Wednesday 30th March 2022
Sight
Hi everyone, hope all is well. Just over a week since the last post but I thought I’d kill a little time before going to get my eyes tested this morning. Although I rarely ever wear my glasses, I’ve had the same frames for, I dunno, 10 years or something now? And I could probably count on my hands how many times I’ve actually wore them. It’s just awkward though as I have one long sighted eye and one short sighted, the long sighted eye has a plastic lens in it as I got cataracts removed and the short sighted right eye is my more dominant eye although there are times when your head goes all weird when the left eye takes over. The thing is I can read and I can see into the distance pretty well, just with one eye for each.
Wearing the glasses as well they always slip off when I’m reading which was irritating so I end up just taking them off. Maybe this time I’ll start to wear them…
I’ve had quite a nice week, the sun has certainly helped, sitting out and reading and I’ve started a short walk which takes about 30 minutes and is quite a nice walk and apart from the one slope it’s fairly flat and nothing too challenging. On the walk I’ve already got to see a few not so common birds, although when I first seen one I thought it was a buzzard, could only really see the silhouette of it but I thought I noticed a flash of white under the wings, it was probably at least 50m away and it wasn’t till I got home and looked at the pictures that I noticed the forked tail which wasn’t a buzzard and turned out to be a red kite.
On the same walk I seen a bird I had never seen before, I only seen it for a second or two and the only reason I seen it was because someone else was looking at it. From what I took in it was in between the size of a robin and blackbird and appeared to be all black with a white chest. Couldn’t find anything that fitted the description but my dad was able to tell me it was a dipper, would be good to get a picture of one and I’ve been keeping an eye out for it since then.
On Sunday with the weather being good I thought I would plan a photo, there was an ISS pass at 8.50 and I thought I would walk up to the Mound to have the ISS pass in the background above the Mound. I got there about 20 mins before and was trying different settings but they kept burning out as it was still to bright and I didn’t think I was going to get the shot. I got a nice late sunset pic over the town which I really liked, the different layers and colours I thought were really nice.
A couple minutes before the pass I went to the spot that would have been ideal and the shots still burnt out, but thankfully *just* in time it reached a point were the shots were working and I managed to get a decent pic of the pass which I was quite happy with. There was also a chance of aurora but looking North there was a bit of a mist and you could see the lights from Lisburn and I didn’t want to stay out too long so I just went on home. Thankfully it’s only 5 mins from the house, like everything here.
Before getting sick I had started to try to reduce the amount of equipment I had to carry around and I ended up getting a phone with a good camera, so rather than carrying around the big camera and all the lenses and tripod, I just have my phone, a small tripod and a selfie stick, also have a longer selfie stick (3m) for using the 360 camera. So I have a small hip bag which it all fits in. And now it’s paying off with the way my back is, I wouldn’t be able to carry around all the other stuff, in fact it was lifting the bag off the floor onto the bed that caused one of the fractures in my back. I’m still holding onto the stuff atm as I would like to try some deep sky stuff from the back but I’m not going try that just yet.
On my walk yesterday I took a few 360 pics and was playing about with them yesterday, it’s nice that with the one 360 picture you can modify the shot to get dozens of other pictures and styles, it’s pretty nice.
The last couple of weeks my nose has been quite runny and I’ve been coughing a lot more, it was only on Friday that I realised that it was probably my hay fever coming back, my main concern was coughing too much and breaking a rib as that was something that happened last year as well. With the rain yesterday it seems to have settled a lot this morning but I do have this really annoying wheeze so I’m still coughing and not sleeping great and chest and stomach is sore with coughing. I also have aggravated a rib again and can’t lie on my side which isn’t helping with the sleeping either. Nothing really bad butt it’s there!
Well now off to the optometrist!Tuesday 22nd March 2022
One Small Step
Hi everyone, hope all is well. I’ve been leaving this a while as there hasn’t really been much going on and I’d end up just repeating myself over and over. It’s pretty much been the same as what I’ve been doing the last couple of months, killing time, but trying to be productive in one way or another and just hoping things start to feel better.
I can’t deny that things are improving, the aches pains are certainly not as bad as they were even last month but they are still there and the pain meds a still quite necessary and even extra pain meds which help with other problems I’m consistently having.
Nearly every morning and early evening I feel as if I’m coming down with something, glands in the neck just feeling bunged up, sinuses blocked and my eye just feeling a bit weird, mostly always on the right-hand side. There are also the joint pains with it too, no fevers and considering it’s been going on for months now, I think it’s just “normal”. Most days after some paracetamol it would settle, other days especially more recently it just seems to linger on.
The doctors don’t seem to be too concerned about it at all, although they are more concerned about reactions to the BMT rather than how I’m feeling and even the bone and heart problems. It has been a year now since I got out of hospital from the transplant and they are really pleased with how things are going and I recently had a PET scan. The PET scan showed that, and for the first time mentioned, that I am in remission, this wasn’t really a surprise and what was expected but was nice to finally actually hear it.
The scan also showed the multiple fractures in my back and the report mentioned broken ribs, I was never told anything about broken ribs before but some of the pains that I have/had would seem to be more from ribs than the back. The funny thing for me is that prior to last year I had only ever broken a couple of toes, and in the last year I’ve fractured my back 5 times and broken ribs, I didn’t even bother asking how many but I can judge that it’s at least 4 from different pains I’ve had.
Last time I was at hospital last week they took an extra load of blood tests to check how things are doing, I am officially a chimera which I think is pretty cool. Hopefully the results will all come back positive and then I may be able to stop the IVIG and that would mean I’d be able to get all my vaccines again, for the 3rd time.
I think I’ve come to accept that there is only so much I’ll be able to do, I’ll not be able to go on adventures the same as I did before and if I do go anywhere, it would just be for a mild stroll or sitting around observing. I had in a way been expecting this with the way I had been preparing the car, that I can open the boot and sit in there comfortably and even go for a nap if needs be.
Anyway, that’s the boring health stuff, now on to the exciting things that I’ve been doing…
Err well, I’ve really not done anything, I don’t have the confidence to go out for walks anywhere and I’ve just been trying to improve things on the treadmill until I do. I have an apprehension of leaving the house because I just don’t know how long I will be able to last before I get too sore and even more so of hurting myself more. But the thing is if I go for a walk to the shop or anything I really enjoy it, as simple as it may be.
I’ve been doing a lot of reading and since I started counting at the start of last year I’ve read over 120 books, I’ve been trying to read everything and anything and recently I’ve been reading a few sci-fi books again which I really enjoy, especially the Bobiverse books. With the nicer weather I’ve been able to sit out on the balcony reading in the mornings while the sun is shining on it, only issue is the breeze but I have a few ideas that might help with that, which may get sorted by the end of the week, need to see how I’m feeling though and whether I’d be able to do it on my own.
While I’ve been out reading, I’ve noticed there are a few crows that sit close by, so I’ve started to try and lure them down to not exactly sit beside me but be comfortable to come down while I’m there. I’ve left out bits of food and been able to get a few decent pictures of them, but they always wait until I’m away before they come down to nab it, so the next step is to only have the food there when I’m there and hopefully they might learn that and come down for a free meal while I’m there. We’ll see how that goes though, if it ever goes, cheaper than a pet and less responsibility.
The odd film and plenty of sport is also thrown in there, I’d like to do something more productive though and hopefully in the next few months I’ll be getting back to work so need to get a good seat that I’ll be comfortable sitting in for longer periods, I’ve been changing my sleeping schedule so that I’m getting up about 6.30/7 rather than 9 to make the most of the daylight and early morning and maybe make the most of the daylight before most of the world wakes up. It’s nice and quiet in the mornings too.
I had hoped to be back at work well before now, it just seems like one thing after another holding things back, but then realistically I probably have been optimistic with my timeframes and considering there still a lot of things going on. Just need to work on the pain management, concentration and staying awake for a few hours… I’ll get there though.
I suppose that’s everything for now, not particularly exciting as usual. Today’s plans include having a bit of a read and try and lure the crows down, will try the treadmill for a while, no doubt fall asleep after, a few quiz shows and that’s pretty much it, as I said… exciting.