Good week, PS2 and new Mika song

My good week has continued :) I've been feeling less tired than usual and have had more energy, despite being as nocturnal as ever :P I've still been feeling tired at some points, but overall I've been feeling much better this week than I usually do and have been able to do more. Fingers crossed it lasts.

Yesterday my heels were the most painful they've ever been with the plantar fasciitis. Luckily they're not too bad today.

The Spasmonal tablets that I've been taking before meals since last Fri haven't helped my tummy pains and have given me indigestion a lot. So I stopped taking those yesterday after trying them for a week. I'll be starting Amitriptyline tonight, so hopefully that'll help.

I received a letter this week with an appt for my next clinic at Hosp A on June 7th. At this clinic the plan will be to complete my transition. I've drafted the email I need to send to S about how things currently work at Hosp B, but I've not sent it yet because I'm going to ask dad to read through it and see if he can think of anything to add. And I've emailed my GP, Dr I, to let him know that once my transition is complete my Tacrolimus wont be delivered by the health care company any more but instead I'll need to get it on prescription.

And the extra Tacrolimus that I needed because I was running short was delivered on Wed.

Yesterday would have been Jessica Wales' 21st birthday. I thought of her family and close friends a lot yesterday, I can't imagine how hard the day must have been for them. RIP Jess xxx

There's been some great news on Rachy since my last update. You can read about her progress and see photos here.

Earlier in the week I was given the link to a clip of Victoria Tremlett talking about organ donation on GMTV. You can see it here.

And the second Give And Let Live Photo book that I ordered from Holly C for mum arrived in the post this week.

Holly S' Battlefront programme was repeated on Channel 4 in the early hours of yesterday morning. We have it recorded on our hard disc recorder, but that is dying and I don't want to lose the programme when it does. So my friend Lizzy recorded it onto her hard disc recorder when it was repeated yesterday and is hoping to now burn it to a DVD (she's never done it before, but hopes she'll be able to) for us. It's really frustrating not being able to record things at the moment, I think if I can watch one more programme on the hard disc recorder then I'll try wiping and reformatting it to see if we can get it to work again. If not I'll try to persuade my parents that we need to buy a new one.

My Playstation 2 was due to be delivered yesterday but I wanted to go out. I knew that the parcel would need to be signed for so I asked Alf if he would stay in and sign for it for me. He agreed but I had to pay him £2 the night before, so I did. As it turned out the PS2 was delivered before we went out yest. I eagerly unpacked it but was disappointed to find that although I had the PS2, a memory card, 2 controllers and 10 games, I had no leads to connect the PS2 to my TV or to the mains power. I was worried that the seller was deliberately not going to sell me these so I emailed her to check. While I was waiting for a response Alf contacted a friend who said he had some spare leads I could have, but it might be a few days before he could get them to me. I just wanted to play with my new toy! Later that day I got a response to the email and discovered that the seller had just forgotten to include the leads in the parcel, so she put them in the post to me first class yesterday. I didn't want to have to wait much longer to play on my PS2, but luckily the leads arrived this morn. The PS2 is now set up and working :D I've only tried out one game so far (Sonic Heroes) but have more that I want to try.

10 games came with the PS2 - 2 of which I know I'll enjoy playing (Sonic Heroes and Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King) and 2 of which I might like playing (The Italian Job LA Heist and Splinter Cell). So that leaves 6-8 that I don't want (children's games, racing games and killing games). I'm waiting to hear if Chris and Sophie want to buy any of them off me because Sophie has a PS2. If not I'll check that they all work and then trade them in at a local game shop when I next go to town. I thought about trading them in at GAME but think I might get a better deal for them at a different game shop in the other local town.

As well as the 10 games that came with the PS2 I've also bought some more. I've had a look on the high street but the prices of the pre-owned PS1 and PS2 games vary greatly as does the quality of the discs. All of Cash Converters PS1 discs look too scratched to play but I did buy a PS2 game (Tony Hawk's Project 8) in there. It was £4 though, so a bit more expensive than I think I'm going to like to pay for games. GAME are selling used PS2 games for £5 so I've not bought any from there yet and wont unless I'm sure I'll like them. And when I went to a different town yesterday I bought a PS1 game (Who Wants to be a Millionaire) and PS2 game (SSX 3) in good condition from a charity shop for £1 each, bargain.

I've also bought a PS2 game (Need for Speed Most Wanted) for £2.70 on eBay which should be on it's way to me soon. And I bought a bundle of 2 PS2 games (Rayman Revolution and Rayman 3) plus a PS1 game (Rayman) for just £3.80 this morning but the seller's PayPal isn't working so I've got to try to pay them by postal order instead.

On Tue I only went out briefly to buy the Radio Times from the local shop. My dad has been on annual leave since Wed and he's off next week too. That's really been confusing me because he's usually only around at the weekends, so each day since Wed I've thought it's Sat! He seems to have been enjoying his annual leave so far - he went fishing on Wed, did loads of work in the garden on Thur and went out with me and mum yest. Next week he's looking forward to staying at the fishing resort where his sister and her partner rent a cabin for a few days.

On Wed I went into town while mum gave a talk at the library there about knitting because they're setting up their own knitting group like mum's Knit Lit at our village library. I successfully bought myself a new pair of slippers because my slipper boots were falling apart. When I'd finished my shopping I went for a drink in the library cafe and then surfed the Internet on one of the computers there til my mum had finished.

Then on Wed eve Claire came round for tea and we had fun playing on New Super Mario Bros Wii together. We didn't make any progress though. Later in the evening we went to the local cinema to see The Lovely Bones. I didn't really like it, it was very weird and quite sad. After that Claire came back briefly for a drink. Later that evening I caught up on my emails.

On Thur I had my 3rd Pathways to Work appt. I popped to the shops in town briefly before that. I used to have problems with Alfie helping himself to money from my purse, so I started to lock it away in a lockable box I had. I trust him more now though, so had stopped locking my money away. Dad suggested I restart now we know Alf is smoking again, but when I tried to put my money away I discovered that the lock on my box had broken. So I was looking out for a lockable cash tin in town but the cheapest I could find cost £9 and I thought that was too much. So my money isn't locked away at the moment. As well as the PS2 game from Cash Converters that I've already mentioned, I also bought a t-shirt from Sainsburys.

My Pathways to Work appt went well, my advisor was really pleased that I'd managed to phone the charity shops and was planning to start volunteering at Barnardo's. She suggested I phone them regularly to chase up the application form until I receive it. That appt only took 30mins as it was just updating my records on the computer. And we chatted about nails too because she was surprised to find someone else with long nails like her! Hopefully next month when I see her we'll be able to talk about how my volunteering is going.

Yesterday I went out with my parents. Firstly we headed to Tesco for a very quick shop and mum needed to return 2 items of clothing. They were both in the same bag yet she only remembered to return one! After that we headed to a town about 40mins away because mum had heard that there was a wool shop there. We all went in a few charity shops were we all got some good bargains. Dad bought himself a pair of jeans and as well as getting a PS1 and a PS2 game (mentioned earlier), I also bought a Victoria Wood DVD for my mum and a DVD of comedy clips for us all. The PS1 game, PS2 game and 2 DVDs all came to less than £4! While mum and dad went in the wool shop I went in Blockbuster, but didn't buy anything.

After that we headed to my uncle (dad's brother) and aunt's house. They were the 2 who celebrated their 45th wedding anniversary last month at a local restaurant. They've lived in their current house, about an hour's drive from us, for nearly 5 years now but we'd never visited them before yesterday. So because they live in the same direction as the town with the wool we went to see them. My uncle made us lunch. I'd planned to take sandwiches with me, but had left them at home. Whoops. The curry he made was nice, but a bit spicy for me so I couldn't eat as much as I would have liked to. We spent about 3 hours there in total which involved lots of chatting, trying to help my uncle sort his computer out (but both him and dad ignored my suggestions so that wasn't very successful!), admiring their knitted toilet roll covers (and sending a photo to Claire of course!), helping my aunt send some photos from her phone to their daughter, listening to some of my uncle's 100 year old records, walking round their land and seeing all their animals (2 cats, 4 geese, chickens...), talking about knitting (no surprise with my mum) and looking at their wedding photos from 45 years ago and laughing at the photos of my dad when he was 15. My uncle is the one who made my mum's giant knitting needles, so we took them with us so he could finish them off by gluing the ends in place. It was a nice but long afternoon so I fell asleep in the car on the way home :P

Today I'm home on my own, but I like it :) Alf stayed at a friend's last night, dad has gone out fishing and mum has gone to a knitting show in London with Claire and another of her friends. I phoned her when I got up this morning and she was on the train on the way there. She'd prebooked tickets for the 3 of them as that works out cheaper than buying on the door. But she'd left the tickets at home, so they'd have to buy new tickets once they got there. Whoops! My mum makes me laugh a lot. Last night when she got home from work she told me that she'd asked someone how old you have to be to join the Over Sixties Club, hehe! :P

Tomorrow morn I'm looking forward to browsing round the local carboot sale for bargain PS games and DVDs :D I'm also going to see if I can recognise the 2 stalls where I bought the wrong region DVDs last week and if so I'm going to ask if I can swap them. On Mon I might go into town to try to trade in my unwanted PS2 games and to chase Barnardo's up about the application form. That aft is Alf's parents' eve, so if I feel up to it I'm going to accompany my parents to that because I've not seen Alf's college before so that'll be interesting. On Tue eve I'm hoping to attend the teenage discussion group in the village.

Once again I've not done much reading this week but I did enjoy flicking through the latest issue of Cheers (AYME's bi-monthly magazine) which arrived in the post this week. I've also played on my DSi a bit more but am getting stuck on my current game, Yoshi's Island DS, now.

I discovered a few days ago that Mika sings the theme tune for a new film that is coming out soon called Kick Ass. The film, about Marvel Superheroes, doesn't interest me at all, but it's exciting that Mika sings the theme tune and that it will be released as a single. Some of Mika's singles don't get much publicity but hopefully this will because it's linked to a film and because it's produced by the famous music producer Red One (this song doesn't have the shout-out at the beginning though). You can see it here. I'm not that keen on the video because it's clips of the film interspersed with clips of Mika and I'd much prefer it all to be clips of Mika :P But I understand why they've done it that way. I like Mika with glasses, I think they suit him. I wasn't sure about the song to start with because it sounds much more computerised than his songs usually do, but it still has that distinctive Mika sound. After just one listen it was firmly stuck in my head, it's definitely catchy, and I've decided I like it :)

Since my last update I've watched a couple of films. I rewatched The Incredibles, but didn't enjoy it as much as I remembered I did last time. Hmmm. I also watched a Sandra Bullock film called The Net (and its extra features) which I rented. I loved it and would highly recommend it. It's got a very original plot, is quite a tense thriller and Sandra Bullock is as great as ever. In fact I then bought the DVD from eBay because I knew it was a film that I wanted to share with mum and would want to rewatch. I bought it for just £2. The DVD arrived this morning, just 2 days after I bought it, and is in perfect condition :) And today I found a trailer for Shrek Forever After on the Internet. You can see it here. I've loved all 3 Shrek films so far, but that trailer doesn't excite me. I'm sure I'll be seeing it in the cinema in 3D anyway when it's released this summer and hopefully it'll be as good as the other Shrek films, fingers crossed.

Since my last update I've also watched the first ever episode of Blackadder because I rented the DVD of the first series. I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would though, so I've not watched any more episodes and have returned the DVD.

I've not watched much on TV since my last update but do have loads to watch on iPlayer because the hard disc recorder isn't working, grrr. I've watched Sport Relief does Dragons' Den, One Born Every Minute and Sport Relief. I watched Sport Relief in the background while I was doing other stuff, but was waiting for interesting parts. There weren't many. James Corden's sketch as Smithy was the highlight of the programme for me, it was brilliant :D I was looking forward to seeing Annie Lennox perform but would much rather her perform one of her own songs than Bridge Over Troubled Water. And the Ashes to Ashes special didn't live up to my expectations either. They clearly didn't worry about the plot because it was all about spotting the 80s celebs in it. But of course I didn't recognise any of them, but did notice the poor plot. I was very excited to find out the other day that series 3 of Ashes to Ashes is starting on Friday April 2nd at 9pm. I can't wait! I'm a bit disappointed it will be shown on Fridays though as that will mean that mum wont be able to watch every other one live due to Knit Lit. So we need to have some kind of working hard disc recorder by then if not before.