign supreme and see a break even at least.

Pouilly de Fume, Steak Au Poive & Tamoxifen

My wonderful husband cooked the most delicious Steak Au Poivre last night - despite having never cooked it before - whilst I relaxed supping Pouilly De Fume we brought back from honeymoon, which I thought was absolutely delicious combining bone dry excitement with gooseberries and apple. Marvellous, can life get any better? I was thinking to myself as I was browsing the National Audit Office report on dementia.

Finally a report comes out and I love it.

Tamoxifen is quite simply a different kettle of fish. Give me the national audit office report any day of the week. Tamoxifen, definitely a Tuesday night thing.

I quite like living up to Blaglady's 'odd blog' title.

Succumbbed to Facebook - after 5 nanoseconds

Rather than waiting for inspiration from my parents, which is hardly 21st century motivational management textbook speak (and I should know), I just emailed all the people in my inbox who I could be bothered to, who wouldn't be too offended to find out I was 'left wing'. And hey presto, I now have eleven friends. And I've put away all the clothes, started taking Tamoxifen at night, which is de-rigeur for all us sensitive people who hate it and other various things like pack the tea spoons I got for the office at the weekend.

Fascinating stuff. But more fascinating would you believe that the sort of stuff that comes up on Facebook. I'm amazed there aren't photos of people putting their rubbish out, cleaning their teeth and turning their ignition in their cars on their way to work.

I think it's for more arty people than me - you can see the people who've spent hours on their pages, doting every t and making themselves sound amazing.

Jealousy. One of the seven deadly sins I believe.

Flabbergasted by Facebook - the perils of 21st century friendship

There's been a lot in the media over the past few weeks about even old people like us having to get on 'Facebook'. And dare I say it, we have a few, Ahem, young friends who recently suggested that we may as well not live than not be on facebook. And one of my even older friends than myself sent me an email today requesting that I become a friend of theirs on it - she's got 61 herself!

So feeling bamboozelled, I felt I had to join - you can't see them you see if you don't. Anyway what was flabbergasting was that you register and then it automatically searches through your email addresses and shows you everyone in your address book who has a 'facebook' page. I felt like I was pilfering through peoples' underwear drawers and had to look away. The photos some of my so-called friends have up there are shocking. Most of them haven't got photos - they're the ones I know better and I have no idea what that means, if it does have a meaning.

Anyway to cut a long story short I'm not going to email any of my so-called friends asking them to be my friends as I don't want to disappoint myself if they then refuse to call me a friend. I might check what the etiquette is in these situations, or alternatively wait for my parents to do it, which normally means it's about time I did it.