Juxtaposing Rhinoplasty

There's a real problem with being back at work and then coming home and spending a few hours a night editing my 2005 tome on comic books. Bugger all else happens in my life to be worthy of blogging about. Even the majority of the last few entries have seemed like my life is becoming increasingly mundane.

I mean, I could give you a run down of yesterday.

• got up and had breakfast
• spent two hours editing
• two hours in the garden
• took dogs for a walk
• set fire to garden detritus
• had a bath
• had my dinner
• watched TV - Being Human and an Eddie Izzard live set
• did some more editing
• went to bed

Don't get me wrong; it wasn't a bad day. The sun shone, the garden doesn't look like a post modern interpretation of the Somme and Being Human was mad telly, as was Mr Izzard. But it wasn't like, you know, WOW!

That said, I did spend a bit of gossip time with Fishwife's wife - who is always good for chinwag with. We have a habit of being both bitchy about our neighbours and setting the world to right. We discussed Fuckwit's lack of brain; how to approach about getting him to remove his fucking leylandii, which block out the whole sun and cast a shadow over most gardens. She told me about the Oxford couple that live on her side; he's been unemployed for 6 months - nothing strange about that apart from two specifically fucked up things: firstly she doesn't want him to get a job in Northampton because he could earn more in Milton Keynes! Um, excuse me, but he's sitting at home watching daytime TV, surely any form of income is better than none, especially as he no longer gets contributions based JSA. The second point is even more bizarre. They still pay £6500 a year to have their child go to day nursery; um, excuse me, but he's still sitting at home watching daytime TV, as the child's father you'd think he was more than capable of looking after the brat during the day, would you not?

Still, at least, Fishwife's wife can still have a semi intelligent conversation with them. My relationship with Fuckwit hit new lows last Monday. Fortunately, I achieved two things from it.

I was cooking. It was early afternoon. I needed some coconut milk and I didn't have any, nor did I have any money. This meant that I had to go to the ATM and then to our local Asian shop. My car was stuck in its usual place and Fuckwit's cars were both on his drive. I hopped in the car, went to the ATM, got my tin of expensive coconut milk and was back home within 12 minutes. During that 12 minutes, Fuckwit had managed to take his poxy P reg Rover off the drive and park it where my car usually sits. This is in a street with barely no cars in it at that point, if you even had to give him the barest benefit of doubt. As you might imagine, this got me rather angry and after parking my car over the road, ostensibly in someone else's place, I walked to my front door and noticed he was standing on his car pad. I don't know what he was doing, but knowing this fat wanker it could have been anything from screaming at the moon to peeling layers of fat off his arse with a sharpened spoon. I was still very angry.

"Fucking wanker!" I said to him in a loud voice and slammed the front door. 30 seconds later; yes, THIRTY SECONDS!!! He got into his car and moved it back onto his drive! We have now had 7 consecutive days where he has not parked his car anywhere apart from on his drive, which suggests to me that he was doing it either on purpose or to wind people up. On calling him a 'fucking wanker' he must have realised that my patience had evaporated.

Last night while watching the TV he was barking again. I turned to the wife and said, "Is that him barking?" She nodded, we chuckled and carried on watching the telly...

***

I have reached the point in the editing of my book where I know that I have to be very, very careful. I'm at the point where my life became both heaven and hell, in equal measure. I remember when I first wrote this autobiography; I felt that I'd skimmed over parts and missed other bits out completely. Approaching it 5 years later, I feel as though I can objectively include things I forgot and clearly state the truth, even allowing for my own shortcomings. When I start to serialise it on my other blog, the parts I'm at now won't appear for a good while; this will probably give me more than enough time to decide whether or not a certain arsehole in my former life has grounds to sue me. Or I have to decide whether or not I'd like to risk being sued for telling the truth.

We'll have to see what happens, won't we?

***

I was officially put 'at risk' last week. That means that my job is effectively redundant and unless I'm lucky enough to get one of the redeployment positions I shall be officially redundant by the second week in May. It's a bit of a frightening concept, but I'm a realist. It's not like I can do much, if anything, to alter the fact.

One of the wonderful things about my job in the last 12 chaotic months has been the organisation's new CEO. Jon has been a real pleasure to work with and I told him so at the end of our 1-2-1 session, last week. I wasn't creeping; I wasn't trying to put myself in a better position than my colleagues, I was being honest. He's about the same age as me, is interested in football - to a degree, but considering his Irish roots is a huge cricket fan, so the half hour session turned into an hour and twenty minutes, of which a percentage was taken up discussing the England v Ireland World Cup cricket match. He was truly divided in his loyalties, but in the end opted for the country of his father's birth, because as he is a Norwich city supporter, you have to root for the underdog. He sent me an email the next day describing Ireland's win as 'awesome'! He was certainly right about that!

The meeting, which could easily have been an upsetting, ill tempered and fraught session was actually really easy going, relaxed and left me with even more respect for the man, who has an awful job to do at the moment. However, the odd thing about the meeting was it took place in his office, which is on the top floor of our buildings. I've not been off the ground floor since I returned to work 8 weeks ago. My disability has meant that my own office is on the ground floor and I rarely venture up more than 3 steps. However, since my meeting with the surgeon, Mr Basu, a couple of weeks ago, I seem to have rediscovered my health mojo. Yes, I've had a shocking cold virus that lasted a lot longer than I expected, but for the first time in a long time I'm mentally kicking the arse of my back and leg problems.

A lot of the problems I've had over the last few years have been exacerbated by my brain's inability to accept that, yes I'm getting older and yes, I'm suffering a bit more than other people my age. but, hey, thems the breaks. Life isn't particularly fair, so we make the most of a bad lot. Jon and I spent a while talking about the fact that he thinks I look better. he actually said, 'you're looking really good' and the truth is that while I wake up in the morning with aching limbs and a psychological fear of my 60s and 70s, I've been getting on with life, it's been positive and by crikey I do look good. He isn't the only person who has said that I'm looking healthy and better than I have for a while. Yes, I'd like to lose the extra weight I've piled on as a result of eating too many munchies; but the bottom line is bollocks to the aches and pains! I even do stairs again and the pain management routine I'm on - a mix of painkillers, physio, beer and sex is quite enjoyable... Heck, I'm even getting the feeling back in my left leg; my ankle is strengthening up and my dentist reckons my teeth are doing really well since I packed up smoking.

Accentuate the positives. Ignore the negatives. Bollocks to the aches and pains the next day - carpe diem, baby!